proceed equally and undividedly from the whole three Persons from God the Father and from his Son Iesus Christ our Lord and from the eternall Spirit of them both the Holy Ghost as from one entire indivisible and coessentiall Agent But for that we are grosse of understanding and unable to conceive the distinct Trinity of Persons in the Unity of the Godhead otherwise then by apprehending some distinction of their operations and offices to-us-ward it hath pleased the wisdome of God in the holy Scriptures which being written for our sakes were to be fitted to our capacities so far to condescend to our weakness and dulness as to attribute some of those great and common works to one person and some to another after a more speciall manner than unto the rest although indeed and in truth none of the three persons had more or lesse to do than other in any of those great and common works This manner of speaking Divines use to call Appropriation By which appropriation as Power is ascribed to the Father and Wisdome to the Son so is Goodness to the Holy Ghost And therefore as the Work of Creation wherein is specially seen the mighty power of God is appropriated to the Father and the work of Redemption wherein is specially seen the wisdome of God to the Son and so the works of sanctification and the infusion of habituall graces whereby the good things of God are communicated unto us is appropriated unto the Holy Ghost And for this cause the gifts thus communicated unto us from God are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spirituall gifts and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the manifestation of the Spirit We see now why spirit but then why manifestation The word as most other verballs of that form may be understood either in the active or passive signification And it is not materiall whether of the two wayes we take it in this place both being true and neither improper For these spirituall gifts are the manifestation of the spirit Actively because by these the spirit manifesteth the will of God unto the Church these being the instruments and means of conveying the knowledge of salvation unto the people of God And they are the manifestation of the spirit Passively too because where any of these gifts especially in any eminent sort appeared in any person it was a manifest evidence that the Spirit of God wrought in him As we read in Acts 10. that they of the Circumcision were astonished When they saw that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost If it be demanded But how did that appear it followeth in the next verse For they heard them speak with tongues c. The spirituall Gift then is a manifestation of the Spirit as every other sensible effect is a manifestation of its proper cause We are now yet farther to know that the Gifts and graces wrought in us by the holy spirit of God are of two sorts The Scriptures sometimes distinguish them by the different terms of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 although those words are sometimes again used indifferently and promiscuously either for other They are commonly known in the Schooles and differenced by the names of Gratiae gratum facientes Gratiae gratis datae Which termes though they be not very proper for the one of them may be affirmed of the other whereas the members of every good distinction ought to be opposite yet because they have been long received and change of termes though haply for the better hath by experience been found for the most part unhappy in the event in multiplying unnecessary book-quarrells we may retain them profitably and without prejudice Those former which they call Gratum facientes are the graces of Sanctification whereby the person that hath them is enabled to do acceptable service to God in the duties of his generall Calling these latter which they call Gratis datas are the Graces of Edification whereby the person that hath them is enabled to do profitable service to the Church of God in the duties of his particular Calling Those are given Nobis Nobis both to us and from us that is chiefly for our own good these Nobis sed Nostris to us indeed but for others that is chiefly for the good of our brethren Those are given us ad salutem for the saving of our own souls these ad lucrum for the winning of other mens souls Those proceed from the speciall love of God to the Person and may therefore be called personall or speciall these proceeed from the Generall love of God to his Church or yet more generall to humane societies and may therefore be rather called Ecclesiasticall or Generall Gifts or Graces Of that first sort are Faith Hope Charity Repentance Patience Humility and all those other holy graces and fruits of the Spirit which accompany salvation Wrought by the blessed and powerful operation of the holy Spirit of God after a most effectuall but unconceivable manner regenerating and renewing and seasoning and sanctifying the hearts of his Chosen But yet these are not the Gifts so much spoken of in this Chapter and namely in my Text Every branch whereof excludeth them Of those graces of sanctification first we may have indeed probable inducements to perswade us that they are or are not in this or that man But hypocrisie may make such a semblance that we may think we see spirit in a man in whom yet there is nothing but flesh and infirmities may cast such a fogge that we can discern nothing but flesh in a man in whom yet there is spirit But the gifts here spoken of do incurre into the senses and give us evident and infallible assurance of the spirit that wrought them here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a manifestation of the spirit Again Secondly those Graces of sanctification are not communicated by distribution Alius sic alius verò sic Faith to one Charity to another Repentance to another but where they are given they are given all at once and together as it were strung upon one threed and linked into one chain But the Gifts here spoken of are distributed as it were by doal and divided severally as it pleased God shared out into severall portions and given to every man some to none all for to one is given by the Spirit the word of Wisdome to another the word of Knowledge c. Thirdly those Graces of sanctification though they may and ought to be exercised to the benefit of others who by the shining of our light and the sight of our good works may be provoked to glorifie God by walking in the same paths yet that is but utilitas emergens and not finis proprius a good use made of them upon the bye but not the main proper and direct end of them for which they were chiefly given But the Gifts here spoken of were given directly
contract my speech to the scanting of time or you if I should lengthen it to the weight of the matter And therefore I resolved here to make an end and to give place as fit it is to the businesse whereabout we meet The Total of what I have said and should say is in effect but this No pretension of a good end of a good meaning of a good event of any good whatsoever either can sufficiently warrant any sinfull action to be done or justifie it being done or sufficiently excuse the Omission of any necessary duty when it is necessary Consider what I say and the Lord give you understanding in all things Now to God the Father Son and Holy Spirit c. AD CLERUM The Third Sermon At a Visitation at Boston Lincoln 13. March 1620. 1 COR. 12.7 But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withall IN the first Verse of this Chapter S. Paul proposeth to himself an Argument which he prosecuteth the whole Chapter through and after a profitable digression into the praise of Charity in the next Chap. resumeth again at the 14. Chapter spending also that whole Chapter therein and it is concerning spirituall gifts Now concerning spirituall gifts brethren I would not have you ignorant c. These gracious gifts of the holy Spirit of God bestowed on them for the edification of the Church the Corinthians by making them the fuell either of their pride in despising those that were inferiour to themselves or of their envy in malicing those that excelled therein abused to the maintenance of schisme and faction and emulation in the Church For the remedying of which evils the Apostle entreth upon the Argument discoursing fully of the variety of these spirituall gifts and who is the Author of them and for what end they were given and in what manner they should be imployed omitting nothing that was needfull to be spoken anent this subject In this part of the Chapter entreating both before and after this verse of the wondrous great yet sweet and usefull variety of these spirituall gifts he sheweth that howsoever manifold they are either for kind or degree so as they may differ in the materiall and formall yet they do all agree both in the same efficient and the same finall cause In the same efficient cause which is God the Lord by his Spirit ver 4 6. Now there are diversities of gifts but the same Spirit and there are differences of administrations