more shall the King of Heaven give this immunity to his onely and natural Son so as in true reason I might challenge an exemption for me and my train Thou mightest O Saviour and no less challenge a tribute of all the Kings of the earth to thee by whom all powers are ordained Reason cannot mutter against this claim the creature owes it self and whatsoever it hath to the Maker he owes nothing to it Then are the children free He that hath right to all needs not pay any thing else there should be a subjection in Sovereignty and men should be debtours to themselves But this right was thine own peculiar and admits no partners why dost thou speak of children as of more and extending this privilege to Peter say Lest we scandalize them Was it for that thy Disciples being of thy robe might justly seem interessed in the liberties of their Master Surely no otherwise were they children no otherwise free Away with that fanatical conceit which challenges an immunity from secular commands and taxes to a spiritual and adoptative Sonship no earthly Saintship can exempt us from tribute to whom tribute belongeth There is a freedom O Saviour which our Christianity calls us to affect a freedom from the yoke of Sin and Satan from the servitude of our corrupt affections we cannot be Sons if we be not thus free Oh free thou us by thy free Spirit from the miserable bondage of our Nature so shall the children be free but as to these secular duties no man is less free then the children O Saviour thou wert free and wouldst not be so thou wert free by natural right wouldst not be free by voluntary dispensation Lest an offence might be taken Surely had there followed an offence it had been taken onely and not given Woe be to the man by whom the offence cometh It cometh by him that gives it it cometh by him that takes it when it is not given no part of this blame could have cleaved unto thee either way Yet such was thy goodness that thou wouldst not suffer an offence unjustly taken at that which thou mightest justly have denied How jealous should we be even of others perils how carefull so to moderate our power in the use of lawfull things that our Charity may prevent others scandalls to remit of our own right for another's safety Oh the deplorable condition of those wilfull men who care not what blocks they lay in the way to Heaven not forbearing by a known leudness to draw others into their own damnation To avoid the unjust offence even of very Publicans Jesus will work a Miracle Peter is sent to the sea and that not with a net but with an hook The Disciple was now in his own trade He knew a net might inclose many fishes an hook could take but one with that hook must he go angle for the Tribute-money A fish shall bring him a stater in her mouth and that fish that bites first What an unusual bearer is here what an unlikely element to yield a piece of ready coin Oh that Omnipotent power which could command the fish to be both his treasurer to keep his silver and his purveyour to bring it Now whether O Saviour thou causedst this fish to take up that shekel out of the bottom of the sea or whether by thine Almighty word thou mad'st it in an instant in the mouth of that fish it is neither possible to determine nor necessary to inquire I rather adore thine infinite Knowledge and Power that couldst make use of unlikeliest means that couldst serve thy self of the very fishes of the sea in a business of earthly and civil imployment It was not out of need that thou didst this though I do not find that thou ever affectedst a full purse What veins of Gold or mines of Silver did not lie open to thy command But out of a desire to teach Peter that whilst he would be tributary to Caesar the very fish of the sea was tributary to him How should this incourage our dependence upon that Omnipotent hand of thine which hath Heaven earth sea at thy disposing Still thou art the same for thy Members which thou wert for thy self the Head Rather then offence shall be given to the world by a seeming neglect of thy dear children thou wilt cause the very fowls of Heaven to bring them meat and the fish of the sea to bring them money O let us look up ever to thee by the eye of our Faith and not be wanting in our dependence upon thee who canst not be wanting in thy Providence over us XL. Lazarus Dead OH the Wisedom of God in penning his own story The Disciple whom Jesus loved comes after his fellow-Evangelists that he might glean up those rich ears of history which the rest had passed over That Eagle soars high and towrs up by degrees It was much to turn water into wine but it was more to feed five thousand with five loaves It was much to restore the Ruler's son it was more to cure him that had been 38 years a cripple It was much to cure him that was born blind it was more to raise up Lazarus that had been so song dead As a stream runs still the stronger and wider the nearer it comes to the Ocean whence it was derived so didst thou O Saviour work the more powerfully the nearer thou drewest to thy Glory This was as one of thy last so of thy greatest Miracles when thou wert ready to die thy self thou raisedst him to life who smelt strong of the grave None of all the sacred Histories is so full and punctuall as this in the report of all