without His death we could not have had the pardon of our sins nor the grace of the Holy Spirit nor the hope of immortality all which are things absolutely necessary to the devesting us of the old man and to the revesting us with the new Whereas now JESUS CHRIST dying on the Cross hath there pierced through and fastned up our old man and by the vertue of His sufferings created and formed in us another new man as different from the old as Heaven from the Earth and Life from Death Therefore the Apostle doth elsewhere conclude from the death of JESUS CHRIST the death of the old man in us and the life of the new 2. Cor. 5.15.17 If one died for all saith he then are all dead and He died for them that they might live henceforth in Him and no more unto themselves If any man be in CHRIST he is a new creature And in another place he saith expresly Rom. 6.6 11. that our old man was crucified with CHRIST that the body of sin might be destroyed and that we being dead with Him might live to GOD in Him Thus the death of CHRIST is at once the destruction of the old man and the production of the new the one was abolish'd by it and the other created This flesh of the mystical Lamb which GOD to day presents us hath slain our flesh and enlivened our spirit and from that Divine blood of His wherein the old man is drown'd is issu'd forth the new created in righteousness and holiness like as heretofore the Israelite was seen to come alive and glorious out of that very gulf of the Red-sea wherein the Egyptian lay sunk and overwhelm'd But oh new wonder as our LORD's flesh and blood is the principle that gives being to our new man so is it his nutriment And as in nature things are sustained by the same means that they were set up so in grace the new man is conserved and increased and strengthened by the same blood of JESUS CHRIST out of which he was formed And that heavenly meat and divine drink which you shall anon receive from the hand of GOD are not given you but for the feeding and perfecting of your new man I go yet further and durst say that this new man whom the Apostle would at this time vest you with is none other rightly considered than the same JESUS CHRIST whom we have put on at Baptism and whom we receive in the Supper propagated if I may so speak and pourtrayed in us by His own vertue who transformeth us into the likeness of His death and resurrection by reason that entring into and dwelling in us He formeth in us a man like Himself that as He did dyeth unto the flesh and with him leaveth in his sepulchre all his old life as an infirm and useless offal and being enlivened with Him and adorned with His light and endowed with an heavenly nature leads thenceforth a spiritual and glorious life Thus you see that the body of CHRIST was crucified and His blood shed and that the one and the other are given us in the Supper to devest us of the old man and vest us with the new This is the end and fruit of all that mysterie unto the participation whereof you are this day called Make account then that the best preparation you can bring unto it is a serious meditating of what the Apostle doth here inform us He exhorted the Colossians afore to mortifie the vices of their flesh and all the infamous passions of that Pagan life they had sometime led in the darkness of their ignorance as fornication covetousness anger evil speaking impurity of language and lying Now to cut up these and other like vices by the root and to comprise all the parts of sanctification in few words he commandeth us to put off the old man with his deeds c. There are others that take these words for a reason of his precedent exhortation drawn from that estate which JESUS CHRIST had put them into by Baptism as if his meaning were that they are obliged to renounce the vices he had been forbidding them since in their Baptism they did put off the old man on which these vices depend and of which they make up a part and put on the new which is contrary to them and incompatible with them Whether you understand it thus or take the text simply for a prosecution of the precedent command shewing us that for the due execution of it we must perform what is here added all amounteth to well-nigh the same sense And for the right comprehending of it we will treat if GOD permit of the three points which offer themselves in the Apostle's words first of the old man which we must put off secondly of the new which we must put on and the form it consisteth in to wit a renewing in knowledge after the image of Him who created it and in fine of that indifferency of nations and ceremonies and conditions which the Apostle affirmeth in this matter requiring nothing in reference to it but CHRIST who is the all of it and in all May it please GOD so to inlighten our understandings for the right discerning of this saving truth and touch our hearts to love and practise it effectually sanctifying us by the vertue of His word and precious Sacrament that we may all go out hence new men conformed in purity and charity and every vertue to that LORD JESUS in whose name and communion we by His grace do glory The Scripture sets before us the person of Adam and of JESUS CHRIST as two different stocks of mankind or as it were two opposite heads or principles of this nature which we call humane They have this in common that both the one and the other hath a great number of children which are issued from them and do depend upon them and that each of them doth communicate to his own his being his form his life and his condition imprinting his image on them which every of them beareth according to the quality of his extraction They differ or to say better are opposite in that the one is earthy the other heavenly the one hath a carnal vicious infirm nature full of ignorance and error and subject to death and the curse The other hath a spiritual holy nature full of light and wisdom acceptable unto GOD immortal and inheriting eternity The one propagateth in his children sin and death The other communicates to his righteousness sanctity and life The one transmits his nature by a carnal generation the other imparteth his to his descendents by a spiritual generation and such an one as hath nothing in common with flesh and blood The nature of the one is deprav'd by the empoisoned breath of the old Serpent which creepeth on the ground and liveth on the dust thereof That of the other hath been formed and conserved by the Eternal and coelestial Spirit It 's for these reasons that
put off the old man and put on the new it is evident that in this renovation of our nature we do not lose the very substance of it nor acquire another new one but only quit that unworthy and wretched form which sin gave it and assume another which resembles that of JESUS CHRIST I acknowledge that that old form which we put off had seized on and blasted and disfigured all the parts of our nature both internal and external as also that the new one which we receive in JESUS CHRIST doth extend its self likewise to them all in which respect the one and the other differeth from a garment which covers but the outside and reaches not further in yet they both are notwithstanding another thing than the Subject it self which is uncloth'd or cloath'd with them as an habit is another kind of thing than the body it covereth The one is at it were the rust as it were the poyson the malady the loathsomness and deformity of our nature The other is the beauty the health the perfection the ornament and honour of it and as it were the jewel that gives it all it hath of worth and value Neither let the terms of Old and new Man trouble you For they are often made use or in all languages to signifie the qualities and not the very essentials of our nature as when we say of a person who was once vicious and debauched but is now become honest and vertuous that he is another man a new Man though to speak properly he have the same substance the same soul and the same body he had before and hath quitted nothing of his former nature but the bad habitudes it was vested with not the substance of his Being Thus it is in regard of the Old and new Man The substance of the subject remains the same under the one and the other There is nothing changed but its formâ— and quality And it 's thus also that we are to understand what after the Prophets S. Peter hath said namely 2 Pet. 3.13 That at the last manifestation of the Son of GOD there shall be new Heavens and a new Earth For these creatures which now subsist shall not be annihilated On the contrary S Paul saith Rom. 8.20 That they shall have part in the deliverance of the sons of GOD but because they shall be purged from all vanity and put into an estate much more excellent than that wherein they now sigh and languish therefore they are called new Heavens and a new Earth As for what remains The Apostle injoyns us expresly both here and elsewhere to put off the old Man and to put on the New because in truth these are two different things even as to depart from evil and to do good It is very true that in the estate men are no one puts off the old Man but puts on the New and so on the contrary and again as true it is that the same Spirit of JESUS CHRIST which effecteth the one doth also effect the other even as the Sun by one and the same action dispelleth the darkness of our Air and diffuseth into it light yet this hinâ—ers not but that considering the matter simply and absolutely in its self the putting off of the old Man is one thing and the putting on of the New another For the corruption of the old Man is not a meer absence and privation of the sanctity of the New neither is vertue a meer privation of vice as darkness is nothing at all but a simple privation of light Otherwise it were to be said that the new man is every-where where the Old is not and so on the contrary as where there is no light darknes doth of necessity take place and so on the contrary But though these two actions of putting off the old Man and putting on the New be different in themselves yet are they inseparably joyned with one another and in the state we now are it is not possible that any person should devest himself of sin and of the misery of his old Man without vesting himself with the New because there is no other way of salvation but the Communion of CHRIST into which no one ever enters without putting on the new Man It 's in this that all our salvation consisteth But because those false Teachers which troubled the Church at that time did pretend to the prejudice of this Doctrine that Circumcision and divers other external things were necessary in Religion as if they were sufficient to save us without the new Man or at least the new Man were not sufficient to save us without them the Apostle doth reject this error of theirs here which he refuted afore and to this purpose in speaking of the new Man addeth Where there is neither Greek nor Jew neither circumcision nor uncircumcision neither Barbarian nor Scythian nor bond nor free but CHRIST is all and in all His meaning is not that among those whom JESUS CHRIST converteth to new men by vertue of his Gospel there are none that be by extraction Jews or Greeks Barbarians or Scythians and for condition bond or free circumcised or uncircumcised nor likewise that these differences are in themselves none or ought not to be considered at all either in nature or in the state and politick order On the contrary he himself will hereafter establish the difference of bond-men and free and command us to observe it in civil life But what he saith must be restrained and appropriated precisely to his intention and design without extending it any further He speaks of the new man and saith that no one of these differences doth take place in him He meaneth therefore simply that in this respect that is in what concerns the nature of the new man all these different qualities and conditions are no way considerable that as to it they have no force nor vertue that neither the nobleness of the Jew nor the advantage of circumcision nor the liberty of the free doth serve at all to bring us neer the new man and communicate him to us that the knowledge of the Greek and the rudeness of the Barbarian and the uncircumsion of the Gentile and the meanness of the slave doth not remove us further off from him That a man both may not participate of him with the first of these qualities and may with the last It 's the same thing that he saith else-where Gal. 6.15 even that in JESVS CHRIST neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature and again That in CHRIST 3.28 there is neither Jew nor Greek nor bond nor free nor male nor female because they are all one in JESVS CHRIST He excludes hereby first the pretended advantage of the Jew above the Greek For the Jews so foolishly presum'd upon their birth that they imagin'd it sufficient to render them acceptable unto GOD and they haughtily disdained the Greeks as accursed and abominable by
grant likewise that JESUS the Son of GOD is the true and single Author of this second Creation But to this I adjoyn two things first That though this passage might be understood of this Reformation of the World yet it would of necessity infer That JESUS to whom it is attributed is the true Eternal GOD. For since this work is no less nay since it is greater than that of Creation it is evident that none but a true GOD could be the Author of it It being clear as we shall say anon that Creation is set before us in Scripture as an Argument of true and eternal Divinity And the thing speaks of it self For since a Divine and Infinite Vertue is requisite to regenerate men and destroy the servitude of Sin and Satan it must of necessity be acknowledged That JESUS the Author of this great work hath an infinite power that is to say is truly GOD no finite subject being capable of an Infinite power and none being infinite but GOD alone Thus you see it is in vain that the Hereticks do toil them their own Interpretation though it were admitted necessarily inferring the thing which they oppose to wit That JESUS is true GOD Infinite and Eternal and subsisting before all ages But I say in the second place that this Text cannot be understood of the Reparation or second Creation of the World First because the Apostle will by and by speak of that in the three Verses immediately following where He loftily describeth it saying That JESVS CHRIST is the head of the body the Church the beginning and the first-born from the dead By whom the Father hath reconciled all things to Himself as well Celestial as Terrestrial having made peace by the blood of His cross By means hereof unless we will render S. Paul guilty of vain babling and useless repetition we must confess that as in this second place he speaks of the Reparation and Renovation of things so in the former he spake of their first Creation Secondly this same appears again from his reckoning the Angels expresly among the things created by JESUS CHRIST yea he insisteth on them more than on the rest as we shall see hereafter saying That by Him were created things in heaven Thrones Dominions Principalities and Powers But the Angels were not renewed nor repaired by JESUS CHRIST since that sin neither ruined their nature nor made it wax old nor subjected it to vanity It must therefore be concluded that the Apostle speaks here not of the reparation of things but of the first creation of them it being most certain that the Angels were created their nature though holy yet being not for all that eternal and without beginning I grant that by the Salvation which we have receiv'd from JESUS CHRIST the Angels have been re-united to us and settled again in peace and good intelligence with us from whom our sin had separated and estranged them and this is that the Apostle meaneth when he saith here beneath Col. 1.20 Epâ—hs 1.10 That GOD hath reconciled things in heaven and things in earth by the death of JESVS CHRIST and elswhere that He hath recapitulated or gathered together again in CHRIST both that which is in heaven and that which is on earth But this is not to be called a creating of the Angels nor can any example of such extravagant language be produced that creating of persons was put to signifie a reconciling them with those they hated and whose communion they avoided Otherwise since JESUS CHRIST reconciled us also with GOD the Father incorporating us into His family so as He is thereby become our Father and we His children in the same manner that we are brethren with the Angels it might to express this be also said That JESUS CHRIST created GOD the Father which no ear I say not Christian but that is ever so little rational could possibly endure Finally the contexture it self of the Apostles words doth evidently shew that they must be understood necessarily of the first and not of the second creation of things I confess the Holy GHOST sometimes useth the word Create 〈◊〉 signifie the Production of the second work of GOD that is the work of His grace in JESUS CHRIST But He never doth it without some addition and restriction that evidently limitteth the word to such a sense as for example Isa 65.17.18 when He saith in Isaiah that he is about to create new heavens and a new earth and that he is about to create Jerusalem to be a joy and her people gladness The very form of this language ordered in the Future Tense as you see and those New Heavens and that Jerusalem which He saith he is about to create do evidently shew that it is not of the first creation of the world He intended to speak So when the Apostle saith that GOD hath created them both that is the Jews and the Gentiles in Himself into one new man This latter word New leaveth no place for doubt but that he meaneth here the second Operation of God by which Jews and Gentiles were united into one onely people and not of the first whereby they were brought forth into their natural existence And likewise when he saith in the same place Eph. 2.15 26. that we are created in JESVS CHRIST unto good works which GOD hath prepared that we should walk in them The persons of whom he speaketh Vs that is the faithful distinquish'd from other men and the end of this work of GOD to wit good works these do sufficiently clear it that the Creation there meant is the second and not the first Nor can any reasonable man doubt of it In these places and others like them if there be any the word Create is still limitted and circumstantiated Otherwhere when it is used simply and absolutely it is not to be taken but for the first Creation as when Isaiah saith Isa 42.5 Rev. 4.11 that GOD hath created the Heavens and S. John in the Revelations that the LORD created all things and in a multitude of the like places Neither can there be brought so much as one to the contrary For as to that which the Adversaries alledge out of the Epistle to the Ephesians where they pretend that the Apostle's saying Ephes 3.9 GOD created all things by JESVS CHRIST must be expounded of the second and not the first Creation in this they do not prove but presuppose the thing in question nothing obliging us to depart in this place more than in the others from the common signification of the Word Forasmuch then as in this Text upon which we are this term Create is used simply and indefinitely without any limitation or restriction the Apostle saying and twice repeating that all things were created by the Son of GOD nay adding to shew the extent of this subject more fully both things which are in heaven and things which are in earth visible and invisible Thrones Dominions Principalities
Such was the sad and dismal estate of the world the end whereof could be nothing else but ruine and eternal perdition Therefore GOD to restore its primitive beauty yea to raise it to a perfection higher than that of its first original reconciled all things by His CHRIST both Terrestrial and Celestial He took away the wars the hatreds and the aversions that divided them and reduced them all into that union which they ought to have for His glory and their own good As to things on earth you know what was the enmity and the separatedness of the Jews and Gentiles whom the Law as a partition wall did bar off from the fellowship of the people of GOD. CHRIST laid this enterclose even with the ground and recalling the Gentiles associated and rea-allyed them with the Jews to make them thenceforth one only and the same people He did as much to the distinctions that separated the more Polite Nations from the Barbarous the Latines from the Greeks the East from the West the North from the South He removed all these marks and differences and united all Nations Sects and conditions into one only people into one only body namely His Church It 's thus that things on earth were reconciled As for things in heaven it was the good pleasure of the Father to reconcile them also by His Son For the Angels the true Citizens of heaven were our foes after sin whereas they are henceforth our Friends and our Allies united with us under JESUS CHRIST our common Head Aforetime they were armed against us with flaming sword now they fight for us and encamp about us They did drive us off from the entrance into Paradise Now themselves do bear our souls thither at their departure out of this life They take part in our interests they are sad at our disasters and rejoyce at our amendment And to testifie how delightful this Reconciliation is to them they saluted the birth of our Lord who came to make it with their songs and melodies For it they glorified GOD and blessed and congratulated men But as the mischief of our sin communicated it self to all the parts of the Universe even those that are without life putting them all in disorder and subjecting them unto vanity so I account that this blessed Reconciliation must be extended even to them also The will of GOD was to comprehend them also in it re-uniting the heavens with our earth and all the Elements with us For heaven which had nothing but Lightnings and Thunder for us and that would rather have been reduc'd to nothing than receive us into its courts is now liberal towards us of its comfortable light and openeth to us the most secret Sanctuaries of its glory Life is at accord with us Immortality is in good intelligence with our flesh the Grave is no longer our enemy the Elements shall be serviceable to our welfare they shall work no more against us And so you see how the will of GOD was to reconcile things on earth and things in heaven by His Son and reduce all the parts of the Universe unto good terms each with other This great work is begun the foundations of it are laid the pledges of it are given us But it will not be perfectly accomplished until the latter day when the world freed from the bondage under which it yet groaneth shall appear entirely changed its new heavens and its new earth and its new elements with the Angels and the Saints and all its other parts conspiring together in an eternal concord and an inviolable correspondence to the glory of their common Creator who shall then be all in all 1 Cor. â—â— as the Apostle elsewhere saith And it 's this in my opinion which he meaneth in this place when he saith That the Father would reconcile all things in Himself as the Original precisely runneth For these words signifie not the term but the end and event of this Reconciliation that is to say that it shall be made not with GOD as the greater part of Expositors have understood it but for the glory of GOD. For it is plain that heavenly things were not reconciled with GOD for they never were at odds with Him But it is no less evident that their Reconciliation with us in the sense we have explained it will redound to the glory of GOD when this whole Universe shall return entirely to its true and due union It 's this therefore the Apostle intendeth when he saith That it is the good pleasure of the Father to reconcile all things in Himself that is for Himself It remains now that we speak of the means which GOD made use of to bring this great work of the Reconciliation of the world to its end S. Paul shews it us when he addeth Having made peace by the blood of the cross of CHRIST The war that man had with GOD in consequence of his sin was as we said afore the true and only cause of the bad intelligence we were in with the Angels and the other parts of the World Whence it is clear that to make the latter cease there needed only an extinguishing of the former that is to reconcile us with the Creatures there needed only a recovering us to the favour of the Creator This is the means that the Father in His Soveraign Wisdom made use of And it 's this the Apostle meaneth when he saith That He made peace that is ours having pacified His own Justice and quenched all the burning of His wrath against us 'T is by the Sacrifice that JESUS CHRIST offer'd on His Cross that this miraculous change was wrought This precious blood contented the Justice of the Father and the odour of this Divine Burnt-offering sweetned His Spirit and of severe and inexorable as He was rendred Him propitious and favourable to us Instead of fulminating His avenges He tenders us the arms of His love and no man is so wretched but He is ready to receive him provided he accept the promise of His mercy with an humble faith It is not long since that upon one of the Texts foregoing we treated of the reality the worthiness and necessity of this Satisfaction by which the Lord JESUS made our peace with the Father through the shedding out of his blood on the Cross and the voluntary suffering there for us and in our room the curse which our sins deserved Therefore we will dispense with our selves for speaking more of it at this time and to conclude the Exercise will content our selves with the noting briefly upon each of the three Points explained the principal heads of Consolation and Edification which they contain And here dear Brethren which shall we most admire the goodness of the Father and the will He had to raise us up from our fall and to reconcile us with the whole Creation whose hatred and aversion we had incurred or His unspeakable wisdom in the ordering of this great work and in the means he
so dwelleth in the humanity of JESUS CHRIST that the same one who is man is also truly GOD these two natures being so strictly united that they are but one only and the same person by means whereof it may be rightly said that if the Word of the Father be almighty and eternal as indeed it is omnipotency and eternity and infiniteness are in JESUS CHRIST for He is truly the Word of the Father but it cannot be inferred that S. Peter for example or S. Paul had in them an infinite power or wisdom because GOD dwelled in them for that GOD dwelt not personally in them that is so as each of them was GOD but only by the grace of His Spirit Finally I add in the second place that all this dispute is beside the Apostle's scope whose meaning they have misapprehended For his intention here is not to speak of what JESUS CHRIST knoweth What would this conduce to the end he hath proposed to Himself namely the confirming of us in the Gospel and the fortifying of us against those traditions and speculations which false teachers would add to it that we might reject them and content our selves with this JESUS CHRIST whom the Father presenteth to us in His word Who sees not that the Knowledg which our LORD hath of things that He knoweth in Himself is altogether extraneous to this purpose For the thing in question is what we must know to serve GOD aright and be saved in the sequel But JESUS CHRIST revealeth not unto us in the Gospel all that He knoweth either as GOD or as man And so from His knowing all things it followeth not that it is enough for us to embrace His Gospel For will the false Teachers say though He know all for His own part yet He hath not discover'd in the Gospel which His Apostles do preach unto us all that is necessary for us to believe or to practise What then you will say is the true sense of these words Dear Brethren it is not hard to discern if you afford ever so little attention to the thing The Apostle considers the LORD JESUS here not simply and absolutely but so as He is set forth and revealed to us in His Gospel as far as He is the subject of the Apostle's preaching and the object of our faith It 's in this respect he saith that all the treasures of wisdom and knowledg are hid in Him thereby signifying that this CHRIST who is present to us in the Gospel is an object so rich and so divine as He containeth all the matter of wisdom in Him that all the verities whereof it is composed are found fully and abundantly in Him so as for the having of true wisdom there is no need of studying any thing but CHRIST alone we need but know Him and shall be ignorant of nothing As if I should say that the treasures of wisdom or natural science are hid in the world my meaning would be not that the world knoweth the things and verities which appertain unto this science but that it doth contain them that it is a theatre whereon they are exposed to our view and an object by the contemplation whereof we may acquire and learn them And as if I should say that Man is the treasury of all the knowledg of living Creatures I should understand thereby not what man knoweth of them but what he exhibiteth of it being as an exact model and patern of all that the nature of living Creatures comprehends so as by careful studying and meditating him all that may be known of them may be drawn forth In this very manner the Apostle saying that in Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledg doth shew us what is the knowledg not that CHRIST hath in Himself but which He can give to us not what He knoweth but what He maketh us to know He being as it were an abyss of wonders wherein are found all the riches of that heavenly truth in the knowledg whereof true wisdom consisteth From whence the inference he aims to make upon it doth clearly flow namely that we ought to shut our ear against any other doctrine how plausible and probable soever it be For since JESUS CHRIST is the Magazin and the treasury of all wisdom in whom is found all that we ought to know not only for necessity but even unto plenty who seeth not but that it is an extream folly for men to turn themselves another way or trouble their heads about the study of any other object And so this wisdom and this knowledg of which the Apostle speaks is not that cognisance which the LORD hath of the things He knoweth either as GOD or as Man but it is that knowledg of Divine things which we have need of for our attaining to Salvation and in the having whereof the true perfection of our nature doth consist And when he saith that the treasures of this wisdom are hid in Him his meaning is not that these Divine things are known unto our LORD such a conception would be frigid and impertinent but that they are all displayed and set forth in Him that they dwell in Him that they are found there that they are enclosed and to be seen in Him through the veil of the infirmity of His Cross which in a manner hideth and overspreads them This is in my opinion the true and genuine sense of the Apostle's expression Let us now examine each of the terms of it which are all of them wondrous elegant and rich and afterwards consider the truth of them First he calleth this wisdom and knowledg which is in JESUS CHRIST Treasures to intimate both the Excellency and the Abundance of them the word Treasure importing both the one and the other For as you know we properly call such a collection a treasure as is of things not worthless and of no value as dust or chass but precious and exquisite as gold and silver and precious stones and jewels But besides worth this term signifieth abundance also For you will not say that that man hath a treasure who hath but two or three pieces of gold or silver or a diamond or four or five Emeralds To have a treasure is to have a great and a considerable mass of rare and precious things And hereby the Verities which JESUS CHRIST exhibits and affords us the knowledg of are distinguished from those which are found otherwhere Perhaps a good number of knowledges will be found otherwhere but they are unprofitable and of no value They do not make a treasure This worthy title appertaineth only to things rare and precious But the Verities which JESUS CHRIST teacheth those that study Him are so many pearls of inestimable price they are divine jewels such as neither the barbarous Sea coasts nor the Mines of the new World do yield such as neither the Heavens nor the Earth nor any of the store-houses of Nature can furnish us with But abundance also is
absurd and ridiculous The spirits in prison 1 Pet. 3 20. of whom S. Peter speaks cannot upon any better ground be taken for the souls of the faithful detâ—ined in Limbus since those spirits were sometimes rebellious or disobedient in the time of Noah and perished in their sin which cannot be said of the Patriarchs and the Faithful In fine the Apostle's saying that the way into the holy places was not manifested while the first Tabernacle was standing signifies indeed that the High-Priest of the Church our LORD JESUS CHRIST did not carry not introduce our nature into Heaven in soul and body nor discover and make manifest the way to our Mansion of Immortality until the veil of the first Tabernacle was rent which is very true But thence it follows not that the spirits of the faithful consecrated before our Saviour's coming did not feel the fruit of his death and much less that they were detain'd in Hell But besides that this Tradition hath no foundation in the Scripture it doth plainly cross the same For our LORD promised the good Thief Luke 23.43 that the very day he was crucified he should be with him in Paradice where yet according to our Adversaries supposition he should not have entred till the forty-third day after And the Parable of that bad rich man doth plainly shew us that at that time as the souls of impenitent sinners were cast into the torments of Hell-fire so the spirits of the faithful were carried up into the repose and felicity of Paradice For that bosome of Abraham wherein Lazarus rested Luke 16.22 25 26. was not a pit without water as the pretended Limbus is counted to have been but a place of refreshment and consolation not situate in the vicinity of Hell but severed from it by a great gulf set between them And in truth since the faithful did even then drink of the Mystical Rock as well as we were sprinkled with his blood did partake of his sufferings why would any one imagine that our Saviour's Sacrifice had less virtue to introduce them into Heaven after their death than it had to justifie and sanctifie and comfort them in the days of their life As they bore a part with us in the same faith and conflicts on the earth so had they share of our repose and joy in Heaven neither is there any reason for our being admitted if you will needs have them excluded Accordingly certain it is that those elder Christian Writers who did barr the souls of the faithful that deceased under the Old Testament out of Heaven did as well deny reception there to the souls of Christians not assenting that either the one or the other were admitted till after the resurrection so as our Adversaries rejecting as they have reason to do the one half of this error and confessing that Christian souls sufficiently purged are received into Heaven it is nothing but pure obstinacy in them to retain the other half thereof and pretend that the condition of the faithful departed under the Old Testament was otherwise than under the New Be it then concluded that all this pretended deliverance of souls brought out of Limbus is but the fiction of an human spirit not only beside but even against Scripture and Reason But I add in the second place that though it were as certain as it is dubious and as true as it is false yet it would not be possible to refer this passage of the Apostles unto it First The spirits of the faithful departed this life are not at all in the power of Satan but in the hands of GOD to whom they recommend them at their death so as though JESUS CHRIST had brought them out of Limbus yet it could not be said that he had therein spoiled the Devils since that to spoil them is to take from them what they were possess'd of and its clear that though the souls of the faithful had been in this imaginary Limbus yet they would have been there out of the Devil's possession Secondly The word here used which the French hath translated mener en montre that is lead about for a shew is always taken in an ill sense for a shameful and ignominious shew such as that of Malefactors is when they are led through the City and publickly executed that the sight of their shame and punishment may keep men in their duty Now if our LORD had delivered the souls of the faithful out of such a Limbus it could not be said that he had made a shew of them in this sense it being evident that in this case they would have accompanied his Triumph by way of honour and that it would not have been any ignominy but a glory for them to have followed his victorious Chariot Moreover the Apostle's words are so placed in the Original that the spoiling and making a shew of and triumphing over which he speaks of do necessarily respect the same persons that is those whom he spoiled are the same he made shew of and triumph'd over Now he spoiled not the spirits of the Fathers he on the contrary did enrich them sure then it is not them he made a shew of neither can the action which the verb importeth be referr'd to them without depraving the Apostle's whole Context This is all spoken of one and the same subject to wit those Powers and Principalities that is the Devils as we have demonstrated and as all do accord They are the Devils whom JESUS spoiled It is the same that he publickly made a shew of and it 's they again whom he triumphed over As for the Latin Interpreter his saying Zanchy the LORD triumphed of them in himself I acknowledg that divers Greek Copies do read the Text in that manner and some of our Writers have so expounded it conceiving that our Saviour upon his crucifixion did bring the Devils whom he had overcome out of their Hells and shew them to the Angels and the Spirits made perfect bound and chained up as a glorious token of the victory he had gotten over them and they add that this triumph did continue too until his ascension into Heaven But the Scripture telling us nothing of this matter I think it dangerous to affirm the same it being better and more safe to keep to that which GOD hath revealed in his word than to take liberty to follow our own imaginations how plausible soever they appear And the reason which seems to have moved those men to advance this conjecture is exceeding slender For they have been induc'd to do it only by conceiving it absurd to say that JESUS CHRIST triumphed over his Enemies on the Cross seeing that to speak properly he overcame them on the Cross but it seems he triumphed only at his resurrection and ascension But first though there were in this some inconvenience yet nothing would enforce us to assert what they propose It would be sufficient for the avoiding thereof to say that our Saviour
old man are left sound and whole to stretch out the one upon the ground and lye in ashes while the others are in pleasure It is not by an hair-cloth nor a whip that vices are subdued These things incommodate the body but do not sure amend the soul They humble the out-side they hurt not within But leave the old man there at full liberty with his thoughts and lusts And it is not without reason the Apostle advertiseth us else-where that bodily exercise profits little 1 Tim. 4.8 Experience hath justified his words the lives of those that addict themselves to such exercises being no better yea sometimes worse than the lives of others And it is not long ago The Jesuit Tetavius l. 5 c. 3. de la penit publique since Truth drew this confession from the penn of one of our greatest adversaries that such exercises do many times much hurt even mens spiritual advancement because of a secret opinionativeness and pride which they beget and feed in some spirits who become arrogant and haughty upon them and take occasion from them to contemn those that lead a more moderated life The Apostle therefore would have us instead of these childish and poorly profitable exercises to lay our our labour upon the mortifying of the members of the old man that is our 〈◊〉 And it is to the same intention of his that I referr what he addeth namely that these members are upon the heart which is a thing excellently noted what way soever you consider it For first these vices are all upon the earth if you respect either their rise or their business or lastly their end and desires It 's clear they all spring up out of the earth from admiration and coveting of earthly things they all creep on the earth in its excrements or in its fruits and rise no higher than its fumes and vapours wretchedly cleaveing to these sordid vanities which they feel to fleet away and perish between their hands while they gripe them and are enjoying them Where is covetousness Where is luxury Where is gluttony and ambition What seek they for What desire they For what do they toil themselves Sure you plainly see that the earth is their only element that the metal which the one desires and the flesh which the other longeth for and the messes that the third breaths after and the vanities that are the passion of the latter I say you plainly see that all this is but earth or fruits and productions of the earth They are then to say true these members of the old man that fasten us to the earth and not the members of this body it is sin and not simply this flesh For as to our body it needs but a little for its conversation during that little time we pass here below whereas the desires of vice are infinite Whence it follows according to the Apostle's conception that it is vice we are to mortifie and not the body the members of the old man and not those of the body Then again if you consider the place destinated to be the abode of the one and the other nature you will further see that the members of the old man that is vices are not but upon the earth It 's there they make their spoyl and exercise all their tyranny there they live there they dye there they rot unprofitably consuming themselves in their own wretched filthinesse They have no place in Heaven where enters nothing but what is pure where perfect sanctity liveth and reigneth eternally crowned with immortal glory But the members of our bodies which superstition fastens ou◠and ridiculously afflicts though they also be for present on the earth and have need of its elements yet they shall not remain there alwaies They shall be one day lifted up into the Heavens and enter into the Sanctuary of GOD and live on His manna and partake of the fruits of the coelestial tree of life Knowing now the meaning of this exhortation of the Apostle's you may easily of your selves without my saying any thing of it comprehend the connexion it hath with the precedent words which imported that we are dead and that our life is hid with CHRIST in GOD and that we shall one day appear with Him in glory For since we be dead to the world and called to the hope and the fruition of an heavenly life which is hidden on high in JESUS CHRIST and shall be one day manifested and given to each one of us who sees not that all this doth most strictly oblige us to draw off all our affections from the earth and to cut all the ties that fasten us unto it that is to mortifie our members which are on the earth all the vices that engage us and ensnare us in the things of the earth It remaineth that we consider the vices or members of the old man which the Apostle does particularly name and expresly injoyn us to mortifie He nameth five in all fornication uncleanness inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousness I conceive that the four first are related to one and the same head and be but divers branches of one and the same stock to wit luxury or sensuality Fornication is the principal species of them the disorders whereof are so evident and so well known that no one can be ignorant of the nature of it Uncleannesse comprehendeth all the other ordures and pollutions that are contrary to the chastity and honesty of our bodies as incests violations and those other abominable furies of carnal passions which transgress even the laws of nature as corrupt as it is The word which we have translated inordinate appetite doth signifie literally perturbation or passion in the original tongue But it is frequently used to express the passion of lubrieity and the filthy disposition of a voluptuous and esseminate heart that easily receives the impression of all lascivious objects and abandons its self to these kind of pleasures and runs out and pours forth its self in a sort entirely to them Evil concupiscence which the Apostle addeth in the fourth place is the source or the root of all the vices of this sort For though concupiscence be often taken in general for all irregular appetites and desires whatever the objects are to which they are unduly carried yet it sometimes signifies those in particular which respect the pleasures of the flesh and we often use the word concupiscence in this sense in our vulgar language Nevertheless I grant that in this place it may be taken in a larger extent as importing inordinate coveting either of pleasures or of profits and riches because the Apostle speaks here of covetousness also and not of sensuality alone He calls this concupiscence evil to distinguish it from that which keeping within its just bounds desireth things lawful in a due manner and measure The last of the vices here touched by the Apostle is Covetousnesse a vice no less known than the fore-going Only
us from holynesse and from sin as we shall be addicted to the one or the other He represents to us on one hand the happinesse to which the Saints are advanced who obey His will and on the other hand the dreadful torments into which vice doth assuredly precipitate all the wicked And though His Spirit doth in part cure this ignorance and this sordid disposition in as many as He doth regenerate yet while we are on earth there do abide some reliques of them in us Whence it comes that He forbears not to use this method even with the faithful themselves You have a notable instance of it in this lesson of the Apostle upon which we now are For having exhorted us to mortifie our members which are upon the earth that is to renounce the defilements of luxury and avarice for the inclining of us to so just a duty he represents unto us in this Text the judgements of GOD upon the obstinate slaves of these vices They are things saith he for which the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion For he compriseth in these few words the fearful and inevitable but just judgement of Heaven upon all those who despising its goodnesse do abandon themselves to the one or the other of these vices And then in the following verse he sets afresh before our eyes for the same purpose the miserablenesse of our fore-pass'd life which even as the life of children of rebellion was e're-while sunk in the turpitude of these same sins and withal the infinite kindness GOD hath done us in drawing us out thence in which things saith he ye also walked sometimes when ye lived in them This he doth to the end that being seized with a just horrour at our former state and ravish'd in the sense of our present happiness we might heartily renounce the service of our former masters and live henceforth in that purity honesty and charity which this new LORD calleth us unto who hath vouchsafed to take us to Himself and to shed into us a new life and nature as distant from our former one as Heaven is from the earth Now as these are the two reasons that St. Paul urgeth for the withdrawing of us from those two principal vices of the prophane so shall they be by the will of GOD the two parts of this action In the first we will consider the judgements of GOD upon obstinate adulterers and covetous persons and in the second the misery of our former state when we lived in the same vices and could expect nothing in the sequel but the same effects of the wrath of GOD upon us The LORD JESUS please so to accompany our words with the vertue of His blessing that such as the loathsomness the injustice and horror its self of these vices hath not been yet able to withdraw from them may now at least be pluck'd from them by the fear and terror of those dreadful judgements of Heaven which are unavoidably prepared for all the children of rebellion The first part is expressed in these words that the wrath of GOD cometh for these things upon the children of rebellion I will not stand to tell you that to speak properly wrath hath no place in the Divine nature For who is there of you but knoweth that GOD is a Spirit most pure most simple and most blessed enjoying an infinite calm and tranquility whose knowledge can never be surprised nor felicity disturbed as we learn both from Scripture and from reason it self Now wrath and such other passions do consist in the agitation and emotion of the blood and of the spirits that stir it they being caused in us by our imagination diversly as the objects which it doth conceive are troublesome or contentful present or to come the one producing in us sorrow others joy some fear and others hope those of one sort wrath those of another contentment or complacency None of this as you see can arrive but where there is some mixture of humors and spirits which being not in GOD at all whose essence is most simple it is also impossible that any of these passions should take place in Him and least of all wrath which is one of the most troubled and most boyling of them But the Scripture which useth the dialect of children with us as with children doth often attribute these passions unto GOD figuratively to represent thus grosly the mysteries of Him under the images of those things that are familiar with us because they belong properly to our nature It 's thus we must understand that which it calls the wrath of GOD. For it signifieth by this term not the perturbation of a commoved Spirit which cannot be in GOD because of the soveraign perfection of His nature but a just and reasonable will to punish the person that deserves it This it termeth wrath by reason of some resemblance that appears to be between these two things For a man who is in wrath doth eagerly desire to avenge himself upon the person that troubles him and he doth it if it be in his power causing him displeasure and afflicting him So doth GOD treat those who violate his laws He makes them suffer evil and punisheth or chastiseth them according to their deserts But He doth it without any perturbation with a calm and composed will whereas a man in wrath doth it with emotion And because we are seldome wont to do otherwise there being few that avenge themselves without some trouble and boyling of choler it seems to us that it is so with the LORD too Wherefore we say He is angry when He avengeth His laws and punisheth the crimes of His creatures though at the bottom and in very deed there be nothing in His action but the purpose and effect of an avengement and not the disturbance of any passion Thence it comes that the Scripture also speaketh in like manner frequently attributing wrath in this sense unto GOD. And if you narrowly heed it you will find that it gives this name either to the will that GOD hath to punish men the arrest and order He passeth for it or to the effects themselves that follow thereupon that is the punishments He makes culpable persons suffer by His order And it 's in this second sense the Apostle intends it here when He saith that the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion The wrath that is the avenges of GOD His judgements the evils and executions wherewith He punisheth their rebellion according to the decrees of His avenging justice He speaks in the same manner else-where when he saith that the wrath of GOD is openly reâ—ealed from Heaven Rom. 1.18 upon all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men for that they with hold the truth in unrighteousness His saying that the wrath of GOD cometh some referr unto the judgements which He doth not seldome execute upon the voluptuous and covetous in this World as if he had said that for these vices GOD
wherein he represents to us some of the principal uses we ought to make of it Ye teaching saith he and admonishing one another in Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs singing from your heart unto the LORD All the terms he useth in the first part are worthy of not a little consideration First his calling the Word of GOD which was deliver'd by the Prophets and Apostles and is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament the Word of CHRIST The Word of CHRIST both because He is the subject and the end of it as also for that He is the Author of it who inspir'd it by His Spirit into His servants in the same manner as the Apostle elsewhere termeth all the afflictions of the new and of the ancient Church Hebr. 11. even to those which Moses and the Israelites suffered in Egypt the afflictions and reproach of CHRIST because CHRIST is both the cause for which the faithful are afflicted and also the Director of their afflictions who sends 'em them and governs them by His Providence Whence it clearly follows that He is GOD since all Scripture is by inspiration of GOD and that He did subsist in the time of the Patriarchs and of all the ancient Church against the impiety of those Hereticks who deny the Divinity of our LORD and pretend that He had no subsistence in Nature until He was born of the Blessed Virgin Further in the next place we are to weigh in what manner the Apostle recommends unto us the study of this Word He saith not Let it be among you let it be read let it be known of you but using a term of much more force and efficacy than all that amounts unto he willeth that this Word of CHRIST do dwell in us Dwelling you know is properly affirmed of men and doth import their making their abode in this or that place their living and being ordinarily and almost alwayes there R. Moses Ben. Maim in More Nevo Chim l. 1. c. 25. Hence it comes as the the Learnedst of the Jewish Doctors hath well observ'd that the Scripture useth this word figuratively to signifie the constant and setled abiding of one thing in another though the thing which is said to dwell in the other be not animate and that other which it is said to dwell in be not properly a place or a space that containeth it As when Job execrating the day of his birth wisheth among other things that clouds may dwell upon it meaning that that day be continually covered with clouds that it never be without that sable and sad veil and as he explains himself that darkness and the shadow of death do for ever pollute it Though to speak properly it cannot be said that clouds which are inanimate things do dwell any where and much less dwell in a day or upon a day which is not a place or comprehensive space but a part of time And it is also in this figurative way that we must take all those passages of Scripture in which GOD His dwelling somewhere is spoken of as when He protesteth in Exodus and elsewhere often Exod. 29.45 Lev. 26.12 1 Cor. 6.16 that He will dwell in the midst of the Children of Israel a particular which the Apostle applyeth also to the Church of the New Testament the meaning is that His Majesty and His Providence should alwayes be with the faithful and never forsake them though to speak properly the LORD who is an infinite Essence and filleth Heaven and Earth without being enclos'd by them dwelleth no where It 's in this figurative sense that the Apostle here doth use the word dwell and verily with much grace and emphasis when He saith Let the Word of CHRIST dwell in you His intention is that it be constantly and setledly in you that it be an inmate with your hearts and lips that it never leave them And as our Souls dwell in our Bodies to quicken them and to govern all their motions in like manner that this Divine Word be the soul of your hearts abiding day and night there to conduct and regulate all your actions that it be as well known and as familiar to you as the persons that dwell at your house and pass their whole time with you But the Apostle not content with so vivid an expression addeth yet another term to signifie more fully how studiously we ought to fill all the faculties of our Souls with this Word of the LORD Let it dwell in you saith he richly that is abundantly and as the French Bibles have it plentiously in such sort as there may be neither any part of its mysteries which is not found in you its promises its commands its assertions its prophecies its instructions being all entertained and not one of them excluded nor any part of your selves but this Divine gâ—est is admitted to lodge and abide in your understandings memories wills affections deportments that it appear in your whole life and shine forth there in such a manner as every one may perceive it It 's also hereunto that the last words which he addeth in all Wisdom do refer wherein he shews us the end and the immediate effect of this dwelling of the Word of GOD in us namely the rendring us wise unto salvation and the giving us all the wisdom that 's necessary to glorifie GOD and obtain eternal happiness He would have it dwell so abundantly in us that we might derive from it all the knowledge it gives both of the things we should believe and of things we should do to be sav'd For it 's this he usually meaneth by that Wisdom which he recommendeth unto us And because this knowledge hath many parts of which some are useless without the rest thence it comes that he saith not simply let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in Wisdom but in all Wisdom to shew us that it is not enough to study some part of this Heavenly knowledge This it may be might have been sufficient for men under the Old Testament who were but in a minority a Christian being come to mature and full age ought to know all the will of GOD all His counsel and all that admirable Wisdome which He hath revealed to us by His Son and unfolded in His Scriptures Thus you see Dear Brethren what the meaning is of this precept of the Apostle In it now we have a great many things to observe And first his procedure in that having begun discourse of our Sanctification and not inclining to enlarge upon it further for the present he remits the faithful for learning the rest not to the voice of the Church but to the Word of CHRIST an evident sign that it 's not the Church as those of Rome pretend but Divine Scripture which is supream directress of the faithful It is true that Pastors are serviceable unto their instruction but it is as Ministers only and not as Masters nor do they Minister of
His last breath with a spirit clear and a soul calm speaking to us of His approaching happiness and of the present grace of His LORD with so much efficacy as it stopped Your tears and in such manner forced the resentments of your grief that how just soever they were You had nevertheless a secret shame to make them appear in the presence and on the occasion of so vertuous a person as if Laments and Plaints should have in some sort offended His piety and dishonored the victory of his faith The same GOD that loosed Him so miraculously from earth to raise him up to heaven granted You to support the affection of His departure with a patience worthy Your vocation After so rude a blow He hath yet sustained You and conducted You to an honourable old age that few persons do attain And now I doubt not but Your principal consolation and the agitations of the present world and the infirmities of this age is the assured hope you have of arriving also one day at the port of that blessed immortality where contrary to the ordinary course of nature You have seen this dear Son enter before You. If in the holy exercises of Piety by which You daily prepare You for it the reading of these Sermons may find place and be of any use for Your consolation I shall therein have extream satisfaction at least I can well assure You it is one of my most ardent desires who pray GOD to preserve you with all your Family in perfect prosperity and remain inviolably From Paris April 1. 1648. SIR Your most humble and most obedient Servant DAILLE Imprimatur Tho. Tomkins Ex. AEd. Lambeth May 15. 1671. SERMONS ON THE FIRST CHAPTER OF THE EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS THE FIRST SERMON On the I II III IV V. VERSES Verse I. Paul an Apostle of JESVS CHRIST by the Will of GOD and the Brother Timothy II. To the Saints and faithful Brethren in CHRIST which are at Colosse Grace be unto you and Peace from GOD our Father and from the LORD JESVS CHRIST III. We give thanks for you unto GOD who is the Father of our LORD JESVS CHRIST praying alway for you IV. Having heard speak of your faith in JESVS CHRIST and of the love you have to all the Saints V. For the hope which is reserved in Heaven for you whereof you have heretofore heard by the Word of Truth to wit the Gospel THE Apostle St. Paul's Assertion is verified in the afflictions of the faithful by constant experience Rom. 8.27 and they ever work together for good to them that love GOD. Beside the excellent fruit which the afflicted themselves receive from them such as they sooner or later acknowledge with the Psalmist That it was good for them to have been afflicted Psal 119.71 they are also serviceable to the edification of others For as Roses the fairest and sweetest of Flowers do grow on a rough and thorny stock so from the afflictions of the faithful rugged and piercing to the flesh spring forth examples of their Vertue and instances of their Piety sweetest and most salubrious productions See what a rich store of benefits the tryals of Job and of David have yielded us It 's to them we owe that admirable Book of the Patience of the former and a good part of the Divine Hymns of the latter Had it not been for their afflictions we should not now enjoy after so many Ages that inestimable treasure of Instructions and Consolations What shall I say of the sufferings of St. Paul which did spead the Gospel all abroad and convert the world unto knowledge of the true GOD. His imprisonment at Rome alone under the Empire of Nero hath done the Church more good than the peace and prosperity of all the rest of the faithful that then were It gave reputation to the Gospel and made it gloriously enter into the stateliest Court in the world It inspired an heroick courage into Preachers of the truth It awakened the curiosity of some and inflamed the charity of others and filled all that great City with the Name and Odor of JESUS CHRIST Nor was it of use unto the Romans only It imparted its celestial fruit unto the remotest Regions and Generations For it was in this very confinement that this holy man wrote several of his Divine Epistles which we read with so much edification to this day as those to Philemon to Timothy to the Ephesians and that directed to the Philippians the Exposition whereof we last finished and the following to the Colossians which we have chosen to explain henceforth unto you if GOD permit Paul's Prison was a common receptacle whence have issued out those living Springs which water and rejoyce the City of GOD and will furnish it even to the end of the world with the streams it needs for its refreshment Having then already drawn from the one of these sweet Springs that Divine Liquor wherewith we have endeavoured according to the Ministry committed to us of GOD to irrorate the heavenly plants of your faith and love we now turn us my Brethren to the other a no less quick and plentiful one than the former Bring ye to it as the Lord requires souls thirsting for His grace and He will give you as He hath promised living water which shall quench your drougth for ever and become in each of you a Well springing up to eternal life The Church of the Colossians to whom this Epistle is addressed having been happily planted by Epaphras a faithful Minister of CHRIST the enemy failed not to sow forthwith his Tares within it by the hands of some Seducers these men would mingle Moses with our Saviour and together with the Gospel of the one retain and observe the Ceremonies of the other To make their error the more pleasing they painted it over with colours of Philosophy subtility of Discourse curiosity of Speculations and other such like Artifices Epaphras seeing the danger whereinto this prophane medly did cast the faith and salvation of his dear Colossians advertiseth St. Paul of it then Prisoner at Rome The Apostle to withdraw them from so pernicious an error taketh Pen in hand and writeth them this Letter wherein he sheweth them that in JESUS CHRIST alone is all the fulness of our salvation in such manner as that we should deeply injure Him to seek ought of it out of Him since in His Gospel we have abundantly wherewith to inform our Faith and form our manners without adding thereto either the shadows of Moses or the vanities of Philosophy At the entrance He saluteth them and congratulates them for the Communion they had with GOD in His Son Next he draweth them a lively pourtrait of the Lord JESUS wherein shine forth the dignity of His person and the inexhaustible abundance of His benefits Upon that he undertaketh the Seducers and refutes the unprofitable additions wherewith they sophisticated the simplicity of the Gospel Afterwards from dispute he
case as none of Creatures do more need the offices of our Charity neither is there any object worthier of the affection and succour of a good and generous soul than innocence hated and oppressed unjustly therefore it is that the Apostle noteth here by name the Charity of the Colossians towards all the Saints He joyneth these two Vertues together Faith and Charity because in effect they are inseparable it being neither possible nor imaginable whatsoever error list to say of it that man should believe and truly embrace GOD as his Saviour in JESUS CHRIST without loving Him and His neighbours for His sake or that he should love Him sincerely without believing in Him He puts Faith before Charity not for that it is more excellent on the contrary he elsewhere openly giveth the advantage unto Charity but because it goes first in the order of things requisite to salvation It is the blessed root whence Charity springs forth 1 Cor. 13. and all other Christian Vertues It is the foundation of the spiritual building the Gate of the Kingdom of Heaven the first fruits of the workmanship of GOD and the beginning of the second Creation As in the old Creation Light was the first thing He created so in the new one Faith is the first thing He produceth which the Apostle divinely expresseth to us elsewhere 2 Cor. 4.6 GOD saith he who commanded the light to shine out of darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the illumination of the knowledge of the glory of GOD in the face of JESVS CHRIST After the Faith and Charity of the Colossians the Apostle adds in the third place the Happiness that was kept for them in the Heavens For the hope saith He which is reserved in Heaven for you Some knit these words with what he had now said of the Faith and Charity of the Colossians and understand that these faithful people laboured with alacrity in the exercise of these Vertues for the hope they had of the celestial Crown and reward according to what the Apostle saith elsewhere of Moses that He chose rather to be afflicted with the People of GOD Hebr. than to enjoy for a little time the delights of sin and esteemed the reproach of CHRIST greater riches than the treasures of Aegypt because saith he he had respect to the recompence And he teacheth us in general of all those that come to GOD that they must believe that GOD is and that He is a rewarder of them that seek him Ibid. v. 6. And from hence it followeth not at all either that our works do merit the glory of Heaven or that our affection is mercenary If we should not hope but for what we merit our hopes would be very miserable But knowing that GOD is faithful and constant we hope with assurance for the bliss which He of His meer grace promiseth us and the less we merit it the more love we conceive towards GOD who giveth it to us and the more acknowledgement and service ought we to render Him for the same And for this gratuitous salary which He promiseth us we look not on it as a prey after which we hunt and without which we would have no love for the LORD but as an excellent evidence of His infinite goodness as a testimony of His admirable liberality that love of GOD which shines forth in it is the thing pleaseth and ravisheth us most of all and which enflameth our faith our zeal and our affection to the service of so good and amiable a LORD though then we should bind what the Apostle saith of the Charity of the Colossians with the hope they had of the heavenly glory there would be nothing in this but what were conform to Evangelical Truth Yet it seems to me more simple and fluent to refer it to the third Verse where he saith that He giveth thanks to GOD for the Colossians having understood their faith and charity for the hope He addeth now which is reserved in Heaven for you For to consider the condition of these believers on the earth it seems there was no great cause to congratulate them for their faith and charity the afflictions which they drew on them rendring them in appearance the most miserable of men But though the flesh make this judgement of it the Spirit that seeth above visible things the Crown of glory prepared for the faith and charity of the faithful holdeth them for the happiest of all Creatures congratulates them and rendreth thanks to GOD for the inestimable treasure he hath communicated to them I know saith the Apostle that your piety hath it's tryals and exercises in this world But I forbear not to bless the LORD affectionately for that He hath given it to you I know the bliss that is prepared for you on high in the Sanctuary of GOD. He takes the word Hope here as often elsewhere for the thing we hope for to wit the blessed immortality and glory of the world to come I confess we possess it not yet for hope is the expectation of a good to come Rom. 8.23 That we are saved saith the Apostle is in hope but hope that a man seeth is not hope for what a man seeth why doth he yet hope for But this good though absent and to come is as assured to us as if we had it already in our hands The Apostle shews it when he addeth that this Hope is reserved in Heaven for you It is a treasure which GOD hath set apart having fully prepared it already keeping it faithfully for us in His own bosome Whence it is that we make an assured account thereof for He hath deposited it in the hands of JESUS CHRIST in whom is hid our life and immortality so as if we make an assured account of things which a man of probity and honour keepeth in trust for us how much more certain should we be of the life and glory to come seeing GOD hath put it for us in the keeping of so faithful and powerful a depositary The place where this rich treasure is kept deposited for us confirms yet more the hope and excellency of it to us for saith the Apostle it is reserved for us in the heavens Fear not ye Faithful Your bliss is not on earth where the Thief steals or infidelity and violence make spoil where time it self ruineth all things where Crowns the best establisht are subject to a thousand and a thousand accidents Yours is on high in the Heavens in the Sanctuary of eternity lifted up above all the odd variations and inconstancies of humane things where neither our changes nor the causes that produce them have any access But this same place sheweth you besides the excellency and perfection of the bliss you hope for inasmuch as all celestial things are great and magnificent Weakness poverty and imperfection lodge here below Heaven is the habitation of glory and felicity In fine the Apostle toucheth briefly in the