but the same Lord and there are diversities of operations but it is the same God which worketh all in all And in the same finall cause which is the advancement of Gods glory in the propagation of his Gospel and the edification of his Church in this ver But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withall By occasion of which words we may enquire into the nature convenience and use of these gifts First their nature in themselves and in their originall what they are and whence they are the works of Gods Spirit in us the manifestation of the Spirit Secondly their conveyance unto us how we come to have them and to have property in them it is by gift It is given to every man Thirdly their use and end why they were given us and what we are to do with them they must be employed to the good of our Brethren and of the Church is given to every man to profit withall Of these briefly and in their order and with speciall reference ever to us that are of the Clergy By manifestation of the Spirit here our Apostle understandeth none other thing then he doth by the adjective word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first and by the substantive word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the last verse of the Chapter Both which put together do signifie those spiritual gifts and graces whereby God enableth men and specially Church-men to the duties of their particular Callings for the generall good Such as are those particulars which are named in the next following verses the word of Wisdome the word of Knowledge Faith the gifts of healing workings of miracles prophecy discerning of spirits divers kinds of tongues interpretation of tongues All which and all other of like nature and use because they are wrought by that one and self-same Spirit which divideth to every one severally as he will are therefore called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spirituall gifts and here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the manifestation of the Spirit The word Spirit though in Scripture it have many other significations yet in this place I conceive to be understood directly of the holy Ghost the third Person in the ever blessed Trinity For first in ver 3. that which is called the Spirit of God in the former part is in the latter part called the Holy Ghost I give you to understand that no man speaking by the spirit of God calleth Iesus accursed and that no man can say that Iesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost Again that variety of gifts which in ver 4. is said to proceed from the same Spirit is said likewise in ver 5. to proceed from the same Lord and in ver 6. to proceed from the same God and therefore such a Spirit is meant as is also Lord and God and that is onely the Holy Ghost And again in those words in ver 11. All these worketh that one and the self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally as he will the Apostle ascribeth to this Spirit the collation and distribution of such gifts according to the free power of his own will and pleasure which free power belongeth to none but God alone Who hath set the members every one in the body as it hath pleased him Which yet ought not to be so understood of the Person of the Spirit as if the Father and the Son had no part or fellowship in this business For all the Actions and operations of the Divine Persons those onely excepted which are of intrinsecall and mutuall relation are the joynt and undivided works of the whole three Persons according to the common known maxime constantly and uniformly received in the Catholike Church Opera Trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa And as to this particular concerning gifts the Scriptures are clear Wherein as they are ascribed to GOD the Holy Ghost in this Chapter so they are elsewhere ascribed to God the Father Every good gift and every perfect giving is from above from the Father of Lights Jam. 1. and elsewhere to God the Son Unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ Eph. 4. Yea and it may be that for this very reason in the three verses next before my text these three words are used Spirit in ver 4. Lord in ver 5. and God in ver 6. to give us intimation that these spirituall gifts
any thing I know at all to trouble this place any more hereafter Let us all now humbly beseech Almighty God to grant a blessing to what hath been presently taught and heard that it may work in the hearts of us all charitable affections one towards another due obedience to lawfull authority and a conscionable care to walk in our severall callings faithfully painfully and peaceably to the comfort of our own souls the edification of Gods Church and the glory of the ever-blessed Trinity the Father Son and Holy Ghost three Persons and one God To whom be ascribed by us and the whole Church as is most due the Kingdome the Power and the Glory for ever and ever Amen AD CLERUM The Second Sermon At a Visitation at Boston Lincoln 24. Apr. 1621. ROM 3.8 And not rather as we be slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say Let us do evil that good may come whose damnation is just A Little before at the fourth verse S. Paul had delivered a Conclusion sound and comfortable and strengthened it from Davids both experience and testimony in Ps. 51. A place pregnant and full of sinews to enforce it The Conclusion in effect was that Nothing in man can anull the Covenant of God Neither the originall unworthinesse of Gods Children through the universall corruption of nature nor their actuall unfaithfulnesse bewrayed through frailty in particular trials can alienate the free love of God from them or cut them off from the Covenant of Grace but that still God will be glorified in the truth and faithfulnesse of his promises notwithstanding any unrighteousnesse or unfaithfulnesse in man But never yet was any Truth so happily innocent as to maintain it self free from Calumny and Abuse Malice on the one hand and Fleshlinesse on the other though with different aimes yet doe the same work They both pervert the Truth by drawing pestilent Corollaries from sound Conclusions as the Spider sucketh poyson from medicinable herbs But with this difference Malice slandereth the Truth to discountenance it but Fleshlinesse abuseth the Truth to countenance it selfe by it The cavilling Sophister he would faine bring the Apostles gracious Doctrine into discredit The carnall Libertine he would as faine bring his own ungracious behaviour into credit Both by making false yet colourable Inferences from the former Conclusion There are three of those Inferences but never a good The first If so then cannot God in reason and justice take vengeance of our unrighteousnesse The Colour for why should he punish us for that which so much magnifieth and commendeth his righteousnesse But if our righteousnesse commend the righteousnesse of God what shall we say Is God unrighteous that taketh vengeance The second Inference If so then it is injust either in God or Man to condemne us as sinners for breaking the Law The Colour for why should that action be censured of sin which so abundantly redoundeth to the glory of God For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lye unto his glory why yet am I also judged as a sinner The third and last and worst Inference If so then it is a good and wise resolution Let us sin freely and boldly commit evil The Colour for why should we fear to do that from which so much good may come in this verse of my Text And not rather let us do evil that good may come This last cavilling Inference the Apostle in this Verse both bringeth in and casteth out again bringeth in as an objection and casteth out by his answer An answer which at once cutteth off both it and the former Inferences And the Answer is double Ad rem Ad hominem That concerneth the force and matter of the objection this the state and danger of the objectors Ad rem in the former part of the Verse And not rather as we be slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say let us do evil that good may come Ad hominem in the latter end Whose damnation is just In the former part there is an Objection and the Rejection of it The Objection And not rather Let us do evil that good may come The Rejection thereof with a Non sequitur implying not onely the bare inconsequence of it upon the Apostles conclusion but withall and especially the falsenesse and unsoundnesse of it taken by it self As we be slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say Let us do evil c. My aime at this present is to insist especially upon a Principle of practick Divinity which by joynt consent of Writers old and new Orthodox and Popish resulteth from the very body of this verse and is of right good use to direct us in sundry difficulties which daily arise in vita communi in point of Conscience The Principle is this We must not do any evil that any good may come of it Yet there are besides this in the Text divers other inferiour observations not to be neglected With which I