circumstances Other Miracles do not more transcend Nature then this transcends other Miracles This alone was a sufficient eviction of thy Godhead O Blessed Saviour none but an infinite power could so far goe beyond Nature as to recall a man four days dead from not a mere privation but a settled corruption Earth must needs be thine from which thou raisest his body Heaven must needs be thine from whence thou fetchest his Spirit None but he that created man could thus make him new Sickness is the common preface to death no mortall nature is exempted from this complaint even Lazarus whom Jesus loved is sick What can strength of Grace or dearness of respect prevail against disease against dissolution It was a stirring message that Mary sent to Jesus He whom thou lovest is sick as if she would imply that his part was no less deep in Lazarus then hers Neither doth she say He that loves thee is sick but He whom thou lovest not pleading the merit of Lazarus his affection to Christ but the mercy and favour of Christ to him Even that other reflexion of love had been no weak motive for O Lord thou hast said Because he hath set his love upon me therefore will I deliver him Thy goodness will not be behind us for love who professest to love
Principalities and Powers and Governours and Princes of the darkness of this World design other then several ranks of evil Angels There can be no being without some kind of order there can be no order in parity If we look up into Heaven there is the King of Gods the Lord of Lords higher then the highest If to the Earth there are Monarchs Kings Princes Peers People If we look down to Hell there is the Prince of Devils They labour for confusion that call for parity What should the Church doe with such a form as is not exemplified in Heaven in Earth in Hell One Devil according to their supposition may be used to cast out another How far the command of one spirit over another may extend it is a secret of infernal state too deep for the inquiry of men The thing it self is apparent upon compact and precontracted composition one gives way to other for the common advantage As we see in the Commonwealth of Cheaters and Cutpurses one doeth the fact another is feed to bring it out and to procure restitution both are of the trade both conspire to the fraud the actour falls not out with the revealer but divides with him that cunning spoil One malicious miscreant sets the Devil on work to the inflicting of disease or death another upon agreement for a farther spiritual gain takes him off There is a Devil in both And if there seem more bodily favour there is no less spiritual danger in the latter In the one Satan wins the agent the suitour in the other It will be no cause of discord in Hell that one Devil gives ease to the body which another tormented that both may triumph in the gain of a soul Oh God that any creature which bears thine Image should not abhor to be beholden to the powers of hell for aid for advice Is it not because there is not a God in Israel that men go to inquire of the God of Ekron Can men be so sottish to think that the vowed enemy of their souls can offer them a bait without an hook What evil is there in the City which the Lord hath not done what is there which he cannot as easily redress He wounds he heals again And if he will not it is the Lord let him doe what seems good in his eyes If he do not deliver us he will crown our faithfulness in a patient perseverance The wounds of God are better then are the salves of Satan Was it possible that the wit of Envy could devise so high a Slander Beelzebub was a God of the heathen therefore herein they accuse him for an Idolater Beelzebub was a Devil to the Jews therefore they accuse him for a Conjurer Beelzebub was the chief of Devils therefore they accuse him for an Arch-exorcist for the worst kind of Magician Some professours of this black Art though their work be devillish yet they pretend to doe it in the name of Jesus and will presumptuously seem to doe that by command which is secretly transacted by agreement The Scribes accuse Christ of a direct compact with the Devil and suppose both a league and familiarity which by the Law of Moses in the very hand of a Saul was no other then deadly Yea so deep doth this wound reach that our Saviour searching it to the bottom finds no less in it then the sin against the Holy Ghost inferring hereupon that dreadfull sentence of the irremissibleness of that sin unto death And if this horrible crimination were cast upon thee O Saviour in whom the Prince of this world found nothing what wonder is it if we thy sinfull Servants be branded on all sides with evil tongues Yea which is yet more how plain is it that these men forced their tongue to speak this slander against their own heart Else this Blasphemy had been onely against the Son of man not against the Holy Ghost but now that the Searcher of hearts finds it to be no less then against the Blessed Spirit of God the spight must needs be obstinate their malice doth wilfully cross their conscience Envy never regards how true but how mischievous So it may gall or kill it cares little whether with truth or falshood For us Blessed are we when men revile us and say all manner of evil of us for the name of Christ For them What