claim to eternal glory For what is that but the inheritance of the Saints Colos 1. Who should have your Lands but your heirs and Lo these are the heirs of God and none but they Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdome prepared for you saith our Saviour Matth. 25.34 Many a one here is borne to a fair estate and is strip't of it whether by the just disherson of his offended Father or else by the power or circumvention of an adversary or by his own mis-government and unthriftiness here is no danger of any of these On our Fathers part none For whom he loves he loves to the end On our Adversaries part none None shall take them out of my hand saith our Saviour The gates of Hell shall not prevaile against his On our part none For whereby can we lavish out our estate but by our sins and he that is borne of God sinneth not sinneth not so as to incurr a forfeit he may so sin as to be frowned on for the time to be chid yea perhaps to be well whipped of his Father not so as to be unsonned or dis-herited For the seed of God remains in him Lo whiles he hath the Divine seed in him he is the Son of God and whiles he is a Son he cannot but be an heir Oh then the comfortable and blessed priviledges of the Sons of God! enough to attract and ravish any heart for who doth not effect the honour of the highest parentage not under Heaven but in it who can be but eagerly ambitious of the title of the Lord of the world so closely yea to be interessed in the great God of Heaven and Earth by an inseparable relation to be attended on by those mighty and majesticall Spirits and lastly to be feoffed in the all-glorious Kingdome of Heaven and immortal crown of glory None of you can be now so dull as not desire to be thus happy and to ask as the blessed Virgin when she was told of her miraculous conception Quomodo fiet istud How shall this be How may I attain to this blessed condition This is a question worth asking Oh the poor and base thoughts of men How may I raise my house how may I settle my estate How may I get a good bargain how may I save or gain how may I be revenged of mine enemy whiles in the mean time we care not to demand what most concerns us which way should I become the child of God But would we know this to which all the World is but trifles surely it is not so hard as useful whose Sons we are by nature we soon know too well It is not enough to say our Father was an Amorite and our Mother an Hittite or to say we are the children of this world Luke 16.8 or a seed of falsehood Esay 57.4 or yet worse the children of the night and darknesse 1 Thess 5.5 worse yet we are filii contumaciae the sons of wilfull disobedience as the original runs Ephes 2.3 and thereby yet worse the sons of wrath Ephes 2.2 and which is the height of all miseries the Sons of death and eternal damnation how then how come we to be the Sons of God It is the Almighty power of Grace that only can make this change A double Grace the Grace of Adoption the Grace of Regeneration Adoption God hath predestinated us to the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ Ephes 1.5 Regeneration So many as received him he gave them this power or right to be made the Sons of God those which are borne not of blood or the lust of the flesh but borne of God John 1.12 13. and that which referrs to both Ye are all the Children of God by faith in Christ Jesus Galat. 3.26 Shortly then if we would be Sons and Daughters of God for the case is one in both the soul hath no sexes and in Christ there is neither male nor female we must see that we be borne again not of water only so we are all sacramentally Regenerated but of the Holy Ghost If any man be in Christ he is a new creature 2 Cor. 5.17 we must not be the men we were and how shall that be effected In Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the Gospell saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 4.15 He hath begotten us by the word of Truth Jam. 1.18 This word is that immortal seed whereby we are begotten to God let this word therefore have it's perfect work in us let it renew us in the inner man mortifying all our evill and corrupt affections and raising us up to a new life of Grace and obedience then God will not shame to own us for his and we shall not presume in claiming this glorious title of the Sons of God But if we be still our old selves no changlings at all the same men that we came into the World without defalcation of our corruptions without addition of Grace and Sanctification Surely we must seek us another Father we are not yet the Sons of God But me thinks ere I was aware I am falling to anticipate my discourse and whiles I am teaching how we come to be the Sons of God am showing how we may know that we are so which is the drift of this Scripture in the qualification here mentioned So many as are led by the Spirit of God are the Sons of God It is not enough for us my beloved to be the Sons and Daughters of God unlesse we know our selves to be so for certainly he cannot be truely happy that doth not know himself happy How shall we therefore know our selves to be the Sons of God surely there may be many signes and proofes of it besides this mentioned in my Text or rather many specialties under this general As first Every Child of God is like his Father It is not so in carnall Generation we have seen many Children that have not so much as one lineament of their Parents and as contrary to their dispositions as if they had been strangers to their loines and womb In the spiritual son-ship it is not so every Child of God carries the true resemblance of his Heavenly Father as he that hath called you is holy so be ye holy in all manner of conversation Because it is written Be ye holy for I am holy 1 Pet. 1.15 16. Well then my Brethren trie your selves by this rule our Heavenly Father is merciful are we cruel Our Father is righteous in all his wayes are we unjust Our Heavenly Father is slow to anger are we furious upon every sleight occasion Our Heavenly Father abhors all manner of evill do we take pleasure in any kind of wickednesse certainly we have nothing of God in us neither can we claim any kindred with Heaven Secondly every Child that is not utterly degenerate bears a filial love to his Parents answering in some measure that naturall affection which the parent bears towards him we cannot but know that the love of
make this Land desolate and an hissing every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished and hisse because of all the plagues thereof Jer. 18.8 Hitherto then I have shewed you the just grounds of our mourning afflictions sins dangers and applyed them to our own condition I have shewed you the due regulation of our mourning in the quantity the quality the manner of performing it the company that goes with it and the train that followes it what remaines now but that I should labour to perswade you all to be true mourners in our Sion were it my work to exhort you to mirth and jollity the task were both pleasing to undertake and easie to perform for we all naturally affect to be delighted yea I doubt there are too many Christians that with the Epicure place their chief felicity in pleasure but for sorrow and mourning it is a sowre and harsh thing unpleasing to the ear but to the heart more But if as Christians we come to weigh both these in the ballance of the sanctuary we shall find cause to take up other resolutions will ye hear what wise Solomon sayes of the point Sorrow saith he is better then laughter And it is better to go to the house of mourning then to the house of feasting Eccles 7.2 3. Lo his very authority alone were enough who as a great King had all the World to be his Minstrell but withall he sticks not to give us his reason why then is sorrow better then laughter For by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better look to the effects of both and you shall easily see the difference sorrow calls our hearts home to God and our selves which are apt to run wild in mirth where did you ever see a man made more holy with worldly pleasure no that is apt to debauch him rather but many a soul hath been bettered with sorrow for that begins his mortification recollecting his thoughts to a serious consideration of his spirituall condition and working his heart to a due remorse for his sin and a lowly submission to the hand that inflicts it And why should it be better to go to the house of mourning then to the house of feasting For this is the end of all men and the living shall lay it to his heart The house of mourning hath here principally respect to a funerall the death which is lamented for being the end of all flesh a man is here and thus put feelingly in mind of his mortality which in an house of feasting and jollity is utterly forgotten By how much then it is better for a man to have his heart kept in order by the meditation of death then to run wild after worldly vanity by so much is the house of mourning better then the house of feasting But if this be not perswasive enough hear what a greater then Solomon sayes Mat. 5.4 Blessed are they that mourn Lo he that is the author and the owner and giver of blessedness tells you where he bestows it even upon the mourners Did ye ever hear him say Blessed are the frolick and joviall Nay do ye not hear him say the contrary Wo be to you that laugh now and though he needed not whose will is the rule of all justice Luke 6.25 and paramount to all reason yet he is pleased to give you the reason of both Blessed are they that mourne for they shall be comforted and wo be to you â—hat laugh now for ye shall mourn and weep Lo joy and comfort is the end of Mourners and mourning and weeping is the end of mirth and Laughter O Saviour give me leave to wonder a little at this contrariety That to which the blessing is promised which is mourning is made the curse of laughter and joy for they shall mourn that rejoyced and yet they that mourn shall rejoyce Is it not partly for that necessary vicissitude which thou in thine infinite wisdome hast set of joy and mourning so as no man can be alwaies capable of both these but he that rejoyceth must have his turne of mourning as Abraham told the rich glutton in his torment and he that mourneth must have a time of rejoycing Or is it for the great difference that there is of the severall kindes of mourning and joy for as there is a naturall joy and sorrow which is neither good nor evill but in it self indifferent so there is a carnall sorrow and joy which is evill and a spirituall joy and sorrow which is good there is a temporall sorrow and joy enterchanged here and there is an eternall joy or sorrow reserved for hereafter So then hath thine infinite justice and wisdom distributed thy rewards and punishments that the carnall and sinfull joy is recompenced with eternal sorrow and mourning the holy and spirituall mourning with eternall joy and blessednesse Do we then desire to be blessed we must mourn do we desire to have all tears wip't hereafter from our eyes we must not then have our eyes dry here below And surely did we know how precious our tears are in the account of the Almighty we would not be niggardly of those penitent drops These these if we know not are so many orient pearles laid up in the Cabinet of the Almighty Ps 56.8 which he makes such store of that he books their number for an everlasting remembrance and lest one tear should be spilt he reserves them all in his bottle Do we not remember that he hath promised an happy and glorious harvest for a wet seed-time That those which sow in teares shall reap in joy Ps 126.5 6. that every grain which we sow in this gracious rain shall yield us a sheaf of blessednesse If then we believe this unfailable word of truth who would not be content to mourne awhile that he may rejoyce for ever Oh the madness of carnall hearts that choose to purchase the momentany pleasure of sin with everlasting torments whiles we are hardly induced to purchase everlasting pleasures with some minutes mourning Neither is it the pleasure of the Almighty to deferr the retributory comforts of his mourners till another World even here is he ready to supply them with abundant consolations The sweet singer of Israel was experimentally sensible of this mercy In the multitude of the sorrows of my heart thy comforts have refreshed my soul Psal 94.19 Neither was the chosen Vessell any whit behind him in the experience and expression of this gracious indulgence of the Almighty 2 Cor. 1.3 4. Blessed be God saith he even the father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort who comforteth us in all our tribulations that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comforts wherewith we our selves are comforted of God what do I stand to instance in the persons of some speciall favorites of heaven it is the very office of the Messiah the
tears but the tender hearts of Gods children are ever lightly attended with weeping-eyes neither can they want tears whilst even other men abound with sins though themselves were free And if good men spend their tears upon wicked wretches how much more ought those wicked ones to bestow tears upon themselves it is their danger and Misery that Gods children are affected withall whilst themselves are insensible of both Wo is me could their eyes be but opened that they might see their own wofull condition they could not love themselves so ill as not to bewail it could they see the frownes of an angry God bent upon them could they see the flames of Hell ready to receive them they could not but dissolve into tears of blood Oh pitty your own souls at last ye obdured sinners be ye feelingly apprehensive of your fearfull danger the eminent danger of an eternal damnation and weep day and night before that God whom ye have provoked wash away your sins with the streams of penitence The fire of hell can have no power where it findes these soveraigne waters Blessed are they that weep now for they shall laugh Luc. 6.21 We have not yet done with St. Pauls tears See I beseech you who were the objects of this sorrow of his the false teachers of the Philippians the rivals and adversaries of the Apostles Ministry whether the Simonians that is the Disciples of Simon Magus as some have thought or rather the Judaizing Christians whom before he calls Dogs and the Concision men that were not more for Christ then for Moses men not more false in opinion then foule in conversation rebrobate persons spightful enemies to him and the gospel yet even these are the men whom St. Paul bedewes with his many tears So far should Gods charitable Children be from desiring or rejoycing in the destruction of those who professe hostility against them though even leud and ungodly persons as that they should make this the matter of their just sorrow and mourning St. Paul had a deeper insight into the state of these men then we can have into any of those goodliest men who fall into our notice and enmity for he saw them as it were in Hell already he lookt upon them as vessels of wrath for he addes whose end is perdition yet he entertaines the thoughts of their sinfull miscarriages with tears Every man can mourn for the danger or loss or fall of a good man of a friend but to be thus deeply affected with either the sins or judgments of wicked persons is incident to none but a tender and charitable heart Gods children are of the diet of their heavenly Father who would have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth 1 Tim. 2.4 Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked shall dye saith the Lord God and not that that he should returne from his wayes and live Ezec. 18.23 And to be sure he binds it with an oath As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turne from his wayes and live turne ye turne ye from your evill wayes for why will ye dye O house of Israel Ezec. 33.11 Those that sport in the sins and rejoyce in the perdition of their brethren let them see of what spirit they are But I have dwelt longer then I meant in the Apostles fidelity in his warning and the frequence and passion of it Turne your eyes now I beseech you to a loathsome object the wickedness of these false teachers of the Philippians described by their number motion quality issue Their number many their motion walk their quality enemies to the crosse of Christ their issue destruction We begin with their Number Mark I beseech you the inference The charge of the Apostle in the words immediatly preceeding is that the Philippians should mark those who walked holily as they had the Apostles for examples and now he addes For many walk inordinately see then from hence that the rarity of conscionable men should make them more observed more valued If there be but one Lot in Sodom he is more worth then all the souls of that populous and fruitfull Pentapolis If there be but some sprinkling of Wheat in a chaffe heap we winnow it out and think it worth our labour to do so some graines or if but scruples of precious mettals are sifted out of the rubbish of the oare and dust It is excellent that our Apostle hath in this Epistle the 2. Chapter v. 15. That ye may be blamless in the midst of a froward and perverse generation among whom ye shine as lights in the world Mark if there be but light held forth in a dark night how do the birds come flying about it how do the eyes of men though afarr off fix upon it when as all the space betwixt us and it which is all wrapped up in darkness is unregarded such are and such should be good men amongst a world of wicked ones so much more eminent and esteemed by how much the fewer they are Paucity is wont to carry contempt with it See say the Philistims when they saw Jonathan and his Armour-bearer come towards them how the Israelites creep out of their holes and proud Benhadad when he heard of some few of Israel coming forth against him can say Take them alive whether they come for peace or whether for war take them alive 1 King 20.18 What is an handful of gainsayers upon any occasion We are apt to think that the stream should bear down all before it Do any of the Rulers believe in him that 's argument enough But it must not be so with Christians here one is worthy to be more then a thousand if he be a man that orders his conversation aright that goes upon the sure grounds of infallible truth though there be none other in the world besides him that followes after righteousness that man is worthy of our mark of our imitation if there be but one Noah in an age all flesh having corrupted their wayes it is better to follow him into the Ark then to perish withall the world of unbelievers Here are these Many opposed to Us Paul and Timothy It is not for us to stand upon the fear of an imputation of singularity we may not do as the most but as the best It was a desperate resolution of Rabbodus the barbarous and ignorant Duke of Prisons that he would go to Hell because he heard the most went that way Our Saviours argument is quite contrary Enter in at the straight gate for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and many there be which go in thereat Matth. 7.13 And St. Pauls argument here to the same purpose Many walk inordinately therefore be ye followers of us We have an old saying that Cases that rarely happen are neglected of Law-givers The newes of a few Enemies is entertained with