good thing so necessary for you If you have it not hitherto ask it of GOD incessantly with prayers and tears and quit Him not before you have obtained it If you have it thank Him for it more than for all the goods of the Universe and make account that in giving you charity He hath given you the Life the Kingdom and the Crown of Heaven Exercise this precious gift continually let there be none of your neighbours without feeling of it Do good to all Communicate what you have received the light of your knowledge to the ignorant the succour of your good offices to the afflicted the sweetness of your patience to enemies the consolation of your visits to the sick the assistance of your alms to the needy the example of your innocence to all with whom you converse But have a particular care of Saints the members of the LORD JESUS who serve Him here with you and how poor soever they be have yet been redeemed with His blood and predestinated to His glory as well as you Dear Brethren your labour shall not be in vain Your charity shall bring forth it's fruits in their season with a most abundant usury For terrene and perishing good things which you shall have sowed here below you shall one day reap on high those that are celestial and immortal for a little bread and a little money that you shall now give to JESUS CHRIST you shall receive from His liberal hand the delights of Paradice and the treasures of eternity This is the hope which is reserved for you in the Heavens It is not the word of weak and vain men that hath promised it to you You have heard by the Gospel the Word of Truth which cannot lye And as so magnificent an hope should enflame our Charity so should it comfort our patience and render it invincible under the Cross to which the Name of CHRIST doth subject us Consider a little what the men of the world do and suffer for uncertain hopes that whirl in the Air flote on the Sea and depend upon the Wind and Fortune to how many dangers they expose themselves to what travail and disquiet they condemn themselves Voluntarily passing nights and dayes in a most laborious servitude for an imaginary good that neither yet is nor perhaps shall ever be and which how happy soever the success of their designs may be they shall not enjoy at most but during some years only Christian shall it be said that you have less zeal for Heaven than these people have for Earth Their hope is doubtful Yours is assured Theirs dependeth on the will of men and the inconstancy of elements Yours is in Heaven Pursue then generously so high and glorious a design And since your hope is in Heaven have incessantly heart affection and thought there Regard no more either flesh or earth it is not here your bliss is JESUS CHRIST hath seated it on high at the right hand of the Father in the Palace of His holiness Let this excellent hope sweeten all the evil you suffer here below If you be not at ease here if you be despised if you have no part in the wealth or honours of the world think that in like manner neither is it here that JESUS CHRIST hath promised you the rewards of your piety That Heaven which you see so constant and immutable keeps them faithfully for you You shall there receive one day the honour the glory and the dignities you now breath after not to possess them during some miserable moneths as worldlings enjoy their pretended riches but eternally with a perfect and unspeakable contentment in the blessed communion of Saints of Angels and of JESUS CHRIST the Lord of the one and the others To whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit the only true GOD blessed for ever be honour and glory to ages of ages Amen THE II. SERMON COL I. Ver. VI VII VIII Vers VI. The Gospel which is come unto you as also it is into all the World and bringeth forth fruit as it doth also in you since the day you heard and knew the Grace of GOD in truth VII As also you have learned of Epaphras our dear fellow servant who is a faithful Minister of CHRIST for you VIII Who also hath declared unto us your charity which you have in the Spirit DEar Brethren the Gospel of our LORD JESUS CHRIST is the most excellent and most admirable Doctrine that was ever published in the Universe It is the grand mysterie of GOD the wisdom of Angels and men the glory of Heaven and the happiness of the Earth It is the only seed of immortality the perfection of our nature the light of our understandings and the sanctity of our affections There is no Philosophy or other Discipline but this alone that is able to deliver us from the slavery of Devils and make us Children of the most High It is this solely that truly purifieth us from the filth of sin and clotheth us with a complete righteousnes that plucketh us out of the hands of death and hell and giveth us access to the Throne of GOD there to receive of His bounty life and supreme felicity All other religions invented and followed by flesh and blood are wayes of perdition disciplines of errour and vanity that present themselves to poor men in the thick darkness of their ignorance as those seducing fires that sometimes abuse Travellers during the obscurity of the Night leading them into the deeps of death and eternal malediction The Law it self though come from on high is nevertheless as much beneath the dignity of the Gospel as Sinai is beneath Heaven and Moses beneath JESUS CHRIST The Law affrighteth Consciences the Gospel assureth them The one slayeth the sinner the other raiseth Him up again The one maketh grace be desired the other makes it be enjoyed The one presented the shadows and figures of the truth the other giveth us the lively image and very body thereof Whence you may judge my Brethren how much it concerneth us to know so saving and Divine a Doctrine that we may embrace and obey it since the repose and happiness of our souls stand on it which we shall unprofitably seek any other where It is to enflame us with an ardent desire of this holy and blessed knowledge that the Apostle St. Paul proposeth to us so often in His Epistles the praises of the Gospel scarce ever naming it without adding presently something to its commendation as the custome is of those that love ardently never to speak of that they love without giving it some Elogy that testifies both its excellency and their passion Such is the manner of Our St. Paul towards the Gospel of his Master He hath his soul so full of the love and admiration of this Heavenly doctrine that He can neither pronounce nor write the name of it but He accompanies it with praises as the just and due marks of its dignity We have
he saith that the Gospel is preached to every creature Col. 1.23 that is under Heaven and at the tenth of the Epistle to the Romans where applying to the Ministers of the LORD JESUS what the Psalmist had sung of the Heavens Rom. 10.18 Their sound saith he is gone forth through all the earth and their words unto the ends of the World And elsewhere speaking of himself he saith That from Jerusalem Rom. 15.19 and round about it even to Illyricum he had made the Gospel of JESUS CHRIST to abound and after the time he wrote those words He sowed it besides in the Isle of Malta and at Rome Now if the other twelve Apostles and the seventy Disciples and the Evangelists did labour each according to his measure in proportion with St. Paul as it is not to be doubted but they did no one will have cause to be astonished that all they together should have by that time carryed the Gospel through the whole world We read likewise in the writings of the first Christians Justin Clement Tertullian and others that in their time that is about 130 and 160 years only after the LORD's death all was full of Christian Churches and that there was no Nation either among the Greeks or the Barbarians nay the very Scythians or Tartarians wherein CHRIST JESUS had not servants And though these testimonies cannot be rejected without extream impudence there being no probability that either St. Paul or those other Writers would have spoken of the thing in such sort if it had not been true yet entirely to disarm incredulity I will add that the very same appears by the Books of Pagans of that time that are remaining For Tacitus a Roman Historian a passionate enemy of Christianity Amel. l. 15. though otherwise a grave man and of great esteem among his Countrymen hath left in Writing that in the eleventh year of Nero that is only eight years after the date of this Epistle of St. Paul to the Colossians a severe search having been made after it there was found a very great multitude of Christians at Rome This sufficeth to justifie what the Apostle says For since that Preaching was able to penetrate so far on this side athwart Provinces that made as it were the heart of the Roman Empire it might be much more easily spread towards the East in the Estates of the Parthians and in the Indies even whither St. Thomas went as appears by tracks of it that remain of it to this day in those Countries and towards the South in Egypt and Ethiopia where St. Matthew Preached as the ancients do report and towards the North whither passed some of the other Disciples This was well nigh the whole world then known of the Greeks and Romans and thus without doubt the Apostle understands it in this place For as to those great Countreys discovered in the West about one hundred and fifty years ago which they commonly call the West Indies or the New world it is evident the Ancients had no certain knowledge of them and it is very likely that they were not yet peopled in the Apostle's time the furtherst memory which the Nations there have preserved of things yerst done among them being but for four or five hundred years at most Be it concluded therefore that taking the World as is commonly understood for Countries inhabited and known at that time the Gospel was then already come into all the world The Apostle mentions it to the Colossians First to confirm them the more in the saith they had given to the Gospel I confess that its truth depends not upon the success of the Preaching it nor upon the multitude of them that believe it Though all the world should reject it though Heaven and Earth should persecute it the faith of a Christian ought to abide alwayes firm and unshaken being founded as it is upon the word of GOD and not upon the consent of men as on the contrary though the whole universe should maintain errour we should not be for this either obliged to follow errour or excusable for having followed it this order of GOD subsisting for ever that we must not follow a multitude to do evil But thoug it be thus yet it is a great consolation to a faithful soul to see the truth spread abroad And since the Divine Vertue of the LORD is so much the more powerfully declared by how much the more men it converteth unto his Christ it is evident that this extension of the Gospel helpeth and confirmeth our Faith in as much as it furnisheth us with an excellent testimony of the power of GOD and of the efficacy of His word But I add also that the success here touched by the Apostle contains a manifest argument of the Divinity of the Gospel and that in two respects For first if you consider the thing in its self it is so great and marvelous as that it sheweth sufficiently that this Doctrine is not only true but even Divine and Celestial When St. Paul wrote this Letter it was not full thirty years that JESUS CHRIST had suffered death in Judea and yet the Gospel as he saith was already come into all the world How could it have made so much way in so little time penetrated so many obstacles flown into so many places infinitely distant if it had not been both of a Celestial Original and carryed by a divine force Certainly as the extension of the light of the Sun who inlightens the whole Hemisphere in an instant and the rapidness of its motion who visits all the Climats of the universe in four and twenty hours doth evidently shew us that it is a work of GOD and of a nature altogether different from that of Earthly and Elementary things In like manner this so swift and suddain course of the Evangelique Doctrine that fill'd the world in so little time pierced through and dissipated the darkness and made it self be seen so quickly from one end of the Heavens to the other invincibly proves that it is a divine thing and no humane production Look on all the disciplines that ever had sway in the World You shall not find any of them that was establisht in this sort and made such a progress in so small a time The religions of the Pagans lived only in the Countries where they were born and if sometimes they stretched further it was rather the curiosity of strangers that brought them from the place of their birth than their own design or vigour all those so famous sects of the Philosophy of the Greeks did abide each of them in the soil that bare them And the Doctrine which the Popes of Rome have established in their Communion came not to the estate wherein we see it but by a long succession of time one age gaining one point and another adding a second till after many ages it took in fine the consistence and form it hath at this day and wherein
so as it is declared in the Gospel not in Error and in Fictions and Lies as in false Religions nor in shadow and in figure as in the Law of Moses but nakedly and simply as it is in it self Of these three Expositions all good and convenient the First is to the praise of the Colossians the Second to that of Epaphras their Pastor and the third to the praise of the Gospel it self But as to Epaphras he speaks of Him by name in the two last Verses of this Text which make the second part of it And to commend Him to the Colossians and win him their hearts and respect He gives an excellent testimony of his fidelity his candour and his goodness As also saith he you have learned of Epaphras our dear fellow-servant who is a faithful Minister of CHRIST for you who also hath declared unto us your charity which you have in the Spirit This holy Apostle knew how much it concerneth Churches for their edification to have a good opinion of their Pastors and with what artifices the enemy laboureth ordinarily to decry the faithful servants of GOD and ruine their reputation among their flocks therefore it is that he here exalteth Epaphras as his piety deserved and to take out of the Colossians all suspicion against the purity of his teachings advertiseth them expresly that the doctrine they had learned of him was in truth the same Gospel of which he had spoken And from this great care the Apostle hath of Epaphras's reputation the Ministers of the LORD should learn to set themselves the best they can in the Spirit of their people abstaining not from evil only but also from its appearances and whatsoever might make them to be suspected of it It is not enough to approve the goodness of our life to our own conscience We must also if it may be content the judgement of our neighbours Innocence is necessary for our selves and reputation for others And since it serves to edifie them we are evidently obliged to preserve not our own only but also the reputation of our fellow-brethren whom GOD hath setled in the same charge for if we bite and rend one another who sees not but the particular reproach of each one will be the common infamy and ruine of us all But since the reputation of Pastors is a publick good which tendeth to the edification of the whole Church you see again that each faithful person oweth it a particular respect and that the crime of those who violate it unjustly is a kind of Sacriledge It 's a robbing of the Church and stealing from it it 's edification to black by calumny and detractions the life and doctrine of them that serve it or to expose them to laughter and contempt by scoffings and revilings But to return to Epaphras the Apostle crowneth him with two or three excellent Elogies First He calleth him his dear fellow-servant Admire I beseech you the candour and the goodness the humility and the modesty of this holy man His candor for whereas ordinarily there 's jealousie between persons of the same faculty St. Paul contrarily acknowledgeth and exalteth the Gifts and Vertue of this servant of GOD. His goodness for He tenderly loves Him as every where else He plainly sheweth that of all men there were none he more affected than the faithful Ministers of the Gospel His humility lastly in that being raised on the Throne of the Apostolick dignity the highest in the Church he maketh Epaphras as one may say to sit there with Him owning Him for His fellow Next He termeth Him a Minister of CHRIST It was much to be fellow-servant with St. Paul but it is much more to be the Minister of CHRIST the LORD of glory the Head of the Church the Soveraign Monarch of Men and Angels Judge with what reason some of our adversaries mock at the title we assume qualifying our selves Ministers of CHRIST or of His Gospel since it is the word that the Apostle useth here expresly to signifie that holy charge which GOD hath called us unto But He doth not term Epaphras simply a Minister of CHRIST He saith moreover that He is a faithful Minister the quality of Minister was common to him with many others the praise of faithfulness with few 'T is all that the Apostle did require in a good Steward of the House of GOD. 1 Cor. 4.1 2. Let each one hold us saith he for Ministers of CHRIST and Stewards of the mysteries of GOD. Moreover it is required in Stewards that each one be found faithful To have the praise thereof the Minister of the LORD must First Seek the glory of his Master and not his own and Secondly Keep close to His Orders without hiding from or envying to His Sheep any of the things committed to him for their edification without setting before them ought of His own invention beyond or against the will of the chief Shepheard But though all these good qualities greatly recommended Epaphras to the Colossians He addeth yet another which no less than the rest obliged them tenderly to love and cherish him namely that He employed the Master's talents to their edification He is saith he a faithful Minister of CHRIST for you They ought therefore to love him both for the dignity of his Office and for the profit that came in to them thereby For though we be obliged to love and respect all the faithful servants of GOD in general yet there is no doubt but we owe a particular affection and reverence to those who peculiarly consecrate their Ministry to our edification In fine the Apostle tells them that this holy servant of GOD had advertised Him of the pure and spiritual love they bore Him He hath declared to us saith he that is both to Him and to Timothy your charity which you have in Spirit I count that by charity he meaneth here not in general the Christian Vertue which we ordinarily call by this name for of the Charity of the Colossians so understood he had already spoken in the fourth Verse but the affection these faithful people had for St. Paul And He calleth it a Charity or Love in Spirit that is spiritual because it was founded upon the Spirit and not upon the flesh upon the interests of Heaven and not of Earth And here consider I beseech you how dextrous and industrious Epaphras was to knit spiritual friendships The Colossians had never seen St. Paul 't is he without doubt that had recounted to them the excellent vertue and piety of this great man and by this means enkindled in their souls that holy and spiritual charity they had for Him And see again how by the relation he makes to the Apostle of the love these believers bore Him He possesseth His soul with a reciprocal affection towards them O holy and blessed tongue that sowest nothing in the hearts of the faithful but charity and love how far now-adayes from thy candour and sincere goodness
his Brethren presented him GOD be gracious unto thee my Son Gen. 43.29 From such sentiments do flow those benedictions which we are wont to pronounce upon persons that are imployed in things beneficial and useful whether natural or civil as to instance with the Psalmist when we see the busie Reapers of a fair Field in Harvest time and say The blessing of the LORD be upon you Psal 129.8 we bless you in the name of the LORD But if this kind of natural beauty and perfection doth engage our affections and good wishes to the subjects in which we perceive it the gifts of divine grace which are incomparably more excellent should much more lively touch us my Brethren and kindle in our hearts greater flames of love and of desire for those that possess them For as high as Heaven is above the Earth and as much as eternity is preferable to time so much advantage have the beauties and perfections of Grace above those of Nature If therefore we judge rightly of them and estimate them according to their worth it cannot be that we should see them shine out in any without running to them and fastning forthwith on them as holy and as happy persons An eminent example of this motion of Christian Charity we have in our Text for the Apostle St. Paul here sheweth us he no sooner understood by Epaphras's report the Colossians faith and love but his soul was presently seized with ardent love unto them and his absence hindring him from giving them other evidences of it he incessantly presented prayer and earnest suits to GOD for their persevering and perfiting in piety that is for the continuation and the perpetuity of their happiness The summ of his desires for them is contained in three Verses as they evidently relate to three sorts of benefits for he wisheth them first in the ninth Verse the benefits that respect perfect knowledge of the truth next in the tenth those that respect the exercise of sanctity and finally in the eleventh such as concern perseverance in faith and patience in afflictions For present we will meditate only on the first of these three Articles remitting the two next to another action And for this cause saith the Apostle we also since the day we heard it cease not to pray for you and to crave that ye might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding For right understanding this Text we will consider in it three particulars by the help of the grace of GOD which we implore for this effect First The Motive of the Apostle's prayers Secondly Their form manner and quality and in fine which is principal and most important the subject of them that is what He requested of GOD in His prayers As for the Motive that induced the Apostle to pray for the Colossians He signifies it to us in these first words And for this cause since the day we heard it we cease not to pray for you For these words sending us back to the precedent Verses with which they have a tye do shew us that the knowledge which the Apostle had by Epaphras's relation of the faith of the Colossians towards JESUS CHRIST and of their charity towards the Saints of their heavenly hope and of their other spiritual graces whereof He spake afore that this knowledge I say having filled Him with love towards them made Him continually pour out His Vows and prayers before GOD for the compleating of their salvation I confess the affection they bore Him in particular and whereof He maketh mention in the Verse immediately preceding contributed something also to this care he had to pray for them But it 's principal cause was their piety and sanctification that they had the first fruits of the Spirit and the beginnings of the Kingdom of Heaven Seeing the foundations of the Gospel and of the building of GOD so happily laid and established among them He beseecheth the Supream Master and Architect of this spiritual work to finish it and powerfully set the last hand to it The same reason made Him in like manner present His prayers to GOD for the Ephesians as he testifies at the beginning of the Epistle Ephes 1.15 16 17. he wrote them using almost all the same words that serve Him here Having saith he to them heard of the faith you have in the LORD JESVS and the charity you have towards all the Saints I cease not to render thanks for you making mention of you in my prayers that the GOD of our LORD JESVS CHRIST the Father of glory would give you the Spirit of Wisdom and of Revelation Faithful Sirs learn by this example of the Apostle to pray the LORD principally 〈◊〉 those in whom you see the work of His Spirit appear Rejoyce ye for their faith and their zeal and love them for the honesty and purity of their life But remember that the first and principal office which your charity oweth them is the continual succour of your prayers Object not that they are too far advanced to need them During the course of this life the progress of a Christian is never so great but the prayers of his Brethren are necessary for him It 's then when he is most advanced that the enemy maketh most attempts and layeth most ambushments for him The nearer he is to the Crown the more need he hath of divine assistance As there is none in the lists whom we favour more with our wishes acclamations and applauses than those that come nearest to victory so in this carrier of the Gospel we should affectionate and accompany with our vows prayers and benedictions those most that run best and are nighest to the mark of the heavenly calling We never make more wishes for a Vessel than when after a long and dangerous voyage it comes upon our Coast or we see it ready to arrive in the Haven When the believer having escaped the shelves and tempests of the world steers the true course of Heaven and makes if we may so say with Oars and Sails to the Port of Salvation 't is then we should redouble our wishes and benedictions for his safety 't is then we should fear more than ever lest some mishap marr all his progress and bereave him of the reward of his pains But let us now consider the manner and the quality of the Apostle's prayers Since the day saith he that we heard these good news we cease not to pray GOD and to make request for you First He did not pray alone We cease not to pray saith he where you see he speaks of more praying with him comprising in this number Timothy whom he had expresly named already at the beginning of this Epistle and the other faithful that were at Rome with him Being put on by one and the same charity animated with one and the same desire they all lifted up their hearts and Votes to GOD together with the Apostle for the
spiritual prosperity of the Colossians As there is nothing on earth more grateful to the LORD than this divine consort of many souls thus mingling their voices and supplications together so there is nothing more effectual to draw down His blessing and obtain His graces in the behalf of our neighbours Matâ—h 1â— 1â— If two of you agree on earth concerning any thing they shall ask saith our LORD it shall be done for them of my Father which is in Heaven But beside that the Apostle's prayers were conjoyned with those of some other believers that prayed unanimously with him for the Colossians they had also two other qualities which gave them much force assiduity and the devotion of heart whence they did issue He expresseth the assiduity of them when he saith that he ceaseth not to pray for them since the day he heard of their piety of their zeal in the Gospel As soon as he received the news of it he deferred not this duty to another time He set himself on praying presently for them demanding of GOD the compleating of their faith so ardently did this holy soul affect all that bore the badges of his LORD But he contented not himself with praying once or twice for the salvation of these dear Disciples of his Master He went on constantly and ceased not still to sollicite the goodness of GOD for them For it is not enough that Moses do lift up his hands once or twice for Joshua's victory To defeat Amalek entirely this holy man must hold his hands still stretched out towards Heaven Whence it comes that Isaiah commandeth the Gards of Jerusalem that is it's Pastors Isaiah not to hold their peace nor give the LORD any rest until He re-establish and set Jerusalem in an estate of renown on the earth And our Soveraign Master teacheth us expresly in one of His Evangelical Parables that we ought alwayes to pray and not faint Luke 18.1 Col. 4.2 Rom. 12.12 1 Thess 5.17 And His Apostle enjoyneth us here beneath to persevere in prayer and elsewhere also to continue instant in prayer and again in another place to pray without ceasing So you see he very carefully practised himself what he commanded others Think not under shadow of this that this holy man was on his knees from Morning to Evening without addicting himself to ought but the reciting of prayers as was the use of a certain Sect of Hereticks in time past named the Messalians or Euchites noted and condemned by the ancient Church who made profession of being alwayes in prayer and under this fair mask did hide a most profound and infamous laziness As the greater part of the Monks of the Communion of Rome at this day who in the Cloysters whither they retire as in so many refuges of idleness pass their time in saying Litanies and Orisons most commonly without any attention or devotion under pretext of this vain service which they pretend to do the publick drawing unjustly the Tribute of huge Alms due of right to the true poor and not to them that are so only of their own will by a Vow directly contrary to the command of GOD. The prayer of a faithful man doth not cross his other duties The same LORD that commands him to pray orders him also to labour To oblige him to the one He doth not dispense with him for the other He intends that he acquit himself of them both Let prayer begin guide and end his labour let his labour seal follow and accompany his prayer Let him pray with his hand upon his work let him work with heart and eyes lift up unto prayer Let these two exercises fill up his whole life parting the dayes and hours thereof between them and keeping faithful and indissoluble company all along St. Paul prayed but this devotion did not hinder him from preaching to the present from writing to the absent from instructing the teachable from reprehending transgressors from confirming them within from drawing those without from fortifying the faithful from convincing the adversaries from employing his time in a multitude of good and holy actions What means he then by saying that he ceaseth not to pray for the Colossians He would only say that he is very assiduous at it that he doth it as often as time and place permit it that there passeth neither day nor night but he doth them this charitable office not to alledge here Augustine in Psal 37. what an Ancient elegantly saith that our desires being prayers these are continual when our desires are continual This example of the Apostle teacheth Pastors in particular that beside preaching the Word they owe also to their flocks the succour of their prayers not only the publick but their private ones also For how can they without crime forget persons that are so strictly united to them Their Crown and their Glory The ground of their joy and the subject of their most precious labour But the Apostle besides the assiduity of his prayers for the Colossians shews us also the ardour and devotion of them when he saith that he prayeth and demandeth for them For the first of those words signifieth the elevation of the soul to GOD when fixing its eyes on the greatness of this supream Majesty it adores Him and gives Him the glory of a perfect goodness power and wisdom This is as the exordium and Preface of Prayer to move the LORD that He do give us favourable audience After which comes that which the Apostle calls here The demand that is the very request we make the LORD beseeching Him to give liberally to us or to our brethren the benefits we have need of From which we have to observe by the way the order we should keep in our prayers that they may be legitimate and grateful unto GOD namely that at the entrance we present Him an heart full of humble and affectionate respect to Him that reveres Him as Almighty and All-wise that loves Him as infinitely good and praiseth and glorifieth Him as perfectly blessed The requests which are presented to Him otherwise heedlesly and without this preparation are more apt to provoke His wrath than attract His beneficence After this first motion we should next make our requests with a great and ardent desire and a filial confidence It 's thus the Apostle prayed for the Colossians Let us now come to the third point and see what was the matter to subject of his Prayer We cease not saith he to demand of GOD that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdome and spiritual understanding It sufficiently appears by the praises he gave the Colossians before that they were already much advanced in the knowledge of GOD and of His Gospel therefore he doth not simply demand of the LORD that they may be made partakers of this knowledge but that they might be filled with it For there are great differences in knowledge First in regard of its extent
and next in regard of its degrees For its extent it comprehends the things themselves that we can know which being almost infinite it is evident a man may know some who yet knoweth not others And as for its degrees one self-same thing is known more clearly and more distinctly by one more obscurely and confusedly by another It 's the same in this as it is in seeing One seeth and discovereth more objects than another and of those that see one and the same object one seeth it much more clearly and purely than another and whatever be the cause of this diversity whether the inequality of their eyes or the difference of their attention or that of the light which brightens them so it is that their seeing is very different that of the one being imperfect and defective in comparison of the other's The Apostle therefore beseeching the LORD that the Colâ—ssians might be filled with knowledge intendeth that they might obtain of His goodness a perfection both of the one and the other sort first that if there were any points of the Gospel not yet come to their knowledge He would grant them the grace to observe and apprehend them and secondly that if they did not purely enough apprehend the things they knew already He would so shine on them by the light of His spirit that they might clearly and distinctly perceive them For it is in these two points that the fulness or perfection he wisheth them in this place doth consist the one not to be ignorant of any of the necessary particulars of the mysterie revealed to us by the Gospel of JESUS CHRIST The other to know each of these particulars clearly and distinctly seeing the truth of them as in a great and resplendant light Besides we must remember that as the estate of a believer is of one sort here below where he travails for a time and after another on high in Heaven where he shall live in the bosome of GOD so the perfection of his knowledge is of two sorts the one earthly and the other heavenly This same is his last and highest perfection that same is but the disposition and beginning of it the one is the perfection of his infancy the other of his full age And though the first may be in a sense and in some respect truly termed fulness and perfection yet in regard of the other it 's imperfect Whence it comes that the Apostle elsewhere putting these two knowledges in parallel one with the other saith that now we know 1 Cor. 13.9 10 11 12. but in part and see but darkly in a glass whereas in the other World we shall see face to face and know as we have been known And in the same place he compareth the knowledge we have here below to the thoughts of a child and that which we shall have on high to the thoughts and judgement of a perfect man Then all the arguments of the truth of the Gospel shall be so magnificently displayed before our eyes that doubt of it shall not be able to take place any more and whereas now we see but the images of things then we shall touch the substance of them besides that the light of our understandings shall be incomparably more clear and pure than it is here below But though considering the thing in its self one may call perfect only the knowledge of a believer enjoying the vision of his LORD on high in the Heavens yet referring and ajusting it to the state we are now in there is also on earth a sort of knowledge which in this respect may be called perfect namely the highest measure a faithful person can attain while he is here beneath As though the knowledge of a child be far below the lights of a perfect man yet this hinders not but there is a certain form and measure of knowledge proportionate to the capacity of this age which when the Child is come to we say it is an accomplished Child yea most accomplished For every age hath its perfection and every greatness its full height T is then of this second sort of perfection and fulness the Apostle intends to speak when he prayes the LORD that the Colossians might be filled with knowledge that is not that they might see the LORD face to face this is not given but in the other world but that they might receive of his goodness all the light necessary for the estate we are in here below and as high and rich a measure of knowledge as may and should be had on earth for getting one day to the upmost degree in the Kingdom of Heaven And note here by the way the holy artifice of the Apostle By praying GOD that the Colossians might be filled he secretly advertiseth them that they yet wanted something that he might render them teachable and attentive to the instructions he will hereafter give them For those that think they are perfect and have an entire and accomplished knowledge do disdain what any one would add thereto as a thing superfluous and unprofitable Therefore he timely takes away this imagination from the Colossians that they may patiently suffer him to instruct them and finish in them what was only rough-drawn To the same end doth that tend which he addeth that they might be filled with the knowledge of the will of GOD. For by this word he rejecteth and removeth far from this subject all the inventions and doctrines of men the disputes and subtilities of Philosophy the voluntary devotions and superstitions which had been sowed among the Colossians by the false teachers as things rather contrary than useful to the perfection and happiness of man and restraineth all the knowledge he desireth for them to the sole will of God as its true object and its just measure Upon which we have first to remark that the word here used by the Apostle in the Original and which we have translated knowledge signifieth properly a great and ample knowledge and these holy Authors employ it ordinarily to express that knowledge of GOD which is given us by the Gospel of JESUS CHRIST For the Law of Moses and the Doctrine of the Prophets doth indeed teach what is the will of GOD. But it hath not designed to declare it so purely and so fully as the Gospel Whence it comes that St. 2 Pet. 2.19 Peter compareth the light of the Prophets to that of a candle shining in a dark place and that of the Gospel to the brightness of the day And it s hereto St. John hath respect when he saith Joh. 1.18 that no man hath seen GOD at any time and that the only Son which is in the bosome of the Father He hath revealed Him Because the knowledge which was of Him before the manifestation of the LORD JESUS was so weak as it is scarce considerable in comparison of that which is given us It 's therefore properly this Evangelical and Christian knowledge which the Apostle wisheth
in Darkness after the Spirit or after the Flesh and other like Phrases which all signifie a certain form and condition of life good or evil as it is qualified According to the stile of Scripture the Apostle saith here to the end that you may walk meaning that you may live that you may direct and form your lives But how will he that we walk worthily saith he as is seemly towards the LORD It is word for word in the Original worthily of the LORD or in a fashion worthy of the LORD But our French Bible hath faithfully represented the sense of these words it being evident that the Apostle intendeth we should lead a life that answereth to the honour we have of being Children and Disciples of JESUS the LORD His co-heirs and heirs of His Father He else-where often useth this manner of speaking or others altogether like it As when he exhorteth the Philippians to converse in such sort as may be worthy of the Gospel Phil. 1.28 Eph. 4.1 1 Thes 2.12 and the Ephesians to walk worthy of the Vocation wherewith they had been called and when in like manner he adjureth the Thessalonians to walk worthy of GOD who hath called them to His Kingdom and Glory The teachers of merits have drawn from these passages that proud name which they ordinarily give them calling them merits of condignity pretending that to walk worthy of GOD signifies meriting of life by their works properly and in the accompt of exact justice But they are evidently deceived For not to speak of the vanity of this presumption which Scripture and reason it self do thunder-strike a thousand wayes it is clear that to be worthy of any thing signifieth not at all in these passages the meriting it properly and exactly For who is there that would thus interpret the Apostles saying walk worthy of GOD that is lead a life that merits GOD There are people found that have opinion of themselves good enough to imagine they merit Heaven and the glory of the life to come There hath none been yet seen that I know who vaunted Himself to merit GOD. This language would be monstrous and surpass the pride of Devils themselves It 's too much presuming but to affirm that any merit the gifts of GOD. Common sense permitteth not a man to think or say that he merits GOD. As ill doth what the Apostle saith elsewhere suffer this gloss Converse in a fashion worthy of the Gospel and live in a fashion worthy of the Vocation of GOD. For who ever heard say that our works do merit either the Gospel or the Vocation of GOD a thing past and which we have already received from the liberality of the LORD before the having done any one good work It is clear that in all these places the worthiness whereof the Apostle speaketh is nothing else but a certain well-beseemingness arising from the correspondence that is found between us and the subjects whereof he saith we are worthy Just as when St. John Baptist exhorteth the Jews to bring forth fruits worthy of repentance he meaneth not that merit repentance but that answer thereto that are suitable to the sense we have of our own sin and of the Grace of GOD. In like manner here a life holy and full of piety and of good works is worthy of GOD not because it merits Him but because it hath some suitableness with His sanctity and glory It is worthy of the Gospel because it is correspondent to it and conform to what it requireth of us It is worthy of the Vocation of GOD because carried to things to which He calleth us and produceth the fruits which He demandeth of us Would you then know Christian what your life should be let it be worthy of the LORD St. Paul hath comprised all in these few words And as sometime a Prince faln into the hands of his enemy who demanded of him how he should treat him answered as a King signifying by that one word all the moderation and generosity he desired should be used towards Him So the Apostle in these two words embraceth the whole form of our carriage How shall we live Lead saith he a life that may be worthy of the LORD This is enough to let us understand that neither avarice nor cruelty nor hatred nor envy nor any other of the passions of the world must have any place in our manners but that justice charity and all other pure and celestial affections should shine forth in them that there should be mixed in them nothing base nor abject but that all should be great and generous and elevated above the dunghills of the Flesh Have then Believer this supream LORD continually before your eyes Interrogate your Conscience upon each of the things that are presented to you whether they be worthy of Him and do not any that may not be put in this rank Flee all that crosseth the quality of His disciple all that swerveth from the rule which He hath given you all that diverts you from the Kingdom to which He conducteth you This LORD is purity and sanctity it self He is entirely separate from sinners He never had any communion with vice This LORD is soveraignly good He hateth no man He prayed even for them that Crucified Him and did infinite benefits to them that injured and blasphemed Him This LORD neither possessed nor coveted the honours and grandeurs of the earth All His glory is divine and His grandeur celestial His discipline is like His life He enjoyneth us throughout nothing but a singular innocency sanctity and goodness and the good things He promiseth us are spiritual and not carnal the inheritance He hath purchased for us and to the possession whereof He leadeth us is in Heaven and not on the earth Upon this it's easie to judge what is this form of life worthy of Him which the Apostle commandeth us It is a life that hath resemblance with His wherein shine forth both the examples of His Divine Vertues and the marks of His doctrine and the badges of His house and the first fruits of His glory It is a life that treadeth under foot the baseness of all vices that disdaineth what the flesh and the world do promise to their slaves and beholding with contempt all that the earth adore hath no passion but for Heaven It 's a life sweet and humble and innocent that obligeth all men and injures none at all that without turning to the right hand or the left runs on and advanceth incessantly towards the mark of the supernal calling It 's thus you must live faithful soul if you would satisfie the light you have received of the knowledge of GOD. I confess it is an high design But neither is it for low and common things that GOD hath given you His Son and His Spirit If our infirmity makes fear let the power and the might of the LORD assure us And if there escape us sometime any act unworthy of Him as in
into Apostles which beats down the proudest fierceness and preserves invincible the most despicable weakness which hardneth the bodies of it's humble Warriours as Steel maintaineth them in the flames and confounds with their lowness the fury of Elements of Men and of Devils For this is that the Sacred Writers ordinarily call glory even an abundance of beauty of power and perfection so rich as it over-bears our senses and makes to bend under it all the vigour of our Spirits reducing them to admiration and astonishment And St. Paul somewhat frequently useth this word in this sense as when he saith that CHRIST was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father that is by His great and unspeakable power Whence it appeareth that the Vertue which converteth us to GOD and that which conserveth us in His grace is not a common and ordinary might but an invincible efficacy which nothing can resist Seek it not in your own nature Christian soul seek it in GOD and acknowledging your weakness ask of Him the remedy of it If it betide you to resist the enemy and to remain victorious in any combate render all the glory of it to this Soveraign LORD without attributing ought of it to your self But the Apostle sheweth us in what follows what is the use and effect of the succour which the glorious power of the LORD giveth us who strengthneth us unto all suffering saith he and patience of mind with joy These are the two productions of the Spirit of GOD in a faithful soul patience and long waiting in which principally our strength consisteth These are as the two hands of Heaven that sustain us in perils and keep us from sinking under the weight of those evils wherewith we often find our selves surcharged And though both the two are of a very like nature yet they have each of them something particular Sufferance beareth the evil without bending submitting to it at its inflicting humbly and standing firm under this rude load The Spirit patient or long-waiting for so the term used here in the Original doth properly signifie lends it the hand afterward and attendeth without murmuring for deliverance from the evil it suffers and for enjoyment of the good it hopeth Sufferance respecteth the very weight and heaviness of the affliction The long-waiting of the patient Spirit respects the duration of it These two vertues are absolutely necessary for a Christian For without them how should he support either the chastisements of GOD or the persecutions of the world How should he be firm in the exercise of other vertues to discharge the Offices of them against the impediments that thwart them every hour Tertull. de patient Patience saith an Ancient is the Superintendant of all the affairs of GOD and without it it is not possible to execute His commands or to wait for His promises 'T is it that defeateth all its enemies without toil It s repose is more efficacious than the motion and action of others 'T is it that makes healthful to us things of their own nature most pernicious It changeth for us poisons into remedies and defeats into victories It rejoyceth the Angels it confoundeth Devils it overcometh the world It mollifieth the hardest courages and converteth the most obstinate hearts It is the strength and the triumph of the Church according to the saying of the ancient Oracle By keeping you quiet and by rest you shall be delivered your strength shall be in silence and in hope But the Apostle to shew us what this patience is to which the Spirit of GOD formeth His children saith that it is with joy This is the true Character of Christian patience The Hypocrite suffers sometimes but it is murmuring And the Philosophers yere while made a great shew of their patience but it was only an effect either of their stiffness or of their stupidity which was no wayes accompanied with the joy which the Holy GHOST sheds into the souls of those that suffer for the name of GOD. Not that they are insensible or that they receive the evil on them without grief But if the evil they suffer do sad them this very thing rejoyceth them that by the grace of their LORD they have the strength and the courage to suffer it and do know that their suffering shall turn to their good and that from these thornes they shall one day reap the flowers and fruits of blessed immortality To which may be added the sweetness which is then shed into their heart by the vive and profound impression of that only Comforter who communicates himself to them on such occasions more freely than ever and can by the ineffable Vertue of His balm their most bitter wounds This is that Dear Brethren which we had to say to you on this Text of the holy Apostle Let us receive his doctrine with faith and religiously obey his voice He sheweth us what our task is here below Let us acquit our selves in it with care GOD of His Grace hath raised up among 〈◊〉 a great light of knowledge let us employ it to its true use and walk with it in such a sort as may be worthy of so holy and merciful a LORD whose name we bear Let this great Name awaken our sences and affections let it pluck them off from the Earth and elevate them to Heaven where He reigneth who hath given it to us Let this Name put into our hearts a secret shame to do or think ought that may be unworthy thereof Faithful Sirs remember you are Christians as oft as flesh or earth sollicits you to evil Put the world by 'T is not to please it that you have been regenerated by the Spirit from on high The World is so unjust so humorous and so changing that 't is impossible to content it See in what pain and torment they continually live that attempt it And though you should compass it the success would cost you dear By pleasing the world you would displease your own Conscience the contenting whereof is infinitely more important to you than any thing else But with GOD it is quite otherwise His will is constant and still the same without any variation or change Nothing is pleasing to Him but what is just and reasonable Your Conscience will find in it its entire satisfaction and never reproach you for having served so good a Master Not to alledge to you that the World after you shall have killed your self to serve it will pay you only with ingratitude and contempt as experience daily shews us whereas the LORD will magnificently reward the care you shall have taken to do His will comforting and blessing you in this world Crowning and glorifying you in the other If you demand what must be done to please Him the Apostle shews you in a word Fructifie saith he in every good work As often as the LORD shall cast His eyes on this Vineyard let Him see it still laden with good fruits Let Him never
have cause to complain of it as He yerst did of that of Israel I expected saith He it should bring forth grapes and it brought forth wild grapes Sure He hath had no less care of ours than of theirs He hath planted it in like manner with choice Vines He hath also environed it with a brave and admirable hedge He hath watered it with the rain of His Clouds and made the beams of His Sun of Righteousness to shine on it and may justly say of it What was there more to be done to my Vineyard that I have not done to it Be we not ungrateful to so sweet a Master Let not our sterility confound His expectation Let our fruits be answerable to His cares and our secondity to His husbandry Let there be no soul barren and unprofitable among us Let each one Fructifie of that He hath each one improve the dressing and sap the LORD hath given us Let the sinner present Him his repentance the Just his Perseverance the Rich his Almes the Poor his Praises Old Age its Prudence Youth its Zeal Let the Knowing abound in Instruction the Strong in Modesty the Weak in Humility and all together in Charity And since it is the good pleasure of our Heavenly Father that we have here divers combats as none may live piously without persecution prepare we also for this other part of our duty and supplicate the LORD with the Apostle that He do strengthen us with all strength according to the power of His glory that He do give us a firm and unmoveable patience to persevere constantly in the Holy Communion of His Son so as neither the promises nor the threatnings of the World neither the Lusts nor the fears of Flesh may be ever able to debauch us from His Service O GOD our task is great and we are feeble Our enemies are Giants and we but Dwarfes Therefore thy self work in us merciful LORD the work which thou commandest us Perfect thy glorious power in our weaknesses Strengthen our hands and confirm our hearts that we may combat vigorously and atchieve great things in thy Name and after the trials and tentations of this life may one day receive in the other from the Sacred and Sweet hand of thy Son the glorious Crown of immortality which we breathe after So be it THE V. SERMON COL I. Ver. XII XIII Vers XII Giving thanks unto the Father who hath made us capable to partake of the inheritance of Saints in light XIII Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of His well-beloved Son DEar Brethren Though the first Creation of man be a most illustrious master piece of the goodness power and wisdom of GOD this great worker then making Adam of the dust and forming Him after His own image to live and reign on earth in a soveraign felicity Yet it must be confessed that our restauration of JESUS CHRIST is much more excellent and admirable For whether you consider the things themselves which have been given us or have respect to the quality of those to whom they have been communicated or to what the LORD did for the communicating of them you will see that the second of these two benefits of His doth surpass the first every way The first gave us an humane nature the second hath communicated to us a divine one The first made us a living soul the second maketh us a quickning spirit By the one we had an earthly and animal being by the other we receive a spiritual and heavenly one The one seated us in the garden of Eden the other elevateth us to the Heaven of Glory There we had a Lordship over living Creatures and the Empire of the Earth here we have the fraternity of Angels and the Kingdom of Heaven There we enjoyed a life full of delight but infirm and depending as that of other living Creatures on the use of meat and drink and sleep Here we possess one full of vigour and strength which like that of blessed spirits is sustained by its own vertue without need of other nourishment The one was subject to change as the event hath declared the other is truly immortal and immutable and above the accidents that altered the first The advantage of the first man was that he might have not dyed the priviledge of the second is that he cannot dye But the difference will appear no less in the disposition of the persons to whom the LORD hath communicated these benefits if you attentively consider it I confess that dust which GOD invested with an humane form merited not a condition so excellent and received it from the meer liberality of the Creatour But if it were not worthy of such a savour at least it had nothing in it which rendred it uncapable thereof in the rigour of justice Whereas we not only have not merited the salvation which God giveth us in His Son but have over and above merited that death which is opposite to it If the matter upon which the LORD wrought in the first creation of man had no disposition for the form He put in it so neither had it any repugnancy thereto whereas in our second Creation that is in our redemption by JESUS CHRIST He findeth in us souls so far from complying with His operation that they potently resist it So you see that to effect the first work He employed only the single out-going of His will and word whereas for creating the second it was necessary He should shake the Heavens send down His Son to earth deliver Him up to death and do miracles that astonished men and Angels It 's with this grand and incomprehensible mysterie of GOD that the Apostle entertaineth us my Brethren at this time in the Text which you have heard For having finished the exordium that is the Preface of this Epistle and intending from thence to enter on His principal subject to slip the more gently into it after representing to the Colossians the Prayers he made to GOD for them he now adds the thanks he offered Him for their common salvation and by this means opens the entry of his dispute touching the sufficiency and inexhaustible abundancy of JESUS CHRIST for saving of believers which leaves no need of making any addition to his Gospel Giving thanks unto the Father saith he who c As this Text consists of two verses so it may be divided into two articles In the first the Apostle giveth thanks unto GOD for His making us capable of entring into the inheritance of His Saints In the second is proposed what he hath done to make us capable of this happiness namely delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of His beloved Son These are the two points we will handle if it please the LORD in this action humbly beseeching Him to guide us in meditating so excellent a mysterie and touch our hearts so vively with it as that it
and felicity whereof we shall be seized on high in the Heavens It is best in my opinion to joyn these two expositions together that we may so comprehend the entire state of the whole inheritance of Saints who after they are once united to JESUS CHRIST do alwayes live in light first in that of grace during their pilgrimage on earth afterwards in that of glory Rev. 21.23 when they shall be raised up to that blessed City which hath no need of the Sun nor of the Moon because the brightness of GOD hath illuminated it and the Lamb is the light thereof 1 Thes 5.5 Phil. 2.15 Mat. 5.14 For this cause all the divine denizons of this heavenly State are called Children of light and of the day which should shine as lights in the midst of a perverse generation and be the light of the world as persons born of the light of the Spirit and of the word of God who being led by the rayes of their Sun of Righteousness walk on straight towards the supream source of lights where arrived they shall eternally dwell in that shine which will transform them into the image of their LORD from glory to glory by the power of His Omnipotent Spirit But it is time to come to the other verse in which the Apostle addeth what the Father hath done to make us thus capable of partaking in the inheritance of Saints in light He hath delivered us saith he from the power of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of His well-beloved Son By darkness the Scripture ordinarily understands ignorance and misery the two contraries of knowledge and joy which it signifies by light as we said even now For ignorance and error do hide the true and natural form of things from our understandings just as darkness doth wrap up visible objects from our bodily eyes And forasmuch as there is nothing more unpleasant to men nor more affrighting than the obscurity of darkness thence it comes that the term is also made use of to represent horrour trouble and misery So the power of darkness is nothing else but that tyranny which the Devil and sin do exercise over their slaves filling their spirits with deadly errours and brutish ignorances and their consciences either with affrightment or insensibility and training them on by little and little under this dismal yoke into the horrours of eternal death which our LORD often calleth outer-darkness where is weeping and gnashing of teeth For as knowledge and truth is a light necessary for the attainment of salvation so errour and ignorance infallibly lead to death Therefore the Devil the sworn enemy of our good blindeth men the most he possibly can spreading before them gross and thick mists which hide Heaven and its blessed brightness from them This is the summ of his craft and subtil operation The deep of his abyss doth ever vomit forth into our aire a black vapour for the rendring of our senses useless By this means he turned heretofore the Nations of the Earth from the service of their Creator obscuring and smothering by his illusions those sparkles of the knowledge of Him which they had and plunging them and holding them down in so deep ignorance that these miserable men were not ashamed Rom. 1.23 to adore the work of their own hands and change the glory of the incorruptible GOD into the resemblance and image of corruptible man and of birds and of four-footed beasts and creeping things As for justice and honesty of life this impostor had so extinguished the lights which Providence had kindled for them in their hearts and so disordered all their knowledge by his seductions that the vilest abominations passed among them for indifferent things Walking on in so thick darkness it is no wonder if they were in continual fear they knew not where they went nor whither they should come and fell at last after having pittifully stumbled and staggered into the precipice of eternal perdition And would to GOD the Prince of errour did not yet still abuse the world in the same manner Certainly the darkness of the old Paganism was not more gross nor shameful than that which covers the greater part of the earth at this very day But whereas that errour wherein the Devil keepeth men is called by the Apostle the power of darkness and not simply darkness this teacheth us that that accursed one worketh effectually in them doing with their hearts what seemeth Him good and planting all deceit and ignorance in them at his will so as these wretches cannot defend themselves therefrom This is one thing the Apostle teacheth us elsewhere as when he saith that this evil Spirit now worketh with efficacy Eph. 2.3 in the children of rebellion Not that he hath naturally any just Dominion over the souls of men but their sin brings them under His Sceptre and their hearts being of themselves full of unclean and unjust affections it comes to pass through the excess of their corruption that he never tempteth them in vain And all this imperial force he hath upon them is founded meerly on imposture on errour and ignorance so as it is with a deal of truth and elegancy that St. Paul calleth it here the power of darkness This is Faithful Brethren the sad and pittiful estate in which naturally men lye Let not the paint and lustre of their pretended wisdom and justice dazle your eyes In the sight of GOD it is but darkness whence it comes Eph. 5.8 that the Scripture calleth them darkness it self Ye were sometime darkness saith the Apostle to the Ephesians Judge hereby how horrible the errour of those is who dogmatize that liberty is so very natural to man as they cannot conceive that they can be men without it Let them Philosophise upon this subject as they please They shall never be able to shew that a man can be all at once both at liberty and under the power of darkness He that is under the power of another is not free It 's GOD alone that can enfranchise men and take them from this miserable servitude and bind that strong Tyrant who did hold them Captive It is to this Soveraign LORD that the Apostle here giveth the glory both of his own liberty and of the Colossians theirs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He saith he hath delivered us from the power of darkness Yet the Greek word which he useth in the Original hath more Emphasis signifying that He delivered us by an exerting of power drawing us and if I may so speak plucking us out of the irons we were in whereby he representeth to us on the one hand how strong and strait the bonds of our slavery were and on the other hand how excellent and admirable the power is which GOD hath displayed to bring us out of this spiritual Egypt For we experiment it daily that though nothing be more sordid and shameful than the tyranny of error Yet we all naturally love it so