reward shall be given to thee thou false tongue Even sharp arrows with hot burning coals yea those very coals of hell from which thou wert enkindled There was yet a third sort that went a mid way betwixt wonder and censure These were not so malicious as to impute the Miracle to a Satanical operation they confess it good but not enough and therefore urge Christ to a farther proof Though thou hast cast out this dumb Devil yet this is no sufficient argument of thy Divine power We have yet seen nothing from thee like those ancient Miracles of the times of our forefathers Joshua caused the Sun to stand still Elias brought fire down from heaven Samuel astonisht the people with thunder and rain in the midst of harvest If thou wouldst command our belief doe somewhat like to these The casting out of a Devil shews thee to have some power over Hell shew us now that thou hast no less power over Heaven There is a kind of unreasonableness of desire and insatiableness in Infidelity it never knows when it hath evidence enough This which the Jews over-looked was a more irrefragable demonstration of Divinity then that which they desired A Devil was more then a Meteor or a parcel of an element to cast out a Devil by command more then to command fire from heaven Infidelity ever loves to be her own carver No son can be more like a father then these Jews to their progenitors in the desart That there might be no fear of degenerating into good they also of old tempted God in the Wilderness First they are weary of the Egyptian bondage and are ready to fall out with God and Moses for their stay in those furnaces By ten miraculous Plagues they are freed and going out of those confines the Egyptians follow them the Sea is before them now they are more afflicted with their liberty then their servitude The Sea yields way the Egyptians are drowned and now that they are safe on the other shore they tempt the providence of God for water The Rock yields it them then no less for bread and meat God sends them Manna and Quails they cry out of the food of Angels Their present enemies in the way are vanquished they whine at the men of measures in the heart of Canaan Nothing from God but mercy nothing from them but temptations Their true brood both in nature and in sin had abundant proofs of the Messiah if curing the blind lame diseased deaf dumb ejecting Devils over-ruling the elements raising the dead could have been sufficient yet still they must have a sign from Heaven and shut up in
praise of concord is in the subject if that be holy the consent is Angelical if sinfull devillish What a fearfull advantage have our spiritual enemies against us If armed troups come against single stragglers what hope is there of life of victory How much doth it concern us to band our hearts together in a communion of Saints Our enemies come upon us like a torrent O let us not run asunder like drops in the dust All our united forces will be little enough to make head against this league of destruction Legion imports Order Number Conflict Order in that there is a distinction of regiment a subordination of Officers Though in Hell there be confusion of faces yet not confusion of degrees Number Those that have reckoned a Legion at the lowest have counted it six thousand others have more then doubled it though here it is not strict but figurative yet the letter of it implies multitude How fearfull is the consideration of the number of Apostate Angels And if a Legion can attend one man how many must we needs think are they who all the world over are at hand to the punishment of the wicked the exercise of the good the temptation of both It cannot be hoped there can be any place or time wherein we may be secure from the onsets of these enemies Be sure ye lewd men ye shall want no furtherance to evil no torment for evil Be sure ye godly ye shall not want combatants to try your strength and skill Awaken your courages to resist and stir up your hearts make sure the means of your safety There are more with us then against us The God of heaven is with us if we be with him and our Angels behold the face of God If every Devil were a Legion we are safe Though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death we shall fear no evil Thou O Lord shalt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of our enemies and thy right hand shall save us Conflict All this Number is not for sight for rest but for motion for action Neither was there ever hour since the first blow given to our first Parents wherein there was so much as a truce betwixt these adversaries As therefore strong Frontier-towns when there is a Peace concluded on both parts break up their garrison open their gates neglect their Bulwarks but when they hear of the enemy mustering his forces in great and unequal numbers then they double their guard keep sentinel repair their Sconces so must we upon the certain knowledge of our numerous and deadly enemies in continual array against us address our selves always to a wary and strong resistence I do not observe the most to think of this ghostly hostility Either they do not find there are Temptations or those Temptations hurtfull they see no worse then themselves and if they feel motions of evil arising in them they impute it to fancy