double providence of the Almighty One that God was pleased to fetch them out of Egypt in an happy suddainnesse even when they had no leasure to make up their bach The other that he sustained them with this unleavened dough till he sent them Manna in the Wildernesse The one was the bread of the poor the other the bread of Angels As therefore he would have a pot of Manna kept in the Ark for a Monument of that miraculous food wherewith he fed them in the desert so he thought good to ordain this observation of unleavened bread for a perpetuall memoriall of their provision preceding it And this was not onely a charge but a sanction under the severe penalty whether of excommunication or death or both both for the authority of the Commander and for the weight of the institution whereby God meant both to rub up their memory of a temporall benefit past and to quicken their faith in a greater spirituall favour of their future Redemption from sin and death by the blood of that true paschall lamb which should be sacrificed for them This is the ground of this institution Now let us if you please inquire a little into the ground of this alâ—usion to the leaven the nature and signification of this implyed comparison here mentioned and we shall easily find that leaven hath first a diffusive faculty so it is taken both in the good part and the evill in good Mat. 1â— 33. so the Kingdom of Heaven is compared to leaven which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till the whole was leavned Lo these same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were more then a bushel of our measure and one morsel of leaven seasons it all In evill so here immediately before my Text in an ordinary Jewish proverb A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump Secondly it hath in it self a displeasing sowerness in which regard it is an ill construction attributed both to false doctrine and to evill manners To false doctrine Mat. 16.6 Take heed saith our Saviour of the leaven of the Pharises To ill manners so in the next words ye have the leaven of malice and wickedness So then here the very inference offers us these two necessary heads of our discourse 1. That sin or the sinner for it may be taken of either or both is spirituall leaven 2. That this leaven must be purged out because Christ is our passover and sacrificed for us For the first sin hath the true qualities of leaven both in respect of the offensive sowreness and of the diffusion In the former nothing can be so distastfull unto God as sin Indeed nothing can displease but it as nothing is so sweet and pleasing to him as the obedience of his faithfull ones If any edible thing could be more offensive to the palate Sin would be likened to it As indeed it is still resembled by whatsoever may be most abhorring to all the senses To the sight so it is compared to filth Esa 4.4 Psal 14.3 to beastly excrements 2 Pet. 2.22 to spots and blemishes 2. Pet. 2.13 to menstruous and polluted blood Ezec. 16.6 To the smell so to a corrupted ointment to the stench of a dead carcass what should I instance in the rest How should it be other then highly offensive to the Majesty of God when it is professedly opposite to divine justice since all sin is the transgression of the royall law even the conscience which is Gods taster finds it abominably loathsome how much more that God who is greater then the conscience who so abhors it that as we are wont to do to the potsherd which hath held poysonous liquor he throwes away and breaks the very vessel wherein it was as he that findes an hair or a coal in the daintiest bit spits it out all Did God find sin in his Angels he tumbles them down out of Heaven Doth he find sin in our first parents he hurles them out of Paradise Yea did he find our sins laid upon the blessed Son of his love of his nature he spares him not awhit but laies load upon him till he roars out in the anguish of his Soul Lo he was wounded for our transgressions he was bruised for our iniquities the chastisements of our peace were upon him and by his stripes we are healed Esa 53.5 And to whom should we rather conform our selves then to the most holy God what diet should we affect but his who is the rule of all perfection How then should we utterly abhorr every evill way how should we hate our sins with a perfect hatred And surely the more ill savour and loathlinesse we can find in our bosom sins the nearer we come to the purity of that holy one of Israel our blessed Redeemer whose stile it is Thou lovest righteousness and hatest wickedness Ps 45.7 Oh then be we perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect Cleanse your hands ye sinners and purge your hearts ye double minded What shall we say then to the disposition of those men that can find no savour in any thing but their sins No morsell goes down sweetly merrily with them but this wo is me how do they chear themselves with the hope of injoying their sinfull pleasures how do they recreate themselves with the memory of their fore-passed filthiness how do they glory in that licentious liberty which they indulge unto themselves how do they even when they are grown old and past beastly action tickle themselves with the wanton remembrances of their younger bestialities yea so hath the delight in sin most wofully besotted them that they respect not friends estate children health body soul in comparison of the bewitching contentment they find in their sins Oh poor miserable souls Oh the wretchedest of all creatures not men but beasts let me not seem either unmannerly or uncharitable to speak from the mouth of Gods Spirit you know the word Canis ad vomitum The dog to his vomit The swine to it's mire And if they will needs be dogs how can they look for any other but dogs intertainment Foris Canes without shall be dogs Revel 22.15 But for us dear Christians let me take up that obtestation of the Psalmist Oh all ye that love the Lord hate the thing which is sin Psal 97.10 let us hate even the garment spotted with the flesh yea let us hate our selves that we can hate our sins no more And if at any time through the frailty of our wretched nature and the violence of tentation we be drawn into a sinfull action yet let us take heed of being leavened with wickedness Purge out the old leaven for Christ our passover is sacrificed for us Now as sin is leaven in respect of the sowring quality of it so also in respect of the diffusive It began with one Angel and infected Legions It began with one Woman it infected all the Generation of Mankind let it take hold of one faculty it infecteth the whole
Angels present and the people shout out their Amen and shall our piety this way be lesse than theirs Surely the Angels of God are inseparably with us yea whole cohorts yea whole Legions of those heavenly soldiery are now viewing guarding us in these holy meetings and we acknowledg them not we yeild not to them such reverent and awful respects as even flesh and blood like our own will expect from us Did we think the Angels of God were with us here durst those of us which dare not be covered at home as if the freedom of this holy place gave them priviledge of a loose and wild licentiousness affect all saucy postures and strive to be more unmannerly then their Masters Did we consider that the Angels of God are witnesses of our demeanour in Gods house durst we stumble in here with no other reverence then we would do into our Barne or Stable and sit down with no other care then we would in an ale-house or Theater Did we finde our selves in an assembly of Angels durst we give our eyes leave to rove abroad in wanton glances our tongues to walk in idle and unseasonable chat our ears to be taken up with frivolous discourse Durst we set our selves to take those naps here whereof we failed on our pillow at home certainly my beloved all these do manifestly convince us of a palpable unrespect to the blessed Angels of God our invisible consorts in these holy services However then it hath been with us hitherto let us now begin to take up other resolutions and settle in our hearts an holy aw of that presence wherein we are Even at thy home address thy self for the Church prepare to come before a dreadful Majesty of God and his powerful Angels thou seest them not no more did Elishaes servant till his eyes were opened It is thine ignorant and grosse infidelity that hath filmed up thine eyes that thou canst discerne no spiritual object were they but anointed with the eye-salve of faith thou shouldest see Gods house full of heavenly glory and shouldest check thy self with holy Jacob when he awaked from his divine vision Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not how dreadfull is this place this is no other but the house of God and this is the gate of Heaven Gen. 28.16 17. Oh then when thou settest thy foot over the threshold of Gods Temple tremble to think who is there lift up thine awfull eyes and bow thine humble knees and raise up thy devout and faithful soul to a religious reverence and fear of those mighty and Majestical Spirits that are there and of that great God of Spirits whose both they and thou art and study in all thy carriage to be approved of so glorious witnesses and overseeres That so at the last those blessed Spirits with whom we have had an invisible conversation here may carry up our departing soules into the heaven of heavens into the presence of that infinite and incomprehensibly-glorious God both theirs and ours there to live and raign with them in the participation of their unconceivable blisse and glory To the fruition whereof he that hath ordained us graciously bring us by the mediation and for the sake of his blessed Son Jesus To whom with thee O Father of Heaven and thy co-eternall Spirit three persons in one God be given all praise honor immortality now and for ever HOLY DECENCY IN THE WORSHIP of GOD. By J. H. B. N. I Know that a clean heart and a right spirit is that which God mainly regards For as he is a Spirit so he will be served in Spirit but withall John 4.24 as he hath made the body and hath made it a partner with the Soul so he justly expects that it should be also wholly devoted to him so as the Apostle upon good reason prayes for his Thessalonians that their whole Spirit and Soul 1 Thes 5.23 and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and beseeches his Romans by the mercies of God that they present their bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable to God Rom. 12.1 Now as the body is capable of a double uncleanness the one morall when it is made an instrument and agent in sin the other naturall when it is polluted with outward filthiness so both of these are fit to be avoided in our addresses to the pure and holy God the former out of Gods absolute command who hath charged us to cleanse our selves from all filthiness both of the flesh and Spirit the latter out of the just grounds of Decency 2 Cor. 7.1 and expedience for though there be no sinfull turpitude in those bodily uncleanenesses wherein we offer our selves to appear before the Lord our God yet there is so deep an unbeseemingness in them as places them in the next door to sin Perhaps Gods ancient people the Jewes were too superstitiously scrupulous in these externall observations whos 's Talmud tells us of one of their great Rabbies that would rather suffer under extremity of hunger and thirst then tast of ought with unwashen hands as counting that neglect equall to lying with an harlot and who have raised a great question whether if any of their poultry have but dipped their beak in the bowle the water may be allowed to wash in forbidding to void the urine standing except it be upon a descent of ground lest any drop should recoyle upon the feet and in case of the other evacuation beside the paddle-staffe and other ceremonies in uncovering the feet injoyning to turn the face to the South not to the East or West because those coasts had their faces directed towards them in their devotions what should I speak of their extreme curiosity in their outward observances concerning the Law which no man might be allowed to read whiles he was but walking towards the unloading of nature or to the Bathe or near to any place of annoyance no Man might so much as spit in the Temple or before that sacred Volumn or stretch forth his feet towards it or turn his back upon it or receive it with the left hand no Man might presume to write it but upon the parchment made of the skin of a clean beast nor to write or give a bill of divorce but by the side of a running stream yea the very Turks as they have borrowed our circumcision so also religious niceties from these Jewes not allowing their Alcoran to be touched by a person that is unclean But surely I fear these men are not more faulty in the one extreme then many Christians are in the other who place a kinde of holinesse in a slovenly neglect and so order themselves as if they thought a nasty carelessenesse in Gods services were most acceptable to him Hence it is that they affect homely places for his worship abandoning all magnificence and cost in all the acts and apendances of their devotion clay and sticks please
it with all joy and thankfulnesse And if Moses by conferring with God but 40 Dayes and Nights in the delivery of the law had a glorious brightnesse in his face Oh let us that more then fourty years have had conversation with God in his Gospell shine with the resplendent beames of heavenly knowledg And if the joyes of heaven are described by Light surely the more lightsome our soules are here the nearer they come to their blessednesse Light is sown from the righteous saith the Psalmist Lo here is the seed-time of Light above is the harvest If the Light of saving knowledg be sown in our hearts here we shall be sure to reap the crop of heavenly glory hereafter And this is the first quality of Light with the reflection of it upon us The next followes which is purity Of all the visible Creatures that God hath made none is so pure and simple as the light it discovers all the foulnesse of the most earthly recrements it mixeth with none of them neither is possibly capable of the least corruption some of the best Interpreters therefore have taken this metaphor of Light to implie the purity and perfect goodness of God In whom as there is an infinite clearnesse of understanding so also an infinite rectitude of will in so much as his will is the rule of all right neither doth he will ought because it is good but therefore it is good because he wills it Goodnesse hath no lesse brightnesse in it then truth and wickedness as it is never without errour so it is no lesse dark then it Justly therefore is God all light in that he is all pure and good and the reflection of this quality upon us must be our holiness For this is the will of God even our sanctification The more holy then we are the more we conform to him that is Light The way of the just is as the shining Light that shineth more and more as contrarily sins are the works of darkness the mover of them is the Prince of darknesse the agents of them are the Sons of darknesse and their trade is walking in darknesse as it followes in my text and the end of them is utter darkness Whiles he sayes then Be Holy as I am Holy he doth as good as say Be ye Light as I am Light Ye were darkness but now it is Gods own phrase Lux estis ye are Light in the Lord saith St. Paul to his Ephesians justly therefore doth it follow walk as children of the Light In right wayes with straight stepps And surely if God be Light and we darkness what interest can we claim in him For what communion is there betwixt Light and darkness Oh the comfortable and happy condicion then of those that are in God they are still in Light Truly the light is sweet saith wise Salomon and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the Sun As on the contrary it is a wofull and disconsolate estate to live in any sin this is no other then to be dungeon'd up in a perpetuall darknesse The Egyptians were even weary of themselves for a three dayes darknesse how irksome had it been to have lived alwayes so I have read a book of one Haitonus a monk of the order of the Praemonstratenses a Cozen as he saies of the then King of Armenia written some 340 Years agoe set forth by one Nic. Salcon and dedicated to Pope Clement the 5th where with much confidence he affirmes that in the Country of Georgia there was a certain province called Hamâ—en of three daies journey about so palpably dark continually as that no man could see his hand in it that the inhabitants of the borders of it might hear many times in the woods the noise of men crying of horses neighing of cocks crowing but no man durst venture to go unto it because he could not find the way out again which he saies with much earnestnesse that he saw Neque Credidissem saith he nisi propriis oculis perspexissem reporting it to have been a miraculous judgment upon some Persian persecutors of the Christians in that place I list not to inquire into the likelyhood of the story it might be some temporary judgment as that was upon Egypt for the time and now long since vanished but imagine ye the truth of that which he dares with so deep protestations avow and conceive the condicion of all wilfull sinners who live shut up in a region of thick darkness whence they can no more get out then they can be capable of any comfort within and when they have wearied themselves in those wretched mazes of vanity they are shut up in the utter darknesse of the dreadfull pit of eternall Death Oh then that willing sinners be they never so gay and glorious could but apprehend the misery and horrour of their own estate in this behalf certainly it were enough to make them either maz'd or penitent For what is darknesse but a privation of Light Now God is Light And sin deprives us of Gods presence and shuts us out from the face of God and if in his presence be the fulnesse of joy then in his absence is the fulnesse of sorrow and torment neither have the Schools determined amiss that the pain of loss is more horrible then the pain of sense so as that darknesse which our sin causeth in the alienation and absence of the Lighr of Gods countenance is without his great mercy the beginning of an utter exclusion from the beatificall face of God and of that utter darknesse of hell For us as we professe our selves the Children of the Light so let us walk in the Light And what Light is that Thy law is a Light to my feet saith holy David Lo this is the Light wherein we must walk that so walking in the Light of his law we may happily enjoy the light of his countenance Ps 36.10 and may come at the last to the light of his glory so in his Light we shall see Light This of the second quality of the Light and the reflection of it The third and last followes It is this which Learned Estius thinks to be mainly driven at in this place That God is therefore Light because he is the Fountain and cause of Light to all Creatures that do enjoy it and indeed what Light is there which is not from him Naturall Morall Divine For the naturall It was he that said Fiat Lux Let there be Light in the first day It was he that recollected that diffused Light into the body of the Sun in the fourth day that goodly Globe of Light receives from him those beames of Light which it communicates to the Moon Stars Skie and this other inferiour World What Light of intellectuall or morall vertue ever shined in the heart of any man but from him The Spirit of man is the Candle of the Lord searching all the inward parts of the belly Prov. 20.27 What Light
