greater was his Mercy so unwilling was he that they should perish that he promis'd the interceeding Patriarch that if he cou'd find but ten Righteous Persons amongst them he would save them all But not to multiply Instances which are numberless the liveliest and most breathing Image of the Divine Mercy and Pity the most glorious and ravishing Displays of his unbounded Compassions appears in the wonderful Contrivance of our Restitution the mysterious and Costly Redemption of Lapsed Man This is an Instance of Love so astonishing and unfathomable as will afford new matter through all the Ages of Eternity for the Contemplation and Praises of the Saints and Angels in Heaven Since 't is a Province too great for any Created Being the Son of God himself before whose insupportable Glories the Seraphims veil their faces graciously descends from the Celestial Paradise into the Wilderness of this World to seek his straying Creatures to restore the lost sheep of the House of Israel and with his own Voice to call them back to himself the great Shepherd and Bishop of their Souls He comes in his Father's Name to proclaim Pardon and Forgiveness to all that return to him to demonstrate his infinite Tenderness and Compassion for every Soul of the Sons of Adam that notwithstanding all their Sins he would not have any of them perish not the greatest not the oldest not the most presumptuous of Sinners but that all should come to the Knowledge of the Truth and be sav'd This is his Business This his Errand This the great End and Design of his Coming which having finish'd in all the Parts he undertook and to confirm our Faith seal'd his Letters of Invitation with his own Blood and being now to return to the Father he to the Everlasting Comfort and Joy of Repenting Sinners commands his Apostles to go forth and carry them into all Parts of the World Go * Mark 16.15 says he and Preach the Gospel these glad Tidings of Reconciliation and Peace between God and Man to every Creature And accordingly too St. †2 Cor. 5.19 Paul tells us that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself not imputing to them their trespasses and sins The whole Tenour and Design you see of the Evangelical Dispensation is to bring Sinners to their Saviour to call them off from all their vain Confidences to believe and trust only in the Son of God to beseech them to come to Christ that they may be refresh'd and find Rest unto their Souls And so I am brought to the Second Thing observable in the Text viz. the Person to whom the Invitation is made To Me that is to our only Saviour and Redeemer the Lord Christ Jesus 2. We are not then to unfold our Necessities or to present our Supplications and Prayers to Saints or Martyrs to Patriarchs Prophets or Apostles no not to the Blessed Virgin Mother her self The Votaries indeed of this Glorious Saint in the Romish Church are as a Learned * See a Discourse of the due Praise and Honour of the Virgin Mary intituled Speculum Beatae Virginis Author of our own has shewn at large sufficiently extravagant in the Honours they pay to her They exalt her above the Thrones even of Cherubim and Seraphim array her in the brightest Robes of Majesty and Honour and most religiously and devoutly Romance her into a Deity Nay this is not the Practice only of her private Authors but the more Authentick Voice likewise of her publick Offices in which they frequently invoke her by the paramount Titles of Mother of Mercy Mother of Grace Sweet Parent of Mercy Queen of Heaven the Gate of the Great King the only Hope of Sinners and their most gracious Lady Now these I say are Rants and Excesses indeed Excesses which questionless if known would put the Modesty of this Blessed Virgin to a much greater Blush than did the Appearance and Complement of the Angel Gabriel We confess her Privileges and Prerogatives are singularly great He that is Mighty hath magnify'd her and Blessed is her Name We acknowledge her a most happy Instrument of our Good and therefore shall her Memory be always Dear to us Dear and Honour'd throughout all Generations Dear and Reverenc'd but not worshipp'd and ador'd In a word Her according to her own Prediction will we ever call Blessed but only amongst Women To Her will we ascribe Glory Honour and Praise But to her Son alone with the Father and the Holy Spirit Power Might Majesty and Dominion For to speak a little closer to this Point if the Saints in Heaven This Blessed Virgin and the Rest have no constant Knowledge of our Affairs here below then 't is the Inference of every Elementary Logician and the Concession of the greatest Champions of their own Party that 't is altogether in vain and to no purpose to Pray to them Si non cognoscant nostras orationes videtur otiosum supervacaneum ad ipsos orare are * De Relig tom 2. l. 1. c. 10. Suarez his own Words But that the Saints in Heaven this Blessed Virgin and the Rest have no constant Knowledge of our Affairs here below and consequently that 't is altogether in vain and to no purpose to Pray to them is evident from that of the Prophet †Cap. 63. v. 16. Isaiah Abraham is ignorant of us and Israel knows us not For certainly if Abraham and Israel were ignorant and know nothing of the Affairs of that very People which descended from their own Loins then we have all the Reason in the World to conclude that the Saints in Heaven have no constant Knowledge of us and of our Affairs who are perfect Strangers to their Blood and Families Our Adversaries I know will be here ready to Object That Abraham and Israel were rightly said by the Prophet to be ignorant and to know nothing in his Time of the Affairs of Mankind and consequently that then indeed 't was but in vain and to no purpose to pray to them because before the Resurrection of our Lord the Patriarchs were not admitted into Heaven but lay only in Limbo the Retir'd and Secret Caverns of the Earth where they were utterly excluded from the Vision of God and likewise from all Traffick and Commerce with Men. But that now the case is quite alter'd with them that they are all translated from those Regions of Darkness that State of Expectation those Tabernacles of Hope into the inmost Court of Heaven the Kingdom of their Father the Land of Fruition where their Understandings are so widen'd and enlarg'd that they have a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done both in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life so that now they are become the proper Objects of our Devotion being both privy to all our Necessities and also as Fellow-Members of the same Mystical Body most willing and
Land where Death reigns for ever and ever Is this I say thy case Why do not any longer despond but throw away thy Garments thy Sins that encompass thee about and rise up for thy Saviour calls thee Behold the Wise Men rise up at his Call they acknowledge his gracious Summons and hastily come away from a far Country and therefore are kindly receiv'd tho' their * Vid. Justin M. Dial. cum Tryph. Jud. pag. 304. Orig. cont Cels lib. 1. p. 45 46. Witchcrafts and Idolatries are so many The humble Shepherd likewise obey the Heavenly Vision as soon as the Angels are gone to Heaven they leave their feeble Flocks and tender Lambs and therefore are graciously admitted to the Presence and Adoration of the great Shepherd of their Souls The Star out of Jacob is risen upon thee also and and if thou wilt follow its Light 't will conduct thee to the Mansions of thy Lord and Saviour The Glory of the Lord too is ready to shine round about thee the abundant Visitations of his Grace from Heaven will if thou art willing dispell the uncomfortable Darkness of the Night all the black Clouds of Melancholy and Despair and enlighten thy Understanding and actuate all thy Faculties till at length they happily bring thee to Bethlehem to the Presence and Embraces of the Holy Jesus Come then I say thou sinking despairing Soul unto thy Saviour Come to him by Faith and Repentance and he will by no means cast thee off Come to him and he will most tenderly receive thee The Bowels of his Compassion will immediatelâ— move towards thee and he will gently take thee by the hand and guide thee into the way that leads to Sion 'T was his Meat and Drink when he liv'd amongst us to proclaim Liberty to the Captives to loosen those whom Sin and Satan has bound to bind up the Broken-hearted to give Medicines to heal their Sicknesses and to preach the acceptable Year of the Lord. And tho' now he is gone to Heaven yet he has not left thee comfortless He is abstracted from thee as to his bodily Presence but his Divine Spirit and Grace still attend and wait upon thee Not all the Glories of Heaven the Allelujahs of the Angels and the triumphant Songs of the Saints can make him forget thee but the same Tenderness of Spirit the same Mercy and Loving-kindness which he had upon Earth he now in the mid'st of all his Glories still retains for thee in Heaven We have not such an High-Priest says the Apostle as cannot be touch'd with the feeling of our Infirmities but who having been tempted himself is able to succour them that are tempted He sits in those glorious Mansions at the Right hand of the Father to make intercession for us His Merits continually plead the Pardon of Repenting Sinners at the Throne of Grace and he is able and willing to save all them to the uttermost that come unto God by him Nay 't is his Glory his Joy and Crown to forgive Sins 'T is the reward of his Sufferings the Recompence of his Agonies to Save Sinners This he so ardently desires and thirsts after that he breaks not the bruised Reed nor quencheth the smoaking Flax but still more and more softens and mollifies the relenting Heart 'till he sends forth Judgment unto Victory He cannot be always chiding neither keepeth he is Anger for ever but tho' he cause Grief yet will he have Compassion according to the multitude of his Mercies Thus when Ephraim turn'd and repented when he smote upon his Thigh and was asham'd for the reproachful Sins of his Youth how tenderly how affectionately does his Maker deal with him Is Ephraim * Jer. 31.20 says he my dear Son Is he a pleasant Child that is Ephraim is indeed my dear Son he is a most pleasant Child for since I spake against him I do earnestly remember him still therefore my bowels are troubled for him I will surely have mercy upon him saith the Lord. In the same manner when Zion deeply sensible of her Sins grew disconsolate and said within her self The Lord hath forsaken me and my Lord hath forgotten me he earnestly protests to her that his Heart was more tender of her than the Heart of any Parent could be of the Child of Infant of her own Womb. Can a Woman * Isa 49.15 says she forget her sucking Child that she should not have compassion on the Son of her Womb Tea they may forget yet will I not forget thee Behold I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands Nay farther is so pleas'd at the Return of a Sinner that he assures us there is Joy in Heaven over such a One yea more Joy among the Angels of God over one Sinner that repenteth than over Ninety and Nine Just Persons who need no Repentance When a lost Sheep of the house of Israel is found when it is rescu'd out of the Jaws of Death and of Hell Snatch'd out of the Paw of that roaring Lion who continually goes about seeking whom he may devour and safely brought back into the Fold of the great Shepherd the Lord Christ Jesus These Blessed Spirits are no sooner acquainted with it but they take into their hands their instruments of Musick and in the highest Strains of Seraphick Joy contulate his Return The Vallies to speak after the Excellent Bishop Taylor are no sooner fill'd with Benediction and a fruitful Shower from Heaven but these Mountains leap with Joy even the Joy of Conquerours This he has sensibly represented to us in the Parable of the Prodigal Luke 15. He had most grievously transgress'd his Duty in every point both to God and Man When his indulgent Father upon his Request had kindly Divided his Living between Him and his Brother expecting you may be sure no small Comfort and Satisfaction from the joynt Welfare and Happiness of his dutiful Children this ungrateful and inhumane Wretch not many days after gathers all together and gets him away into a far Country where forgetful of his most tender Father forgetful of his sorrowful Relations forgetful of his most gracious God he lies wallowing in the Mire of all Fifthiness and Debauchery mispending his precious hours in the Conversation and Caresses of shameless prostitute abominable Strumpets and wasting all his Substance in a most profligate brutish and riotous way of living Yet no sooner does his Father spy him returning home with a penitent Confession in his Mouth but notwithstanding his great Unworthiness his Bowels are mov'd towards him yea he becomes impatient cannot expect his near Approach but his Joy and Affection give him wings Whilst he is yet a great way off he runs he flies to meet him has not Patience to stay for his humble Confession but immediately in an Extasie of Joy falls upon his Neck forgives and kisses him The best Robe the fattest Calf Musick and Dancing all the Expressions of the most solemn and extraordinary Joy