us This is the mysterie of the bread we there break and of the cup we there bless in remembrance and for the communicating of that sacred body which was broken for us and of that divine blood which was shed for the remission of our sins Let us carefully improve a doctrine so necessary and which is so diligently inculcated on us in the word and in the Sacraments of our LORD referring it to our edification and comfort Learn we from it first the horrour of sin a spot so black as could not be washed out but by the blood of JESUS CHRIST That remission of it might be given us it was necessary the Father should deliver up His dear Son to dye and the Son give His blood the preciousest jewel of the universe a thousand times more worth than heaven and earth and all the glory of them From this meditation conceive a just hatred against Sin since it is so abominable in the eyes of this Soveraign LORD on whose communion alone depends all your bliss shun it and pluck it out of your Consciences and your hearts As for sins already committed seek the remission of them in the blood of CHRIST Give your selves no rest till you have found it till you have obtained grace till it be exemplified in your souls by the hand and seal of the Holy Ghost Lay by the pretended satisfactions and merits of men Have no recourse but to the righteousness of JESUS CHRIST which alone is able to cover our shame and render us acceptable to GOD. But having once obtained pardon for the time passed return not into it for the future When sin shall present it self to you repell it couragiously opposing to all its temptations this holy and healthsome consideration It 's my Master 's the murtherer of the LORD of glory It 's the accursed Serpent that separated man from GOD that put enmity between Heaven and earth that sowed misery and death in the world and obliged the Father to deliver up His Son to the sufferings of the Cross GOD forbid I should take into my bosome so cruel so deadly an enemy But from this same source we may also draw unspeakable consolation against the gnawing guilt of sin and the troubles of Conscience For since it 's by the blood of the Son of GOD that we have been redeemed what cause is there to doubt but that our remission is assured The superstitious hath reason to be in continual affright since man in whom he puts his confidence is but vanity The propitiatory I present you Faithful soul is not the blood of a man or of an Angel creatures finite and incapable of sustaining the eternal burnings of the wrath of the Almighty It is the blood of GOD's own Son who also is Himself GOD blessed for ever It 's a blood of infinite value and truly capable of counter-poising and bearing down the infinite demerit of your crimes Come then sinner whoever you be Come with assurance How foul soever your transgessions be this blood will cleanse them away How ardent soever the displeasure of GOD against you be this blood will quench it Only bedew your soul with it Make an aspersion of it on your hearts with a lively faith and you shall no more need to fear the word of the executioner of the avenges of GOD. But Faithful Brethren having thus assured your Conscience by the meditation of this divine blood of our LORD admire ye also His infinite love which He so clearly sheweth us and confirmeth to us This King of Glory hath so loved you that when your sins could not be pardoned without the effusion of His blood He would dye upon a Cross rather than see you perish in Hell He poured out His blood to keep in yours and did undergo the curse of GOD that you might partake in His blessings O great and incomprehensible love the singular miracle of Heaven which ravishest men and Angels What should we fear henceforth since this great GOD hath so loved us Who shall condemn us since He is our surety Who shall accuse us since He is our Advocate He hath given us His own blood What can He any longer refuse to bestow on us He hath laid down His soul for us how much more will He grant us all other things that may be necessary for our salvation But as this thought doth comfort us so ought it to sanctifie us Of what Hells shall not we be worthy if we love not a LORD who hath so passionately loved us If we obey not His commandments who hath blotted out our sins If for this precious blood which He hath given us we do not render to Him ours and consecrate to His glory a life which He hath redeemed by the offering up of His own in sacrifice for our salvation And after an example of so ravishing goodness how can we be ill affected to any man Christians GOD hath forgiven you a thousand and a thousand most-enormous sins how have you the heart to deny your neighbour the pardon of one slight offence He hath given you His blood you that were His enemy How can you refuse a small almes to him that is your Brother and that upon the account both of nature and grace Let the goodness of the LORD JESUS mollifie the hardness of your heart let the vertue of His blood melt your bowels into sweetness into charity and into love both toward Him and towards His members Discharge you this very day at His table of all the bitter passions of your flesh Put off there pride hatred and envy and clothe you there with His humility and His gentleness Do him new homage and give Him oath to be never any others but His alone presenting your selves with deepest respect before this Throne of His grace Remember both at this time and ever after that blood by which He hath obtained Redemption for you that is the remission of your sins This blood is the peace of Heaven and of earth This blood hath brought us out of Hell and opened Paradise unto us It hath delivered us from death and given us life This blood hath blotted out the sentence of our curse that stood registred in the Law of GOD it hath stopped the mouth of our accusers and pacified our Judge This blood hath effected a renovation of the world It hath quickned the dead and animated the dust and changed our mortal flesh into a celestial and divine nature Dear Brethren GOD forbid we should tread under foot a thing so holy or account such precious blood profane or common Let us reverence it and receive it into our hearts with an ardent devotion And may it display its admirable efficacy in them causing the royal image of GOD even holiness and righteousness to flourish there to the glory of the LORD and our own consolation and salvation Amen THE VII SERMON COL I. Ver. XV. Vers XV. Who is the image of the invisible GOD the first-born of every
in like manner hath not only the shadow or the appearance of the authority and power of his Predecessor He hath the whole substance and reality of it Gen. 5.3 Thus it is that Moses saith Adam begat Seth his son in his own likeness and after his image He signifies thereby that Seth had a nature the same in all things with Adam's own Now the question is in which of these two senses must we take the word Image when the Apostle saith here and also elsewhere that JESVS CHRIST is the image of GOD. 2 Cor. 4.4 The very quality of the subject in question sheweth us so clearly that we must apprehend it after the second way and not the former as even those that quarrel it dare not say that JESUS CHRIST is an imperfect image of His Father For where is the Christian ear that could suffer a blasphemy so horrible and so contrary to all the Scripture Sure when the Apostle saith of our LORD that He is the image of GOD he thereby meaneth quite another thing then what he signifies elsewhere when he saith that man is the image of GOD. For intending here to exalt the LORD JESUS and to demonstrate that His dignity is so high as capacitateth Him to save us He would ill suite this design if he attributed nothing to Him but what agreeth to any man whoever he be And yet if you do not understand it that JESUS CHRIST is a perfect image of GOD the Apostle will affirm no other thing of Him here then he asserts elsewhere of man when he saith he is the image of GOD. Beside the Apostle's end the thing it self he speaks of doth evidently shew it us also For our LORD informeth us that He who hath seen Him hath seen the Father and that Joh. 14.9 12.45 who beholdeth Him beholdeth Him that sent him Where is the pourtrait of which it may be said that he who hath seen it hath seen the subject which it representeth It 's clear this is not found but in such an image as is most perfect and containeth fully in it all the being of its original Whence it appears that it is in this sense that JESVS CHRIST is the image of GOD. And to make us conceive it the better the Apostle hath a passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews the scope the terms and sense whereof have very much resemblance with this here there he saith Heb. 1.3 that JESVS CHRIST is the resplendency of the glory of His Father and the Character or engraven Stamp of His person Terms exceeding elegant and expressive and such as clearly decide this case that the LORD is the image of GOD in another manner than man and that the same glory which shineth in the Father is respendent also in the Son and that the same nature which is in the person of the one is likewise in the person of the other Say we therefore according to the Analogie of this Doctrine and the reason of the thing it self That JESUS CHRIST is the image of GOD His Father but a perfect one yea the most perfect that an image may be An image which exhibiteth unto us and representeth not the colour or the shadow but the truth and substance of the Deity The Scripture our only guide in these high mysteries teacheth it clearly And to aid you in the comprehending of it though the GOD-head be most simple in it self exempt from all mixture and composition yet speaking of it according to the weakness of our understanding to which GOD hath not disdained to accommodate Himself in His word we will consider three things of Him the nature the properties or qualities which Divines commonly call His Attributes and His works As for His Nature it is most perfectly represented in JESUS CHRIST forasmuch as He hath really and veritably the same being and same substance with GOD the Father As a child whom we call the image of His Father hath the same nature with Him being truly of mankind as He. The Scripture teacheth us this truth in very many places where it saith Joh. 1.5 Tit. 2.13 Rom. 9.5 1 Cor. 10.9 Joh. 12.41 that JESUS CHRIST is GOD that He is the true GOD. Our great GOD and Saviour GOD blessed above all Jehovah yerst tempted by the Israelites in the desart He whose glory Isaiah saw in the vision described at the sixth Chapter of His Prophecy It layeth down the same thing also as often as it represents Him to us a due object of our adoration saying that all ought to honour Him as they honour the Father Joh. 5.23 Heb. 1.6 and that the very Angels worship Him it being evident that according to Scripture there is nothing but a nature truly divine to whom adoration may be lawfully given But the LORD JESUS no less perfectly represents the Father in His Properties then in His Nature The Father is eternal so is the Son and Isaiah calleth Him upon this account The Father of eternity Before Abraham was He is Joh. 8.58 He was from the beginning with GOD and before the world was created even then He was in the bosome of the Father His love and His delight The Heavens shall perish but He is permanent The Heavens shall wax old as a garment and be folded up as a Vesture and be changed But JESUS is the same Heb 1.11 12. and His years shall not fail The Father is immutable without ever receiving any alteration or change Heb. 13.8 either in His being or in His will The Son is the same both yesterday and to day and for ever The Father is infinite filling Heaven and earth neither is there any thing within or without the world that boundeth the presence of His being Joh. 3.13 The Son is in like manner infinite He is in Heaven whiles He speaketh to Nicodemus on earth He is here below on earth in our hearts and in our assemblies the same instant that He is fitting at the right hand of the Father in the highest room of the Universe and though the Heavens contain that body and humane nature which He did assume yet they do not enclose His Majesty and all-present Divinity The Father hath a soveraign understanding knowing all things present past and to come The Son is Wisdom it self He knoweth all things and if He say somewhere that He knoweth not the day of Judgement this is not to be understood but in respect of His humane nature and not in respect of His divine intelligency Rev. 2.23 He soundeth the reins and knoweth the heart of man a quality which the Scripture noteth to us as the character and specifique mark of the knowledge of GOD asserting that there is none but He only who knoweth the hearts of men The Father knoweth Himself and no man or Angel to speak properly ever saw Him The Son so perfectly knoweth Him that He hath even declared and revealed Him unto men The Father is almighty and
doth whatsoever He will The Son hath all power in Heaven and in Earth and there is nothing but is facile to Him The Father is super-eminently good hating evil and loving rectitude and justice The Son is the Saint of Saints entirely separate from sinners goodness and justice it self The Father is merciful and inclined to pity The Son is the bottom of His compassions The Father maketh His Sun to shine on and His Rain to bedew even the men that blaspheme Him The Son dyed for His enemies and prayed for those that crucified Him In short the Father hath not any other essential quality but the Son hath it likewise and in the same measure with the Father I come to His Works Certainly the Son Himself informeth us how perfectly He represents the Father in this respect Joh. 5.19 saying in general that what thing soever the Father doth the same doth the Son likewise The Father created the Universe The Son founded the Earth Heb. 1.10 Joh. 1.3 and the Heavens are the work of His hands All things were made by Him and without Him nothing was made of all that was made The Father conserveth the world by His providence the Son sustaineth all things by His mighty word The Father hath set up the Princes and Magistrates who govern mankind Prov. 8.15 and there is no power but of Him It 's by the Son that Kings Reign and Princes decree justice The Father saved and redeemed the Church the Son is our righteousness our wisdom and our redemption The Father loved us and delivered up His Son to death for us the Son gave Himself a ransome for our sins If the Father raised up the Son the Son also raised again His own Temple when the fury of the Jews had beaten it down If the Father quicken the dead the Son quickneth them likewise and the last judgment the punishing of the wicked in Hell the glory of the Faithful in Heaven and all that refers to it is the work both of the one and the other The Father hath elected us so likewise hath the Son Joh. 13.18 I know saith He whom I have chosen It is the same in all the other actions and operations of the divine nature If you read the Scriptures exactly you shall not see any of them attributed to the Father but is likewise attributed to the Son And as for that right and soveraign authority which accreweth unto GOD over all things from these great and high qualities and operations this glory shineth in the person of the Son as it doth in the person of the Father If the Father be Judge of the earth King of ages and Monarch of the world the Son is in like manner the LORD of glory the head of the Armies of Heaven the Prince of men and Angels the Judge of all flesh If the Name of the Father be great and dreadful that of the Son is above every name which is named in this world or in the world to come If all creatures both superiour intermedial and inferiour do owe a soveraign homage to the Father and cast down themselves before Him adoring His Majesty with the profoundest respect they are capable of so it is clear that before JESUS every knee doth bow both of things in Heaven and things on earth and things under the Earth the Father Himself proclaiming when He bringeth Him into the world Let all the Angels of GOD worship Him So you see Dear Brethren that the LORD JESUS is truly the image of His Father since He hath and discovereth perfectly in Himself the Nature the Properties and the Works of the Father An admirable a singular and a truly Divine image which possesseth the whole form of its original without any variation and faithfully and naturally representeth all the features of it in their true and just greatness measure and nature I confess there are among men sons that resemble in some sort their Fathers but there are none in whom such resemblance is comparable with that of the Son of GOD to His Eternal Father If our Sons represent our nature and manners it is always with some difference which a piercing and a clear-sighted eye may easily observe and after all there are none that in their life do express the lives of their fathers totally entire with every one of their actions and operations Whereas the Son of GOD is a most complete image both of the nature and the life of His Father if we may speak in this manner of these mysteries all the works of the one whether small or great being also the works of the other This sacred Verity taught here by the Apostle overthroweth two heresies which though contrary and opposite to one another did sometime equally trouble the Church of GOD. I mean that of the Sabellians and that of the Arians The former confounded the Son with the Father the latter rent them on sunder Those took from the Son His person these His nature For the Sabellians did dogmatize that the Father and the Son were but one and the self-same person who according to the divers wayes and ends of his manifestations did assume sometimes the name of Father sometimes the name of Son So as in their account it is the Father who suffered on the Cross and it 's the Son who sent Him that suffered St. Paul breaketh their errour by saying that JESVS CHRIST is the image of the Father For no one is the image of himself and how great and exact soever the image's resemblance of its original be it 's of necessity that it be another subsistence than its original A child hath the same nature with the Father whose image it is said to be but nevertheless the person of the Father is one and that of the child another Since then the Apostle declareth here and elsewhere that JESVS CHRIST is the image of GOD that is to say of the Father we must either desert His doctrine or acknowledge that JESUS CHRIST is another person than the Father But if you distinguish their persons it doth not follow that you must divide their nature as did the Arians who made it their position that the nature of the Father is another than that of the Son the one increated and infinite the other created and finite These are two shelves which we must equally avoid steering our course straight in the midst shunning on one side the confusion of Sabellius and on the other the division of Arius JESVS CHRIST saith the Apostle is the image of GOD His Father He could not be the image of Him if He were one same person with Him He could not be His Perfect image if He had a nature differing from the nature of the Father How should He represent His eternity if He had been created in time How His immensity if He had a limited essence How His Majesty and glory if He were but a creature Let us then hold fast this truth full and entire
Creatures and expresseth the relation He hath to them by saying that He is the first-born of every Creature This passage hath diversly exercised the Hereticks Those of them who deny that the Son of GOD subsisted at all in nature before His being born of the Holy Virgin perceiving that these words place Him before all the Creatures to salve their errour do corrupt the word Creature and will have it signifie in this place the faithful that believed the Gospel of our LORD Wretched unbelief to what extravagancies dost thou lead miserable men For what deliration can produce a thing more empty within and even less apparent without than this exposition First it rendreth the Apostles conception frigid and impertinent If you believe these people the Apostle advertiseth the Colossians that JESUS CHRIST was born before men believed what He Preached Is not this a great secret and highly conducing to the Apostles design Then again who gave them the Authority they assume to change the sense of the words of GOD St. Paul saith that the LORD is the first-born of every creature By what right do they restrain a subject of so great and vast extent to the faithful alone The faithful say they are created anew of the LORD Who doubts it St. Paul teacheth us Eph. 2.10 2 Cor. 5.17 that they are the workmanship of GOD created in JESVS CHRIST unto good works and elsewhere that if any one he in CHRIST he is a new creature But it followeth not thence that the word Creature put purely and singly as here must be taken for the disciples of JESUS CHRIST and His Apostles only The Scripture never useth so to speak As for the eighth Chapter to the Romans where they pretend that the Apostle signifieth the faithful alone by all the Creatures which sigh Rom. 8.21 and are in travel together this is a new dream no less absurd than the former it being clear by all the circumstances of the passage that those creatures there are not the children of GOD but of another sort St. Paul plainly distinguisheth them saying of those that they also shall be delivered Rom. 8. â—2 that they may have part in the glorious liberty of these and that not only they but we also that is all the faithful who have the first-fruits of the Spirit do sigh in our selves All those Creatures are no other than the Universe the Heavens and the Elements which shall one day be set free from the vanity they now groan under and which they were made subject to by sin That which they alledge out of the third of the Revelation is no whit more to the purpose JESUS CHRIST stileth Himself there the beginning Rev. 3.14 or principle of the Creature of GOD. But nothing obligeth us to take the creature of GOD in this place for the faithful alone any more than in the other The LORD meaneth all the things which GOD hath created either in the first or in the second world He being the principle of the one and the other according to what he had said in the same Book generally and indefinitely I am Alpha Rev. 1.8 and Omega the first and the last Besides though the Creature of GOD should signifie the faithful in this place yet it would not follow that the words every Creature here must be taken for the faithful alone as when the Scripture calleth them sometimes men of GOD it followeth not from thence that to signifie the faithful alone a man may say All men The term of GOD is put there for an adjective Epithet as the Grammarians call it according to the use of the Holy tongue the creature of GOD that is a divine and celestial creature a quality which evidently restraineth the sense of the word Creature to which it is annexed unto the most excellent kind of creatures that is the faithful Whereas St. Paul saith here simply every creature without adding of GOD or divine or any other word that might contract and limit the signification of the general term Creature to one of its species only that is the faithful Rejecting therefore these mens gloss as impertinent and contrary both to the Apostles scope and stile we say that by every creature he meaneth what the Scripture and all the languages of men do ordinarily signifie by these words namely created things the Heavens and the Earth and all that in them is But here rise up the Arians another sort of Hereticks who infisting upon this interpretation conclude hence that the Son of GOD is a creature since He is called the first-born of them alledging that the first-born is of the same nature with His brethren and adding to fortine their pretention that in effect the supream wisdom Prov. 8.22 which is no other than the Son saith in the Proverbs that GOD created it in the beginning of His wayes before He made any of His works which is nothing else as they affirm but what St. Paul saith here that the Son is the first-born of every creature and they adjoyn also that which is said in the Epistle to the Hebrews Heb. 3.2 that JESVS CHRIST is faithful to Him who made Him that is as they pretend to GOD who created Him But GOD forbid we should rank Him with creatures to whom the Scripture ascribeth the glory of having created them all and unto whom it commandeth us to give that supream adoration which is due to GOD alone and not to any creature The Apostle in this very place which they abuse putteth a most evident distinction between the Son and other things For whereas he calleth them creatures he saith of the Son that He is not the first-created as should have been said if He were of their order but the first-born an evident sign that He received His being of the Father by a divine and ineffable generation and not by creation As for that which they cite out of the Proverbs not to urge another exposition of it the original text importeth that GOD possessed wisdom in the beginning of his ways as our Bibles have well rendred it and not that He created it as the Greek interpreters have unrightly taken it And whereas St. Paul saith in the Epistle to the Hebrews that GOD did make CHRIST he meaneth not that He Created Him a conceit which would be quite beside his purpose but that He ordained and set Him up High Priest in His Church 1 Sam. 12.6 Even as when Samuel saith that GOD made Moses and Aaron He signifieth that He established them in the charges they bore among His people And it 's in this sense we must understand St. Peters language in the Acts Act. 2.36 that GOD hath made JESVS both LORD and CHRIST that is hath ordained Him unto these great dignities And so from these passages it duly follows that the Son of GOD was called the Annointed and setled in His office of Mâ—diator which we do confess but not that His
Divine nature was created which is that we utterly deny In fine for the words of St. Paul in this place some answer that by saying JESVS CHRIST is the first born of every creature he only signifieth that He was born before all creatures and perhaps it would be very difficult that I say not impossible to refute this exposition Yet there is another which I judge more fluent and indeed more suitable both to the scope and to the sequel of this Text It is to understand by the first born the owner the Lord and the Prince of every creature That which the Apostle addeth For by Him were created all things in Heaven and in earth perfectly accordeth with this sense it being clear that the creation of things is a true and solid title to that power and Lordship which GOD hath over them Why is the Son of GOD the Lord of every creature Because there is not any of them but He did create the same and it is good reason He should dispose of them and govern them at His pleasure since He gave them all the being or life that they have And that the word First-born may be taken to signifie Master and Lord is evident both by examples in Scripture and by the reason of the thing it self For the LORD promiseth in the Psalmes to make David the first-born of the Kings of the earth that is Psal 89.27 as every one seeth to make Him Master and the chief of Kings it being evident that to speak properly he was not their elder brother being neither brother unto other Kings nor more aged than they Isaiah saith also in His Prophecy Isa 14.30 the first-born of the poor to signifie the chiefest poor those that if I may so say do carry away the prize for poverty though otherwise they were born neither before others nor of the same family with them But the passage in Job is more remarkable than any other where mention is of the first-born of death He is meant Job 18.13 that hath the power and the administration of death the Angel and Prince of death and as the Epistle to the Hebrews speaks he that hath the dominion of death The reason of this manner of speaking is also throughly evident For the eldest-born by the law and custome of most Nations heretofore were and to this day are the principal of the family the heads and in a manner the LORD 's as well of their brethren as of the slaves and goods whence hath come this kind of language even the putting eldest or first-born to signifie the head the Lord and the Master We say therefore that it is in this sence we must understand the Apostles saying that CHRIST is the first-born of every creature to wit the Master and Lord of them Which no way inferreth that himself is a creature Lords not being always of the same extraction and lineage with their subjects but most frequently of another very different And as it would be ridiculous reasoning to conclude that he that hath the dominion of death is death it self under the colour that Job termeth him the first-born of death so is it most impertinent arguing to infer that the LORD is a creature because the Apostle saith here that he is the first-born of every creature We have a passage exactly parallel with this in the beginning of the Epistle to the Hebrews where the Apostle saith Heb. 1.2 that GOD hath established His Son heir of all things by whom also He made the worlds There you see first that he expresseth the Lordship which JESUS CHRIST hath over all the creatures by a figurative word stiling Him the Heir of them For that the word Heir was taken by the ancients to mean Lord and Master Instit l. 2. tit 19. S. ult the Civilians themselves have observed And secondly you see further that the Apostle after the same manner as in the Text doth found the dominion which JESUS CHRIST hath in the whole universe upon His being the Creator of it For it is this he meaneth when he saith that by Him GOD made the worlds Be it then concluded that this Primogeniture of the LORD JESUS over every creature is nothing else but that glorious and soveraign Empire which He hath over the whole world and every of its parts by the right of creation being the supream and absolute LORD thereof as He that brought all creatures out of nothing and gave them every degree of that being which they have Thus you see Dear Brethren that which we had to say to you for the exposition of this Text. Let us make our profit of it and extract the uses it containeth and the succour it may give us against sin and errour First it furnisheth us with what to answer those that blame us for having no images among us Tell them that JESUS CHRIST the only most perfect image of GOD sufficeth us This is an image we securely honour without fear of offending GOD because it is a true one and shews us to the life and in reality all the perfections of the Father whereas the others that are offered us are the work of mens hands inventions of their superstition and images not of GOD but of their own vain imaginations Their very being visible doth discover their falsity since that GOD is invisible For to represent an invisible nature by colours is to do much worse than if you should paint whiteness with a cole or light with darkness Your images O adversaries are dead and insensible destitute of the advantages which nature hath given to the least and lowest animals Ours is alive and intelligent the source of life and wisdom Yours are incapable of seeing or rewarding the service you do them Ours knoweth our hearts and hath an infinite goodness and power For JESUS the image of GOD that we adore is the first-born of every creature the Soveraign Master of the universe Let us boldly address our most religious services to Him And since it is in Him that GOD manifesteth Himself to us have we Him still before our eyes seeking the true knowledge of GOD in Him alone There we shall see Him as He is But let this seeing by no means be idle He doth not set before us this most full-wrought table of His perfections which he hath drawn to the life in His CHRIST that we should unprofitably feed our eyes therewith but that we should imitate Him each one according to our small ability should express in our souls some draughts of that perfect goodness and sanctity which shineth so gloriously in Him and become every of us by little and little a pure and lively image of our LORD Consider how He was obedient to the Father charitable to men helpful to the afflicted compassionate to sinners sweet and kind to enemies There is Christian the pattern of your life Follow these sacred examples Serve GOD like Him patiently bearing all that He layeth on you marching
couragiously where He calleth you Love men as He lov'd them cheerfully employing all that you are or can do for their edification communicating your goods to the poor your light to the ignorant your assistance to the oppressed Let not their badness withhold you from being good If they offend you pardon them and pray for them and conceive as the LORD said that they know not what they do neither their injuries nor their soothings of you turning you ever from piety Fear not the hatred nor the force of the world Remember that as this JESUS whom you serve is the image of GOD so He is likewise the first-born of every creature He hath them all in His hand He commandeth the Heavens and the Elements He governeth men and beasts All the parts of nature owe Him and render Him a prompt obedience and will they nill they do nothing against His orders Having the Master of all things for Head and Saviour how is it you are not ashamed of your timidity The wind maketh us to shake as the leaves of the wood The least sound affrighteth us and instead of glorifying the LORD here in His palace in peace and joy while His voice maketh the world tremble we tremble while the world is in repose Is it this that we promised JESUS CHRIST Is this to bear His Cross with patience and resist for His salte even unto blood Is this that lively and unmoveable faith whereof we make profession which should carry us through waters and through flames without appalling If the Providence of the LORD were unknown to us our weakness would be less inexcusable but now that we have lived for so long a time by continual meer miracles of His goodness why doubt we so easily of a carefulness and fidelity we have so many a time experimented and had proof of You see on the present occasion what thoughts for us He hath inspired into the sacred powers that govern us and even the supream among them what order they have taken for our safety and what care they declare themselves resolved to take of it for the future receiving us under the protection of their edicts Dear Brethren it is an admirable effect of the love which the LORD beareth us Let us enjoy it with perfect thankfulness both towards Him and towards His Ministers the Princes of whom He is the first-born in a particular manner Let us not disturb the work of His grace by our fears and diffidences but assured of His infinite goodness and power let us rely upon the truth of His promises and rest upon His favourable Providence quietly and comfortably finishing this short journey which we have begun waiting till this holy and merciful LORD after having conducted and comforted us in this desert do raise us up on high to the mountain of His holiness where far from evils and from dangers and from fears we shall glorifie Him eternally with the Father and the Holy Spirit the true and only GOD blessed for ever Amen THE VIII SERMON COL I. Ver. XVI XVII Vers XVI For by him were all things created that are in Heaven and that are in Earth visible and invisible whether Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers All things were created by Him and for Him XVII And He is before all things and by Him all things subsist AMong all the reasons for which we have a right to the things that we possess there is none more just or more natural than that which ariseth from the production of them it being evident that what issueth from us should depend upon us and that it is just every one should dispose of what he hath made Thus you see that among all the Nations of the earth children do belong to the Parents who begat them and works either of the mind or body are theirs that formed them and set them forth This right is the first and the most ancient foundation of all the possessions and dominions of mankind the power which men have to give to sell or exchange things proceeding from hence that either themselves or those of whom they received them did give or preserve that being which they have For if you go back to the first sources of humane laws and institutions you will find that men assumed not Dominion or possession save of the persons whom they had either naturally begotten or saved in war by preserving and giving the life they might have taken from them and of things which they had either made and composed as buildings or at least improved and cultivated as the grounds they cleansed and tilled It 's from thence that were formed by little and little those good and just establishments of Families of Cities and of States and of Laws necessary for their government which have maintained mankind to this present time You see likewise that GOD our Soveraign Lord to justifie both the right He hath to dispose of us as seemeth Him good and the obligation we have to serve Him ordinarily urgeth this reason that He hath created us It is He that hath made us saith his Prophet and not we our selves Psal 100.3 We are His people and the flock of His pasture It 's by the same consideration that He silenceth the refractory and prophane who have the insolence to blame His disposals Shall the thing formed say to Him that formed it Rom. 9.20 21. why hast thou made me thus Hath not the potter power to make divers vessels of the same mass It 's further by the same reason My Brethren the Apostle proveth in this place that JESUS CHRIST the Son of GOD is the Lord of all things Having said afore that He is the first-born that is the Master of every creature he now alledgeth us the proof of it taken from his being the Creatour of all things For by Him saith he all things were created that are in Heaven and that are in earth visible and invisible whether Thrones or Dominions or Principalites or Powers All things were Created by Him and for Him And He is before all things and by Him all things subsist This reason is clear and invincible For if man who giveth to the things He maketh only the form of their being working in all his operations upon borrowed matter do yet acquire thereby a right of dominion over them as we said even now so that He may dispose of them as He will How much more justly is the Son of GOD the Master and Lord of all the Creatures since He created them that is gave them the whole being which they have not the form only but the matter also whereof they consist having brought them out of nothing having entirely made and formed them by the sole might of His power without any subject for His displaying it upon existent when He first created them And this proof clearly inferreth that which we laid down in the precedent action to wit that when the Apostle there calleth JESUS CHRIST the
first-born of every creature He simply meaneth that He is the Master of them and not as the hereticks pretend that He is a Creature as they are and only created before them For the reason which St. Paul annexeth taken from His having created them concludeth rightly that He is Master of them but not that He was created Himself Otherwise it must by the same means be said that the Father who created all things was also created Himself a blasphemy which the most shameless hereticks would abhorr For if the Apostles discourse be good and pertinent as all Christians confess thus must His reasoning be Whoever hath created all things the same is the first-born of every creature But the LORD JESUS hath created all things He is therefore the first-born of every creature There you see clearly that this first proposition Whoever hath created all things is the first-born of every creature cannot be true save in this sense that He is the master of every creature but it is evidently false in the sense that the hereticks take the words first-born of every creature that is created before every other creature it being clear that the Father who created all things is eternal and sure was not created It must therefore of necessity be said that the Apostle by the first-born of every creature doth mean their LORD and Master Otherwise His discourse would not be pertinent But having sufficiently justified in our last action and cleared this conclusion of St. Pauls that the Son of GOD is the first-born of every creature let us consider now the reason of it he alledgeth drawn from hence viz. that He created all things and that they are all for Him and all subsist by Him that is to say He is the Author the End and the Conserver of them It is a truth of infinite importance in Christian Religion both of it self and for its own merit as also for the great contradictions it hath suffered at all times from the enemies of the Divinity of JESUS CHRIST both ancient and modern who have put to it all their force that they might either overthrow or at least shake it For this cause we are obliged to examine the present Text wherein it is so statelily founded with so much the more care and that we may omit nothing which is necessary for the clearing of it we will consider in the first place what the Apostle saith of the Son of GOD that All things were created by Him and for Him and that He is before all things and that they all subsist by Him Next we will view in the second place the division he maketh of all these things which the LORD created some they that are in Heaven others they that are in earth some visible others invisible as Thrones Dominions Principalities and Powers These shall be if the LORD will the two parts and as it were the two Articles of this Action May it please GOD to guide us by His Spirit in so sublime a meditation and to enable us by His grace to refer it to His glory and to our own edification and consolation In the former of these two Articles the Apostle as you see saith first that All things were created by JESVS CHRIST secondly that they were all created for Him in the third place that He is before all things and lastly that they all subsist by Him For though these four points be near a kin and necessarily linked the one with the others yet they are distinct at the bottome and ought to come under consideration severally there being neither of them but doth contribute somthing particular to the glory of our great GOD and Saviour JESUS CHRIST The first is plain that All things were created by JESVS CHRIST For where is the Christian who understands not this and knows not that to create doth signifie in the use of Scripture to make a thing either of nothing or of a matter which had no disposedness to the form that it receiveth And forasmuch as there is none but the Divine Power that is capable of such an action or operation thence it comes that this word is never attributed to any but GOD only There 's none but He that doth create things For this cause among the other Titles which are given him for marks of His glory He is stiled The Creator this Title appertaining unto Him alone When the Apostle then saith here and twice repeats it That all things were created by the Son he signifieth that it is of Him they received all the being they have that it is He who by this Noble and Divine manner of working which the Scripture calls Creation brought them from non-being to a being who by His infinite power produced the matter of which they consist prepar'd it and fitted it as it now is investing it with those forms and admirable qualities on which all the motions of their nature do depend that is to say in one word The LORD JESUS is the Creator of the Universe It was not possible to express this truth more clearly And thus it is that all Christians always understood this passage until those new Enemies of the Divinity of our LORD who blasphemously say that He hath no actual subsistence in the world but since His birth of the holy Virgin they not able to bear so respendent a light have endeavoured to obscure it by the fumes of their frivolous and false glosses They say therefore that the word Create signifieth in this place mearly to reform and re-establish things to put them in a better estate than they were in and not to bring them out of nothing and give them their whole being They will have it that the Apostle by saying All things were created by JESVS doth intend not the first Creation of the World when arising out of nothing it receiv'd its natural being and form from the Creator But the Renovation of the World wrought by the Preaching of the Gospel and by the word of the Apostles whom the LORD sent to reform the Nations and to put things in an incomparably better and more happy estate than they were in before Enslav'd they were to the Empire of Sin and Satan whereas by the Doctrine and Power of the LORD JESUS they have now been consecrated to God and sanctified to His glory Unto this I answer That it 's true the World was renewed by the Gospel inasmuch as this holy Doctrine did abolish both the Ceremonies of Moses's Discipline and the false Religions of the Heathen and formed in the whole earth a new people that serve God in Spirit and in Truth being created in righteousness and holiness I acknowledge also that this Renovation is the work of a Divine Power and could not have been effected by any Humane or Angelical strength by reason whereof it may and ought to be called a Creation it being evident that there was need of no less vertue to reform the World than to create it And finally I
as being incommunicable to any other besides Him Isa 42.5 45.12 48.13 51.13 It is I saith He who have made the earth and who have stretched out the Heavens Finally the thing speaks of it self For the Power requisite for the creating the world that is to make it of nothing is so great and so infinite that the Philosophers with all the light of their Reason could not comprehend it but were so far from attributing it to any Creature that they deny'd it unto GOD Himself Whence it follows that if there be any part of Divine Glory proper and essential unto GOD it is this same without all doubt Seeing then it is found in the LORD JESUS we must necessarily confess that He is in truth the Great GOD most High Eternal and Blessed for ever above all things As for the distinction they advance to cover their error alledging that the Son was but the Instrument and Minister of the Father in the work of Creation not the first and principal cause it is vain and frivilous For this creative vertue being infinite it cannot be but in an Infinite subject and in a Soveraign and principal Agent It cannot be communicated to an Instrument seeing that every Instrument being finite is consequently uncapable of receiving and containing an Infinite vertue so as since it is in the person of the Son it unavoidably follows that He is not the instrumental as they say but the first and the principal cause in the work of Creation Rev. 1. And S. John clearly shews it in the Revelation where he saith That He is Alpha and Omega the first and the last a thing that cannot be said of an instrumental cause which hath necessarily above it another Agent of a diverse nature The Apostle also clearly refuteth this gloss when he appropiates that to JESUS CHRIST which the Prophet uttered evidently of the first the principal and supreme cause of the Creation LORD thou hast founded the earth at the beginning and the Heavens are the works of thy hands An Application which would be evidently false and impertinent if JESUS CHRIST were only the instrmental cause of the Creation The observation upon which they pretend to ground this distinction is no whit more solid to wit that the Scripture saith indeed the world was created by the Son but not that the Son did create the world For first S. Paul saith in express terms that the Son founded the earth and though he had not said it who sees not but that the one and the other do amount to the same thing and that His saving All things were created by the Son is all one as if he had said That the Son created all things But if this form of Speech would infer that the Son is not the first and principal Efficient of the Creation the same must be concluded also of the Father since S. Paul speaking of Him saith in like manner That All things are of Him and by Him and for Him But that which he saith here of JESUS CHRIST in the second place That all things were created for Him doth further demonstrate the same truth very clearly For these words do signifie that the Son is the last and supreme end of the Creation of things a matter which pertaineth only to the principal cause and not to the instrument it useth for the effecting of its work Sure it is clear that it 's the true GOD who is the ultimate end for which all things were created that the glory of His Divine Vertues might be manifested so as He might be known and served as He is worthy This falls not under contest Since therefore it is for the Son that all things were created it must be acknowledged that He is the true Eternal GOD it being not possible that a Creature should be the end for which all things were created From thence the Apostle concludes in the third place That JESVS CHRIST is before all things For since He created them all it must of necessity be that He should subsist before they were And he noteth it expresly that none might suspect Him of novelty as if he He had not been but since Moses under colour of His having not been manifested till the fulness of time John 8. He is not only before Moses and Abraham as Himself saith in S. John but before all things from the beginning before there was any thing created before the mountains were settled Prov. 8. and before the hills As saith Wisdom that is the Son himself in the Book of the Proverbs But the Apostle after having thus given to the LORD JESUS the glory of creating all things passeth on further and attributeth to Him the preservation of them All things saith he subsist by him It 's this which he expresseth otherwhere in other terms when he saith Hebr. 1.3 That he sustaineth all things by His powerful word that is to say He preserves them by His Providence as He created them by His vertue their being their life and their motion so depending on Him that when He hideth His face they are troubled and fail utterly and return unto their dust or their nothing as the Prophet singeth Whence yet again appears Psal 104.29 that He is the true GOD the Eternal one blessed for ever with the Father forasmuch as this preservation of the Universe is one of the highest and most incommunicable glories of the Deity Let us now consider what are those things whose Creation and Conservation the Apostle doth attribute to the Son of GOD All things saith he were created by Him those that are in heaven and those that are in earth visible and invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers He leaves not any Creature of higher or of middle or of lower rank without the reach of his assertion and for the enclosing of them all within it he makes use first of a division taken from their elements I mean the places where their natural abode is saying Things in heaven and things in earth The Scripture speaketh often of them in the same manner As when we are forbidden in the Decalogue to make Religious use of any Image or the likeness of any thing whatever Thou shalt not make thee saith the LORD any image of things that are in heaven above or in the earth beneath or in the waters under the earth By Heaven he meaneth not only that vast Region where we see the Sun and the other Stars to be lifted up But also Paradise the Habitation of Angels and of the souls of Saints above and this void space where the Fowls do fly and where the Showers and the Thunders and the other Meteors are formed below By Earth he meaneth this whole Globe wherein we live with the waters that run in stream or do float here There being then no creature but is in one of these two places it is evident he doth comprize them all by saying
The things that are in heaven and those that are in earth But he addeth yet another division no less general taken from the quality of the things themselves which all are either visible as the Heavens the Elements the Plants and the living Creatures or invisible as the Devils and the Angels and the souls of men And to the end none might imagine that the good Angels by reason of the excellency of their admirable nature were excepted from this number the Apostle makes expressest mention of them giving a touch at the false Teachers thereby who taught the worshipping of Angels as he will shew hereafter To refute this error he ranketh them by name among the things that were created by JESUS CHRIST and that depend on Him and were made for Him For there is no doubt but they are the holy Angels whom he calleth here Thrones Rom 8.37 Ephes 1.21 Dominions Principalities and Powers And he useth these words so often in this sense as in the Epistle to the Romans and to the Ephesians and elsewhere that I wonder not a little at some Expositors who give them here another reference There is great likelihood that this diversity of names doth signifie a great difference among the Angels Indeed there is no sort of Creatures in the whole Universe but an admirable variety is found among them that Soveraign Wisdom which hath formed them having pleased to set forth the infinite riches of His power and understanding in the diversity of those ranks qualities and functions by which He hath distinguish'd things which are otherwise of a like yea of the same nature To pass by the rest who can reckon up the differences of estates of conditions of temperaments and inclinations which are observed among men All of them have the same nature none have the same form nor the same countenance We may not doubt but that there is somthing semblable among the Angels and that in their intelligible World there is some image of that variety which renders our visible one so beautiful and so mervellous The Apostle to express this difference of their Orders useth the names of those divers degrees which are found in the States and Polities of the world where are Thrones that is Monarchs and Kings Dominions that is Dignities which though very high yet art beneath Kings as Dukes and Archdukes then Principalities as the Governors of Cities and Provinces and lastly Powers such as inferior Magistrates are whom the Latines in the Apostle's time did call by the very name that we read here and it is yet in use * Il podestà among the people of Italy From whence in my opinion it may be with reason concluded that there is a diversity of charges and Ministries among the Angels If you ask me what the Orders of them be and how many and what the difference between them is and whether it consist in qualities of their nature or only in the employments GOD hath given them I am not ashamed to confess unto you freely with * Exchirâ—d c. 58. S. Augustine that I cannot tell the Scripture which alone could inform us having declared nothing about it to us As for that which the Roman Schools do sound withal upon this matter of nine Orders of the Celestial Hierarchy it is but the fansyings of a man that having overmuch leisure amus'd himself to fashion the same with the least unhandsomness he could in imitation of some fond Jewish imaginations of like nature and to make them weigh the more did set them forth under the holy and venerable name of Dionysius the Areopagite the frigid frothiness of his pufft-up stile his quirks and his vanity and his whole air being infinitely far from the gravity modesty and simplicity of the Apostles Scholars do sufficiently shew that he is nothing less than what he affirms himself to be and indeed long since some testimonies urged out of his Books by Hereticks Concil tom l. 855. Ep. Joan. Maroâ—ia Ep 〈◊〉 A. C. â—32 have been rejected by the Orthodox as Apocryphal and uncertain and such as were not S. Denys's at all Laying aside therefore beloved Brethren the empty and vain Authorities of an humane spirit let us content our selves with what the Apostle hath told us in this subject and let us diligently make our profit of His Divine instructions Let us learn from them first to adore the LORD JESUS as Creator of the Universe and to acknowledge by this work of His His true and eternal Divinity Let no objection or carnal difficulty let no Heretical subtilty ever pluck up this sacred truth out of our hearts Let us oppose the Apostl's Authority against all that men and Devils can say or invent to the contrary And admire we constantly the goodness and the wisdom of the Father who gave us such a Saviour as our necessity did require For none was able to repair us but He that first made us and the hand alone which created us could restore us to that blessed state from whence we had fallen by sin And since GOD hath given us for Mediator and the Prince of our Salvation the same whom this great frame had for its Creator let us embrace Him with a firm belief Be we content with His fulness and regard none beside Him in heaven or in earth The Angels how sublime soever their nature and their dignity be after all are but creatures not to speak of men who beside the infirmity of their being were all conceiv'd in sin But it is not enough to confess that the LORD JESUS is the Creator of all things and to acknowledge Him for our only Saviour and Mediator this Faith must work and fructifie in us it must spread it self into all the parts of our life must sanctifie our affections and actions arm us against all the temptations of the enemy comfort us in affliction and assure us against every fear For since JESUS hath created this grand Universe since Thrones and Dominions are the work of His hands since it is by His Providence that this All subsisteth in the state it is who seeth not with what Devotion we should serve so Puissant a Monarch This earth that beareth you this air that you breath these heavens that shine on you these plants and these living creatures that nourish or refresh you and these Celestial Powers which encamp about you all these things are productions of His power and presents from His bounty In like manner your own nature this body so skilfully composed and that soul which enliveneth it are works of His Providence which neither were created nor do now subsist but by Him Is it not reasonable that you should consecrate to His glory what you do hold only from His Grace Remember also what the Apostle addeth That as all things were created by Him so they were made for him Do not frustrate your Creator of His intentions Live for His glory since it was for it you were created For
towards His Church For He enliveneth all the members of it from the greatest even to the least and gives them not the power and authority only as Princes give their subjects but the very strength and ability to act communicating to each of His faithful ones such a measure of His Spirit as is necessary for sensation and motion and all the other functions of heavenly life as St. Paul teacheth us in the Epistle to the Ephesians and more at large in the First to the Corinthians Eph. 4. 1 Cor. 12. Moreover the Head hath this advantage above the rest of the body that it is of a more exquisite constitution and temper than the other members according to the rule that nature prudently observes in general which is to frame those things best that are designed to the choiâ—est employments Kings and Captains do deserve also the name of Heads in this respect their dignity being very high-raised above their subjects But their advantage in this particular is nothing in comparison of that which JESUS CHRIST hath above His Church not only by His being incomparably more holy more wise and more powerful than any of all the faithful but especially in that He is GOD blessed for ever Finally as you see the Head is placed highest in the body of man this scituation being necessary for its commodious exercising the functions of its government a thing that Kings and Princes imitate dwelling ordinarily in Palaces and sitting on Thrones raised above the houses and seats of their subjects so JESUS CHRIST hath this advantage but in a far greater degree sitting on high in the Heavens upon the Throne of GOD above the whole Church both militant and triumphant And whereas He conversed sometime on earth that was only for a while and by dispensation for the good of His body which obliged Him to do it even as the head boweth down it self somtimes when the necessity of any of its members doth require it But the proper and natural place of JESUS CHRIST is that lofty Sanctuary of immortality where He now appears in highest glory from thence governing by His Spirit all the parts of this mystical body of the Church both those that are in Heaven and those that are yet on earth Thus My Brethren you see wherein this dignity of our LORD JESUS doth consist and with how much reason St. Paul expresseth it here and otherwhere by saying that He is the head of the Church Whence evidently follows what the Apostle also evidently says that the Church is the body of CHRIST For if JESUS CHRIST be call'd the Head thereof for having and exercising towards it all the functions and prerogatives of a natural Head towards its members it is clear that the Church must also be called His body since this whole Divine society depends on JESUS CHRIST and receives of Him all the light all the aptitude all the sense and motion that it hath Upon this doctrine of the Apostle we have divers things to consider before we pass any further First by fixing this position he timely fortifies the Colossians against that errour which we shall find Him expresly opposing hereafter the errour of those that would subject the faithful to Angels and to Moses introducing into the Church the worshipping of the one and the Pedagogy of the other For since the Son of GOD is the Head of this sacred society who seeth not that it ought to depend on Him alone that 't is to Him it oweth its obedience and service and of Him it ought to receive its discipline and guidance But it must also be observed that the Apostle giveth this title to JESUS CHRIST with a design to glorifie Him enroling it among the other praises of His Soveraign dignity Indeed since the Church is the most Divine society in the world since it is acompany of Kings of Priests and of Prophets the Assembly of the first-fruits and a new world much more excellent than the old a world immortal and incorruptible it is evident that to be the Head thereof is a quality more sublime then to have been the Creator and Prince of the Universe at first Whereby you see in the third place how unrighteous to say no more the rashness of those is who give this name to another beside JESUS CHRIST acknowledging a mortal man for the true Head of the universal Church Let them colour this usurpation how they will they shall not be able to justifie it This is evidently to despoil JESUS CHRIST of His royal robe and to take the Diadem from Him which none but He can bear They alledge that the Scripture verily communicates to others beside JESUS CHRIST the names of Pastor of Priest and of Teacher and of Light and such others It is true but it never gives that of Head of the Church to any but Him And the difference of these titles is evident the former signifying charges whereof the faithful do exercise some portion and some shadow whereas that of Head of the Church signifies the Supremacy which is incommunicable to any other but the Son of GOD. As you see that in a State the name of Prince and of Governour and Captain and others of like sort are not given to the King only they pertain to others also But no other may be called the Soveraign or the Head of the State besides Him without incurring the guilt of Sacriledge or Treason Yet they endeavour to excuse them and say they make the Pope but the ministerial and subordiate Head not an essential and soveraign one But this is nothing but words arising from their interest and not founded in the truth of things There is no Prince that would be satisfied with such language if any one of his subjects that had made himself the head and Monarch of His State should alledge for his excuse that he had no intention save to pass for a ministerial head In the nature of men whence this similitude is taken we see no bodies that have two heads of a different rank and if any such be found at any time they are accounted for monsters which cannot be said of the Church the most perfect master-piece of all the works of GOD. In a word it is not enough to say that the Pope is the ministerial head of the Church it must be proved We plainly read in Scripture that JESUS CHRIST is Head of the Church Let us believe it and adore Him under that quality But that there is another head in the Church be he visible or invisible be he ministerial or soveraign this we meet not with at all in the writings of the Apostles not to say that we meet with divers things in them wherewith such a doctrine is incompatible Faith is by hearing and hearing by the word of GOD. Let it therefore be permitted us to suspend our believing this other pretended head of the Church since we have heard nothing of it in the word of GOD. But that which the
the same infirmities and to the same necessity of dying and indeed they dyed after they had lived again awhile Their death was rather deferred than abolished Their bodies did corrupt and in the end return to that dust from which they were preserved for some years But with JESUS CHRIST it is not so He in coming forth from the dead retook not the life He had quitted that is the life of the first Adam that infirm natural and earthly life a life still subject unto death He left it in the Sepulchre where it must remain as in eternal oblivion He put on a new life and nature such as is spiritual and celestial as the Apostle elsewhere termeth it a life wholly full of strength and glory that is not subject either to the use of meat or sleep not subject to dolour or death a life appropriate to the second world and not to the first a nature peculiar to the future age not to the present Accordingly you see that being vested therewith he remained not on the earth This is the old Adam's element the habitation of corruption and death But having only sojourned there fourty days so long as was needful to assure His Apostles of the truth of His resurrection and to shew them in His own person the first-fruits of the mystical Canaan He ascended up above the Heavens to the true element of the new man and the Sanctuary of eternity Conclude we then that He is truly the beginning and the first-born from the dead since He is the first of all the dead that was born and raised again in incorruption But these titles signifie yet another thing namely that it shall be He who shall raise again all the members of the Church in like glory that He is the master and the Lord of the dead for the investing them one day in their order with a nature resembling His own according to what St. Paul elsewhere saith that He will make our vile body Phil. 3. like unto His own glorious body For He would not be the first-born from the dead if He did not communicate the priviledge and the possession of this second birth to all His brethren that is to say all the faithful The Apostle adds to the end that He might have the first place in all things Those that are well versed in the reading of these divine Books do know that the word to the end that is often put in them for so as that or in such a sort as even to signifie the event and consequence of an action rather than the intention or design of the agent I account that it must be so taken in this place For the intention of our LORD in being made Head of the Church and the beginning of the new life was rather to Save us and glorifie His Father then to obtain unto Himself the first place in all things Yet true it is that such was the success of this His undertaking as He actually hath the first place in all things For there are but two sorts of things one of those that pertâ—â—â—â—o the first world and its creation the other of those that are of the second world and of the regeneration CHRIST therefore being already the Master and Creator of the former it is evident that having been also established Head of the Church which is the State that consists of the latter and the beginning and first-born of the resurrection of the dead He doth obtain by this means the first place in all things that is to say both in those of the first creation whereof He is the author and in those of the second whereof He is the Head This is the conclusion which the Apostle deduceth from his whole precedent discourse there he said that the LORD is the image of the invisible GOD the first-born of every creature the Creator of the Elements and the Angels and moreover the Head of the Church the principle and the first-fruits of the new Creation now he addeth so as He hath the first place in all things This being as seems to me from hence clear enough there is no necessity we should make any longer stay upon the exposition of this Text. It remains that to conclude we do briefly touch at the duties to which the doctrine of the Apostle doth oblige us and the comforts which it doth afford us JESUS CHRIST saith he is the head of the body of the Church These few words if we meditate them as we ought will teach us all that we owe both of obedience to the LORD and of charity to our brethren and of care and respect to our selves As for the LORD since He hath vouchsafed to become our Head it is evident we ought to honour Him with utmost devotion and submit all the actions of our life to His conduct See with what promptitude the body obeyeth the head and with how absolute a submission it follows all its movings The body neither stirreth nor resteth but as the head ordereth It depends entirely on its guidance and never crosseth its orders or resisteth its commands The head hath no sooner conceived a thing but the spirits forthwith present themselves at the place it desireth and each of the members employeth all the vigor and strength it hath to execute its will This is an image of that obedience which the LORD our mystical Head demands of us and this is that which the Apostle meaneth elsewhere Eph. 5.24 when he saith that the Church is subject to Him It 's in vain therefore that they boast themselves to be the Church who do contrary to what the LORD ordaineth who are subject to another beside Him and instead of His orders follow the will of a mortal man owning another head adoring another oracle keeping what He hath forbidden Blessed be His Name for that He hath granted us to disclaim their errour and to hang all our religion upon His sacred lips believing only that truth which He hath revealed to us in His Gospel and engraven in our hearts by His Spirit But what will it profit us to follow Him in our faith if we resist in our manners How can he avouch for His Church a body subject to Mammon to pleasure to ambition and other idols of the world a body wholly bended down to the earth whereas this divine Head is lift up above the Heavens Dear Brethren let us not deceive our selves We cannot be the Church of CHRIST except we be His body and we cannot be His body except we depend absolutely on Him except we cast out of our members the spirit of the Flesh and of the world and take in His to follow it's light and obey it's movings Henceforth then let us so compose our life that it do not contradict our profession Let the LORD JESUS be truly our Head let Him be still above us let Him preside in all our designs let Him conduct our steps and govern all our motions and inspire into us