great power are met in any Prince he can be content to fit still and not break forth into some notable breaches of publick peace And where once the fire of war is kindled it is not easily quenched yea it runs as in a trayn and feeds it self with all the combustable matter it meets withall on every side and therefore t is a marveilous work of the power and mercy of God that he makes war to cease And this he doth either by an over-powering victory as in the case of Hezekiah Sennacherib which should seem to be the drift of this Psalme whereof every passage imports such a victory and triumph as the conquered adversary should never be able to recover Or by tempering and composing the hearts of men restraining them in their most furious carriere and taming their wild heats of revenge and inclining them to termes of peace This is a thing which none but he can do the heart of man is an unruly and head strong thing it is not more close then violent as none can know it so none can over-rule it but he that made it It is a rough sea he only can say here shalt thou stay thy proud waves Shortly then publick peace is the proper work of an Almighty and mercifull God His very title is Deus pacis the God of peace Rom. 15.33 and 16.20 Heb. 13.20 so as this is his peculium yea it is not only his for he owes it but his for he makes it I make peace and create evill I the Lord do all these things Esa 45.7 That malignant Spirit is in this his profest opposite that he is the great make-bate of the World Labouring to set all together by the ears sowing discord betwixt Heaven and Earth betwixt one peece of Earth against another Man against Man Nation against Nation hence he hath the name of Satan of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Diabolus of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as whose whole indeavour is enmity and destruction Contrarily the good God of Heaven whose work it is to destroy the works of the Devill is all for peace he loves peace he commands it he effects it He maketh wars to cease This is his work in the kinde and so much more his work in the extent To the ends of the Earth by how much more good any work is by so much more it is his and by how much more common any good is by so much better it is Even the pax pectoris the private and bosome peace of every man with himself is his great and good work for the heart of every man is naturally as an unquiet sea ever tossing and restlesse troubled with variety of boistrous passions he only can calme it the peace of the family is his he maketh men to be of one minde in an house without whose work there is nothing but jarres and discord betwixt husband and wife parents and children masters and servants servants and children with each other so as the house is made if not an hell for the time yet a purgatory at the least the peace of the neighbourhood is his without whom there is nothing but scolding brawling bloodsheds lawing that a City is at unity in it self not divided into sides and factions it is the Lords doing for many men many mindes and every man is naturally addicted to his own opinion hence grow daily destractions in populous bodies That a Country that a Nation is so is so much more his work as there are more heads and hearts to governe But that one Nation should be at unity with another yea that all Nations should agree upon an universall cessation of armes and embrace peace A domino factum est hoc est mirabile it must needs be the Lords doing so much more eminently and it is marveilous in our eyes Faciam eos in gentem unam was a word fit only for the mouth of God who only can restrain hands and conjoyne hearts as here He maketh wars to cease unto the ends of the Earth Now wherefore serves all this but for the direction of our recourse for the excitation of our duty and immitation for the challenge of our thankfulnesse In the first place are we troubled with the fears or rumours of wars are we grieved with the quarrells and dissensions that we finde within the bosome of our own Nation or Church would we earnestly desire to finde all differences composed and a constant peace setled amongst us we see whether to make our addresse even to that omnipotent God who maketh warrs to cease unto the ends of the earth who breaketh the bow and snappeth the spear in sunder And surely if ever any Nation had cause to complain in the midst of a publick peace of the danger of private destractions and factious divisions ours is it wherein I know not how many uncouch Sects are lately risen out of Hell to the disturbance of our wonted peace all of them eagerly pursuing their own various fancies and opposing our formerly received truth what should we do then but be take our selves in our earnest supplications to the God of peace with an Help Lord never ceasing to solicit him with our prayers that he would be pleased so to order the hearts of men that they might encline to an happy agreement at least to a meek cessation of those unkinde quarrels wherewith the Church is thus miserably afflicted But secondly in vain shall we pray if we do nothing Our prayers serve only to testifie the truth of our desires and to what purpose shall we pretend a desire of that which we indeavour not to effect That God who makes wars and quarrels to cease useth means to accomplish that peace which he decrees And what are those means but the inclinations projects labors of all the well-willers to peace It must be our care therefore to immitate yea to second God in this great work of peace-making The phrase is a strange but an emphaticall one that Deborah uses in her song Curse ye Meroz said the Angel of the Lord curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof because they came not to help the Lord to help the Lord against the mighty Judg. 5.23 Lo what a word here is To help the Lord what help needs the Almighty or what help can our weaknesse afford to his omnipotence Yet when we put our hands to his and do that as instruments which he as the authour requires of us and works by us we help that Lord which gives us all the motions both of our wills and actions so must we do in the promoting of peace and the allaying of quarrells when an house is on fire we must every one cast in his pail-full to the quenching of the flames It is not enough that we look on harmlesly with our hands in our bosomes No we add to that burning which we indeavour not to quench We must contribute our utmost to the cessation of these spirituall and intellectuall wars which shall be
we should as we well might expect a dissolution of all things neither hath it lesse horrour in it to feel the Earth stagger under us Whose hair doth not start up at this trepidation and the more a man knowes the more is his astonishment He hangeth the Earth upon nothing saith Job Job 26.7 For a man to feel the Earth that hangs upon nothing but as some vast ball in the midst of a thin yielding air totter under him how can his soul choose but be possessed with a secret fright and confusion Me thinks I tremble but to think of such a trembling Such are the distempers and publick calamities of States though even of particular Kingdoms but so much more as they are more universall they are both unnaturall and dreadfull They are politickly unnaturall For as the end of all motion is rest so the end of all civill and spirituall agitations is peace and settlednesse The very name of a State implies so much which is we know a stando from standing and not from moving The man riding upon the red Horse which stood upon the myrtle trees Zachar. 1.11 describes the condicion of a peacefull government Behold all the Earth sitteth still and is at rest and Micah They shall sit still every man under his vine and figtree Micah 4.4 and none shall make them afraid Particular mens affayres are like the Clouds publick government is as the Earth The Clouds are alwayes in motion it were strange for any of them to stand still in one point of the air so it were to see private mens occasions void of some movings of quarrells or change the publick State is or should be as the Earth a great and solid body whose chief praise is settlednesse and consistence Now therefore when publick stirs and tumults arise in a well ordered Church or Common-wealth the State is out of the socket or when common calamities of war famine pestilence seize upon it then the hearts of men quake and shiver within them then is our prophets Earth-quake which is here spoken of Thou hast made the Earth to tremble To begin with the passive motions of publick calamities they are the shakings of our Earth So God intends them so must we account them and make use of them accordingly what are we I mean all the visible part of us but a peece of Earth besides therefore that magneticall vertue which is operative upon all the parts of it why should or can a piece stand still when the whole moveth Denominations are wont to be not from the greater but the better part and the best part of this Earthen World is man and therefore when men are moved we say the Earth is so and when the Earth in a generality is thus moved good reason we should be so also we must tremble therefore when God makes the Earth to do so What shall we say then to those obdured hearts which are nowhit affected with publick evils Surely he were a bold man that could sleep whiles the Earth rocks him and so were he that could give himself to a stupid security when he feels any vehement concussations of government or publick hand of Gods afflictive judgment But it falls out too usually that as the Philosopher said in matter of affaires so it is in matter of calamities Communia negliguntur Men are like Jonas in the storm sleep it out though it mainly concern them surely besides that we are men bound up each in his own skin we are limbs of a community and that body is no lesse intire and consistent of all his members then this naturall and no lesse sensible should we be of any evill that afflicts it If but the least toe do ache the head feels it but if the whole body be in pain much more do both head and feet feele it Tell me can it be that in a common Earth-quake any house can be free or is the danger lesse because the neighbours roofes rattle also Yet too many men because they suffer not alone neither are singled out for Vengeance are insensible of Gods hand Surely such men as cannot be shaken with Gods judgment are fit for the center the lowest parts of the Earth where there is a constant and eternall unrest not for the surface of it which looks towards an Heaven where are interchanges of good and evill It is notable and pregnant which the prophet Esay hath hear it all ye secure hearts and tremble In that day did the Lord of Hosts call to weeping and mourning and baldnesse and girding with sackcloth and behold joy and gladnesse slaying of Oxen and killing of Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine And what of that Surely this iniquity shall not be purged till you die saith the Lord God of Hosts What shall we say to this honourable and beloved wherefore hath God given us his good creatures but that we should injoy them Doth not Solomon tell us there is nothing better then that a man should Eat and Drink and make his soule injoy good in his labour Eccles. 2.24 And why is God so incensed against Israel for doing what he allowes them Know then that it is not the act but the time that God stands upon Very unseasonableness is criminall here and now comforts are sins to be joviall when God calls to mourning to glut our maw when he calls to fasting to glitter when he would have us sackcloth'd and squalid he hates it to the death here we may say with Solomon Of laughter thou art mad and of mirth what is this thou doest He grudges not our moderate and seasonable jolities there is an Ope-tyde by his allowance as well as a Lent Go thy wayes Eat thy Bread with joy and drink thy wine with a merry heart for now God accepteth thy work Lo Gods acceptation is warrant enough for our mirth Now may his saints rejoyce and sing but there is a time to mourne and a time to daunce It was a strange word that God had to the Prophet Ezekiel that he would take away from him his wife the comfort of his life and yet he must not mourne but surely when he but threats to take away from us the publick comforts of our peace and common welfare he would have us weep out our eyes and doth no lesse hate that our hearts should be quiet within us then he hates that we should give him so just cause of our disquiet Here the Prophet can cry out Quis dabit capiti meo aquas And how doth the mournfull prophet now pour out himself into Lamentations How hath the Lord covered the doughter of Sion with a cloud in his anger and cast down from heaven to the earth the beauty of Israel Lament 2.1 Oh that our hearts could rive in sunder at but the dangers of those publick Judgments which we have too well deserved and be lesse sensible of our private concernments then should we make a right use of that dreadfull hand of God of
cease again without any sensible breach it were no great matter but as there is no thunder in the cloud without an eruption of lightning so there is no Earth-quake lightly without some fearfull rupture The judgments of God never return empty handed they still bring what they were sent for Those three great executioners of God sword famine pestilence what wofull havock have they made in the World I could show you very wide breaches that these have made wheresoever they have come I could tell you out of Josephus of so many Jewes slaughtered at Hierusalem the bordering parts as you would wonder the World should yield so many men I could tell you of Eighteen hundred thousand in one Year swept away as it is said in one City Cairo with the pestilence what need I travell so far off when we have so many and miserable instances nearer home Here in England as our Florilegus or Matthew of Westminster tells us in the Year 665 there was so great a mortality that men run up by troups to the rocks and cast themselves into the Sea Do but look back and recollect those bills of death which in our two last heavy visitations astonished the presse Do but look about at both Germanies and their bordering neighbourhood and see what gaps the sword hath made in those yet bleeding territories Oh the wofull breaches that have followed these late Earth-quakes of Christendome the very examples whereof one would think should be enough to teach us both fear and thankfulnesse when the Israelites round about saw Corah and his company devoured of the Earth they run away at the cry of them and said lest the Earth swallow us up also I cannot blame them they had reason the same jawes of the Earth might have yawned wider and taken them in too So let us do Honourable and beloved yea why should not the care of our own safety prevail so far with us as to force us since we see the lamentable breaches that are made in our neighbour Nations to run away trembling from this gulf of Gods deserved judgments and shall I tell you how we may run away to purpose Run away before-hand from those sins which have drawn down these judgments on them and will otherwise do the like upon us so shall we be sure to escape the avenging hand of God who alone it is that moves the earth and makes these breaches which is the third head of our discourse Thou hast made the earth to tremble thou hast divided or broaken it Who or what ever be the means he is the author of these movings of these breaches as in nature the immediate causes of an Earth-quake are those Subterraneous heats which we mentioned yet it is God the prime cause that sets them on work in causing both them and their agency so it is in these analogical motions Men may be the immediate actors in them but he that actuates the orders over-rules these means is God to him must be ascribed these stirrings these breakings whether by a just but efficacious permission as sins or by a just immission as punishments This is Gods claime the prerogative of the King of Heaven Is there any evill in the City and I have not done it Surely none except we will detract from his omnipotence none against him none without him none but by him his infinite power justice wisdome mercy knowes when and how to scourge one to chastise a second to warne a third to humble a fourth to obdure a fifth to destroy a sixt shortly to break some and move all Oh the infinite varieties and inevitable certainties of Gods vengeance upon sinfull Nations Doth Israell walk with God they are the miraculous prâ—cedent of favours to all ages and people Do they fly off in Mutinies and Idolatries God hath plagues fiery serpents mighty enemies to execute his wrath upon them Doth Solomon hold right with his God Never Kingdome so flourished in plenty and peace Is his heart turned from the Lord God of Israel straightwayes the Lord stirred up an adversary to Solomon Hadad the Edomite and after him 1 K 11.9 v. 14. the wicked Son of Nebat the Ephrathite vers 26. and which is worthy of singular observation when that rebell Jeroboam had drawn away the ten Tribes of Israel from their allegiance to the Son of Solomon and Rehoboam had gathered together an hundred and fourscore thousand men of Judah and Benjamin to fight against the revolted Israelites the word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God Speak to Rehoboam and say Ye shall not go up nor fight against your brethren for this thing is from me Lo who it is that moves the Earth and divides it we may look as humane wisdome teacheth us to do at the secondary causâ—s and finde them guilty of the publick evils this mans illimitable ambition that mans insatiable covetousnesse the cruel oppressions of these great ones the mutinous dispositions of thoâ—e inferiours violence in one in another Faction but if we look not at the first mover of all these lower wheels we are but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not seeing things afarr off we do but as the Dog snarle at the stones neglect the hand we are like some fond spectators that when they see the puppets acting upon the ledge think they move alone not knowing that there is an hand behind the curtain that stirs all their wires Upon the sight we do well and wisely by all politick provisions to meet with or prevent all those peccant humours which may occasion a publick distemper to curb the lawlesse insolence of some the seditious machinations of others the extortions cruelties of some the corrupt wresting of justice in others the giddinesse of some others quarrelsomenesse but when all is done if we do not make our peace with God we do nothing it is but a reckoning without our host a remedy without ease Oh then in all either our sense or fear of evils let us have our recourse to that Almighty hand which ordereth all the events of Heaven and Earth and work him by our true repentance to a gratious cessation of vengeance else what do we with all our endeavours but as that fond man who wearies himself lading out the channel with a shallow dish whiles the Spring runs full and unchecked Vain man can he possibly hope to scoppet it out so fast as it fills let him take order with the well head from whence it issues if that be filled up the channell dries alone When the Paralytick was with much labour let down through the roof to our Saviours cure what said he Son thy sins be forgiven thee Alas the poor man came not for pardon he came for cure but that great unfailing Physitian knew that he must begin here If the sins were gone he knew the palsy could not stay behind them If ever we think to be rid of judgments we must begin whence they begin He it is that can both