carv'd to themselves in Memory of their Ancestors and to which upon all Occasions they address'd themselves with the most solemn Veneration And from thence how imperious and domineering how haughty arrogant and cruel how tyrannical and intolerable he shew'd himself to his Worshippers till Christianity appear'd in the World all Histories both Sacred and Profane do abundantly testifie Having exalted himself above all that is called God and the Jews excepted rendred the whole Creation subject to Vanity he sat himself Lordly in the House of God acting there like himself the grand Chief of the Damn'd He sent Miseries and Calamities upon the Theatre of the World for his Sport and Pastime and set on one part of the Creation to bait another for his Diversion Like the immane Roman Emperours he took Pleasure to exercise Men with Dangers and to see them play bloody Prizes before him Neither thousands of Rams nor ten thousands of Rivers of Oyl could satisfie the raging Thirst or Boulimy of this ravenous Wolf He must needs tear in pieces the more excellent Prey and take his Pastime in Rivers of Human Blood Thus in Crete and Africk under the Name of Saturn he glutted his Ears with the last Groans and dismal Accents and his devouring Jaws with the tender Carcasses of slaughter'd Infants Thus in Cyprus Tenedos and Lacedaemonia in Carthage France and Germany in Arabia Scythia Egypt and Rome it self he made himself drunk with the Blood of Men which is attested not only by those Christian Writers * Apol. c. 9. Tertullian and †Divin Institut l. 1. c. 21. Lactantius but likewise by that acute Philosopher and Enemy to Christianity ‖ De Abst l. 2. p. 226. Porphyry who after he had reckon'd up in how many places of the World Human Sacrifices were in use confesses 't was done at Rome in the Feast of Jupiter Latialis even in his time Nay as tho' the Air had been corrupted and Men by natural Breathing drew in the Infection this Contagion spread it self as far as the House of God and the Holy Land it self was defil'd with Blood Not only Aliens and Strangers to the Common-wealth of Israel but even God's own peculiar People was so bewitch'd and besotted as both to adore the Sun when it shin'd and the Moon when she walk'd in her brightness which it self was an Iniquity to be punish'd by the Judge and also to inflame themselves with Idols under every green Tree and to offer their Sons and their Daughters unto Devils Thus tho' his ambitious Designs were balk'd in the Beginning and he fell with all his Legions like Lightning from Heaven tho' he could not be like the Most High in Glory nor erect his Throne next to the Almighty yet he vaunted himself here amongst the deluded Sons of Men and by his Villainies Sophistries and Arts of Terror affrighted them into the Worship and Adoration of his Person Yet even then so great is the Pride and Unbounded the Malice of this cursed Arch-Daemon as though Crowns and Septers and all the Tributary Princes and Potentates of the Earth had been too little as though the Glory of so much Power and the infinite multitude of Slaves and Vassals avail'd him nothing at all whilst good Mordecai bowed not nor did him Reverence he was restless and dissatisfied and with haughty Haman impatiently sought his Ruin He repin'd at those peaceable Halcyonian Days which under the kind influence of Heaven pious Souls did enjoy and whom Providence hedg'd in he chiefly long'd to devour This is fully illustrated in the Instance of Job where as soon as God had permitted to put forth his hand and touch all that he had how did he muster up all the Mischiefs Hellish Malice could invent and with greater Eagerness than that of an Eagle or Vulture seize upon the Prey He plunder'd him in his Estate says the Reverend and Learned Dr. * Patriarchal Dispensation Cave by the Sabaean and Chaldaean Free-booters who left him not an Ox or Ass of all his Herd not a Sheep or a Lamb either for Food or Sacrifice He endeavour'd all he could to blot out his Name from under Heaven having slain his seven Sons and three Daughters at once by the Fall of an House He blasted him in his Credit and Reputation and that by his nearest Friends who had traduc'd and challeng'd him for a Dissembler and an Hypocrite He ruin'd him in his Health having smitten him with sore Ulcers from the Crown of the Head to the Sole of the Foot till his Body became a very Hospital of Diseases Nay that not the least Dawnings of Consolation might peep through this black Cloud of Sorrow and Anguish besides those gastly Spectacles and horrid Apparitions whereby he infested his * Cap. 7. ver 14. Dreams he suggested to his †Cap. 6. ver 4. waking Thoughts sad and uncomfortable Reflexions the Arrows of the Almighty being shot within him the Poyson whereof drank up his Spirits the Terrors of God setting themselves in Array against him And thus for at least twelve Months say the Jews probably for a much longer time did this grand Engineer of all Mischief wreek his Hellish Malice upon this Good Man till God in Mercy put a Period to this tedious Tryal and crown'd his Sufferings with an ample Restitution But if we ascend from these Times to the first Plantings of the Gospel we shall find him yet more eagerly prosecuting all Acts of Hostility possessing Mens Bodies tormenting them with sundry kinds of Diseases and endeavouring if possible to break the very Golden Chain of Predestination Now that dreadful Woe which the * Rev. 12.10 12. Angel with a loud Voice denounc'd from Heaven against the Inhabitants of the Earth and of the Sea was fulfill'd for the Devil was come amongst Men having great Wrath because he had but a short time He saw the Prophecies were all fulfill'd that the Scepter was departed from Judah and a Law-giver from between his Feet that therefore Shiloh was suddenly to come unto whom the gathering of all People should be He saw that his Coming was now grown not only the Expectation of the Jews but the common discourse too of all the Heathen Nations That there was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as St. Cyril says of him a great and eminent Harbinger who in the Power and Spirit of Elias introduc'd and usher'd in the Arrival of this Son of Righteousness and spake great and glorious things of this Son of God Wherefore not to mention his persecuting him a poor helpless Infant by jealous Herod nor yet to re-mind you of those many Troubles which he afterwards created him from the hypocritical ambitious blood-thirsty Pharisees that he might leave no stone unturn'd nothing unattempted whereby he might compass his Designs he impudently attacks the Redeemer of the World himself and perceiving him to be a Person of greater Sanctity and Perfection than to be mov'd by sensual and low Desires
Glorified Spirits to behold admire and praise his excellent Greatness and when our enlarged Souls shall fly away to the same blissful Mansions and be admitted to the Comprehensions of an intuitive Beatitude they shall with equal Satisfaction contemplate his Divine Beauty and as skilfully tune their Harps to his Praises as they Let us therefore in the mean time lay our Hand upon our Mouth and with all due Prostration both of Body and Mind adore this great Mystery of Goodness this astonishing Miracle of the Divine Mercy and Condescention which though above the adequate Comprehension of our Reason is put beyond all possibility of Distrust being most amply confirm'd to us by the concurrent and infallible Testimony of God Angels and Men. At his Baptism and Transfiguration you know he was proclaim'd by a Voice from Heaven to be the Beloved Son of God in whom he was well pleas'd And again when he bringeth in his First-begotten into the World he commands that this Exinanition of himself this Obscuration of his Essential Glory under the Veil of Humane Flesh may not diminish one Ray from the Honour of his Divine Majesty but that all the Potentates in Heaven and Earth fall down and worship him Worship him †Psal 97.7 says he all ye Gods all ye Angels and Thrones in Heaven all ye Kings and Judges of the Earth The holy Angels with their usual Chearfulness obey'd the Royal Orders They humbly ador'd the holy Child Jesus and stood ready through all the Periods of his Life to Serve and Worship him St. Peter though he saw him not so clearly as these Blessed Spirits generously confess'd that he was Christ the Son of the Living God and he receiv'd this Confirmation from the Mouth of our Lord himself That Flesh and Blood had not reveal'd it unto him but his Father only which is in Heaven Nay to the everlasting Shame and Confusion of the unbelieving Sons of Men the Devils themselves have ever subscrib'd to this Article They knew and confess'd him here on Earth and still believe and tremble The over-aw'd and trembling ‖ Vid. Suidam in August Oracle plainly confess'd to the Roman Emperour at his Birth that though he appear'd under all the disadvantageous Circumstances of Humanity and Weakness He was the Soveraign Lord and King of the blest Beings above * Luke 8.28 which was afterwards confirm'd by a whole Legion of unclean Spirits when in the Man possess'd they joyntly lifted up their Voices to him with a Jesus thou Son of God Most High But to what purpose I say was all this or why all this Noise and Ostentation had he not been the Son of God in another and more excellent manner than were any of the Sons of Men who either liv'd with him or that went before him had there not been something in it extraordinary that entitled him to so sublime and divine a Privilege Angels Kings and Prophets I confess are frequently call'd the Sons of God They have a larger Participation of his Power or a Communication of more special Grace than is indulg'd and granted to his other Children but yet their Honour and Dignity fall infinitely short of that of Jesus the Son of God For to which of the Angels said he at any time Thou art my Son this Day have I begotten thee Or who is he amongst all those exalted Sons of the Most High whom the Father advanc'd to sit at his own Right-hand till his Enemies are made his Footstool David you know was a King and yet he calls him Lord and John the Baptist though he was more than a Prophet was never by Angels Men or Devils acknowledg'd to be properly the Son of God no these are the high Prerogatives of our Lord Christ Jesus to him alone belong the most glorious and supereminent Titles of his own Son his only Son his only Begotten and the Heir of all things So that in all things I say he has the Preheminence But the Scriptures if possible speak plainer yet They not only instruct by natural and necessary Illations and Consequences but also to prevent all Cavils and Disputes are careful in many places to assert this Truth as clearly and as expresly as Words can speak * Joh. 20.28 29. St. Thomas believes and confesseth to him that he is his Lord and God and those who should afterwards inherit the same Faith are pronounced Blessed The Beloved †Joh. 1.1 Disciple is positive that the Word was God and in the Close of his first Epistle speaking of Jesus to shew against an Objection which he rightly foresaw would be afterwards urg'd against the Christians that they might safely worship him without any Fear or Danger of that Idolatry which the Heathens were guilty of in worshipping their Daemons This says he is not Deus factus a made God a God by Office not by Nature but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the True God The Learn'd * 1 Cor. 15.87 1 Tim. 3.16 Rom. 9.5 Apostle adds that this Second Man is the Lord from heaven and God manifested in the Flesh and again most blasphemously if not truly this being that particular Eulogy which is due only to Jehovah the one Supreme Eternal God of Israel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God over all Blessed for Ever and Ever Nay not to mention the many Repetitions of this most glorious Doxology to him in other places of Scripture This is that good Confession our Lord himself made before his Judge He had all along to the Rage and Amazement of his Enemies held his peace shewing by his Silence that he despis'd all their Accusations as certain and apparent Calumnies But no sooner is urg'd to determine this Point but he opens his Mouth and decides the matter I adjure thee by the living God * Mat. 26.63 64. says the High-Priest that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ the Son of God Jesus after their modest way of Affirmation saith unto him Thou hast said Or as St. Mark more positively Jesus said I am 'T is certain the High-Priest understood him not in that Vulgar Sense wherein Great and Righteous Persons Kings and Prophets are call'd the Sons of God but that he affirm'd himself to be so in the Literal Proper and Natural Signification of the words For otherwise he could not upon the account of this Confession have charg'd him with Blasphemy nor consequently the Council have voted him to be guilty of Death Thus too in the Fifth of St. John he tells the Jews plainly that God is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his own Father making himself thereby as they rightly concluded to be Equal with God And in another Conference with them in the Tenth of that Evangelist He not only owns himself to be the Christ and the Son of God in the most proper sence but adds farther that He and his Father are One One not in Will only but in Essence Glory Honour and Power I am sure the Jews understood him
so are become the Objects of our Devotion from the constant and faithful Relations of daily ascending Saints and Angels from the Informations and kind Intercourses of Guardian Angels and the narrations of such happy Spirits as leaving their Earthly Tabernacle daily ascend thither because 't is evident you see that there are many things here amongst us which these Saints and Angels can never understand many Designs and Contrivances many Wishes and Desires many Vows and Prayers that are lodg'd only in the Heart and consequently are known only unto God Wherefore 4. The Saints in Heaven have not a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion from the vision of the Divine Essence which they call Speculum Trinitatis Now 't is a great Question amongst Learn'd Men Whether the Blessed Spirits above are indeed capable of seeing the Divine Essence and many of no ordinary note espouse the Negative thinking it as impossible for a Created Finite Being to behold the Essence of an Uncreated Infinite Being as 't is for a Bird of Night to gaze steddily upon the Sun Which Opinion if true entirely destroys this Speculum Trinitatis and dashes it with its Consequences all to pieces upon the Ground But I confess I hitherto see nothing that can induce me to embrace it The Affirmative seems most consonant both to Scripture and Reason When Moses humbly desir'd that God would vouchsafe to shew him his Glory or to imprint upon his Mind a clear distinct Idea of his Divine Essence he was answer'd That he could nor have his wish now whilst he lay under the Disadvantages of Mortality because he was a God dwelling in such Light as no Mortal Eye could approach but that he should so see him hereafter when these Impediments should be remov'd and he happily invested with the stronger Privileges of Immortality Thou can'st not see my Face says God Exod. 33.20 for there shall no man see me and live For these words certainly imply That tho' he could not now by reason of the thick Veil of his flesh yet that he should see his Essence hereafter both when his Earthly Tabernacle should be dissolv'd and laid aside and also when he should receive it again all clarify'd and spiritualiz'd Moses himself undoubtedly understood them thus for had he thought otherwise and that he was never to be admitted to the Intuition of his Maker's Glory the naked clear and real Vision of his Divine Essence but that he was for ever to rest in Symbals and Figures in reflected Glories and secondary Manifestations which was to find his Ultimate Happiness in some thing really distinct from his God his devout affectionate Soul which so ardently breath'd after the most intimate Fruition even of the Living God would never have been satisfy'd with this uncomfortable Answer but we had questionless heard of the sad Complaints the bitter Bemoanings and doleful Accents of his disconsolate Spirit who when the natural Byass of her Desires mov'd necessarily towards God trembling continually like the amorous Needle for the Embraces of that most Lovely and Amiable Object was yet for ever excluded from his Beatifick Presence the Contemplation and Fruition of the interiour Beauties of her Belov'd And indeed we all so naturally desire to see this First Cause this Parent of Nature and the Author of all our Beings that tho' we were surrounded with all the Sweets of Paradise all the other most exquisite Delights and Entertainments that Heaven can afford yet without Him they would but fade and wither and dwindle into nothing and our restless dissatisfy'd Spirits would still in the midst of them all be impatiently crying out Ah! Where Where is our God For as He is the First of Beings so is He the Last of Ends 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Plato