think it will not be amisse to begin and to dispatch them first briefly that so I may fall the sooner and stay the longer upon that which I mainly intend Observe first the Apostles Method and substantiall manner of proceeding how he cleareth all as he goeth how diligent he is and carefull betimes to remove such cavils though he step a little out of his way for it as might bring scandall to the Truth he had delivered When we preach and instruct others we should not think it enough to deliver positive truths but we should take good care also as near as we can to leave them clear and by prevention to stop the mouths of such as love to pick quarrells at the Truth and to bark against the light It were good we would so far as our leisure and gifts will permit wisely forecast and prevent all offence that might be taken at any part of Gods truth and be carefull as not to broach any thing that is false through rashnesse errour or intemperance so not to betray any truth by ignorant handling or by superficiall slight and unsatisfying answers But then especially concerneth it us to be most carefull herein when we have to speak before such as we have some cause before-hand to suspect to be through ignorance or weaknesse or custome or education or prejudice or partiall affections or otherwise contrary-minded unto or at leastwise not well perswaded of those Truths we are to teach If the wayes be rough and knotty and the passengers feeble-joynted and dark-sighted it is but needfull the guides should remove as many blocks and stones out of the way as may be When we have gone as warily as we can to work Cavillers if they list will take exceptions it is our part to see we give them no advantage lest we help to justifie the principals by making our selves Accessories Those men are ill-advised how ever zealous for the Truth that stir in controversed points and
of Ecclesiasticall ceremonies and Constitutions in which case the aforesaid allegations are usually most stood upon this hath been abundantly done in our Church not onely in the learned writings of sundry private men but by the publick declaration also of authority as is to be seen at large in the preface commonly printed before the book of Common prayer concerning that argument enough to satisfie those that are peaceable and not disposed to stretch their wits to cavill at things established And thus much of the second Question touching a doubting conscience whereon I have insisted the longer because it is a point both so proper to the Text whereat so many have stumbled There remaineth but one other Question and that of far smaller difficulty What is to be done when the conscience is scrupulous I call that a scruple when a man is reasonably well perswaded of the lawfulnesse of a thing yet hath withall some jealousies and fears lest perhaps it should prove unlawfull Such scruples are most incident to men of melancholy dispositions or of timorous spirits especially if they be tender-conscienced withall and they are much encreased by the false suggestions of Satan by reading the books or hearing the Sermons or frequenting the company of men more strict precise and austere in sundry points than they need or ought to be and by sundry other means which I now mention not Of which scruples it behooveth every man first to be wary that he do not at all admit them if he can chuse or if he cannot wholly avoid them that secondly he endeavour so far as may be to eject them speedily out of his thoughts as Satans snares and things that may breed him worser inconveniencies or if he cannot be so rid of them that then thirdly he resolve to go on according to the more profitable perswasion of his mind and despise those scruples And this he may do with a good conscience not onely in things commanded him by lawfull authority but even in things indifferent and arbitrary and wherein he is left to his own liberty Much more might have been added for the farther both declaration and confirmation of these points But you see I have been forced to wrap things together that deserve a more full and distinct handling that I might hold some proportion with the time I had a purpose briefly to have comprised the summe of what I have delivered concerning a gainsaying a doubting and a scrupulous conscience in some few conclusions for your better remembrance and to have added also something by way of direction what course might be the most probably taken for the correcting of an erroneous conscience for the setling of a doubtfull conscience and for the quieting of a scrupulous conscience But it is more then time that I should give place to other business and the most and most material of those directions have been here and there occasionally touched in that which hath been delivered already in which respect I may the better spare that labour Beseech we God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ so to endue us all with the grace of his holy Spirit that in our whole conversations we may unfeignedly endeavour to preserve a good conscience and to yield all due obedience to him first and then to every Ordinance of man for his sake Now to this Father Son and blessed Spirit three persons and one eternall God be ascribed all the Kingdome the power and the glory both now and for evermore Amen FINIS AD MAGISTRATUM The First Sermon At a publick Sessions at Grantham Lincoln 11 June 1623. JOB 29. ver 14 15 16 17. 14. I put on righteousnesse and it clothed me my judgement was as a Robe and Diadem 15. I was eyes to the blind and feet was I to the lame 16. I was a Father to the poor and the cause which I knew not I searched out 17. And I brake the jawes of the wicked and plucked the spoil out of his teeth WHere silence against foul and false imputations may be interpreted a Confession there the protestation of a mans own innocency is ever just and sometimes necessary When others doe us open wrong it is not now Vanity but Charity to do our selves open right and whatsoever appearance of folly or vain boasting there is in so doing they are chargeable with all that compell us thereunto and not we I am become a fool in glorying but ye have compelled me 2 Cor. 12.11 It was neither pride nor passion in Iob but such a compulsion as this that made him so often in this book proclaim his own righteousnesse Amongst whose many and grievous afflictions as it is hard to say which was the greatest so we are sure this was not the least that he was to wrestle with the unjust and bitter upbraidings of unreasonable and incompassionate men They came to visit him as friends and as friends they should have comforted him But sorry friends they were and miserable comforters indeed not comforters but tormenters and Accusers rather than Friends Seeing Gods hand heavy upon him for want of better or other proof they charge him with Hypocrisie And because they would not seem to deal all in generalities for against this generall accusation of hypocrisie it was sufficient for him as generally to plead the truth and uprightnesse of his heart they therefore go on more particularly but as falsely and as it were by way of instance to charge him with Oppression Thus Eliphaz by name taxeth him Chap. 22.6 c. Thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for naught and hast stripped the naked of their clothing Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink and thou hast withholden bread from the hungry But as for the mighty man he had the earth and the honourable man dwelt in it Thou hast sent widowes away empty and the arms of the fatherlesse hast thou broken Being thus shamefully indeed shamelesly upbraided to his face without any desert of his by those men who if he had deserved it should least of all have done it his neighbours and familiar friends can you blame the good man if to remove such false aspersions he do with more then ordinary freedome insist upon his own integrity in this behalf And that he doth in this Chapter something largely wherein he declareth how he demeaned himself in the time of his prosperity in the administration of his Magistracy far otherwise than was laid to his charge When the ear heard me then it blessed me and when the eye saw me it gave witnesse to me Because I delivered the poor that cryed and the fatherlesse and him that had none to help him The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me and I caused the widowes heart to sing for joy in the next immediate verses before these And then he goeth on in the words of my Text I put on righteousnesse c. It seemeth Iob was
than they the great God of heaven and earth hath reposed in you and expecteth from you Chastise him with severe indignation if he begin and if he continue spit defiance in his face who ere he be that shall think you so base as to sell your freedome for a bribe Gird your sword upon your thigh keeping your selves ever within the compass of your Commissions and Callings as the Sun in the Zodiack go through stitch right on in the course of Iustice as the Sun in the firmament with unresisted violence and as a Giant that rejoyceth to run his race and who can stop him Bear not the sword in vain but let your right hand teach you terrible things Defend the poor and fatherless and deliver the oppressed from them that are mightier then he Smite through the loyns of those that rise up to do wrong that they rise not again Break the jaws of the wicked and pluck the spoyl out of his teeth Thus if you do the wicked shall fear you the good shall blesse you the poor shall pray for you posterity shall praise you your own hearts shall chear you and the great God of Heaven shall reward you This that you may do in some good measure the same God of Heaven enable you and give you and every of us grace in our severall places and callings to seek his glory and to endeavour the discharge of a good conscience To which God blessed for ever Father Sonne and Holy Ghost three Persons and one eternall invisible and onely wise God be ascribed all the Kingdome Power and Glory for ever and ever AMEN AD MAGISTRATUM The Second Sermon At the Assises at Lincoln 7 March 1624. at the request of William Lister Esq then high Sheriff of the County EXOD. 23. ver 1. 3. 1. Thou shalt not raise a false report put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness 2. Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgement 3. Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause THere is no one thing Religion ever excepted that more secureth and adorneth the State than Iustice doth It is both Columna and Corona Reipublicae as a Prop to make it subsist firm in it selfe and as a Crown to render it glorious in the eyes of others As the Cement in a building that holdeth all together so is Iustice to the publick Body as whereunto it oweth a great part both of its strength for by it the throne is established in the sixteenth and of its height too for it exalteth a Nation in the 14th of the Proverbs As then in a Building when for want of good looking to the Morter getting wet dissolveth and the wals belly out the house cannot but settle apace and without speedy repaires fall to the ground so there is not a more certain symptome of a declining and decaying and tottering State than is the generall dissolution of manners for want of the due execution and administration of Iustice. The more cause have we that are Gods Ministers by frequent exhortations admonitions obsecrations expostulations even out of season sometimes but especially upon such seasonable opportunities as this to be instant with all them that have any thing to do in matters of Iustice but especially with you who are Gods Ministers too though in another kind you who are in Commission to sit upon the Bench of judicature either for Sentence or Assistance to do your God and King service to do your Country and Calling honour to do your selves and others right by advancing to the utmost of your powers the due course of Iustice. Wherein as I verily think none dare but the guilty so I am well assured none can justly mislike in us the choice either of our Argument that we beat upon these things or of our Method that we begin first with you For as we cannot be perswaded on the one side but that we are bound for the discharge of our duties to put you in mind of yours so we cannot be perswaded on the other side but that if there were generally in the greater ones that care and conscience and zeal there ought to be of the common good a thousand corruptions rife among inferiours would be if not wholly reformed at leastwise practised with lesse connivence from you confidence in them grievance to others But right and reason will that every man bear his own burthen And therefore as we may not make you innocent if you be faulty by transferring your faults upon others so far be it from us to impute their faults to you otherwise then as by not doing your best to hinder them you make them yours For Iustice we know is an Engine that turneth upon many hinges And to the exercise of judicature besides the Sentence which is properly yours there are diverse other things required Informations and Testimonies and Arguings and Inquests and sundry Formalities which I am neither able to name nor yet covetous to learne wherein you are to rest much upon the faithfulnesse of other men In any of whom if there be as sometimes there will be foul and unfaithfull dealing such as you either cannot spie or cannot help wrong sentence may proceed from out your lips without your fault As in a curious Watch or Clock that moveth upon many wheeles the finger may point a wrong hour though the wheel that next moveth it be most exactly true if but some little pinne or notch or spring be out of order in or about any of the baser and inferiour wheels What he said of old Non fieri potest quin Principes etiam valde boni iniqua faciant was then and ever since and yet is and ever will be most true For say a Iudge be never so honestly minded never so zealous of the truth never so carefull to do right yet if there be a spitefull Accuser that will suggest any thing or an audacious Witnesse that will sweare any thing or a crafty Pleader that will maintain any thing or a tame Iury that will swallow any thing or a craving Clerk or Officer that for a bribe will foist in any thing the Iudge who is tyed as it is meet he should to proceed secundum allegata probata cannot with his best care and wisdome prevent it but that sometimes justice shall be perverted innocency oppressed and guilty ones justified Out of which consideration I the rather desired for this Assise-Assembly to choose a Text as neer as I could of equall latitude with the Assise-Businesse For which purpose I could not readily think of any other portion of Scripture so proper and full to meet with all sorts of persons and all sorts of abuses as these three verses are Is there either Calumny in the Accuser or Perjury in the Witnesse or Supinity in the Iurer or
those temporal afflictions he inflicteth For as he rewardeth those few good things that are in evil men with these temporall benefits for whom yet in his Iustice he reserveth eternall damnation as the due wages by that Iustice of their grace-lesse impenitency so he punisheth those remnants of sin that are in Godly men with these temporal afflictions for whom yet in his mercy he reserveth Eternall salvation as the due wages yet by that mercy only of their Faith and repentance and holy obedience As Abraham said to the rich glutton in the Parable Luke 16. Son remember that thou in thy life time receivedst thy good things and likewise Lazarus evil things but now he is comforted and thou art tormented As if he had said If thou hadst any thing good in thee remember thou hast had thy reward in earth already and now there remaineth for thee nothing but the full punishment of thine ungodlinesse there in Hell but as for Lazarus he hath had the chastisement of his infirmities on earth already and now remaineth for him nothing but the full reward of his godlinesse here in Heaven Thus the meditation of this Doctrine yieldeth good Comfort against temporal afflictions Here is yet a third Comfort and that of the three the greatest unto the godly in the firm assurance of their Eternal reward It is one of the Reasons why God temporally rewardeth the unsound obedience of natural carnal and unregenerate men even to give his faithfull servants undoubted assurance that he will in no wise forget their true and sound and sincere obedience Doth God reward Ahabs temporary Humiliation and will he not much more reward thy hearty and unfeined repentance Have the Hypocrites their reward and canst thou doubt of thine This was the very ground of all that comfort wherewith the Prodigal sonne sustained his heart and hope when he thus discoursed to his own soul If all the hired servants which are in my Fathers house have bread enough and to spare surely my Father will never be so unmindfull of me who am his Son though too too unworthy of that name as to let me perish for hunger Every temporal blessing bestowed upon the wicked ought to be of the child of God entertained as a fresh assurance given him of his everlasting reward hereafter Abraham gave gifts to the sons of his Concubines and sent them away but his onely son Isaac he kept with him and gave him all that he had Right so God giveth temporal gifts to Hypocrites and Cast-awayes who are bastards and not sonnes not sonnes of the free woman not sons of promise not born after the spirit and that is their portion when they have gotten that they have gotten all they are like to have there is no more to be looked for at his hands But as for the inheritance he reserveth that for his dear Children the godly who are Born after the spirit and Heires according unto promise on these he bestoweth all that ever he hath all things are theirs for on them he bestoweth his Son the heir of all things in whom are hid all the treasures of all good things and together with whom all other things are conveyed and made over unto them as accessories and appurtenances of him and on them he bestoweth Himself who is All in all In whose presence is fulnesse of joy and at whose right hand there are pleasures for evermore To which joy unspeakable and glorious O thou the Father of mercies who hast promised it unto us bring us in the end for thy dear Sonnes sake Jesus Christ who hath purchased it for us and given into our hearts the earnest of his and thy holy Spirit to seal it unto us To which blessed Son and holy Spirit together with thee O Father three persons and one only wise gracious glorious Almighty and eternal Lord God be ascribed by us and all thy faithfull people throughout the world the whole kingdome power and glory for ever and ever Amen Amen THE SECOND SERMON AD POPVLVM At Grantham L inc Febr. 27. 