strike and case wound and heal again which is the next and must be for fear of your over-tiring the last subject of our discourse heal thou the sores or breaches thereof That great and ineffable name of God consisting of four letters which we now call Jehovah no man knowes what it was or how pronounced but being abridged to Jah the Grecians have been wont to expresse it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to heal the sense whereof is answered by that name which the Heathens gave him Jupiter as juvans pater This healing then is a proper kindly and naturall act of God whereas the other as dividing striking wounding commoving are a◠it were forced upon him by men Surely else he that is essentiall unity would not divide he that is stability it self would not move he that is salus ipsa would not wound he that is all mercy would not strike we do as it were put this upon him and therefore he cries out Why will ye die O house of Israel but when we shall returne to our selves and him and be once capable of mercy and cure how doth he hasten to our redresse The Son of righteousness shall arise with healing in his wings Mal. 4.2 Lo here is healing for his act and wings for his haste Those breaches which are made in the earth by the shaking of it are as so many wounds gashes or sores in a vast body and both of these resemble those either divisions or calamities which fall out in the bodies of Churches or States the hand that made them must can will only heal them Heal thou the breaches And how doth he heal them in matter of calamity First by removing the grounds of it Surely the great and true sores of the Land are the sins of the Land which till it please him to heal by working us to a serious repentance in vain shall we complain of our breaches which follow them These are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a noysome sore and grievous Rev. 16.2 Not only in the Knees Leggs Deut. 28. but in the very bowels vitallest parts as Jeroboams was 2 Chro. 21. Wo is me how full we are of these sores Longae pacis mala we are what an Ulcerous body are we grown like to that great pattern of misery that was totus ulcus all but one botch I would not be querulous but I must say so What shall I say of our blasphemies prophanesses uncleanesses drunkennesses oppressions sacriledges lawlesse disobediences contempt of Gods messengers and all that rabble of hellish enormities enough to shame Heaven and confound Earth These are sores with a witnesse Alas these like to Davids run and cease not they are besides their noysomnesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sure and old sores But yet stay my brethren we are not come to that passe that Jehoram was that the Wound is incurable or to the State of the Sareptans Son that there was no breath left in him but like Eutichus rather bruised but yet breathing And still still there is balme in Gilead let our Wounds be never so deep repentance may can will recure them let not us think onwards to heal Gods people with good words this is the way to fester them within No let us who are Gods Chirurgions make use of the probe of Wise Austere judgment let us gage the sore to the botome and tent it home with the applications of the Law let us take off the proud flesh with the corrosiving denunciations of vengeance to the impenitent sinners and then when it is thoroughly drawn let us lay on the soveraign emplaisters of the most precious and meritorious mercy of our blessed Redeemer Thus thus must all our spirituall sores be healed and oh that we could obtain of our own hearts to addresse our selves to a saving use of these sure remedies how happy were both for our soules and for our Land whose sores yet lye dangerously open how soon would our justly provoked God take off his heavy judgments Is it an Enemy that would afflict us He can put a hook into the Nostrils and a bridle into the Lips of the proudest Assyrian at pleasure Is it a Pestilence He can call in the destroying Angel and bid him Smite no more Is it Famine He can restore to us the years that the Locust hath eaten the Canker-worme and the Caterpiller The Floores shall be full of Wheat and the Fat 's overflow with Wine and Oyle In matter of division secondly the way to his cure must be by composing all unkind differences and uniting the hearts of men one to another the hearts even of Kings much more of Subjects are in his hand as the Rivers of Waters and he turnes them which way soever he pleases sometimes dreadfully forward to a right down opposition sometimes side-ways to a fair accomodation sometimes circularly bringing them about to a full condescent and accordance But as we commonly say the Chirurgion heals the wound and yet that the Plaister heals it too the Chirurgion by the plaister so may we justly here it is God that heals and the means heal God by the means and the means by and under God and surely when we pray or expect that God should heal either of these breaches we do not mean to sue to him to work miracles this were as St. Austin said truely in the like case to tempt God but we beseech God to give and bless those means whereby those breaches may be made up As for the calamitous breaches those we wish may be healed so far as the arme of flesh can reach by the vigilance and ower of Soveraignity by the prudence of wise Statesmen by the sage Councell of the State and Kingdome by wholsome provisions of good Lawes by carefull and just executions As for quarrellous and discontented breaches there are other Remedies to heal them the Remedies must be as the causes of them from within Let the first be a resolution of confining our desires within the due bounds not affecting mutuall incroachments or unnecessary innovations Not Incroachments first Good Lord what a stir these two great wranglers Meum and Tuum make in the World were it not for them all would be quiet Justice must do her part betwixt them both holding the balance even with a suum cuique and sayes with the Master of the vineyard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Take that which is thine own and go thy way Mat. 20.14 remembring in all states that heavy word of the Apostle But he that doth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done and there is no respect of persons Colos 3. ult It is but right that wrong should receive a payment in whose hands soever it be found and if this retribution fail sometimes with you men of might whom earthly greatnesse may perhaps for a time bear out in hard measures to your impotent inferiours yet there is no respect of persons above except this be it potentes potenter
presence followes upon the other or accompanies it For when we do carefully and conscionably wait upon Gods ordinance then his Spirit offers and conveighs it self into the heart these are Vehiculum gratiae the carriage of grace into the soul Never any scorner or profane person hath any sense of this presence This is that David speaks so passionately of Oh cast me not away from thy presence and take not thine holy spirit from me It troubled him as before to be kept from Gods ordinances but it troubled him an hundred times more to be cast out from this more entire presence Cant. 5.6.7 the Church in the Canticles when she misses her welbeloved how impatient she is How she runs about the City How she hazards her self to the blowes of the watchmen and will take no rest till she have recovered him These spirituall desertions are the saddest things that can befall to a man For there is a spirituall familiarity of sweet conversation betwixt God and his which it is a death to forgoe they injoy each other live in each others sight impart their counsels each to other So then we draw near to God when repenting us of our former aberrations from him we renue our covenants with him put our selves into an awfull acknowledgment of him still seeing him that is invisible when we grow into dear though trembling acquaintance with him taking pleasure in his company interchanging our dulce susurrium cum Deo as Bernard speaks and indevouring to be in all things approved of him This must needs be a very comfortable and blessed condicion Oh happy thrice happy are they that ever they were born who have truly attained to it It is a true rule in philosophy that every naturall agent works by a contaction whether bodily or virtuall which the weaker or further off it is the efficacy of the operation is so much the lesse As when we are cold the fire heates us but not except we come within the reach of it If we stand aloof off it warmes us so feebly that we are little the better for it but if we draw close to the hearth now it sensibly refresheth us even thus also doth God himself please to impart himself to us How ever there is infinite vertue in the Almighty not confinable to any limits Luc. 8.45 yet he will not put it forth to our benefit unlesse we thus draw near to him who toucht me saith our Saviour when the bloody-fluxed woman fingred but the hemme of his garment Lo many thronged him but there was but one that toucht him and upon that touch Vertue went out from him to her cure He might have diffused his vertue as the Sun doth his beames at a distance to the furthest man but as good old Isaac that could have blessed his Esau in the field or in the forrest yet would have him to come close to him for his benediction So will God have us to draw nigh to him if ever we look for any blessing at his hands according to the charge here given Draw nigh unto God Now then that from the respect to the presence of God we may descend to consider the motion of man There are many wayes of our appropinquation to God this People saith God drawes nigh me with their lips but their hearts are farr from me This is an approach that God cannot abide this lip-walk may advance us to hell for our hypocrisie but it can never promove us one step towards Heaven God cannot abide meer talkers of religion let them say Lord Lord he shall answer them I know you not Depart from me ye workers of iniquity There are three wayes of our drawing nigh to God which he accepts of from us On our feet on our hands and on our knees On our feet first Keep thy foot Eccles. 5.1 saith Solomon when thou goest into the house of God what are the feet of the soul but the affections Then do we therefore draw nigh to God when we are so affected to him as we ought when we come to him with the foot of fear Fear the Lord all his Saints saith the Psalmist Serve the Lord in fear Ps 2. Fear God and depart from evill saith his Son Solomon Prov. 3.7 when we come to him with the foot of love I sought him whom my soul loveth saith the Spouse Cant. 3.1 when with the foot of desire As the embossed heart panteth for the rivers of waters so doth my soul for thee O God Ps 42.1 with the foot of joy I rejoyced when they said Come let us go up to the house of the Lord with the foot of confidence In the Lord put I my trust how then do ye say to my soul Flee hence as a bird to the hills And as we must draw nigh to God on the feet of our affections so also upon the hands of our actions even as Jonathan and his armour-bearer climbed up the rock with feet and hands this is done when we perform to God all holy obedience when we serve him as we ought both in our devotions and our carriage and this is the best and truest approximation to God Walk before me saith God to Abraham and be upright Master saith Peter if it be thou Joh. 21.17 bid me come unto thee and after that when he heard it was the Lord he girt his fishers coat to him casts himself into the Sea to come to Christ without this reality of action all our profession is but idle pretence I remember our Country-man Bromiard tells us of one who meeting his neighbour coming out of the Church askt him what is the Sermon done Done said the other No It is said it is ended but it is not so soon done And surely so it is with us we have good store of Sermons said but we have but a few done and one sermon done is worth a thousand said and heard For not the hearers of the law but the doers of it are justified and if ye know these things blessed are ye if ye do them Glory honour and peace to every one that worketh good Rom. 2.10 Now that we may supply both those other approaches on our feet hands we must in the third place draw nigh to God on our knees in our earnest supplications to him for his enabling us to them both doth any man want wisdom and this is the best improvement of wisdom that may be Ja. 1.4 to shelter our selves under the wings of the Almighty let him ask of God who giveth liberally and upbraideth no man let us sue to him with all holy importunity Oh that my wayes were made so direct that I might keep thy statutes Teach me O Lord the way of thy statutes Ps 119. and I shall keep it to the end O stablish thy word in thy servant that I may fear thee Thus let us seek the Lord early and fervently and powre out our hearts before him It is not for us to
the door of the Tabernacle of the Congregation before the Lord where I will meet you to speak there with thee Lo God meets us in the holy Assemblies Meets us yea stayes with us there Zach. 2.10 The prophet speaking of the dayes of the Gospell Sing and rejoyce saith he O Daughter of Sion for Lo I come and will dwell in the midst of thee saith the Lord Contrarily when he withdrawes from any people the ordinary means of salvation he is truly said to depart from them but this perhaps not at once but by degrees as in Ezekiels vision he removes first to the threshold and from thence to the door of the East-gate and this I would have you know to be done not only in a meer silence but in a corruption of doctrine not only when faithfull mouths are stopped but when mens mouths are lawlesly opened to the venting whether of popish fancies or satyricall invectives against authority for you may not think that all discourses are preaching or all preaching Gospell when men preach themselves and not Christ when they utter their own impetuous fury and not the glad tidings of peace how shall we call this the message of God No God was not in the winde he was not in the fire he was in the soft voice And he that walks betwixt the golden Candlesticks doth not go away only when the light is quite out but when the snuff burns unsavourily in the socket Shortly where the sincere milk of the Gospell is given to Gods babes and the solid meat of true Orthodox and saving doctrine is set before the stronger men there God visits his people in mercy and is drawn nigh to them in his holy Ordinance Secondly in his audience we use to say out of sight out of mind and those that are out of distance what noise so ever they make are not heard The ravished Virgin in the field saith God cryed out and there was none to save her Deut. 22.27 but when we come neer the least groan and sigh is heard Thus God who is never but with us is said to come neer us when he gives proof to us that he comes not only within the ken of our necessities but within the hearing of the softest whisperings of our prayers So David every where The Lord hath heard my supplication the Lord will hear my prayer Ps 6. The Lord will hear me when I call upon him The tender mother is never away from the bed-side of her sick child but if she perceive the disease to grow dangerous now she is more attentive and layes her ear to the mouth of it and listens to every breathing that it fetcheth so doth our heavenly father to us The Lord is nigh to all that call upon him saith the Psalmist Nigh them indeed for he puts into them those holy desires which he graciously hears and answers Contrarily when that sweet singer of Israel findes some stop made of his audience he is then in another tune Wherefore hidest thou thy face and forgettest our affliction and our oppression Psal 44.24 still measuring Gods nearnesse to us by his regard and as it were re-ecchoing to our prayers A third and yet nearer and happier approach of God to us is in his Grace and favour in the other two as in his word and in our prayers he may come near us little to our availe He speaks to many in his word that hear him not or that hear him to their further judgment Our gospell is howsoever a sweet savour to God yet a savour of death unto death to many a soul wo be to thee Chorazin wo be to thee Bethsaida He hears many speak to him in their prayers but for their own punishment and sometimes will not