or unreasonable appetite to no power but Nature's and those motions they follow without sensible hurt neither see they what harm it is to sin Is it any marvel that carnal eyes cannot discern spiritual objects that the World who is the friend the vassal of Satan is in no war with him Elisha's servant when his eyes were opened saw troups of spiritual souldiers which before he discerned not If the eyes of our Souls be once enlightned by supernatural knowledge and the clear beams of Faith we shall as plainly descry the invisible powers of wickedness as now our bodily eyes see Heaven and Earth They are though we see them not we cannot be saâ—â— from them if we do not acknowledge not oppose them The Devils are now become great suitours to Christ that he would not command them into the deep that he would permit their entrance into the Swine What is this deep but Hell both for the utter separation from the face of God and for the impossibility of passage to the region of rest and glory The very evil Spirits then fear and expect a farther degree of torment they know themselves reserved in those chains of darkness for the judgment of the great day There is the same wages due to their sins and to ours neither are the wages paid till the work be done They tempting men to sin must needs sin grievously in tempting as with us men those that mislead into sin offend more then the actours not till the upshot therefore of their wickedness shall they receive the full measure of their condemnation This Day this Deep they tremble at what shall I say of those men that fear it not It is hard for men to believe their own Unbelief If they were perswaded of this fiery dungeon this bottomless deep wherein every sin shall receive an horrible portion with the damned durst they stretch forth their hands to wickedness No man will put his hand into a fiery crucible to fetch gold thence because he knows it will burn him Did we as truly believe the everlasting burning of that infernal fire we durst not offer to fetch pleasures or profits out of the midst of those flames This degree of torment they grant in Christ's power to command They knew his power unresistible had he therefore but said Back to Hell whence ye came they could no more have staid upon earth then they can now climb into heaven O the wonderfull dispensation of the Almighty who though he could command all the evil Spirits down to their dungeons in an instant so as they should have no more opportunity of temptation yet thinks fit to retain them upon earth It is not out of weakness or improvidence of that Divine hand that wicked Spirits tyrannize here upon earth but out of the most wise and most holy ordination of God who knows how to turn evil into good how to fetch good out of evil and by the worst instruments to bring about his most just decrees Oh that we could adore that awfull and infinite power and chearfully cast our selves upon that Providence which keeps the Keys even of Hell it self and either lets out or returns the Devils to their places Their other suit hath some marvel in moving it more in the grant that they might be suffered to enter into the Herd of swine It was their ambition of some mischief that brought forth this desire that since they might not vex the Body of man they might yet afflict men in their Goods The malice of these envious Spirits reacheth from us to ours It is sore against their wills if we be not every way miserable If the Swine were legally unclean for the use of the table yet they were naturally good Had not Satan known them usefull for man he had never desired their ruine But as Fencers will seem to fetch a blow at the leg when they intend it at the head so doeth this Devil whilst he drives at the Swine he aims at the Souls of these Gadarens By this means he hoped well and his
healthfull fear sickness the free servitude the people fear a Tyrant's oppression and cruelty the Tyrant fears the people's mutiny and insurrection If there have been some so great as to be above the reach of the power and machinations of inferiours yet never any that have been free from their fears and suspicions Happy is he that fears nothing but what he should God Why did Herod fear the people They held John for a Prophet And this opinion was both common and constant even the Scribes and Pharisees durst not say his Baptism was from men It is the wisedom and goodness of God ever to give his children favour somewhere If Jezebel hate Elias Ahab shall for the time honour him and if Herod hate the Baptist and would kill him yet the people reverence him Herod's malice would make him away the people's reputation keeps him alive As wise Princes have been content to maintain a faction in their Court or State for their own purposes so here did the God of Heaven contrive and order differences of judgment and affection betwixt Herod and his Subjects for his own holy ends Else certainly if all wicked men should conspire in evil there could be no being upon earth as contrarily if evil spirits did not accord Hell could not stand Oh the unjust and fond partiality of this people They all generally applaud John for a Prophet yet they receive not his message Whose Prophet was John but of the Highest what was his errand but to be the way-maker unto Christ what was he but the Voice of that Eternal Word of his Father what was the sound of that Voice but Behold the Lamb of God He that comes after me is greater then I whose shoe-latchet I am not worthy to unlose Yet they honour the Servant and reject the Master they contemn that Prince whose Embassadour they reverence How could they but argue John is a Prophet he speaks from God his words must be true he tells us this is the Lamb of God the Messias that should come to redeem the World this must then needs be he we will look for no other Yet this perverse people receives John and rejects Jesus There is ever an absurdity in unbelief whilst it separates those relations and respects which can never in nature be disjoyned Thus it readily apprehends God as mercifull in pardoning not as just in punishing Christ as a Saviour not as a Judge Thus we ordinarily in a contrariety to these Jews profess to receive the Master and contemn the Servants whilst he hath said that will make it good He that despiseth you despiseth me That which Herod in policy durst not in wine he dares doe And that which God had restrained till his own time now in his own time he permits to be done The day was as one of the Evangelists styles it convenient if for the purpose of Herodias I am sure for God's who having determined to glorify himself by John's martyrdome will cast it upon a time when it may be most notified Herod's birth-day All the Peers of the Country perhaps of the neighbour Nations are now assembled Herodias could not have found out a time more fit to blazon her own shame and cruelty then in such a confluence The wise Providence of God many times pays us with our own choice so as when we think to have brought about our own Ends to our best content we bring about his purposes to our own confusion Herod's Birth-day is kept and so was Pharaoh's both of them with bloud These personal stains cannot make the practice unlawfull Where the man is good the Birth is memorable What blessing have we if Life be none and if our life be a blessing why should it not be celebrated Excess and disorder may blemish any Solemnity but that cleaves to the act not to the institution Herod's birth-day was kept with a Feast and this Feast was a Supper It was fit to be a night-work this Festivity was spent in works of darkness not of the light it was a child of darkness that was then born not of the day Those that are drunken are drunk in the night There is a kind of shame in Sin even where it is committed with the stiffest resolution at least there was wont to be if now Sin be grown impudent and Justice grown bashfull wo be to us That there might be perfect revells at Herod's Birth-day besides the Feast there is musick and dancing and that by Salome the daughter of Herodias A meet Daughter for such a Mother bred according to the disposition of so immodest a Parent Dancing in it self as it is a set regular harmonious motion of the body cannot be unlawfull more then walking or running Circumstances may make it sinfull The wanton gesticulations of a Virgin in a wild assembly of Gallants warmed with Wine could be no other then riggish and unmaidenly It is not so frequently seen that the Child follows the good qualities of the Parent it is seldome seen that it follows not the evil Nature is the soil good and ill Qualities are the herbs and weeds the soil bears the weeds naturally the herbs not without culture What with traduction what with education it were strange if we should miss any of our Parents mis-dispositions Herodias and Salome have what they desired The dance pleased Herod well those indecent motions that would have displeased any modest eye though what should a modest eye doe at Herod's Feast over-pleased Herod Well did Herodias know how to fit the tooth of her Paramour and had therefore purposely so composed the carriage and gesture of her Daughter as it might take best although doubtless the same action could not have so pleased from another Herod saw in Salome's face and fashion the image of her whom he doated on so did she look so did she move besides that his lavish cups had predisposed him to wantonness and now he cannot but like well that which so pleasingly suted his inordinate desire All humours love to be fed especially the vicious so much more as they are more eager and stirring There cannot be a better glass wherein to discern the face of our hearts then our pleasures such as they are such are we whether vain or holy What a strange transportation was this Whatsoever thou shalt ask half a Kingdom for a dance Herod this pastime is over-pay'd for there is no proportion in this remuneration this is not bounty it is prodigence Neither doth this pass under a bare Promise onely but under an Oath and that solemn and as it might be in wine serious How largely do sensual men both profer and give for a little momentany and vain contentment How many censure Herod's gross impotence and yet second it with a worse giving away their precious Souls for a short pleasure of sin What is half a Kingdom yea a whole World to a Soul So much therefore is their madness greater as their loss is more So large a boon was