all the sentiments we have Let there appear nothing in our words in our affections or our works but what is His. But this lesson of the Apostles doth no less recommend to us charity towards our neighbour than submission towards JESUS CHRIST For since the Church is a body and even the body of CHRIST that is the fairest and most perfect body in the world judge ye what ought to be the union and the love of all the faithful that compose it Look upon the body of man from which this resemblance is taken how great is the zeal of all the parts for the conservation of the whole How do they love it and conspire for it's good how do they do and suffer all things and each in it's rank expose their life and being for it Such ye Faithful ought to be your affection for the Church this Divine body of the LORD whereof you are members It s peace its preservation and its glory should be the object of your highest and most urgent defires There is nothing that should not be cheerfully employed in so brave a design Wo to them that have no feeling of the wounds of this sacred body that are not affected with its bruises and look upon the breaches of it unmoved who are so far from groaning at them and endeavouring to repair them that themselves make more rending with extream impiety and inhumanity the most innocent body in the world and most beloved of GOD the body of His Son which He hath redeemed at the price of His own Blood But besides the affection we ought to have for the Church in general this similitude advertiseth us also to love ardently each of the faithful in particular St. Paul toucheth at and treateth of this advice expresly in another place There is no division in the body 1 Cor. 12.25 26. saith he the members have a mutual care one of another and if one of the members suffer any thing all the members suffer with it or if one of the members be honoured all the members rejoyce together in it Now ye are the body of CHRIST and His members each one on his part O GOD how great would be our happiness and our glory if the union and concord of our flock did answer this fair and rich picture if knit together by an holy and inviolable love and having but one heart and one soul as we have but one Head we did amiably converse together tenderly resenting the good and evil of each other and each of us putting forth his power to conserve and encrease the good of our brethren and to comfort and cure their evils But alas instead of this sweet and grateful spectacle which would ravish heaven and earth we behold nothing among us but quarrels and coldness and hatred and animofities The welfare of our brethren displeaseth us and their ill case toucheth us not at all The former raiseth our envy and the latter stirreth not our compassion Vanity and the love of our selves make us either disdain or hate all others There are no bonds which our fierceness doth not break it equally violates both those of nature and those of grace Is this that great name of the body of CHRIST which we glory to be called by CHRIST is nothing but sweetness and love He hath laid down His life for His enemies How are we His we that hate and persecute our brethren And how are we His body since we rend one another Were ever the members of the same body seen at war together the hand assaulting the foot and the teeth falling on the hand If any such thing appear is it not taken for the effect of an extream rage or for an horrible prodigy Oh! how ordinary is this rage and this prodigy among us who being members of the same body and which infinitely augmenteth our shame of the body of CHRIST the Saviour of the world have yet no horrour at the biting and consuming of one another as if we were an herd of Canibals and not the flock of the Lord JESUS I well know we do not want plausible reasons to palliate each of us our faults passion it self making us witty in the defence of this bad cause But let our own conscience be our judge let it remember it hath to do with JESUS CHRIST and not with men if it beguile us it cannot deceive GOD. Renounce we then unfeignedly all this kind of vices and cordially loving our Brethren succouring the afflicted assisting the poor comforting the sick and living in concord with all let us truly be as we say we are the body of our LORD JESUS CHRIST It 's this in particular that the bread and the wine of our LORD the sacred embleme of our mystical union do require of us they mind us that we are but one bread and one body as the Apostle represents it Chap. 10. in the first Epistle to the Corinthians Finally this doctrine further sheweth us with what purity and sanctity we ought to keep our own persons since all being the body of CHRIST we are each one members of Him Against every temptation that sin shall let fly at us let us take up this consideration for our succour say shall I take the members of CHRIST to make of them members of Satan Shall I defile that body in the ordure of incontinency or of drunkenness or any other debauches which the Son of GOD hath cleansed with His blood which He hath united and joyned to Himself and whereof He is become their Head Far be it from me to commit so vile a fact It 's thus My Brethren that we ought to regulate our whole life for the being truly the body of CHRIST And if we so be this Divine Head doubt it not will love us and tenderly preserve us For no one ever yet hated his own flesh He will feed us and set us at His own Table and give us the bread and wine of Heaven and after the combats and trials of this life will clothe us with His own glory and immortality as being the first-born from the dead To Him with the Father and the Holy Spirit the true GOD blessed for ever be honour and glory to ages of ages Amen THE X. SERMON COL I. Ver. XIX XX. Vers XIX For it was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell XX. And by Him to reconcile all things to Himself having made peace by the blood of His cross viz. as well the things that are in Earth as those that are in Heaven EVen as in the frame of Nature GOD hath set up one only principle of light namely the Sun and hath united in the body of this admirable luminary all the brightness that was spred through the universe that it might enlighten the Heavens and the earth and that from it as from a common source might stream forth into all things all the flame and warmth they do receive so likewise in the Kingdom of
Grace the same GOD hath given us one JESUS CHRIST alone the true Sun of righteousness whom He hath filled with all the treasures of wisdom and life that He might be as an exceeding abundant and inexhaustible fountain of joy and immortality whence are diffused upon all the parts of the new world which is created in righteousness and in holiness all the spiritual perfections and benedictions they have This is that Dear Brethren which the Apostle divinely teacheth us in the Text you have now heard wherein speaking of the LORD JESUS he saith it was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell He represented to us in the precedent words the excellency of the Lord JESUS's person in that He is the Image of GOD the Lord and the Creator of all things visible and invisible then next His dignity in that He is the Head of the Church the beginning and the first-born from the dead concluding that He hath the first place in all things The Apostle now produceth the reason of it taken from the decree and will of the Eternal Father For it was His good pleasure saith he that in Him should all fulness dwell And that we might discern the wisdom of the Father in this disposal of the thing he sets before us in the words following the work for the effecting whereof He defigned and sent His Son a work so great and so wonderful as it is evident that without this fulness which He caused to dwell in Him it was not possible it should be brought to an end For it is by Him that He purposed to reconcile and actually did reconcile all things in Himself as well those that are in Heaven as those that are in earth And for the more full discovery of the greatness of this Divine master-piece he toucheth also at the means by which it was accomplished to wit Peace which he made by the blood of His Son's Cross It was not possible to reunite Heaven and Earth and reconcile these parts of the Universe that were divided each from other but by making peace by extinguishing their hate and removing the cause of their enmities Neither was it any more possible to procure this peace otherways then by the shedding of a Divine blood and the offering up a sacrifice of infinite worth and by the intervention of a Mediator who should have in him all the perfections and excellencies of the parties that were to be reconciled The greatness of the work shews us the quality of the means that was requisite to finish it and the quality of the means doth regulate the faculties and nature of the person that was necessary to do it To reconcile earthly and heavenly things in GOD there was need to make peace To make peace there was need of a blood and a sacrifice of infinite value To offer such a sacrifice there was need of a person in whom all fulness dwelt that is who had in Him fully and perfectly all the graces and excellencies of Heaven and Earth Certainly then it was an order highly reasonable and most worthy of the Divine wisdom of the Father to make all fulness dwell in His CHRIST for the reconciling of Heaven and earth by making peace through the blood of His cross That we may have the fuller view of it for His glory and our own consolation we will consider by His grace in this action those three points that are distinctly proposed us in the Apostles Text. First the good pleasure of the Father that all fulness should dwell in CHRIST Secondly the work He hath wrought by the hand of His CHRIST thus furnished namely the reconciling of all things in Himself as well those that are in earth as those that are in Heaven and finally the means by which He hath executed this great design to wit making peace by the blood of the cross of His well-beloved Son For a right understanding of the first of these three points we must enquire at our entrance what this fulness is which the good pleasure of the Father hath made to dwell wholly in CHRIST especially seeing that Interpreters do not well accord about it Some referring it to the Divinity of our LORD others to the graces which were accumulated on Him after His manifestation in our flesh It is certain that the word Fulness is variously taken in the Scripture and not to speak of other senses it hath which are beside our purpose it is somtimes referred to the greatness of things and signifies their just their whole and due measure As when it is said that Saul fell on the earth to the fulness of his stature that is all along 1 Sam. 28 2â— so as his whole body lay stretcht out on the ground and it is very likely that it is thus that St. Paul calleth the Church the fulness or the compleatness of CHRIST Eph. 1.23 forasmuch as being His body 't is in it that His just and due magnitude consisteth Without the Church He would be an Head without a body that is withot a magnitude and a stature proportionate to His supereminent Majesty It seemeth we might so take the Fulness mentioned in this Text even as signifying all the graces and excellencies requisite to the full and entire greatness that becomes the CHRIST of GOD but the word Dwell which is annexed to it doth not comport with it For it would be an harsh phrase and without example in any language to say that a man's stature dwelleth in him Upon the same consideration I exclude hence another sence which else would sute not ill with the matter I mean that which the term fulness hath when it is put for a full and whole measure and such as wanteth nothing We are to observe therefore beside what hath been said that the word fulness doth very commonly in Scripture set forth that which filleth any thing as when one Prophet calleth men and other creatures which the earth is full of the fulness of the earth and another the fulness of a City all the people Psal 24. â— Amos 6.8 Isa 4â— 10 that dwell in it and again another the fulness of the sea the Isles whereof it is full with all their inhabitants And because the forms of things as Philosophers speak their perfections and qualities do fill them up and give them all the beauty they have like as plants and living creatures are the ornament of the earth people the glory of Citys and Isles so many crownes of the Sea thence it comes that by a very elegant figure the graces and perfections of such or such a subject are termed the fulness thereof for that without them it would be empty and of such a condition as that rude and uncouth mass that Moses describeth in the beginning of Genesis the earth saith he was without form and void Gen. 1.2 before the LORD clothed it with these stately ornaments and filled it with that rich abundance which
we now behold upon it It s in this sence that the Apostle St. John gives the name of the Fulness of CHRIST to that total abundance of perfections and divine graces which dwelt in Him His wisdom His justice His sanctification and His redemption when he saith that of His fulness we all have received Joh. 1.16 And it is after the same manner that S. Paul hereafter by the fulness of the Godhead meaneth all the qualities or properties of the Divine Nature its Understanding its Wisdom its Omnipotency it 's Goodness and Infinite Justice saying That in JESVS CHRIST dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily Col. 2.9 It is therefore in this sense also as seems to me that we must take the word Fulness in this Text referring it to the things whereof the Apostle had even now spoken when he affirmed That JESVS CHRIST is the Image of the invisible GOD the First-born of every creature by whom all things were created and do subsist the Head of the Church the Beginning and the First-born from the dead holding the first place in all things For these qualities as you see are the perfections and excellencies partly of the Divine Nature and partly of the Humane the former namely His being the Image of GOD and the Master and Author of the Creatures pertaining to the Divine the latter to wit His being the Head of the Church and the First-born from the dead to the Humane so as when the Apostle after these things addeth now For it was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell it is as much as if He had said For it was the Fathers will that there should appear in His CHRIST a rich and a compleat abundance of all Divine and Humane perfections all the beauty dignity and excellency that replenisheth heaven and earth that adorneth the nature of GOD and of men And so the question which Interpreters debate whether this Fulness should be referred to the Divinity or to the Humanity of our LORD is cleared for this Exposition comprizeth them both the eternal Wisdom and Power of the one with all its attributes the Sanctity and Charity of the other with all the graces which have been given it without measure This is the All-fulness that dwelleth in JESUS CHRIST And the word Dwelleth hath here a great deal of Emphasis For in the stile of Scripture it signifies an abode not transient and for a time only but such as is firm constant and durable So that the Apostle saying That all fulness dwelleth in CHRIST doth thereby shew us that this rich abundance of all Divine and Humane perfections shall eternally be in Him not as the Divine Glory and Majestie erewhile was in the Tabernacle of Moses and in the Temple of Solomon where it lodg'd but for a space not as the irradiations of the Deity in the souls of the Prophets which they fill'd but for some hours finally not as the graces and perfections that do for some years only enrich the bodies and spirits of mortal men old age and a thousand other accidents and in the end death it self quickly despoiling them of the same which makes the sacred Writers say that the comliness of flesh and the fashion of this world passeth away and that it is like to flowers and herbs in whom beauty tarrieth but a few days time without delay plucking it from them and defacing all the lineaments of it Our CHRIST is an eternal Temple which the Glory of GOD filleth both continually and for ever It doth not meerly lodge there it dwelleth there as in its true and incorruptible Sanctuary Never shall the same be void of it This Fulness shall abide eternally in Him But the Apostle saith That it was the good pleasure of the Father that this fulness should dwell in Him By the good pleasure of the Father he meaneth according to the ordinary stile of Scripture the determination and order of the Eternal wisdom of GOD. For CHRIST did not violently snatch up this glory nor did He assume it to Him of Himself He receiv'd it by the will of the Father who gave Him and sent Him into the world pouring into Him all the treasures of His graces that we might draw from His fulness all the good we need for our happiness But further it must be remembred that the Apostle considereth the LORD JESUS here as CHRIST and Mediator and not simply as the Son of GOD he considereth Him in regard of His Office and not in respect to His first and original nature for if you look upon Him this second way it is clear that being GOD Eternal with the Father He receiv'd of Him His Divine Essence with all its fulness not by any Decree of His will or of His good pleasure but by a natural communication that is to say by an Eternal Ineffable and Incomprehensible generation The Creation of the world is a work of the good pleasure of GOD the Generation of the Son is a natural act of the Person of the Father The first was done in time the other is before all time The world which is the effect of Creation had a beginning of being the Son who is the fruit of the foresaid Generation is Eternal without beginning as well as without end of days But this Son who is GOD by nature is CHRIST by the will of the Father for the name CHRIST signifies an Office and not strictly an Essence or a Nature Originally this Office was not fastned to the Person of the Son He might have been the Son without being our Mediator and had subsisted so indeed if the sin of man had not intervened or if the Justice of GOD had left us in the misery whereinto sin had precipitated us But this good and gracious LORD having had compassion on us and resolved thereupon to bring us up from those deeps of death in which we lay did ordain a Mediator who might effect this great work and invested Him with all the qualities and perfections that were necessary for this end It 's therefore precisely under this respect that the Apostle considers JESUS CHRIST here when he saith It was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell He thereby meaneth it was the Fathers will that in this Sacred Person of the Mediator who was established and destinated for our salvation all perfection richness grace and excellency should meet together Divinity and Humanity filled with the infinite aboundance of all the qualities and properties that pertain to them concur Such being His good pleasure He chose His Son GOD co-eternal and co-essential with Himself who uniting all the riches of His Deity with the Humane nature He assumed constituteth one only person in the bosom of which dwelleth all this fulness that is necessary for the charge of Mediator Whence it appears how vain the cavil of Hereticks is who conclude from this passage that the Deity of the
Son is not Eternal and co-essential with the * As the whose Church believeâ— Fathers but created and made by the will and good pleasure of the Father For the Apostle doth not speak here of the original of the perfections that are found in CHRIST but of their being united and met together in one and the same subject I acknowledge it is by the good pleasure of the Father and by the order of His will that the Godhead of the Son dwelleth in the Mediator But it thence follows that this Godhead of His is an effect of the Fathers will It was before it filled the Mediator The same Father who by His will united it to our flesh for the making up together with that flesh the person of CHRIST had communicated it to His Son from all Eternity by a natural act of His Eternal understanding that is to say by a Divine Generation Now it is not in vain that the Apostle here advanceth this assertion That it was the good pleasure of the Father all fulness should dwell in HIS CHRIST But he doth it with design to * Or settle confirm our Consciences in the Religion of the LORD JESUS only For these Colossians as we shall see hereafter were tamper'd with by Seducers who mingled the Mosaical Ceremonies with the Gospel and the worshipping of Angels with the service of the LORD the Apostle therefore doth here timely fortifie these Believers against this error and that by two excellent Reasons the first taken from the dwelling of all fulness in JESVS CHRIST Poor men saith he what seek you for either in Moses or in Angels we have all in JESUS CHRIST There is no good no perfection nor excellency either in GOD or in the Creature but dwelleth in this Soveraign LORD Having Him we have no need at all to go unto others since in Him we find all The other Reason is taken from the Will of GOD the supreme rule of Religion the only thing that is sufficient to settle the agitation and natural distrust of our Consciences As for JESUS CHRIST saith he it was the good pleasure of GOD that in Him should all fulness dwell The Father hath set up Him to be the spring of our salvation But as for Moses and Angels we do not see that ever it was the will of the Father to give them such a dignity Dear Brethren now that our faith is fought against with the like errors let us arm it also with the same reasons If the Adversary send us to Angels and Saints let us answer him that the LORD JESUS sufficeth us that having Him we can want nothing since all fulness dwelleth in Him I will not enquire for the present what these Angels and Saints are whom you recommend to me whether they have indeed that merit and that righteousness and that authority which I need for the expiation of my sin and for opening the house of GOD to me How rich and how abounding soever you represent them to me I may let pass their store this CHRIST whom I embrace having all fulness dwelling in Him Let them be all that you please they will want however some part of that infinite plentifulness which overfloweth in our CHRIST And how zealous soever you be for their glory yet you durst not presume to say that all fulness dwelleth in them How great is your imprudence to go hither and thither a groping in pits and cisterns while you have near you such a living and inexhaustible fountain Grant that the worshipping of Saints is not criminal which yet it evidently is it is notwithstanding superfluous forasmuch as it hath nothing in it but we find the same better in the fulness of JESUS CHRIST But the other consideration which the Apostle sets before us here is of no less force That it was the good pleasure of the Father all fulness should dwell in His CHRIST My Faith yea our Adversaries attends on the will of GOD. This will is its object and its rule I cannot rellish either Doctrine or Service that is not conform thereto Tell me how you know it is the good pleasure of GOD that this fulness of merit and power which you ascribe somtimes to Saints departed somtimes to your Pope and his Ministers doth indeed dwell in them As for the LORD JESUS whom I adore and in whom I seek all my bliss the Father hath proclaimed from Heaven That He is His welbeloved Son His Scriptures declare That He hath committed all judgment to Him and That all fulness dwelleth in Him But as for those others whom you have taken for objects of your Devotion and to whom you have recourse for your salvation you cannot shew me any thing semblable of them Certainly then it must be vouched that all your Devotion in this behalf is but a Will-worship founded only on your own passion and the fancy of your Leaders not upon the good pleasure of the Father It is strange fire that hath issued out of the earth and not been kindled from Heaven Such as cannot without crime either enter into or be used in the Sanctuary of GOD. But I return to the Apostle who having said That it was the good pleasure of the Father all fulness should dwell in CHRIST doth add And by Him to reconcile all things in Himself both those that are in Heaven and those that are in the earth This is the great Master-piece of the good pleasure of GOD the end for which His will was that the fulness of all Divine and Humane perfections should be seated in CHRIST And this is that which the particle and used by the Apostle doth signifie It doth not meerly connect the two parts of his discourse but importeth moreover the consecution and the dependance of the latter on the former as if He had said It was the good pleasure of the Father that in JESUS CHRIST should all fulness dwell and so reconcile or to the end that He might reconcile all things by Him For all this fulness which the Father would that His CHRIST should have dwelling in Him was necessary for His effecting this Reconciliation There needed he should have the power and the holiness and the wisdom of the Divinity and together with it the humility and the obedience and the meritorious sufferings of the Humanity that he might finish this design He could not have been able to re-unite Heaven and Earth with less preparations Let us see then what this work is this Reconciling the Apostle speaks of of all things Terrestrial and Celestial in GOD by JESVS CHRIST It is clear by the Scriptures that JESUS CHEIST hath by His death reconciled men unto GOD so as He hath appeased His wrath and opened to us the Throne of His grace as the Apostle teacheth us in divers places and particularly in the Epistle to the Romans Rom. 5.10 11. 2 Cor. 5.18 where he saith That we have been reconciled to GOD by the death of His Son and
elsewhere That GOD hath reconciled us to Himself by JESVS CHRIST But it seems that this is not precisely that Reconciliation which S. Paul meaneth here First because the things in heaven which he expresly puts among the parties reconciled have no part therein the Angels that dwell in the Heavens pure and holy as they are having never fallen into any alienation from GOD. Secondly because of that Reconciliation the Apostle will speak instantly in the words immediately following in which he saith Having made peace by the blood of His cross so as the former words must of necessity be referred to some other Reconciliation except we will render the language of this Divine Writer culpable of a vain and fruitless repetition The truth is they that understand these words of Reconciliation with GOD do find themselves much intangled in the matter and have recourse to divers means for clearing them of this difficulty Some affirm that though the Angels be holy and blessed yet they were not exempt from needing the death of JESUS CHRIST to merit and obtain their confirmation and perseverance in the estate they had a bold Doctrine and such as it is hard to find any foundation for in the Scripture For by this reckoning JESUS CHRIST should also be the Mediator of Angels a thing that seems to cross the end and the true nature of this Office First because a Mediator should partake of the nature of the parties whom he reconcileth as you see that JESUS CHRIST the Mediator between GOD and men is GOD and man whereas He took not the nature of Angels Secondly because every Mediator interveneth between parties that are at difference whereas the Angels are and ever were at perfect accord with GOD holily obeying His will Lastly because the blood of JESUS CHRIST was shed only to wash away sin and the Scripture every where represents the people of GOD's Covenant His redeemed ones and those whom He hath saved as justified and cleansed from their filth for which there was no place in the nature of Angels they being pure and clean from all sin For as to that of Job That GOD putteth no trust in His servants Job 4.18 and doth set light by his Angels it is evident and acknowledged by all Christians that this is not said to accuse those blessed Spirits or to suggest that if they were tried by the ordinary and legal justice of GOD they would be found guilty and have need of pardon but rather to signifie either that the Authority of GOD over His creatures is so great and so absolute as He oweth nothing to the Angels themselves how exquisite soever their Sanctity be the light of glory wherewith He crowns them being a gift from His own bounty and not the due reward of their merit or else that the infinite purity of this Supreme Majestie is so splendid and so glorious that the light of the most holy Spirits fadeth before Him and is found dusky and defective in comparison of Him as the shining of our lights and of the Stars themselves doth disappear at the brightness of the Sun Others therefore not able to savour and for just cause I think this Doctrine that the Angels were reconciled to GOD by JESUS CHRIST to exclude them from this passage do restrain the Apostle's words to men only understanding by the things that are in Heaven the already hallowed spirits of the faithful which death had taken out of this world and by the things that are on earth the faithful that yet live here beneath in flesh But not to dissemble this Exposition seemeth both forced and frigid Forced because the Scripture by things in heaven ordinarily meaneth the Angels whose element and natural habitation as you know the heavens are whereas souls separated from their bodies are receiv'd in and lodged there by a Supernatural grace and dispensation Frigid because the sense it attributeth to the Apostle no way answers the sublimity and dignity of his words For if his aim were to express nothing but that the faithful are reconciled to GOD what need was there to divide them into two ranks some that are on the earth others that are in the heavens Who doubts but He reconciled these as well as those But without question he purposed to magnifie this work of GOD by JESUS CHRIST and to this end saith that it extendeth not to men alone that are reconciled to the Father by the efficacy of the cross of the LORD but that it hath effect in heaven it self re-uniting and reconciling the things that are there What shall we say then to these difficulties and in what sense shall we take the Apostle's words That GOD hath reconciled all things in Himself both those that are on earth and those that are in heaven Dear Brethren we will leave them in their genuine and ordinary sense and say that these expressions do signifie the recomposing and re-uniting of the creatures both Terrestrial and Celestial not with GOD but among themselves with each other For as in a State the Subjects have a twofold union one with their Prince on whom thy all depend another among themselves being as members of the same Political Body joyned together by the bond of mutual concord amity and correspondence In like manner is it with things Celestial and Terrestrial the two principal parties of this great State of GOD's which we cal the Universe Besides the union they have with GOD as their Soveraign Monarch from whose bounty they receive the being and the life they enjoy they have another alliance and conjunction one with the other as parts of one Corporation having been formed and qualified for mutual commerce It 's in this relation and in this union that the beauty and perfection of the Universe doth consist when Heaven and earth have amicable entercourse and conspire to one and the same end with an holy and a reciprocal affection Sin having broken the first union and separated man from his Creator by the same means dissolved the second loosning us from the creatures For as again in a state when one part of the Subjects riseth against the Sovereign the rest that remain in their duty presently break with the Rebels and instead of the commerce they held before with them do make cruel and implacable war upon them while they continue in their disobedience Such hath the event proved in the world Man had no sooner rebell'd against GOD but heaven and all that remained in His obedience brake with man Whole Nature took up arms against this Rebel and would have even then utterly ruin'd him if the Counsel of GOD who would not destroy us had not hindred it And as from one disorder there never fail to spring up divers others this first rupture of man with GOD and the good Creatures brought forth divers others indeed rending mankind it self into several pieces the one divided from the other by diversity of Religions and the aversions and animosities that attend it
elected and imploy'd to compass it or the love of the Son who for our welfare spared not his own blood Sinner approach the Throne of GOD with boldness He is no longer environed with flames and Lightning flashes He is full of grace and clemency Fear not His indignation or His severity Peace is made Your Rebellions are expiated your sins are purged GOD requires nothing of you but Faith and Repentance His Justice is contented and doubt not but the satisfaction it hath received is sufficient He that made it for you is the Well-beloved of the Father the Lord of glory in whom all fulness dwelleth You will find abundantly in Him all the good things that are necessary for your felicity the light of wisdom to dissipate your darkness and illuminate your understandings unto a perfect knowledge of Divine things a righteousness most compleat and of proof every way to justifie and exempt you from the Curse of the Law and to open the entrance of the Tribunal of GOD to you A most efficacious Sanctification to mortifie the lusts of your flesh and fill you with Charity Honesty and Purity And a most plentiful Redemption to deliver you from death and from all the evils that have connexion with it and put you in Eternal possession of Immortality Make your advantage of this Divine Well of Life Give no ear to them that call you any otherwhere You are happy enough if you possess the LORD JESUS He is the only Prince of Salvation the Way the Truth and the Life And as for Creatures whether Earthly or Heavenly fear them not If you are JESUS CHRIST's they shall do you no evil He hath reconcil'd them all to you He hath taken out of them all the will and all the power they had to hurt you They desire your good and secretly favour you owning you for their Friends and Allies Heaven looks down on you in peace and calleth you up into its holy place The Angels bless you and direct all your ways This Earth will hold you no longer than your common LORD shall judge expedient for His own glory and your salvation But if this general peace which you have now with GOD and the World do rejoyce you the means by which it was procured should no less ravish you even that blood of CHRIST shed out upon a Cross the grand Miracle of GOD the price of your Liberty the Salvation and the Glory of the Universe What and how ardent was that love which gave so rich and so admirable a Ransom for you What will He deny you who hath not kept back His own blood from you who to make you happy abhorred not a Cross the most infamous of all punishments who to raise you up to the most eminent Contentments underwent the extremest Dolours the lowest disgrace to bring you unto highest glory the Malidiction of GOD to communicate to you His Benediction O over-happy Christians if you could discern your blisses Where is the anguish of Spirit or the trouble of Conscience or the loss or the suffering or the reproach which the meditation of this love should not consolate Who shall condemn us since the Son of GOD dyed to merit our Absolution Who shall accuse us since His Blood and His Cross defend us Who shall take from us the Benevolence of the Father since He hath obtain'd it for us and conserves it towards us Who shall pluck out of our hands a life He hath given us a Salvation that He hath so dearly bought But dear Brethren these considerations which open to us so rich a Source of Consolation oblige us also to a singular Sanctification For how great will be the hardness of our hearts if these great evidences which GOD hath given us of His love do not affect us if they kindle not in us an ardent affection towards a GOD who hath so loved us a sacred and inviolable respect towards a Redeemer who hath done so much for us He hath reconciled and reunited all things in Him both Terrestrial and Celestial Let us live then henceforth in such sort as may answer this happy alliance Let us no more afflict heaven no more scandalize the earth by the impurity of our deportments Let us labour in conjunction with all the Creatures for the service and to glory of our common LORD Imitate we the purity the zeal and the obsequiousness of those Celestial Spirits into whose Society we are entred by the benefit of this Reconciliation Let us be cloathed as they are with a beautiful and pleasing light Our lot is to be one day like them in Immortality let us be so for the present in Sanctity Our peace is made with GOD. Let us not make war upon Him any more He hath pardoned us all the exorbitancies and rage of our Rebellion never turn we to any of them again He will be our good LORD and gracious Master Be we His faithful Subjects and obedient Servants Let the Blood of CHRIST wipe away both our guilt and our filth Fasten we our old man to His Cross Let the nails that there pierced His flesh pierce also the members of ours Let the Cross that made Him dye make to dye all our lusts and extinguish by little and little in us that earthly carnal and vicious life which we derive from the first Adam to regenerate and raise us up again with the second unto a new an holy and spiritual life worthy of that Blood by which he He hath purchas'd it for us and of that Spirit by whom He hath communicated the beginnings of it to us and of that Sanctuary of Immortality where He will fully finish it one day to His own glory and our eternal blessedness Amen THE XI SERMON COL I. Ver. XXI XXII Vers XXI And you who were somtime estranged from Him and who were His enemies in your understanding in wicked works XXII Yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh by death to render you holy and without spot and unreprovable before Him DEar Brethren It was long since observed by Philosophers and we still find it by experience that general things do move the spirits of men very little The cause is that being naturally glewed up too close every one to his particular interests they mind only that which toucheth the same and are not sollicitous about a common concern till they are made some way smartly sensible that themselves have part in it The ministers of the Church therefore should not content themselves with proposing the maxims of heavenly doctrine in gross and in general only to the souls whose edification is committed to them that they may get hold of them and produce some good effect upon them they must apply to them in particular each of those Divine verities St. Paul whose example should serve for a rule to all the true servants of GOD takes this course in divers places of His Epistles and particularly in the Text we have now read you For
Himself without witness and that He hath made manifest in His works what may be known of Him But all this light doth only shew us the greatness of their corruption For they with all the vivacity of their spirits made no proficiency in the School of Providence unto the fearing of GOD and serving Him but became vain in their reasonings and miserably abused the gifts of Heaven so as the whole success of this dispensation was nought else on their part but that they were thereby rendred inexcusable Conclude we then that all men generally not one excepted are of their own nature such as the Apostle here describes the Colossians strangers and enemies to GOD in their understanding in wicked works There is nothing but the word of the LORD alone which is able to bring them out of this estate by the saving grace of His Spirit wherewith GOD accompanies it And this the Apostle representeth here to the Colossians in the second place For having minded them of their former condition he addeth Yet now hath GOD reconciled you by the body of His flesh that is the flesh of JESUS CHRIST by His death The condition they were in before was very miserable For what can be imagined more wretched than men far from and strangers to GOD in whose communion alone all their welfare consisteth men enemies to Him without whose love they can have no true good yet besides misery there was horrour also in their case Misery doth ordinarily stir up pity their 's was worthy of abhorring and hatred For what is there in the world that less deserves the compassion of GOD and men or is more worthy of the execration of Heaven and Earth than a Subject that withdraweth from His Soveraign that hates Him and Warrs against Him that insolently violates all His Laws and abandons himself to all the crimes He hath forbidden especially if the Soveraign be gracious and beneficent as the LORD is the only Author of all the being life and motion that we have Nevertheless Oh inestimable and incomprehensible goodness GOD for all this forbore not to have pity on the Colossians He sought to them when they were alienated from Him He offered them peace when they made War upon Him He took them for His friends and chose them for His Children when they shewed Him the greatest hatred and enmity Their wicked works deserved His curse and He bestowed on them His grace Their rebellion deserved His direful flashes and He sent them His comfortable light This opposition the Apostle indicateth here when he saith And yet you hath God reconciled A like opposition he expresseth elsewhere Rom. 5.8 in the same matter saying GOD altogether commendeth His love to us-ward in that while we were but sinners CHRIST dyed for us For the setting forth of this great grace of GOD towards these faithful people he saith that GOD hath reconciled them Having spoken of their estrangement and of their enmity with GOD He doth with good reason make use of the word Reconcile to signifie the setting of them again in His good liking and favour It happens somtimes in the misunderstandings of men that the averseness and hatred is but on one side one of the parties seeking the favour of the other Here as we have yerst intimated the aversion was mutual For we hated GOD and He because of our sins hated us It was necessary therefore for the restoring of us that both the one and the other of these two passions should be remedied that is that the wrath of GOD against us should be appeased and our hatred and enmity against Him extinguished The word Reconcile doth of its self comprehend both the one and the other But in the Apostle's writings it referreth principally to the first that is the mitigation and appeasing of the wrath of GOD. As indeed this is the principal point of our reconciliation For GOD being our soveraign LORD it would not benefit us at all to change our will towards Him if His did not operate otherwise towards us as the repentance and tears of a subject are vain if his Prince reject them and remain still angry with Him Furthermore the word Reconcile as also the most part of other words of like form and nature is taken two manner of ways For either it signifies simply the action that hath such vertue as is necessary to make reconciliation or it compriseth the effect of it also It 's in the first sense that the Apostle used it afore where he said that GOD hath reconciled all things celestial and terrestrial in Himself or for Himself having made peace by the blood of the cross of CHRIST For he meaneth simply that GOD hath taken away the causes of hatred and enmity and opened the way of reconciliation not that all things are already actually reconciled It 's thus again that we must take 2 Cor. 5.19 what he saith elsewhere that GOD was in CHRIST reconciling the world unto Himself not imputing unto them their trespasses But the Apostle takes the word Reconcile in the second sense when he saith that we have obtained reconciliation by CHRIST and when he beseecheth us to be reconciled to GOD it being evident that in these places he intendeth not the right and power only but the very effect and actual having of reconciliation It 's after this second way that we must take the word reconcile in the Text. For again this Reconciation may be considered two ways first in general as made by JESUS CHRIST on the Cross and secondly in particular as applyed to each of us by Faith In the first consideration it is presented to all men as sufficient for their salvation according to that doctrine of the Apostle Tit. 2.11 1 Joh. 2.2 that the Grace of GOD is saving to all men and that also of St. John that JESVS CHRIST is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world Under the second consideration it appertaineth only to the faithful according to that clause of the covenant which declareth That the only Son was given to the world that whosoever believeth in Him Joh. 3.16 should have eternal life It 's precisely in this sense the Apostle saith here that GOD had reconciled the Colossians he meaneth not simply that GOD had given them through the cross of His Son that they might be reconciled to Him by believing but also that He had effectively reconciled them to Himself and put them in real possession of the benefits that were purchased for us by the merit of CHRIST embracing them as His children pardoning them all their sins and obliviating all His wrath and the aversion their offences had given Him towards them But the Apostle mentions to them yet again here the means by which this reconciliation was effected as being a thing of infinite importance both to the glory of GOD and their edification He hath reconciled you saith he by the body of His
enmity to the end that being purified by the vertue of the Sacrifice of His Son and clothed with His righteousness by faith we might appear before the Tribunal of His grace without condemnation and without confusion But nothing compelleth us to pitch on this It is much better in my judgment to understand it of our sanctification than of our Justification First because the words themselves agree much better with it the Scripture as you know ordinarily expressing the gift of Regeneration by the word Holiness whereas it useth the word Justifie or pardon of our sins and not imputing them unto us when it would signifie the first benefit of GOD which we obtain by the imputation of the righteousness of CHRIST Secondly because the Apostle having already represented it unto us in those words that GOD hath reconciled us by the body of the flesh of His Son by death which do signifie that He hath received us into favour pardoning us all our sins as we have explained them it seems needless to repeat the same thing again In fine because both St. Paul and the other sacred writers are wont to joyn those two gifts of GOD our Justification and our Sanctification together as two graces that are inseparable and never go one without the other so as having spoken to us of the one it was not only convenient but also in some sort necessary 1 Cor. 1.30 1 Cor. 6.11 he should annex the other just as elsewhere having said that CHRIST is made unto us righteousness he immediately adds and sanctification and again in another place where having touched the filthiness of the former life of the Corinthians as here that of the Colossians he saith But ye are washed but ye are sanctified Here the Apostle doth not only knit these two graces together but moreover sheweth us the order and relation which they have the one to the other that the second to wit Sanctification is the end of the former that is of Justification He hath reconciled us saith he by the death of His Son to render us holy without spot and unrebukable before Him The Scripture teacheth us the same thing in divers other places as in St. Luke where Zachary saith that GOD sheweth us mercy and delivereth us out of the hand of our enemies that we might serve Him without fear in holiness and righteousness before Him And St. Peter in his first Epistle Luk. 1.74 75. 1 Pet. 2.24 CHRIST saith he hath born our sins in His own body on the tree that we being dead to sin might live unto righteousness And our St. Paul that JESVS CHRIST dyed for all that they which live 1 Cor. 5.15 might not henceforth live unto themselves but unto Him who dyed and was raised again for them and elsewhere again that CHRIST gave Himself for us Tit. 2.14 that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie us to be unto Him a peculiar people addicted to good works and in another passage altogether like that which we are upon Eph. 4.5 He loved the Church saith he and gave Himself for it that he might sanctifie it have cleansed it by the washing of water by the word and might present it to Himself a glorious Church having neither spot nor wrinkle nor other such thing but that it might be holy and unreprovable I insist upon this point because it is of exceeding great importance First you see by it what the dignity of Holiness is For since the end of necessity is always more excellent than the means which are used to compass it it is clear than sanctification being the last end of all the things that the LORD employs for our salvation is the greatest and most excellent of all His graces And so you know St. Paul positively declares that Charity which is for substance no other thing but sanctity is more excellent than either faith or hope and he proves it because neither the one nor the other of these two vertues shall have any place in Heaven as being but means and helps for our conducting thither whereas Charity as the last and highest perfection of our being shall eternally remain Secondly from hence appears how much carnal Christians do deceive themselves who pretend to salvation without sanctification Wretched men what do you Your pretention is a vain Chimera You pursue an impossibility For that salvation which you do desire is nothing for the main but that very holiness which you do refuse Both that faith and those other qualities which as you say you have serve only to sanctifie men Without this they are unprofitable things Suppose then that you have them if they do not change you if they do not fill your heart with love to GOD and with charity towards your neighbour in a word if they render you not holy they will advantage you nothing So far will they be from giving you immortality that they will aggravate your misery and sink you deeper into the abyss of death Never believe that GOD gave us His own Son clothed Him with a body of flesh delivered Him up to the death of the Cross that He reconciled us by such precious blood and wrought all these grand wonders which ravish Heaven and Earth that He might acquire us the priviledge to sin freely For far be it from so wise and so holy a Deity to be thought to have ever had such an extravagant and infamous a design He hath laid forth all the marvels of grace and love upon us that He might restore His own image in our nature that He might abolish sin out of it and transform us into new creatures pure and holy and in some sort like Himself and His Son in this respect I confess the description which the Apostle here giveth us of this grace of GOD in us is high and magnifique and that it seems to surmount the reach of believers while they are in the present life For of which of them can it be truly said while he remains in this world that he is Holy and without spot and unreprovable before GOD But to this I answer first that neither doth the Apostle affirm that this great work of the LORD 's in us is compleated in this life He sheweth us only what His purpose is and what the end of His grace and how good and glorious that holiness is wherewith He will cloath us For if we be truly His He will not leave us till He hath made us such as the Apostle's Text importeth even holy without spot and unreprovable Secondly I say that though the highest degree of sanctification in this life be much beneath that which shall adorn us in the next and that in comparison of it the same is defective yet it fails not of being true and of having all its parts though in a weak degree It is sincere and without hypocrisie and such in summ as the words of the Apostle in some sort agree to For true believers while
the other Even such is the case of true Believers and such as are but temporary Persecution and offence do not make the difference which is seen between them when the former do retain the Gospel and the others quit it This event only sheweth that the one were GOD's wheat and the others but chaff according to what S. John saith of Apostates They went out from us because they were not of us 1 John 2.19 that it might be made manifest that all are not of us The same is to be further seen evidently in the Parable of the Sower where the LORD saith expresly Mat. 13.13 19 21. that he that persevereth had heard the word and understood it and receiv'd it in an honest and good heart Whereas He saith of them who do revolt that one heard but understood it not another had no root in himself An evident sign that their disposition was different at first before the perseverance of the one and the fall of the others Whence appears how impertinent the Argument is which our Adversaries draw from the Apostacy of the latter to prove that the faith of the former may fail and on the contrary For if the wind carry away the chaff it doth not therefore follow that it shall also bear away the corn and if the storm beat down an house that 's planted on two or three stakes it is not to be said it may do as much to an House that 's founded on a rock If the blade that shoots forth and grows up suddenly in the sand without any bottom happen to wither at the first extreme heat that smites it this implieth not that the like may betide the corn which is deeply rooted in a good and fertile soil The other point which we have to observe is the assurance of true faith excellently represented here by the Apostle in these words which are full of a singular Emphasis If you continue in the faith being founded and firm contrary to what is taught in the Church of Rome that faith is in a continual agitation so as a Believer can have no assurance that he is for present in the state of Grace and much less yet that he shall persevere in it for the future In Conscience can it be said of these people as the Apostle saith here of the LORD 's true Disciples that they are firm and founded How may it be seeing they incessantly float in doubt and uncertainty and are miserablely in suspence between the hope of heaven and the fear of bell I pass by that other error of theirs which is yet more contrary to the Apostle's Doctrine namely their maintaining that the choicest faith may fail If it be thus how can it be affirm'd that those that have it are founded and firm Let us then hold fast the truth that 's taught us here and in divers other places of Scripture to wit that true faith abideth always and being founded on the Merit and the Death and the Intercession of JESUS CHRIST doth never fail The wind makes but the chaff to fly away it prevails not upon good grain It overthrows only the trees that are feeble and ill grounded It leaveth in their place those that stand upon good and deep grown roots And as an Ancient sometime said Tertul. de Paersc We may not account them prudent or faithful whom Heresie hath been able to change None is a Christian but he that persevereth to the end But I return to the Apostle who for the fuller Explication of this firm and not to be shaken faith which he requireth in us for the obtaining of salvation addeth further And if ye be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel Justly doth he joyn Hope unto Faith these two virtues being so straitly link'd together that they mutually succour each other and one cannot be had or lost without the other For first Hope is the suit of faith expecting with assurance the fruition of the the things that we believe so as when the perswasion that we have of them comes to totter it is not possible but the hope which was founded on it must come to ruine Again in the combats which we sustain for the faith hope is one of our principal supports while it is firm and vigorus in us it repelleth without difficulty all the strokes of the Enemy opposing to the fear of the evils wherewith he threatneth us and to desire of the good he promiseth us the incomparable excellency of the glory and felicity which we look for in the other world He that hopes for heaven cannot be tempted by the paintings and appearances of the earth For this cause the Apostle in another place compares hope to an Anchor which penetrating within the vail fastned and grounded in Heaven holdeth our vessel firm and steady amid the waves and agitations of this tempestuous Sea whereon we sail here below And it 's this in my opinion which the Apostle aims at here that the faithful might be established in the faith he willeth them to have still in their hearts the hope of heavenly bliss and never to suffer this Sacred and Divine Anchor to be taken from them They are in safety while it holds them fast But for the better expressing it he calleth it peculiarly The hope of the Gospel that is the hope which the Gospel hath wrought in us the expectation of those good things which it promiseth And so you see he referreth Hope to the Gospel as to its true and genuine object All the hopes that we conceive from other grounds are vain and failing There are none but those which embrace the promises of JESUS CHRIST that are firm and solid and such as never confound them that wait for them The Gospel promiseth us first the entire expiation of our sins and the peace of GOD in JESUS CHRIST His Son They therefore that seek this benefit in the Ceremonies and Shadows of the Law as the Galatians somtime did and the false Teachers who would have seduced the Colossians or that seek it in their own merits and the merits of Creatures they all I say and all that are like them let themselves be carried away from the hope of the Gospel Then again the Gospel promiseth us eternal life in the heavens by the grace of GOD in His Son Those therefore quit the hope thereof also who seek their felicity either in the earth or in heaven otherways than by the sole mercy of the LORD Whereby it doth appear how very pertinently S. Paul doth recommend this hope of the Gospel unto the Colossians For in the combat wherein they were engaged it was sufficient to preserve them from all the attempts of the Impostors What have I to do saith this Hope with the observation of your Disciplines or the quirks of your Philophy since I abundantly have in my Gospel all the good things which you vainly promise me But because it is ordinary with false Teachers to abuse the name
of the Gospel and to give it to the Fopperies and Vanities which they preach S. Paul to put the Colossians out of all doubt and ambiguity indicateth expresly to them what this Gospel is of which he speaketh That saith he which you have heard namely of Epaphras who had preached it among them and to whom he gave before an excellent Testimonial for fidelity and sincerity I mean saith he the Gospel which you receiv'd at the beginning from the mouth of true Servants of GOD and not these vain and dangerous Doctrines which evil workers would make to pass with you for the Gospel of CHRIST though they be nothing less then so But to confirm them the more in the faith he sets before them in the second place an excellent encomium of the Gospel which containeth a clear proof of its truth saying That it is the Gospel which was preached to every creature under heaven It is not the Doctrine which these false Apostles sowed here and there in some out quarters whispering and privily advancing the same among light and unstable spirits It is the true Word of the Son of GOD which had been proclaimed through the whole Universe by His command and according to the Oracles of His ancient Prophets That Word which going forth from Jerusalem did spread its self every way in a very little time and being accompanied with the power of its Author made it self be heard and believed in all the Provinces of the habitable earth in spight of the contradictions of Hell and the world His assertion that the Gospel was preached to every creature which is under heaven may be expounded two manner of ways but both of them amounting to the same sense First by a Figure very common in Divine and Humane speech the word Creature may be taken for Man the noblest and most excellent of all the Creatures And the LORD had so used the word before in the same matter when He commanded His Apostles to do what S. Paul doth magnifie in this place Go ye forth said He to them into all the world and preach the Gospel unto every creature Where it is evident that by every creature He understandeth men who alone are capable of hearing and receiving what is preached In this sense when S. Paul saith that the Gospel was preached to every creature it is as much as if he had said to all mankind and among all sorts of men agreeably to what he saith here a little after speaking of himself that he admonisheth every man Col. 1.28 and teacheth every man in all wisdom Secondly these words To every creature may in my opinion be taken also as signifying in all the world and this the rather because it is literally in the Original in all the creature with the Article the and not simply to every creature Now that S. Paul sometimes useth this term the creature to signifie the world this great body and collection of all things which GOD hath created this is manifestly to be seen in the Epistle to the Romans where he saith Rom. 8.19 20 21. That the great and ardent desire of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the children of GOD and again That the creature was made subject to vanity and more a little after That all the creature groaneth and travelleth in pain together until now where it is clear and confessed by the greatest part of Interpreters that the creature signifies the world and our Bibles to make us understand it the better do change the singular number into the plural rendring it les creatures and toutes les creatures the creatures and all the creatures whereas the Original readeth simply the creature and all the creature Taking it thus therefore in this place when the Apostle saith the Gospel was preached in all the creature which is under heaven he meaneth in all the world wherein we dwell wherein GOD hath seated mankind beneath the heavens I will make no stay here now to shew you how it might be truly said in S. Pauls time that the Gospel of our LORD was then preached to all mankind or in all the habitable world or how this event is a clear and solid proof of its truth We have already heretofore handled both the one and the other of these two particulars in expounding if you remember the sixth Verse of this Chapter which affirmed that the Gospel was come unto all the world Upon that Text which signifies no other thing than what the Apostle saith here namely that the Gospel hath been preached in all the creature which is under heaven We shewed first by good and irrefragable testimonies of Ancient Writers both Christian and Pagan that the heavenly Word had been preached within the Apostles days in all Countreys then known either to Greeks or Romans and receiv'd for the most part with fruit so as taking the word World according to the stile of all Languages not simply and absolutely for all the parts of the Terrestrial Globe but only for those which at that time were known to men and which they understood to be inhabited it might be said with truth and without any over-reaching Hyperbole as S. Paul declareth here that the Gospel had been preached in all the creature which is under heaven that is in all the world And in the second place we proved both by the importance of the thing it self and by the respect it hath to the Oracles of the Old Testament which had predicted it many ages before its event that this so swift so sudden and so admirable running of the Gospel through all the world in so few years is a certain and infallible evidence of the verity and divinity of this holy Doctrine obliging consequently both the Colossians heretofore and us at present to hold fast and persevere in the faith which we have given to it without suffering our selves to be ever mov'd away from it either by the cheating arts of false Teachers and their crafty Seducements or by the Threatnings and Persecutions of the world These things having been heretofore largely deduced and opened to you lest the repition of them should be irksome I will pass to the third head of our Text wherein the Apostle sets before the Colossians another Character of true Christian Doctrine to wit that it is the Word the Ministery whereof was committed to him It is saith he the Gospel of which I Paul have been made a Minister He opposeth his heavenly call to the temerity of the false Teachers who ran without having been sent and preached not what Heaven commanded them but what earth inspir'd them with their impulsions and instructions being from flesh and blood and not from the LORD JESUS It was otherwise with Paul all the faithful knew him to have been called from heaven and suddenly changed by the efficacy of Divine power from a Wolf into a Pastor made an Herald and witness of the Gospel immediately by the LORD JESUS instructed in His
our members whether the hand or the foot Paul is the hand of CHRIST as one of the members of His body yea one of the most excellent Surely then all that he suffereth partaineth to CHRIST It 's His affliction and His hurt None of the wounds of His servant is alien to Him And you see even among men it 's an offending a Prince to offend His Minister it 's an affronting the Husband to injure the wife to fall upon the servant is to make battery on the Master Though the union of these ranks of persons be nothing so strict or so intimate as that of JESUS CHRIST and the faithful yet it sufficeth to denominate those outrages and injuries the Prince's the Husbands or the Masters injuries which are done to the persons that appertain to them under that relation Accordingly you see in the course of civil affairs men interess themselves as much in such kind of causes and take as heinously or more the outrages done to persons depending on them and dear to them than those that are directly aimed at themselves Thus in the Heavenly State of the Church JESUS CHRIST owneth both the good and the evil that is done to His faithful ones He saith of those that visit that comfort and feed His poor members that they visit and comfort and feed Himself Of those that refuse them these good offices He complained that they have denied them to Him And Paul had learned this lesson from His own mouth For when in the darkness of his ignorance he agitated with the fury of his zeal without knowledge persecuted the Disciples JESUS had cryed to him from Heaven Saul Saul why persecutest thou me Acts 9.4 It is me thou outragest in the person of those faithful people whom thou purposest to bind and imprison Thou dealest them never a blow but reacheth me I miss not by being in Heaven to bear a part in all that they suffer one earth The blood thou drawest from them is mine and as their persons belong to me so all their afflictions and torments are mine The Apostle instructed by this Divine oracle boldly calleth afflictions of CHRIST all that which he suffered after he had the honour to be His. But he doth not barely say here that he suffereth the afflictions of CHRIST He saith he fills up the rest or that which is behind that which was yet wanting of them To understand it aright we must remember what he teacheth us elsewhere to wit that whom GOD hath foreknown Rom. 8.28 He hath also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son that He might be the first born among many brethren And that one of the principal parts of this conformity is their suffering here below and their partaking of the cross of CHRIST according to the constant advertisement He giveth us in Scripture as that if any one will follow Him he do take up his Cross that such as will live godly in Him shall suffer persecution and that it is by many afflictions GOD leadeth us into His Kingdom Now as the wisdom and understanding of the LORD is infinite He hath not only ordeined this in general but hath defined and decreed in His eternal counsel both what the whole body of the Church shall bear in gross and what each of the faithful of whom this body is composed shall suffer in particular through what trials he shall pass where his exercises shall begin and where they shall end And as His hand Acts 4.28 1 Pet. 1.20 and His counsel had before determined all that the LORD JESUS suffered in His own person by reason whereof S. Peter calleth Him the Lamb that was pre-ordeined before the foundations of the world So likewise hath He resolved upon and formed in the light of His eternal Providence the whole lot of each one of the faithful all the parts and passes of their combat The case of the head and of the members is alike There doth not any thing betide them by meer chance The procedure and proportion of their whole laborious course is cut out and fashioned before all ages According to this holy and veritable doctrine the Apostle doubted not but that His task was ordained in the counsel of His GOD and the number of his sufferings determined and the quality of them regulated Having then already dispatched a good part of them he meaneth here that which remained for him yet to finish according to the counsel of GOD. I accomplish saith he in my present sufferings the remainder of the afflictions of CHRIST I dispatch my task by little and little and what I now suffer makes up a part of it It is one draught of the cup which the LORD hath ordained for me a portion of the afflictions which I am to pass through for His CHRIST's sake and cause It 's one of the conflicts which I must endure for the consummating of my whole course But it may not be omitted that the word here used and which we have rendred I do fill up is in the Original very emphatical and signifies not simply to fill up or to finish but to fill up in ones turn in consequence of and in exchange with some other I reckon that there is represented by it a secret opposition between what JESUS CHRIST had suffered for the Apostle and what the Apostle at that time was suffering for JESUS CHRIST The LORD saith he hath in his rank compleated all the sufferings that were necessary for my redemption I now in my turn fill up all the afflictions that are useful for His glory He did the work which the Father had given Him to do on earth and I after Him and after His example do that which He hath charged me with He hath suffered for me I suffer for Him He hath purchased my salvation by His cross I advance His Kingdom by my combats His blood hath redeemed the Church my imprisonment and my bonds do edify it For you see My Brethren that the conformity which is between JESUS CHRIST and each one of the faithful doth require that there be such a resemblance between His sufferings and ours And this is that which the Apostle intends by the word here used Hitherto we must also referr his saying particularly that he fills up the remainder of the afflictions of CHRIST in his flesh For as the LORD did suffer in this infirm and mortal nature which He had put on and after He had put off the infirmness of it and rendered it immortal and impassible suffered no more in like manner it 's in this flesh that all the afflictions shall be filled up which we are to suffer by the order and counsel of GOD. When we shall have once quitted it there will be no more conflicts and sufferings for us to undergo then there were for the LORD JESUS after His death upon the cross It 's this same thing the Apostle signifies in the passages before alledged that he beareth the