hear in mercy to the petitioner the Devill sues to enter into the Swine and is heard Paul sues to be freed from the buffets of the messenger of Satan and is mercifully not heard the Israelites have Quailes according to their desires but sauced to them with a vengeance But this third appropinquation of God is never other then cordiall and beneficiall It is a sweet word I will dwell amongst the Children of Israell and will be their God Exod. 29.45 Yea this is true happinesse indeed that God will so dwell with us as to be ours St. Paul told the Athenians most truely non longe ab unoquoque he is not far from every one of us how should he when in him we live and move and are but little are we the better for these generall favours which are common to all his creatures if we do not finde in our selves a speciall interest in the presence of his Spirit If he only call on us as a passenger or lodge with us as a stranger or sojourne with us as a guest this can be small comfort to us nor any thing lesse then his so dwelling with us as that he dwell in us and that not as an inmate but as an owner Know ye not that Christ dwells in you saith St. Paul unlesse ye be Reprobates Know ye not that ye are the Temples of the living God his Temples for a perpetuall inhabitation of which he hath said Here shall be my rest for ever Whereupon there will be sure to follow the fourth degree of his appropinquation which is our aid and sweet experience of his mercifull deliverance It was out of a full sense of Gods goodnesse that holy David breaks out into that heavenly Epiphonema The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite Spirit many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivereth him out of them all Psal 34.18 19. His salvation is nigh to them that fear him that glory may dwell in our Land Psal 85.9 So then the sum of all is this that if we draw nigh unto God he will be sure to draw nigh to us in his Ordinances in his Audience in his Graces in his Aid But what shall we say to the order of these two approaches One would have thought he should have said God drawes near to you therefore draw you near to God For surely his approach to us is the cause that we come near to him and not our approach to him causeth him to come near to us Do not think that God and man strain courtesie who shall begin or that man hath any power to draw to God but from God The true order of our regeneration is that Cantic 1.4 Draw me and I shall run after thee There have been contrary heresies in the Church concerning this point The Manichees held man in all things dragged by a necessity of destiny The Pelagians held man led altogether by his will so as that can alone enable him to do good and to feoffe him in blessednesse And our Semipelagian Papists go not much lesse save that they suppose some help given to the will which it can thus improve The Orthodox Church still hath
gone and doth go a mid-way betwixt these so ascribing all to grace that it destroyes not nature teaching us as Bernard well that we will is from nature that we will good and well is from grace But if it stick with you that we are bidden to draw nigh to God and therefore we can do it else the exhortation were vain and reason-lesse know that these charges show us what we should do not what we can do and that he who bids us can and doth together with the word of his invitation inable us to do what he requires his Spirit working with his word effects what he commands As a mother or nurse bids the child come to her but reaches forth a finger to uphold it in the walk If therefore Wisdom say in the Proverbs 1.17 I love them that love me yet St. John must comment upon Solomon prior dilexit he loved us first else we could never have loved him 1 John 4.19 It is true that in order of time there is no difference betwixt Gods working and our willing our conversion so soon as it is fire it burnes and if it burnes it is fire but in order of nature Gods work is before ours as the cause before the effect As we therefore say sensibly blow the fire and it will burne implying that our blowing doth not make it to be fire but helps to intend the heat where fire is so doth the Spirit of God say here draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you Our first motion of drawing to God is the work of God he that thus drawes our will to him upon our pliant obedience to his will thus graciously seconds and rewards his own work in us so if we draw nigh to him by his co-working grace he will draw nearer still to us by his perfecting grace And oh how happy a condicion is this whosoever hath by Gods mercy attained unto it What can that man want who injoyes him that possesses all things In thy presence is the fulnesse of joy saith the Psalmist as contrarily in his estranging of himself from us there is nothing but grief and horrour It is with God and the Soul as betwixt the Sun and the Earth In the declining of the Year when the Sun drawes afar off from us how doth the Earth mourne and droop how do the Trees cast off the ornaments of their leaves and fruit how doth the Sap of all Plants run down to the root and leave the bare boughs seemingly feare and dead But at the approach of it in the rising of the Spring all things seem revived the earth decks her self in her fresh abiliments of blossomes leaves flowers to entertain those comfortable heats and influences so and more is it in the declining or approach of this all-glorious Sun of righteousnesse In his presence there is life and blessednesse in his absence nothing but dolour disconsolatenesse despair if an earthly King do but withdraw himself from us for a time we are troubled how much more if the King of glory shall absent himself from us in displeasure Surely nothing but our sins can estrange him from us our miseries do rather attract him to us our sins are only they that separate between God and us That we may therefore shut up in some application there is the same reason of a particular soul and of a whole Church one of these is but an abridgment of the other there is therefore the same consideration of Gods absence from or presence with both And certainly if sins can alienate a people from God and God from a people we have cast our selves miserably aloof from him For which of his commandments have we not shamefully violated wo is me how is our patient God affronted by us every day By our atheous profanesse by our frequent oathes and blasphemies by our wilfull disobediences by our pride excesse drunkennesse uncleanesse usury cozenages oppressions lying slanderous detractions as if we would utterly casheere the ninth commandement out of the Decalogue Yea what evil is there under Heaven that we can wash our hands of But withall we are so much the further off from God by how much we either were or or should have been nearer of a people that knew not God that could not know him no other could be expected Had we had the Gospel of the Kingdome lock't up from us and been kept hood-wink't from the knowledg of his royall Law the times of such ignorance God had not regarded But now that we have had so clear a light of Gods truth shining in our faces and such importunate solicitations from God to reclaim us from our wicked wayes by his Messengers rising early and suing to us and yet have as it were in spight of Heaven continued and aggravated our wickednesses Alas what excuse is there for us how can we do other then hang down our heads in a guilty confusion and expect a fearfull retribution from the just hand of God Thus have we done to God and whilest we have gone away from him hath he done other to us Hath he not given too just testimonies of withdrawing his countenance from us Hath he not for these many years crossed us in our publick designes both of war and peace Hath he not threatned to stir up evill against us out of our own bowels Nay which is worse then all this hath he not given us up to a generall security obdurednesse and insensiblenesse of heart so as we do not feel either our own sins or our dangers or relent at all at his judgments Alas Lord thou art too far off from us and we have deserved it yea we have too well deserved that thou shouldst turn thy face away from us for ever that thou shouldest draw near to us in thy vengeance who have so shamefully abused thy mercy But what shall we say Whatsoever we be we know thou wilt be ever thy self a God of mercy and compassion long suffering and great in kindnesse and truth so bad as we are could we have the Grace to draw nigh to thee in an unfained re-repentance thou wouldst draw nigh to us in mercy and forgivenesse Could we turne away from our sins to thee thou wouldst turne away from thy judgments to us Lord what can we do to thee without thee Oh do thou draw us unto thee that we may come Do thou enable us to draw nigh unto thee upon the feet of our affections upon the hands of our actions upon the knees of our prayers that so thou mayest draw nigh to us in thine Ordinances in thine Audience in thy grace and mercy in thine Aid and Salvation All this for thy mercy sake and for thy Christs sake to whom with thee O Father and thy good Spirit one infinite God be given all praise honour and glory now and for ever Amen A SERMON Preacht on WHITSUNDAY June 9. 1644. in the GREEN-YARD OF NORWICH By JOS. B. of N. EPHES. 4.30 And grieve not the holy
be the Children of men cursed be they before the Lord And even Josephs Brethren though so ill-natur'd that they could eat and drink whilst their Brother was crying in their pit yet at last as doubtlesse they had done ere then they come with humble prostrations and passionate Supplications to their Brother Gen. ult we pray thee forgive the trespasse of the Servants of thy Fathers God what speak I of these Even Absolom himself though he soon after carried a Traitor in his bosome how earnestly he sued for his restoring to his fathers long denyed presence and out of his impatience caused Joab to pay dear for the delay Oh then how should we be affected with the sence of the displeasure of the holy Spirit of our good God who as he is our best friend so he is a most powerful avenger of wickednesse Surely we do so vex and sadden him with our grievous provocations that he cryes out and makes moan of his insufferable wrong this way Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins and wearied me with thine iniquities Esa 43.24 and Amos 1.13 Behold I am pressed under you as a cart is pressed that is full of Sheaves even so full that the Axeltree creaks and bends and cracks again It must needs be a great weight that the Almighty complaines of and surely so it is could our offences be terminated in men and not strike God thorough them we might well say that all the outrages and affronts that we could put upon a world of men were nothing to the least violation of the infinite Majestie of God and so doth the God against whom they are committed take them by how much more tender the part is so much more painfull is the blow the least wipe of the eye troubles us more then a hard stroak upon the back it is easy to observe that the more holy the person is the more he is afflicted with his own and with others sin Lot vexed his righteous Soul with the unclean conversation of the Sodomites Davids eyes gusht out rivers of waters because men kept not the Law how much more then shall the holy God from whom these good men receive these touches of Godly indignation be vexed to see and hear our profanations of his name and dayes our contempt of his Servants and ordinances our debauched lives our malicious and oppressive practises our wilfull disobediences our shamefull excesses and uncleanesses our uncharitable censures of each other and all that World of wickednesse that we are overborne withall grief is never but an unpleasive passion the rest have some life and contentment in them Not only love and joy which useth to dilate and chear the heart but even hatred it self to a rancorous stomack hath a kinde of wicked pleasure in it but grief is ever harsh and tedious one of St. Augustins two tormentors of Mankinde Dolor et Timor And shall our hearts tell us That we have grieved the good Spirit of God by our sins and shall not we be grieved at our selves that we have grieved him How can there be any true sense of heavenly love and gratitude in us if we be not thoroughly humbled and vexed within our selves to think that we have angred so good a God How can we choose but roar out in the unquietnesse of our soules with the holy Psalmist There is no soundnesse in my flesh because of thine Anger neither is there any rest in my Bones because of my sin for mine iniquities are gone over my head as an heavy burden they are to heavy for me to bear Ps 38.3 4. Certainly it is a signe of a gracelesse Soul to be secure and cheerfull under a known sin that Man that can sleep soundly after a murder that can give merry checks to his Conscience after an act of adultery or theft or any such grievous crimes hath an heart insensible of goodnesse and may prove a fit brand for hell This is that whereof Esay speaks In that Day did the Lord of Hosts call to weeping and to mourning and to baldnesse and to girding with sackcloth and behold joy and gladnesse slaying of Oxen and killing of Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine Esa 22.12 13. But it followes next Surely this iniquity shall not be purged till ye die vers 14. these are they that say we have made a covenant with death and with hell we are at an agreement but it followes soon after Their covenant with death shall soon be disanulled and their agreement with hell shall not stand Esa 28.15.18 Far far be this disposition from us that professe to love the Lord let it be with us as with some good natur'd Children whom I have seen even after their whippings unquiet till with their continued tears and importunities they have made their peace with their offended parent And thus much for the displeasure which is in this grieving of the Spirit of God which never goes alone but is attended by those two other consequent effects Aversion and Punishment As those therefore which scent an unsavory breath turne their heads aside and those great and good guests who finde themselves ill used change their Inn so doth the holy Spirit of God upon occasion of our wilfull sins turne away his face and withdraw his presence In a little wrath I hid my face from thee saith God Esa 54.8 This good David found and complained of Thou turnedst away thy face and I was troubled Psal 30.7 And again as if he feard lest God would be quite gone upon those his horrible sins of Adultery and Murder he cryes out passionatly O cast me not away from from thy Presence and take not thine holy Spirit from me Psal 51.11 This is that which Divines call spirituall desertion A course which God takes not seldome when he finds a kind of restiveness and neglect in his Servants or passage given to some haynous sin against the checks of conscience where he intends correction quickning and reclamation the Spouse in the Canticles because she opened not instantly to her Beloved findes her self disappointed I opened to my Beloved but my Beloved had withdrawen himself and was gone and my Soul failed me Cant. 5.6 This is no other then we must make account of and which if we have any acquaintance with God and our selves in our daily experience we have found and shall find if we have given way to any willing sin in that very Act the Spirit is grieved and in that Act of griefe subduced neither can we ever expect comfort in the sense of his return or hope to have his face shine upon us again till we have won him to us and recovered his favour by an unfained Repentance Is there any of us therefore that hath grieved and estranged the holy Spirit from us by any known offence it must cost us warme water ere we can recover him and the light of his countenance upon us neither let us be sparing of our Tears to this
God hath taken at our thus Grieving of him his Indearments our Ingagements his Expectation were we a people that God had no whit promerited by his favours that he had done nothing for us more then for the savage Nations of the World surely the God of Heaven had not taken it so deeply to heart but now that he hath been more kind to us then to any Nation under Heaven how doth he call Heaven and Earth to record of the justnesse of his high regret Hear O Heaven and hearken O Earth for the Lord himself hath spoken I have nourished and brought up Children and they have rebelled against me Esa 1.2 and excellently Jerem. 