think the weather is changing to serenity O Saviour we may not always measure thy meaning by thy semblance sometimes what thou most intendest thou shewest least In our Afflictions thou turnest thy back upon us and hidest thy face from us when thou most mindest our distresses So Jonathan shot the arrows beyond David when he meant them to him So Joseph calls for Benjamin into bonds when his heart was bound to him in the strongest affection So the tender mother makes as if she would give away her crying child whom she hugs so much closer in her bosome If thou pass by us whilst we are struggling with the tempest we know it is not for want of mercy Thou canst not neglect us O let not us distrust thee What Object should have been so pleasing to the eyes of the Disciples as their Master and so much the more as he shewed his Divine power in this miraculous walk But lo contrarily they are troubled not with his presence but with this form of presence The supernatural works of God when we look upon them with our own eyes are subject to a dangerous misprision The very Sun-beams to whom we are beholden for our sight if we eye them directly blind us Miserable men we are ready to suspect Truths to run away from our safety to be afraid of our comforts to mis-know our best friends And why are they thus troubled They had thought they had seen a Spirit That there have been such apparitions of Spirits both good and evil hath ever been a Truth undoubtedly received of Pagans Jews Christians although in the blind times of Superstition there was much collusion mixed with some verities Crafty men and lying spirits agreed to abuse the credulous world But even where there was not Truth yet there was Horrour The very Good Angels were not seen without much fear their sight was construed to bode Death how much more the Evil which in their very nature are harmfull and pernicious We see not a Snake or a Toad without some recoiling of bloud and sensible reluctation although those creatures run away from us how much more must our hairs stand upright and our senses boggle at the sight of a Spirit whose both nature and will is contrary to ours and professedly bent to our hurt But say it had been what they mistook it for a Spirit why should they fear Had they well considered they had soon found that evil spirits are never the less present when they are not seen and never the less harmfull or malicious when they are present unseen Visibility adds nothing to their spite or mischief And could their eyes have been opened they had with Elisha's servant seen more with them then against them a sure though invisible guard of more powerfull Spirits and themselves under the protection of the God of Spirits so as they might have bidden a bold defiance to all the powers of darkness But partly their Faith was yet but in the bud and partly the presentation of this dreadfull Object was sudden and without the respite of a recollection and settlement of their thoughts Oh the weakness of our frail Nature who in the want of Faith are affrighted with the visible appearance of those adversaries whom we profess daily to resist and vanquish and with whom we know the Decree of God hath matched us in an everlasting conflict Are not these they that ejected Devils by their command Are not these of them that could say Master the evil spirits are subdued to us Yet now when they see but an imagined Spirit they fear What power there is in the eye to betray the heart Whilst Goliah was mingled with the rest of the Philistin hoast Israel camped boldly against them but when that Giant stalks out single between the two armies and fills and amazes their eyes with his hideous stature now they run away for fear Behold we are committed with Legions of Evil spirits and complain not Let but one of them give us some visible token of his presence we shreek and tremble and are not our selves Neither is our weakness more conspicuous then thy mercy O God in restraining these spiritual enemies from these dreadfull and ghastly representations of themselves to our eyes Might those infernal Spirits have liberty to appear how and when and to whom they would certainly not many would be left in their wits or in their lives It is thy power and goodness to frail mankind that they are kept in their chains and reserved in the darkness of their own spiritual being that we may both oppugn and subdue them unseen But oh the deplorable condition of reprobate souls If but the imagined sight of one of these spirits of darkness can so daunt the heart of those which are free from their power what a terrour shall it be to live perpetually in the sight yea under the torture of thousands of legions of millions of Devils Oh the madness of wilfull sinners that will needs run themselves headily into so dreadfull a damnation It was high time for our Saviour to speak What with the Tempest what with the Apparition the Disciples were almost lost with fear How seasonable are his gracious redresses Till they were thus affrighted he would not speak when they were thus affrighted he would not hold his peace If his presence were fearfull yet his word was comfortable Be of good chear it is I yea it is his word onely which must make his presence both known and comfortable He was present before they mistook him and feared there needs no other erection of their drooping hearts but It is I. It is cordial enough