is clear that we read nothing in this text either of these satisfactions or of that treasury or of those indulgences whereof they tell us Certainly if they will draw these things from hence it behoveth them to shew us that they are here to discover them to us to constrain us by the force of their proofs to see it here But so far are they from binding us to this that they not so much as endeavour to do it and content themselves with telling us that though our exposition be good and true yet theirs also must be adjoyned Since they urge no other reason of it but their own dictate we may reject it with the same facility that they offer it Nevertheless for your greater edification I will insist a little further upon the illustration of this Text. First the Apostles words do no way oblige us to understand him of their satisfactions it being evident that it may be said of all useful things that they are for those who have the use of them as for example that it is for men the Sun shineth in the heavens that it is for them the clouds poure down the rain and the earth yieldeth its fruits That it is for the Church S. Paul wrote his Epistles that for the same he preached and published the Gospel and a thousand other such things 2 Cor. 12.15 in which never any man dreamt of any satisfaction And when S. Paul professeth to the Corinthians that he would most willingly spend Justinian on the place and be spent for them doth he mean for the satisfaction of their sins No saith a Jesuite but he speaks of his great pains in preaching and teaching which would not have failed of being very useful to the edification of the Church though of no value for the satisfaction of GOD Here therefore in the same manner when the Apostle saith his afflictions are for the Church It follows clearly that his sufferings were of use to the Church which I willingly confess but not that they were satisfactions for the sins of the Church which is precisely the thing we deny and which they should prove But if the words of this Text do not found their exposition the authority of the Fathers of which they are wont to make so great a noise doth not establish it any jot more there being not known any one of them that ever inferred their doctrine from the Text or that interprets it otherwise than we have done Lastly the thing it self doth as little favour their design And to demostrate it to you we must briefly touch at all the points of their pretended mystery It is composed of four propositions all which they advance upon their own credit without founding so much as one of them on Scripture For first they presuppose that when GOD pardoneth us the sins that are committed after Baptism He remitteth to us only the fault and the eternal punishment but not the temporal punishment of our trespasses this they count He obligeth us to expiate either here or in Purgatory Secondly they add that divers Saints as the Apostles and the Martyrs and others have done and suffered much more than themselves needed for the expiating of their own sins And as they are provident thrifty men lest these superfluous satisfactions for so they call them be unprofitably lost they hold that they go into the Churches common treasury where being mixed with the superabundant passions of CHRIST they are conserved for the necessities of penetents And finally after all the rest they give the custody of this treasury to the Bishop of Rome alone who dispenseth it as he judgeth expedient Here 's a chain of immaginations which have no foundation either in reason or in Scripture or any other where but in their own passion and interest For first who taught them to cut in pieces thus the benefits of GOD and to suppose that He remits the guilt without the punishment as if to remit a sin were ought else than not to punish it and that He again remits a part of the punishment to wit the eternal and holds us bound to satisfie for the other How doth this accord with that full and entire grace which He promiseth to repenting sinners and how with His declaring that He will forget their sins that He will do away their iniquities that He will remember them no more and that there is no condemnation to them that are in JESVS CHRIST Would not it be a mocking of men if after all this He should exact of them the punishment of their faults to the utmost farthing And as for the pretended satisfactions of the Saints whence have they drawn them from what Prophets from what Apostles seeing both the one and the others do declare that none of them were justified by their doings or their sufferings that they all had need of grace for the expiation of their sins So far were they from having suffered more than was necessary to expiate them and that all their sufferings are not able to counterpoise the glory wherewith GOD will crown them And if we be indebted unto them for any part of the expiation of our sins what will become of the Apostles assertion that CHRST purged our sins by Himself Heb. 1 3â— and that he did consummate or make perfect them that believe by that one sole oblation which He made on the Cross If S. Paul who is in question did in suffering satisfie for us how doth he protest elsewhere that He was not crucified for us Sure according to our adversaries supposition 1 Cor. 1.13 he could not in truth deny it For if his sufferings do serve not only to the edification of our lives but also to the satisfying for our sins as they pretend there remains no longer any sense in which it may be said that CHRIST alone did suffer for us These two propositions that the Apostle did suffer and did not suffer for us will be irreconcilable whereas in our doctrine it is easie to accord them by saying he suffered for us that is for our edification and suffered not for us that is not to satisfie for our sins this kind of suffering appertaining to the LORD JESUS only Beside if the afflictions which the Apostle speaks of here were satisfactory for the Church as our adversaries will have it S. Paul would not have suffered them with joy it being evident that pains of this nature do necessarily seize those that suffer them with an extream horror and heaviness because they are accompanied with the apprehension of the wrath of GOD against sin as it appears both by the Cross of our LORD which he bore constantly and patiently it is true but without any moving of joy and also by the confession of our adversaries themselves who represent to us the souls that suffer for their sins in their imaginary Purgatory all astonied with horror and full of an excessive sadness In fine how doth this fixtion accord with the
groaned repair this disorder Comfort her with your pious tears whom you have sadded by your vain pleasures Break with the world Have no more commerce but with the children of GOD. Remember you have the honour to be the body of JESUS CHRIST How is it that you have no horrour at defiling in the ordures of sin and vanity those members which are consecrated to the Son of GOD washed with His blood sanctified by His word and baptized with His Spirit The Church beside this purity of life which its edification requireth of you at all times doth particularly at the present demand of you the succour of your alms for the refreshment of its poor members Their number and their necessity encreaseth daily Let your charity be augmented after the same proportion Let it relieve the indigence of some let it allay the passions of others let it extinguish enmities and hatred among us all Let it seek not only to those whom you have wronged but even to them that have offended you without cause that henceforth you may truly be the body of the LORD His Church holy and unblamable having no spot nor wrinkle nor any such thing patient and generous in affliction humble and modest in prosperity crowned with good works and the fruits of righteousness to the glory of our great Saviour the edification of men and your own salvation Amen THE XIV SERMON COL I. Vers XXV XXVI XXVII Vers XXV Of which Church I have been made a Minister according to the dispensation of GOD which hath been given me towards you to fullfil the word of GOD. XXVI Even the secret which had been hid from all ages and generations but hath now been manifested to His Saints XXVII To whom GOD would give to know what are the riches of the glory of this secret among the Gentiles which is CHRIST in you the hope of glory THE Church of our LORD JESUS CHRIST is the fairest and most glorious State that ever existed in the world a State formed in the counsel of GOD before the creation of the heavens founded on the cross of His Son in the fulness of time governed by the Father of eternity enlivened by His Spirit the most prized of His Jewels the last end of His works and the only scope of all His marvels It 's a State not mortal and corruptible as those of the earth but firm and everlasting situate above the Sun and Moon and see all other things roul under its feet in continual change without being subject to their vanity It 's the only society against which neither the gates of hell nor the revolutions of time shall at all prevail It is the House of the living GOD the Temple of His holiness the Pillar of His truth the dwelling-place of His grace and glory Whence it comes that one of the Prophets long ago contemplating it in spirit cried out transported and in extasy Honourable are the things Psal 87.3 that are spoken of thee O City of GOD. But among its other glories this in my opinion is none of the least that GOD would employ the hands the sweat and the blood of His Apostles for the erecting of it It is for the Church that He made and formed these great men It 's for the same that He poured into their souls all the riches of Heaven And as they had received them for the Churches service so they laid them out faithfully and cheerfully in it yea to such a degree that they counted it a great honour to suffer on its occasion They blessed the reproaches that they received for edifying of it We lately heard S. Paul the most excellent of those divine men protesting that he rejoyced in his sufferings and afflictions for the Church and now in the Text we have read he goeth on and saith that he is the Minister of the Church What and how admirable must that happy Republique be whose Minister and servitor S. Paul was the greatest of men one of the master-pieces of Heaven and the wonder of the earth But beside his designing to justifie by these words the joy he had in suffering for the Church as Minister of it He would also found the liberty he took to make remonstrances to the Colossians and authorize his doctrine against the errors which Seducers were sowing among them For this cause he enlargeth on this matter and magnifieth his Ministry First he represents unto them the foundation of it namely the Call of GOD and the object of it that is those towards he ought to exercise it and the end of it in verse 25. in these words I have been made a Minister of the Church according to the dispensation of GOD which hath been given me towards you to fullfil the word of GOD. After this in the following verse he extolleth the subject about which the labour of this ministry was to be to wit the word of GOD saying that it is the mystery which had been hid from all ages and generations but which hath now saith he been manifested to the Saints Lastly he addeth in the last verse the efficacy of this Divine secret towards the Gentiles and declareth in one wherein it consisteth namely in JESVS CHRIST our LORD He is the whole matter and substance of this great mystery GOD saith he would give the Saints to know what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles which is CHRIST in you the hope of Glory These are the three points which we purpose to handle in this action if the LORD permit the ministry of Paul the mystery of the Gospel and the riches of its glory towards the Gentiles The subject is great the time short and our abilities small May it please GOD to supply our defects by the abundance of His Spirit so powerfully strengthning and multiplying the words of our mouth in your hearts that notwithstanding their scantiness and poverty they may yet administer food for your souls even as sometime by the vertue of His blessing seven loaves and a few little fishes as you heard not long ago sufficed to satiate a great multitude As for the first of these three points the Apostle speaking of the Church doth say Of which I have been made a Minister according to the dispensation of GOD which hath been given me towards you to fullfil the word of GOD. Upon which we have four things to consider First the quality of the Apostles office which he termeth the ministry of the Church Secondly the the title to this office founded on the dispensation GOD had given him Thirdly the object of the execution of this office which he expresseth by saying towards you that is towards you Gentiles as we shall shew anon and in the Fourth place the function and the proximate end of this office which he declareth to us in those words to fullfil the word of GOD. Observe then Brethren first of all how this holy Apostle to express the office to which GOD had
His peace His Spirit His Holiness His consolation His life and His immortality But the Apostle doth not speak here of the riches of the glory of the Gospel in general and towards all He addeth particularly among the Gentiles Sure there is no sort of men whether Jews or Greeks but the Gospel sheweth forth riches of glory in them if they receive it Yet we must acknowledge that never-did its glory break forth with so much splendor as when it was preached to the Gentiles First that exceeding great and inexhaustible abundance of goodness and grace which the Gospel goeth fill'd up with did pour forth it self and if I may so speak overflowed all bounds in saving the Gentiles the most hopeless of all men when it raised them from this grave or rather from that abyss of misery wherein they had lain not four dayes as Lazarus in his Sepulchre but for four thousand years For this cause the holy Apostle comparing the grace of GOD in His Son 〈◊〉 15.8.9 shewed to the Jew with that shewed to the Gentile at His calling of each of them doth name the former Truth for that it was promised and the second simply and altogether Mercy Then again how very admirable was the vertue of the Gospel which effected that in a few dayes that the Law had not been able to do in so many ages The Ministers of the Law did compass Sea and Land and after all found it very hard to make one proselyte and with all their diligence for two thousand years that they toiled had not reduced so much as one Nation to the Service of GOD though they employed even sword and strength to that end when they could But the Gospel quite naked and without other weapons then its Cross brought unto GOD many a people converted from Paganism They were a sort of men that worshipped stocks and stones they lay plunged in a bruitish ignorance and in the most infamous vices there was a mixture in them of the stupidity of beasts and the wickedness of Devils Certainly to make so much as one of these a Christian to bring him out of this infernal pit 〈◊〉 and place him in the Church to make him of a slave of Satan a child of GOD was as an Ancient writing on this passage rightly says no less a miracle than if some one should suddenly change an unclean and deformed dog into a man and from the dunghil whereon he lay cause him to sit upon a royal throne It was truly therefore a great and an ineffable richness and abundance of glory for the Gospel to transform so speedily not a small number but hundreds and thousands of Pagans into so many believers And in this the Apostle secretly strikes at the false Teachers who would mix such a noble and glorious mystery with their feeble traditions as if it had not strength and vertue enough of it self to subsist without the succour of their inventions Finally he intimates in two words the ground of all this richness of glory that the Gospel hath which is saith he CHRIST in you that is to say that CHRIST whom they possessed and who dwelt in them by faith 1 Tim. 1.1 And he addeth that He is the hope of glory after the same manner that elsewhere he calleth CHRIST our hope that is He of whom we hope for highest glory and in whom we do infallibly find all the blessedness that we can either defire or expect It is not without design that he advertiseth them that JESUS CHRIST is all the fullness of the mystery of the Gospel He lays a foundation hereby for what he will more clearly tell them hereafter namely that it is in vain that the seducers would mingle the Ceremonies of Moses and the service of Angels with it All this great mystery begins and ends in JESUS CHRIST since it is no other thing 1 Tim. 4.16 as himself defineth it elsewhere than GOD manifested in the flesh justified in the spirit seen of Angels preached to the Gentiles believed on in the world and received up into Glory that is JESUS CHRIST our LORD born put to death raised again glorified and set forth in the Gospel for us Such is the mystery whereof the holy Apostle hath spoken to us Judge now Beloved Brethren what grace GOD hath shewed us in communicating so rich and so admirable a secret to us Many Kings and Prophets have desired to see and hear it and not at all had the happiness Heaven and earth did sigh four thousand years after the blessing we possess But in the end only the last ages did obtain it The Jews saw the wonders of GOD but obscurely and through veils and shadows The Gentiles saw them not at all being covered with a disinal night living without GOD and without hope This divine mystery appearing at once in the end of times as a great light that shines forth sudainly from Heaven did dissipate the shadows of the one and dispel the darkness of the other changing by its vertue the whole face of the universe in a moment It hath particularly shewed the riches of its glory among us having brought our Fathers out of the horrours of Paganism which did once cover this whole Land Let us embrace therefore with all the affections of our souls this great and inestimable favour of the LORD's Let us keep it pure and uncorupted without immixing in it ought that 's alien to it It is not only sufficient for our happiness It is even rich and abundant in glory They that would stuff it out with Ceremonies and services whether of Moses's teaching or mans inventing as false Teachers heretofore did and our adversaries at this day do they understand not aright the inexhaustible opulency wherewith it overslows They obscure the resplendency of its heavenly glory by their additions they hide it and cover it again with the veil which JESUS CHRIST hath rent in sunder Let us say to such as propose them unto us We are contented with the mystery which GOD hath vouchsafed to manifest unto His Saints It sufficed for their bliss It will well suffice for ours We do not desire any other riches than those which it aboundeth with or any other glory than that which it shines withall It is enough that this JESUS CHRIST who fills it up is in us the hope of true glory There is no need to associate with Him either Moses or Angels or Saints But Faithful Brethren the securing of this mystery from the errors of superstition is not all For the conversing of it pure among us and placing it in that glory which is due to it there must be a putting far away the filth of vices and of carnal and earthly passions GOD hath not lighted up this great Sun among you that ye should continue to live ill and do the same works in such a blessed light as are done in darkness Far be it from Him He hath discovered to you the mysteries hidden
crucifie their flesh with it's affections and who forgetting the things which are behind do advance some steps daily towards the mark and prize of their calling such as Paul whose speech about it you are now hearing hath prevailed to render by the efficaciousness of his Preaching perfect in CHRIST JESVS It 's a mistake it 's a folly to fancy any others These double or middling Christians that would at once be both Christians and worldlings disciples of Heaven and of Earth have no more place in reality of nature than in the Scriptures of GOD. If you would have place among the perfect ones of the life to come be betimes among the perfect of this life There 's no ascending to the one of these perfections but by the other If you will be one day in the number of full-grown men of JESUS CHRIST be now in the number of His Children Walk in faith and in love during this Pilgrimage if you pretend to the vision and glory of the heavenly Country But it is now time My Brethren to say something to you of the Apostle's labour and combats having spoken of his Preaching Whereunto I also labour saith he combating according to His efficacy which worketh powerfully in me Sure there is no Christian but meets in the way to Heaven with many thorns which the flesh the World and the Devil do sow there for that they cannot suffer that any one should undertake so glorious a design but they must cross him 〈◊〉 utmost of their power Yet among all the faithful there are none that have more labours and combats to undergo than the Ministers of the Gospel This high Office besides that it is first very painful in its self doth next draw the hatred and persecutions of the enemy upon them more than others and again among all those whom GOD hath honoured with this divine employment it must be acknowledged that the Apostles are the men who had most difficulties to surmount and afflictions to wade through All our pains to say true are but Childrens play in comparison of the combats that these great Warriers had to fight For who doth not know that in every work of importance the beginning is ever much more difficult than the progress and prosecution The Apostles brake up the ground wherein we labour They opened and planed the race in which we run They with infinite pain laid the foundations of the house which we build The business at that time was to overthrow Paganism to demolish Judaism to fill up great deeps and to make plain mountains whereas we enter upon a work already setled and fixed They went through a Country where was neither way nor path nor any thing favourable to them whereas we go in the track they have made To all this we must also adde the great extent of their charges which enclosed the whole universe and obliged them to take care of all the Nations of the World whereas we labour each of us in a small parcel of this great and vast heritage of the Son of GOD. What shall I say of the persecutions which Satan raised up and brought upon them in all quarters animating all the powers of the world against them and subtily engaging them in this war some by a zeal for the Religion of their Fathers others by reasons of State some by a jealousie for reputation others by their passion for pleasures and vices To overcome so many difficulties and to advance as they did a work whose success was in appearance as impossible as if they had undertaken to displace the bounds of the world and to change mountains and seas it was evidently necessary that these holy men should toil in an extraordinary manner and strive with a quite other vigor than any of all the rest of the faithful ever had But though they all applied themselves to such service with an indefatigable and couragious earnestness and with an admirable constancy of mind yet sure S. Paul did particularly signalize himself among those blessed Patriarks of the new people and Israel of GOD For as to labour which he mentions first none of them all preached CHRIST with more fervour none of them pressed men to yield themselves to Him with more vehemency none began with more allacrity nor went on with more assiduity There never was tongue more active nor pen more Divine nor mind more vigilant He alone travelled well-nigh as many countries as all the rest together He visited all nations sowing the Gospel every where watering it night and day by His speech by his tears and by his cares with incredible pains He had no sooner achieved one conquest but he enterprized another and the end of one labour was to him but the beginning of another Never did ambition or avarice though the most restless of our passions put men of the world to half the pain that the design of bringing mankind to the perfection which the LORD JESUS promised caused unto him And as the inclination which the Sun hath to communicate his comfortable beams to all creatures keeps him in a perpetual motion without permitting him to have one moments rest So S. Pauls charity and the passion he had to shed abroad every way the light and life and blessedness wherewith his Master had filled him pressing him alike both day and night made him take his course without ceasing and roul continually about mankind presenting his treasures sometimes to one country and sometimes to another passing all the days he lived in this glorious unquietness Neither did he overlash at all when he said somewhere being compelled to it 1 Cor. 15.10 by the unequitableness of his Calumniators that he had laboured more abundantly than any of the rest That part of his story which S. Lake hath told us in the Acts doth justifie the truth of those words of his and these fourteen divine Epistles which he hath left us and which do themselves make up part of his admirable labours do as clearly shew us how the case stood indeed His combats were no less than his ministerial labours For by them he meaneth the perils and the sufferings upon which his discharging his Apostleship and the preaching of the Gospel did cast him every hour which he frequently compares to the combats that were at that time solemnized in Greece because those that entred into them had divers pains and inconveniences to suffer as he sheweth at large towards the end of the ninth Chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians He had more enemies to sustain 1 Cor. 9.25 26 27. than any of the rest Jews and Pagans without Seducers and false brethren within It may make us tremble but to read the persecutions and the crosses he received from the one and the others Himself hath drawn up a little Catalogue of them wherein he represents to us through what depths of afflictions he had passed and did still daily pass being pursued out of measure both by his own
yea a glorious light that is to say great and sparkling Why then saith he that the treasures of wisdom are hid in Him whereas it seemeth he should say on the contrary that they are manifested in Him that they shine out and appear clearly in Him I answer that the one and the other may be said in divers respects For if you consider the thing in its self the treasures of wisdom are manifested to us in JESUS CHRIST and there is no purifyed Soul but sees them in Him and acknowledgeth them immediately when it views Him as the Gospel represents Him But if you have respect to the eyes and perceptions of men as they naturally are even obscured and corrupted by Sin I confess it 's hard for them to discern in JESUS CHRIST the riches of wisdom and knowledg which the Father hath put in Him and that this proceeds in part from that veil of meanness and infirmity wherewith He is as it were covered all over And this makes S. Paul say elswhere that CHRIST crucified whom He preached was to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness though to the faithful who were called He was the Power and the Wisdom of GOD. Therefore it being necessary for our Salvation that He should be born and live poorly on earth and there suffer in the end the death of the Cross which surpassed all others for cruelty and ignominy the Father who sent Him in this form cloath'd with this sad and shameful mantle that assrighteth men hath both manifested and hidden His treasures in Him He hath manifested them in Him since it is in Him and by Him that He exhibiteth to us whatsoever we ought to know for the attainment of Salvation He hath hidden them in Hun since He hath covered this treasure with such a veil as by its poor and contemptible look discourageth men and makes them say as Isaiah prophecyed He hath no form nor comeliness in Him and when we see Him there is no beauty that we should desire Him But they which have their eyes purified by light from on high do discern under this appearing simplicity and humility all coelestial riches in their stateliest and most glorious form This is the Apostle's meaning here when he saith that these treasures are hid in CHRIST He advertiseth us that we must not stop at that infirmity and emptiness which appeareth at first sight in Him and disgusteth vain and earthly spirits but look within and contemplate the great wonders which GOD hath there manifested for our compleat instruction and consolation Hitherto we have examin'd the words of this Text. It remaineth that we now consider the truth in it We shall do it but summarily For the prosecution of this rich subject in its whole extent is above the ability of Man or Angel to be worthily performed so great is the heighth and depth of it But we will briefly touch its chief heads Mans true wisdom in his present state is to know His misery with the means to escape it and his felicity with the way that he must take to attain it As for our misery nature indeed hath given us some perception of it there being scarce a man in the world who sees not some depravation and irregularity in himself and whose conscience doth not reproach him with his faults and threaten the judgment of a supream justice The Law hath taught us much more of it representing GOD unto us as armed with inexorable severity against sinners and fulminating his curse upon them But beside that these knowledges are weak and are easily smothered in security there is this sorrow with them that having shewed us our misery they do not inform us of the remedy so as if they be necessary to draw us out of that folly wherein the most are plunged who confidently sleep amid the tempest and presume they are well while they have a mortal impostume in their brain or in their bowels yet it cannot be said that they suffice to make us wise seeing that for the just possession of this title a man must know not only his malady but also the means to cure it And yet though we knew it too nevertheless this would not be sufficient because besides deliverance from evil we desire also the fruition of good yea the chief Good But neither the light of nature nor even the light of the Law does reveal to us what this supream felicity is which without distinct knowing it we do desire so far are they from shewing us the way to it But in JESUS CHRIST as proposed to us in the Gospel these Verities that are necessary to render us wise are found clearly and fully all of them For as to our misery He declareth it exactly to us not by some surd and inarticulate sounds as nature doth nor by circuitions and essaies as the Law did but by the fullest and most moving way of information that ever was in the world even crying aloud to us from that Cross to which our sins had nailed Him Behold ye sons of men how horrid your crimes are since that it was necessary for the washing them away that I should come down from the Heavens shed forth my blood Behold how great irreparable your fall was since there was none in heaven or earth that could raise you up again but my self As much as the life of the Son of GOD is more precious than the life of all mankind so much clearer is the proof which his death giveth us of the horror of sin than that which we might take from the death of all that ever sinned though we should we see them stricken down together and punished by the avenging justice of GOD. But if this great Saviour do make us so feelingly perceive the horridness of our misery his end is only to make us the more ardently desire and embrace the remedy which he offereth us fully prepared from that same Cross to which he He was fastned for us I grant that the forbearance and kindness of GOD in his conduct of men though sinful might give them some sparkle of hope and his promises under the old Covenant had highly confirm'd it betimes But the Sword of his Justice dreadfully flaming in the hand of the Law perplexed them not a little and it was very difficult for them to accord His inflexible righteousness with the mercy that was necessary for them JESUS CHRIST hath removed all these difficulties and exhibiteth unto us in his Cross the solution of all our doubts Fear nothing sinner I saith he have contented the Justice of God and satisfied his Law Boldly trust his promises and approach his Throne with full assurance This blood which hath opened to you the entrance thither is not the blood of a beast nor an earthly ransome it is the blood of GOD a ransome of infinite value more than sufficient to take away your sins how infinite soever the demerit of them be But you will say This
is not yet enough for my consolation CHRIST I confess sufficiently assureth me of the pardon of my sins What assurance doth he give me against so many enemies the world the evil Angels flesh and blood in midst of whom my way doth lye But Christian doth not the same Cross which hath merited your pardon give you also clear and undoubted evidence of your safety during the whole course of your life For since you understand by it that GOD hath delivered up his only Son to death for you how can you fear that he will with-hold any of the cares of his Providence from you Yet this is not all CHRIST JESUS who sheweth us these excellent and sacred verities in his death as it were engraven in great Letters on his Cross holds up others before our eyes of no less importance in his Resurrection Believers neither the pardon of your sin nor the assistance of GOD during your life would be sufficient for you for as much as after all death will swallow you up as well as unbelievers See then further in your JESUS the truth that is necessary to compleat your consolation By committing his spirit at the point of death into the Father's hands he teacheth you that GOD will receive your soul when you depart out of the world And by rising again the third day after he assureth you that your bodies shall one day be rais'd out of the dust And ascending into Heaven he assureth you that you shall be transported thither both soul and body to live and reign there with him in eternal glory As for the way which you must take to arrive at this high happiness his whole life and his death have clearly mark'd it out to you and he still shews it you from that lofty Throne whereon he is set Tread in my steps saith he if you will be exalted to my glory Follow the example of my innocence and of my charity if you desire to have part in the Crown of my Kingdom I have born injuries with calmness and patience I have constantly obeyed my Father even unto my death on the Cross and you see the honour wherewith he hath crowned me Imitate my obedience and you shall receive my recompence This is the lesson which the LORD JESUS giveth us shewing us incomparably more clearly than either the frame or government of the World or the Mosaical dispensation ever did both the Justice of GOD that we may dread him and the Power and Wisdom of God that we may reverence him and his mercy that we may love and serve him with all the strength of our souls serve him I say not with the sacrifices of old Judaism nor with the feeble and childish devotions of Superstition but with a pure and holy heart with works worthy of him with an ardent zeal a sincere charity a constant integrity and honesty a profound patience and humility an immovable hope and confidence These are the Verities which do constitute true Wisdom all of them as you see high and sublime but in like degree useful and salutiferous Here is not question of the nature of Elements of Animals of Plants or of Meteors nor of the motions of the Sun or of the Moon or of the other Planets but of the Beeing and the Counsels and the Conduct of that Great and Most High God who made and formed all those things and in comparison of whom Heaven and Earth are but a Mite of dust Question is not of numbers and figures which can neither diminish your mseries nor make your souls happy but of your peace with GOD of your consolation in this life and of your glory and immortality in the next It 's this which JESUS CHRIST teacheth us that Divine crucified Person who dyed and rose again for us It s this he shews us represented in high and splendid colours through all the pieces of his Mystery However Nature and the Law might discover the brims and first lineaments of this Celestial Wisdom it 's he alone who hath exhibited to us the whole body and shewed us the entire frame and structure of it Conclude we then that it is verily in him that all the treasures of wisdom and knowledg are hidden as the Apostle saith Embrace we this Conclusion with firm belief and upon it bless we GOD first for that he hath vouchsafed to give his CHRIST unto Mankind and particularly for that he hath communicated him unto us mercifully presenting him to us both in his Word and in his Sacraments Next pray him to open our eyes more and more that we may discern these rich and precious treasures of wisdom and knowledg which he hath hid in him Let not the vileness of his Cross nor the veil of his Infirmity nor the simplicity of his Gospel and these Sacraments wherein he is offer'd to us offend us This very thing if we consider it as we ought makes up one principal part of the wonder and that we may rightly know and value this treasure let us cleanse our minds from the clay and mire of the earth let us purifie our understandings and rid them of the sentiments and opinions of the world which being fastned to its own dung doth prize nothing but the luster of its false honours and the vanity of its perishing riches and the delight of its unseemly pleasures Let us once set free our souls from these fordid and servile passions and acknowledg as is clear and visible and justified by experience that it 's an extream error and folly to seek one's happiness in such wretched things Lift we up our eyes unto Wisdom and desire the possession and embrace the study of it It is the jewel and ornament of our nature its whole dignity stands in it Without it man is little or nothing different from beasts nay in some sort in worse case than they as sinking beneath himself and falling into utmost misery But give we good heed lest we take a shadow for substance and a phantasm for true wisdom Be not deceived This wisdom is only in CHRIST JESUS All that pretended wisdom which hath the acclamations and applauses of people whether in the Courts or in the Schools of the world is but masked folly a disguised extravagance and a painted error which passeth by the principal and necessary part and amuseth its self about that which is of no profit nor any way provides for its own welfare which is the true end of wisdom Seek it therefore in JESUS CHRIST alone It is in him that you shall find the true substance of it And as those that have any treasure are wont to visit it often and have their hearts always in the place where it is so think you night and day upon this Divine Saviour in whom are hid the treasures of wisdom and knowledg Consider him pry into him and diligently sound him He is an Abyss of good things Have your hand ever there and draw thence by faith study and meditation all
that was born of the blessed Virgin and reciprocally the sufferings the qualities and the actions of the Flesh that was born of Mary are attributed to the Eternal Son of GOD as when the Scripture saith That GOD hath redeemed the Church with his own blood that the Lord of Glory was crucified that JESUS CHRIST is before Abraham was that he founded the Earth at the beginning and the Heavens are the work of his hands and other like expressions Dear Brethren such is the sense of these divine words of the Apostle Admire ye the force and the richness of the Scripture which hath in so few words blasted and beaten down all the inventions and dogmatizings of Error against the Truth both of the two Natures of our LORD and Saviour and of the union of them in His Person First These words do overthrow the impiety of those who bereave JESUS CHRIST of his Divinity and reduce Him to the degree and condition either of a meer Man or of a Person raised indeed above man yet made notwithstanding and created at the beginning as well as other Celestial and Terrestrial Creatures How can such blasphemy subsist before this Sacred Oracle which proclaimeth not simply the Divinity but that the Godhead and not this simply neither but that the fulness of the Godhead yea to omit nothing that all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him bodily If He be but a Man and no more no part of this fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him neither its Power nor its Wisdom neither its Goodness nor its Justice neither its Glory nor its Eternity For none of these Divine qualities do dwell in one who is but a man We must avouch that he hath in him verily those Perfections that fill up the Godhead that is the Divine Nature or deny that all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him But if you grant me as deny it you cannot without giving the Apostle the lye that all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him you must of necessity confess also that he is GOD no one if he be not GOD being capable of receiving holding and having in himself the fulness of GOD. For this fulness being infinite there is none but GOD that can contain it since there is not any but he alone who is infinite Now it dwelleth all in our LORD JESUS CHRIST It must therefore of necessity be confessed That He is GOD of a Nature infinite Whereby the frigid and frivolous evasions of those impious men are refuted who taking away from JESUS CHRIST the reality and true glory of Divinity do leave him the name of it and make a titular GOD of him a GOD as they speak created and raised up a while since who hath but the title of GOD not the nature the office not the essence Who can sufficiently detest the audaciousness of these Wretches that by this impiety of theirs do overthrow all the ground-work of the Scripture which hath insinuated nothing more clearly or more expresly than the one-ness of the true GOD Who is too so jealous of his glory as that he forbiddeth us upon pain of death to give his Name or his Worship or his Attributes unto any Creature of what quality soever If JESUS CHRIST be not the true Eternal GOD Creator of the Heavens and the Earth how will you miserable men avoid this condemnation you that give him the name and the adoration of the true GOD But S. Paul lays all their subtilty in the dust by saying formally here that all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him bodily The fulness of the Godhead is not an empty name or a titular dignity It is that which fills it it is that gloriousness it is that light it is that nature that truth and that perfection wherewith the Godhead is full It 's this therefore that dwells in JESUS CHRIST the substance of a true and real Divinity not an hollow and a vain shadow it 's the thing and not the title of Deity But as the Apostle doth by these words convince the impiousness of such as bereave our LORD and Saviour of the glory of his Divinity so doth he likewise confound the extravagancy of others who deprive him of his human nature foolishly affirming that he had but a false appearance in that kind For here are two subjects clearly represented to us one that dwelleth to wit the fulness of the Godhead another in which this fulness dwelleth to wit JESUS CHRIST the one is the Temple the other is the GOD that resideth in the same the one our Saviours Human nature the other the Eternal Son of the Father Two real and veritable subjects by the wonderful uniting whereof this sacred and adorable Sanctuary of GOD is made up and composed To take away the truth either of his Godhead with the former or of his Flesh with the latter is to destroy the Fabrick Again these words of the Apostle do in like manner overthrow the error of those who have corrupted the union of these two natures in JESUS CHRIST on one hand by dividing them as did the Nestorians on the other by confounding them as did the Eutycheans For if we sever JESUS CHRIST into two Persons the fulness of the Godhead will not dwell bodily in his Flesh This Man will have but gifts of the Divinity which are as it were some draughts and lineaments of it He will not have the Truth and the very Body of it Neither may it be reply'd That the Temple in which GOD resideth is a substance different from his Person For the Body is the residence of the Soul yet Soul and Body have but one and the same subsistence and do constitute but one and the same Person So as the dwelling of the Son in his Human nature as in his Temple doth not hinder but that this Human nature of his doth subsist with him in one and the same Person Yet though we may not divide these two Natures of our LORD it doth not follow that we must mix and confound them as they do who define the union of them by the Human nature its being made equal with the Divine and will have it to be become infinite and immense and endowed really in its self with all the properties of the Divine nature The Apostle saith indeed that the fulness of the Godhead dwells in CHRIST but he saith not that his Flesh was really chang'd into the Godhead The body by being personally united to the soul doth not thereby become soul It conserveth its own nature and hath only this advantage by that strict conjunction which knits it with the soul that they subsist together and make up but one and the same person Just so the Flesh of our LORD by the Word 's dwelling in it becomes one self-same Person with it being truly the body and the soul and in one word the nature of the Son of GOD yet it still keeps its original beeing and essential properties
me with I know not who they were or to say better I know well that they were men subject to failing so as neither you nor I can have any firm and certain assurance that their assertions are true But for this JESUS with whose Gospel I content me we all know that he was the Son of GOD in whom wisdom and truth do dwell bodily with all the fulness of the Deity Moses himself must be silent when the LORD JESUS doth appear as the Starrs do withdraw their light when the Sun shews abroad his The one's Law is no longer considerable when the other's Gospel is risen In fine this sentence of the Apostle's doth suffice to overturn not only all the traditions of men in gross and in general but even each of them singly and in particular For example we are press'd to serve and invocate Angels and Saints departed I will not for the present alledg that GOD whose voice is the rule of my Faith hath given no command about it I will not say that Religious worship doth not belong to any Creature I will not enquire whether Saints do heaâ— from Heaven where they are the prayers that are directed to them on the earthâ— nor whether being finite and created as they are they do behold the motions of our hearts I will only demand of our Adversaries Why they would have us serve and invocate Saints To the end say they that we may gain their favour and their intercession with the Father But poor men have we not in JESUS CHRIST all the grace and favour that we need And though there were nothing else in the matter would it not be great imprudence for us to have recourse to others since we have him near us in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Deity They extol unto us their merits and their satisfactions and the indulgences of their Popes I enter not upon a strict examination of these things nor do I make enquiry for the present whether they be merits and satisfactions and indulgences in reality or no. Though they were what those men pretend they be yet it is clear that they are useless to us since we find in this JESUS CHRIST who sufficeth us all the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in him even bodily If you have need of mercy of grace of consolation of righteousness of merit of assistance of life none of these good things are wanting in him in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Deity And I am well assured you shall find no degree of them any other where either in Heaven or Earth But though some drop of them might be elsewhere met with yet it is certain and your selves will not deny it that they are not to be had either in Saints or in Angels either so undoubtedly or so abundantly as in JESUS CHRIST Why then while I have so rich a treasure in my hands would you have me go a begging other-where It is sufficient for me to be saved Since the fulness of things necessary for my salvation dwelleth in JESUS CHRIST I will content my self with having recourse to him alone with sixing my trust and my love on him and with addressing my services and supplications unto him nor will I be so unadvis'd as to lose or at least hazzard my time and my devotions in directing them to others which I am sure I may successfully apply unto him Dear Brethren Let us hold to this LORD alone Let us not divide our piety between him and any other Let him alone have our whole hearts and all our desires since he alone hath all that fulness which is necessary to make us happy He is the true Fountain of living water let us not draw any other where We have no need of Cisterns This Divine Rock that followeth the Camp of his own Israel hath wherewithal to satisfie all his people plentifully He wanteth nothing who hath fulness Only let us bring him souls hungring after his benefits and thirsting for his righteousness hearts panting after the pleasures of his Sanctuary and braying after him as the Hart after the brooks of water Let us serve him constantly and keep faithfully the holy discipline he hath given us in a continual exercise of piety and charity This is all that he demands of us for the love he hath born us for the favours he hath done us and for the glory which he promiseth us Let us not deny him I beseech you so just a thing Let us do what he requireth us and he will liberally give what we ask of him He will through his great goodness communicate this Divine fulness to us which dwells in himself that being justified by his merit cleared by his light upheld by his power enriched by his treasures quickned by his spirit and fed with his abundance we may one day have part in his Crowns and in his Glory after the petty conflicts and slight trials of this life to be made eternally happy in him Amen The Twenty-second SERMON COL CHAP. II. VER X XI Ver. X. And ye are made compleat in Him who is the head of all principality and power XI In whom also you are circumcised with a circumcision made without hand by the putting off of the body of the sins of the flesh to wit by the circumcision of CHRIST DEar Brethren With excellent reason said our LORD and Saviour when he would magnifie the love of GOD towards Mankind that he so loved the world as he gave his only Son John 3.16 that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life For this donation of his CHRIST which he hath made us is without contradiction the greatest and most admirable evidence of his love that he could give us I confess that this great Frame which he freely bestowed on us at the first Creation this World roof'd with those stately Heavens that environ us enlightned by those brave Luminaries that roll about incessantly over us and filled with an infinite variety of good things was a choice sign of a wonderful bounty and love and that the Psalmist had reason to cry out as ravish'd with the consideration of it What is mortal man Psal 8.5 6 7. that thou hast remembrance of him and the son of man that thou visitest him For thou hast made him little less than the Angels and hast crowned him with glory and honour Thou hast made him ruler over the works of thy hands Thou hast set all things under his feet Yet it must be acknowledged that all this liberality of GOD's to us-ward which consider'd in its self is so great and so ravishing is a small matter in comparison of the ineffable and incomprehensible love which he hath shewed in giving us his CHRIST whether you compare the gifts themselves one with the other or do consider the fruit which they both yeeld For the first Whereas the World is a kind of Magazine of the riches of Nature JESUS CHRIST is the Treasury of
upon them So in Grace if we may take leave to compare the mysteries thereof with natural things JESUS CHRIST the true Sun of righteousness hath not only in himself all the fulness of the Deity dwelling there bodily He also communicateth his fulness to all the souls of men that look on him and do move and live in his communion He filleth them with his abundance and clotheth them with his light changing them into his Image and of dim and dark lumps as they were originally in themselves making them so many Starrs and lightsome bodies Now if you take the Apostle's word here in another manner as importing that we have been made compleat in JESUS CHRIST the sense will still be very pertinent For besides that we being naked of all perfections meet for our nature the saying that we have been made compleat in CHRIST will excellently well express his Grace as signifying that it is he who hath fill'd up our breaches and repaired in us what the other Adam had ruined by giving us all that we wanted Besides this I say this term will also very aptly answer to that title which the Apostle gave a little before to the Ceremonies of Moses's Law where he called them the rudiments of the world that is the beginnings the first and plainest Lessons of Piety Heb. 7.19 Gal. 4. such as consequently were unable to bring to perfection as he saith expresly in another place by reason whereof he stileth the time of the Law the infancy of the Church that is the age of its imperfection Opposing therefore JESUS CHRIST unto the Law in this respect he now saith that we are compleat in Him and that for good reason in as much as He hath the body whereas the Law had but the shadow He hath fulness whereas the Law had but some small parcel of the requisites of our salvation For the same cause he elsewhere calleth the Ceremonies of it weak and poor or beggarly elements Gal. 4 9. As for the Law saith he it did but begin with us and only draw some slight and dark lineament upon us of that true form which GOD did purpose to imprint whereas JESUS CHRIST hath finish'd us In Him it is we have that perfection that entire body that truth and fulness whereof the Law had but the beginning the shadow and figure Hereby now this holy man deals those seducers whom he hath undertaken an handsom blow discovering the foolishness of their design who would still oblige persons to the Ceremonies of the Law that were made compleat in JESUS CHRIST an attempt no less ridiculous than if one should put a man to his ABC again who had received the last tincture of highest erudition in the University pretending that he could not be throughly intelligent and accomplish'd except he still daily studied the rudiments and plainest lessons of Children But that which follows in the Apostle's words namely that JESUS CHRIST is the Head of all principality and power is adjoined to prevent another error of those men's who as we shall hereafter hear did teach the worshipping and serving of Angels pretending it necessary we should address our selves to them as to Spirits capable of interceding with GOD for us and of obtaining by their interposal with that Supreamest Majesty those graces and perfections which we need S. Paul doth shew in these few words the vanity of this false doctrine For since the LORD JESUS is the Head of Angels who sees not but that we have most abundantly in Him whatsoever these people could expect from them and that possessing JESUS CHRIST as we do by faith in His Gospel we have no need to run to Angels who depend upon Him and have nought but what is found much more richly in their Head As if a man that doth possess a Prince's Son would yet needs make use of the favour and interpositions of his servants with him Members have neither motion nor sensation nor life but the same is much more abundantly in their Head Subjects and Servants possess nothing but the Prince can far better and far more easily communicate it to us than any one of them Since JESUS CHRIST is the Head and Prince of Angels it is clear that having Him we want nothing of all that which the Angels can give us From the same ground appeareth further the impiety of the error of these Seducers For since the Angels are subject unto JESUS CHRIST it is evident by the light of Scripture that no one can give them that religious worship which these people attribute to them without becoming guilty of idolatry the greatest and sensiblest outrage that man can do to his Creator For no Christian can be ignorant but that GOD throughout his whole word doth forbid us to serve any creature how high and excellent soever it be religious worship being an homage which belongs to the Divine Nature and cannot be performed without sacriledg to any other As for other things I presume you all know that they are the Angels whom the Apostle means by these principalities and powers of which he speaks as we formerly explained it Col. 1.16 upon the precedent Chapter He saith that JESUS CHRIST is their Head that is their Lord. And this quality belongeth to Him not only as He is the Eternal Son of the Father of the same essence and power with Him who having created them at the beginning and continuing to preserve them by His Goodness and Might is by all kind of right their true Master and natural Lord but also as He is the CHRIST and Mediator For since He in this relation and under this quality hath been constituted the Lord of all things both superior Phil. 2.10 inferior and intermediate having in consequence of His humiliation receiv'd such a Name as is above every name and unto which every knee boweth both of those that are in Heaven and that are on Earth and that are under the Earth it is evident that in this sense He hath dominion and empire over Angels 1 Pet. 3.22 as well as others And thus also S. Peter expresly teacheth us saying that Angels and Authorities and Powers have been made subject to Him For this cause these Spirits are often called the Angels of CHRIST as in S. Matthew Matt. 13.41 24.31 Rev. 1.1 and 22.16 The Son of Man shall send his Angels and in the Apocalypse where S. John saith that JESUS CHRIST sent him by his Angel the things that were revealed to him and in the same Book I JESVS saith the LORD have sent mine Angel Only we must observe that the L. JESUS is not called Head of the Angels in the same manner and sense as He is stiled Head of His Church The former Title signifieth only the Empire and Lordship which he hath over the Angels The second signifieth further the union He hath with His faithful ones who were saved and redeemed by the merit of His Death and are animated
the New Testament were then but fore-told and promised not fully and clearly revealed as now by their accomplishment they have been by means whereof it was meet that during all that time they should be exercis'd in the observing of these typical rites and held in and kept under the Pedagogie of Moses until the fulness of time according to the Apostle's Doctrine in the Epistle to the Galatians Now that JESUS CHRIST hath openly exhibited the very body of truth and fully brought to light all the causes and motives of true sanctification these exercises of the Church's infancy are no longer seasonable and they that still stick to them are no less ridiculous than he that would still keep up the centries of a vault or the models of a building even after the Fabrick is finish'd and brought to its perfection or retain under a School-master's Ferule and in the restraints of childhood a man grown up and come to ripeness of years This is that we had to say for the exposition of this Text. It remaineth for a conclusion that we extract those instructions and consolations which if we meditate on it attentively it will afford us First Since the Apostle assureth us that we are compleat in CHRIST you see how vain those mens pretensions are who set forth certain rules of perfection as they call them beyond the Gospel Let us content our selves with our LORD's fulness and seek our perfection in him alone And instead of amusing our selves about the inventions of men embrace and practise CHRIST's Discipline advancing daily towards the utmost degree of perfectness For we may not flatter our selves with an imagination that a man may nevertheless appertain to him though he lead an wholly vicious and corrupt life S. Paul here protesteth plainly to us that all such as are in him are made compleat Whence it necessarily follows that such as are not compleat are without his communion and by consequence should not promise themselves any share in his salvation it being prepared for those only that are in him If this Doctrine do trouble us let us impute it to our vices and our loosness and taking once this truth to heart with all our might endeavour after that perfection which is in JESUS CHRIST accounting that without it we cannot possess either his grace in this world or his glory in the world to come I well know that to speak absolutely no one is perfect and that if we compare our condition on earth with that in heaven all our perfections are but weaknesses Yet it is true that JESUS CHRIST doth even in this life in some sense compleat his faithful ones and this perfection which he giveth them is not a vain name or an imagination It 's a thing and a most real truth it is a piety and charity sincere and free and without hypocrisie which though it sometimes fail doth notwithstanding produce true fruits and works quite different from those of Worldlings and Hypocrites according to what our LORD said even that if your righteousness do not exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees you shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven Object not that you are yet on earth and that perfection is not to be found but in heaven and that to live as an Angel one should be without a body It is not the perfection of Heaven that we demand of you The LORD will not reject you for having not had in this life the transcendent brightness of the next But though a child be not obliged to conduct his life with as much prudence and reason as a man of years it doth not follow that he hath licence to live without rule and in the debanches and disorders of slaves Every Age hath its bounds and its measures and its perfection Our childhood here below must not be without discipline under the pretence that it is not come to full growth Christians I complain not that there are defects in your knowledg and practice which have no place in Heaven but that there are in you vices which ought to have no place on earth I blame you not for that there is a great difference between you and Angels but that there is none between you and worldly men I require not what is above the strength of your age but what is worthy of your profession and doth not at all exceed your light I beseech you only to labour as much for JESUS CHRIST as the children of this generation do for the interests of their lusts This doth not exceed the capacity of our nature since you see what the servants of sin do and it s necessarily your duty except you imagine that we owe less to JESUS CHRIST than Worldlings do to their foolish and vain passions The first piece of that compleatness which we have in him is this Divine Circumcision which is not made with hand but by the efficacy of his Spirit Without it we can have neither place in the communion of his people nor right to his Inheritance It 's a Circumcision of which we may truly say that every soul that shall not have receiv'd it shall be cut off from his people The Apostle shews us wherein it consists to wit in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh JESUS CHRIST hath put the sword in our hand that 's necessary to cut away this wretched flesh namely his sacred word wherein he discovers the horridness of sin and infernal venom of vices and the vanity and iniquity of all the lusts of the flesh He hath shew'd us the perdition which they that serve it fall into and hath put it to death on his Cross and buried it in his Sepulcher He hath spread before our eyes the wonders of GOD's love and the eternity of the Kingdom appointed for faithful servants He hath given us rules and examples of this part of our sanctification in his Gospel and in his life and offereth us the lights and consolations of his Spirit to lead us in this work Grasp we then this Divine Knife of his Gospel Thrust it hardily in to our hearts and cut out thence all the impurity of the vices that are there Let us rid our selves of them and cast them behind us Exterminate all the productions of the flesh as execrable things Leave not one of them in our selves Having subdued Avarice combat Ambition Pluck out Luxury and all its passions from our inward parts Root up Hatred and Wrath and Cruelty and spare the life of none of these Monsters Let us not rest until we have cleansed our hearts of all this cursed brood For it is not enough to have cut off some of them One sole Enemy abiding in our bosome is able to destroy us The body of the sins of the flesh must be put off saith the Apostle and not one or two of its sins only I confess the labour is hard but it is necessary and that at all times for it is the
henceforth any track of him in your whole course And instead of that infernal vigorousness wherewith he inspired heretofore and disturbed your whole life put on that new man whom JESUS hath on this day made to come forth out of his Sepulcher Drink in his Spirit fill your veins with his Blood and your arteries with his fire Receive his Sentiments and deck your selves with his Lights Lead henceforth a life worthy of his Resurrection and of his Baptism and of that immortal Food which you have taken at his Table Let your actions aim at nothing but Heaven 'T is there your Treasure is Christian what do you yet seek on Earth Your LORD is no longer here This day saw him come up thence to go fit down on high at the right hand of GOD and carry up your hearts with him giving them all his motions that where he is ye may be also And if his will do oblige you to tarry yet a while on earth spend the whole time in the same manner that he spent his forty days after his resurrection in a continual meditation of heavenly things in the company of Apostles in the entertainment of Saints in the exercise of an ardent charity in the preparatives of your ascension to his â—ingdom wholly managing this short space to his glory and to the instruction and edification of men This is that we owe dear Bretthren to the Burial and Resurrection of our LORD There is no need to run to Palestine nor to go up Mount Calvary for to enter into his Sâ—pulcher You are entred into it and buried with him if you by the faith of his Gospel do mortifie and destroy sin according to the intention of your Baptism Nor is it a whit more necessary for the having of part in his resurrection to go and kiss the last print of his seet upon Mount Olivet You are risen again with him if affected with the glory he brought out of his Tomb and perswaded of the truth of the discoveries he made of blessed immortality you live according to the form of his Gospel in purity and sanctification GOD who raiseth the dead by his glorious power please to reveal the same might upon our hearts and form so lively a faith in them as may be the true workmanship of his hand and the faith of his efficacy that we may thereby be buried and raised up with CHRIST and after these first-fruits of his holiness be one day transform'd into a perfect resemblance of his glory for the eternal possessing of that great and blessed Heavenly Kingdom with Him which he hath purchas'd for us by the merit of his death and ensured to us by the virtue of his resurrection So be it The Twenty-fourth SERMON COL CHAP. II. VER XIII Ver. XIII And when ye were dead in offences and in the uncircumcision of your flesh He quickned you together with Him having freely forgiven you all your offences DEar Brethren The Philosophers do with good reason commonly say That contraries illustrate one another For nothing makes us better understand the excellence of liberty than consideration of the misâ—râ—es of bondage and nothing doth more discover the nature and advantages of Vertue than the deformity and wretchedness of its oppositâ— Vices The beauty and usefulness of light is perceiv'd by the hideousness of black obscurity and the sweetness of health by the incommodities of sickness For this cause the Ministers of God to teach us the true worth of his benefits do frequently represent to us the misery of that estate out of which he deliver'd us Thus you â—ee the Prophets of the Old Testament did continually put the Israelites in mind of their once sad and pitiful estate in Egypt under the tyranny of Pharaâ—h They would have them keep it in their eye that so they might duly relish the redâ—mption of GOD and the sweetness of that liberty he had given them Under the New Testament the Apostles are no less intentive to represent at every turn the extream hideousness of our original condition for to make us acknowledg so much the more the grace that GOD hath shew'd us in his Son by translating us out of the Kingdom of darkness into his marvellous light Thus S. Paul doth in the Text we have read wherein that the Colossians might be brought to a fuller comprehension of the inestimable excellency of the benefit they had receiv'd from GOD in JESUS CHRIST when they were raised again with him in Baptism by the faith of his efficacy as he expressed in the foregoing Verse He now lays before them the misery they were before engult'd in When ye were dead in offences saith he and in the uncircumcision of your flesh c. Now this discourse does also hit the mark he principally aim'd at in the whole dispute which is as you have often heard to refute the pernicious error of those who accounted the observing of circumcision and other Ceremonies of Moses necessary for Christians Sure all the profit they could pretend to by them was either the remission of our sins or the sanctification of our lives But the Apostle doth here shew us in few words that we have both the one and the other of these two graces in JESUS CHRIST The first Since GOD hath freely forgiven us all our offences in Him The second Since of being dead as we were in our selves He hath made us alive with him whereby it is evident that the Ceremonies of the Law are henceforth wholly useless to us There is no need of the knife of Moses any longer GOD by the sole Gospel of his CHRIST dying and risen again for us the true Sword of Heaven infinitely sharper than any of the Metals of Nature hath cut off all the corruption of our flesh He hath done much more yet By the alone vertue of the same CHRIST he hath rescued us from death and animated and made us alive And as for the sins whereof we were guilty he hath pardon'd us them all His pure grace in JESUS CHRIST hath effectually fulfill'd whatsoever Moses's Law did promise or figure You have had experience of it saith the Apostle to the faithful at Coloss you have seen and felt the efficacy of JESVS CHRIST in your selves Remember what you were when you believed on him and consider what you are since you passed through his hands Ye were dead and ye are alive ye were covered with crimes and are fully absolv'd of them Do not so assront your Deliverer as to think that having wrought so great Miracles by his own power alone he does need the Elements of the Law to finish his work in you and that he cannot compleat without Moses what he so magnificently began and advanced without him This my Brethren is the Apostle's express design in these words We who through the grace of GOD are not troubled with the error of these false Teachers which dyed and was buried long ago will consider this Text more generally and view