2.31 O generation see the word of the Lord have I been a wilderness to Israel a land of darkness therefore it followes Behold I will plead with thee ver 35. Neither are his indearments of us more then our ingagements to him for what Nation in all the World hath made a more glorious profession of the name of God then this of ours What Church under the cope of Heaven hath been more famous and flourishing Had we not pretended to holiness and purity of religion even beyond others the unkindness had been the lesse now our unanswerablenesse calls God to the highest protestation of his offence Be astonished O Heavens and be horribly afraid be ye very desolate saith the Lord for my people have committed two evils they have forsaken me the Fountain of living waters and have hewen them out Cisternes broken Cisternes that can hold no water Jer. 2.11 And who is so blind as my servant Esa 42.19 Now according to his Indearments and our Ingagements hath been his just expectation of an answerable carriage of us towards him the Husbandman looks not for a crop in the wild desart but where he hath Gooded and plowed and Eared and Sowne why should not he look for an harvest And this disappointment is a just heightner of his griefe what could I have done more for my Vineyard that I have not done I looked for grapes and it brought forth wild grapes And now I will tell you what I will do to my Vineyard I will take away the hedge thereof and I will lay it wast Esa 5.4 5. Wo is me we do not hear but feel God making his fearfull word good upon us I need not tell you what we suffer the word of Esay is fulfilled here It shall be a vexation onely to understand the report Esa 28.19 Alas we know it too well what rivers of blood what piles of Carcasses are to be seen on all sides would God I could as easily tell you of the Remedy and why can I not do so Doubtlesse there is a remedy no lesse certain then our suffering if we had but the grace to use it too long alas too long have we driven off the applying of our redress yet even still there is Balme in Gilead still there is hope yea assurance of help if we will not be wanting to our selves we have grieved our God to the height Oh that we could resolve to make our peace with our provoked God at the last Excellent is that of Esay 27.5 Let him take hold of my strength and make Peace with me and he shall make peace with with me Oh that we could take hold of our strong Helper who is mighty to save that we would lay hold on the strength of his marvellous mercies Oh that we could take Benhadads course here as they said of the King of Israel much more may I say of the God of Israel He is a merciful God let us put sackcloth upon our loynes and ropes upon our heads and go to the God of Israel and say Thy servants say I pray thee let us live 1 K. 20.31 Oh that it could greive us thoroughly that we have greived so good a God that we could by a sound and serious humiliation and hearty Repentance reconcile our selves to that offended Majesty we should yet live to praise him for his mercifull deliverance and for the happy restauration of our peace which God for his mercies sake vouchsafe to graunt us Thus much for the grieving of the holy Spirit in himself by way of allusion to humane affection Now followes that grievance which by way of Sympathy he feels in his Saints Anselme Aquinas Estius and other latter Interpreters have justly construed one branch of this offence of the Holy Spirit to be when through our leud despightful words or actions we grieve and scandalize those Saints and Servants of God in whom that Holy Spirit dwells It is true as Zanchius observes well that it is no thank to a wicked man that the Spirit of God is not grieved by him even in person he doth what he can to vex him the Impossibility is in the Impassiblenesse of the Spirit of God not in the Will of the Agent But although not in himself yet in his faithful Ones he may and doth grieve him They are the Receptacles of the Holy Ghost which he so possesses and takes up that the injuries and affronts done to them are felt and acknowledged by him As when an enemy offers to burn or pull down or strip plunder the house the Master or Owner takes the violence as done to himself We are the Temples the Houses wherein it pleaseth the Spirit of God to dwell what is done to us is done to him in us He challengeth as our Actions The Spirit of God prayes in us Rom. 8.26 so our Passions also he is grieved in our grief such an interest hath God in his that as Christ the second person in the Trinity could say to Saul why persecutest thou me So the Holy Ghost appropriates our injuries to himself If ye be reproached for the Name of Christ happy are ye saith S. Peter for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you on their part he is evil spoken of but on your part he is glorified 1 Pet. 4.14 Lo the Holy Spirit is glorified by our sufferings and is evil spoken of in our reproaches the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is blasphemed so as it is a fearful thing to think of to speak contumelious words against Gods children is by the Apostles own determination no better then a kinde of blaspheming the Holy Ghost See then consider ye malicious uncharitable men your wrongs reach further then ye are aware of ye suffer your tongues to run ryot in bitter Scoffs in spightful slanders in injurious raylings against those that are truly conscionable ye think ye gall none but men worse then your selves but ye shall finde that ye have opened your mouthes against Heaven I speak not for those that are meer outsides visors of Christianity making a shew of Godliness and denving the power of it in their lives I take no protection of them God shall give them their portion with Hypocrites But if he be a true childe of God one that hath the true fear
besides it And indeed what other can we insist upon Outward profession will not do it many a one shall say Lord Lord with a zealous reduplication which yet shall be excluded And for pretended revelations they are no lesse deceitfull Satan oftentimes transforming himself into an Angel of light A Zidkijeh thinks he hath the Spirit as well as any Michaiah of them all our books are full of the reports of dangerous dulusions of this kind whereby it hath come to pass that many a one in stead of the true David hath found nothing but an image of clouts laid upon a bolster stuffed with Goats hair 1 Sam. 19.16 But this mark of reall sanctification cannot fail us It will ever hold good that which St. Paul hath Rom. 8. So many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God Nothing in this World can so highly concern us as this to see and know whether we be sealed to the day of Redemption Would we know how it may be evidenced to us look upon the impression that Gods Spirit hath made upon our hearts and lives if he have renewed us in the inner man and wrought us unto true holiness to a lively faith to a sincere love of God to a conscionable care of all our actions and to all other his good graces doubtlesse we are so sealed that all the powers of Hell cannot deface and obliterate this blessed impression But the principal main use of this Seal is for certainty of performance If we have the word of an honest man we believe it but if we have his hand we make our selves more sure but if we have both his hand and seal we rest secure of the accomplishing of what is given or undertaken How much more assurance may we have when we have the word of a God whose very title is Amen Rev. 3.14 whose promises are like himself Yea and Amen 2 Cor. 1.20 Alas the best man is deceitful upon the balance and his true stile is Omnis homo mend ax every man is a lyer But for this God of truth Heaven and Earth shall passe away before one tittle of his word shall fail but when that promise is seconded by his Seal what a transcendent assurance is here It is the charge of the Apostle Peter Give diligence to make your calling and election sure 2 Pet. 1.10 Sure not in respect of God whom no changes can reach whose word is I am Jehovah my counsel shall stand but in respect of our apprehension not in regard of the object only which cannot fail but even of the subject also which if it were not fecible sure the Spirit of God would not have injoyned it or imposed it upon us The Vulgar reads Per bona opera by good works And indeed it is granted by Beza and Clamier that in some Greek copies it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whereupon Bellarmine would fain take an advantage to prove his conjecturall assurance A strange match of words meerly contradictory for if but conjecturall how can it be assurance and if it be assurance how only conjecturall we may as well talk of a false truth as a conjecturall assurance But that implication of Bellarmine is easily blown over if we consider that these Good works do not only comprehend external works as almes-deeds prayer attendance on Gods ordinances and the like but also the internall acts of the soul the Acts of believing the Acts of the love of God the Acts of that hope which shall never make us ashamed These will evidence as our calling and election so the certainty of both and therefore are the seal of our Redemption Let foolish men have leave to improve their wits to their own wrong in pleading for the uncertainty of their right to Heaven But for us let us not suffer our souls to take any rest till we have this blessed seal put upon us to the assuring of our Redemption and Salvation that we may be able to say with the chosen vessel God hath sealed us and given us the earnest of his Spirit in our hearts 2 Cor. 1.22 If we have the grant of some good lease or some goodly Mannor made to us by word of mouth we stay not till we have gotten it under black and white and not then till we have it under seal nor then if it be a perpetuity till we have livery and seizin given us of it and when all this is done we make account securely to enjoy our hopes and shall we be lesse carefull of the main-chance even of the eternal inheritance of Heaven Lo here all these done for us Here is the word preaching peace and Salvation to all that believe here are his Scriptures the internal monuments of his written word confirming it here is the seal added to it here is the Livery and Seâ—zin given in the earnest of his Spirit and here is sufficient witnesse to all even Gods Spirit witnessing with our Spirits that we are the sons of God Let us finde this in our bosome and we are happy neither let our hearts be quiet till we can say with the chosen Vessel I am perswaded that neither life nor death nor Angels nor Principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any creature can be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord Rom. 3. the last verse Lo this is not a guesse but an assurance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither doth the Apostle speak of his own speciall revelation as the Popish Doctors would pretend but he takes all beleevers into the partnership of this comfortable unfailablenesse nothing shall separate us thus happy are we if we be sealed unto the day of Redemption Having now handled the parts severally let us if you please put them together and see the power of this inference or argument ye are by the Spirit of God sealed to the day of redemption Oh therefore grieve not that Spirit of God by whom ye are thus sealed The Spirit of God hath infinitely merited of you hath done so much for you as ye are not capable to conceive much lesse to answer in so Heavenly an obsignation Oh then be you tender of giving any offence to that good Spirit Do not you dare to do ought that might displease that loving and beneficent Spirit Be not you so much your own enemies as to give just distast to your good God So as the force of the argument as we intimated at the first lies upon an action of unkindnesse affording us this instruction that the ground of Gods Childrens fear to offend must be out of love and thankfulness great is thy mercy that thou maist be feared saith the Psalmist he doth not say great is thy mercy that thou maist be loved nor great is thy Majesty that thou maist be feared but great is thy mercy that thou maist be feared base servile natures are kept in with feare
of evil inclinations and actions which yet will never reach to evince our son-ship to God How easily were it for me to name you divers Heathens which have been eminent in all these and yet for ought we know never the nearer to Heaven yet lower there are some speciall gifts of the Spirit which we call Charismata rare endowments bestowed upon some men excellent faculties of preaching and praying power of miraculous workings as no doubt Judas did cast out Devils as well as the best of his fellow-Apostles gifts of tongues and of Prophesie and the like which do no more argue a right to the son-ship of God then the Manuaries infused skill of Bezaleel and Aâ—oliab could prove them Saints yet lastly there may be sensible operations of the Spirit of God upon the soul in the influences of holy motions into the heart in working a temporary faith and some fair progresse in an holy profession and yet no sonship the world is full of such glow-wormes that make some show of Spiritual Light from God when they have nothing in them but cold crudities that can serve for nothing but deceit Will ye then see what leading of the Spirit can evince us to be the Sons and Daughters of God know then that if we will hope for a comfortable assurance hereof we must be efficaciously led by his sanctifying Spirit first in matter of judgment secondly in our dispositions and thirdly in our practise For matter of judgment ye remember what our Saviour said to his Disciples When the Spirit of truth is come he will lead you into all Truth John 16.13 That is into all saving and necessary truthes so as to free us from grosse ignorance or main errour Whosoever therefore is enlightned with the true and solid knowledg of all those points of Christian doctrine which are requisite for salvation is in that first regard led by the Spirit and in this behalf hath a just title to the son-ship of God as contrarily those that are grosly and obstinately erroneous in their judgment of fundamental truthes let them pretend to never so much holinesse in heart or life shall in vain lay claim to this happy condition of the Sons of God For our disposition secondly If the holy Spirit have wrought our hearts to be right with God in all our affections if we do sincerely love and fear him if we do truely believe in him receiving him as not our Saviour only but as our Lord If our desires be unfained towards him If after a meek and penitent self-dejection we can find our selves raised to a lively hope and firm confidence in that our blessed Redeemer and shall continue in a constant and habitual fruition of him being thus led by the Spirit of God we may be assured that we are the Sons of God for flesh and blood cannot be accessary to these gracious dispositions Lastly for our practise it is a clear word which we hear God say by Ezekiel I will put my Spirit into the midst of you and will by it cause you to walk in my statutes and keep my laws Ezech. 36.27 Lo herein is the main crisis of a soul led by the Spirit of God and adopted to this heavenly son-ship It is not for us to content our selves to talk of the lawes of our God and to make empty and formal professions of his name Here must be a continued walk in Gods statutes it will not serve the turne for us to stumble upon some acceptable work to step aside a little into the pathes of godlinesse and then draw back to the World no my beloved this leading of Gods Spirit must neither be a forced angariation as if God would feoffe grace and salvation upon us against our wills nor some suddain protrusion to good nor a meer actual momentany transient conduction for a brunt of holinesse and away leaving us to the sinful wayes of our former disobedience and to our wonted compliances with the World the Devil and the Flesh but must be in a steady uninterrupted habitual course of holy obedience so as we may sincerely professe with the man after Gods own heart My soul hath kept thy Testimonies and I love them exceedingly Psal 119.67 Now then dear Christians lay this to heart seriously and call your selves sadly to this triall What is the carriage of our lives What obedience do we yeild to the whole law of our God If that be entire hearty universal constant perseverant and truly conscientious we have whereof to rejoyce an unfailing ground to passe a confident judgment upon our spiritual estate to be no lesse then happy But if we be willingly failing in the unfained desires and indevours of these holy performances and shall let loose the reins to any known wickednesse we have no part nor portion in this blessed condition Mark I beseech you how fully this is asserted to our hands in this saith the beloved Apostle the Children of God are manifest and the children of the Devil whosoever doth not righteousnesse is not of God neither he that loves not his brother 1 Joh. 3.10 Observe I pray you what test we are put to ye hear him not say who so talks not holily or who so professes not godlinesse in these an hypocrite may exceed the best Saint but whosoever doth not righteousnesse withall see what a clause the Disciple of love superadds to the mention of all Righteousnesse neither he that loves not his brother surely the Spirit of God is a Loving Spirit Wisdom 1.6 and St. Paul hath the like phrase Rom. 15.30 To let passe then all the other proofes of our guidance by the spirit Instance but in this one Alas my Brethren what is become of that charitable and christian carriage of men towards one another which God requires of us and which was wont to be conspicuous amongst Christian compatriots Wo is me instead of that true and hearty love which our Saviour would have the Livery of our Disciple-ship the badg of our holy profession what do we see but emulation envy malice rigid censures and rancorous heart-burnings amongst men In stead of those neighbourly and friendly offices which Christians were wont lovingly to performe to each other what have we now in the common practise of men but underminings oppressions violence cruelty Can we think that the Spirit of him who would be styled Love it self would lead us in these rugged and bloody pathes No no this alone is too clear a proof how great a stranger the Spirit of God is to the hearts and waies of men and how few there are that upon good and firme grounds can plead their right to the son-ship of God Alas alas if these dispositions and practises may bewray the sons of an holy God what can men do to prove themselves the children of that hellish Apollion who was a man-slayer from the beginning For us my beloved Oh let us hate and bewaile this common degeneration of Christians and as we would