1620 3. Kings 21.29 because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his dayes I Will not so farr either distrust your memories or straiten my self of time for the delivery of what I am now purposed to speak as to make any large repetition of the particulars which were observed the last time from the consideration of Ahabs person and condition who was but an Hypocrite taken joyntly with his present carriage together with the occasion and successe thereof He was humbled It was the voyce of God by his Prophet that humbled him Upon his humbling God adjourneth his punishment From all which was noted 1. that there might be even in Hypocrites an outward formal humiliation 2. the power and efficacy of the word of God able to humble an oppressing Ahab 3. the boundlesse mercy of God in not suffering the outward formal humiliation of an ungodly Hypocrite to passe altogether unrewarded All this the last time by occasion of those first clauses in the verse Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me because he humbleth himself before me I will not We are now next to consider of the great Favour which it pleased God to shew to Ahab upon his humiliation what it was and wherein it consisted It was the Removal at least for a time that is the suspension of an heavy judgement denounced against Ahab and his house most deservedly for his bloody and execrable oppression Because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his days The Evil which God now promiseth he will not bring I will not bring the evil in his days is that which in verse 21. he hath threatned he would bring upon Ahab and upon his house Behold I will bring evil upon thee and will take away thy posterity and will cut off from Ahab him that pisseth against the wall and him that is shut up and left in Israel and will make thy house like the house of Ieroboam the son of Nebat and like the house of Baasha the son of Abijah for the provocation wherewith thou hast provoked me to anger and made Israel to sin A great judgement and an heavy but the greater the judgement is when it is deserved and threatned the greater the mercy is if it be afterwards forborn as some of this was But whatsoever becommeth of the judgement here we see is mercy good store God who is rich in mercy and delighted to be stiled the God of mercies and the Father of mercies abundantly manifesteth his mercy in dealing thus graciously with one that deserved it so little Here is mercy in but threatning the punishment when he might have inflicted it and more mercy in not inflicting the punishment when he had threatned it Here is mercy first in suspending the Punishment I will not bring
Secondly here is a Warning for us to take consideration of the losse of good or usefull men and to fear when they are going from us that some evil is comming towards us The Prophet complaineth of the too great and general neglect hereof in his times The righteous perisheth and no man layeth it to heart and mercifull men are taken away none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come Esa. 57. When God sendeth his Angel to pluck out his righteous Loâ—s what may Sodome expect but fire and brimstone to be rained down upon them When he plucketh up the fairest and choicest flowers in his garden and croppeth off the tops of the goodliest poppies who can think other than that he meaneth to lay his garden waste and to turn it into a wild wildernesse when he undermineth the main pillars of the house taketh away the very props and buttresses of Church and Common-weal sweepeth away religious Princes wise Senatours zealous Magistrates painfull Ministers men of eminent rancks gifts or example who can be secure that either Church or Common-weal shall stand up long and not â—otter at least if not fall God in Mercy taketh such away from the evil to come we in wisdom should look for evil to come when God taketh such away Thirdly here is instruction for wordlings to make much of those few godly ones that live among them for they are the very pawns of their peace and the pledges of their security Think not yee filthy Sodomites it is for your own sakes that ye have been spared so long know to whom you are beholden This Fellow that came in to sojourn among you this stranger this Lot whom you so hate and malign and disquiet he it is that hath bayled you hitherto and given you protection Despise not Gods patience and long suffering ye prophane ones neither blesse your selves in your ungodly wayes neither say We prosper though we walk in the lusts of our hearts This and thus we have done and nothing hath been done to us God holdeth his hand and holdeth his tongue at us surely He is such a one as our selves Learn O ye despisers that if God thus forbear you it is not at all for your own sakes or because he careth not to punish evil doers no he hath a little remnant a little flock a little handfull of his own among you a few names that have given themselves unto him call upon him daily for mercy upon the land and that weep and mourn in secret and upon their beds for your abominations whom you hate and despise and persecute and defame and account as the very scumme of the people and the refuse and off-scowring of all things to whom yet you owe your preservation Surely if it were not for some godly Iehoshaphat or other whose presence God regardeth among you if it were not for some zealous Moses or other that standeth in the gap for you Gods wrath had entred in upon you long ere this as a mighty breach of water and as an overflowing deluge overwhelmed you and you had been swept away as with the Besome of destruction and devoured as stubble before the fire It is The innocent that delivereth the land and repriveth it from destruction when the sentence of desolation is pronounced against it and it is delivered by the purenesse of his hands O the goodnesse of our GOD that would have spared the five Cities of the Salt Sea if among so many thousands of beastly and filthy persons there had been found but Ten righteous ones and that was for each City but two persons nay that would have pardoned Ierusalem if in all the streets and broad places thereof replenished with a world of Idolaters and Swearers and Adulterers and Oppressours there had been found but one single man that executed judgement and sought the truth from his heart But O the madness of the men of this foolish world withall who seek to doe them most mischief of all others who of all others seek to doe them most good thirsting most after their destruction who are the chiefest instruments of their preservation On foolish and mad world if thou hadst but wit enough yet yet to hugge and to make much of that little flock the hostages of thy peace and the earnest of thy tranquillity if thou wouldst but Know even thou at least in this thy day the things that belong unto thy peace Thou art yet happy that God hath a remnant in thee and if thou knewest how to make use of this happinesse at least in this thy day by honouring their persons by procuring their safety and welfare by following their examples by praying for their continuance thou mightest be still and more and ever happy But if these things that belong unto thy peace be now hidden from thine eyes if these men that prolong thy peace and prorogue thy destruction be now despised in thy heart in this day of thy peace God is just thou knowest not how soon they may be taken from thee and though he do not bring the evil upon thee in their days when they are gone thou knowest not how soon vengeance may overtake thee and Then shall he tear thee in pieces and there shall be none left to deliver thee I have now done Beseech we God the Father of mercies for his dear son Iesus Christ his sake to shed his Holy Spirit into our hearts that by his good blessing upon us that which hath been presently delivered agreeably to his holy truth and word may take root downwards in our hearts and bring forth fruit upwards in our lives and conversations and so to assist us ever with his grace that we may with humble confidence lay hold on his mercies with cheerfull reverence tremble at his judgements by unfeigned repentance turn from us what he hath threatned and by unwearied Obedience assure unto us what he hath promised To which Holy Father Sonne and Spirit three persons and c. THE THIRD SERMON AD POPVLVM At Grantham Linc. Iun. 19. 1621 3 Kings 21.29 I will not bring the evil in his dayes but in his sons dayes will I bring the evil upon his house I Come now this third time to entreat of this Scripture and by Gods help to finish it Of the three parts whereof heretofore propounded viz. 1. Ahabs Humiliation 2. The suspension of his judgement for his time 3. And the Devolution of it upon Iehoram the two former having been already handled the last only now remaineth to be considered of In the prosecution whereof as heretofore we have cleared GOD'S Holiness and Truth so we shall be now occasioned to clear his Iustice from such imputions as might seem to lie upon it from this Act. And that in three respects accordingly as Iehoram who standeth here punishable for Ahabs sin may be considered in a threefold