to us in the worst of our afflictions to be assured of Christ's presence with us Say but It is I O Saviour and let evils doe their worst thou needest not say any more Thy voice was evidence enough so well were the Disciples acquainted with the tongue of thee their Master that It is I was as much as an hundred names Thou art the good Shepherd we are not of thy Flock if we know thee not by thy voice from a thousand Even this one is a great word yea an ample style It is I. The same tongue that said to Moses I am hath sent thee saith now to the Disciples It is I I your Lord and Master I the Commander of winds and waters I the soveraign Lord of Heaven and earth I the God of Spirits Let Heaven be but as one scroll and let it be written all over with titles they cannot express more then It is I. Oh sweet and seasonable word of a gracious Saviour able to calm all tempests able to revive all hearts Say but so to my Soul and in spight of Hell I am safe No sooner hath Jesus said I then Peter answers Master He can instantly name him that did not name himself Every little hint is enough to Faith The Church sees her Beloved as well through the Lattice as through the open Window Which
Samaritan Cottage It was thy choice O Saviour to take upon thee the shape not of a Prince but of a Servant How can we either neglect means or despise homeliness when thou the God of all the World wouldst stoop to the suit of so poor a provision We know well in what terms the Samaritans stood with the Jews so much more hostile as they did more symbolize in matter of Religion no Nations were mutually so hatefull to each other A Samaritan's bread was no better then Swines-flesh their very fire and water was not more grudged then infectious The looking towards Jerusalem was here cause enough of repulse No enmity is so desperate as that which arises from matter of Religion Agreement in some points when there are differences in the main doth but advance hatred the more It is not more strange to hear the Son of God sue for a lodging then to hear him repelled Upon so churlish a deniall the two angry Disciples return to their Master on a fiery errand Lord wilt thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them as Elias did The Sons of Thunder would be lightning straight their zeal whether as kinsmen or Disciples could not brook so harsh a refusal As they were naturally more hot then their fellows so now they thought their Piety bade them be impatient Yet they dare not but begin with leave Master wilt thou His will must lead theirs their choler cannot drive their wills before his all their motion is from him onely True Disciples are like those artificiall engines which goe no otherwise then they are set or like little Children that speak nothing but what they are taught O Saviour if we have wills of our own we are not thine Do thou set me as thou wouldst have me goe do thou teach me what thou wouldst have me say or doe A mannerly preface leads in a faulty suit Master wilt thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them Faulty both in presumption and in desire of private revenge I do not hear them say Master will it please thee who art the sole Lord of the Heavens and the Elements to command fire from Heaven upon these men but Wilt thou that we command As if because they had power given them over diseases and unclean spirits therefore Heaven and Earth were in their managing How easily might they be mistaken Their large commission had the just limits Subjects that have munificent grants from their Princes can challenge nothing beyond the words of their Patent And if the fetching down fire from Heaven were less then the dispossessing of Devils since the Devil shall inable the Beast to doe thus much yet how possible is it to doe the greater and stick at the less where both depend upon a delegated power The Magicians of Aegypt could bring forth Frogs and Bloud they could not bring Lice ordinary Corruption can doe that which they could not It is the fashion of our bold Nature upon an inch given to challenge an ell and where we find our selves graced with some abilities to flatter our selves with the faculty of more I grant Faith hath done as great things as ever Presumption undertook but there is great difference in the enterprises of both The one hath a warrant either by instinct or express command the other none at all Indeed had these two Disciples either meant or said Master if it be thy pleasure to command us to call down fire from Heaven we know thy word shall enable us to doe what thou requirest if the words be ours the power shall be thine this had been but holy modest faithfull but if they supposed there needed nothing save a leave onely and that might they be but let loose they could go alone they presumed they offended Yet had they thus overshot themselves in some pious and charitable motion the fault had been the less now the act had in it both cruelty and private revenge Their zeal was not worthy of more praise then their fury of censure That fire should fall down from Heaven upon men is a fearfull thing to think of and that which hath not been often done It was done in the case of Sodome when those five unclean Cities burned with the unnatural fire of hellish Lust it was done two severall times