necessity the doom was in paradise upon mans disobedience morte morieris thou shalt dye the death Man sinned man must die The first Adam sinned and we in him the second Adam must by death expiate the sin Had not Christ dyed mankind must had not he dyed the first death we had all dyed both the first and second without shedding of blood there is no remission Heb. 9.22 Hereby therefore are we freed from the sence of the second death and the sting of the first to the unfailing comfort of our soules hereupon it is that our Saviour is so carefull to have his death and passion so fully represented to us in both his sacraments the water is his blood in the first Sacrament the Wine is his blood in the second In this he is sensiby crucify'd before our eyes the bread that is his body broken the wine his blood poured out And if these acts and objects do not carry our hearts to a lively apprehension of Christ our true passover we shall offer to him no other then the sacrifice of fools Lo here then a soveraign antidote against the first death and a preservative against the second the Lamb slain from the beginning of the World why should we be discomforted with the expectation of that death which Christ hath suffered why should we be dismayed with the fear of that death which our all-sufficient Redeemer hath fully expiated 2ly In the first institution of this passover The blood of the lamb was to be sprinkled upon the posts and lintells of the doores of every Israelite so if ever we look for any benefit from Christ our Passover there must be a particular application of his blood to the believing soul even very Papists can say that unless our merits or holy actions be dyed or tinctured in the blood of Christ they can avail us nothing but this consideration will meet with us more seasonably upon the fourth head 3ly This passover must be roasted home not stewed not parboild So did the true paschall lamb undergo the flames of his Fathers wrath for our sins here was not a scorching and blistering but a vehement and full torrefaction It was an ardent heat that could fetch drops of blood from him in the garden but it was the hottest of flames that he felt upon the cross when he cryed out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Oh who can without horrour and amazement hear so wosull a word fall from the mouth of the Son of God Had he not said My Father this strain had sunk us into utter despair but now in this very torment is comfort He knew he could not be forsaken of him of whom he saith I and my Father are one he could not be forsaken by a sublation of union though he seemed so by a substraction of vision as Leo well the sense of comfort was clouded for a while from his humanity his deity was ever glorious his faith firme and supplyed that strong consolation which his present sense failed of and therefore you soon hear him in a full concurrence of all Heavenly and victorious powers of a confident Saviour say Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit In the mean while even in the height of this suffering there is our ease for certainly the more the Son of God indured for us the more sure we are of an happy acquittance from the Tribunall of Heaven the justice of God never punished the same sin twise over By his stripes we are healed by his payment we are discharged by his torments we are assured of peace and glory Thus much of the preparation The eating of it followes in the appendances the manner the persons The appendances It must be eaten with unleavned bread and with sour or bitter herbs Of the unleavened bread we have spoken enough before For the herbs that nothing might be wanting the same God that appointed meat appointed the sauce too and that was a sallad of not pleasing but bitter herbs herein providing not so much for the palate of the body as of the soul to teach us that we may not hope to partake of Christ without sensible disrelishes of nature without outward afflictions without a true contrition of Spirit It is the condition that our Saviour makes with us in admitting us to the profession of Christianity he shall receive an 100. fold with persecutions those to boot that for his sake and the Gospells forsake all Mark 10.30 Sit down therefore O man and count what it will cost thee to be a true Christian through many tribulations c. Neither can we receive this evangelicall passover without a true contrition of soul for our sins past think not my beloved that there is nothing but jollity to be look't for at Gods table Ye may frolick it ye that feast with the World but if ye will sit with Christ and feed on him ye must eat him with bitter herbs here must be a sound compunction of heart after a due self examination for all our sins wherewith we have offended our good God Thou wouldst be eating the paschal lamb but with sugar-sops or some pleasing sauce it may not be so here must be a bitternesse of soul or no passover It is true that there is a kind of holy mixture of affections in all our holy services a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rejoyce in him with trembling saith the Psalmist It is and should be our joy that we have this lamb of God to be ours but it is our just sorrow to finde our own wretched unworthiness of so great a mercy Godly sorrow must make way for solid joy and comfort if there be any of you therefore that harbours in your breast a secret love of and complacency in your known and resolved sins procul O procul let him keep off from this holy Table let him bewail his sinfull mis-disposition and not dare to put forth his hand to this passover till he have gathered the bitter herbs of a sorrowful remorse for his hated offences And where should he gather these but in the low grounds of the Law there they grow plenteously lay the law then home to thy soul that shall show thee thy sins and thy judgment School thee Yea dear Christians how can any of us see the body of our blessed Saviour broken and his blood poured out and withall think and know that his own sins are guilty of this tort offered to the son of God the Lord of life and not feel his heart touched with a sad and passionate apprehension of his own vilenesse and an indignation at his own wickednesse that hath deserved and done this these are the bitter herbs wherewith if we shall eat this passover we shall finde it most wholesome and nourishable unto us to eternall life The manner of the eating of it followes in three particulars 1. The whole lamb must be eaten not a part of it 2. Not a bone of it must be broken 3. In
wives be subject to your Husbands Colos 3. 1 Pet. 3. And inded how is the husband the head if he be not both more eminent and furnished with the faculty of directing the whole body A Vertuous woman saith Solomon is the crown or Diadem of her Husband Prov. 12.3 Lo she is the crown for the ornament of his head but if she be vertuous she doth not affect to be the head and if the Crown be set upon the head as the husband may give honour to the weaker vessel yet it is a pittyful head that is not better then the crown that adornes it but why urge I this none but some mamish Monsters can question it and if there be any such that would fain read the words amiss that the wife hath power over her head they are more worthy to be punished by the whip of authority then by their neighbours shame or my censure But to say as it is they are rare complaints that we hear of in this kind I would the contrary were not more frequent The man hath power over the wife and he knowes it too well and uses it too boistrously this sweet gentle and familiar power which he should exercise over his other-self is degenerated in the practise of too many into a stern Tyranny according to the old Barbarian fashion in Aristotles time which holds even still their wives are their slaves This is not for the woman to have power on her head but for the man to have power in his hand for the hand to have power on the body an unmanly and savage power to the very destruction of it self This kind of cruelty cries unto me daily for redresse and give me leave to cry out against it as the most odious and abhominable oppression that is incident into him that would be called a man for the deareness of the relation aggravates the violence to strike a beast causelesly is unmercifull a slave unchristian a stranger furious a child unmanly but our own flesh monstrous this is to do that which no man does saith our Apostle Ephes 5.29 There was in the time of Gregory 10th about 1275 as our histories tell us a brood of mad hereticks which arose in the Church whom they called Flagellantes the whippers which went about through France and Germany lashing themselves to blood A guise which though at the first cryed down is since taken up by some mis-zealous penitents of the Romish Church who do not only take pleasure but place merit in blood a lesson taken out by both of them from the Baalites 1 K. 18. Men rather more prodigall of their flesh then the lavishest of these late zelots surely what those Bigots did and do out of falsely named religion these husbands of blood as Zipporah miscalled Moses do out of a crabbed and imperious cruelty even draw blood of those bodies which a severall kinne cannot difference from their own Far far be this more then Turkish more then Paganish inhumanity from those that would pass for Christians for you my dear Brethren let it be enough for me to mention that gracious and needfull charge of our blessed Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Husbands love your wives and be not bitter to them Colos 3.19 Whiles their heads confesse your power take you heed least your power be abused to vex their hearts and to tyrannize over their bodies This for the power here signified of the Husband over the wife we descend to the signification of that power by the covering of the head an ancient custom and that which was practised among all civill Nations hence the Romans expressed the womans marriage by nubere which signifies to vail whereupon a cloud is termed nubes because it is as a vail drawn betwixt Heaven and our sight Neither doubt I but before all latinity was hatched this was alluded to by Abimelech Genes 20.16 Hu ceseth gnenaiim he is the covering of thine eyes said that Heathen King to Sarah concerning her husband a covering which both protects and limits the eye The Apostles charge then is that the womans head ought to be covered to show that she is under anothers power but how and how farre and when this covering is required will require a further disquisition which I shall the rather enter into because I see some religious and well affected women carried away with Erroneous opinions concerning this point whose tender consciences have been abused by the mis-interpretations of some ignorants to be drawn to hold that this covering must be absolute and totall and perpetuall so as if any hair at all be seen it is a violation of this charge and their duty to which purpose they urge that verse 15 as a full commentary upon this text that the hair was given the woman for a covering and upon this ground they are apt to censure them who take liberty to expose any of their hair though never so moderately to others view I beseech you dear Brethren and Sisters misconstrue me not as one that affect to be a Patron of ruffianly and dissolute fashions of excess or immodesty in this kind these I hate from my soul and must tell those vain dames that where such bushes are hanged out 't is an argument that something is exposed to sale but as I would not have you inordinately wild so I would not have you scrupulously superstitious in restraining the due bounds of lawfull Christian liberty and placing sin where God never meant it That I may therefore lay some grounds of this my just determination know first that in the use of garments and these outward appendances of the body there is much latitude and variety according to the severall guises of Nations and degrees of persons there are Countries the extremity of whose cold climate is such that it is no boot to bid both sexes be covered yea muffled up for their own safety there are others so scorching that will hardly admit of any covering either for head or body there are some whose hair is so large that is able to hide them there are others whose curled heads are alike short in both sexes and give no advantage to the covering of either he that made these differences of climates and people hath not thought fit to confine them to one universall rule only contenting himself with a generall prescription of decency which in all Countries must be regulated according to the custom or convenience of the place For certainly these sacred ceremonies must follow the rule of the civill for that which is held a token of subjection to our Princes and other superiors in all Countries is so used in the service of the King above all Gods the Turks and all Mahumetans therefore not uncovering their heads to their Bashaes or their Grand Lord keep their heads covered in their devotions and only by bowing or prostration testifie their humble subjection to God The French Divines preach with their hats on ours uncovered both pretend good reason and
not better have been spared Surely had those Godly Emperours Kings Princes Peers Gentry been of the minde of many moderne Christians they had forborne this care and cost and turned their magnificence into another channel But if this bounty of theirs were holy and commendable as it hath been justly celebrated by all Christians till this present age how are those of ours shamefully degenerated who affect nothing but homlinesse and beggery in all that is devoted to the Almighty and are ready to say contrary to the man after Gods own heart 2 Sam. 24.24 I will offer to the Lord my God of that which shall cost me nothing With what great state and deep expence God was served under the Law no man can be ignorant for who knowes not the costly furniture of the Tabernacle the rich habiliments of the Priest the precious vessels for the sacrifices and after that the invaluable sumptuouâ—ness of the Temple both without and within In the marbles cedars almuggim trees brasse silver gold in the curious celatures and artificial textures in regard of all which for matter and forme what was this other then the glory of the whole earth and as for the very altar alone Gods Ariel that which went up there from in smoke both in the daily sacrifices and the solemn Hecatombs upon special occasions what man could value Besides the treble tithes first fruites oblations which were perpetually presented to God for the maintenance of his Priesthood O the costly services of God under the Law And do we think the same God is now of a quite other diet then formerly Is all this meer ceremony Is there not so much morality in it as that it is meet the great God who is the possessour of Heaven and Earth should be served of the best that it is not for us to affect too much cheapnesse and neglective homeliness in our evangelical devotions Surely nature it self calls to us for this respect to a deity even the very savage Indians may teach us this point of religion amongst whom we find the Mexicans a people that had never had any intercourse with the other three parts of the World Eminent in this kinde what sumptuous and stately Temples had they erected to their Devils How did they enrich their mis-called Gods with Magazins of their treasure And even still the most barbarous and brutish of all those people that bear the shape of men have this principle bred in them that if they have ought better then other it is for their God a principle so much advanced by imperfect Christianity that the Abassins hold it piacular to build their own houses of the same matter which is reserved for their Churches Jo. Pories descript of Africk to the very fabrick and use whereof they yield so much reverence as that their greatest Peer alights from his horse when he comes but within view of those sacred piles And if from those remote parts of the world we shall think fit to look homewards how just cause shall we finde to wonder at the munificent piety of our predecessors who so freely poured out themselves into bountiful expence for raising of the houses of God in our Island and endowing them with rich patrimony that the prime honor of this Nation all the world over hath ever been the beauty of our Churches Neither was it otherwise in all those parts of the World where Christianity had obtained How frequent was it for a wealthy matron with Vestina and for a great Nobleman with the Roman Tertullus Regna potius quam coenobia vir sanctis posteris reliquit c. Volaterran to make God their heir Ex lâ—bro Portifie Innocent 1. and to enrich his houses and services with the legacies of their jewels and possessions Whereupon it came to passe that those structures and vessels which at the first were but of mud and meaner mettals according to the poverty of the donors soon after exchanged their homeliness for so glorious a magnificence as bleared the eyes of the heathen beholders See saith that enemy of Christ in what vessels Maries son is served and Ammianus is ready to burst with spight at the liberal provision of Gods ministers in comparison of their neglective Paganisme Ut ditenter oblationibus matronarum c. There may have been some in all ages that out of a misgrounded humility and pretended mortification have affected a willing disrespect of all outward accommodations both in their own domestick provisions and in the publick services of God such were St. Gallus of old and in later Times the two famous Franceses of Assise and of St. Paul The first whereof Gallus Wolafrid Strab. c. 18. as the history reports when a great Duke out of a reverent opinion of his sanctity had given him a rich and curiously carved peece of plate Magnoaldus his Disciple who had the carriage of that pretious vessel moving that it might be reserved for the sacred use of Gods table received this answer from him Son remember what Peter said Gold and Silver have I none let this plate which thou bearest be distributed to the poor for my blessed master Saint Colomb was wont to offer that holy Sacrifice in chalices of brasse because they say our Saviour was with brazen nailes fastned to his cross thus he in more humility then wisdome Lep rosis ulcerosarum plagarum ruebat in Oscula lib. Confor Fructu Separatur And for the other two never man more affected bravery and pride then they did beggery and nastiness placing a kind of merit in sticks and clay in rags and patches and slovenry S. Franciscus circa mortem suam in testamento suo scribi voluit quod omnes cellae domus fratrum de lignis luto essent tantum ad conservandam melius humilitatem paupertatem Libr. Conform p. 218. lib. 2. Fructu 4. Conform 16. Let these and their ill-advised followers pass for Cynicks in Christianity although now what ever the original rule of their sordid founder was even those of that order can in their buildings and furnitures emulate the magnificence of Princes as if they affected no less excess in the one extreme then their patron did in the other Fratres omnes vilibus vestibus induantur possunt earepeciare de saccis aliis peciis cum benedictione Dei. Conform l. 1. Fructu 9. p. 116. Wise Christians sit down in the mean now under the Gospel avoyding a carelesse or parcimonious neglect on the one side and a superstitious lavishnesse on the other As for this Church of ours there is at this time especially little fear of too much and if we be not more in the ablative then our Ancestors were in the dative case yet we are generally more apt to higgle with the Almighty and in a base niggardliness to pinch him in the allowances to his service wherein we do not so much wrong our God as our selves for there is not in all the World so sure