rightly that proper and principal End of Rational Beings the Vision of whom alone can satisfie the aspiring Soul and in the Circle of whose Embraces only the immoratal Spirit finds Rest and Peace and Joy for Evermore See him then we shall in the other World See the Soveraign Fair openly and clearly really and as He is Now we hear of him by the Ear but then shall our Eye with Joy and Triumph see him Now we see through a glass darkly but then Face to Face Now we know only in part but then shall we know even as we our selves also are known This Expression I readily acknowledge is not to be understood according to the Strictness of the Letter As we are known is a Note of Similitude only not of Equality for the Sun may as well be included in a Spark of Fire as God be comprehended by our Finite Faculties Know him then we shall not so as to comprehend him but so as to be ravish'd and for ever transported with his Essential Perfections The Light of a Candle as truly shines as the Light of the Sun tho' not with equal Extent and Splendour so shall our Knowledge be truly like His reaching even His Divine Essence tho' not Equal to His in comprehending it as He does ours Thus far then are we and our Adversaries agreed The Saints in Heaven do really view and contemplate the Divine Essence But now to say that they behold in it all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion is most absurd and ridiculous If you let a Vessel down into the Sea 't will indeed be fill'd to the utmost of its Capacity but then you know it must needs overflow because 't is impossible it should receive into its Bosom the vast Congeries of that inexhaustible Abyss So admit the Saints into the Presence of their Maker where they may clearly and distinctly behold his Divine Essence their Finite Understandings may indeed by his voluntary Revelations be filled with all that Knowledge they are capable of receiving but then 't is necessary they likewise overflow because 't is absolutely impossible they should be widen'd and enlarg'd to the infinite and boundless Comprehensions of Omniscience This besides the Reason of the thing which assures us that 't is absolute impossible any Being should have the Attributes of the Divine Nature which has not the Divine Nature it self is plain from the Instance of the Angels These Blessed Spirits were before the Incarnation of our Lord admitted into their Father's House the Mansions of Glory the Royal City of the Heavenly King The time of their Probation was over and gone and they all unalterably confirm'd in a state of Happiness and Glory Their Business and Employment was to contemplate the Unfolded Beauties of the Divine Countenance and to sing continually in the Presence of the Lord that Great is the Glory of their
God And yet how imperfect was the Knowledge how improveable the Understandings even of these Intelligences Notwithstanding this clear Vision of the Divine Essence the Mystery of Man's Redemption was so far hid from their Eyes that before the Manifestation of the Son of God in the Flesh they had only some general dark and obscure Notices of it And tho' now as * Ephes 3.10 St. Paul tells us the manifold Wisdom of God is in a greater measure made known unto them by his Dispensations in the Church yet even now are they so far from being able to comprehend it that †1 Epist 1.12 St. Peter assures us they still desire to look farther into it These things says he the Angels desire to look into In short our Lord has put this case beyond all doubt for speaking of the Day of Judgment Of that Day and Hour ‖ Matth. 24.36 Mat. 13.32 says he knoweth no Man no not the Angels of Heaven nor the Son but my Father only For if the Son of God himself as Man tho' he is to be the Umpire of that Great Day and the Holy Angels who always behold the Face of their Father and who with unspeakable Alacrity and Joy will attend and wait upon him in this his glorious Expedition was once and are still ignorant in this matter then certainly it can be nothing but Folly and Madness to imagine that the Spirits of Just Men and Women which tho' never so perfect as such are as they stand in Relation to their Bodies to whom they have a natural Inclination even in Heaven it self but in a State of Imperfection should so far excel as to have an entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done both in Heaven and Earth Now then from what has been thus discours'd I presume 't is Evident that there is no Foundation in Reason to think that the Saints tho in Heaven have a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion as our Adversaries pretend but that on the contrary we have all the Reason in the World to conclude that they have no constant Knowledge of any thing here below and consequently that according to the Romish Doctors themselves 't is otiosum Supervacaneum an idle vain and superfluous and according to Truth it self an impious wicked and idolatrous piece of Devotion that is put up to them For tho' we allow that God does sometimes of his especial Grace vouchsafe by an Extraordinary Revelation to acquaint his Saints with something of our Affairs here below like the good Shepherd in the Gospel who when he had found the Sheep he had lost soon inform'd his Neighbours of it and call'd them together to rejoyce with him for it nay farther tho' I cannot think it too much to grant that the Saints in Heaven do not only intercede with God for the Church in general that he would be favourable and gracious unto Sion and vouchsafe to repair the Breaches in the Walls of Jerusalem but also that some of them at some Times on some Occasions which either an immediate Revelation from God himself or perhaps the Relation of a Guardian Angel or possibly a short Errand of their own discovers to them do as * Ep. ad Trall pag. 80. Vsser Edit Ignatius †De Orat. sect 34 Origen ‖ De Mortalit pag. 166. Ed. Oxon. Cyprian and ** Vid. Aug. Confess l. 9. c. 3. Basil Hom. 20. Ambros de obitu Theod. Hieron Ep. 25. others think they do Pray for some of us in particular yet since there is no certainty in this matter no Revelation to inform us when this is done or indeed whether it be so much as done at all we cannot from such pious Conjectures only infer with the Council of Trent that we ought to Pray to them or make them the Mediators between God and our selves especially since besides the Arguments already alledg'd God himself has expressly pronounc'd him Curs'd who thus trusteth in Man and maketh Flesh his Arm and whose Heart departeth from the Lord. All we are to do is to Praise and Magnifie the Name of God for them that he has been pleas'd of his gracious Goodness to deliver their Souls from the Burthen of the Flesh from the Waves and Storms of this tempestuous World and to land them safely on the peaceful Harbour of Eternity That he adorn'd and inrich'd them with his manifold Gifts and Graces whereby they are rendered as burning and shining Light to his Church in succeeding Generations This I say together with a Reverential Respect and study of Imitation is all we have to do upon their Account and This we are sure whatever the Trent Doctors determine was the only Inference the Primitive Church made from these Premises 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Honour says * Vid. tom 5. p. 625. Vid. Eus Hist Eccl. l. 4. c. 15. pag. 134 135. Aug. de Civit. Dei l. 8. c. 27. l. 22. c. 10. S. Chrysostom that we are to pay to the Martyrs is to strike the same Lines as those invincible Heroes have done to copy out their Fortitude and Magnanimity and with the like Chearfulness to lay down our Lives for the Lord's sake And so I come to my 3. Particular which is to shew That as this Assertion has no Foundation in Scripture nor Reason so neither has it the least Support from Antiquity Spiritus Defunctorum †De curâ pro mortuis says St. Austin non vident quaecunque eveniunt aut aguntur in istâ vitâ hominum i. e. The Spirits of the Saints departed do not know all things that are Acted upon the Stage of the World And * Ep. 3. de Epitaph Nepot St. Hierom speaking of his deceased Friend Nepotianus is more particular Quicquid dixero says he quia ille non audit mutum videtur quocum loqui non possumus de eo loqui non desinamus Whatsoever I shall say seems dumb and to no purpose because Nepotian does not hear me yet since we can no more speak with him let us be the longer in speaking of him I know the Fathers about the latter End of the Fourth Century in their Funeral and Anniversary Panegyricks of the Saints and Martyrs frequently use very elegant and affectionate Apostrophe's to them as tho' they suppos'd them present But the Popish Abusers of this innocent Custom would do well to consider that they most cautiously usher them in with If 's and And 's as in that †Orat. 1. cont Julian of Nazianzen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hear O thou Soul of the Renown'd Constantine if thou hast any sence or knowledge of these matters For every School-boy will tell them that this is only a Rhetorical Flourish a pleasing Strain of
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Singular Number and he says with St. Paul That what the Heathens thus sacrific'd they sacrific'd to Devils and not to God From all which put together it evidently appears That the thinking Sages of the Heathen World had a clear and distinct Idea of the Malignity of some Evil Spirits which we Christians know to be Apostate or Fallen Angels 2. These wicked and malignant Daemons are permitted to wander up and down in the Earth Minut. Felix tells us of Hosthanes whom he calls the First of the Magi that he deliver'd a tradition of some malignant Daemons which wander to and fro in the Earth and are Enemies to Mankind and both the Jews with most of the * Vide eruditissimum illum virum Josephum Mede l. 1. serm 4. Fathers of the four first Centuries and also the Pythagoreans and Platonists and other Sects have carried the Notion yet higher affirming that not only the whole Circumference of this Lower World but that likewise the several Regions of the Air and all that Space above the Globe of the Earth to the Face of Heaven is full of Daemons or Evil Spirits who serve under their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Prince and are commission'd and sent out by him to inveigle undiscerning Mortals into Ruin and Destruction Thus the great * Sect. 4. cap. 13. Patron of the Egyptian Mysteries does not hesitate to assert 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that without all Controversie these Spirits have a vast and almost unlimited Power over the Affairs of Men and in the Government of this World and therefore †Sect. 2. cap. 3 7. he indifferently calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Governours Rulers of this World who manage all Sublunary things as they please And indeed he seems here to stretch himself much beyond his Measure and not to speak like an undisciplin'd unilluminated Philosopher For the Saviour of the World himself who best knew what Power he had given to this Enemy of Mankind * Joh. 12.31 stiles him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Prince of this World and the great Apostle of the Gentiles advanceth yet farther expresly †2 Cor. 4.4 calling him the God of this World both which mighty Denominations sufficiently indicate that the Devil is more than a petty Prince in this World Nay in the sixth Chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians he delivers himself in such terms as seem to betray the Reading of the forecited Philosopher Put on says he the whole Armour of God that ye may be able to repell all the Temptations and Stratagems and to hold out against all the Assaults of your Adversaries for your Danger is great and your Enemies powerful you wrestle not against Flesh and Blood i. e. against any ordinary Human Enemies but against the several Ranks of Devils 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against Principalities against Powers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against the Rulers of the Darkness of this World against spiritual Wickedness or as the ‖ Grotium videas Hammondum Syriack reads wicked Spirits in high places Here as the Reverend and Learned Dr. Hammond observes Wicked Spirits in high places are distinguish'd from the Rulers of the Darkness of this World noting thereby several sorts of Devils either in respect of their Mansions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 aerial or earthly Spirits or else of the Inclinations which they suggest The Earthly Devils suggesting grosser carnal Appetites the Filthiness of the Flesh the Aerial Pride Vain-glory Malice and such like the Filthiness of the Spirit But from the Consideration of the destructive and implacable Temper of these Spirits of Darkness the truly Philosophical and most Thinking Pagans follow'd herein by some eminent and ancient * Vide Hermae Pastorem lib 2. mandat 6. Edit Ox. Christians have been induc'd to believe that every individual Person is not only the common Scope of their Envy and Malice but that as the Poet sings Quisque suos patitur manes every Man has likewise his peculiar Evil Angel which constantly attends him curiously observing his Faults and endeavouring by all Arts and Stratagems to ruine and destroy him Thus every Pythagorean had two Genii a Good one and a bad one the latter of which Olympiodorus calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Daemon which hales the Soul to Judgment and which he says follows her into this World against her Will whereas she chooseth her Good Genius to be her Leader and Guardian and as Plato speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Accomplisher of all her Desires Mahomet has adopted the same Doctrine into his Religion telling us withal That they sit on Mens Shoulders with Table-Books in their Hands and that the one writes down all the Good the other all the Evil a Man does But whatever we think of this certain it is That the Evil Spirits are not only permitted sometimes to tempt Men to bring Mischief upon themselves but that many of the Disasters and Calamities which are brought upon the World may also be attributed to the same pernicious Agents Jamblicus was very sensible of this and therefore he * Sect. 2. c. 7. calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 punishing or revenging Daemons and for the same Reason the †Gallaeum consulas ad calcem Orac. Sibyll Chaldaick Oracles stile them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Earthly Dogs and Executioners of Mankind ‖ De Abst l. 2 pag. 198 202. Porphyry is of the same Opinion ascribing the Miseries of Humane Life such as Plagues Famines Sterilities Earthquakes Droughts to no other Cause than the Malice of these Daemons and he is follow'd herein by Bodinus who attributes not only all prodigious Thunders Storms and Tempests but even your most ordinary Winds to Good or Bad Angels Now tho' I can by no means subscribe to him in this Latitude yet 't is sufficiently evident from the History of Job that as to the former Opinion both he and the other Philosophers are much in the right For * Cap. 1. there we find him both consuming the Good Man's Sheep and Servants with Lightning and also by a great and violent Wind from the Wilderness overturning the House upon his Sons and Daughters †Psal 78.49 Nay the Royal Psalmist puts the Case beyond all reasonable Doubt assuring us That the dreadful and tragical Scene of multiply'd Signs and Wonders in the Land of Egypt was acted by the Ministry of Evil Spirits He cast upon them says he the Fierceness of his Anger Wrath and Indignation and Trouble 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by sending Evil Angels among them And the Apostle seems to assert no less when he ‖ Eph. 2.2 calls the Devil the Prince of the Power of the Air. But as 't is certain that the Devil is permitted sometimes actually to tempt Men sometimes to amaze them only by the horrible Fragors of Storms and Tempests so likewise 't is evident that he is a Person capable of a
