faire words concerning his Sonne Job 10.1.2 but all to no purpose And surely had it not bin Abraham he would have offered like Job in the bitterness of his soule to have pleaded with God he would have stood up in the behalf of his Sonne and replyed again And is this that Isaac that should be my comfort is this he whom thou hast so often promised and whom I have so long expected as a pledge of thy love and favour towards me and must I now kill him Quid meus hic Isaac in te committere c. Alas what hath Isaac committed against thee how hath he offended thee who will ever believe that thou wouldest have spared Sodom had there been ten that were good in it if thou now takest delight in the blood of the innocent doest thou thus reward thy Children and Servants and is this the fruit of their love and obedience O let it not be known in Gath nor published in Ascalon lest the uncircumcised Philistins insult over thy people say among themselves such honour may have all his Saints But Abraham never opened his mouth for his Sonne but grace having got the upper hand of nature and faith of affection he was glad when God had given him a Sonne but more glad that he had a Sonne to give unto God for so saith Chrysostom Latus erat Abraham cum silium acciperet laetior cum sibi imolandum dominus postularet Abraham rejoyced when he received his Sonne but he rejoyced more when God commanded him to offer him unto him Doct. 1 The Doctrine that may be gathered from hence is this That God makes tryall of our love and obedience in those things which of all other are dearest unto us For so we see he deales here with Abraham when he sees how dearly he loves his Sonne for the better tryall of his love and obedience he commands him to offer him for a burnt-offring Thus dealt our Saviour with the Ruler in the Gospell Luke 18.22 for knowing that he was rich and withall that his heart was set upon his treasure he willed him to sell all that ever he had and to give it to the poor and so tryed him in that which was dearest unto him He Math. 10.37 saith our Saviour that loveth Father Mother Sonne or Daughter more then me he is not worthy of me It is no ordinary love which God requires of us but such a love as is able to subdue all naturall affection So that if our Children were dearer unto us then our own soules yet the love of God is to be preferred before them And this was prefigured by those milch kine 1 Sam. 6. which being to carry the Arke of the Lord it is said that their Calves were taken from them and yet they went on and onely sometimes did low after their Calves but never turned back to look after them To note unto us that Religion must alwayes oversway affection and though we do naturally love our Children yet if they be any hinderance unto us in Gods service we are not to regard them It is the commendation of Levi Deut. 33. that he said to his Father and Mother he had not seen them and that he knew not his Brethren nor his own Children For when the Levites were commanded Exod. 32. to consecrate their hands unto the Lord every man upon his own Sonne and his own Daughter they were so zealous in Gods Cause that they fought against nature and had no more compassion on their Parents or Children then if they had been meer changers whom they had never seene Hieron lib. 2. Epist Select It is an excellent saying of St. Jerom Licet pervulus ex collo pendeat nepos c. Though thy little Nephew should hang about thy neck though thy Mother should intreat thee by those her own duggs that gave thee suck though thy Father should lie upon the Threshold and cling about thy feete as thou art going out to stay thee from spending thy life in Gods service per calcatum perge patrem c. Tread thy Father under thy feete and trample upon him Solum in hac re crudelem esse pietatis est genus Onely in this case it is a kind of piety to use cruelty This howsoever it may seeme a very harsh Doctrine unto flesh and blood yet if our hearts were once throughly inflamed with the love of God if we were wholly devoted unto Gods service and if we did even hunger and thirst after righteousness then whatsoever it were that God required at our hands we would be ready with Abraham to perform obedience Mat. 4.21.22 And as the Disciples when our Saviour called them they left both their goods and their Parents to follow him So whatsoever it were that God required of us though it were to the losse of all that ever we have yet we would be willing to resigne it when God commands us And thus much concerning the first difficulty in this Commandement in regard of the sacrifice which is to be offered Abrahams onely beloved sonne Isaac I come now to the second diffi ∣ culty Second The second difficulty is in regard of the Person that must offer this sacrifice that is Abraham Abraham a Father must sacrifice his Son he must do it himself and no other for him Take thine onely beloved Sonne Isaac and do thou offer him If a Father having but one onely Son should but hear that he were causeless to be put to death this ye know would be a great grief unto him but if he were commanded to be present himself and to be an eye-witnesse and spectator of his death this must needes be a further vexation O but being come thither if he himself were inforced to be his Sonnes executioner and with his own hands to kill his Sonne this were a torment beyond all comparison But this is Abrahams case here If God had commanded him to deliver his Son to some of his Servants and that they should kill him yet Abraham might have conceived some comfort for it may be his Servants would have had compassion on him as it hath often been seene or if they had not but had put him to death yet Abraham should not have been a spectator thereof but that Abraham may be sure of the death of his Son God will have him not onely an eye-witness thereof but to be the actor himself he will have him with his own hands to kill him Valer. Max. lib. 5. tit 7. When Caesar commanded Cesetus a Roman to subscribe but his hand to the bannishment of his Son he made him this answer Celerius tu mihi Caesar omnes meos liberos eripies quam ex his ego unum mea notá pellam Thou shalt sooner saith he berave me of all my Children then I will ever set my hand to bnnish any one of them What would he have answered if he had been commanded with his own hands to have