that supposing a man be perfectly cured of vicious habits and inclinations yet would he nevertheless be faulty by reason of his fore-passed sins and consequently liable upon this account unto the curse with which and the terrors that precede it true life is so incompatible that it is not imaginable a man in such a state could ever resolve to serve GOD freely and sincerely Therefore GOD that he may throughly quicken us doth not only deliver us from the tyranny of vice and of the flesh by that Princely Spirit which he poureth into our inward parts but moreover pardoneth us all the sins whereof we are guilty and it seems in very deed if we do accurately observe the moments of his action in us that it 's there he does begin first remitting our former offences to the end that the sense of this goodness of His may cause us to love him and encline us to obey him and conform our selves with all our might unto his holy will The Apostle attributeth unto this remission two remarkable qualities One that GOD forgiveth us all our offences that is doth not impute to us any of our sins either in whole or in part but treateth us as if we had committed none at all Another is that he doth it freely and of meer grace for so doth the word giving used here in the Original properly signifie as our Translation hath well express'd by rendring He hath freely forgiven us The Scripture tells us not of any other kind of pardon For as to that which our Adversaries do assert to wit whereby the fault is remitted but the punishment exacted either in whole or in part or is bought out with the payment of our own satisfactions or the satisfactions of others it's a figment of their own Schools of which the Holy Ghost says nothing any where but represents unto us all that remission which GOD gives the faithful either at the beginning or in the progress of their regeneration as an entire pardon and purely gratuitous As for that satisfaction by which our LORD and Saviour obtained it for us it is so far from any way diminishing that it does infinitely exalt the bounty of GOD towards us since that he so loved us as that he might pardon our faults with the consent of his Justice he would have his only Son to shed his precious blood for the contenting thereof This is that we had to deliver upon this Text of the Apostle's Dear Brethren Let us hold fast what it hath taught us of the condition that all men are naturally in before GOD calleth them to his grace Let not their outward appearance deceive you nor the pleasures of their flesh nor the splendor of their pretended virtues either civil or moral All this is but a false image of life covering a carkass that 's stinking and abominable before GOD. Make account that they are dead and that if they walk it is not a true principle of life but sin the poyson of life which doth animate them and set them on working The issue will one day clear it to us all when the just judgment of GOD having stript them of that fallacious disguise which now hideth the hideousness of their nature shall shew it before Heaven and Earth and make us plainly see that they were but Sepulchers whited without and full of filth and infection within and cast them thereupon into that wretched and eternal death which is prepared for them with the Devil and his Angels Bless we GOD who hath deliver'd us from this perdition by his great mercy and hate we sin and the corruption of the flesh which had involv'd us in it Look we on them as pests and poysons that destroy our life and reckon we that we have liv'd no more time than what hath been exempted from our serving of them You deceive your self Worldling who count the days of your unclean pleasures or your vain honours the best part of your life To say plainly it was the time of your being dead and not of your being alive After so many years as you have tumbled up and down the earth you have not yet liv'd a moment You have all along been in a state of death And they that write upon your Tombs that you liv'd so many years and died such a day do grosly err You did not live when you offended GOD and your Neighbour or lost your time in the filth of your infamous delights And on the day that you shall quit the earth you will not cease to live for to say true you never liv'd but from one kind of death you will pass into another from the death of sin to a death of torment Christians if you love life and hate horror at death renounce sin and mortifie your flesh You cannot live except it dye Put in exercise that noble life which the LORD hath given you in his Son Act according to the Principles which he hath put into you by his Spirit and lay forth continually in good and holy works the Graces wherewith he hath vested you Faithfully love and serve him Let your minds meditate on nothing beside him your hearts desire none but him your tongues speak only of him Let the contemplation of the wonders of his love and the hopes of his glory be the whole food of your souls Respect those men in whom you see his Image shine Affect them and serve them for his sake looking upon their lives their estates their honour their bodies and souls as sacred and inviolable things Endeavour to enrich them by communicating of your prosperities unto them Offend no man Do good to all Let your charity and your innocence be conspicuous in the sight of GOD and Man Faithful Brethren This is that life truly worthy to be called life which GOD doth reward for the present with a joy and contentment of Conscience that 's a thousand times more sweet and savoury than any of the vain delights of the world and which he will crown one day with that glorious Immortality he hath promised It 's for this that he hath vouchsafed to forgive us freely all our offences all those so many horrible Crimes which had merited Hell-fire and is still ready to pardon all the sins we have committed since This so great and admirable loving-kindness of his tendeth only to withdraw us from sin and oblige us to love and revere so good a GOD. It 's for the self-same end that he hath raised up his Son from the dead and enliven'd us with him giving us faith hope and charity the principles of a new life even that henceforth renouncing sin and the flesh and turning our hearts towards Heaven where our treasure and our glory is we might live soberly righteously and godly in the present world looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great GOD and Saviour JESUS CHRIST Amen The Twenty-fifth SERMON COL CHAP. II. VER XIV Ver. xiv Having effaced the obligation
and Powers These are the Enemies whom the LORD JESUS hath overcome and utterly defeated on the Cross as himself reported the evening before his passion saying that the Prince of this world was then judged that is was about to be condemned And S. Paul elsewhere saith Heb. 2 1â— that JESVS hath by his death destroyed him that had the power of death to wit the Devil Let us now see how our Saviour hath spoiled these Principalities and Powers and publickly made a shew of them triumphing over them on the Cross First It is evident that all this language of the Apostle's is figurative and taken from what great Captains that had been victorious over their Enemies were heretofore wont to do For after they had spoiled them not only Arms Habits Jewels and Baggage but also of their Estates and all their Glory they led them away prisoners and made a shew of them to their Countrey-men on the day of their triumph This name the Romans gave to the pomps of that entry which their Captains and Generals of a Victorious Army made into their City For when any of them had won a Battel taken Towns conquer'd Countreys or done any great and notable exploit of warr one of the principal and most prized Honours that were decreed him for a reward of his valour was a Triumphâ— which was acted with incredible pomp and ceremony The Conqueror was mounted on a stately Chariot magnificently cloth'd and crowned His whole Army marched before and after him in Military order every Troop under its Ensigns and Colours The heads and principal of the Enemies followed his Chariot bound and in chains There was carried along all the Gold and Silver and other Treasures he had won from the Enemy The Towns he had taken the Rivers he had pass'd the Provinces he had subdued the Battels he had given were represented in Picture and exposed to the view of the people who with great festivity and rejoycing accompanied in throng or beheld him from the windows of their houses and filled the air with their acclamations and applauses He entred Rome in this â—quipage and passing through the fairest Streets of the City ascended the Capitol the chief of their Temples where he betook himself to offer sacrifice after he had thus displayed the fruits of his Victories before the eyes of all thâ— world and received all kind of benedictions and praises from his fellow Citizens This is properly that which was called a Triumph The Apostle therefore fetching his terms from this custom which was well known at that time and familiar to every one doth apply them to our LORD and Saviour because of that resemblance we find between the pomp of his mystical victory and this Triumph of Sâ—cular Rulers and Captains He tells us that he hath spoiled these hostile Principalities and Powers He saith that he hath publickly made a shew of them In fine he affirms that he hath triumphed on the Cross expressions all of them manifestly taken as you see from that glorious pomp of the Roman Triumphs which we have now described and which for substance do signifie no other thing but that JESUS dying on the Cross hath fully vanquish'd and defeated the Devil with all his power in the view of Heaven and Earth In prosecution hereof we are to refute the false expositions which some do give of this passage Themas Loranus Cajetan and after that render you an account of the true Some of the famousest Interpreters of the Church of Rome do understand it of the deliverance of the Fathers whom our Saviour as those men say took out of that Limbus in which their spirits were and led them to Heaven with them He spoiled principalities and powers that is the Devils from whom he took away what they kept in Hell forasmuch say they as he caused Adam Noah Abraham Isaac and Jacob with the rest of the faithful who deceased under the Old Testament to come forth from their Limbus which is one of the partitions of the infernâ—l Region Then they say he led them carrying them up to Heaven and giving them entrance into Jerusalem on high whence they had been until then excluded And he made them triumph in himself for so the same Authors do read the Apostle's words that is He made them to participate of his triumph in that they had the honour to accompany and enter into Heaven with him But scarce can a thing be uttered more false more forced and more impertinent than this whole interpretation First That which it supposeth of the abode of the spirits of the old believers in a subterraneous and infernal Limbus is uncertain and fabulous being sounded only upon the tradition of men and not on any authority of the word of GOD. As for that which they commonly alledg to prove it namely Gen. 37.35 Jacob's saying that he would go down into Hell unto his Son Joseph they that are versed in Scripture do well know the word Inferi or Hell in that place in particular and almost every other where in the Book of GOD doth signifie the Grave Whence it comes that the same Patriarch saith elsewhere unto his sons that if any evil befel Benjamin they would make his white hairs descend with sorrow ad inferos to Hell as divers read it where it is clear that by the same word he means the Grave into which the dead go down with their hairs and not Limbus into which only souls descended who have no hair sure And as to what they produce of the pretended soul of Samuel call'd up from Hell by the Sorceress her charms where is the Christian that doth not burn to see such power granted the Ministers of Devils over the Spirits of Prophets God forbid we should credit so gross an absurdity That which the Enchantress saw came from Hell I confess but that which she saw was not in truth the soul of Samuel which was at rest with GOD in Ahraham's bosome It was nothing but a vain shadow and a phantasm of that Prophet called by his name because of its resembling him as the greatest part of the ancient Fathers did affirm and as some of the most famous Authors Leo Allatius in Euctath Antiâ—ch Psal 68.19 even of the Roman Communion do at this day hold They again do abuse what the Psalmist singeth of the Messiah Thou art gone up on high thou hast taken or led a multitude of captives as it s rendred These captives they will have to be the spirits of the Fathers But it is manifest to all that have the least knowledg in the holy Tongue that the phrase there used by the Prophet doth signifie to take or to make prisoners not to free them and to lead not into liberty but into captivity So as if this passage be meant of the Fathers we must say not that the LORD brought them out prison as is suppos'd but that he put them in a thing that would be infinitely
triumphed of his enemies in himself or by himself that is according to the ordinary stile of Scripture by his own strength and virtue he being raised from the dead and gloriously lifted up to Heaven by the potency of his own arm But I say in the second place that there is no absurdity at all in attributing these things to the very death of our LORD understanding them as we ought spiritually and mystically And without doubt it is much more fluent and clear to refer the last words of this verse to the Cross of our Saviour of which the Apostle had spoken immediately before he fastned the obligation to the Cross having spoiled Principalities and Powers over whom he triumphed on it that is on the Cross than to take it of our LORD himself and say that he triumphed over his enemies in himself which is frigid and harsh and obscure Say we then with the greater part of the Modern and with the more knowing and illustrious of the ancient Expositors that it is on the Cross our Saviour spoiled Principalities and Powers and that it was there also he publickly made a shew of them and triumphed of them I confess if we look upon him as suffering on that execrable tree amid the scoffs and sarcasms of the Jews in the lowest degree of his exinanition Flesh will find in him nothing less than victories and triumphs But you know likewise that this mystery must not be judged of by the senses of the flesh 'T is faith alone that 's able to discover and contemplate the wonders that are in it Now if you open the eyes of Faith you will easily perceive that JESUS hath spoiled all hostile powers on the Cross and that it is with this weapon properly that he surmounted those strong and potent Tyrants and took from them all the instruments of their violence and made a prey of all their riches For to say true that harsh and cruel dominion which the Devil exerciseth in the world is not founded upon any thing but sin If this pest had not infected us all the forces of Hell though they were a thousand times greater than they are could not have hurted us It 's upon our sin that this fierce Tyrant hath built all his power and it 's upon our ruins that he hath raised his grandeur For first if we were not culpable by reason of the sins we have committed the Justice of GOD would never have suffer'd this Executioner of his Judgments to trouble and prosecute us as he hath done It would not permit him so much as to open his mouth against us to accuse us But sin having provoked the wrath of GOD and his Law prohibiting access unto his Throne and pronouncing a curse upon us it 's evident that the same delivered up our persons to the evil Angels and gave them power to execute its judgment on us Again beside these evils which are termed penal and which could not terminate at last but in an eternal death the Devil did annoy men in another kind even by pushing them on to vice by his temptations and making them commit a multitude of sins some by means of avarice and others by the furies of ambition casting some into the excesses of luxury others into the disorders of drunkenness and glutny But it is sin also that gives him this power upon men to wit that Concupiscence which reigneth in them and which the Scripture calls the old man because it is the inheritance and succession and image of the first Adam It 's by this as by an handle that the Devil seizeth on them and trains them into such sins as he pleaseth Were it not for this he would have no hold upon them and each of them if he were exempted from it might say as our LORD did The Prince of this world cometh but hath nothing in me Now JESUS CHRIST hath abolish'd by his Cross both the guilt and the vices of men the guilt in that he bore the punishment thereof and satisfi'd Divine Justice for them and extinguish'd all the flamings of the Law and opened the Throne of Grace to every impenitent sinner Their vices in that he crucifi'd and destroy'd our old man on the Cross and mortifi'd all its lusts and discover'd its impostures Sure then it s by his Cross that he divested the Devils of the dominion they exercised over mankind having sapped and demolish'd all the foundations thereof by his admirable sufferings As for that which the Apostle addeth in the second place viz. that he publickly made a shew of those hostile powers this doth excellently well agree with his Cross For this shew signifieth nothing else but an extream confusion and ignominy as we have already intimated and who is there but knows that the evil Angels never receiv'd a greater than that was wherewith the Cross of our LORD and Saviour did cover them They thought to have overcome him and found themselves overcome instead of ruining his Dominion as they imagined they saw their own utterly overthrown And this was publickly done in the view of Heaven and Earth our Saviour having been crucified in the greatest City of the Orient by broad day and at the solemnity of the most sacred Festival the Jews had The Angels look'd on it from on high and never beheld any thing with more attention and astonishment Jews and Gentiles were spectators of it and Nature it self however mute and insensible sufficiently shew'd that it took part in it shutting if we may so say its eye through the horror it had to see its Creator suffer But fear not poor Creatures The shame and confusion will wholly remain to our Enemies Our Sun will soon come out of this Eclipse and his suffering is the salvation not the ruin or damage of the Universe In fine the Apostle's further assertion in the last place that our LORD triumphed over these hostile powers on the Cross is easily verifi'd also For Origen as an Ancient said There were two crucified persons on that Cross the one JESUS CHRIST who was nailed to it visibly voluntarily and for a short time only the other the Devil invisibly fastned to the same Cross and to his great regret and for ever in as much as this Cross of our Saviour hath destroy'd his life and power having given him that deadly blow whereof he will never recover Faith seeth upon the Cross above the Son of GOD combating and conquering for us and it sees beneath all the bad Angels put in chains vanquished and in vain raging under his feet Yet do I ingenuously confess that to speak properly the resurrection and ascension of our LORD have more analogy with a triumph than his death which doth rather resemble a conflict But it 's a very common manner of speech to attribute the name of an effect to the cause which produced it It 's in my opinion principally in this sense that our Saviour triumphed of his enemies on the Cross because the
universal and eternal and that no Age nor Climat can dispense with men for them or exempt the Violaters of them from that righteous curse they threaten let us faithfully obey this holy and sacred order which the Apostle hath given Hearken we not to the vain glosses and frivolous distinctions by which humane subtilty endeavours to elude it and colour over its own abuses Observe we sincerely what this great Minister of JESUS CHRIST enjoyneth us He forbiddeth us to Worship Angels in point of Religion There is no reason that either the eloquence or the subtilty either the splendor or the power of men much less their pleasure and usurped domineering should have more efficacy upon us than this Heavenly Authothority And praised be GOD for that He hath given us the courage to obey His Apostle in this particular and to put away the Worshipping of Angels and men from among us notwithstanding the strong contradiction of flesh and blood Let us abide firm in this resolution Let us adore none but GOD since there is none adorable but He. It 's just that He alone should be served among us since it is He alone who hath created and redeemed us But Beloved remember I beseech you that rightly to render Him His due glory it is not sufficient to have renounced the errour of those ancient Phrygians whom the Apostle here opposeth and of our Adversaries of Rome to wit the adoration of Angels and men departed There must also be banishing of all strange service all Idolizing of any thing whatever For if GOD cannot suffer those who serve Angels and deceased Saints that is the most excellent natures that be and such as have the image of the Deity most clearly resplendent in them how much less will He endure those that adore Gold and Silver the excrements of the earth or their own belly the shamefullest and most infamous of all idols or the flesh which is but a vain and perishing figure or the grandeurs of the world which are but exhalations And we that have renounced the first fort of these false services how can we be excusable if we retain and exercise the second Now would to GOD we were as free from the one as we are from the other But it must be confessed to our shame these latter kind of Idols have still a great many Devoto's and Servitors among us That avarice which S. Paul calls an Idolatry is but too much exercised among us the flesh and vanity are here publickly served Wretched men where is your judgement You do not serve the Angels of Heaven and you serve the mettals of the earth You do not adore Spirits made perfect and you do adore profane flesh Neither the light of the Sun nor the brightness of the Moon hath been able to seduce your hearts and you have suffered your selves to be seduced by the glittering of Gold and Silver the false Sol and Luna of the Chymists You have put your hope in Gold and said unto fine Gold Thou art my confidence You that have disdained to put your confidence in Saints The belly with shame and horrour do I utter it the belly is your GOD yours who have made this glorious promise to have none but the Eternal only for your GOD How can you hope that the LORD should suffer you to give Him such Monsters for companions He who is so jealous of His glory that He cannot suffer the Angels themselves to be associated with Him Dear Brethren I pray let us deceive our selves no longer Let us once for all put clean away all these false services and exterminating every Idol from among us adore and serve none but GOD alone Let Him have the entire possession of our whole hearts let Him reign and exercise an absolue dominion in them governing all the sentiments and motions of them at His will that after having constantly adored Him in Spirit and in truth we may one day receive from His holy faithful hand the Crown of Glory and Eternity which He hath purchased for us by the merit of His only Son our LORD JESUS CHRIST To whom with Him and the Holy Spirit the true and only GOD blessed for ever be honour and praise unto Ages of Ages Amen THE XXIX SERMON COL II. Vers XVIII XIX Vers XVIII Let no man Master it over you at his pleasure by humility of Spirit and the service of Angels intruding into things he hath not seen beeing rashly puffed up with the sense of his flesh XIX And not holding the head from which the whole body being furnished and fitly knit together by joints and bands encreaseth with the encrease of GOD. DEAR Brethren The same pride that destroyed the first man at the begining is the cause of the ruine of such of his posterity as do perish For if you heed it well you will see that that 's the thing which maketh them despise or mis-embrace the CHRIST of GOD in whom alone stands our salvation It was pride that kept the Jews from embracing this singular gift of Heaven because saith S. John they lov'd the praise of men even as our LORD reproached them saying How can you believe seeing you seek honour one of another And S. Paul expresly informs us that the proud phancy they had to establish their own righteousness was the cause they submitted not to the righteousness of GOD. It was likewise pride that blinded the minds of the Gentiles so as they saw not the wonderful things of the Gospel of JESUS CHRIST The haughty opinion they had of their own vain wisdome induced them to disdain the wisdom of GOD and to account the Cross of His Son foolishness though it be an inexhaustible treasury of sapience Again in fine it is pride that hath seminated among Christians themselves all the heresies that have grown up into any request since the Churches nativity to this hour Ignorance animated with presumption hath brought them all forth and bred them up For if the unhappy workers that divulged them had kept to the doctrine of GOD and not lash'd out beyond what He hath revealed in His word if the vain fierceness of their Spirit had not emboldned them to enterprise things above the reach of men they would never have thought upon corrupting Religion with their falsly-subtil inventions It would have remained pure throughout and sincere to this day and such as the Ministers of our LORD and Saviour deliver'd it at first to their Disciples by word and writing But their pride mis-leading them did induce them to attempt things above their capacity and adore and spread abroad their presumptuous imaginations as true secrets of GOD. The Apostle informs us in this Text that this was the origine in particular of those errors and false services which certain Seducers went about to introduce at that time among Christians We heard in the last exercise upon this subject what their errour was namely that under colour of a false humility of Spirit they taught
Philosophers defined good by this its refâ—â—â— to our affections and by the vertue it hath to move and attract our desires 〈◊〉 Good is that which all desire And hence it comes that Impostors who 〈◊〉 trade of seducing men have alwaies taken a great deal of care to give their 〈◊〉 vain institutions some shew of goodness being not ignorant that witho◠〈◊〉 they should not be able to gain any mans affections and much less to have any train of followers in the world This is to be seen particularly in religion into wâ—â—â—n never was heresie nor superstition introduced but under the favour of this in posture though spirits of different capacities having medled in the matter there haâ—â— been accordingly a great difference between their cosenages For as those that would make a false stone pass for a Diamond or an Emerald or a Ruby do endeavour as farr as cunning is able to counterfeit the truth to give it the colour the shape the lustre the sparkling and other qualities thereof that by such a feigned resemblance they may deceive simple and unexperienced persons So they that have set themselves upon the corrupting of Religion to the end they might make the opinions and services they promoted be received for sound doctrines and disciplines have above all things taken a great deal of pains to guild over their merchandize and to colour it with some fair and specious pretexts fit to dazle the eyes of men and hide the defects of their doctrine and give it the shew of what in substance it is not It is this that the Apostle S. Paul doth observe here in the documents and commandments of those Seducers whom he undertook in this Chapter For having solidly and admirably refuted that superstitious discipline which they had set a foot and which consisted in a religious worshipping of Angels and in a scrupulous abstinence from certain meats and in the observation of certain festival days for a conclusion he discovers in this last verse the false colours wherewith they did in vain dawb it over He acknowledgeth that it had its true some shew of wisdom but denies that this was sufficient to cover its defects or to oblige the faithful to receive it Their Ordinances said he afore are commandments and doctrines of men Which yet he now adds have some shew of wisdom in voluntary devotion and humility of spirit and in that they do not at all spare the body and have no regard to the satisfying of the flesh It is evident that he speaks of those humane doctrines which he had been mentioning in the verse immediately foregoing and he says first that they have a shew of wisdom Next he represents particularly three things which give them this false shew voluntary service humility of spirit and rough treatment of the body which they did not at all spare These are as it were the three colours which being mingled together by the artifice of the Seducers composed that paint which rendred their doctrine plausible and gave it this false shew of wisdom that beguiled the eyes of the simple In compliance with this distinction we shall treat of three points in this action voluntary service humility of spirit and little care for the body and then consider how error and superstition have always made and still to this day make use of them to glose their inventions GOD grant us to beware duly of them and please for this end so to guide and assist us by His Spirit in discoursing of them as we may all bear away some Edification and Consolation The name of wisdom is great and honourable in the opinion of all people in the world For whereas other Sciences have respect but to natural or humane the relation of wisdom is to Divine things And whereas other knowledges are for the most part unprofitable to him who possesseth them that of wisdom is salutiferous it signifying the skill of conducting ones way aright for the attainment of happiness by the light of some choice and excellent verities Whence it follows that this title of wisdom doth not properly belong but to the knowledge of GOD which He hath given us by His Son in the Gospel the only light that is capable of conducting us to supreme felicity Accordingly you know it is the name that S. Paul does ordinarily give it as when he willeth that the word of GOD dwell richly in us in all wisdom and when he saith elsewhere that he speaks wisdom among them that are perfect calling the same a little after the wisdom of GOD in a mysterie the hidden wisdom and so often elsewhere Now though the doctrine of those who corrupt the Gospel as these Seducers did who S. Paul opposeth in this Chapter be nothing less in reality than wisdom yet so it is that its authors gave it the name and would have it pass in the belief of men for a rare and a beneficial knowledge more worthy of heaven than earth and capable in fine of rendring those that follow it perfect and happy The Apostle acknowledgeth that the doctrine of the Seducers of his time had this shew of wisdom but by his very granting them the shew hâ— denies them the truth of it and his meaning is that that doctrine of theirs had nothing but a false and a deceitful colour of wisdom not the substance and reality of the thing Voluntary service is the first particular that gave these doctrines of the Seducers such a shew They have saith the Apostle some shew of wisdom in voluntary service that is by reason or because of the voluntary service they taught and set a foot the observances and institutions which these men enjoyed as abstinence from certain meats the worshipping of Angels and the like being nothing else but voluntary services A service may be called voluntary two manner of waies First when he that performs it unto GOD doth it with affection and a good will without torment and constraint The love he bears this great and soveraign LORD sweetly bringing his soul under His yoke and disposing him to account whatsoever He hath commanded to be good and delectable In this sense that free and sincere obedience which true believers render unto GOD according to the Gospel may be stiled voluntary because it proceeds not from a spirit of bondage as theirs doth who do serve only because they are afraid but from a spirit of Love and of Adoption crying in their hearts Abba Father Wherefore the Prophet termeth the new people who render this frank and filial service unto GOD Psal 110.3 under the Gospel of the Messiah a voluntary or willing people Thy people saith he speaking to Him shall be a voluntary people or a people of frank willingness in the day that thou shalt assemble thine army in holy pomp It is not in this sense that the Apostle understands the voluntary service he speaks of in this place For first though the terms voluntary service which are taken up
follow it Amen The End of the Second Part. SERMONS OF M R. JOHN DAILLE ON THE EPISTLE OF THE Apostle S T. Paul TO THE COLOSSIANS THE THIRD PART CONTAINING An Exposition of the two last Chapters in Eighteen SERMONS LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst 1671. The Author's Epistle Dedicatory TO MONSIEUR Monsieur de Rambovillet LORD OF LANCEY and of PLESSIS-FRANC SIR THese Sermons will not be new to You there having past so little time since you heard them at Charenton no doubt but you will know them at first sight The support they then found in our holy Assembly emboldens them now to present themselves in publick Perhaps it had been better to rest contented with that favour which our people shew'd them and not publish them once more in this other form For beside that the eye is much more delicate than the ear and the defects of a discourse are far more easily observ'd on paper where they abide than in the air where they do but pass there is further a great difference between an Auditor whom devotion doth oblige to hear you and a Reader who does owe you nothing The one would think he should sin against Piety if he deny'd you his attention The other doth you a favour in heeding you and may examine you without a crime The one's judgment is half made for you whereas the other's is at its full liberty These reasons would have with-held me from hazarding the edition of these small Books if the matter had wholly depended upon my opinion But the desires of my friends and the intreaties of the Book-seller interposing in it their violence hath forc'd my modesty Yet I should have had vigour and firmness enough to defend my self against it if the question had been simply of my self and my reputation For the present age being so polite and so illuminated as the most eloquent tongues and the best fashioned penns can hardly content it I well know that to please it there is need of graces and perfections which I do not possess But neither is that the thing I seek since of my weakness and the Calling wherewith GOD hath honoured me having competently secured me from such a passion That which made me yield to the too favourable will of my Friends is the interest of Christian souls which they laid before me and the service they believ'd this Book might do them The success will inform us whether they had reason to promise themselves so much from it For my part the thing being as yet uncertain I held my self obliged to give place unto their judgment and to prefer the profit which they imagine the faithful may receive from my poor labours before any other consideration And if it be temerity to hope the same at least it is not a crime but a laudable affection to desire it Of one thing Sir I am well-nigh assured that you will not dislike the gift I make you of this third and last part of my work For to say nothing of that sweetness of spirit and that obliging nature which every one observes in you and not to consider divers testimonies which I have received of your good will towards me in particular I am confirm'd in this opinion by your piety well known in our Church both by the excellent fruits of your charity in the ordinary course of your life and by the services you have sometime done our whole flock in the Office of an Elder while you executed it among us with much edification and praise Perswading my self therefore Sir may it please you that you will receive this small present with your usual goodness and facility there remains not else but that I pray GOD to conserve you with your worthy and well-born Family in health and prosperity daily augmenting on you His most precious blessings both spiritual and temporal I beseech you to continue me the honour of your good graces and to do me the favour to believe that I passionately am SIR Your most Humble and most obedient Servitour DAILLE From Paris Apr. the 1. 1648. SERMONS ON THE THIRD AND FOURTH CHAPTERS OF THE Epistle of the Apostle St. Paul TO THE COLOSSIANS SERMON XXXII CHAP. III. Verses I. II. Verse I. If then ye be risen again with CHRIST seek the things which are above where CHRIST sitteth at the right hand of GOD. II. Mind the things which are above not those which are on the earth DEar Brethren If the study and practise of true holiness which consists in the love of God and our Neighbour had filled as it ought the hearts and lives of Christians they would never have amus'd themselves in those minute devotions and carnal ceremonies wherewith superstition hath alwaies fed and doth still to this day feed the World This second sort of services was not invented and introduced in Religion but to be a supply in defect of the other For man well knowing that the Majesty and Beneficence of GOD obligeth us to serve Him and the charms and tentations of the earth turning away his heart from the legitimate service we owe Him which is that of a true and real sanctity that he may not appear empty in the presence of this soveraign Deity he presents it instead of that which it requireth of us with certain corporeal childish and spurious devotions which for that they are of our own invention are naturally pleasing to us Accordingly they are commonly called satisfactions because they are performed to content GOD and pay Him for the omission of what was due to Him An evident sign that if men had fulfill'd their duty there would have been no need of their busying themselves in these other exercises Hence there proceeded at the beginning those abstinences from certain meats and those distinctions of daies and that worshipping of Angels which some seducers would have set up among Christians in the very daies of the Apostles From the same source also issued afterward the stations the xerofagies and other disciplines of the Montanists and of divers hereticks that sometime disturbed the ancient Church In fine from this very original have sprung the observances and voluntary services of Rome those Orders and Rules of so many Monks as do now a-daies fill the World quadragesimal rites fasts and vigils auricular confession pilgrimages whippings feastivals jubilees chappelets and fraternities with a multitude of such other devotions which have overwhelmed Christian Religion We may confidently say there would never have been recourse to such things if mortification of the old man if true piety towards GOD and true charity towards their neighbour had exercised and continually taken up the affections and whole life of Christians So likewise you see their greatest Zealots confess that their rules and disciplines have no place in Heaven where holiness is perfected and never had less on earth than among Christians of the first age that is the best and most holy all these humane devotions being evidently sprung from a relaxing of the piety
of Christians and the corruption of their manners Therefore the Apostle St. Paul having refuted in the precedent Chapter as you have heard the pretended services and mortifications of the false Teachers of his time that the faithful to whom he writes might utterly be disgusted at and turned away from the same does now lay before them the just offices and legitimate exercises of Christian piety the body of holiness instead of shadows the solid doctrine of the LORD JESUS instead of the vain and childish lessons of superstition the true mortifying of the flesh instead of the seducers unprofitable macerations and an abstinence from sin and the lusts thereof instead of abstinence from certain meats in fine Heaven instead of the earth As a prudent gardiner who after he hath pluck'd up the bad or unprofitable herbs of his garden and well cleans'd the ground casts in good seeds that are worthy to take up the earth and capable of yielding fruits useful for the food of men Withal the Apostle by this means prevents an objection that superstition usually makes For being not able to maintain its petty services as holy and necessary in themselves it hath been wont to alledge that whatever they be otherwaies it is yet better for Christians to employ themselves in them than to abide idle The Apostle takes from it this vain colour shewing the faithful that they have another task which is much more worthy and much more noble to wit the study and practise of true sanctity so that superstition is guilty not only of a superfluous diligence but of a pernicious temerity in diverting Christians from their legitimate and necessary work by those voluntary exercises wherewith it pretends to charge them Let us then Dearly beloved Brethren keep off from the vain institutions of superstition whether ancient or modern and keep to the discipline of St. Paul Let us meditate let us study and practise what he enjoyneth us and assure our selves that in following and observing his rule exactly we shall have neither time nor will nor need to busie our selves after the rules of men He employes all the remainder of this Epistle in these Divine documents and in the beginning of this Chapter after he hath raised our hearts to Heaven he represents unto us the general duties of sanctification that are necessary for all Christians thence passing unto particulars he instructeth married persons children fathers servants and masters in what they owe to one another as you shall hear if GOD please in the sequel of these actions For the present to explain the exhortation which he hath plac'd at the head of this excellent tract and the words whereof we have read to you we will consider by the grace and assistance of the Holy Ghost first the precept it containeth that we do seek the things which are above and then in the second place the two reasons upon which he foundeth it one taken from our being risen again with CHRIST and the other from J. CHRIST His sitting on high at the right-hand of GOD and we shall observe upon each particular as briefly as we may the instructions and lessons they afford us either for our edification and consolation in general or particularly for our preparation to that holy and mystical repast unto which the LORD JESUS invites us against the next LORD'S Day The ancient Greeks e're-while ascribed to that Philosopher of theirs whom they most esteemed the glory of having brought down wisdom from Heaven to the earth because he was the first that fixed the minds of his Scholars on the considering of their own nature and what we owe either to our selves or to other men whereas the Sages that liv'd before him busied themselves in nothing but the contemplating of Heaven and its motions and the natural things that depend upon the same But the LORD JESUS the true Prince of Wisdom and Verity instructs us quite otherwise than that man did who verily was but a blind leader of the blind For all the Philosophy of JESUS CHRIST is to loosen us from the earth and lift us up to Heaven and so fix our minds and affections there as we may dwell even for the present and converse and have our souls incessantly there how far distant so-ever our bodies be from that happy habitation It is very true as that poor Pagan judged that the contemplating of the Sun and the Planets and the other Stars and the searching out of their motions and the admiring of their beauty their light their greatness and other qualities which was all the employment of the Heathens first Philosophy doth not much conduce to the perfection of our manners and the felicity of our lives But neither is it upon that that JESUS CHRIST doth fix us He hath discovered to us other things on high within that nobler part of the World which are infinitely more excellent and more necessary and such as if that Pagan had seen them he would have made no difficulty to confess that true wisdom consisteth not in staying ones self here below on the earth but in ascending up to Heaven for the viewing the loving and admiring of them continually For first He hath revealed to us there an holy and a glorious City seated above nature and all its elements a City not mutable and subject to perish as inferiour things but founded permanent and eternal the sanctuary of life and immortality which GOD hath builded and in which He hath displayed all the wonders of His power and wisdom the dwelling place which He hath prepared for such among men as embracing His promises by Faith shall live here below in His fear and obey His commandments and where He hath aleady gathered in and consecrated in His rest the spirits of such of the faithful as He hath fetch'd out of the present World CHRIST hath made us see that it is there those blessed ones do dwell with the armies of holy Angels and that it 's thither He went Himself when He had finished the work of our redemption upon earth It 's in this mystical Paradise that the true Tree of Life doth grow It 's there that the rivers of pleasure do run There shineth the true Sun that never sets There are kept those divine flowers that can neither be fouled nor fade with which the piety and patience of Saints shall be one day crowned It 's there that GOD manifesteth himself to His servants and shews them the mervails of His countenance unveiled and feeds them and fills them with joy and transforms them by this vision into so many living images of His eternal and blessed nature It 's there is true glory and true pleasure an honour a felicity and a magnificence the idea whereof never entred either into our senses or into the very thoughts of our heart in comparison whereof all the pomp of the Earth and the glory of this Heaven in which we see the Sun and the Stars go their rounds is but a shadow
and a vapour Again as the creatures there possess true glory so do they exercise true sanctity All of it that 's seen here below is but a little sparkle of the perfection of those blessed inhabitants of that coelestial City The love they bear to their LORD is there perfect as well as the knowledge they have of Him Charity towards our neighbour concord union truth do there reign absolute Their souls have neither affections nor desires but which are conform unto the will of GOD. The light of his face governeth all their motions and shedding abroad its self continually upon them maintains them in an eternal holiness peace and blessedness The LORD JESUS hath discovered to us all these wonders above the Heavens having brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel But further He hath certified us to that these are things which concern us and pertain to us and opened by His cross and resurrection the way that will most assuredly bring us to them If we have the courage to follow Him of what condition or quality so-ever we may be He will congregate us to this holy company of His servants receiving our souls into His bosome upon their departure from this earth and raising up our poor bodies themselves one day revested with His immortality and His glory These be Dear Brethren the things which are above that the Apostle willeth we do seek in the same sense that our Saviour commands us in the Gospel Matth. 6.33 to seek the Kingdom of GOD and His righteousness signifying by that term First that we propose Heaven and Eternity to our selves for the utmost end of our whole life and place our supreme happiness in this rich possession that we make it our grand and only design And secondly that we employ in this noble persuit all the might we have seriously using all the means that the Word of GOD prescribeth us faith invocation piety sanctity and flee as a mortal pest every thing that keeps us off or turneth us aside from this mark For Prov. 21.25 as to the slothful who does nothing all day but desire and sets not his hand to the work he hath no part in those heavenly things His desire kills him saith the wise man as one that feeds on nothing but wind there must be knocking there must be seeking there must be working out our salvation with fear and trembling This treasure is not for cold and languid wills that evaporate altogether in vain wishings It shall be that man's prize who shall take it with an ardent and a generous courage and impulsed with a violent affection spare neither pain nor watching nor labour to obtain it That which the Apostle commandeth us in the following verse namely to mind the things which are above doth amount to well-neer the same sense For the word he useth comprehends the two actions of our souls towards objects we love the one a considering them and thinking on them the other a desiring and embracing them in our affections So you see he obligeth us first to list up our hearts to Heaven where the LORD JESUS is and to have that blessed Kingdom continually before our eyes which GOD hath there prepared for us together with all those great eternal good things wherein it consisteth He requireth that this thought do fill our souls day and night that it be the thought that hath superiority in them that governs all the motions of them the thought that regulateth our resolutions and decideth all our doubts That in all things which shall present themselves we ever reflect hereon to see how they refer unto it and whether they be compatible with it Such was the practise of the Father of the faithful He looked saith the Apostle for a City that hath foundation And Moses the grand legislator of the Jews He had regard saith the same Apostle unto the recompence that is as he explains himself in the Text They minded the things which are above And this thought as you see is also necessarily conjoynt with affection with an ardent desire of possessing such amiable and excellent things and with a stedfast hope of enjoying them at length This is then my Brethren the first of those two duties which the Apostle requireth of us to wit that we seek the things which are above Now unto it he annexeth a prohibition which follows necessarily from it namely that we seek not the things which are upon the earth Heaven and earth being so opposite as it is is not possible but they who seek the things of the one must renounce the things of the other The things of the earth are as you know the goods of the World riches gold silver honours pleasures and the like all that which earthly men the children of this generation do esteem and passionately love He does not mean we should have no care at all about the necessaries of the present life for the good things that refer thereto being gifts of GOD which we cannot be without one may both acquire and serve himself of them with thanksgiving yet not cleave unto them and use them yet not abuse them And the Apostle you know other-where commands us to have care of our families and to do every one his own business and to labour with our hands that we may carry our selves honestly towards them that are without and that we may have lack of nothing But he forbids us to seek the things of the earth in the same sense that he commanded us to seek those of Heaven that is to place our chief good in them and to desire them with choicest affection and prefer them before any other consideration It 's thus that those men sought the things of the earth Phil. 3.12 Luke 14. of whom the Apostle saith elsewhere that the belly was their God and they gloried in their shame and those in the Gospel-parable who preferred the care of their fields and of their oxen and the love of their wives before the call of Heaven Such a one in the Old Testament was that Esan who chose a little pottage of lentils rather than his primogeniture Such in the New were those sordid Gadarens who would have the Son of GOD be gone because He had made them lose their swine and those that love their fathers or mothers or brethren or other alliances or their worldly possessions more than the LORD JESUS or that prefer the praise of men before the praise of GOD. Such a one also was that besotted rich man who thought himself happy enough because he had goods laid up for many years and dreamt of nothing but enjoying them Now though the bare dignity of heavenly things and the meer meanness and unprofitableness of earthly things should be sufficient to recommend the former and to disgust us at the latter yet the Apostle for the swaying of us to duties so just as these sets before us two excellent reasons the first whereof is drawn from our
us unto so just a duty Seek the things which are above where CHRIST saith he sitteth at the right hand of GOD. For it as our LORD sometime said where our treasure is there be our hearts also where should our souls be but in Heaven since it is in that blessed dwelling place that their treasure doth reside JESUS their good their life and their joy in whom is hidden all our felicity In time past under the Mosaical Law the faithful alwaies turned their eyes and thoughts towards the Temple at Jerusalem because it was the abiding place of the pledges of GOD's covenant with them and of the most precious symbols of His presence and glory Judge what our affection and earnestness should be for Heaven which containeth the true Ark of GOD where all the fulness of His Godhead dwelleth not in shadow and figure but really and bodily But there is more yet JESUS CHRIST is our Head and we His members How can we conserve this honour but in keeping close to Him and following Him faithfully without ever separating from Him or withdrawing from that Sanctuary where He dwelleth And indeed He expresly assures us in the Gospel that He willeth we should be where He is and that where the dead body is there also the Eagles gather together so as if we be truly of the number of His Eagles it is not possible but we should take our flight to Heaven since this divine body of our LORD and Saviour is there And hereby you see dear Brethren to note it by the way how distant the doctrine of St. Paul is from that of Rome For whereas the Apostle elevateth our hearts from earth to Heaven Rome brings them down as far as in her lyeth from Heaven to the earth fastning the hearts of her zealots on her material altars and ciboires which she pretends the LORD is enclosed in against the suffrage of the whole Church who hath ever constantly applied these words of the Apostle particularly to the Sacrament of the Eucharist exhorting the faithful when they celebrate it to have their hearts above Sure if JESUS CHRIST be here below as Rome would have it the Apostle does ill to command us to mind the things which are above and worse again in urging for a reason of it that it 's above that JESUS CHRIST resideth If for that the LORD is in Heaven we ought according to the Apostles instruction not to seek any thing on earth how much less I beseech you ought we to seek the LORD Himself there I do not advertise you that this is to be understood of the presence of the humane nature of JESUS CHRIST For you know that He is every where as to the essence and providence of His Divinity And as to the grace of His Spirit and the efficacy and virtue of His will and institutions we readily confess that the same is not confined to the Heavens and doth extend and shew its self wheresoever He pleaseth according to the promise He hath made us to be in the midst of us when we are assembled in His Name But the Apostle doth not barely say that JESUS is in Heaven He adds that He sitteth at the right hand of GOD. Divers Doctors have belaboured themselves much in the explicating of these words and at length there are some that have strangely disguised them as if they signified that our LORD 's humane nature had been invested with all the properties of the Divinity which would be no other thing but that it was transform'd into a Divine nature a conceit which all true Christians have horrour for confessing that the two natures do remain each of them in its integrity having been united in JESUS CHRIST but not blended together nor confused The Apostle if we please to hear him will tell us in two words what it is to sit at the right hand of GOD. For in the 15th Chapter of the first Epist to the Corinthians speaking of the estate to which JESUS CHRIST hath been exalted in the Heavens and in which he shall abide constantly unto the end instead of its being said by the Prophet from whom the expression was taken in Psal 110. that the LORD should fit at the right hand of the Father he saith simply that He shall reign till He hath put all His enemies under His feet an evident sign that this sitting at the right hand of the Father is nothing else but that supreme dominion which hath been given Him over all things and which He doth and shall exercise unto the end of all ages inasmuch as GOD hath made Him LORD Acts 2.36 and CHRIST as St. Peter speaks And this consideration doth again mightily strengthen the holy Apostle's exhortation For since Heaven is the throne on which the Prince of the Universe doth sit and from which He dispenseth and governeth all things at His will there is great reason we should turn our eyes thither-ward and have this Royal Court of our Soveraign in mind night and day to comfort our selves under the trouble that either the iniquity of men and devils or the intemperateness of other creatures does give us and to form our manners and all the parts of our life after the will and by the example of so great and so holy a Monarch Behold the Lesson Beloved Brethren which the Apostle gives us at this time that we seek not low but high things not those of the earth but the things of Heaven since we are risen up with JESVS CHRIST who is sat down on high in Heaven at the right hand of GOD. What would there be in all the World more happy than we if we took up a good and a firm resolution to obey Him and practise the thing He enjoyneth us These fears and these desires and so many other vain passions which trouble our whole life would have no more place in us We elevated far above that which men unprofitably covet or possess or apprehend should with Angels enjoy a Divine contentment From that glorious Heaven where we should be we should despise the vanities and variations of the earth and see its seasons pass on and its elements roul about and its idols perish and its pleasures fleet away without any perturbation being secure that none of its storms can ever reach that high and inaccessible region where our hearts and lives would be We should look upon death without terrour knowing that it could not take any of those things from us which we possess on high We should suffer all the accidents of this life without emotion because they can change no part of the things we have in Heaven The charms also and illusions of the World would touch us as little as its menaces and raging because the fruition of a greater good would render us insensible for lesser ones as the presence of the Sun puts out the shining of the stars Being content with Heaven and its eternity we should covet nothing more and satisfied
with so rich a portion not envy any of the creatures the perfections and happiness they have Our whole life would be a perpetual feastival whereon free from the travail and turmoil of worldlings contemplating in spirit the glory of the Palace of our LORD meditating His promises breathing after His benefits and enjoying them for the present by faith and Hope we should in repose wait for the blessed day of our glorious triumph But alas how far are we from such a felicity This wretched and perishing earth is the sole object of our minds Our souls are no less fastned to it than our bodies It swalloweth up all our thoughts it possesseth our affections it takes up our cares and our labours and hath the use of all our time We have no desires and love but for the false goods which it sheweth us nor fear and horrour but for the evils wherewith it threatneth us As for Heaven and the things it comprehendeth we are so far from seeking them that we not so much as think of them except it be dreamingly or in manner of a divertisement when we are told of them in this place looking on the stately representations which JESUS CHRIST hath drawn us of them as an empty picture fair indeed and pleasing but good for nought saving to feed our eyes with a short and bootless pleasure not attracting nor engaging our desires This is the cause why our whole life is miserable full of griefs and fears of weaknesses of regrets and infelicities The least strokes overturn us the least losses and slightest afflictions bear us down because not being fastned to Heaven the only firm and sure place of the World we fluctuate exposed to the mercy of all that comes against us And as children cannot be appeased when their puppets are taken from them because they have set all their affection on them so are we seized and do take on when we come to lose some of these toyes of the earth There is no way to comfort us because we have fastned our hearts to them And to say truth our condition is worse than other mens they at least are subject but to the evils that either the infirmity of nature or as they call it the inconstancy of fortune do bring with them whereas besides these the bad Christian who is not a Christian but in name is moreover exposed to the persecution of the World so as to say plainly there is nothing more foolish nor more wretched than he who hath part in the temporal sufferings and hardships of true beleevers and none at all in their consolation or blessedness inasmuch as his profession exposes Him to the hatred of the World and his vice excludes him from the Kingdom of GOD. Awake then ye that are worldly and come once out of so dangerous an errour Let not the trumpet of Heaven the voice of our great Apostle have founded now in your ears in vain Do not add this contempt to your other crimes He hath advertised you of your duty He hath declared the reasons that oblige you to it Take heed lest if you shut your ears against JESUS CHRIST who speaks by His mouth you perish in the end with this earth and the things you seek on it How do you not perceive that you shall never find there the happiness you seek Why hath not the experience of so many millions of persons who daily spend themselves in this vain labour taught you that the things of the earth are all of them but vanities and illusions transient figures which promise pleasure honour and contentment but afford none which do not cure the maladies of the body nor of the soul which infinitely toil out those that seek them and never fill the hearts of those that possess them multiplying their desires and their fears inflaming and envenoming their passions instead of extinguishing them which are subject to infinite mutations which men and elements may bereave you of every moment and which considering the short and uncertain duration of the life we lead here below you can enjoy but a very little time supposing that nothing does deprive you of them before death At that time Matt. 16.26 What will it profit a man to have gained the whole world and lose his own soul It is sure a blindness incredible to one that saw it not I do not say that a Christian who hath hopes of the world to come but that even any reasonable man should adhere with so ardent and obstinate a passion unto such wretched and fruitless things We perceive it and confess it and make the bravest discourses in the World upon it and after all that false lustre which we behold in these things hath such a faculty to bewitch our senses that not a person but lets himself be caught thereby But the worst is that besides errour and vanity there 's in it a tendency to eternal damnation For men may not slatter themselves None can serve two Masters nor look on Heaven and earth both together He that seeks the one must of necessity renounce the other it being no more possible to seek than it 's to find at once the things beneath and those which are above Faithful Brethren choose you and take the better part and leaving worldly men to labour in vain after the things of the earth and to seek in it what they shall never find turn you your hearts and eyes towards Heaven as the Apostle calleth you to do There Christian is the felicity you desire There dwelleth rest and joy and immortality and the perfection of both soul and body These are the only things that are truly worthy of your prayers and your pains Seek them and mind them night and day Give your selves no rest till you have found them and do feel the first-fruits and beginnings of them in your hearts Let these thoughts sweeten your sufferings and consolate your losses T is in vain that you threaten me ye people of the World You cannot deprive me of what I possess nor hinder me from finding what I seek since upon the things of Heaven you have no power Whatever you bereave me of the best part of my treasure and the only part that deserves that appellation will still remain entire to me Let the same thought arm us against all tentations Thou Tempter promisest me the things of the earth but I seek those of Heaven which thou canst not dispose of Though I should lose all I have here below even to this flesh its self yet shall I find it again with a thousand-fold increase in Heaven Let this thought again keep us continually busied in the good and worthy actions of piety charity and honesty Let our manners resemble those of the inhabitants of that divine City which wee seek Let the light of their knowledge the ardency of their love the purity of their affections shine forth now betimes in our lives 'T is that to which that new nature JESUS