delegate Employment in some great Mutation of States and many Probabilities have been observ'd by wise Personages says the Excellent Bishop ††Great Exemplar pag. 100. Taylor perswading that the Grandeur of the Roman Empire was in the Degrees of Increment and Decrement permitted to the Power and Managing of the Devil that the Greatness of that Government being in all Appearance full of Advantage to Satan's Kingdom and employ'd for the Disimprovement of the weak Beginnings and improbable Increase of Christianity might give Lustre and Demonstration to it that it came from God since the great Permissions of Power made to the Devil and acted with all Art and Malice in Defiance of the Religion could produce no other effect upon it but that it made it grow greater and the Greatness was made more miraculous since the Devil when his Chain was off fain would but could not suppress it But perhaps it may be here objected That tho' we must confess that before the Mysterious Incarnation of the Son of God the Devil had such vast Dominions in the World that he seem'd actually to have possess'd what God promis'd to his Son even the Heathen for his Inheritance and the uttermost Parts of the Earth for his Possession yet since the Triumphant Ascension of our Blessed Saviour we cannot suppose without Contradiction to Sacred Writ that he now retains any at all since both * Joh. 12.31 Christ himself assures us that he hath cast him out and St. †Pet. 2.4 Peter expresly declares that they are cast down to Hell and deliver'd into Chains of Darkness to be reserv'd unto Judgment To this we answer Those bright Sons of the Morning which grew vertiginous through the Sublimity of Happiness and are most deservedly charg'd with Folly for leaving their own Habitations are indeed bound over to Eternal Pains and lie at present in a dark miserable and wretched Condition Where-ever they be they carry Hell in their Breasts and read in their Consciences the large Characters of Divine Vengeance consigning them over to Everlasting Woe and Misery But Yet we must needs acknowledge that 't is abundantly evident both from * Mat. 8.20 Mat 5.7 Luk. 8.31 Scripture and Reason That their present Punishment how dolorous and bitter soever will be much heightned and increas'd after the Great Day of Accounts so that tho' I will not deny but that as the School-men and other Divines of Latter â—iâ—es would have it many of these infernal Bands may be so closely committed to Prison that they are never permitted to make Excursions into the Earth yet on the other side we may dare to affirm that the All-wise God does often suffer great Troops and vast Multitudes of them to come abroad into this World either for the Trial of the Good or for the Punishment of the Bad or to be to us what the Remnant of the cursed Nations was to the sinful Israelites even Pricks in our Eyes and Thorns in our Sides And if we impartially consider neither this Text of St. Peter nor the parallel one of St. Jude do any thing evacuate or enervate this Assertion For if they must needs be understood to prove such an actual condemning of the Devil to Chains at present that he shall not come forth till hal'd to Judgment if I say the Sence of the Words must needs be this we cannot allow them by any means to be true For even when these Epistles where written which is suppos'd to have been a little before the Destruction of the Jews his Dominions were large and his Empire extensive He did not only work powerfully in the Children of Disobedience who were taken Captive by him at his Will but had also began to Lord it over God's own Heritage He was daily sowing Tares among the Wheat and endeavouring to choak the good Seed and to render it fruitless Like an hungry Lion he roar'd after the Prey and began to glut his Jaws with the Blood of the slain and upon this account the Apostle in my Text warns the Christians to watch and to be always upon their Guard against so potent and vigilant an Adversary Though therefore the victorious Saviour of the World hath utterly divested these Evil Spirits of their Power and made his Conquests over them publickly discernible to all Men by throwing them out of their Temples gagging and silencing them in their Oracles and so dragging as it were Principalities and all the Powers of Darkness shackled and unarm'd at the Wheels of his triumphant Chariot Though I say since the towring Roman Eagle which for many Ages had spread its all-conquering Wings over the trembling World submitted her self and gave place to the humble Sign of the Cross the Sound of the Gospel is gone out into all Lands and its Words unto the Ends of the World so that the Kingdoms of the World are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and almost all Nations do him Service yet Certain it is that the Devil is not yet totally banished out of this World For in the 23d Chap. of the Revelations and the 3d Ver. we have an account of a closer Imprisonment of Satan and so of his Regiments of Evil Spirits that shall be before the Worlds End than is yet for sthe present and 't is also manifest from the * Sozom. Hist l. 5. c. 19. p. 627. History of Primitive Times that after the Death Resurrection and Ascension of Christ he was still permitted to be in the World For even in the Times of Julian the Apostate we find his Oracle yet standing and 't was the constant Custom of the Church in the first Ages to excommunicate or as S. Paul phraseth it to deliver enormous and incorrigible Sinners to Satan as to a Lictor or Executioner who was wont to sift and shake them terribly and by inflicting Diseases and Torments upon the Body forc'd them to fly for Refuge to the Arms of their offended Father Now therefore we must indeed acknowledge with the †Rev. 12.9 10 Inhabitants of Heaven that Salvation and Strength and the Kingdom of our God and the Power of his Christ is come unto us for the great Dragon is cast out that old Serpent call'd the Devil and Satan which deceiv'd the whole World He is cast out of his Strong-holds and his Angels can no longer exercise their Tyranny in the Earth But yet he still sitteth lurking in the thievish Corners of the World and privily in his lurking Dens does he plot against the Innocent his Eyes are wholly set against the Saints Though his Hands are tied and he is bound to his Good-behaviour yet as an Explorator or Searcher for faults he goes up and down to and fro in the Earth I know there are some who will be ready to object That this Relaxation of Evil-Spirits from their dark houses of Sorrow can by no means consist with the Wisdom of God For since his Justice condemn'd them to unspeakable and Eternal Torments
't is next to Madness say they to suppose that he would suffer their Pains to receive any Diminution which yet the Hurt which according to this Position they are sometimes permitted to do to Mankind would certainly afford them But this seeming Contradiction will be easily reconcil'd if we consider that the like Argument may be urg'd as well against the Absence of good Angels from the Court of Heaven For since 't is piously believ'd on all hands that the Bless'd Inhabitants of those serene and peaceful Mansions are now the time of Probation being gone long ago fully and unalterably confirm'd in Happiness and Glory how can we imagine that their heavenly Father would be so unkind as to deprive them of the Beatifick Intuition of his interiour Beauties and as it were to banish his beloved Sons for a time from the Regions of Bliss And yet we need not be beholden neither to the Egyptians nor to the Platonists for the Confirmation of this Truth the Sacred History more than once assuring us if they do not constantly adhere to and inseparably accompany Good Men yet that they often descended to succour them in their Dangers and are also still 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ministring Spirits sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of Salvation Wherefore in Answer to this Objection we may consider That Kindness and Compassion are so twisted and interwoven as I may so say with the very Essences of these glorious Creatures that 't is Heaven to them to relieve and assist their Fellow-Servants here below which being joyn'd to that infinite Delight and Satisfaction which they undoubtedly receive in the Execution of the Divine Will makes abundant Recompence for the seeming Loss of that more plentiful Harvest of Joys which the Blessed reap in the Mansions above And on the other side The Evagation of Evil Spirits from their infernal Dungeon must rather afford them fresh Occasions of Torture than administer any true Solace or real Content For so fierce and implacable so insolent and outrageous so envious and Eternally malicious are these Sons of Perdition that it must needs be Death to them to be frustrated in their Designs and worse if possible than Hell it self to see their Plots and Machinations all defeated and unravell'd How then must they fret and tear their Bowels for Grief to find their weak Attempts trampled on in great Disdain and Triumph by the Regenerate Sons of Adam who dwell securely under the Defence of the Most High and abide continually under the Shadow of the Almighty To see themselves sunk into so low and despicable a condition that they are as light and contemptible as the Dust before the Wind whilst the Angels of the Lord persecute and Scatter them How must they be cloath'd with Shame and Dishoour and Confusion of Face to see those little Mists they endeavour'd to raise utterly dispers'd and vanish'd and the Glory of the Lord shining round about the World and appearing out of Sion in perfect Beauty But not to prosecute these Considerations any farther The bare dismal Apprehensions of that accumulated Punishment which after the Last Day they must certainly undergo for all the Evil they have done amongst Men are sufficient to counterpoise whatever accidentary Satisfaction they seem to receive upon the Earth I foresee but one Scruple more that may arise against this Discourse which is That supposing Men were very well dispos'd to believe all we have said yet those Antick ridiculous Circumstances which in the Narrations even of the gravest Personages do accompany many things of this nature strongly argue the Uncertainty of them all But to this 't will be sufficient to answer with the Learned and Judicious Dr. * Appendix to the Antidote against Atheism c. 12. par 3. More That the Conversation of Evil Spirits amongst us in this World ought to seem never the more incredible for those ludicrous Passages For 't is not at all disconsonant to Reason that such Daemons which have their Haunts near this lower Air and Earth are variously †Hanc opinor ob causam audiunt apud S. Lucam c. 4. v. 33. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 passim apud Ethnicos penates Lares Lamiae Empusae Fauni Satyri Lemures c. laps'd into the enormous Love and Liking of the Animal Life having utterly forsaken the Divine and that therefore there are such Passions and Affections in them as are in Wicked Men and Beasts and that some of them especially bear the same Analogy to an Unfallen Angel that an Ape or Monkey does to a Sober Man so that all their Pleasure is in unlucky ridiculous Tricks This I am sure is fully and clearly attested by * De Abst lib. 2. Porphyry †Orig. cont Cels l. 8. p. 417. l. 7. p. 334. Celsus Origen St. Basil or whoever else was the Author of that Commentary upon Isaiah and others Wherefore 3. I come to shew with what indefatigable Pains and various Stratagems they seek to Ruin Men and with what Cruelty they treat them when they are delivered up into their hands This sublunary Region indeed which Man inhabits is nothing else but a continued Scene of Changes and Revolutions All things in this natural World are subject to Ebbs and Flows and nothing is found in it that acts either uniformly or constantly But the Devil's Malice is of another Constitution it suffers no Intermissions no Vicissitudes but like that stock of Motion which that great Mechanical Wit Descartes supposeth the Universe at first endow'd with it continues always in the same proportion and is never intended or remitted For tho' he may act more fiercely at one time than at another yet certainly he pursues his Revenge in general with the same Earnestness and Vigour and always wills our Ruine in the same measure of Volition Hence it comes to pass that having once gain'd Permission to begin his Assault he like Fire has no Power to suspend his Act but is as entirely determin'd by the Fullness of his Malice as a Natural Agent by the Appetites of Nature Thus as though it had been a small thing to have caus'd infinite Numbers of the Heavenly Host to let fall their Crowns and to have swept away with his Tail the third part of the Stars of Heaven we find him in the way Infancy of the World nay if some say true in the same Day wherein Man was Created plotting and nontriving to ruin all Mankind in their Head And tho' 't is believ'd for very good Reasons that he could not with all his Art and Subtilty entice so much as the Impure and Debauch'd Posterity of Cain to Idolatry before the Flood yet we are too well assur'd that he laid the Foundations of his Empire very early in the World For Historians say that even in the time of Heber who was the fifth from Noah Idolatry began mightily to prevail these Hellish Impostors giving Answers through the Images which Men generally