necessity of the whole requireth that some should drudge in baser and meaner offices If all the body were Eye where were the Hearing And if there were none to grind at the Mill there would soon be none to sit upon the Throne Salomons Temple had not been reared to this hour if there had not been burden-bearers and labourers as well as curious workers in stone and brasse and gold There should be no shame in that whereof there can be no want nay Much more those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary Grudge not then at thine own lot for not the meanest Calling but hath a promise of Gods blessing neither envy anothers lot for not the greatest Calling but is attended with worldly vexations Whatsoever thy Calling is therein abide be Content with it The second is faithfulnesse and Industry and Diligence What is here called Abiding in it is at v. 17 called Walking in it and in Rom. 12. Waiting on it Let him that hath an office wait on his office It is required in stewards that a man be found faithfull and every man in his Calling is a Steward He that professeth a Calling and doth nothing in it doth no more abide in it than he that leaveth it or he that never had it Spartam quam nactus es orna Whatsoever Calling thou hast undertaken therein abide be painfull in it The third is sobriety that we keep our selves within the proper bounds and limits of our Callings For how doth he abide in his Calling that is ever and anon flying out of it or starting beyond it like an extravagant souldier that is alwayes breaking rank Uzza had better have ventured the falling than the fingering of the Ark though it tottered It is never well when the Cobler looketh above the Ankle nor when Lay-men teach us what and how we should teach them The Pope should have done well to have thrown away his keyes as they say one of them once did before he had taken the sword into his hands and Midwives well to go teach all Nations before they baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Ghost Let it be the singular absurdity of the Church of Rome to allow Vicars to dispose of Crownes and Women of Sacraments As for thee whatsoever thy calling be therein abide keep within the bounds of it But yet abide with God That clause was not added for nothing it teacheth thee also some duties First so to demean thy self in thy particular Calling as that thou do nothing but what may stand with thy general Calling Magistrate or Minister or Lawyer or Merchant or Artificer or whatsoever other thou art remember thou art withall a Christian. Pretend not the necessities of thy particular Calling to any breach of the least of those Lawes of God which must rule thy general Calling God is the author of both Callings of thy General Calling and of thy Particular Calling too Do not think he hath called thee to service in the one and to liberty in the other to Iustice in the one and to Cousenage in the other to Simplicity in the one and to Dissimulation in the other to Holinesse in the one and to Prophanenesse in the other in a word to an entire and universal Obedience in the one and to any kind or degree of Disobedience in the other It teacheth thee secondly not to ingulfe thy self so wholly into the businesses of thy particular Calling as to abridge thy self of convenient opportunities for the exercise of those religious duties which thou art bound to perform by vertue of thy general Calling as Prayer Confession Thanksgiving Meditation c. God alloweth thee to serve thy self but he commandeth thee to serve him too Be not thou so all for thy self as to forget him but as thou art ready to embrace that liberty which he hath given thee to serve thy self so make a conscience to perform thâ—se duties which he hath required of thee for his service Work and spare not but yet pray too or else work not Prayer is the means to procure a blessing upon thy labours from his hands who never faileth to serve them that never faile to serve him Did ever any man serve God for nought A man cannot have so comfortable assurance that he shall prosper in the affaires he taketh in hand by any other meanes as by making God the Alpha and Omega of his endeavours by beginning them in his name and directing them to his glory Neither is this a point of Duty only in regard of Gods command or a point of Wisdome onely to make our labours successefull but it is a point of Iustice too as due by way of Restitution We make bold with his day and dispence with some of that time which he hath sanctified unto his service for our own necessities It is equal we should allow him at least as much of ours as we borrow of his though it be for our necessities or lawfull comforts But if we rob him of some of his time as too often we do employing it in our own businesses without the warrant of a just necessity we are to know that it is theft yea theft in the highest degree sacrilege and that therefore we are bound at least as far as petty thieves were in the Law to a fourfold restitution Abide in thy Calling by doing thine own part and labouring faithfully but yet so as Gods part be not forgotten in serving him daily It teacheth thee thirdly to watch over the special sinnes of thy particular Calling Sinnes I mean not that cleave necessarily to the Calling for then the very Calling it self should be unlawfull but sinnes unto the temptations whereof the condition of thy Calling layeth thee open more than it doth unto other sinnes or more than some other Callings would do unto the same sinnes and wherewith whilest thou art stirring about the businesses of thy Calling thou mayest be soonest overtaken if thou doest not heedfully watch over thy self and them The Magistrates sinnes Partiality and Injustice the Ministers sinnes Sloath and Flattery the Lawyers sinnes Maintenance and Collusion the Merchants sinnes Lying and Deceitfulnesse the Courtiers sinnes Ambition and Dissimulation the Great Mans sinnes Pride and Oppression the Gentlemans sinnes Riot and Prodigality the officers sinnes Bribery and Extortion the Countrey mans sinnes Envie and Discontentednesse the Servants sinnes Tale-bearing and Purloyning In every State and condition of life there is a kind of opportunity to some special sinne wherein if our watchfulnesse be not the greater mainly to oppose it and keep it out we cannot abide therein with God All that I have done all this while in my passage over this Scripture is but this I have proved the Necessity of having a Calling layed down directions for the Choyce and tryal of our Callings and shewed what is required
speaketh Saint Chrysostome especially so farre as concerneth the execution of it many of the Creatures being now rebellious and noysome unto Man and unanswering his commands and expectations yet the Right still remaineth even in corrupt nature and there are still to be found some tracings and Characters as in man of superiority so in them of subjection But those dimme and confused and scarce legible as in old Marbles and Coynes and out-worn Inscriptions we have much adoe to find out what some of the letters were But if by sin we had lost all that first title we had to the Creature wholly and utterly yet as God hath been pleased graciously to deal with us we are fully as well as before God the Father hath granted us and God the Sonne hath acquired us and God the Holy Ghost hath sealed us a new Patent By it whatsoever Defect is or can be supposed to be in our old Evidence is supplyed and by vertue of it we may make fresh challenge and renew our claim unto the Creatures The blessed Son of God Having made peace through the bloud of his Crosse hath reconciled us to his Father and therein also reconciled the Creatures both to us and him reconciling by him saith our Apostle Col. 1.20 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all things not men only unto himself For God having given us his Son the heir of all things hath he not with him given us all things else hath he not permitted us the free use of his Creatures in as ample Right as ever If the Son have made us free we are free indeed And as verily as Christ is Gods so verily if we be Christs all things are ours This Apostle setteth down the whole series and form of this spiritual Hierarchy if