Apostle tells us Hebrewes 11. is but for a season and therefore seeing the sinnes of the wicked are but temporall how can it stand with the justice of God that their punishment is eternall First Therefore we are to know that sinne though it be committed and past in a moment yet as it is a trespasse against God that is infinite so it deserves an infinite punishment Tanto majus est peccatum quanto major in quem peccatur Every sinne is by so much the greater and so deserves the greater punishment as the person is the greater against whom it is committed If a man should dishonour and revile his Father he deserves ye know a farre greater punishment then he that should dishonour and revile his Neighbour If a man should strike a publick Magistrate he deserves a greater punishment to be inflicted upon him then he should if he struck but a private person but every sinne is committed against God and therefore deserves eternall punishment Secondly Though the wicked do but sinne for a time yet they have a perpetuall desire to sinne and should they live never so long in this World they would continue in sinne For like as Gamesters that delight in nothing so much as in gaming they will usually play as long as they can see and still have a desire to play longer but that the night comes upon them and compells them to give over So it is with sinners they take their pleasure and delight in their sinnes through the whole course of their life and so would continually go on in their sinnes but that they are prevented and cut oft by death Voluissent saith Gregory sine fine vivere ut sine fine possent in iniquitatibus permanere they would have lived in this World for ever that they might have continued in their sinnes for ever and therefore as they would have continually sinned so they justly deserve to be eternally punished And thus we have heard What it is to lose the soule and the misery which the soule which is lost is to undergoe both in regard of the felicity it shall lose and the torments it shall suffer What comparison is there then between the gaining of the World and the losing of the soule the gaining of the World with some temporall pleasures and the losing of the soule with eternall happiness the gaining of the World whereby we are freed from some worldly miseries and the losing of the soule whereby we are subject to everlasting torments the gaining of the World whereby for a time we may advance our friends and the losing of the soule whereby for ever we undo our selves All other losses whether of body or goods a man may well bear but the losse of the soule of all other losses is the most intolerable whatsoever a man loseth besides his soule yet he loseth that which was given him but for a time and which at one time or other he must have forgone but losing his soule he loseth that which he might have kept for ever Whatsoever a man loseth besides his soule yet he may recover it again If he lose his Children as Job did Job 1.19 yet he may have more if he lose his friends as David did yet he may find better Dan. 4.31 if he lose his Kingdom as Nebuchadnezer did yet he may recover it again or get another but losing his soule he loseth that which he can never recover Whatsoever a man loseth besides his soule yet he hath something left him If he lose his goods yet he may have a good name if he lose his good name yet he may have his liberty if he lose his liberty yet his life may be left him and if he lose his life yet his soule is remaining but losing his soule he hath no more to lose but loseth all at once his life liberty goods good-name even all that he hath and his soule besides Xxres having escaped a dangerous tempest Sabellic lib. 2. but yet with the losse of divers of his Nobles to reward the Governour of the ship for it he set upon his head a Crown of gold but withall Ennead 3. because he had not saved his Nobility likewise he caused him to be beheaded So he gave him that which he could take away from him but he took away that which he could not give him making him to lose not onely his reward but his life to boote Now who would have a Crown upon the like condition If the Devill should offer as he did to our Saviour the whole World unto any man and should say unto him All this will I give thee if thou wilt die presently there is no man in the World would accept of his offer for he should be so farre from gaining by the bargain that he should lose all he had and his life together If this therefore be so hard an exchange then what is theirs who for the gaining of the World do part with their soules Job 2.4 The Father of lies said true in this skin for skin and all that a man hath he will give for his life but yet life and all he may well give for his soule for he may lose his life and not lose his soule but losing his soule he loseth life and all Jonah 1.5 We see that Seamen will cast away their goods into the Sea to save their lives as the Mariners did in the first of Jonas We see in the Gospel that the woman that was diseased with an issue of blood she valued her bodily health at so high a rate that she spent all her substance upon the Physitians to be cured of her disease And we see in the old Law that every part and Member of our bodies was valued by God at so high a rate Exod. 21.24 that he that should put out another mans eye or but strike out his tooth he was to be punished with the losse of his own and might not be excused with any other satisfaction if a man had taken away another mans goods yet he was bound with his goods to make him amends but in this case his goods would not serve the turne but an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth and no other satisfaction If therefore our bodies be so dear and precious that every part and Member thereof is more to be valued then our Worldly goods then what gaine is sufficient to make any recompence for the losse of our soules We have heard then briefly both what it is to gain the Would and to lose the soule and that the gain of the one cannot countervaile the losse of the other Vse The use that we may make hereof is this that therefore we affect not this World so much as that thereby we hazard and indanger our soules If a man have a Jewell of any great value which he is to carry through any dangerous place he will look carefully to it and he will take no delight to converse