all things made Visible and Invisible Those most glorious and exalted Sons of the Morning who when the Foundations of the World were laid sang melodiously together and shouted for Joy as well as the Beasts of the Field All Thrones Dominions Principalities and Powers in Heaven and Earth as well as the subordinate Classes of inferiour Beings and who still upholds them all by the Word of his Power This is the Person that comes to Save us Even He †Phil. 2.6 7. who subsisted in the Form or Nature of God and therefore thought it no Robbery but his inviolable Right to be Equal with God makes himself of no Reputation but takes upon him the Form or Nature of a Servant and is made in the Likeness of Men. Deus Humanâ visit sab imagine terras God himself I say even the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth Eternity and whose Name is Great Wonderful and Holy the Lord Jehovah with whom is Everlasting Strength in very deed bows the Heavens and comes down to dwell among Men. Well then might the officious Host of Heaven the Quires of Angels who long desir'd to see the Mystery of this Day usher in the Birth of this great Prince with Songs and Allelujahs Well might one of them cloath'd with the Brightness and Similitude of a Star call the Levantine Princes the great and Learned Magi as Emblems of his Future Conquests over the Princes and Learned Sages of the Heathen World to do him Obeisance and others wing'd with Joy and Triumph carry these glad Tidings to the humble Shepherds and send them likewise as the First-fruits of his own People to pay their Homage to their Lord. For had the heavenly Host been silent the Lowest Class of Beings the very senseless and inanimate Parts of impatient Nature had questionless found a Voice to have told us That unto us a Son was born unto us a Child was given whose Government is upon his Shoulders and whose Goings forth from Everlasting But now how miserable and wretched was our Captivity which the Arm of Omnipotence only could lead captive How thick and dismal the Darkness we were in which the irresistable Rays of the Sun of Righteousness only could disperse and scatter How weighty and insupportable that Wrath which nothing could appease but the adequate Condescensions of an Infinite Love Where were all those spotless Beauties of the Upper World Those kind compassionate Spirits who seem to make it a great Part of their Heaven to relieve us here below Where all those bright Squadrons of exalted Seraphims whose Names are renown'd and glorious for their transcendent Love in the Habitations of Men here as well as in the Mansions of Glory Could not these unstain'd pure and undefiled Images of our heavenly Father These faultless innocent and unblameable Beings who continually surround his Throne with Anthems of Praise intercede for and reconcile the offended Deity to Sinful Man No we were such heinous Offenders that nothing less than God himself could satisfie for our Faults These Blessed Spirits could only in strains of Sorrow lament our Fall and with a Pity and Concern commensurate to the passible Nature of such happy Beings expect the Final determination of Infinite Wisdom Goodness and Justice I know many Learned Men both Ancient and Modern are of Opinion That God might have pardon'd the Sins of Mankind without any Satisfaction made to his Justice Solo nutu jussu voluntate merely by the unexceptionable Prerogative of his Soveraign Will and Power and that 't was only to shew his great Concern for the Honour of his Laws and his everlasting Hatred and Detestation of Sin that he humbled his own Son to become a propitiation for it Far be it from me to intrench upon the Divine Omnipotence or impiously to say to his Goodness what himself does to the Sea Hitherto shalt thou come but no farther and here shall thy Operations be staid Yet I think we may venture to affirm that these Excellent Persons seem to be so enamour'd with the Beauty of that lovely Attribute his Mercy that they have hardly vouchsaf'd to cast so much as one glance upon his Justice Mercy I acknowledge is his Favourite his darling Excellence the very Flower and Beauty as I may so say of his Nature in which his Soul takes most Delight and Complacency And this consider'd alone might have remitted the whole Debt without any payment at all or at least have accepted the Satisfaction of an Angel But then I consider on the other hand that Justice is as Essential to him as Mercy and that as the one is infinite so is the other too Now Justice you know demands the whole Debt should be discharg'd and the Sinner not releas'd till he has one way or other paid the uttermost Farthing But which I pray of all the Angels is sufficient for these things or where shall we find amongst those Finite tho' glorious Beings a Saviour able to satisfie Infinite Justice for the Sins of the whole World The Blessed Jesus look'd and saw there was none to help and wonder'd there was no Intercessor therefore his own Arm brought Salvation to him and his Righteousness it sustain'd him What I say none of all Created Beings none of the heavenly Powers those Magisterial and Master-pieces of his Creation could Undertake the Son of God himself humbly descends from his Throne of Glory even down to his Foot-stool to perform and accomplish Welcome then thrice welcome Blessed Jesu into thine own World Welcome to the unhappy Dwellings of forlorn and helpless Man May the sense of thine infinite Love enlarge thy Dominions and cause all People Nations and Languages to rise up and call thee Blessed May all Nations whom thou hast made come and worship thee and glorifie thy Name For thou art Great and dost wonderous things thou art God alone Now then my Brethren let us not so ill requite this stupendous Condescension of the Son of God as to debase him as some impious and ungrateful Wretches do beneath the Condition he humbled himself unto Let us not I say for his infinite Love cast Dirt in his Face or because he vouchsaf'd to assume the Infirmities of Humane Nature despoil him as much as we can of the Glory and Majesty of the Divine Though his Beauty was benighted under a Cloud there was Form and Comeliness enough in him that we should desire him The unconverted * Joseph de Antiq. Jud. l. 18. c. 4. Jew himself will tell us that his Divinity like the Sun shining through a Cloud gave such Illustration and Testimony to all his Actions that 't was hardly lawful to call him a Man And now he has run his Race and finished his Course the Cloud is remov'd and the Mists all scatter'd before the prevailing Sun The Incarnate God shines forth in his full Glory and Triumph yea he is now altogether lovely 'T is the highest Repast of Angels and the peculiar Entertainment of
thus for knowing that none could call himself the proper and natural Son of God who must not assert himself likewise to be God and allowing him to be nothing more than a mere Man they again tax him with Blasphemy and go about to stone him I and my Father says our Lord are One. Then the Jews took up Sones again to stone him Jesus answer'd them Many good Works have I shew'd you from my Father for which of those Works do ye stone me The Jews answer'd him saying For a good work we stone thee not but for Blasphemy and because that thou being a Man makest thy self God The Jews I say in these places accuse him of calling himself the Son of God in the most proper Sense and consequently of making himself also very God And yet our Lord is so far from traversing the Indictment or reselling the Crimination that in Vers 38. he confirms their Logick and then leaves them in this Opinion which certainly he could never have done without infinite Derogation from the Honour of the Divine Majesty and downright blasphemy had he not really been what they apprehended he said he was the Proper Natural and Only Begotten Son of God Thus I say is the Divinity of our Lord put beyond all possibility of Distrust being preach'd to all the World by Angels Prophets and Apostles Proclaim'd more than once from Heaven by the God of all Truth the Eternal Father of Angels and men and also most positively asserted in a publick Assembly by our Lord himself who as the * 1 Pet. 2.22 Holy Ghost bears him witness did no Sin neither was guile found in his mouth What need we then My Brethren any farther witness Or how is it possible for any Man who rightly understands the weight of Divine Testimony to call it into Question Such Men as †Hist Eccles lib. 5. cap. 28. Eusebius has long since observ'd must be more wise than their Maker more knowing and more intelligent even than God that made them Those inspir'd and infallible Witnesses the Prophets and Apostles were not so knowing and the most intelligent of all the Heavenly Spirits the Cherubims themselves if compar'd to them are found wanting The Church of Christ in all Ages has unhappily been overspread with the thick uncomfortable darkness of Ignorance and Error and These Men alone have had the inestimable Privilege of enjoying the happy Goshen the Dwellings of Light the glorious Habitations of Wisdom and Knowledge For if after the complicated irrefragable Testimony of so many Infallible Witnesses the Belief and Confession of the Church be requir'd in this Matter She has in all Ages believ'd and confess'd it This is that Faith says the * Concil Paris tom 1. pag. 844. Synod of Antioch which we have receiv'd from the Beginning and which the holy Catholick Church preserves pure and undefil'd having deriv'd it by a constant and uninterrupted Succession even unto this Day from the Blessed Apostles themselves And †Videas Bulli Defensionem Fidei Nicenae Whitbit tractatum de verâ Christi Deitate sect 2. some truly excellent and Learned Divines of our own have shewn at large the Truth of this Assertion from the particular Writings and Monuments of the Primitive Fathers who as well before as after the Council of Nice with one Heart and one Voice confess and maintain the Divinity and Eternal Generation of the Son of God These well-grounded and pious Souls could not be laugh'd or ridicul'd by the Scoffs and Jeers the Taunts and Sarcasms of their Learned and witty Adversaries nor frighted by the severest Appearances of Torture and Persecution out of their Trust and Confidence in the Holy Jesus but notwithstanding all the Imputations of Folly and Madness from an invidious Trypho a scoffing Lucian a virulent Celsus and a malicious Julian they continually call'd upon him in the time of Trouble and as * Epist l. 10. Ep. 97. Pliny tells Trajan sang Praises to him as to the God of their Salvation Neither did they only thus bravely contend for the Faith against the violent Incursions of the wild Boar out of the Forest the Menaces and blasphemous Assaults of their profess'd Enemies the Jews and Gentiles but also were infinitely careful to secure it from the Wiles and Stratagems of the little Foxes those false Teachers that crept in amongst them and under the specious Pretences of Reason and Revelation continually endeavour'd to spoil the Lords Vineyard No sooner did any Heretick dare to impugn or invalidate this Doctrine but he was immediately disown'd by all the Faithful and Anathematiz'd or cast out of the Church as a ravenous Wolf who design'd only to devour and tear in pieces the Lord's Flock which is demonstratively Evident from that Class of Hereticks Ebion Theodotus Artemon Paulus Samosatenus and Photinus In short Socinus himself confesseth that the whole Stream of Antiquity runs against him and that of all the Primitive Fathers and Councils there is not so much as one that any way countenanceth his Opinion So that you see from all hands that unless with a truly Satanical Pride we exalt our selves above all that is called God and flatly give Heaven and Earth God Angels and pious Men the Lye to their face and side only with Jews Turks and Pagans we must acknowledge the Blessed Jesus to be in very deed no other than the Only-Begotten Son of the Most High the Maker of All things the King of Glory Alpha and Omega the First of Beings and the Last of Ends which is and which was and which is to come the Almighty Thus then does the Greatness of our Salvation appear from the Greatness and Majesty of the Person undertaking it It does so 2. From the Greatness and Unconceivableness of those Sufferings whereby he did accomplish it Some indeed lessen the Sufferings of our Lord by thinking he had the Comprehension of Blessedness the Supports of actual Glory in the midst of all his Torments that even then he did behold the Face of God and communicate in Glory But in answer to Men of these Thoughts I consider with the Excellent Bishop * Great Exemplar pag. 413 414. Taylor 1. That though the two Natures of Christ were knit by a mysterious Union into one Person yet the Natures still retain'd their incommunicable Properties so that as the Divine Nature could not by vertue of this Union derive upon it self the Infirmities of the Humane so neither did the Humane partake in all Instances of the Felicities of the Divine these indeed being essentially in God but to Man communicated without Necessity and by an arbitrary Dispensation Tho' therefore as God he is omniscient and knows every thing yet that as Man he was ignorant as many things seeking Fruit upon the Fig-tree when the time of Figs was not come and telling us himself that he knew not the Day nor the Hour when he should judge the World and therefore being said to have
Reflections upon the inestimable Happiness of Good Men in the other World he in the very last Words dash'd all with an open undisguis'd Acknowledgment of his remaining Doubts and Jealousies Sub finem Apol. apud Platonem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Could I be assur'd says he a little before of the Reality of this Blessed State I would gladly die a thousand times over to enjoy it But now my Judges the time of my Departure is come 'T is your Lot to live and mine to die which of these two is the Better 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a thing utterly unknown to any but God alone In short Dicaearchus Democritus Epicurus and their Followers as constantly as positively declare That there is no Subsistence of the Soul after this Life but that when the Body returns to Dust she immediately relapseth into the bottomless Abyss of Annihilation and Darkness And then for the Jews at the time of our Saviour's Coming they stood much upon the same Level For though from the Translation of Enoch and Elias and the Death of their Patriarchs who never inherited the Promises of Temporal Felicity and particularly that of Moses which their Rabbins are pleas'd to call The Kiss of God's Mouth intimating thereby that he breathed out his Soul by the Force and Energy of Contemplation without those Pains and Convulsions which are the usual Concomitants of the Death of other Men resolving himself into the Embraces of his Maker From the positive and express Words of Job which however some Modern Commentators are pleas'd to understand them are I conceive with S. Hierom and the Ancients as plain and clear a Confession of the Resurrection as any that have been made since the Promulgation of the Gospel From the glorious Confession of that excellent Woman and her seven Children in the Maccabees who all refus'd Deliverance that they might obtain a better Resurrection and from those many Promises of Eternal Life scatter'd up and down in the Book of Psalms and other Writings of the Old Testament Though I say from all these one might reasonably expect the Jews should have had some fuller and clearer Knowledge of the State after Death yet being no part of that Covenant which if strictly considered as made with that People at Mount Sinai was founded only upon Temporal Promises Peace Long Life Plenty and Prosperity in their own Land they had generally no other Effect than that they were believ'd to be the Reward of Men of Heroick and Extraordinary Piety Nay their unaccountable Blindness and Unattention to the Faith and Manners of their Fathers who did all eat the same spiritual Meat and did all drink the same Spiritual Drink as we Christians