CHRIST hath given us in raising us again with Himself doth oblige us These thoughts and works of Heaven are necessary productions of the principles and faculties of that life unto which we have been raised up You can neither be Christians without having part in the resurrection of our LORD nor have part in His resurrection except you walk with Him and wear that lightsome robe of sanctity wherewith He vesteth all the associates of His resurrection He Himself calleth us hereto from that lofty Throne whereon He sitteth at the right hand of GOD Faithful soul saith He to each of us look unto me and I will give thee light Fear not for I govern the Heavens and the earth Only fix thine eyes thy thoughts and thine heart on me and I will guide thee by my counsel and receive thee one day into my glory Dear Brethren this He doth promise us and of this He will give us earnest next LORD's-day at His holy table Let us do what He demands of us or to say better let us pray Him to do it in us and He will assuredly do what He promiseth us Unto Him unto the Father and unto the Holy Spirit the true and only GOD blessed for ever be honour praise and glory to ages of ages Amen THE THIRTY THIRD SERMON ON COLOSSIANS CHAP. III. VER III IV. Verse III. For ye are dead and your life is hid with CHRIST in GOD. IV. When CHRIST who is your life shall appear then shall ye also appear with Him in glory DEAR Brethren The LORD JESUS being not only the author and the cause but also the pattern and exemplar of that great Salvation which GOD of His infinite mercy offereth to mankind in the Gospel it is not possible that we should have part in it or assuredly enter into this rich possession without having in us a resemblance of the same soveraign LORD and being as so many copies of this Divine Original where all His features and lineaments may appear though in a form and measure much less perfect and eminent than His. Rom. 8.28 Of this the Apostle expresly informeth us in his Epistle to the Romans saying that those whom GOD did fore-know that is love and discriminate from the rest of men according to His good pleasure to communicate really faith and eternal salvation unto them He did also predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son Heb. 2.12 13. For this cause He doth us the honour to call us sometimes His children and sometimes His brethren by reason of the resemblance we have with Him the nature the condition the quality and as 't is commonly termed the fortune of children following the fathers and of brethren being like their elder brothers Whence the Apostle concludes in the Epistle to the Hebrews that He who sanctifyeth that is the LORD JESUS Heb. 8.11 and they who are sanctified that is the faithful are all of one that is of one and the same mass of one and the same form and nature And to make it plain to us the Scripture compareth Him sometimes to a Vine-stock Jo. 15. Rom. 11. otherwhile to an Olive-tree of each of which we are branches all of them things between which there is by nature a strict communion the one and the others having the same constitution and qualities And thence again it is that Saint Paul calleth Him our first-fruits when speaking of our death and the resurrection which is to succeed it he saith that CHRIST was made the first fruits of them that slâ—ep 1 Cor. 15.20 the first-fruits as you know being of the same condition and nature with the rest of those things out of the mass whereof they are taken Now although this consormity of the faithful with the LORD JESUS be of a large extent yet it doth principally appear in two heads wherein the Scripture doth particularly consider it to wit in His Death and in His Resurrection the happy remembrance whereof we have celebrated this morning For the death of JESUS CHRIST hath produced a death like it in all true believers reducing them by its efficacy and virtue unto a state conform to His when He was stretched out on the Cross and lay in the Sepulchre In like manner His Resurrection transmitteth into them a life like that which He resumed when having overcome death He issued out of His grave His Death is not only the cause but also the pattern of ours and likewise His Life is both the principle and exemplar of ours It 's of this death and this life Dearly beloved Brethren the effect and the image of the Death and Resurrection of the LORD that we make account to entertain you in this action For after our having celebrated the memory of the death and resurrection of this Great Saviour and participated of the one and the other by the vertue of His Spirit and our Faith what can we more pertinently meditate than the precious fruit which each of them produceth in us and the images of the one and the other of these mysteries which this Divine dead and again risen perâ—â—â— doth draw and form in us inasmuch as He changeth us after a sort into Himself by an impression of His omnipotent vertue so as if we have truly receiv'd Him we are become dead and risen again with Him St. Paui teacheth us this excellent and saving truth in the series of our ordinary Texts by these words which we have read for the subject of this exercise In those that preceded which we expounded eight daies since this great Apostle drew us from the earth that he might elevate us to Heaven where JESUS sitteth at the right hand of the Father Seek saith he the things which are above and not the things which are on the earth But because he knew how difficult such a transportation would be for persons who are still so many waies fastned to the earth to work so high a design thoroughly into us besides the reasons already represented which were taken from our resurrection with the LORD and from His presence and glorious soveraignty in the places he would elevate us to he further proposes two more for that end in this passage The one taken from our death For saith he ye are dead and the other from that new life which we have received a life hidden it 's true for the present in GOD but such as will be plainly and plenarily discovered one day at the manifestation of the LORD JESUS Your life saith he is hid with CHRIST in GOD. When CHRIST c. These are the two principal points we will treat of in this action the grace of our LORD assisting and Him we invocate praying that this word of His may be effectually in us His power to salvation throughly changing us into the similitude both of His salutary death and of His glorious life that being dead unto our selves we may not live henceforth but in Him unto His honour and the edification
of our Brethren Be not asrighted Christians at the Apostle's telling you in the entrance that ye are dead This death which he attributeth unto you is gain and not loss a donative from GOD's grace and not an effect of His wrath or an execution of His justice I grant that every death is the privation of some life that was possessed But since there are miserable and execrable lives it must be confess'd that every death is not a calamity For to be rid of a thing that harms us is not a calamity but a comfort It 's an advantage and not a damage to be deprived of a poyson and devested of an habit of malediction The death of which the Apostle speaks is not the destroying of that happy life which the Creator gave us at the beginning to be led within Paradise in a continual execise of the original justice and rectitude of our nature and in the sweet and innocent fruition of the goods of the first world It 's the first Adam and not the second that outed us of this life and as we did receive it in his person so we have lost it by his crime being heirs of his misery as well as of his sin The life which is extinguished in us by the death here intended of the Apostle is that corrupted and sin-infected life which we have received from our first parents by carnal generation a life contrary to the will of GOD and meriting His wrath and obnoxious to His curse the operation of an empoysoned nature and the acting of a blind understanding a perverse will and an irregular affection the continual flux of an abominable pest which in the course of nature could not otherwise determine than in an eternal death It 's that which Scripture calleth the life of the old man that is of this altogether depraved and corrupted nature which we derive from Adam and which through error in its false wisdom placing its felicity in the enjoyment of earthly things adhereth to them with inordinate desire and doth not act or labour but to acquire the same pursuing them with such a violent ardour that there is not any thing so holy so just and so honest but it violates the same to attain its end This is the life that the LORD JESUS destroyeth in all His true members and in regard of which His holy Apostle saith and meaneth here that we are dead The death whereof he speaks is nothing else but the privation of this pernicious and accursed life the abolition of its principles and the destroying of the habitudes on which it doth depend We are dead because entring into the communion of JESUS CHRIST we have put off this first life which was natural carnal and terrene and consisted in a perverse and vitious re-search and fruition of the perishing things of this old world that goeth to perdition And this is it he teacheth us again in so many other places as when he saith 2 Cor. 5.14 15 16. Rom 6. that Old things are pass'd away that CHRIST having died for all all are also dead that they may not live henceforth unto themselves and again We are dead with CHRIST buried with Him by baptisme into His death made one and the same plant with Him by the likeness of His death that Our old man was crucified with Him that the body of sin might be destroyed and else-where that they that are CHRIST's Gal. 5.24 have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts and it 's the same thing that he called afore the circumcision of CHRIST Col. 2.11 and the putting off the body of the flesh the same again that he represents other-where in His own person when he saith that he is crucified with CHRIST Gal. 2.19 20. 6.14 and that it is no more himself that liveth but CHRIST who liveth in him and that the world is crucified unto him and he unto the World And it 's the same too that St. Peter understands 1 Pet. 4.1 2. when he saith that we have suffered with CHRIST in the flesh that we should live the rest of our time in the flesh no more after the lusts of men Behold me that penitent woman whose history you have in the Gospel Before she had seen the LORD she was an harlot that liv'd in nothing but filth and had neither action nor thought but for the lusts of the flesh But after she had heard the word of JESUS and felt the efficacy of His Spirit she soon lost all that former life of hers She hath now no longer that wanton and wicked heart those unchaste looks those impure desires Psal 45.6 Acts 9.1 In vain seek you in her that debauched person that liv'd in infamy before That person is no more there but is dead The sharpned arrows of the King of glory have penetrated her heart and slain her Behold me our Paul before his conversion He was a furious wild boar inflam'd unto threatnings and slaughter breathing out nothing but blood and butcheries a murtherer animated by pride and cruelty Spake JESUS to him on the way to Damascus His word like a two-edged sword pierced this fierce and unruly persecutor He struck him dead or to say better destroyed and consumed him all in a moment Seek not Saul in him any longer that so fierce and cruel man He 's no more there He is dead and so throughly dead that you shall not find in him any print of what he was before Again take me a view of those Pagans of Colosse of Ephesus of Athens and of other places who were converted by his ministery Before they were idolaters breaking out into all kind of vices their life was nothing but a continual practise of superstition and impiety of avarice and ambition of envy cruelty and injustice Now when they have passed through the victorious hand of the LORD JESUS you see no more any such thing in them He hath extinguish'd in them all the life of this kind that they had Those idolaters and ungodly wretches those epicures and robbers which lived in their persons heretofore are all dead They are new men of another quality in whom none of that they were before remaineth any longer In sine there is not one of the truly faithful and living members of JESUS CHRIST but hath undergone this death the flesh hath been slain in him and the old man pierced nailed and crucified upon the cross of the Son of GOD. I acknowledge that so long as they are on earth they still resent the efforts and attempts of this old man and that combat of the flesh lusting against the spirit Gal. 5.17 which the Apostle else-where speaks of Yet I affirm that this hinders not but that true believers may be said even for the present to be dead in regard of the flesh and the flesh dead in them First because sentence of it is given in the judgement of GOD who hath in His eternal counsel determined
to extinguish and abolish in all the members of His Son that first life which they inherited from old Adam Secondly because the execution of this decree of GOD is begun and advanced in them for the present The mortal blow thereof the flesh receives in this life from the hand of JESUS CHRIST and cannot possibly recover it again Then in the third place because this execution already begun in them will not be long a finishing natural death which considering the few daies we spend here below is not far from either of them devesting first their souls of all terrene and carnal reliques and then the resurrection being finally to refine their bodies also at the last day when earthly life shall be entirely and quite and clean dissolved and destroyed It 's for these three reasons that the Apostle saith here and else-where that the faithful are dead in regard of the life of sin and of the flesh not that they have not in them yet some remainders of them but for that this death is ordained by the decree of GOD and already begun in them and will soon be infallibly finished Even as we reckon among the dead a malefactor whom a supream Court and a sick person whom a prudent and able Physitian have condemn'd to dye neither do we stick to say that he is gone he is dead because his death is inevitable and all the life that remains for him is no longâ—r any thing So when a man hath been mortally wounded we immediately rank him with the dead because his vitals are struck and all the movings and perceivings he yet hath are but his last gaspings and the last combat his life makes before it doth end It 's in the same manner with true believers The flesh in them is wounded to death and if it does yet stir if it struggle if it give them any blow this at most is a small matter in comparison of that life it other-while exercised in them At that time it reigned in them Now if it do fight yet it rules no longer It finds a spirit in them which resists it which makes head against it and in this unto-it-fatal conflict it loseth by little and little all the blood and life it hath yet left it Wherefore the LORD JESUS whose death as we have said is both the cause and the pattern of ours did not dye in an instant but a lingring death having continued five or six hours in an agony before He gave up the ghost It is thus that the old man dyeth in the faithful He is already pierced with the nails of our Saviour and fastned to His cross and in a dying estate and without hope of recovery Nevertheless he strugleth still and will be a-while in this estate losing blood and strength and motion and life not all at once but by little and little This same is the condition of true believers Whence appears the pernicious error of those men who having the old man not bound not pierced not wounded to death in them but living and reigning at full liberty and with his whole vigour do yet imagine that they pertain to JESUS CHRIST and are of the number of His true members It 's a mortal mistake JESUS owneth none for His but such as are dead with Him whose flesh is either already laid down and destroyed in the grave as theirs who live in Heaven or at least nailed to His cross as theirs who yet combat on earth I confess the presumption of those who vaunt they sin no more and feel no longer in themselves any motion or contradiction of the flesh is extremely vain But your errour worldling is no whit less who having sin reigning and the flesh living in you do not forbear to perswade your self that you are a true Christian If the flesh doth still breath in a true Christian if it hath still some motion and some feeling in him yet it hath dominion in him no longer It lives in him no longer it languisheth in him and is so weak as it plainly appears to be at the pangs of death Put it into this estate if you will be truly Christian Fasten it to the cross of JESUS Pierce it through with His nails and with His thorns Make it drink of His vinegar Take from it its pleasures draw out its blood and strength Again since this is our condition since we by the beneficence of our Saviour are dead in such sort as we even now explained you clearly see Christian that what the Apostle concludes upon it doth evidently and necessarily follow from it to wit that we should not seek any more the things which are on earth For since we have in JESUS CHRIST put off that carnal and vitious life for the maintaining and welfare whereof earthly things are subordinate who is there but comprehends that it would be an insufferable extravagancy for us to amuse our selves still about them It would be an errour as ridiculous as if one went an hunting after game or a buying precious stones and stuffs for a person either already dead or at least in the agony of death Such a person hath no more need of those things they being good only to feed or fashion that liâ—e which he no longer hath It 's just so that you Christian do who labour so ardently in the seeking after and acquiring of riches honours and other goods of the present World All this is the equipage of a life that you no longer have The flesh for whose delight and adornment those goods do serve is dead or at least death-struck in you It is crucified with the LORD and a crucified one hath nothing to do with meat nor jewels nor other things of the earth Luke 12.20 Thou fool said our Saviour to the rich worldling in the Gospel-parable this very night shall thy soul be required of thee and then whose shall those things be which thou hast laid up As if he had said that being once dead he could no more enjoy them Christian how is it you do not consider not only your dying e're long but that you are to say truth dead already that there is no carnal life for you any longer so as to conclude thereupon that you have therefore no need of all this earthly pelf which with such a deal of pain you scrape together I confess that while we are on earth we cannot altogether be without it But neither can you deny that for a living Christianly here we need but a little of it and for a little time because we have little left us of that life for which it is necessary Let us proportionably have little affection and adherence to it Let us use it but for necessity and not for delight Let us look upon the world with the eyes of pilgrims taking but so much of it as is requisite for our passing on Set we before us the example of the life of our LORD led on earth during the daies of His
flesh for indeed it is the pattern of that life we live here below after our regeneration He sought not either the glory or the pleasures or the riches of the World He adhered not to any one of those things but used what was necessary for His food and raiment with great sobriety and frugality not tasting the fruition of it and so little fearing to be deprived of the fame that instead of the glory of the world He voluntarily suffered extreme ignominy poverty and nakedness instead of riches torments and the cross instead of pleasure And so you see my Brethren how the consideration of our being dead in CHRIST JESUS should turn us aside from the affecting and the seeking of earthly things But the life we also have in Him should no less set us at distance from the same and this is that the Apostle sets before us in the second place You are dead and your life saith he is hid with JESVS CHRIST in GOD. When CHRIST who is your life shall appear then shall you also appear with Him in glory It seems that the first words do tend to prevent an objection which might be made to the Apostle upon his saying that we are dead For how doth this consist with that which he asserted afore namely that we are risen again with CHRIST If we be risen we live and if we live it is not true that we are dead But this difficulty is easily resolv'd For first the life unto which we are dead is the life of sin and of the flesh as we have explicated it whereas the life unto which we be risen in JESUS CHRIST is the life of CHRIST and of His Spirit The one is the life of the old Adam and the other of the new Now it is not incompatible that one and the same person be deprived of the former and possessed of the latter Nay on the contrary it is not possible that such as live in the former manner should also live in the latter and as in nature the generation of one thing doth naturally presuppose the corruption of another so likewise in grace the life of the second Adam doth of necessity inferr the death of the first so that from our being risen again with CHRIST it is so far from following we are not dead to the flesh that quite on the contrary it thence necessarily follows we are dead to the flesh it not being possible to affirm the former without supposing the latter nor to place the life of CHRIST in us otherwise than by the death of Adam in us An inevitable necessity requires the one do dye that the other may live in us As for that life which we acquire by our resurrection with JESUS CHRIST the Apostle grants that it pertaineth to us and that in this behalf it may be said of us that we live as he doth say frequently both of other beleevers in general and of himself in particular Yet notwithstanding he shews us again that this life of CHRIST is not manifested and compleated in us that it is yet for the present hidden in GOD with JESUS CHRIST so as in this respect it might be said of us while we are on the earth that we live not and that we have not yet the life unto which CHRIST hath raised us after the same manner Rom. 8.22 23. as he spares not to say else-where that our being saved is in hope and we yet wait for the adoption as if we had not hitherto receiv'd the salvation and adoption of GOD. For the right understanding of this mysterie we must consider briefly what the Apostle here saith of it and first what that life is which he calleth ours Secondly how it is hid in GOD with JESUS CHRIST and then lastly what shall be that manifestation of this life which he promiseth us at the appearing of CHRIST The life of the faithful is that same which JESUS CHRIST doth give them instead of the life He taketh from them when He receiveth them into His communion This which he takes away was impure and vicious the other was pure and holy This was natural and earthly the other is spiritual and heavenly The principle of the former was a carnal mind and an irregular concupiscence the principle of the latter is a divine saith and a just and reasonable love The one consisted in a vicious fruition of the flesh and of the earth the other is a sweet and a legitimate possessing of the Spirit and of Heaven And as the former was mortal and perishing no less than the flesh and the earth from which it drew its nutriment so the other is incorruptible and eternal according to the nature of the Spirit that quickens it and of Heaven that maintains it The fruits of the former were sin and shame and damnation The fruits of the latter are righteousness honour joy and immortality That first life therefore to say true was a death rather than a life being such as after a short and feaverish agitation could not terminate but in eternal sufferings And this other on the contrary is alone truly worthy of the name of life which name also the Scripture does oft-times purely and absolutely give it â— Joh. 5. as when it saith that He that hath the Son hath life and He that hath not the Son hath not life and that He that believeth in the Son is passed from death to life But then you will say since we do believe how is it that the Apostle says our life is hid with CHRIST in GOD as if it were not in our selves Dear Brethren I answer it is very certain that the LORD JESUS doth even at present give all His true members the seminals and principles of this blessed life the which He casteth into their hearts by His Gospel and that He preserveth augmenteth and fortifyeth them there gradually by the vertue of His Spirit and by the usage of His Word His Sacraments and his Disciplines unto the making them bring forth the excellent fruits of charity and sanctity By reason of these beginnings and of the sure title they bring them to the plenitude and perfection of that life they are said in Scripture to live and to have eternal life at present even as we attribute to a plant the name and life of the kind which it is of when it hath once taken root and thrust forth some bud and verdure though it hath not yet its whole extent and perfection Yet it must be acknowledged too that the compleat form of this life which consists in perfect sanctity rob'd with glorious immortality resembling that which JESUS CHRIST our elder brother brought up out of His sâ—pulchre at His rising again and carried into Heaven with Him forty daies after will not be communicated to us but in the world to come For here below as you know both our knowledge is imperfect and our sanctity infirm as the Apostle saith else-where declaring that now we see but in
here that CHRIST is our life doth not simply signifie that He is the cause and author of our life but that it fully and wholly dependeth upon Him that without Him and separate from Him we have not a drop nor spark of life and that it is in Him alone we have all the being all the moving and all the feeling that respects the life of Heaven In very deed it is He that hath merited it for us by His death It is He that hath brought it to light by His Gospel It 's He hath shewed us a most accomplish'd pattern of it in His person at His issuing out of His sepulchre It 's He that hath given us the first-fruits of it by His word and Spirit and conserveth and increaseth them in us by His benediction It is He that keeps the fulness of it for us in His treasury on high as being the true Father of eternity And lastly it is He that taking this glorious life out of His heavenly cabinet one day will put it on us with His own hand Besides we do possess neither the beginnings nor the perfection of it but in Him and by the benefit of our communion with Him in that we are members and branches of His which cannot live but united with their head and incorporated in their vine The Apostle therefore saith that when this soveraign and only author of our life shall appear then we also shall appear in glory He hath appeared once already but in the flesh as the Apostle sayes GOD was manifested in the flesh He shall appear again a second time but in glory It 's this second appearing he doth mean when the LORD JESUS descending from the Heavens with the host of His Angels and seating Himself on a judicial Throne shall openly shew to all the creatures of the World His Glory and Godhead which the Heavens that contain his flesh on high and the weaknesses that cover His mystical body here below do now hide from the earth as we lately said Then saith the Apostle shall you also appear with Him in Glory At the coming of this sweet and happy season you as plants in the spring shall receive your life which from that sacred stock wherein it is now conserved shall be diffused into you and into all the other branches of this vine of GOD and crown you at an instant with its eternal verdure The glory whereof he speaks doth signifie the light the perfections the wonders and the pomp of blissful life perfect knowledge of GOD love and sanctity and joy the immortality of our bodies their beauty their brightness their strength and impassibility and in fine all the pieces of that infinite good the grandeur and excellency whereof we shall never distinctly comprehend untill the time that we possess it We shall then appear in this glory first because beside the first-fruits of it which we have JESUS CHRIST shall give us the fulness of it which we have not this undoubtedly the greatest and most illustrious part of His glory which now remaineth hidden in Him being then to be shed abroad upon us Secondly because the World which now despiseth and treads us under foot shall then see us in this glorious estate And as CHRIST our head shall be seen with astonishment by those that sometime pierced Him so they that now outrage His members shall then see them in their glory and be constrained to change their opinion and to acknowledge those for children of GOD and Saints of His whom in the present World they do deride and make by-words of Wisd â— 3 as saith the Book of Wisdome Thus you see Beloved Brethren what kind of life it is which JESUS CHRIST doth promise and communicate unto His faithful ones to wit the fruit of our faith and of that divine food which we have taken this morning the life of Angels the crown of Saints a super-eminent and eternal felicity in conjunction with a super-eminent and immortal glory It 's the rich treasury the living and inexhaustible spring of our consolation and sanctification Judge I beseech you what manner of persons they should be that have so high and so divine an hope and if it be not reasonable we should withdraw our thoughts and our affections from the earth to elevate them unto Heaven since it is there our life is and thence that we expect our chief happiness Christian are you not asham'd to long for earth you that have title for Heaven to labour for the meat that perisheth you that are destinated to a life which perisheth not to run after shadows you that in JESUS CHRIST have the substance of true and solid happiness How much more generous and constant are the children of this generation in their vanity Those of them that are of noble extraction and especially they that are brought up in hope of a Crown would not for any thing have a mechanick trade or foul themselves in sordid actions and even nations there are among whom they totally refrain from commerce with other men and account themselves defiled and profaned by having but touched a plebeian And you that are the issue of Heaven a child of the most High a brother of His Angels and an Heir of His kingdom you that are bred up with divine manna in the hope of an heavenly life and an immortal crown how have you the heart to grope in the mud and heap up dung to intermix with the miserablest bond-men of the earth and the profanest workers of iniquity A King's son heretofore refused to contend in the publick games because he saw no Kings do it Christian remember the dignity of your name separate your self from the exercises and divertisements of the people of the world Leave them the earth out of which they come and unto which they shall return Enter not into so ignoble and fordid a race in which you see none run but children of the earth the race of Mammon and the brood of vipers and serpents Purifie your hearts and your bodies let it never betide you to defile them with base and terrene either thoughts or actions Say not what shall we eat what shall we drink wherewithal shall we be clothed These are the thoughts and cares of bond-men These are the discourses of Pagans This is all they seek You that are Christians and whose life is hid in JESUS CHRIST seek His kingdom and His righteousness Let this be your ambition and all the passion of your souls Let this divine life and the glory wherewith it will one day crown you in the fight of Heaven and earth be night and day the object of your thoughts Take it away even at the present with an holy impatiency Begin betimes to live as you shall live eternally Let the contemplating of GOD let the love of His beauties let the meditating of His mysteries let the considering of and a conversing with His CHRIST be your employment and your refreshment in the present World
Sanctifie this earth during the time you tarry on it and change it as much as may be into Heaven adorning it with an Angelick life and conversation This is the way to make sure your crown For it will not be given in Heaven but to those that have desired and sought it in the time of their abode on earth None shall reap eternal life but they that have sowed to the Spirit No man shall have fruition above but he that hath hoped here below and no man hopeth here below but he that cleanseth himself from the filth of vices He that hath this hope in JESVS CHRIST purifieth himself saith St. John Represent incessantly unto your selves this glorious coming of the Son of GOD. Consider that He will not long delay Yet as little a while as may be and he that should come will come Consider that He will come on the sudden as lightning which in an instant shines out from the clouds and as the thief that comes at the point of time he was least looked for How much will our confusion be if He should surprise us in the disorder of our worldly affections and occupations But GOD forbid that this should betide us He hath waited sufficiently for us Let us employ that little time which is left us with so much the more care the less we have had for that which is past Let us watch let us pray let us be doing Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling Let us lead lives worthy of the name of Christians which we bear worthy of the Master whom we serve and of the food He hath given us and of the love He hath born us and of the glory He keeps for us cleansing our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and waiting with an holy joy and setled patience for the revelation of this great GOD and Saviour to His Glory and our Salvation Amen THE THIRTY FOURTH SERMON ON COLOSSIANS CHAP. III. VER V. Verse V. Mortifie therefore your members which are upon the earth fornication unclearness inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousness which is idolatry DEAR Brethren In all the designs of our lives the End is the principle that moveth us to act and the rule of our actions The fair aspect it gives us is the thing that inslameth our hearts and kindleth in them the desire of possessing it which thereupon awakeneth the powers of our souls and causeth each of them to employ what ability and industry they have in the pursuit the understanding its light to find out and make a due choice of means fit to conduct us in it the will and affections and other faculties of our nature which depend upon them their motions to get these means and set them on work All this is done as you know and experiment it daily only to attain that End we have proposed to our selves The ends which men aim at are infinitely different and oftentimes even contrary to one another and consequently their courses very different also as if some went East and others West or some took their way Southward and others their march Northward Yet notwithstanding such diversity of intentions and prosecutions they are all incited and led on in the self-same manner there being not one of them but the desire of some end he loveth hath seized and swayed unto action and at length induced to take the course he steers according to the passion he hath for the attainment of it and the judgement his understanding makes of means proper to bring him to it The end therefore being the first spring that setteth us a going the principle of our motions and as it were the North of our course the guide and measure of our actions You see My Brethren that it infinitely concerneth us to take it right and having once taken it to have it continually before our eyes for the referring and addressing of all our travails to the same Wherefore our LORD condemns those as unadvised and injudicious persons who enterprise a design without having first duly considered it without having sate down and taken their counters in hand and exactly calculated all the cost that is without having maturely and composedly examin'd what the thing is which they desire and what abilities they have to compass it as that ridiculous builder who laid the foundation of a Tower and was then constrained to give over not having wherewithal to finish it For this reason also the Masters of Moral Philosophy that they might rightly form their scholars to it have been wont to set before their eyes the felicity of man that is his End for the enkindling a love and desire of it in their hearts and then they propose to them the means that are to be used to attain it Such is the method that the holy Apostle hath followed in this part of his divine discourse which we are explicating to you He shewed us at the entrance Heaven and JESUS CHRIST who reigneth there sitting at the right-hand of His Father together with that life and immortality and glory which He keeps for and promiseth to His faithful ones This is the end we should tend unto Seek said He the things which are in Heaven and I perswade my self there is not a man so stupid and savage but an object so good and so desirable does make impression upon and possess with love of it and a secret passion to obtain it Now though the splendor of so noble and so sublime an happiness should as soon as it appears put out all that fallacious appearance of the things of the earth wherein the children of this world do vainly seek their good and which they foolishly take for the end of their lives yet the Apostle to preserve us from this error and fully inform us of our true end hath further expresly advised us not to place it in things here below Mind not the things saith he which are upon the earth Having therefore each of you setled this divine end of your lives in his heart according to the Apostles doctrine look at it continually Let it be night and day before your eyes This thought alone is capable to direct all your steps to govern all your actions to purifie your souls to render you invincible against all your enemies to conserve the peace and the joy of GOD in you and maintain His consolations in you amid the greatest storms Yet this doth not satisfie our Apostle He not content with having mark'd out our aim to us and shewed in general what we ought to decline doth particularize us the means we are to use for arriving one day at that blessed Heaven whither he had elevated our hearts He discovers to us and tells us one by one the shelves and dangerous passages of our course and finally goes over the most part of our duties in the conduct of this grand design He begins with vices of the flesh and of the earth the two pernicious pests of
all and most contrary to the design which by the grace of GOD we are entred on The Apostle therefore commands us to make mortal war upon them and to fight to weaken to kill and to destroy without pity all that we shall perceive in our selves to bear any affection or inclination to them Mortifie therefore saith he your members which are upon the earth c. The LORD please to bless now the voice of His Apostle and sink these words which Himself sometime inspired so deep into our fouls that they may be at this time effectual to our sanctification eradicating those accursed passions out of our hearts which cannot live nor fructifie there without dishonouring the Gospel and depriving us of that heavenly life to which we aspire The speech as you see contains two parts the first of which commands us in general to mortifie our members which are upon the earth The other represents unto us in particular some of these members of our old man which we are to mortifie to wit fornication uncleanness inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousness which saith he is idolatry These are the two heads which the grace of GOD assisting we will consider in this action first the Apostle's general exhortation and then in the second place the vices which he doth by name and expresly give us order to mortifie As to the general exhortation it is conceiv'd in these words Mortifie therefore your members which are on the earth and to comprehend it aright we must consider the meaning of it and the coherence An understanding of the meaning of it does depend upon that clause your members which are upon the earth For there is no one but sees that this term members cannot signifie here as it ordinarily doth the parts of which our body is comâ—osed the hands the arms the feet and the like and as St. Paul useth it 〈◊〉 where when he saith Apply not your members to be instruments of iniquity unto sin Rom. 6.13 If he had had this intention here there would have been no need to add as he doth that these members are upon the earth every one plainly seeing it Besides what he saith in the sequel doth necessarily exclude this sense For he puts uncleanness and covetousness in the rank of those members which he orders us to mortifie things that are not parts of our bodies whereof neither the being nor name doth any way suit with them but indeed vices of our souls in which they properly reside and whence they spread forth themselves over our whole nature defiling and dishonouring it divers waies This addition leaves us no doubt at all but that these vices and others like them together with all filthy and shameful habitudes from whence bad actions proceed which he elsewhere calls the deeds of the body and works of the flesh are directly and precisely those members the mortifying whereof he commands us But you will say how and why doth he call them our members seeing they are not the parts of our nature which are all good and created of GOD but rather the maladies the leprosies and the pests of our nature supervening from without by the venomous breath of the old Serpent and his contagious commerce things that deprave and blast eat out and consume our being so far are they from accomodating it or adorning it or affording it either the benefit or the beauty which the body doth derive from that diversity of members wherewith it is so admirably furnished I answer that this is very true and that vices being the poison and ruine of our true being they cannot be properly called members of it it being evident that a disease is nothing less than one of the members of the body which it afflicteth Yet this for all that hinders not but the Apostle might upon some other account use this similitude and compare the vices of humane nature in the state it now is unto the divers members that constitute our body And for the right understanding of it you may please to remember that it is a form of speaking very common in all languages to compare those things unto a body which are made up of an accumulation or collection of many parts indeed different but nevertheless knit together in some order and having some sequel and dependance of some upon the rest among them whence it comes that we say the body of an Estate of an Army of a Town of a Family An whole wherein is no distinction of parts is called a mass one in which some distinction is to be be observed is termed a body Thence it comes that the Apostle compares that heap of vices and ill inclinations which existing now in all men from their birth goes on growing and gathering strength with age he compares it I say to and gives it the name of a body as you may remember you heard him speak in the precedent chapter where he saith that by our regeneration in JESUS CHRIST we have put off the body of the sins of the flesh This same body of our vices is also often compared to an entire person and called as you know the old man or the old Adam For first it is not one vice alone it 's a vast multitude of them a mass of horrors an hydra of evils a mixture of many poisons an heap of an infinity of ordures a complication of many maladies that do all at once make spoyl of one and the same creature and leave nothing sound nor whole in it from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head to speak with the Prophets but cover it all over with wounds and bruises with putrified and inveterate sores Then again these maladies though all pernicious and mortal are yet different among themselves there 's infidelity superstition distrust hatred or contempt both of GOD and our neighbour love of the flesh and the earth pride cruelty sloth luxury intemperance avarice and a thousand such others For who can so much as name them all And though the confusion that alwaies necessarily follows error and vice be to say true very great among them nevertheless there is some kind of order and sequacity to be observed in them For whereas it is knowledge that should move and guide our nature here it is ignorance that governeth this troop â—â—monsters Blindness is their guide and error their director And whereas in the due constitution of man the will follows the light of the understanding here the will followeth its darkness and embraceth those phantasms which the phrensie of its leader takes for real and solid things And as in the diseases of the body what disorder soever there be a certain order and regularity is nevertheless to be seen in their beginnings their progress and increases nothing coming to pass in them without cause so is it in the sicknesses of the soul they have their accesses their inflammations their returns and their periods that though there be nothing but
a perpetual disorder which displaceth every thing and overturns all yet all hath its certain causes It 's therefore with a great deal of reason and elegance that the Apostle compares this strange convention of so many evils which are so divers and do all work with some sequel and dependance unto a body and each of those vices of which it is composed as covetousness fornication and the like unto the members of a body He calleth them our members because that old man which is made up of them is wholly ours and does invest all the principles of our life from their root and invelope them and mingle so deeply with them that it all in a sort is nothing but corruption and malady this venome infecting all the actions and all the motions of our nature its understanding its affections and passions together with the thoughts words and actions which flow from them so that as our animal and natural life consisteth in the exercising of our members and in their actions in like manner our moral life is all of it nothing but a continual exercising of these vices and of the sins they produce as is to be clearly seen if you consider the lives of profane and unregenerate persons For they are nought else but a continual exercise of vices of ambition of vanity of covetousness of luxury and sensuality as they are addicted more or less to the one or the other of these sins the perpetual running of a foul and muddy stream which a corrupted spring doth daily thrust forth that you cannot observe so much as one of its swellings or rollings exempt from its filthiness And this may suffice for comprehending the reason why the Apostle calls these parts of the old man our members For as to that consideration which some do propose in this matter namely that the members of our bodies having been created of GOD they are not ours but in regard of use and not in regard of their original whereas the members of the old man are ours all manner of waies having been made and formed in us by our own fault and naughtiness and not by the hand of GOD who created man upright and pure man distorting and depraving himself this conceit I say seems to me more subtil than solid For though the matter of it be very true yet it is so wide from the Apostles design in this place that there is little likelyhood he thought upon it when he called the vices here of our corrupt nature our members Without doubt he so doth only because it is in the exercising and acting of these vices that the carnal life of men doth consist For the rest if you remember what we said upon the precedent Text of the death of the old man in us you will not think it strange that the Apostle after having said that we are dead does not yet forbear to exhort us to mortifie the members of this same life which we have put off in JESUS CHRIST For our being dead in this respect doth not import that the life of the flesh is entirely and absolutely extinct in us this will not be effected untill we shall quit it at our leaving of the earth and put on coelestial and spiritual bodies at the day of the resurrection but the Scripture doth thus speak first because JESUS CHRIST hath by His death His resurrection and His ascension into Heaven destroyed and abolished all the causes that gave nutriment and sustenance to the life of the old man and secondly because the old man 〈◊〉 receiv'd his deaths wound in each of us by the faith that ingrafted and incorporated us into JESUS CHRIST so as if we persevere it is not possible that he should recover But this death of His as we said doth not arrive all at once It 's executed by little and little and the exercise of a believer during his stay here below is to busie himself incessantly about it daily to weaken and wound that flesh of his which is already nailed to the cross of his LORD to entinguish by little and little all the life it hath remaining that is to mortifie his members as the Apostle here speaks In this sense you see these two conceptions are so far from having ought that 's contrary or incompatible in them that quite otherwise the one doth evidently and necessarily follow from the other For since we are dead in JESUS CHRIST since the arrest of the death of our old man is past since JESUS CHRIST hath done on His part all that was necessary to execute it since this flesh condemn'd is already fastened to His cross it is evident that it ought to live no longer and that by consequent each of us should incessantly bestirr our selves to put it to death by mortifying its members beating down and weakening their vigour driving deep into them our Saviour's nails and thorns untill they be effectually reduced unto that state of death unto which they were condemned having no more either motion or sentiment or force or life at all in us Lo My Brethren the thing the Apostle means by these words mortifie your members To say it in a word he would have us weaken and extinguish the vices of our old man and put them in such a state of death as hath no more strength nor vigour nor stirring But as this holy man's whole language is full of profound wisdome I am of opinion he thus speaks to give a further blow to those seducers whose error he had been refuting in the fore-going chapter These men to recommend their disciplines gave out that they did not at all spare the body that they had no regard to the satiating of the flesh that they oppos'd its pleasures and humbled and mortified it And you know that this is at this very day the language of those votaries who place Christianity in such exercises They speak of nothing but their mortifications St. Paul therefore doth here correct the vain conceits of this error and sheweth us what true mortification is and that that is worthy of the study and exercise of the faithful It is saith he the members of the old man we are to mortifie and not those of the body It is vices It 's fornication and covetousness and pride that we must quell and kill with blows and not our body And as one of the Prophets sometime said to the superstitious of his age who fasted and afflicted themselves and rent their clothes Rend your hearts and not your garments Joel 2.13 in like manner the Apostle here opposeth the internal mortification of sins as only necessary and truly worthy of a Christian unto the external mortification of the body unto which error did and still doth tye up its self For in truth to what purpose is it to beat a man's breast and rend his back while sin mean time reigneth in his heart To what purpose is it to afflict the members of this body while the members of the
corrupted by these shameless sayings of the world But why do we call our selves Christians if we preferr the sentiments of the world or of our own flesh before the judgements of GOD St. Paul beside what he saith of it here protests aloud else-where having spoken of adultery Gal. 5.21 fornication and uncleannesse that they that commit such things 1 Cor. 6.10 shall not inherit the kingdom of GOD And again more formally elsewhere Deceive not your selves saith he neither fornicators nor adulterers nor the effeminate shall inherit the kingdom of GOD. Renounce either St. Paul or this error of the world If you persist in it the Apostle cryeth to you that you deceive your selves that is to say instead of Heaven which you in vain hope for while you continue in this evil way you shall in the end have hell for your portion in the communion of devils whose uncleannesse you love more than the purity of JESUS CHRIST and of His Saints Neither may you plead to us the furiousness of this passion GOD hath provided for it giving you an honest and a lawful remedy of it namely Marriage Why do ye not use it But the love of libertinizing and the fear of an imaginary yoke and an ambitious humour with-hold most men from thinking on it who would willingly say what the Doctors of Rome have not been asham'd to write concerning their Priests even that marriage is a greater sin for them than fornication whereby they sufficiently declare what opinion they have of this filth since they preferr it before a thing which they rank among the Sacraments But the Epicurians among Pagans and Monks among Christians have cried down marriage as much as they could through a mervaillous artifice of the enemy of our salvation who rightly judged that by this pernicious doctrine he should involve a multitude of people in the vilinies of luxury and consequently in damnation But if this vice be pernicious the other which St. Paul condemneth here is no less so And his not being able to name it without giving it the title of idolatry doth evidently shew you what indeed it is Ye covetous let this thunderbolt break the charms of your illusion Judge what a vice yours is since the Apostle calleth it idolatry and thereupon conceiving a just horrour at it renounce it for ever and all those low thoughts in which it busieth you to become henceforth liberal charitable beneficent communicative rich in good works Instead of these perishing goods which are exposed to the hands of men and the injuries of nature labour to treasure up a foundation for the time to come and to get together on high in the Heavens those true and immortal riches which JESUS CHRIST the Father of Eternity doth there keep for us and will one day give us to enjoy the same for ever in supreme glory with Himself and all His Saints So be it THE THIRTY FIFTH SERMON ON COLOSSIANS CHAP. III. VER VI VII Verse VI. For which things the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion VII In which you also walked other-while when ye lived in them DEAR Brethren If men had as great a measure of understanding and generosity as vertue hath of beauty and attractiveness there would need no more to induce them to love it and embrace it but a representing to them the image of it This admirable object would quickly ravish their hearts and in an instant kindle in them a sweet and an everlasting flame of love which would govern all the motions and sentiments of their lives and consuming in a short time the vices and the foolish or unjust passions of their nature fill their deportment with piety honesty and charity One of those ancient sages of the world whom they call Philosophers did rightly acknowledge this truth notwithstanding the darknesse of his Paganism and said that if we could see vertue naked that is as it is in its self it would inflame our souls with a marvellous love to it For indeed what is there fairer and more amiable than virtue the true and lively image of GOD the supreme beauty of all beauties the resemblance of Angels the fairest of all creatures the only jewel of reasonable nature the light of our souls the ornament of our bodies the advantage of our being above that of animals the end and utmost perfection of the world it's just and legitimate governesse this vast universe having not been made and formed but that she might happily possesse it governing and keeping it under her holy and divine laws She sets all our affections in their true position bowing them under the Creator and raising them above the creature She reduceth all the faculties of our nature to their just symmetrie subjecting our passions to the will and our will to reason Resting content with the love of GOD and the hope of His glory she coveteth no unjust thing and doth no person wrong no not in desire and thought but loveth and obligeth all men as much as she can and sheds abroad continually upon them the sweet and innocent rayes of her excellent light remaining alwaies holy and just and honest without alwaies calm and peaceable and happy within Who could look upon a thing so beautiful without loving it accordingly you may observe that where there does appear at any heigth for instance upon the throne of a nation some image of it though not fully to the lire nor compleat and every way entire but only grosly drawn and in many respects imperfect yet it fails not to attract the eyes and hearts of the world forthwith It proves the love and joy of the present generation and the admiration of all posterity Men bless it heaven and earth delight in it and the age that produced it is glorious by it one single example of this nature being sufficient to adorn a whole countrey and render the time wherein it flourished for ever illustrious What then would our ravishments be if we beheld the true and accomplished effigies of it in all its lively colours without defect and without imperfection It 's true GOD hath pourtray'd it indeed to the life in the tables of His Scriptures But the eyes of our souls are so bad that we never comprehend it but very weakly and again our fordidnesse and wretchlesnesse is so extreme that commonly we do not love things according to their inherent beauty and honesty but according to the profit they afford us and do likewise hate things not so much for their deformity and natural odiousnesse as for the hurt that they may do us This ignorance and this mercenary humour which is common to all men is a cause that our Saviour contemeth not Himself with proposing to us the beauty of holynesse and the deformity and disorder of sin which is the due manner of dealing with reasonable creatures but accommodating Himself to our infirmity he incessantly sets before our eyes the good and the evil that will redound unto
people do not reject the word either of the Gospel or the Law which is neither the one nor the other addressed to them yet can they not be excused of contemning that other voice of GOD which makes it self be heard from Heaven throughout all the earth and soundeth secretly in every man's heart and privily calleth them to repentance for their sins to piety to honesty to justice and rectitude They profanely reject this sacred declaration of the Deity without which GOD never left a man among the nations no not the most forlorn or most desperately plunged in idolatry and viciousnesse as the Apostle teacheth us in the Acts. They despise those admirable directions He gives them in the governing of the world to seek Him feel Him and find Him Acts 14.17 17.26 27. They make light of the evidences He offers them in His administration of the universe of His eternal power and Godhead and finally do abuse the riches of His mercy of His patience Rom. 1.20 2.4 and of His long-suffering by which His goodness inviteth and solliciteth all men to repentance Whence appears the wonderfulnesse not only of the justice but even of the gentleness and benignity of GOD who having right to punish men upon the first sin they are sound guilty of yet doth it not but calleth and inviteth them to repentance and waiteth for them and causeth not His wrath to come upon them untill to the crime of their sin they have added that of rebellion against that second way of salvation which He in His loving kindness offers them to wit the way of repentance For that which the Apostle saith here of fornicators and the avaricious in particular is true of all vices in general the wrath of Heaven cometh not upon them that are guilty but when by their unbelieving and obduration they have made themselves children of rebellion and there is not a sinner in the world how great and enormous soever his crimes may be but this good and all-merciful Majesty receives most readily to mercy providâ— only he repent according to the Prophet's saying that God willeth not the death of a sinner Ezek. 33. but that he be converted and live so as henceforth it is not simply sin that damneth men but impenitency and unbelief And the goodnesse of GOD doth so much the more gloriously appear in this procedure of His towards them for that to have the liberty of treating thus with them He bought it if I may so speak at the price of the blood of His only Son whom He such is His goodnesse to us deliver'd up to the death of the Cross to salve the interests of His justice which opposed this way of mercy that He inclined to open unto men after their falling into sin But this very thing shews us on the other hand how great the corruption of men is and how untractable the furiousnesse of the passion they have for vice in that not content to be debauched from the service of their Soveraign which is of it self an horrible attentat and worthy of a thousand penalties they are so desperately in love with sin that to continue in it they despise and even reject with an enraged insolency all this holy and sacred mysterie of the kindnesse of GOD and are so inchanted and bestialized by the poisons of sin that they preferr its short its vain and wretched pleasures before Divine grace and salvation and do less dread the wrath of their Soveraign and the society of Devils and the torments of Hell than the loss of that unworthy and shameful delight which the practise of sin and the fulfilling of its lusts doth give them for a few daies But we may further observe here the Apostle's holy art who aiming to divert the Colossians from avarice and the pollution of carnal pleasures doth not tell them that GOD will punish them heavily if they do not avoid them this language would have in some sort offended them as implying that they had some inclination or disposition to such a faultinesse On the contrary presupposing that this would not betide them to give them horror at these crimes he shews them the just punishments of them in the person of the unbelieving and rebellious like a tender and a prudent father who to imprint an hatred of vice and debauch in the heart of his child chastiseth the slaves in his presence that the example of those vile and wretched persons may teach him what punishments he will deserve if he come to fall into any such disorder he who is the son of his house the heir of his freedom and estate For we must not fancy that because we have the honour to be of the alliance of GOD we may therefore commit with impunity those sins which the LORD punisheth so severely in those that are without Far from us be so fottish and so pernicious a conceit It 's vice that GOD hateth and not persons and whoever hardens himself therein live he in any profession Pagan or Christian reformed or otherwise he is a child of rebellion and the advantage and excellency of the profession he makes is so far from exempting him from that it will aggravate his punishment it being most just as our Saviour teacheth us Luke 12.47 that he who knew the will of his Master and doth it not should receive more stripes than he that offends ignorantly And when a true believer salleth through infirmity into some one of these disorders as alas happens but too often GOD plainly shews how much it doth displease Him never failing to rebuke and chasten it except a prompt repentance do prevent such chastening of His. 1 Pet. 4.17 1 Cor. 11.32 Judgment saith St. Peter beginneth at the house of GOD. And He judgeth us saith St. Paul and teacheth us that we may not be condemned with the world as we shall assuredly be if we persevere in sin without repentance and amendment Hence the Apostle fearing lest some such imagination should abuse the Ephesians he gives them the same intimation with express advice that they suffer not themselves to be beguiled with a false hope of impunity Eph. 5.6 Let none saith he deceive you with vain words For for these things the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion But further his threatning here particularly fornication uncleannesse inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousnesse in saying that it is for these things the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion is not to signifie that other excesses of such rebellions ones as their cruelties their murthers their ambitions and the like exorbitances should remain unpunished on the contrary Rom. 1.18 Rom. 2.9 he else-where expresly declareth that the wrath of GOD is revealed peremptorily upon all ungodliness and unrighteousness and again that there shall be tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doth evil But he hath denounced this wrath of GOD upon the luxurious and
not to be doubted but that the precipitaâ—ed deaths and ruines of so many great ones whom the world hath seen and still doth see perish with astonishment are for the most part from the same source even the debauches they have been carried into The accidents of particular houses and persons infected with this leaprousie are less marked yet are they nevertheless very remarkable And he that shall look narrowly into them shall find in them admirable examples of the justice of GOD upon these kind of sins and this in special that He commonly takes away His covenant from houses where such disorders reign I might easily let you see like foot-steps of the wrath of GOD upon the covetous whose unrighteousnesse He often punisheth with loss of senses of health of honour and of that very wealth which they love much better than their bodies and their souls themselves not to speak of the infamy which GOD sometimes poureth out upon them and the horrible miseries into which He lets them fall in their persons and in their posterity But I must pass to the other part of this Text and speak a few words of it and conclude For the Apostle after this wrath of GOD which he hath represented as falling from Heaven upon the children of rebellion because of their pollutions and avarices reminds the Colossians that themselves had sometime been in the same condition in which saith he you also walked other-while when ye lived in these things To live in these sins is to have the principles of our life infected with the venome of them To walk in them is to produce the actions of them The one is the power and faculty of life the other is the exercise and function of it For the having in ones self the principles and faculties of life this the Apostle termeth living and by walking he understands a putting forth the actions of the same as appears plainly by his saying elsewhere If we live in the Spirit let us also walk in the Spirit For a man that Gal. 5.25 for instance is asleep does nevertheless live and hath life though he performeth not the actions of it As therefore to live in the Spirit is no other thing but to have the faculties and powers of our nature renewed and as it were new-east and regenerated by the vertue of the Spirit of JESUS CHRIST so on the contrary to live in sin is in like manner to have our understanding and will and the other powers of our nature putrified and corrupted and as it were empoisoned with Adam's sin by the contagion of his flesh And again as those do walk in the Spirit who exercise piety and sanctity and do conduct all the actions and motions of their lives according to the will of the Spirit so they on the contrary walk in sin who follow and fulfill the lusts thereof and employ themselves in no other exercise but the serving it and doing those evil works which naturally flow from the habitudes of it But we have spoken largely heretofore if you remember of this first life of old Adam which the grace of the LORD JESUS hath destroyed and mortified in us We have only to observe in our way that since the exercise of man in his state of nature before grace is to walk in vices and in grossest pollutions it must be an huge error to imagine that he should be able in such a state to produce works either meritorious as some say or preparatory to grace as others do pretend All he doth for this time if you believe the Apostle in the case is not good but to prepare for Hell and merit the wrath of GOD and to have any other opinion of it will be a diminution of the greatnesse of the grace of GOD towards us Let us think then Beloved Brethren on that shameful and miserable estate in which we naturally were and should have continued for ever with the children of rebellion living and walking in sins the wages and fruit whereof could be no other than eternal death if the LORD through His abundant grace had not delivered us from such a condemnation And resenting as we ought the greatness of the benefit He hath conferr'd upon us let us incessantly bless His mercy and goodness Thanks be ever rendred unto thee O holy and merciful LORD for that we being servants of sin thou hast made us free by Thy Son and given us by thy Spirit Rom. 6.17 to obey that express form of doctrine which hath been delivered us by thy servants But as heretofore the vices in which we lived did continually produce all kind of pollutions and sins and henceforth since the cross and grace of our LORD hath dried up this source of impurity let there no more appear any track of them in our manners Let the holyness of that new man whose name and blood we boast of shine forth in all the actions of our lives Above all let us banish thence those two capital and accursed pests of luxury and avarices for which you have heard here before all the mouths of Heaven opened to fulminate against the rebellious that serve them the curses of this world and of that which is to come And if the ignorance of such as lived in error withheld not the wrath of GOD heretofore from coming on them for these two kinds of sins what must those expect now who commit the same crimes in the light of JESUS CHRIST Sure as much as the disobedience and the rebellion of the one is more grievous and more enormous than that of others so much more terrible will be the wrath that shall pour from Heaven upon them than all the judgements of GOD the world hath seen in time past Your ingratitude Christian who so ill brook your name and your disobedience surpasseth in horridnesse all the unbelief both of the first world and of ancient Israel they rejected but the preaching of Noah and the ministry of Mâ—ses whereas you outrage the Gospel of the Son of GOD and as much is in you is make Him a lyer Yet you know how they were punished you know the deluges which the fault of the one brought upon all the earth You know the abysse opened its mouth to swallow up the others alive Heaven and earth and the elements were armed against them If their punishment makes you tremble why do you imitate their faults yea why commit you such as are more hainous and blacker than theirs GOD is good and merciful I acknowledge but to sinners repenting To those that mock at His instruction and make a jest of His menaces He is severe and inexorable And if they amend not they shall know sooner or later to their cost that it 's a fearful thing to fall into His hands But the LORD JESUS whom we invocate please to give us better things so reforming this Church by the power of His Spirit and of His voice that henceforth these crying sins be no more seen