only hold it fit out of our obedience to the lawes both of our church and kingdome to continue a joyful celebration of a memorial day to the honour of our blessed Saviour But that other authority which you tell me was urged to this purpose I confesse doth not a little amaze me it was you say of King James our learned Soveraigne of late and blessed Memory whose testimony was brought in before the credulous people not without the just applause of a Solomon-like wisdome as crying down these festivals and in a certain speech of his applauding the purity of the church of Scotland above that of Geneva for that it observed not the common feasts of Christs Nativity and Resurrection c. Is it possible that any mouth could name that wise and good King in such a cause whom all the world knowes to have been as zealous a patron of those festivals as any lived upon earth and if he did let fall any such speech before he had any Downe upon his chin whilst he was under the serule what candor is it to produce it now to the contradiction of his better experience and ripest judgment Nay is it not famously known that it was one of the main errands of his journy into his native Kingdome of Scotland to reduce that church unto a conformity to the rest of the Churches of Christendom in the observation of these solemn dayes One of the five Articles of Perth and to this purpose was it not one of the main businesses which he set on work in the Assembly at Perth and wherein he employed the service of his worthy Chaplain Doctor Young Dean of Winchester to recall and re-establish these festivalls And accordingly in pursuance of his Majesties earnest desire this way was it not enacted in that Assembly that the said feasts should be duely kept Doubtlesse it was and that not without much wise care and holy caution which act because it cannot be had every where and is well worthy of your notice and that which clears the point in hand I have thought good here to insert the tenor of it therefore is this As we abhorr the superstitious observation of Festival dayes by the Papists and detest all licentious and profane abuse thereof by the common sort of professors so we think that the inestimable benefits received from God by our Lord Jesus Christ his Birth Passion Resurrection Ascension and sending down of the Holy Ghost was commendably and godly remembred at certain particular dayes and times by the whole church of the World and may be also now Therefore the Assembly ordaines that every Minister shall upon these dayes have the commemoration of the foresaid inestimable benefits and make choice of several and pertinent texts of Scripture and frame their doctrine and exhortation there to and rebuke all superstitious observation and licentious profanation thereof I could if it were needful give you other proofes of King James his zeal for these dayes but what should I spend time in proving there is a sun in the Heaven and sight in that Sun The name of that great King suffereth for his excesse this way Shortly then the Church of God his anointed law antiquity reason are for us in this point and I doubt not but you will gladly be on their side away with all innovations and frivolous quarrels we were divided enough before and little needed any new rents The God of peace quiet all these distempers and unite our hearts one to another and all to himself Farwell in the Lord. TO My Reverend and worthily Dear Friend M r. WILLIAM STRUTHERS One of the Preachers of EDINBOURGH THe hast of your Letters my reverend and worthy Mr. Struthers was not so great as their welcome which they might well challenge for your name but more for that love and confidence which they imported thus must our Friendship be fed that it may neither feel death nor age The substance of your Letter was partly Relation and partly Request For the first Rumour had in part prevented you and brought to my ears those Stirs which happened after my departure and namely together with that impetuous Protestation some rude deportment of ill-governed Spirits towards his Majesty Alas my dear Brother this is not an usage for Kings they are the nurses of the Church if the child shall fall to scratching and biting the brest what can it expect but stripes and hunger your Letter professes that his Majesty sent you away in peace and joy and why would any of those rough-hewn Zelots send him away in discontentment But this was I know much against your heart whose often protestations assured me of your wise moderation in these things How earnestly have you professed to me that if you were in the Church of England such was your indifferency in these indifferent matters you would make no scruple of your ceremonies yea how sharp hath your censure been of those refractaries amongst us that would forgo their stations rather then yield to these harmeless impositions So much the more therefore do I marvell how any delator could get any ground from you whereon to place an accusation in this kind But this and the rest of those historicall passages being only concerning things past have their end in my notice Let me rather turn my pen to that part which calleth for my advise which for your sake I could well wish were worthy to be held such as that your self and your collegues might find cause to rest in it howsoever it shall be honest and hearty and no other then I would in the presence of God give to my own soul Matters you think will not stand long at this point but will come on further and press you to a resolution What is to be done will you hear me counselling as a friend as a Brother Since you foresee this meet them in the way with a resolution to intertain them and perswade others There are five points in question The solemn festivities The private use of either Sacrament Geniculation at the Eucharist Confirmation by Bishops For these there may be a double Plea insinuated by way of comparison in your Letters Expedience in the things themselves Authority in the commander some things are therefore to be done because they are commanded some others are therefore commanded because they are to be done obedience pleads for the one justice for the other If I shall leave these in the first rank I shall satisfie but if in the second I shall supererogate which if I do not I shall fail of my hopes Let me profess to you seriously I did never so busily and intentively study these rituall matters as I have done since your Letters called me unto this task Since which time I speak boldly I made no spare either of hours or papers Neque enim magna exiliter nec seria perfunctorie as I have learned of our Nazianzen and besides this under one name seemed a common cause and
vexations which we meet withall here below and which is yet more from all the danger of sinning which now every day adds to the fearfulness of our account and lastly from the wofull wages of sin Death bodily spirituall eternall here is a redemption worth our longing for worth our joying in when Joseph was fetcht out of Pharaohs Gaol and changed the nasty rags of his prison for pure linnen vestures and his Iron fetters for a chain of Gold and his wooden stocks for Pharaohs second Charet Gen. 41.42 do we not think he must needs be joyfully affected with it When Peter was called up from betwixt his Leopards as that Father termes them and had his shackles shaken off and was brought through the Iron gates into the free and open street or when Daniel was called out of the lyons den to the embracements of Darius could he choose but rejoyce in the change when Lazarus was called after three dayes entombing out of his grave and saluted his mourning sisters and walk't home with his friends could there be ought but the voice of joy and gladnesse among them But alas all these are but sleight resemblances of the blessed Redemption which is purchased for us who are thus ransomed from sin and death Rather if we could imagine the soul of a Trajan fetcht out of hell by the prayers of Gregory or of a Falconella by Tecla according to the bold legends of lying fablers and now freed from those intolerable and unconceiveable torments we might apprehend in some measure what it is that is wrought for our souls in this mercifull redemption and what is the favour of that deliverance which we must long to have fully perfected But alas what shall I say to us We are enslaved and fettered and we are loath to be free we are in love with our bonds with our miseries with our sins and when death comes like a good Ebed-molech to drag us up out of our dungeon we are unwilling to put the rags under our arme-pits and to lay hold of that our sure and happy conveyance to the light and liberty of the Saints Oh our wretched unbelief that is guilty of this slackness of our desires whereas if we were what we profess our selves we would think the time long till it be accomplished and say Come Lord Jesus come quickly even so come Lord Jesus come quickly and make up our full redemption from misery from sin from death and bring us into that glorious liberty of the Sons of God This for the day of our redemption now Secondly let us see what this sealing is to the day of Redemption I find in Gods book three uses of a seal 1. For secrecy 2. For peculiar designation 3. For certainty and assurance For secrecy first So God speaking of the condition of Israel Deut. 32.34 Is not this laid up in store and sealed up among my treasures So Esay speaking of a vision of his It shall be as the letter of a book sealed whereof one shall say Read this the other shall answer I cannot for it is sealed Esa 29.11 Yea this sealing argues a long reservation and closenesse Go thy way Daniel for the words are closed up and sealed to the time of the end Dan. 12.9 and thereupon it is that John is forbidden to seale up the book of his prophesie Revel 22.10 for the time is â—igh at hand so we are wont to do in ordinary practise that Closet which we would have no body go into we seal up that bag which we would not have opened and that letter which we would not have seen by others we seal up and think it a great violation of civility to have it opened Hence is that sigillum confessionis the seale of confession amongst the Romish Casuists held so sacred that it may not in any case whatsoever be broken up Insomuch as their great Doctour Martinus Alphonsus Vivaldus goes so farr as to say Si penderet salus vel liberatio totius mundi ex revelatione unius peccati non esset revelandum etiamsi totus mundus esset perdendus That if the safety of the whole World should depend upon the revealing of one sin it is not to be revealed though all the World should be destroyed and adds Imo propter liberationem omnium animarum totius mundi non est revelandum Though it were for the freeing of all the souls of the whole World it is not to be revealed in his Candelabrum aureum De sigillo number the 11th A strange height of expression to give the World assurance of the close carriage of their auricular Confession and that not without need for were it not for this perswasion their hearths might cool and men would keep their own counsell and surely not to meddle with their tyrannicall impositions upon the conscience in their forced confessions which we do justly call carnificinam conscientiae I should hold and profess that if a man should come in the anguish of his soul for some sin to unload his heart secretly to the bosom of his Minister of whom he looks for counsell and comfort if in such a case that Minister should reveale that sin to any other whosoever no death were torment enough for such a spirituall perfidiousnesse all secrets are at the least sub sigillo fidei under the seal of fidelity and therefore not to be revealed For peculiar designation thus our blessed Saviour speaking of himself the Son of man adds For him hath God the Father sealed Joh. 6.27 that is hath designed him to the speciall office of his Mediatorship So Revelation 7.5 Of the tribe of Juda were sealed twelve thousand and so the name of the number of the severall tribes to the whole sum of an hundred fourty four thousand were designed to Salvation But the chief use of the seale is for certainty and assurance so Jezebel to make sure work with the Elders of Jezreel for the dispatch of Naboth sealed it with Ahabs seale 1 Kings 21. so the Jewish Princes Priests and Levites when they had made their covenant sealed it with their seales Nehem. 9. the last verse Hence Hamans Order for the destruction of the Jewes was sealed with the Kings seale Esth 3.12 and the countermand for their preservation so sealed also Esth 8.8 so Jeremy for his land at Anathoth wrote and sealed Jerem. 32.9 so the gravestone of Christs Tomb was sealed Matth. 27.66 And still this is our practise that which we would make sure and past all question we give not under our hand onely but our seal also In all these three regards of secrecy peculiar designation and certainty the Church is sons obsignatus a well sealed up Cant. 4.12 and she justly prayes Set me as a Seal upon thine heart and a Seal upon thine arme Cant. 8.6 Let us take them severally into our thoughts and first for the Secrecy It is a sure word which the Spirit of God hath 2 Tim. 2.19 The foundation of God remaineth
sure having this seal The Lord knoweth who are his The Lord knoweth and none but he neither Man nor Angel It is sealed on purpose that it may be concealed and reserved only in the counsel of the most High It is therefore a most high and dangerous presumption in any man to passe a judgment upon the final estate of another especially to the worse part This is no other then to rush into the Closet of the Highest and to break open his cabinet and to tear up the privy Seal of Heaven an insolence that God will not passe over unrevenged It was a good answer that the Servant gave in the story who carrying a covered dish through the Street and being asked what it was answered It is therefore covered that thou mayest not know and so it is here the final estate of every Soul is sealed that it may be known only to the God of Heaven and if any man dare to pry into this Ark of God with the men of Bethshemesh let him fear to be struck dead as they were 1 Sam. 6. The Romanists have taken too much boldnesse this way there is one of their Saints St. Matilda or St. Maude a Prophetesse of theirs which in her Revelations professeth that she would needs know of God what became of the Souls of four men Sampson Solomon whom I must tell you the greatest part of the Romish Doctors give out for a cast away very injuriously and uncharitably since that besides his being a type of Christ and a pen-man of some part of holy Scripture his Ecclesiastes is a plain publication to all the World of his penance for his former miscarriages Origen and Trajane and received this answer What my pitty hath done with Sampson I will not have known that men may not be incouraged to take revenge on their enemies what my mercy hath done with Solomon I will not have known lest men should take too much liberty to carnal sins What my bounty hath done with Origen I would not have known lest men should put too much confidence in their knowledg What my liberality hath done with Trajan I would not have known for the advancement of the Catholick faith lest men should sleight the Sacrament of Baptism a presumptious question and an answer answerable So they have not stuck to tell us that the same day that their St. Thomas Becket dyed there dyed in all the World three thousand thirty and three whereof 3000. went to Hell thirty to Purgatory and three whereof their Saint was one to Heaven sure I think much alike I will not weary you with their frenzies of this kind they have bragg'd of some of their Saints who have had this deep insight into the hearts of men and counsels of God that they could tell by the view who should be saved who condemned and some fanatick Spirits in our Church have gone so farr as to take upon them as some vain Palmesters by the sight of the hand to judge of fortunes by the face and words and garbe and carriage of men to passe sentence of reprobation upon other mens souls what an horrible insolence is this in any creature under Heaven or in it There may be perhaps grounds to judg of a mans present condition God doth not call any man to stupidity or unreasonablenesse If I see a man live debauchedly in drunkennesse in whoring in professed profanesse If I hear him in his ordinary speeches to tear Gods name in pieces with oaths and bsasphemies I may safely say that man is in a damnable condition and must demean my self to him accordingly forbearing an entire conversation with him with such a one eat not saith the Apostle but if I shall presume to judg of his finall estate I may incur my own condemnation in pronouncing his Judg not that ye be not judged Perhaps that man whom thou sentencest is in the secret counsel of God sealed to life and shall go before thee to Heaven who that had seen Manasses revelling in his Idolatry Magick Murder worshiping all the hoast of Heaven polluting the house of God with his abominable altars using sorceries and inchantments filling the streets of Jerusalem with innocent blood 2 Kings 21. would not have said there is a cast-away Yet howsoever the history of the Kings leaves him in his sin and dishonor yet in the 2 Chron. 33. You find his conversion his acceptation his prayer and how God was entreated of him vers 19. So as for ought we know he lived a Devil and dyed a Saint Who that had seen and heard Soul breathing out threatnings and executing his bloody cruelties upon the Church of God dragging poor Christians to their judgments and executions would not have given him for a man branded for hell yet behold him a chosen vessel the most glorious instrument of Gods name that hath been since Christ left the earth as thou lovest thy Soul therefore meddle not with Gods seal leave that to himself Thou mayest read the superscription of a man if thou wilt and judge of his outside but take heed of going deeper look well to the seal that God hath set upon thine own soul look for that new name which none can read but he that hath it this is worth thine enquiry into and God hath given thee the Characters whereby to decipher it whom he did predestinate them also he called and whom he called them also he justifyed and whom he justified them also he glorified that is they are as sure to be glorified as if they were glorified already Rom. 8.30 Read thine own name in the book of life and thou art happy as for others let thy rule be the judgment of charity and let Gods seal alone Secret things belong to God and things revealed to us and our children but if thou wilt needs be searching into Gods counsel remember that of Solomon as the Vulgar reads it Prov. 25.27 Scrutator Majestatis opprimetur a gloria He that pries into Majesty shall be overwhelmed with glory Now that from the Secrecy we may descend to the Peculiarity of Designation You know it in common practise in your trades and merchandise that when a man hath bought a parcel of commodities he sets his marke upon them to distinguish them from the rest in the warehouse so doth our God he sets a mark upon his own whereby they are plainly differenced from others And this mark besides the stampe of his eternal decree is true sanctification By this then it is that we are known from the World As upon some large plain where there are severall flocks and heards feeding together every one knows his own by his mark So the man with the writers inkhorne set a mark upon those which mourned for their own sins and the sins of their people Ezek. 9. It is therefore so farr from truth that our sanctification is no certain proof of our son-ship and of our interest in the covenant of grace as that there is no other