do occasion'd so many Cavils and Disputes amongst them that the Sadduces peremptorily deny'd it not only decrying the Resurrection of the Dead but affirming likewise with the foremention'd Epicureans that the Souls of Men did perish together with the Body And tho' the Pharisees on the contrary confess'd it yet their Notions of it as Josephus himself * Antiq. Jud. l. 18. c. 2. who was one of them tells us were no better than those of Fairy-Land or Elysian Dreams Delicious Dwellings flowery Fields Crystalline Rivers and beautious Trees of Gold under whose delightful shade they should play and toy away a whole Eternity with fair and amorous Virgins was the utmost Heaven they could or car'd to imagine and therefore the Sadduces so often foil'd and buffled them with that Argument of the Woman and her seven Husbands which they thought to be so conclusive that but with different Success they attack'd likewise with it our Saviour himself But now the Veil is taken off by Christ and we behold the Glory of the Lord with open Face For this says the Apostle is the Promise that he has promis'd us even Eternal Life A Life not of sensual and brutish Pleasures not a Paradise of all Filthiness and Debauchery whereby the Epileptick Impostor has likewise impos'd upon his Followers but a Life of perfect Purity and Holiness a Life of immaterial spiritual abstracted Joys of chaste and rational Delights where our Nature shall be entirely conform'd to the Divine made like to God and we enjoy an endless and uninterrupted Communion with our Maker This he has promis'd and of this he has given us Assurance all the Assurance the thing is capable of in that he has not only rais'd himself from the Dead but call'd likewise some of our Brethren already out of the Grave and taken them up with him in their glorious Bodies to enter before-hand upon the Possession of this promis'd Inheritance So that we may boldly say with the Apostle We know for certain and are fully assured that if this earthly house of our Tabernacle be dissolved we have a Building of God an House not made with hands eternal in the Heavens Thus has the Sun of Righteousness dispell'd all those Clouds of Ignorance and Darkness which overspread the whole World at his Rising and brought Life and Immortality to perfect Light thro' the Gospel Which must certainly be acknowledg'd to be a very great Salvation if we consider in the next place that he has hereby rescu'd us from that base and slavish Fear of Death by reason of which we had otherwise been all our life-time subject to Bondage 6. Now how unwelcome soever Death must be to those Men to whom 't is therefore all Terror before because all Darkness behind who are therefore dismay'd at his Approach because they know not the Consequences of this King of Terrors 't is impossible that Person should immoderately fear Death who considers that 't is only a Passage from this Wilderness to the true Canaan the Rest above that flows with Milk and Honey with Innocence and Happiness for ever who knows that the Death of the Saints is not total but that as in the Ceremony of Purification from Leprosie one Bird was kill'd the other let fly into the open Air the mysterious Shadow of the Lepers being restor'd to a state of Liberty so when the Body dies and returns to the Earth the Spirit is freed from the Clogs of Mortality and returns with Songs of Joy and Triumph in its mouth to the Object of its Happiness the God that gave it Nay the faithful Christians the true Lovers of Jesus who have tasted the Goodness of the Lord and long consider'd and well weighed the incomparable Difference between the mean imperfect frail Felicities of this present World and the substantial solid immutable Glories of that which is to come must certainly cry out with the inflamed * Cant. 1.4 Spouse Draw us and we will run after thee O! loosen our Affections from this World that we may readily ascend to thee Their longing Souls will renew the passionate Sighs of the Exil'd Prophet O when shall we come and appear before the presence of God! How welcome must Death be to them when it comes as it were with
Certainly no. The Lame and the Blind says the Prophet such impotent Mal. 1.8 imperfect Services if offer'd to an Earthly Governour would most assuredly be rejected much less then can they be grateful â—o him who is the Fountain of all Dominion and Soveraignty the Lord of Lords and King of Kings who reigns to all the Ends of the Earth The matchless Excellency of his Nature as many Learned Pagans have observ'd calls for our best and noblest Performances neither will he accept of any thing less than the Cream the Flower and Strength of our Reason We must nor pretend to honour him with our Lips when our Hearts are far from him but always approach him with the deepest Awe Reverence and Admiration love and desire him as an exact and learned †Mr. Norris in his Reas and Rel. pag. 39. Author speaks with the full Bent and Spring of our Souls and fix and concenter upon him all our Passions and Affections The Armies of Heaven the glorious Troops of Angels serve him thus Their Wings know no weariness from continual Flying their Voices are never hoarse through loud and constant Allelujahs but with unconceivable Alacrity and Joy they sing and fly and do his Will to all Eternity 'T is true our present Incumbrances are many our Wings are clipp'd and we cannot run so nimbly as these bright Favourites of Heaven yet such is the Nature of our Souls that even in this unhappy state of Degeneracy they may arrive to many degrees of their Bâ—…ness and Alacrity 'T is impossible 〈◊〉 we should love and praise our Maker 〈◊〉 these Spirits do who with open Face behold his unfolded and essential Gloâ—… yet may our Spirits if they are not wanâ—ing to themselves regain in a great measure their heavenly Nature and Activity They need not be so oppress'd with the weight of the Body not so confin'd to these Walls of Clay but that they may frequently â—o abroad recover upon the Wing mount into a purer Air far above the â—ttractions and Enchantments of Sense and converse freely with God And so I come to my Second Consideration which is to represent to you the Reasonableness of the Exhortation contain'd in the Text from the Nature of our own Souls 2. Sad indeed and deplorable are the Decays of our Primitive Beauty and lamentable the Ruins of our Original Frame God made Man upright his whole Constitution was beautiful and harmonious and his Soul drawn as it were by the central Force of her native Seat mov'd naturally towards Heaven But if we view him in his present Condition Quantum mutatus ab illo est how is this glorious Creature changed Clouds and Darkness if I may so speak are continually round about him Confusion and Disorder are the Habitation of his Seat His Understanding is dark and cloudy his Will crooked and perverse and he is become a strange Contradiction to himself being not able to do the things that he would Wars and Tumults intestine Broils and Commotions ruffle and discompose him and there is a Law in his Members impetuously fighting against and frequently bringing into Captivity the Law of the Mind But though the Soul is thus shamefully fallen from her Primitive State of Excellency and Perfection yet how glorious is she still in comparison of all the Creatures that are round about her The glimmering Remains of her original Beauty the very Twilight of her native Lustre and Brightness appears so wonderful and dazling that she is still but a few degrees below the Angels of God How swift are her Motions how nimble her Thoughts how brisk and active her Operations and Reflections The swiftest Morning-Ray passeth not so soon from East to West as she flies through all the Airy Regions into the highest Heavens and thence again descends through all the Ethereal Plains to contemplate in their various Mansions the Workmanship of her Maker How exalted are her Aspirations how boundless her Desires how vastly large and comprehensive her Capacities She weighs all the Excellencies of Nature in a Balance and finds them wanting her Appetites and Inclinations being no more to be satisfied with any Created Good than an hungry Stomach with wise Sayings or excellent Diagrams But now has God enrich'd our Minds with these noble Powers to prosecute the Delights or Interests of this World and to bestow some fashionable and perfunctory Attendance only on his Service and Obedience No these vast capacious Spirits that can take in and lodge so many Truths together without Confusion or Disorder that are so restless and indefatigable in their Search after Happiness and can no where acquiesce or terminate their Desires upon any Created Good are design'd for the highest and most exalted Entertainments Not for these disproportionate Objects of Sense the faeculent Pleasures of the Body which the contracted Faculties of Brutes are able even in their utmost Intention to comprehend but for Joys truly Angelical and Divine for Communion and Fellowship with God himself by Prayers and Praises here and for the most intimate Fruition of his Beatifick and Essential Glories in Heaven hereafter How unworthily then do we behave our selves towards them when we decoy them down into earthly Enjoyments How do we cramp and streighten their Faculties contract and lessen their aspiring Strength and Vivacity Their natural Motion you see is towards Heaven and they grasp at nothing less than Glory and Honour and Immortality Let us not then confine them to the Earth when they are ready to take Wing and fly towards Heaven Let us not enslave them to poor and beggarly Objects when their Capacities dispose them for the Fruition of the Best Being the Life of Angels When through the Assistances of Religion they are advanc'd to their true Elevation they 'll immediately ascend above the Magnetism of secular Entertainments They will then be possest with such lively and ravishing Apprehensions of the Divine Beauty as will oblige them for his sake utterly to discard and renounce all their other Loves Though there be threescore Queens and fourscore Concubines and Virgins without number yet their Love their Undefil'd will be but one In a word They 'll collect and concenter all the scatter'd Rays of their Affections into this one Point delight and solace themselves only in the Lord their God and sing and give Praise to him with Fervour and Alacrity as the Angels do who joyfully wait his Call and stand with Wings stretch'd out ready to fly when he commands 3. I am to represent to you the Reasonableness of the Exhortation contain'd in the Text from the Consideration of the transcendent and inestimable Value of the Rewards that attend us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We are engag'd says the Philosopher in a great Conflict a Divine Enterprize 't is for a Kingdom and for Liberty for the Liberty even of the Sons of God and for the Kingdom of Heaven As we were not redeem'd by corruptible things such as Gold Silver or precious Stones
a Prison before the Tribunal of Christ and hear the just Sentence of Eternal Death more solemnly pronounc'd against them before the General Assembly of the Saints and Angels This I say is the deplorable and undone Condition of the Apostate Angels Their Fall is irrecoverable their Sin irremissible and the Decree that is gone out against them irreversible But Man tho' a Being of a much lower Class and an Apostate too finds Favour and Mercy at the hands of his God He vouchsafes him the liberty of Second Thoughts and if we will but be obedient and hearken promiseth an entire Renovation of his Corrupted Nature by the abundant and powerful Communications of his most Holy Spirit Nay so desirous is he of this happy Change that he long prostitutes his Patience as I shall instantly shew more at large to Mens wanton Humours in Expectation of it is contented to lay aside his amazing Glories and seems to divest and strip himself of all his Attributes save that of Mercy His All-seeing Eye graciously overlooks our manifold Sins and Wickednesses and as tho' he saw them not continues to shine upon us with its reviving Brightness His Justice gives way to his Forbearance and Long-suffering and when it takes place 't is so temper'd and qualify'd that in the midst of Judgment he always remembers Mercy Mercy is his Favourite his darling Excellence that lovely and amiable Attribute which is over all his Works and in which we are sure his Soul takes most Delight and Complacency 'T was by this Name he in the Presence and Assembly of his invincible Holy Ones upon Mount Sinai most solemnly proclaim'd himself to his Servant Moses The Lord Exod. 34.6 says he the Lord God merciful and gracious Nay tho' he is the God of all Truth and therefore can no more deceive than be deceived yet as though it had been a small thing thus to have proclaim'd himself before Men and Angels he has likewise in a gracious and wonderful Condescension to the Infirmities of his Creatures and that the broken and contrite Spirit might have the surest Word of Promise that could possibly be given it vouchsaf'd even to interpose his Oath and as solemnly to swear the same thing As I live saith the Lord God Ezek. 33.11 I have no pleasure in the death of the Wicked but that the Wicked turn from his way and live Turn ye turn ye from your evil ways for why will ye die O house of Israel What tender what compassionate Strains are these 'T is as if he had said Since there is no Being so great as my self by my self I have sworn that as sure as I am God that eternal and faithful Being with whom is no Variableness or Shadow of Turning I desire not the Death of any Sinner but had rather ten thousand times over that you would all from the least to the greatest hear my Voice in this Accepted Time this day of Salvation and repent and be sav'd For now do I freely offer you my Grace which I most passionately beseech and intreat you to accept and to return and live Turn ye then turn ye unto me for why will ye die Why will ye weary me out with your continued Provocations Why will ye constrain me by your unworthy and most wretched Abuses of my Grace your insufferable Grievings of my Spirit at length to depart from you and to leave you to die in your Sins Is Eternal Death so desirable a thing Is Heaven and my Glory so despicable and vile Why then let me ask you again since you have my free Grace to enable you to Return nay since 't is far easier for you to be saved than to be damned why why will ye die O house of Israel Thus does our Heavenly Father by the most solemn Protestations demonstrate his Everlasting Love and Kindness to Mankind And how exactly do all his Dispensations correspond with these his gracious Declarations With what Patience I say and Forbearance does he deal even with the greatest of Sinners How affectionately intreat them to fly into the Harbour and to secure themselves by a timely Reformation from the Wrath which is to come Such various Ways and Methods does he contrive to bring them to Repentance so earnestly beg and sollicite them to accept in time the Terms of Salvation that one would think 't was his own not their Interest that Men should be sav'd He always like a generous Enemy declares