I may so speak this subjection and subordination of the Creatures to Man of Man to Christ of Christ to God 1 Cor. 3. All are yours and ye are Christs and Christ is Gods Strengthened with this double title what should hinder us from possession Why may we not freely use that liberty which was once given us by God and again restored us by Iesus Christ Why should we not stand fast in and contend earnestly for the maintenance of that liberty wherewith Christ hath set us free by rejecting all fancies opinions and Doctrines that any way trench upon this our Christian prerogative or seek either to shorten or to corrupt our freedome unto and power over the Creatures First if any shall oppose the legal Prohibitions of the Old Testament whereby some Creatures were forbidden the Iewes pronounced by God himself unclean and decreed unlawfull it should not trouble us For whatever the principal reasons were for which those prohibitions were then made unto them as there be divers reasons given thereof by Divines both ancient and modern certain it is they now concern not us The Church during her nonage and pupillage though she were heir of all and had right to all yet was to be held under Tutors and Governours and to be trained up under the law of Ceremonies as under a Schoolmaster during the appointed time But When the fulnesse of the time appointed was come her wardship expired and livery sued out as it were by the coming and suffering of Christ in the flesh the Church was then to enter upon her full royalties and no more to be burdened with those beggarly rudiments of legal observances The handwriting of Ordinances was then blotted out and the muddy partition wall broken down and the legal impurity of the Creatures scowred off by the bloud of Christ. They have little to do then but withall much to answer who by seeking to bring in Iudaism again into the Christian Church either in whole or in part do thereby as much as lieth in them though perhaps unawares to themselves yet indeed and in truth evacuate the Crosse of Christ. In that large sheet of the Creatures which reacheth from Heaven to the Earth whatsoever we find we may freely kill and eat and use every other way to our comforts without scruple God having cleansed all we are not to call or esteem any thing common or unclean God having created all good we are to refuse nothing If any shall oppose secondly the seeming morality of some of these prohibitions as being given before the Law of Ceremonies pressed from Moral reasons and confirmed by Apostolical Constitution since upon which ground some would impose upon the Christian Church this as a perpetual yoke to abstain from bloud or thirdly the prophanation which some Creatures have contracted by being used in the exercise of Idolatrous worship whereby they become Anathema and are to be held as execrable things as Achans wedge was and the Brazen Serpent which Hezekiah stamped to powder upon which ground also some others have inferred an utter unlawfulnesse to use any thing in the Church which was abused in Popery by calling them ragges and reliques of Idolatry neither this nor that ought to trouble us For although neither my aim which lyeth another way nor the time will permit me now to give a just and full satisfying answer to the several instances and their grounds yet the very words and weight of my Text doe give us a clear resolution in the general and sufficient to rest our Consciences and our judgements and practice upon that notwithstanding all pretensions of reason to the contrary yet these things for so much as they are still good ought not to be refused For the Apostle hath here laid a sure foundation and impregnable in that he groundeth the Use upon the Power and from the Goodness of the Creature inferreth the lawfulnesse of it Every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused He concludeth it is therefore not to be refused because it is good So that look whatsoever Goodnesse there is in any Creature that is whatsoever natural Power it hath which either immediately and of it self is or may by the improvement of humane Art and industry be taught to be of any use unto man for necessity nourishment service lawfull delight or otherwise the Creature wherein such goodness or power is to be found may not be refused as upon tye of Conscience but that power and goodness it hath may lawfully be employed to those uses for which it is meet in regard thereof Ever provided we be carefull to observe all those requisite conditions which must guide our Consciences and regulate our practice in the use of all lawfull and indifferent things They that teach otherwise lay burdens upon their own consciences which they need not and upon the consciences of their brethren which they should not and are injurious to that liberty which the blessed Son of God hath purchased for his Church and which the blessed Spirit of God hath asserted in my Text. Injurious in the second place to
for that Bread of life which came down from Heaven and feedeth our Soules unto eternal life and neither they nor it can perish If we must say for that Give us this day our daily bread shall we not much more say for this Lord evermore give us this bread But I have done Beseech we now Almighty God to guide us all with such holy discretion and wisdome in the free use of his good Creatures that keeping our selves within the due bounds of Sobriety Charity and civil Duty we may in all things glorifie God and above all things and for all things give thanks alwayes unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Iesus Christ. To which our Lord Jesus Christ the blessed Sonne of God together with the Father and the Holy Spirit three Persons and one onely wise gracious and everliving God be ascribed as is most due by us and his whole Church all the Kingdome the Power and the glory both now and for evermore Amen Amen THE SIXTH SERMON AD POPVLVM At S. Pauls Crosse London April 15. 1627. GEN. 20.6 And God said unto him in a dream Yea I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thine heart For I also withheld thee from sinning against me therefore suffered I thee not to touch her FOr our more profitable understanding of which words it is needfull we should have in remembrance the whole story of this present Chapter of which story these words are a part And thus it was Abraham commeth with Sarah his Wife and their family as a Stranger to sojourn among the Philistims in Gerar covenanteth with her before-hand thinking thereby to provide for his own safety because she was beautifull that they should not be to know that they were any more than Brother and Sister Abimelech King of the place heareth of their comming and of her beauty sendeth for them both enquireth whence and who they were heareth no more from them but that she was his Sister dismisseth him taketh her into his House Hereupon God plagueth him and his House with a strange Visitation threatneth him also with Death giveth him to understand that all this was for taking another mans Wife He answereth for himself GOD replyeth The Answer is in the two next former Verses the Reply in this and the next following Verse His Answer is by way of Apology he pleadeth first Ignorance and then and thence his Innocence And he said Lord wilt thou slay also a righteous Nation Said not he unto me She is my Sister and she even she her self said He is my Brother in the integrity of my heart and innocency of my hands have I done this That is his Plea Now God replyeth of which reply letâ—â—ng pass the remainder in the next Verse which concerneth the time to come so much of it as is contained in this Verse hath reference to what was already done and past and it meeteth right with Abimilechs Answer Something he had done and something he had not not done he had indeed taken Sarah into his House but he had not yet come near her For that which he had done in taking her he thought he had a just excuse and he pleadeth it he did not know her to be another mans Wife and therefore as to any intent of doing wrong to the Husband he was altogether Innocent But for that which he had not done in not touching her because he took her into his House with an unchaste purpose he passeth that over in silence and not so much as mentioneth it So that his Answer so far as it reached was just but because it reached not home it was not full And now Almighty God fitteth it with a Reply most convenient for such an Answer admitting his Plea so far as he alleged it for what he had done in taking Abrahams Wife having done it simply out of ignorance Yea I know thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart and withall supplying that which Abimelech had omitted for what he had not done in not touching her by assigning the true cause thereof viz. his powerfull restraint For I also with-held thee from sinning against me therefore suffered I thee not to touch her In the whole Verse we may observe First the manner of the Revelation namely by what means it pleased God to conveigh to Abimelech the knowledge