the King of Navarre died both for the suddennesse and violence of it who feeling great anguish in all his nerves was by the advice of his Physicians to be close wrapped in linnen cloth which had been well steeped in Aquavitae and the cloth to be sowed strait all about his body one having sowed it not having a knife ready to cut the thread took the candle to burn the thread in sunder and the thread flaming to the cloth took sudden hold of the same and the Aquavitae that the King in this flame was burnt to death before he could be helped by any And many come to such fearfull ends and yet we cannot judge of them by the kind of their death because even the godly whose death is precious in the eyes of the Lord howsoever they die do sometimes die a violent death and that suddenly So did old Eli that was a good man vvho hearing that the Arke of God was taken 2 Sam. 4.18 fell backward from his scate his neck brake and he dyed So Job's Children no doubt were holy persons having had godly education and their Fathers prayers laid up in Heaven for them yet While they were feasting together in their elder brothers house Job 1.19 the house on the sudden fell down and killed every one of them If therefore we judge of men by the kinde of their deaths we shall condemn the generation of the righteous and may bring on ourselves the like censure from others For we do not know by what kinde of death we shall glorifie God whether we shall die an easie or a painfull death whether a naturall or a violent death whether a lingring or a sudden death The times have been God grant the like times may never come again when there have been so great persecutions in the Church that the faithfull have been put to all manner of deaths whether God hath reserved us to the like times or no we do not know we know we have no promise to the contrary and therefore ought to prepare our selves for the like times that if they come we may constantly maintain the profession of Christ though it cost us our lives as here it did Steven And thus much likewise for the second point the kinde of his martyrdom And so I come to the third by whom he was thus martyred namely by the Iewes They stoned Steven Ye all know that the Iewes were the people whom God had chosen to himself above all other Nations Behold saith Moses Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens is the Lords Déut. 10.14 and the Earth and all that is therein notwithstanding he hath set his affection on thy Fathers to love them and hath also chosen their seed after them Even you saith he hath he chosen above all people For as for all other Nations God counted them strangers and left them to themselves and did not vouchsafe them his Statutes and Ordinances but suffered them to walk in their own wayes But as for the Iewes he first taught them himself and delivered them his Law from his own mouth and because they desired to be instructed rather by men like themselves and therefore spake to Moses Loquere tu nobiscum et audiemus c. Speak thon say they with us and we will hear Exe. 20.19 but let not God speak with us lest we dye God yielded to their request and first taught them by Moses afterwards by the Prophets Luke 19.26 of whom Abraham said to the rich-man They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them But the Iewes were so far from hearing these that Steven could here upbraid them Which of the Prophets have not your Fathers persecuted And Christ complaine of them O Jerusalem Jerusalem thou that killest the Prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee as here they did Steven Their sinne then is aggravated in regard of the persons by whom it was committed They were not the Gentiles or any Heathenish people that knew not God for then their sin had been the less but they were the Jewes Gods chosen people who commonly if they were offended with any upon every occasion were ready to stone them If they be offended with Moses Exod. 17.4 because they were thirsty and had no water to drink they are presently ready to stone him for it If they be offended with Caleb and Joshua Numb 14.10 for contradicting the spies that were sent into Candan and for giving a good report of the Land they are likewise ready to stone them for it And how often in the Gospel did they take up stones to have stoned our Saviour And here they stone Steven for bearing witnesse unto him And this vvas a greater sin in them being the people of God then if they had been heathen The heathen shall rise up in judgement against them for they reverenced their Priests though they were Idolaters The Marriners that were so tender-hearted to Jonas shall rise up against them for they hazarded their lives to save the Prophet though it were for his sinnes that they vvere in danger to perish but these mercilesse Iewes did stone him to death who sought to bring them to eternall life And therefore as the voice of Abels bloud did cry aloud in the eares of the Lord against Cain that shed it and was vox sanguinum a voice of blouds as the Scripture calls it as being not onely the voice of his bloud but of all the bloud that might have come of that bloud if it had not been shed So here the bloud of Steven did cry aloud against the Iewes that shed the same and the bloud of all those that might have come from him nay upon them was laid all the righteous blood that was shed before him Mat. 23.34 for so our Saviour told them Behold I send unto you Prophets and wise-men and Scribes and some of them you shall kill and Crucifie c. that upon you saith he may come all the righteous bloud shed upon the earth from the bloud of righteous Abel to the bloud of Zacharias Sonne of Barachias whom ye slew betweene the Temple and the Altar We read of Tomyris the Queen of the Scythians that because Cyrus the King of Persia had slain her son she gathered an Army and made War upon him and having vanquisht the Persians she took Cyrus and cutting off his head she cast it into a barrell that was filled with bloud thus insulting over it Thou that wast so thirsty and insatiable of bloud that thou slewest my son shalt now have thy fill till thou be glutted vvith it And thus the Jews vvho vvere so insatiable of the bloud of the Prophets had in the end their fill of bloud vvhen the bloud of all the righteous vvho had been slain from Abel to Zacharie vvas laid upon them And that may fitly be applied unto them vvhich the Angell saith Revel 16. Thou art righteous O Lord because thou hast judged thus