Sinners his just Anger and Displeasure and excites them before it be too late to prepare to Meet him and with Weapons which will most certainly prevail viz. Prayers and Tears to disarm his Justice Thus when within the small compass of about two thousand years his gracious and marvellous Works of Creation and Providence were so far from being prais'd and had in Honour that all Flesh had degenerated from this great End of its Creation and most shamefully corrupted its way upon the Earth tho' he was griev'd to speak after the manner of Men at the very Heart and it repented him that he had made Man yet he could not immediately withdraw his Hand and let him fall into Ruine but mercifully prolong'd the day of Vengeance and gave his sinful Creatures time and space for Repentance He resolv'd indeed that the Spirits which he had made should not Eternally remain in their Bodies as Slaves and Vassals to those Instruments of Unrighteousness but that if Men repented not he would open the Windows of Heaven and break up the Fountains of the great Deep and bring in a Flood upon them that should sweep them all away But before he can do this Noah a Preacher of Righteousness must daily assure them of their Danger and he waits their Repentance a hundred and twenty Years Thus too tho' the Sins of Sodom and Gomorrah were very grievous and cryed loud and the Cry of them ascended up into the Ears of the Lord of Sabbaoth yet could not they prevail with him to let loose his Thunder to overwhelm them with a swift and deserv'd Destruction but on the contrary to prevent if possible their Ruine he by his good Providence so order'd and dispos'd things that Lot a holy and pious Person living amongst them should first lay before them their prodigious Impieties and warn them to prevent the heavy Judgments due to them by a speedy Repentance And when notwithstanding all this they sinned yet more and forc'd his Holy Spirit to forsake them utterly by their intolerable Fornications yet would not his Goodness then give him leave to execute upon them the Fierceness of his Indignation but still stay'd his hand and engag'd him to be gracious As though 't was possible for him to be deceiv'd it induc'd him to make a further Enquiry to go down and see whether they had indeed done altogether according to the Cry of it which was come unto him Nay tho' their Sins and Provocations were so many and so great yet so much
ready to here and assist us But I answer 1. That this Opinion of Abraham and Israel's being in Limbo only and not in Heaven it self before the Resurrection of our Lord is groundless and unwarrantable Elias we are sure was translated into Heaven and we know likewise that Moses came down with him from that place to commune with our Lord upon the Mount But if these his Sons were thought worthy before the Resurrection of our Lord to be admitted into those blissful Mansions why Abraham the Father of the Faithful and the Peculiar Friend of God Why Isaac and Israel and the other Patriarchs and Prophets who were all Heirs of the same most holy Faith should be excluded I know not But supposing this Opinion was really as true as they would have it and that we could not deny what you see we have all the Reason in the World to deny but that the Saints before the Resurrection of our Lord lay only in Limbo but are now in Heaven yet that being there they have a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion is I answer in the 2. Place a most unphilosophical false and impious Assertion that has no Foundation in Scripture Reason or Antiquity 1. It has no Foundation in Scripture Now to pray after any other manner than what Christ himself hath taught us is not only Ignorance but Sin says * De Orat. Domin pag. 139. Ed. Oxon. St. Cyprian But what one place is there I ask in all his Scriptures that demands this of us which of all his Apostles Evangelists or Prophets doth allow that any of the Saints departed should be invok'd by us Bannes a Learned Dominican ingenuously confesseth that he knows not of any His Words are as express and full as can be Orationes ad Sanctos faciendas nequè etià m expressè nequè involute Scripturae docent i. e. that 't is our Duty to Pray to the Saints the Scriptures do neither explicitely nor implicitely inform us And those of his own Profession have never yet been able to shew that he is in an Errour 2. This Assertion has no Foundation in Reason For if the Saints in Heaven have a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion then this Knowledge of theirs is owing either 1. To their own Ubiquitary Presence by vertue of which they see and hear all our Words and Actions as some of our Adversaries affirm Or 2. As others with the like Boldness To their Perspicacity and Clear-sightedness whereby they are able to discern our very Thoughts and Intentions Or 3. To the constant and faithful Relations of daily-ascending Saints and Angels as a Third more modestly Or 4. As most To the Vision of the Divine Essence which they call Speculum Trinitatis But all these ways are ridiculous and absurd and some of them impious For 1. The Saints in Heaven have not a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion because they are every where present and so see and hear all our Words and Actions Heaven indeed is God's Throne and the Earth is his Foot-stool The Heaven of Heavens cannot contain him but he fills all Places both in Heaven and Earth and the imaginary Space too beyond the Limits of Both he is a God near at hand to us all to those that abide in the Continent and that remain in the broad Sea and also that live afar off in the Ends of all the Earth In a word tho' he cannot be circumscrib'd or included in any Place yet by his Immensity he is so every where present as not to be excluded out of any so that we may all of us at one and the same time pour out our Prayers before him with full Assurance of being heard But now 't is quite otherwise with all Created Beings Creation necessarily implies Limitation so that 't is as great a Contradiction to say That the Essence or Virtue of a Created Being can be Boundless or Infinite as that a Self-Existent Independent Being can be Finite Every Abstracted Spirit therefore since Created tho' rais'd to the utmost degree of its Perfection is but Finite and consequently as that great Patriarch of the Roman Schools * Sum. Part. prim Quaest 52. Art 2. Aquinas himself confesseth non se extendit ad omnia sed ad aliquid unum determinatum tho' it may as it pleaseth be sometimes in a greater sometimes in a lesser place yet it is so far from being able to extend it self to all places that 't is always necessarily and unavoidably but in one Non est ubique nec in pluribus locis sed in uno loco tantùm as he speaks again in the same Paragraph Great then only is the Lord and greatly to be praised because there is no End of his Greatness 2. The Saints in Heaven have not a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and so are become the Objects of our Devotion from their Perspicacity or Clear-sightedness whereby they are able to discern our very Thought and Intentions This is plain from the Argument immediately foregoing For since according to the Laws of Creation the Saints are all limited and circumscrib'd in their Essences and Perfections it must necessarily be granted that they are likewise limited and circumscrib'd in their Science or Knowledge it being impossible for any Being but such as is Immense and fills all Places to know the different Concerns of all the several Beings residing and acting in those different Places God then alone since it appears that he only is Omnipresent must be acknowledg'd to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Searcher of the Hearts In him indeed do our Souls and Bodies live move and have their Beings He understands our Constitution knows whereof we are made the Composition as I may so say of our very Essences and therefore discerns all the Motions and Operations of our Souls In short 'T is his Prerogative alone to be about our Paths and about our Beds in our Hearts and in our Spirits and consequently to spy out all our Ways Whence it likewise appears in the 3. Place That the Saints in Heaven have not a particular entire and perfect Knowledge of all things that are done in Heaven and Earth and consequently of all the Circumstances Concerns Occurrences and Affairs of every Man's Life and
Eloquence taken up by Orators in expressing their own and moving the affections of others but never us'd by any as a Form of Prayer or a Mode of addressing their Devotions to the Deceas'd But we need not seek far for the Sence of Antiquity in this Matter The Fathers have sufficiently declar'd their Opinion in their Controversie with the Arians These Hereticks divested the Blessed Jesus of his Divinity diminish'd and degraded him into a mere Creature and yet held it lawful to pay him Religious Worship This tho' the Arians declar'd they worship'd him only with an inferiour degree of Worship parallel to what our Adversaries now call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or that Degree which is peculiar only to the Supreme God was universally abhorr'd and detested by the Fathers who look'd upon it as an impious Restauration of Pagan Idolatry 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Athanasius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Why do not these Arians since they are of this Opinion descend into the Class of the Unbelieving Gentiles for they are all guilty of one and the same kind of Idolatry Worshipping the Creature besides the Creator But now if the Arians were thus peremptorily condemn'd by the Fathers for Idolatry because they worshipp'd the Blessed Jesus tho' but with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as they suppos'd him to be a Creature then how is it possible for our Adversaries to escape the same Condemnation who pay the same degree of worship to those we all know to be Creatures The Arians suppos'd the Son of God to be a Creature but were in the wrong and therefore tho' Formally Idolaters according to their own mistaken Hypothesis yet were they not Materially and Really so But these Men know for certain that the Saints they worship are indeed but Creatures and therefore are as well Materially as Formally Idolaters The Arians worshipp'd the Son indeed as a Creature but then not as an Ordinary Inferiour Creature but as the first the most glorious and the most excellent of all Creatures by whom as an Instrument all the others were made and yet were found Guilty How then shall these Men escape who worship in the same manner these ordinary Inferiour Beings whom we all know to be the Workmanship of his hands as he is God But tho the Saints are to have no part or share in our Devotions yet may we not humbly present our petitions before the Exalted Thrones of Angels and Archangels The Saints indeed were Persons of like Passions with our selves they had their Slips and Miscarriages here upon Earth and now in Heaven still bear the Marks and Badges of their Sins being depriv'd of half of themselves their Bodies But these Blessed indefective Spirits are the First-born Sons of the Heavenly King the most Correct and Amiable Patterns of his Essential Purity and Holiness and certainly he expects we should peculiarly honour them whom himself in so especial a manner delights to honour Honour them indeed we will and in the way most becoming such glorious and Exalted Beings We will endeavour to copy out their heavenly Vertues to transcribe their Heroick Exellencies and to live like Angels here that we may for ever live with them hereafter But to pray to them to invoke them to implore their Aid and Assistance in the time of our Need is what neither they desire nor we can give 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 see not Rev. 19.10 and 22.9 was the Heavenly Messengers abrupt and hasty prohibition to St. John when dazzled and overcome by his Extraordinary Glory he would erroneously have worshipp'd him for his Adorable Master and he that dares do this holds not the Head says * Col. 2.19 St. Paul but vainly pust up by his fleshly Mind degenerates as the whole Laodicean †Vid. Balsamon Canon p. 841. Council in its thirty fifth Canon truly declares into the Abominable and Sacrilegious Rites of the Idolatrous Jews and Gentiles For whatever Fig-leaves Men may sew together to cover their Nakedness withal 't is most certain that they who in these Nations worshipp'd their Baalim their Daemons or Angels most did it upon the very same Principles as our Adversaries do at this day The ‖ Vid. Plat. sym Apul. de Daemon Socrat. Grotium in 2. cap. Ep. ad Col. v. 18. Pythagoreans ‖ Vid. Plat. sym Apul. de Daemon Socrat. Grotium in 2. cap. Ep. ad Col. v. 18. Platonists and other Learned Heathens will answer for themselves and the Rabbins as they are cited at large by the learned ‖ Intell. Gust p. 468 469. Cudworth for both Jews and Gentiles that they were always so far from thinking by such worship to derogate any thing from the Honour of the Lord Jehovah whom tho' under different Names they all equally acknowledge to be the Common Father of Gods and Men that they did verily believe he was highly pleas'd at that sort of Worship which they gave these his Extraordinary Ministers the Honour redounding chiefly to himself that made them and also that he accepted their Humility who duly sensible of their own Vileness and Unworthiness dar'd not to approach his awful Majesty without the Introduction of such mighty Favourites such Beloved Mediators And yet notwithstanding these so specious Pretences our * Rom. 1. Apostle expressly declares of the Gentiles that when they knew God they glorify'd him not as God but were therefore vain in their Imaginations because they worshipp'd the Creatures tho' not as so many Supreme Independent Beings but only as Mediators of Intercession 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Besides the Creator and the Prophets continually bait the Jewish Church for these things with the soul and odious Name of Whore Prostitute Whore and Abominable Harlot So that you see 't is the peculiar Honour the incommunicable Prerogative of the Son of God as the Learned †Orig. cont Cels l. 5. p. 233. l. 8. p. 382.384.395 Father peremptorily and frequently inculcates to be our Mediator to receive our Devotions and to intercede for us at the Right hand of the Father Prayer then shall be made only unto him and daily shall he be prais'd He is the way the Truth and the Life and no man can come unto the Father but by Him As in the Earthly Tabernacle the High-Priest only entered into the most Holy Place beyond the Veil there to be an Agent with God for the People so our only High-Priest the Blessed Jesus has therefore by his own blood entred into the Holy of Holies the Heavenly Tabernacle that there he may appear in the Presence of God for us He is that Angel with the golden Censer who offers the Incense the Prayers of the Saints upon the golden Altar before the Throne that Angel of the Presence that Messenger of the Covenant who is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him Tho' therefore there be as the Learn'd * 1 Cor.