friends doth offend us And though we have more need than any of the equity and indulgence of others yet we can bear nothing from them but imitating in this part of our lives the furious and extravagant rigours of Rome in her Councils do excommunicate and anathematize indifferently all that crosseth us And as for the offences that are done us we make them so hainous that if we were believ'd they would all be taken for treasons which cannot be pardon'd without injustice and notable prejudice to all humane society Hence come those hatreds and quarrels wherewith all is full among us and which are kept on foot and perpetuated to the reproach of the Gospel and scandal of the world between great and small yea the more the sorrow between neighbours and nearest alliances not so much as Brethren and Sisters exempted neither the communion of grace nor of nature being sufficient to reduce our refractory and untrâ—ctable stoutness to reason Now though this be horrible yet need it not be wondred at For the cause of it is very evident even pride which hath taken up the place of that humility which the Apostle commandeth us 'T is this arrogancy and that haughty opinion which every one hath of himself that renders us so cruel and unnatural insensible of the miseries of the afflicted and implacable towards those that have offended us This is the poyson that kills all sweetness and gentleness all tenderness and humanity in us and draws out of our bowels all the sentiments of the charity of JESUS CHRIST Restore humility and you will soon recover all those divine Vertues But dear Brethren enough of complaints especially on so good a day in which we have communicatted at the LORD 's own Table I would now much rather praise your vertues and graces than reprehend your faults and vices I shall therefore leave the charge of examining them to each one of your selves to be performed by you apart under the eyes of GOD and in the secret of your own consciences and will for a conclusion content my self with exhorting and conjuring you to obey henceforth this command of the Apostle and to put on as he enjoyns bowels of mercy kindness humility gentleness and patience bearing with one another and pardoning one another if one hath a quarrel against the other as CHRIST hath pardoned you This is required of you by that sacred Bread and Wine which you all have taken together this Morning at the Table of JESUS CHRIST and are the symbol of your union and the badge of your concord Hath not that mystical Cup indeed sweetned your hearts Hath it not mitigated your gall and bitterness and mollified your stoutness and expel'd out of your minds all thoughts contrary to charity This again that holy and glorious LORD calls for of you who hath to day been communicated to you Christian saith he I have shewed thee mercy that thou might'st so do to others I have had pity upon thee that thou might'st have compassion upon them I have given thee my flesh and blood that thou might'st impart of thy good things to my poor members who need them I have dy'd for thee that thou might'st live for them and have satisfied thee with the bread of Heaven that thou might'st distribute unto them that of the earth I have pardoned thee thy crimes and drowned them all in my blood that thou might'st chearfully forgive them the offences they have done thee Thus it is my Brethren that the LORD bespeaks us The name of Christians which we bear and the quality of elect of GOD Saints and Beloved which is inseparably annext thereto doth also oblige us to the same devoirs For with what face can we say that we are elected of GOD if we still abide in the commerce of the World and its vices Or his Saints if we have no mark of his sanctity Or his Beloved if we despise his commandments In fine the interest of our own welfare and salvation demandeth too the same thing of us For what is there more miserable than cruel haughty hard-hearted and implacable souls whom their own vices do torment night and day for the present and the fire of Hell will torment eternally in the world to come And on the contrary what is more graceful or more happy than a Church in which do reign pity and benignity humility meekness and patience And these holy vertues bind all the faithful together It 's there that the LORD hath commanded life and the blessing for ever Psal 133.3 as the Psalmist sings It 's there he pours forth the graces and consolations of his Spirit during this world and will in the next distribute the crowns of his Glory and of his Immortality Amen THE FORTIETH SERMON ON COLOSSIANS CHAP. III. VER XIV XV. Verse XIV And besides all this put on Charity which is the bond of persection XV. And let the peace of GOD hold the chief place in your hearts unto which ye are called in one body and be ye thankful DEAR Brethren Hypocrisie that piece of wickedness which GOD most abhorreth hath a great extent in humane life It not only counterfeiteth piety doing external actions of religion and hiding a protane and impious heart under this handsome veil but also frequently puts on a false thew of justness and goodness towards men that by this out-side it may deceive them and through their credulity accomplish its unhonest and vicious designs Hereby first it commits an iniquity of blackest note it being as a wise Heathen sometime said one of the unjustest things in the world to make a wicked wretch pass for an honest man And secondly it does unworthily profane the acts of vertue as holy and sacred a thing as any is making them serve the passions and interests of vice than which a more unclean and baser object cannot be imagined For an Hypocrite does good not out of any affection he hath unto vertue but to get reputation or win peoples hearts or advance his own affairs Ambition or avarice or pleasure is the idol to which he sacrificeth the noblest and most splendid actions For instance when he gives alms unto the poor 't is not for that he careth for them as the Scripture speaks of Judas but he doth it only to win credit He gives properly to his own vanity and not to the necessitousness of men Again when he acts the part of a merciful man and forgives those that have cross'd him the offences they have done him it is not any sentiment of goodness but meerly the interest of his glory that sways him so to do There are a multitude of people that do thus abuse beneficence and gentleness As the more expert sort of Tyrants they make 'em instruments of their lust and when they perform any actions of 'em it is not at the command of those vertues themselves but in subserviency to their own vices retaining a disposition to be cruel and inhumane if their interest requireth
would have place in him but from the time he had put on the habit of Charity and could not hinder but that he might have transgressed divers waies before Since then the law justifyeth none but those that never violated it at any time what-ever it is manifest that though a Christian should never violate the law after he hath Charity yet could he not be justified by his works nor would he be exempted from needing the grace of GOD for the remission of the sins he committed before he had Charity But where grace is Rom. 11.6 there justification by works cannot have place according to St. Paul's saying in the Epistle to the Romans If it be by grace it is no more by works Otherwise grace is no more grace but if it be by works it is no more by grace Otherwise work is no more work But I add in the second place that what they do suppose to wit that he that hath Charity does perfectly fulfill the law and so as never to fail so much as in one point that this I say moreover is evidently false and contrary unto experience and unto Scripture Unto experience for who but daily sees and perceives how often how many waies those very men among the faithful do offend who have greatest degrees of Charity 1 Joh. 1. Unto Scripture for it plainly telleth us in divers places that if we say they are the words of an Apostle we have no sin we lye and the truth is not in us True it is that Charity doth not cause us to offend nay such offending is on the contrary a deviation and a departure from Charity However I affirm it is no impossibility but that a man that hath true Charity may sometime falter in it as you see it often comes to pass in all habits he that 's endowed with them doth some actions not very consonant unto them A good Archer for instance doth not alwaies hit the white and a good Advocate doth not alwaies plead exactly well It befalls the best Writers and the exquisitest Painters and the most accomplished Politicians to commit errors now and then in the matters of their profession And it was said long since of the excellentest and most admired piece of heathen Poetry that there are passages in it at which the author slept from whence others have deriv'd the priviledge that in a prolix work they may sometimes forget themselves The same event attends the habitudes of moral vertues for neither do these so absolutely fill up the souls of men but that actions contrary to them do sometimes escape those who have obtained them to an hiâ—â— degree as experience shews and Philosophers have expresly noted Therefore neither are faults incompatible with the habit of Charity as we possesse it here beneath Only it with-holdeth such as are truly endowed with it from committing them often and when they are overtaken it eftsoons toucheth them with regret at it and moves them to repent of what they have committed Since then that to be justified by works a man must present such one 's unto GOD as have no way any need of pardon it is still evident that Charity how accomplished soever we may have it here below yet is not capable of justisying us before GOD. If our adversaries will be obstinate and maintain that Charity is exempted from all sin I will grant it them of that Charity which reigneth on high in the Heavens being kindled Aug. Ep. 29. ad Hieron and kept up by the vision of the glorious face of GOD but I will say with St. Augustine that no man hath such a Charity upon earth ours here is but begun and impersectly formed Yet the Law requireth of us a Charity full and entire and perfect in every particular Surely then that which we for present have is not able to satisfie the Law nor by consequence justifie us But others conceive that by this perfection which Charity is the bond of the integrity and unity of the Church is to be understood for that the perfection of bodies doth properly consist in the collection and colligation of the parts whereof they are compos'd those that want any one of them being not in a condition to be called perfect These authors therefore make account that Charity is here stil'd the bond of perfection because 't is it that joyneth and bindeth all the faithful together by means of the mutual love they bear to one another For my part Dear Brethren I think we must joyn together these two expositions and reduce them to one for this end taking the Apostle's words the bond of perfection as simply importing that Charity is a perfect bond by an Hebraism very frequent through the whole Scripture as when 't is said a man of sin or a man of peace to signifie a sinful man Rom. â— 26 or one that 's peaceable or pacifick affections of infamy for infamous affections and so in a multitude of other places Here then in like manner the Apostle says a bond of perfection instead of a perfect bond an exquisite bond capable of binding up in perfection both all Christian Vertues in every faithful soul and all the faithful in the Church with one another For as concerning Vertues Charity binds them together both by that common principle whence it causeth them to spring to wit love of our neighbour and by that common end unto which it directeth them namely his benefit and edification It gathers up and puts all of them together in its bosome not leaving one out of its enclosure because they are all necessary for it mercy to comfort those whom it loves benignity to succour them humility to win them gentlenesse to please them patience to conserve them and in fine all the rest to acquit it self of those duties it would do them And as for the faithful who knows not that Charity is the perfect bond of their union The considerations of blood of state of interest and of pleasure do sometimes bind other men together but it is with a great deal of imperfection these unsure bonds being daily broken and so badly compacting the persons they inclose that they are soon separated and do sometimes even fall foul with and rend one another But Charity is in very deed a perfect bond that uniteth those whom it ties together so close and with such firmnesse as neither the accidents of fortâ—ne as they call them nor the mutations of the earth nor death it self which ruines all other unions and conjunctions in the World can loosen them or separate them from one another It was this sacred bond that heretofore made all the beleevers at Jerusalem to be of one heart and of one soul It 's a bond Acts 4.32 that all the force of men and elements can neither break nor untye a bond stronger than death and the grave as the mystical Spouse sings in that excellent Song It doth not only joyn the souls of the
faithful it mingleth and consociates them changeth them into one body and one spirit gives them the same will and the same affections Now surther it is to form and conserve this holy union among us that the Apostle does recommend to us the peace of GOD in the second part of this Text. Let the peace of GOD saith he hold the first place in your hearts to the which you are called in one body For this peace of GOD is not that which we have with GOD by faith in JESUS CHRIST His Son when as being appeased by the satisfaction of His Crosse He looks upon us in Him with a propitions and favourable eye as a Father and not as a Judge not imputing our sins to us which may be termed Peace of conscience But it is the peace we ought to have with one another all of us living amiably together as children of one and the same Father and heirs of one and the same grace and glory It 's the daughter of Charity and a fruit of that holy and Christian love which binds us perfectly together The Apostle calls it the peace of GOD first because He loves it above all things and upon this account is often stil'd in the Scriptures the GOD of peace hating nothing in the world more than trouble and discord and contentions and wars Secondly because He commands it us every where in His word And lastly because He is the Author of it who gives it and inspires it by His Spirit into all those that are truly His children And the Apostle hath expresly given it this title in this place for the more effectual recommending of it to us and that He might induce us to receive it with the greater respect as a thing of GOD's holy sacred and divine which we cannot violate without offending grievously that Soveraign Majesty to whom it doth belong 〈◊〉 many waies He willeth that this Peace of GOD do hold the chief place in our hearts The term he makes use of in the original is admirably expressive and elegant for it properly signifies to have the super-intendance of a thing to be the judge and arbiter of it to govern and regulate it and give it law That is the Apostle means that this Divine peace be the Queen of our hearts the mistresse and governesse of all your motions that that keeps them in due respect and with-holds them from ever attempting ought that tendeth to violate or disturb it And if the resenting of an offence for instance or an opinion of our own worth or any other such consideration do begin to kindle wrath or hatred or animosity against our brethren or excite some other passion of like nature in our hearts that this Peace do forthwith advance and stay the commotion and agitation of our minds calming the storm and speedily repelling all these sentiments of the flesh as so many incendiaries or evil spirits without giving them entrance or audience That it do enjoyn us and inspire into us humility and patience when we have been offended regret and the making of satisfaction when we have offended any other and cause us to seek carefully after all that it shall judge necessary to maintain amity and good intelligence among us as kind words and obliging deeds banishing both from our mouths and from our manners all that 's apt to cause or keep up our dividing from our neighbours The advertising of us that this is the peace of GOD were enough to perswade us to give it such place in our hearts But that the Apostle might overcome all possible obstinacy he here further represents unto us two considerations besides which oblige us to give it this super-intendency over our souls The one is that we are thereunto called and the other that we are one body For the first you know that our LORD and Master JESUS CHRIST doth every where call us to this Peace of GOD and that He hath given us precepts for it in His Gospel and examples of it in His life For what was there ever in the world more meek and peaceable than this Divine Lamb He contended not Mat. 12.19 nor cryed and His voice was not heard in the streets as the Prophets fore-told of Him He was gentle and lowly in heart He never repulsed any and received sinners with open arms how bad and abominable soever they had been He invited His greatest enemies unto His salvation and offered His grace to the most obstinate and bore their contradictions without answering again and their reproaches with silence and their rage without exasperation and did weep bitterly for that Jerusalem that rebellious City would not know the things of her peace Such is the pattern He gave us commanding us likewise expresly to be sweet Mark 9.50 and simple as doves without gall and without bitternesse and to be in peace among our selves And His Apostles repeat this lesson to us in divers places Rom. 12.8 as St. Paul here and other-where again If it be possible as much as in you lyeth have peace with all men And it 's for this that JESVS CHRIST came into the world even to pacifie Heaven and Earth Jews and Gentiles Isa 2.4 11.6 7 8. to extinguish enmities and wars and change swords into plow-shares and spears into pruning-books to take away the poison of asps and the cruelty of wolves and the fierceness of lions and transform bears and the savagest beasts into lambs Isa 66.12 and make them all live and dwell peaceably and amicably together finally to make peace overflow as a river as the ancient oracles had magnifically foretold Isa 9.5 by reason whereof He is also expresly stiled the Prince of Peace And you know it was the legacy He bequeathed us when He was preparing to dye for us Joh. 14.2 Peace I leave with you said He my peace I give unto you not to speak of the blessing and the dignity He promiseth those that shall love the same Blessed saith He are the Peace-makers Matt. 5.9 for they shall be called children of GOD. After all this who can doubt but He calleth all His unto peace as the Apostle here affirms Since He forms them to it by His voice by His lise by His promises and by the whole design of His Mediatorial Office But besides the command and order He hath given the very estate and condition He hath by His vocation put us in doth manifestly oblige us thereunto and this the Apostle represents unto us in the second place when having told us that we are called unto peace he adds in one body or to express the full and whole force of the Greek words in one only body It 's a doctrine universally received and most expresly asserted in divers places of Scripture that the whole Church doth make up but one only mystical body of which JESUS CHRIST is the head and the faithful are the members being animated under Him with one and the same
the name and title they have in Christian Morality Works that are the same as to the external action do sometimes prove nevertheless very different and even contrary one good another bad because the Spirit that produceth them is not the same As for instance the alms of an ambitious man and of a true believer have no external difference the ones act in that regard is the same the others is yet if you consider the inward springs of them both you will find that the one is a piece of vanity and the other a fruit of charity Whence it comes that notwithstanding all the resemblance they have in open view they are yet at the bottom works of a quite different nature the one evil and condemned of GOD the other good and acceptable to the LORD The one with all its outside paint and colour is an act of vice the other of vertue The same is to be said of those two kinds of Preaching which the Apostle mentions in the Epistle to the Philippians the one of those that Preached CHRIST through envy Phil. 1.15 16. and of contention the other of such as preached Him of good will and of love The language of them both was the same but the diversity of their designs render'd their actions so different that the one 's to say the truth was a sacriledge and an abomination the other 's on the contrary one of the best and most excellent works of Christian piety and charity Thus you see the rule which S. Paul gives us to order all the external actions of our lives our words and works even that we do all in the Name of the LORD JESVS The rule is short and easie but of vast and almost infinite use As a little square serve 's an Artificer to design and mark out a multitude of lines and to discover and correct all those that are amiss so by this little rule which the Apostle puts in our hands there is no humane action but we may certainly perceive whether it be right or wrong good or evil and conform to the will of GOD or otherwise neither is there any part of our lives but this rule if we take care to adjust them by it is capable of guiding and forming unto perfection Now as the name of GOD in Scripture signifies sometimes that Ebrew word of four Letters which the LORD takes for His name and memorial distinguishing Himself by that appellation from all those GODs to whom the error of Nations wrongfully gave that quality and the honours due to it so likewise the name of JESUS is sometimes taken for this very word JESUS which as you know is the name that was given Him by the express command of GOD. And so those of the communion of Rome seem to understand it Phil. 2.10 in that passage of S. Paul where it is said that in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow of things in Heaven and things in Earth and things under the Earth uncovering as oft as they hear the word JESUS pronounced as if the Apostles meaning were that all creatures coelestial terrestrial and infernal should do reverence when those two Syllables JESUS are uttered Wherein verily they are much mistaken the import of that passage beeing quite otherwise It 's not thus neither that S Paul takes the name of JESUS in our Text as if he simply intended that in our actions and discourses we should not fail to intermix alwayes the word JESUS having it incessantly in our mouths and never doing nor saying any thing without pronouncing it first Far be it from us to imagine that such a thought should fix upon the Apostles mind It is not the word nor the letters or syllables of this name that he recommends unto us I grant we cannot have it too much in our mouths provided it flow into them from the heart and that it be a religious and respectful consideration which makes us mention it and not a vain and childish superstition as if there were some secret vertue annexed unto words We are to note then in the second place that as the Name of GOD is very often taken in Scripture for the power the authority the will respect and consideration of GOD in like manner is the Name of JESUS Thus Moses foretelling the coming of the Messiah Deut. 18.19 And it shall come to pass saith he that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which He shall speak in my Name I will require it of him Which He shall speak in my Name that is by my order and authority and in acquitting himself of the charge which I have committed to Him And it 's thus we frequently read that the Prophets spake in the name of GOD that is by His express command they being sent and dispatched from Him 2 Kings 2.24 And it 's said of Eliah that he cursed the children that reviled him in the name of the LORD that is by His authority And this form of speech was so common among the Jews that the Priests and Elders demanded of the Apostles in the fourth Chapter of the Acts Acts 4.7 in whose name they had done that miracle meaning upon whose authority and by whose order they had undertaken it The same exposition is to be given of that which the Psalmist singeth We will boast in the name of the LORD our GOD Psal 20.8.25 that is in His help and power and speaking of the faithful unto GOD They shall rejoyce saith he in thy name that is in the confidence they have in thy power and goodness of like import is that which he addeth that the Horn of His anointed shall be exalted in His name that is by His might and by the vertue and order of His providence So David entring into combat with the Philistin 1 Sam. 17 4â— Thou comest against me saith he with a sword and with a spear and with a shield but I come against thee in the name of the LORD of hosts whom thou hast defied In the name of the LORD that is for His glory which thou hast reproached and in assurance of His protection and succour in the same sense that King Asa mean't it on a like occasion Help us saith he O LORD our GOD. For we rely on Thee 2 Chr. 14.11 and are come forth in Thy name against this multitude that is in Thy quarrel and with confidence in Thee It 's therefore in the same manner we are to take this phrase in the name of CHRIST which often occurs in the Books of the New Testament as in S. Matthew Prophecying and casting out Devils in the name of the LORD that is Mat. 7.22 24.5 Acts 5.28 by His authority and in His might and when men are said to come in His name that is to avouch themselves His and to affirm themselves sent by His order to speak and teach in the name of JESVS CHRIST and likewise to be assembled in His name
have you observ'd examples of them What would S. Paul say if he were in the world to see his discipline so strangely forgotten among men that make profession to hold him for one of their principal Apostles He recommendeth to us not one of these names to which you oblige your selves He speaks of none but that of the LORD JESUS it 's in that name alone he commands us to do all we do whether in word or work because indeed Acts 4.12 there is none other under heaven given unto men whâ—â—eby we must be sav'd as said S. Peter the same Peter whom you pretend to be the head and the foundation of your Popes S. Paul sure gave and conserved this glory to his LORD's name alone with so much zeal and jealousie that understanding how some in the Church of Corinth joyned in some sort the names of servants of His with it calling themselves 1 Cor. 1.12 some of Paul others of Apollos others of Cephas and others of CHRIST as you see among our adversaries at this day some call themselves of Augustine others of Francis and others of JESVS this Holy man cryes out upon it as a Sacriledge and an utter overthrowing of Religion Is CHRIST divided saith he was Paul crucified for you Ibid ver 13. or were you baptized in the name of Paul Prescribing by these words or rather by this flash of lightning that the faithful ought not either call or distinguish themselves or glory or speak or do whatever in Religion in any other name than that of this holy and merciful LORD who was crucified for them and in whose name alone they were baptiz'd Yea he thanketh GOD that he had administred baptism but to few of them lest any once should thence taken occasion to believe or say that he had baptiz'd in his own name Then a little after resuming the discourse so much took he the thing to heart 1 Cor. 3 4 5 9. Are you not carnal saith he to these people while one of you says I am of Paul and another I am of Apollos Who then is Paul and who is Apolloâ— but Ministers by whom you believed even as the LORD gave to every man Ye are GOD's Husbandry Ye are GOD's building Is not this a telling us plainly that we ought neither bear the name of any other than of GOD nor act in matters of piety in any name but that of JESUS CHRIST In which likewise he here commandeth us to do and say all that we shall act in word or work But having considered what the Apostle affords us here against error for the instruction of our faith let us now observe what he teacheth us for the correction of our manners which is his principal intention He teacheth us My Brethren that if we will be truly faithful persons and Christians as we make profession to be we must have JESUS CHRIST continually before our eyes must examine address and sute our actions our speeches and purposes unto the name of CHRIST take it for the North-star in our course and in one word for the rule of our whole life That we never do any thing little or great otherwise than in His name That His name be the only motive inducing us to speak and act and the only mark at which our words and actions tend Think now first how great our confusion ought to be The Apostle willeth that whatever we do in word or work we do it all in the name of the LORD JESVS and the most of us quite contrary do almost nothing in His Name Heaven and earth are witnesses that the name of JESUS hath no part in our works or words They are all consecrated to His enemies they are inspired by their spirit and aim at nothing but their interests Tell me ye covetous is it in the name of JESUS CHRIST that ye toil night and day to heap up dung Is it He that taught you those black arts and inhumane dexterities to spoil the Orphan and the Widow for the enriching of your selves Have you had the confidence to call upon the name of JESUS that He might teach you and guide your hands to work deceit and bless your violences Is it to advance His glory and give His name a good odour that you make your selves famous among the Vassals of Mammon not disdaining any part of his drudgery how distastful soever to GOD and man And you that are ambitious can you indeed perswade your selves that those vanities that take you up are so important unto JESUS CHRIST Or that it is in His Name you lose your time about them You also whom the flesh and its pleasures do drown in their ordures in conscience is it in the name of JESUS CHRIST you are employed Is it for His glory or according to His will I say as much of the revengeful and the drunken and of all those that serve any one of the other vices which JESUS CHRIST hath expresly condemned and forbidden No one of all these do's act in His name Dear Brethren let us renounce these things if we will be Christians Let us never make any enterprize never set upon any action but first consider whether it may be done in the name of the LORD JESUS that is whether it be such as we may with a good conscience implore His help to finish it and judge either proper to advance His glory and conform or at least not contrary to His will and interests Hereby we are obliged to banish out of our lives first all vitious actions of which none can be done in the name of JESUS CHRIST since they are all displeasing to Him And they that in designs of such nature have the impudence to ask assistance of Him as some there be whom superstition hath inspir'd this sottish conceit into that they may do evil for a good end these I say offend JESUS CHRIST excessively rendring Him guilty of their crimes as much as in them is and inviting Him to take part in their vices But this rule of the Apostle doth not only oblige us to eschew evil and abstain from sin It requireth also that what good we do be done for CHRIST's sake and in His name that in our alms and in our devotions and in all the acts of our piety and charity we seek nothing but His glory the fulfilling of His will and the advancement of His Kingdom and not the praise of men or the interest of our own affairs It 's a taking of His name in vain to do otherwise It 's a prophaning the actions of vertue by employing them in the service of flesh and blood them which of their own nature and by GOD's intention are not to be done but for His glory and for His Son's name sake In fine this maxim of the Apostle's embracing generally all the things a Christian doth both in word and work 't is evident that it ought to regulate those also which are in their own nature indifferent
degree of society either civil or domestick or religious they be placed And though this part being once well comprehended hath in it a great and almost sufficient light to direct and govern all the rest yet they forbear not upon it to descend unto the particular duties of each of those estates and conditions which the faithful live in in humane society Thus the Apostle S. Paul hath done in this Epistle for after having formed us all in general unto piety and sanctity and charity which belong to all Christians equally as you have heard in the precedent exercises he now addresseth himself in particular to each of those three orders of which an houshold is composed the first whereof is the Husband and the Wife the second the Father and the Children the third Master and Servants giving each of them a good lesson for their conduct in the condition to which GOD hath called them Elsewhere he regulateth the duties of Subjects in reference to the civil Powers under which they live of the faithful in reference to their Pastors and reciprocally of Pastors in reference to their flocks not omitting Deacons the other part of Ecclesiastick Ministry and this not in one place alone but many In consideration hereof before we proceed any further permit me I beseech you to make here at the entrance one general reflection upon this the Holy Apostles way of treating thus Whence comes it that having been so careful to instruct and to direct in particular each of those different ranks of persons which then were and still are in the Church they never drop'd one word of the duties of three kinds of conditions in which now a dayes Rome makes the main and in a manner the all of the Christian Commonweal to consist I mean the Pope Sacrificers or Priests and Monks The Apostles do instruct the lowest Masters how they ought to treat their attendants and the simplest Presbyters or Bishops that is Pastors how they ought to feed their flocks They never tell the Pope in what manner he ought to deport himself in that great government of all Christendom which as is said hath been given him of GOD. The Apostles do advertise the most abject slaves of the servitude they owe their Masters and every flock of the diference and respect it owes its Pastors They never speak a word either to single believers or their guides of that infinite subjection which they are obliged to profess unto the Pope or of kiâ—â—ing his feet or of submitting the conscience or any other such like thing The Apostles do exactly inform Bishops or Pastors of the duties of their charge of preaching exhorting instructing of watching of correcting of censuring of excluding the scandalous from communion They never order any Sacrificers to offer a propitiatory hoast unto GOD for the sins of quick and dead nor tell them of the preparations ceremonies and observances necessary thereto nor of purifying by means of an auricular confession the consciences of such as are to participate of such a sacrifice nor of the precautions and subtilties that are necessary for the right administration of it In fine the Apostles verity vouchsafe to take the pains to enter into Families and there regulate the demeanour of Husbands and Wives of Virgins and Widows of Fathers and Children of Masters and Servants Why say they nothing unto Monks neither to the solitary as Hermits and Anachorets nor to those that live associated in separated dwellings Why do they not somewhere instruct the Guardians the Abbots the Superiours and Generals of these orders Why do they not exhort their inferiors to yield them a blind obedience Why say they nothing of their three vows and of the means of well observing them And why give they no instructions to Religious women who imitating the zeal of men shut themselves up in Convents But what say I that they no where regulate the carriage and particular duties of these three sorts of conditions More than so they make no mention of them at all neither expresly nor implicitly And if you read the Books of the New Testament you will find that there is no more speech in them of the Pope and the Sacrificers and the Monks of Rome than of the Bramines of India or the Bonzians of Japan or the Muphti of the Musulmen Whence comes so strange a silence so universal an obliviousness Is it that the thing was not worthy of the Apostles care and quill But how can that be imagin'd since if you believe those of Rome it 's upon these three orders that Christianity depends For as to the Pope he is the head of the Church and exerciseth so necessary an imperial power that out of his communion there is no salvation And as for Priests or Sacrificers it 's they alone that purifie the souls of men both by the absolution they give those whom they confess and by that Deity which they deliver unto such as they communicate Lastly as for Monks their order is the state of perfection They are the Angels of the earth the glory and the rampart of the Church the sole patterns of Evangelick piety and sanctity wherefore they call their fraternities Religions and disdaining their old name of Monks each sex of them stiles themselves Religious as if the piety of other Christians did not deserve to be called Religion in comparison of theirs Whence comes it then that the Apostles have so forgotten these three sorts of people which are as highly or more necessary in the Church than the four elements in the world Dear Brethren you plainly see the reason and if passion did not blind our adversaries they might see it too as well as we The Apostles have said nothing to these three sorts of people because there were none such among Christians in their time Had there been then a Pope and Sacrificers in the Church the Apostles without doubt would have told them their duty as well as Bishops and Elders that is Pastors And if there had been Monks and Religiouses they would undoubtedly have spoken unto them as well as unto men and women that live in wedlock Since they did it not be we certainly assured that neither of these three plants was sown or set by JESUS CHRIST or His Apostles but they have all sprung up since their dayes partly from the imprudence partly from the superstition and corruptness of men who also affording them cultivation have raised them by little and little to that prodigious greatness which now for divers ages they have had And this be spoken at the entrance upon occasion of the care the Apostles in general had to form and regulate the duties of the divers conditions of persons which are found in the Church As for S. Paul's particular in this place he speaks here first unto Husbands and Wives next unto Fathers and Children and last of all unto Masters and Servants following therein the natural order of the things themselves For if you consider the
their duty The command of obedience is expressed in these words Servants obey in all things them that are your Masters according to the flesh The very names which he makes use of do shew the justice of the duty which he gives them in charge For since they are servants and those whom they serve are their masters it 's evident that they are obliged by the reason and nature of the things themselves to render them exact and faithful obedience But his saying of Masters that they are their masters according to the flesh doth mitigate the rigour and the meanness of servitude limiting the power of masters and superiors and extending it no further than unto temporal and corporeal things not unto the soul and conscience Man may be master of our flesh GOD alone is LORD over our Spirits Whatever be the subjection of our bodies we have still our souls free and dependant on none but GOD their Creator who alone hath the power as well as the right to do them good or evil as our LORD and Saviour remonstrates unto us Fear not them saith He that kill the body Matt. 10.28 and cannot kill the soul but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell It is with this distinction that we are to take the obedience which the Apostle recommends unto servants in all things his meaning is in all things that lye within the Master's power and do purely and singly refer unto the flesh not reflecting on or touching the interests of the spirit For if our master according to the flesh command us things contrary to the will of our Master according to the spirit that is of GOD in this case it is evident that we ought to obey GOD rather than man and that if we owe much and in some sense even all things unto men yet we owe them nothing to the prejudice of GOD and that there is nothing but we should suffer rather than fail of that first and eternal servitude we owe to our Creator and Redeemer This holy doctrine of the Apostle's sheweth us first that the LORD JESUS CHRIST doth not at all disturb the order of humane societies He leaves to every one in them the just rights they are possessed of unto persons or things He subjecteth us unto Himself and unto GOD His Father but without doing wrong unto Caesar or any of the lawful powers that govern either Estates or Families He intends that all His should render to them what they owe them He destroys but the treacheries and tyrannie of sin and Satan Herod dread not His coming He will neither pull your Scepter out of your hand nor diminish in any thing the rights of your Crown His design is to give you Heaven not to out you of the earth to enfranchise you from the slavery of vices and not to deprive you of the service of your subjects Whence appears how unjust and scandalous the pretention of those is who under the ombrage of Gospel-liberty would abolish all dominion and soveraignty among Christians accounting it incompatible with the state of grace and their 's no less who subject even in respect of temporals all that are Christians not the greatest Monarchs excepted to one mortal man making their Crowns to depend upon his will and giving him authority to depose them and to loose their subjects from the yoke of their obedience dogmatizing too by the same means that a Christian Prince who falleth into heresie loseth the right he had over his people Can there a thing be said more pernicious or more contrary to the Apostle who would not that Paganism it self a matter worse than heresie should make Masters and Superiors lose any of the lawful rights they have over their Christian slaves Secondly the Apostle's limiting the authority and power of masters over their slaves in things of the flesh naming them their masters according to the flesh doth shew us that there is none but GOD alone who is our Master according to the spirit whence it follows that such as under any pretext whatever do peremptorily invade the Lordly ruling of our souls do grievously erre and usurp a thing which belongs to none but GOD an attentat which those of Rome are evidently guilty of in that they put the consciences of all Christians in subjection to their Pope and Council whereas the holy Apostles do expresly declare that they have no dominion over our faith 1 Cor. 1.19 1 Pet. 5.2 and advertise all the Ministers of CHRIST to feed the flock committed to them not as being Lords over GOD's heritage but so as they may be a pattern to them But I return unto St. Paul who having in general injoyned servants that obedience which they owe their masters according to the flesh in all things doth adjoyn the manner after which he would have 'em to obey them not serving to the eye saith he as bent to please men but in simplicity of heart fearing GOD. He first purgeth the carriage of Christian servants of a vice very ordinary with persons of that quality namely serving only to the eye because they have no other design but to content men They do not think themselves obliged by reasons of conscience but only by those of their own interest to do their masters any duty or service And so they serve them no further than they judge necessary for the exempting themselves from that chastisement which they should incurr if they failed to obey or for their procuring some recompence by winning their favour They respect nothing but this in all the obedience they render them Whence it comes that when they see their master present they play the good husbands as we say and labour at their work with most officious diligence and care But if he turn his back they return unto their nature caring for nothing less than for his service like that evil servant in the parable who seeing that his master delaid to come betook himself to his debauches and fell an outraging his Lord's houshold and wasting his goods All these peoples servitude is but a Comedy And as Players put on their disguise and act their parts when there is an assembly of spectators so these do not their duty but when their master looketh on And if they thought they could deceive his eyes and knowledge or avoid his correcting them or save their salary they would surely never take the pain to do ought of what he hath commanded them It 's this fallacious and truly servile disposition of heart which the Apostle here forbids to Christian servants when he says they should not serve to the eye as aiming only to please men But instead of this he would have them serve in singleness of heart fearing GOD that is sincerely without fraud or feigning and having more respect to GOD than men To that eye-service he had mentioned he opposeth singleness of heart and to the pleasing of men the fearing of GOD. The
either by defect or excess do not render to their servants what is right as for instance those that overbear them with toil or strokes and they that quite contrary let them live idle and in debauches those that diet them ill or too well and lastly they that defraud them of their wages which is one of the most horrid and cruel acts of injustice that can be committed But besides right the Apostle would have Masters render also to their servants equity The word he makes use of in the original properly signifies a certain equality and correspondence that should appear between the offices of the one of them and the deportment of the other so that as the servant obeyeth in singleness of heart and in the fear of GOD the Master likewise do command holily and religiously and that as the one serveth with joy and respect in like manner the other do govern with mildness and affection In a word right comprehends all that refers to justice and equity all that pertains to Christian Charity and gentleness For the reducing of the faithful unto this holy moderation he orders them to remember that they also have a LORD in the Heavens His meaning is that the dominion they have over their servants is not absolute but dependant on GOD and by consequence such as ought to be regulated by His word and will If they have people beneath them they have a Master and a Soveraign above them who is the common LORD of them all and unto whom they are to give account of the treatment which their servants shall receive at their hands He says particularly that this LORD is in the Heavens to hold them the better to their duty by the consideration of so redoutable a Majesty who is not here beneath on earth the place of misery and vanity but on high in Heaven sitting on an eternal throne and from that glorious habitation of light and immortality doth consider and govern all things at His pleasure nothing coming to pass in His whole Empire but He plainly perceives and most justly judgeth of This great LORD is above all and there is neither Master nor Prince of such elevation among men but is under His feet He is superlatively holy just and good He loveth all His creatures and concerns Himself in the wrongs of the meanest and most contemptible ones hating nothing more than injustice and insolence outrage and cruelty possessing withal an infinite wisdome and an almighty power which none is able to resist Sure then consideration of the Empire and soveraign dominion that He hath over us is very proper to keep us within bounds and to restrain us from abusing the power He hath given us over persons subject to us nor could the Apostle put those that have servants in mind of any thing more pertinently that should oblige 'em to render them right and equity Thus we have explained his instructions It 's now for you Beloved Brethren to make your profit of them and to gather the fruits he offers you in them for the amendment of your lives and the consolation of your souls First Ye Christians whom the meanness of your birth or as they call it of your fortune hath reduc'd to the condition of serving rejoyce ye at the the honour done you by this great Minister of CHRIST who disdaineth not to address his holy voice unto you Set the care he hath of you against the contempt that men cast upon you Let his speaking to you comfort you and raise your hopes of the inheritance of GOD. Think well upon the report he makes you that the persons to whom ye are subject are not your Masters but in reference to the flesh Your servitude will not be eternal Nay it will not be very long nor extend further at most then to the end of that carnal life which ye lead upon the earth When this earthly tabernacle is once dissolved you shall enter into the glorious liberty of the children of GOD and then there will no more be any difference between you and your Masters For the present your better part is already in possession of this liberty namely that spirit which GOD hath formed in you after his own image and which maugre all the outrages of men will ever remain master of it self if you give it to JESUS CHRIST the great freer of mankind who doth faithfully and speedily enfranchise every one that receiveth and embraceth His truth Only take heed that ye abuse not His grace as if the spiritual liberty He hath gratify'd you with did discharge you from doing faithful service to your Masters after the flesh The more He hath illuminated you in the knowledge of Himself the more fidelity and love do you owe. For besides other reasons the fear of GOD and the will of JESUS CHRIST doth now oblige you to obey them so that the serving them makes up a part of your piety According to your acquitting your selves therein well or ill GOD will give you or deny you his inheritance But besides your own interest the glory also of the Gospel is concerned in the case For your faults defame our religion and make it believ'd to be a licentious discipline whereas your fidelity will produce us praise Every one will be constrained to acknowledge the sanctity of our doctrine when they shall see it reform the deportment even of man and maid-servants And this the Apostle doth expresly represent unto you elsewere Tit. 2.9 10. Let servants saith he be obedient to their masters pleasing them well in all things not answering again not purloyning but shewing all good fidelity that they may adorn the doctrine of GOD our Saviour in all things Object me not the ill humour and rigour of your Masters Remember the words of St. Peter 1 Pet. 2.18 who obligeth you to serve not only such as are good and equitable but also the froward Take their ill treatment for an occasion by which GOD would exercise and refine your faith Receive those strokes of the rod from His hand and not from theirs making them matter for your patience and a tryal of your faith Let the eye of JESUS CHRIST who looketh on you let His favour and benediction which always accompany conscionable sufferings let the hope of his inheritance for your Salary sweeten all the pains of your servitude How ingrateful soever men be to you your patience shall not be left unrewarded if ye persevere in it constantly for CHRIST'S sake And you Masters who so much desire to have faithful and obedient servants render ye to them that right and equity which the Apostle commands you Though your extraction or estates set you above them in humane society yet your nature is no other then theirs Ye are subject to the like infirmities with them One and the same death will consume you both nor will there be any difference between your dust and theirs You shall appear before the same Judge and the tribunal
with all the Elogies they merit Surely the Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews naming Timothy whose praise and great advantages in the work of the ministry and in all vertue every one sufficiently knows calls him simply his brother Timothy The other on whose behalf he salutes the Colossians is Demas In the Epistle to Philemon written at the same time with this and in which he maketh mention or most of the persons here named he placeth Demas with Mark and Aristarchus and St. Luke among his fellow-labourers whence it appears that he was a Minister of the word of GOD of the order of those who served for helpers to the Apostles and are stiled Evangelists But after he had for a space ran well after he had appeared with praise among the lights of the Church alas he lost in the end this fair crown of glory St. Paul who vouchsafed to give his name such an honourable rank in two places of his Epistles in a third tells this lamentable story Demas saith he hath forsaken me having lov'd this present world 2 Tim. 4.10 and is departed unto Thessalonica From this doleful example let us all learn Dear Brethren and particularly such of us as GOD hath called to the holy Ministry to stand on our guard and to mortifie in our selves worldly lusts as avarice the love of life and pleasures ambition and such like passions which ruined Demas And if the Dragon cast down some of the stars that shined in the heaven of our Churches if the flesh and the earth the food and the fulness of Egypt and the false grandeurs of Chaldea cause them unworthily to quit the design and the hopes of mystical Canaan let us not be scandalized at it We are not better then the Apostles If all the light of their wisdom and miracles could not keep Demas from becoming bankrupt of the truth we ought not to think it strange if there happen to be among us some whom belly and vanity do precipitate into the like fault notwithstanding the clearness and evidence of our holy doctrine But it is time to pass into the second part of our Text in which the Apostle orders the Colossians three things first to salute those of Laodicea on his behalf secondly to communicate this Epistle of his to them and thirdly to advertise Archippus of his duty Salute saith he the brethren that is the Christians which are at Laodicea and Nymphas and the Church which is in his house This Nymphas dwelt either in the City of Laodicea it self or in the Countrey near it as some in my opinion do without necessity suspect The Apostle names him in particular because doubtless he was one of the most considerable persons of the flock at Laodicea and St. Paul's affirming that he had a Church in his house doth sufficiently testifie the zeal of his piety This Church was not a place in his house where the Assemblies for religious exercises were for the Scripture never useth the word Church in this sense which is now common among Christians but it is his houshold and the persons whereof it consisted who all made profession of Christianity with him and were confirmed and edified therein by his instructions and good examples Whence appears the vanity of the pretension of those at Rome who acknowledge no Church to be but which braves it in the world and carries with it the pomp of multitude and prosperity The Church of JESUS CHRIST is found where ever He is known and served and adored according to His Gospel within the enclosure of the walls of an house in the very caverns of mountains and coverts of the wilderness whither the Holy Spirit expresly foretelleth us that the Spouse of the Lamb shall be sometimes constrained to retire The second order which the Apostle gives the Colossians is considerable When this Epistle saith he hath been read among you cause that it be also read in the Church of the Laodiceans and read ye also the Epistle from Laodicea First his willing that this Epistle of his be publickly read in the assemblies of these two Churches doth shew us that the Scriptures of GOD were given us to the end all the people of CHRIST Clerks and Laicks small and great should hear and read them and not to be put into the hands of one certain sort of persons only as if this treasure did belong to none but them And hence appears the abuse of those who read the Scriptures to their people but in a language they understand not which is as bad yea in my opinion worse then if they read them not at all For not to read them is simply to bereave the people of the profit they might make of them whereas to read them in an unknown tongue is not only to deprive them of their edification but moreover to mock them and no less offend GOD by perverting His word in such a manner from its due tâ—e and end What shall I say of their outrage who accuse these Divine books of ambiguity of obscurity of seeming contradictions and errours Who say that the reading of them is dangerous and more apt to corrupt and embroil the faithful then to instruct or edifie them O holy Apostle why didst thou put so dangerous a book into our hands a book full of thorns and void of fruit Why didst thou order them to read it in their assembly to impart it unto neighbouring Churches and enjoyn them to read it also Why didst thou not fear the infecting the Spirits of thine innocent Disciples and the insnaring of them in some heresie by the darkness of thy riddles or the sowing of some disorder in their hearts by the ambiguity of thine expressions Dear Brethren the Apostle answers that his Gospel is clear that it is not covered but to unstable spirits and such as are engaged in some evil passion that this Epistle is not any seed of errour but a remedy against seduction a vessel full not of poysons but of preservatives and antidotes But I perceive what the matter is The Scriptures seem to these Gentlemen dangerous because saying nothing of their Pope nor of their Mass nor of the worship of their Saints and Images nor of their Purgatory and such other points nay saying many things which are evidently contrary unto them they easily induce those that read them with respect to beleeve that these doctrines have been invented by men and were never taught by JESUS CHRIST and His Apostles This book troubles them because they find not their reckoning in it it is obscure because what they love do's not there appear It is ambiguous because it pronounceth nothing clearly or expresly for the opinions which they are resolved never to forsake Furthermore this imparting of St. Paul's Epistle unto the Laodiceans unto which the Colossians were obliged by his order shews us that there ought to be an holy and charitable commerce between the Churches of JESUS CHRIST in reference to spiritual things
he expresly gives it us in charge For though the duty be not only very just but even most necessary yet we are of our selves so cold and sluggish and so indisposed to the performance of it that we all need the heavenly voice of this Minister of GOD to excite us unto it Presuming that we have the things we need in our own power or shall find them in the sufficiency of nature and not considering how they all depend upon the hands of GOD we remit the assiduous invocating of him and make not use of prayer but on extraordinary occasions when humane succour faileth us as the manner is in tragedies where the Deity is not brought in but at some difficulties which no created power or prudence is able to clear On the other hand we are so proudly delicate and tender that if we are not heard as soon as we have spoken we flye off and are ready to say as that King of Israel once did Why should I wait on the LORD any longer 2 Kings 6.33 For the curing our selves of so pernicious an humour and that we may persevere in prayer according to the Apostle's advice let us consider in the first place the continual need we have of GOD's assistance For since it is in Him that we have being life and motion since it is He who sendeth poverty and maketh rich who sets up and puts down who dispenceth health and sickness who bringeth to the grave and reduceth thence who governs the hearts of men and the elements of nature Since it is He again who beginneth who polisheth and perfecteth all the work of grace and crowneth it with glory who effectually produceth in us both the will and the deed of his good pleasure it is evident that without the help of His holy and most happy hand we can never come to possess any good either in our own persons or in our families either in the State or in the Church nor be preserved and secured or freed and saved from any evil of any kind whatever You cannot refuse belief of this great truth without imputing falshood at once to the Scriptures of GOD and the depositions of Nature both which do harmoniously report and averr it to us on all hands Yet if thou credit it why do you not consider what it necessarily inferrs namely that having continual need of GOD's assistance you are by your own interest obliged to implore it continually And that as you cannot pass a day without His favourable succour so neither should you spend a day without calling on His Name Look I beseech you upon poor beggars with what earnestness with what indefatigable perseverance they spend whole daies nay their whole life a petitioning of us It 's a sense of their necessity that gives them this constancy and inspires this courage into them Dear Brethren we have infinitely more need of the succours of GOD than these poor people have of ours Why are not we at least as earnest as constant and assiduous in beseeching Him as they are in asking alms of us As for them our flintiness is such that for the most part they reap little or no fruit of their perseverance in praying of us whereas the LORD according to the riches of His infinite goodness and power never sends away ashamed such as persevere in prayer to Him He hath so promised He doth daily so perform and the Church's experience in all ages assures us of the truth of the word He hath given us in that behalf I confess He doth not alwaies presently give us what we crave But if we be constant if undismayed at His first denials we press Him with a vigorous and an ardent faith there 's nothing but perseverance will draw it from His bounty Gen. 32.25 26. Hos 12.4 in the end It was thus that Jacob obtained the blessing he desired He wrestled stoutly with GOD all night and had power over Him he wept and begged favour and constantly holding fast his LORD I will not let thee go said he to Him untill thou bless me The Canaanitish woman in the Gospel took the same course and was heard in like manner She bore our Saviour's first put-offs without dismay and those hard words It is not good to cast the childrens bread to dogs Matt. 15.26 astonish'd her not She receiv'd this great blow without giving over and her holy importunity came off victorious having drawn from our LORD's mouth that sweet and desirable answer O woman great is thy faith Be it unto thee as thou wilt Imitate this violence It offends not GOD. It appeaseth Him The LORD Himself commands it us expresly and teacheth us that we ought to pray alwaies and not faint by the parable of that poor widow whose importunity overcame the obdurateness of the unjust Judge and drew that from him in the end which neither fear of GOD nor respect of men could sway him to This Judge was wicked and cruel yet the perseverance of a woman conquered him How much rather shall ours bear away what we desire of GOD who is goodness and clemency its self As for that Judge it was his nature and the disposition of his heart that rendred him cruel and inexorable But if the LORD grant not our first requests 't is not that He means indeed to be sparing of His benefits towards us To say true He is more willing to give them than we are to receive them This in total is but a mysterious act of His wisdome and by such delays He would exercise our faith enflame our desires and make tryal of our constancy He hides himself that we might seek Him He retires that we might press after Him and holds back His blessing that we might pluck it from Him His favours are no boons that should be faintly desired We do not know the value of them if we do not esteem them worthy to be asked with instancy The favours we sue for at the Courts and Palaces of men are verily but terrene things things of little value and of a short and uncertain duration Yet what do we not do to obtain them We besiege their gates in the morning early we abide there till late at night we suffer their put-offs and disdains and oftentimes even their reproaches and the outrages of their domesticks They drive us from them they call us troublesome people they accuse our hardiness of impudence or insolency We swallow all these affronts and after all forbear not to come on again inventing if it be possible some new submission to soften them so great and pressing is our desire of those things which we petition them for Christians do ye not blush at having more passion for things of the earth then for things of Heaven Are you not ashamed to sollicite the justice or the favour of men with more earnestness then the grace of GOD To have more patience and perseverance in seeking to win the heart of a worm of the
earth then to overcome the King of Kings your salvation is concerned The grace you crave of Him is the abolition of crimes that merit an eternal death and that which you sollicite with Him is not a piece of ground or an house or a small sum of money or some years of a temporal life or liberty It is Heaven and Eternity which you beg the treasury and palace of His CHRIST the peace and joy of his Spirit an immortal liberty an immortal life and glory It 's for this Beloved Brethren that we should be violent eager and obstinately importunate It 's for this we should spend days and nights in sollicitation at the feet of GOD and seize resolutely on Him and protest unto Him with a firm and fixed determination that we will not quit Him till He accord our desire No LORD thou shalt not escape me Either Thou must suffer day and night my importunities or I obtain what I petition for I will give thee no rest untill Thou hast fulfilled the desire of my heart I will have it from Thine hand or die begging it Such Christians is the perseverance which the Apostle commands us here and again elsewhere when he gives us order to pray without ceasing I have only two advertisements to add The first is that we may not understand these words as if he obliged us to quit all other exercise and lay aside the labour of the callings in which GOD hath set us and do nothing but pour out prayers as they say certain extravagant hereticks called the Eutiches that is the Prayers did sometime interpret it The Apostle who orders us here to pray without ceasing commands us also to labour and that with such necessity as he sentences that man not to eat who doth not labour These acts of our piety do not thwart one the other Prayer seasoneth and animateth labour hindereth it not That perseverance in it which is our duty is not continued praying without intermission but prayer frequently resumed and assiduously reiterated so as neither the trouble of waiting nor despair of obtaining nor any other consideration makes us give over the diligent practise of it The other advice we have to give you in reference to this subject is against superstition which regulateth prayers you know by the clock and scrupulously ties men up to the number and to the words of their orisons A Christian who hath his conversation in Heaven above time and the motions that make it measures his devotion by things themselves and makes his prayers not at the toll of a bell but at the signal of his need he lengthens or ends them not according to the number of beads in a chaplet but according to the movings of his heart Now after Perseverance in prayer the Apostle requires also of us vigilancy in it Persevere in prayer saith he watching in it with thanksgiving I freely yield that the faithful may steal away some hours from their repose and employ them in prayer provided it be done without superstition Nor do I deny but that the Prophets and the Apostles and the Christians of the primitive Church often did so rising at night and spending either in private or in their temples some hours in prayer and other exercises of piety Yet it seems to me that it is not of these watchings the Apostle speaketh here For there is another kind of Watch which we may call the Watch of the Soul and it 's only an attention of mind when we keep all our faculties in a good estate lively and working not asleep nor drown'd in idleness or in love of the world or in it's errors and vanities but awake and elevated unto GOD heeding him and intent upon His work looking unto CHRIST and for His day and expecting His salvation with earnestness and constancy Psal 130. â— It 's thus the soul of that Prophet watched who waited more attentively for GOD then the morning watchmen that waited with impatience for the break of day And hereto must be referred so many places of the New Testament that commanded us to to watch Watch and pray that ye enter not into tentation Watch Mat. 26.41 Mark 13.35 1 Thes 5.6 for you know not when the Master of the house will come Let us not sleep as do others but let us watch and be sober 1 Cor. 16.13 Rev. 3.2 16 15. Watch ye stand fast in the faith quit you like men be strong Be vigilant Blessed is he that watcheth And the like often elsewhere For as the Apostle somewhere elegantly says of a widow who spends her time in the pleasures of sin that she is dead while she liveth so may we say in like manner of a person that takes no thought of GOD nor of his service nor minds the occasions of doing good and holy works how active and busie soever he otherwise is in the affairs of the world that he sleeps while he is awake This mystical sleeping is an insensibility of soul for the things of GOD. The waking or watching opposite to it is the attentiveness the sensibility and the acting of the soul about the things of salvation 'T is true this kind of watching is necessary for us in all the parts of our lives and that no season no occasion should ever find a Christian asleep in this sense But as prayer is the excellentest of all our services so doth it particularly require of us this watching this attention I account therefore that it 's precisely this the Apostle means when he commands us to watch in prayer He would have us bring unto it a soul awakened not overwhelm'd in the cares and passions of the world not loaden and weighed down with thoughts of the flesh not spiritless and languid but stretch'd forth and lifted up to GOD not heedless of what it doth or heeding it by halves but minding the things it asks of Him and that CHRIST of his in whose name it presents it's requests to Him By which you may judge what account we are to make of most mens prayers that are pronounced by the mouth alone without any attention of heart for custom rather then out of any solid devotion Certainly since prayer ought to be made with watching thereunto it is evident that these peoples supplications are to say true dreamings and not prayers They are vain words like to those which a man that dotes utters sometimes in his sleep Those of Rome are so far from taking Christians off from this abuse that they precipitate them into it by that strange and extravagant law for their services which orders the performing them to be in a language that the people understand not Our hearts are so vain that they can hardly keep close to the things and words we understand I beseech you what attention can they have for those they understand not And how do they watch in praying that are so far from thinking upon what they say as they know not what is meant Pies