of so much of his will as he thought good to acquaint him withall it was even the same whereby he had given him the first information at Verse 3. it was by a dream And God said unto him in a dream and then after the substance of the Reply whereof again the general parts are two The former an Admission of Abimelechs Plea or an Acknowledgement of the integrity of his heart so far as he alleged it in that which he had done yea I know that thou didst it in the integrity of thine heart The later an Instruction or Advertisement to Abimelech to take knowledge of Gods goodnesse unto and providence with him in that which he had not done it was God that over-held him from doing it For I also with-held thee from sinning against me therefore suffered I thee not to touch her By occasion of those first words of the Text And God said unto him in a dream if we should enter into some enquiries concerning the nature and use of divine Revelations in general and in particular of Dreams the Discourse as it would not be wholly impertinent so neither altogether unprofitable Concerning all which these several Conclusions might be easily made good First that God revealed himself and his will frequently in old times especially before the sealing of the Scripture-Canon in sundry manners as by Visions Prophecies Extacies Oracles and other supernatural means and namely and among the rest by Dreams Secondly that God imparted his Will by such kind of supernatural Revelations not only to the godly and faithfull though to them most frequently and especially but sometimes also to Hypocrites within the Church as to Saul and others yea and sometimes even to Infidells too out of the Church as to Pharaoh Balaam Nebuchadnezzer c. and here to Abimelech Thirdly that since the writings of the Prophets and Apostles were made up the Scripture-Canon sealed and the Christian Church by the preaching of the Gospel become Oecumenical dreams and other supernatural Revelations 〈◊〉 also other things of like nature as Miracles and whatsoever more immediate and extraordinary manifestations of the will and power of God have ceased to be of ordinary and familiar use so as now we ought rather to suspect delusion in them than to expect direction from them Fourthly that although God have now tyed us to his holy written word as unto a perpetual infallible Rule beyond which we may not expect and against which we may not admit any other direction as from God yet he hath no where abridged himself
will and affections to the obedience of Faith and Godlinesse So shalt thou not only be restrained from sinning against God as Abimelech here was but also be enabled as faithfull Abraham was to please God and consequently assured with all the faithfull children of Abraham to be preserved by the almighty power of God through faith unto salvation Which Grace and Faith and salvation the same Almighty God the God of Power and of Peace bestow upon us all here assembled With all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours even for the same our Lord Jesus Christs sake his most dear Son and our blessed Saviour and Redeemer to which blessed Father and blessed Son with the blessed Spirit most holy blessed and glorious Trinity be ascribed by us and the whole Church all the Kingdome the power and the glory from this time forth and for ever Amen AD POPULUM The Seventh Sermon At S. Pauls Cross London 6. May 1632. 1 PET. 2.16 As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God THere is not any thing in the world more generally desired than Liberty nor scarse any thing more generally abused Insomuch as even that blessed liberty which the eternal Son of God hath purchased for His Spouse the Church and endowed her therewithal hath in no age been free from abuses whilest some have sinfully neglected their Christian liberty to their own prejudice and othersome have as sinfully stood upon it to the prejudice of their brethren So hardly through pride and ignorance and other corruptions that abound in us do we hit upon the golden mean either in this or almost in any thing else but easily swarve into the vitious extreams on both hands declining sometimes into the defect and sometimes into the excess The Apostles therefore especially Saint Peter and Saint Paul the two chiefest planters of the Churches endeavoured early to instruct believers in the true doctrine and to direct them in the right use of their Christian liberty so often in their several Epistles as fit occasion was offered thereunto Which we may observe them to have done most frequently and fully in those two cases which being very common are therefore of the greater consequence viz. the case of Scandal and the case of Obedience And we may further observe concerning these two Apostles that S. Paul usually toucheth upon this argument of liberty as it is to be exercised in the case of Scandal but S. Peter oftner as in the Case of Obedience Whereof on S. Peters part I conceive the reason to be this That being the Apostle of the Circumcision and so having to deal most with the Iews who could not brook subjection but were of all Nations under heaven the most impatient of a forain yoke he was therefore the more careful to deliver the doctrine of Christian liberty to them in such a manner as might frame them withal to yeeld such reverence and obedience to their Governours as became them to do And therefore S. Peter beateth much upon the point of Obedience But he no where presseth it more fully than in this Chapter Wherein after the general exhortations of subduing the lusts that are in their own bosoms vers 11. and of ordering their conversation so as might be for their credit and honesty in the sight of others ver 12. when he descendeth to more particular duties he beginneth first with and insisteth most upon this duty of subjection and obedience to authority in the greatest remaining part of the Chapter The first Precept he giveth in this kinde is set down with sundry amplifications and reasons thereunto belonging in the next verses before the Text Submit your selves to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake And then he doth by way of Prolepsis take away an objection which he foresaw would readily be made against that and the following Exhortations from the pretext of Christian liberty in the words of the Text As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God Conceive the words as spoken in answer to what those new converts might have objected We have been taught that the Son of God hath made us free and then we are free indeed and so not bound to subject our selves to any Masters or Governors upon earth no not to Kings but much rather bound not to do it that so we may preserve that freedom which Christ hath purchased for us and reserve our selves the more entirely for Gods service by refusing to be the servants of men This Objection the Apostle clearly taketh off in the Text with much holy wisdom truth He telleth them that being indeed set at liberty by Christ they are not therefore any more to enthral themselves to any living soul or other creature not to submit to any ordinance of man as slaves that is as if the ordinance it self did by any proper direct and immediate vertue binde the conscience But yet all this notwithstanding they might and ought to submit thereunto as the Lords freemen and in a free manner that is by a voluntary and uninforced both subjection to their power and obedience to their lawful commands They must therefore take heed they use not their liberty for an occasion to the flesh nor under so fair a title palliate an evil licentiousness making that a cloak for their irreverent and undutiful carriage towards their Superiours For albeit they be not the servants of men but of God and therefore owe no obedience to men as upon immediate tie of conscience and for their own sake but to God only yet for his sake and out of the conscience of that obedience which they owe to his command of honouring father and mother and of being subject to the higher powers they ought to give unto them such honour and obedience as of right belongeth unto them according to the eminency of their high places As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God From which words thus paraphrased I gather three observations all concerning our Christian liberty in that branch of it especially which respecteth humane ordinances and the use of the creatures and of all indifferent things Either 1. in the existence of it As free or 2. in the exercise of it And not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness or 3. in the end of it but as the servants of Gods The first observation this We must so submit our selves to superiour authority as that we do not thereby impeach our Christian liberty As free The second this We must so maintain our liberty as that we do not under that colour either commit any sin or omit any requisite office either of charity or duty and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness The third this In the whole exercise both of the