are hardly enough to entertain him Now then my disconsolate Brother who would not rather thus cause Joy to the Blessed Choires above by a sincere and hearty Repentance than by a Sullen unwarrantable Despair please the profess'd Enemies of God and Man the Spirits of Darkness Who I say would not rather by a timely Repentance be the occasion of a Jubilation and Festival both in Heaven and Earth than by causing Grief in both delight the sullen and destructive Powers of the Kingdom of Darkness A Jubilation I say in Heaven and Earth too For see thy Mother the Church is highly concern'd for thee she mourns and laments thy unhappy State and daily offers up Prayers and Tears for thy Recovery She longs to see thee come boldly into her Courts there with all her faithful Sons and Daughters to worship the God of our Joy and Gladness and to sing merrily and to make a chearful noise unto the God of Jacob. Let then the Prayers and Tears of thy afflicted Mother let the Hearty Concern and passionate Wishes of the kind Spirits above let the most gracious and tender Promises of Pardon which Truth it self has made thee work thee out of this groundless this unaccountable State of Despondency Thou must not thou can'st not surely after all this despair Thy Saviour tells thee thou art not thine own but His. He made thee at first when thou wast nothing and when thou wast lost and worse than nothing He Redeem'd thee too with his own blood and most solemnly swears he would not have thee perish Wilt thou not then believe Him who hath done so many and great things for thee Wilt thou not believe Him who could even bleed and die for thee If any Man of known Integrity had given thee his word thou wouldst not Scruple to believe him How then can'st thou thus affront thy God who cannot lye by thy Infidelity when he not only says but also swears he would have thee live O! do not do not thus evacuate all the gracious Methods the Heavenly Father is pleas'd to use for thy Recovery Do not thus foolishly exclude thy self from Happiness when God does not exclude thee Alas Thy God is Omnipotent and can most easily perform all his Promises and therefore he needs not deceive thee He is good and gracious and therefore he will not deceive thee With him is no Variableness or shadow of Turning but he is the same yesterday to day and for ever and therefore he cannot deceive thee Obey then his gracious Call come to him throw thy self into his Arms prostrate thy self with all due Humility at his feet offer to him thy broken and contrite Spirit beg him to accept thee who never yet refus'd any and he will most gladly receive thee Tho' thou art never so heavy-laden he will give thee Rest He will ease thee of thy burthen he will pardon thy sins he will quiet thy Conscience here and give thee everlasting Rest and Happiness hereafter Which God of his infinite Mercy Grant unto us all through the Merits and Mediation of Jesus the Belov'd To whom c. A DISCOURSE Upon the Fifth of November PSAL. cxviii Ver. 24. This is the Day which the Lord hath made we will rejoyce and be glad in it THIS Psalm is suppos'd to have been compil'd by the Royal Psalmist when after a long Series of Troubles and Persecutions he was at last both safely plac'd upon the Throne of Israel and Judah and had also subdued the proud Lords of the Philistines together with their Allies and Confederates * 2 Sam. 5. who in hopes to have crush'd him before he grew too powerful had rally'd their Forces and invaded the Land He had long grappled with the indefatigable Malice of his envious blood-thirsty Master long encountered the fierce Oppositions of Enemies abroad but especially of Adversaries at home some of which as he complains Psalm 64. were Men of such sneaking slavish mercenary Souls of such beggarly disingenuous unmanly Spirits that not daring to appear in the Gallantry of open Enemies they betook themselves to the little Arts of skulking Revenge endeavoring by all the sinister methods of clancular hatred by a long train of secret Calumnies and Reproaches to blow up his reputation and at one Blast to deprive him both of Life and Crown But now at length had the good hand of Providence put a joyful period to all these Troubles and Afflictions and made him glad with the Joy of his Countenance His haughty Neighbours humbly pay him Homage and he tramples upon the Necks of his Domestick Adversaries The Greatness of his Dangers endear him to the People who from his so many miraculous Escapes conclude him the Peculiar Favourite of Heaven and therefore receive him with the hearty and joyous Reiterations of Acclamations and Hosanna's Wherefore in a due sense of these great blessings he is not contented to offer only his own Sacrifice of Praise but likewise in the beginning of this Psalm excites all the people with their Doxologies and Allelujahs to assist and joyn with him in these his grateful acknowledgments O give thanks unto the Lord says he for he is gracious because his mercy endureth for ever Let all the Tribes of Israel let the Priests and Levites yea let All them that fear the Lord confess that he is gracious and that his mercy endureth for ever You need not recount the Wonders he shew'd for your Forefathers in the Land of Egypt nor recall to your Memories how after a Succession of Mracles for forty years in the Wilderness he at last with a mighty Hand and stretch'd-out Arm drove out the Nations before them and gave them this pleasant Land for an Inheritance Look only upon me and you will see a most lively Instance of his Mercy and Goodness For when mine Enemies swarm'd about me like Bees and as one Man conspir'd with all their Might and Cunning to throw me down from the Throne to which I was advanc'd when I was invaded by vast Multitudes from abroad and undermin'd by the secret Treacheries and Machinations of more dangerous Adversaries at home even then when there seem'd no possible way for my Escape was the Lord my Helper and is become my Strength and my Song and my mighty Salvation So that the Stone which these unskilful Builders would have rejected as unfit to be used is you see become the head-stone in the Corner whilst notwithstanding all the Attempts of mine Enemies to the contrary I sit this day safely on my Fathers Seat Now then it ever present your selves joyful before the Lord the King and come with me into his Courts in the voice of Thanksgiving for This of all others is the Day which the Lord himself hath made we will therefore rejoyce and be glad in it Thus you have in short the occasion of these Words which I shall no longer insist upon as they respect the circumstances of David but consider them wholly as they reflect
Barbarity of Superstition and Idolatry of Mischief and Immanity could have impos'd upon us must unless the Almighty hand of God would have wrought a Miracle for their Rescue and Deliverance have been endured by our Posterity throughout all Generations so that this Church I say which is now the Perfection of Beauty and the Joy of the wholy Earth had unhappily became the very Scorn and Derision of her Enemies and their Song all the day long But Blessed be God our Soul is escap'd as a Bird out of the Snare of the Fowler the Snare is broken the Design blasted the Plot unravelled and we thereby most wonderfully delivered Which brings me to my Second Particular which is to shew that it will likewise appear that of all the Deliverances God in past Ages vouchsaf'd his Church none ever amounted to the Wonder of this Day and consequently that this Day of all others may most properly be said to be made by the Lord if we consider the Strangeness and Unexpectedness of our Deliverance 2. Many and glorious I confess have been the Deliverances which God in past Ages has vouchsaf'd his Church He has often deseated the Designs infatuated the Counsels and brought to nought the Devices even of her most powerful Enemies upholding her when just sinking by the hand of his Providence But yet when I seriously reflect upon the dismal Circumstances of this Day 's Design how secret the Conspiracy how little Prospect of a discovery and how ready the Execution I am forc'd to acknowledge that This of all others was the Lord 's own doing and that 't is altogether marvellous in our eyes The Church of God indeed in the Persian Monarchs time was destin'd to Ruine and the black Decree seal'd with the King 's own Signet But then you know the Design was divulg'd and the Day of Slaughter deferr'd so that the Jews had time to contrive means for their Preservation which accordingly we find they did and turn'd the fatal Stroke upon the Heads of their Enemies The Primitive Christians likewise were often persecuted and devoted to Death But then they always with the Prophet foresaw the Cloud that threatned them The Emperours were Heathens and so they could expect no better Usage from them and consequently had warning to provide for themselves But now the case of our Church was quite different at this time Her Security was her greatest Danger and her implicit Faith like to have ended in her Ruine No Storm threatned from abroad neither did any Cloud seem to gather over our Heads at home but our Air was as serene and quiet as free from Storms and Tempests as the superlunary Regions The Mercy of our peaceful Solomon like the Sun-beams did as we shall see more at large by and by so plentifully diffuse its kind Heat and Warmth to all sorts of Men that 't was generally thought he had melted the obdurate and inflexible Hearts of his most virulent enemies into reciprocal Tenderness Loyalty and Obedience But alas the Event most truly Demonstrated that some of his best Subjects did not more frequently than justly tell him that he was merciful even to a Fault and kind tho' it were to his own and the Kingdoms Danger For when by these Means we were too easily perswaded that our Enemies were reconcil'd to us and become our Friends so that we should never see the Sons of the Giants returning to defie our Israel any more and upon this account not only intoxicated our selves with present pleasure but entertain'd our thoughts likewise with the fair delightful Prospect of our future Felicity Even then I say when we thought our selves most secure was the Enemy within our Walls and the fatal Sword hanging over our Heads The Snares of Death encompass'd us about and our Souls were even hard at Deaths door Strangers sought after our Life and we knew it not yea they had caught us in their Nets yet we perceived it not There was indeed in the Kingdom a confus'd Notion and obscure Knowledge of some great thing that was suddenly to be done But then as King * K. Jame's Works pag. 291. James assures us 't was only amongst the Papists who likewise for secrecies sake were not to be intrusted with the Particulars But that the King and Parliament were to be destroy'd and that by the quick dispatch of Gun-Powder That the Enemy had so long sate brooding upon this wicked Design that the direful Off-spring was almost come to the birth This was a thing of that nature that no Protestant either fear'd or so much as suspected it 'T was lock'd up only in the Breasts of the Conspirators who likewise for the greater Concealment had bound themselves by an Oath of Secrecy yea under the seal of the Holy Sacrament not to reveal it directly not indirectly to any without common Consent So that as to all external Helps our Case was as desperate as possibly it could be and we were even like Sheep bound ready for the Slaughter Now then did our own Strength or Policy bring Salvation to us or our own Right-arm obtain us this Victory Did the wisdom of the Kings Counsellours the Care of his Magistrates the Subsidies of his Friends the Fidelity of his Servants or the Courage of his Soldiers work for him this Deliverance No. We only stood still and saw the Salvation of God Tho' our hands were tied God fought from Heaven for us the Stars in their courses fought against our Enemies When the Harvest was come and they were just putting in the Sickle he turn'd the Edge against themselves and cut them down in their Wickedness He so infatuated their Counsels and turn'd their deepest Policy like Achitophel's into so great Foolishness that when they might securely have let in the Floods upon us they turn'd the Stream directly against themselves so that the Waters went over their own Soul Had they but gone on with the same Privacy they began and not suffered the direful Project to wander beyond the Limits of their own Breasts it had undoubtedly been crown'd with wish'd-for Success But as tho' the mighty Secret was too big to be long confin'd within so narrow a Compass and like a boisterous Vapour shut up within a cloud strugled and was restless 'till it tore its way through of their own accord when no Man either desir'd or compell'd them they disclosed their own Wickedness for by a Letter from one of them to the Lord Mounteagle which yet was wrapt up in Terms as dark and aenigmatical as the Aegyptian Hieroglyphicks was the whole Matter most happily discovered and this horrid Design which had long been contriving and was now just brought to a head in a moment most miraculously blasted and confounded Thus did He alone who stilleth the raging of the Sea curbing the Insolence of its proud Waves only with Reins of sand stem likewise the impetuous Torrent of our Enemies Fury and set it its Bounds which it could not pass Thus did
secure Empire a safe House valiant Armies a faithful Senate a good People a peaceable World quaecunque Hominis Caesaris Vota sunt and whatsoever Caesar either as a Man or Emperour can wish 'T is manifest then that these Primitive Christians never thought it their Duty to assassinate Princes tho' Pagan or Heretical for the Cause of Religion or to excite their Subjects to Rebellion for the Interest of the Gospel They did not illuminate Mens Understandings with Fire and Faggots nor convince or silence Gainsayers by the uncontroulable Arguments of Apostolical Dragooners As their Battels were Spiritual so neither were their Weapons Carnal 'T was the peculiar Honour of their Profession that it grew victorious by Sufferings and triumph'd in Persecutions That Tears were its Jewels and its Chains its chiefest Ornaments That whereas all other Religions in the World did by a multitude of Sacrifices as it were train up and inure Mens Minds to Blood and Destruction it was always like its great Author upon the Passive not by Swords and Daggers by Fire and Faggots by Plots and Caballs but by enduring all things by bearing all things recommending it self to the World Now then is the Church of Rome this meek and gentle spouse of Christ which is therefore comely as the Curtains of Solomon because black through the Heat of Persecutions Is she I say that Church whose Foundations are laid on the Blood not of her Enemies but dearest Friends However Bellarmine might pride himself in his Notes of the true Church yet surely her red and bloody Garments speak her to be either that Beast in the Apocalypse that kills all those that will not receive his Mark in their Foreheads nor worship his Image or that great Babylon the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth which St. John saw drunken with the Blood of the Saints and with the Blood of the Martyrs of Jesus O my Soul then come not thou into her secret and unto her Assemblies mine Honour be not thou united 2. We cannot better express our Joy and Gratitude to God for the transcendant Mercy of this Day than by letting it remind us of his infinite Goodness in calling us from the Tents of these wicked Men who by teaching and maintaining such pernicious Doctrines do not only as you have already seen carry Men on to the most heinous Immoralities but also as a natural Consequence from such Premises wholly and entirely pervert the Simplicity of the Gospel of Christ To some unthinking Persons perhaps this may seem a bold Charge yet I need not be long in the Proof of it For not to tell you that these Men have set up such a number of Intercessors that as the Prophet Jeremy speaks according to the number of their Cities so are their Gods tho' the * 1 Tim. 2.5 Apostle for his Argument is levell'd against the Heathens who never so much as heard of a Mediator of Redemption and therefore did only acknowledge those of Intercession expresly declares that there is but One. Not I say to remind you that tho' our Saviour in his Farewell-speech most passionately bequeaths to us mutual Love and Kindness and the more to endear this Duty to us adds withal that this should be so evident a Mark of our Profession that hereby should all Men know that we are indeed his Disciples yet †Vid. Concil Lateran 4 Can. 3. de Haeret. These Men teach that if we will be Christians indeed we must rifle and plunder one another kill and stab our Brethren butcher our Benefactors blow up Parliaments and destroy Heretical Kings and States for this is not only lawful but also laudable excellent heroick and meritorious Lastly nor to say that they forbid their Priests to Marry and condemn that Sacred Institution in such Persons as impious and damnable tho' ‖ Heb. 13.4 St. Paul assures us that 't is equally honourable in all sorts of Men nay * 1 Tim. 4.1 3. reckons the Prohibition of it amongst the Doctrines of Devils and the Primitive Church never thought the worse of her Bishops for it What else speak their taking the Cup from the Laity tho' according to the positive command of Christ that they should all Drink of it the Primitive Church as they themselves confess allow'd it them and rather than not worship an Idol or Image their abolishing as much as they can the Commandment that forbids it What mean their Indulgences their Fairs and Sales of Masses and frequent Prayers for the dead by all which they have inverted the Assertion of our blessed Saviour rendring it almost impossible for a Poor Man to be Sav'd or for a Rich Man to be Damn'd Why have they interdicted the Use of the Scriptures to the People when the †2 Tim. 3.15 Apostle assures us that they are so far from doing them harm as they pretend that they are able to make them wise to Salvation and the ‖ Psal 1.1 2. Psalmist in an Ecstasie pronounceth the Blessedness of that Man unspeakably great whose Delight is in the law of the Lord and who therefore with unwearied Study meditates continually therein both Day and Night Nay when * Joh. 5.39 and Mat. 22.29 Christ himself expresly Commands them to read them diligently and attributes the pernicious Errors of the Sadducees to their Ignorance of them Are these things indeed with their other repudiated Doctrines built upon the Foundations of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ himself being the Head-corner-stone Alas If you look narrowly into them you will discern their Nature to be aliene and extraneous some of them being borrowed purely from the Heathens others from the Post of the Primitive Church the Gnosticks and most of them as they themselves acknowledge from Oral Tradition there being not one Word to countenance them in all the Scriptures But is not this to invert the Religion of Christ and entirely to overthrow the fundamental and substantial Principles of our Profession Is not this with the Pharisees to make the Word of God of none effect by humane Traditions or rather to preach another Gospel than what we have receiv'd from Christ and his Apostles the which tho' an Angel from Heaven should do the †Gal. 1.8 9. Holy Ghost has long since pronounc'd him accurs'd How they are like to escape this Imputation at God's Tribunal they would do well to consider I wish it could never be laid to their charge To return then to ourselves What infinite Reason have we to bless God who has graciously purg'd out this old Leaven from amongst us and made us a new Lump unto himself Who by the glorious Instruments of our Reformation has brought us out of the darkness of Errour and Innovation into the true and genuine Light of the Gospel and for those Leeks and Garlick our Souls so much abhorr'd feeds us with heavenly Manna to the full Certainly if Heaps of Mercies both Spiritual and Temporal If the