at the suit of Elijah it was done in an height of triall to that great pattern of Patience I find it no more and tremble at these I find But besides the dreadfulness of the judgment it self who can but quake at the thought of the suddenness of this destruction which sweeps away both Body and Soul in a state of unpreparation of unrepentance so as this fire should but begin a worse this Heavenly flame should but kindle that of Hell Thus unconceivably heavy was the revenge but what was the offence We have learned not to think any indignity light that is offered to the Son of God but we know these spiritual affronts are capable of degrees Had these Samaritans reviled Christ and his train had they violently assaulted him had they followed him with stones in their hands and blasphemies in their mouths it had been a just provocation of so horrible a vengeance Now the wrong was onely negative they received him not And that not out of any particular quarrel or dislike of his Person but of his Nation onely the men had been welcome had not their Country distasted All the charge that I hear our Saviour give to his Disciples in case of their rejection is If they receive you not shake off the dust of your feet Yet this was amongst their own and when they went on that sacred errand of publishing the Gospel of Peace These were strangers from the commonwealth of Israel This measure was not to Preachers but to Travellers onely a meer inhospitality to misliked guests Yet no less revenge will serve them then fire from Heaven I dare say for you ye holy sons of Zebedee it was not your spleen but your zeal that was guilty of so bloudy a suggestion your indignation could not but be stirred to see the great Prophet and Saviour of the world so unkindly repelled yet all this will not excuse you from a rash Cruelty from an inordinate Rage Even the best heart may easily be miscarried with a well-meant Zeal No affection is either more necessary or better accepted Love to any Object cannot be severed from hatred of the contrary whence it is that all creatures which have the concupiscible part have also the irascible adjoyned unto it Anger and displeasure is not so much an enemy as a guardian and champion of Love Whoever therefore is rightly affected to his Saviour cannot but find much regret at his wrongs O gracious and divine Zeal the kindly warmth and vital temper of Piety whither hast thou withdrawn thy self from the cold hearts of men Or is this according to the just constitution of the old
is For the Place tradition hath taken it still for Tabor I list not to cross it without warrant This was an high Hill indeed thirty furlongs high saith Josephus mirâ rotunditate sublimis saith Hierome and so steep that some of our English travellers that have desired to climbe it of late have been glad to give it up in the mid-way and to measure the rest with their eyes Doubtless this Hill was a Symbol of Heaven being near it as in situation in resemblance Heaven is expressed usually by the name of God's hill and Nature or this appellation taught the Heathens to figure it by their Olympus All Divine affairs of any magnificence were done on Hills On the hill of Sinai was the Law delivered on the hill of Moriah was Isaac to be sacrificed whence Abraham's posie is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In monte providebitur on the hill of Rephidim stood Moses with the rod of God in his stretched hand and figured him crucified upon the hill whom Joshua figured victorious in the valley on the hills of Ebal and Gerizim were the Blessings and Curses on Carmel was Eliah's sacrifice the Phrontisteria Schools or Universities of the Prophets were still Ramah and Gibeah Excelsa High places who knows not that on the hill of Sion stood the Temple I have looked up to the hills saith the Psalmist And Idolatry in imitation had its hill-altars On the mount of Olives was Christ wont to send up his Prayers and sent up himself And here Luke saith he went up to an high hill to pray not for that God makes difference of places to whose immensity Heaven it self is a valley It was an heathenish conceit of those Aramites that God is Deus montium the God of the mountains But because we are commonly more disposed to good by either the freedome of our scope to Heaven or the awfulness or solitary silence of places which as one saith strikes a kind of adoration into us or by our locall removall from this attractive body of the earth howsoever when the body sees it self above the earth the eye of the Mind is more easily raised to her Heaven It is good to take all advantage of place setting aside superstition to further our Devotion Aaron and Hur were in the mountain with Moses and held up his hands Aaron say some Allegorists is mountainous Hur fiery Heavenly meditation and the fire of Charity must lift up our prayers to God As Satan carried up Christ to an high hill to tempt him so he carries up himself to be freed from temptation and distraction If ever we would be transfigured in our dispositions we must leave the earth below and abandon all worldly thoughts Venite ascendamus O come let us climbe up to the hill where God sees or is seen saith devout Bernard O all ye cares distractions thoughtfulness labours pains servitudes stay me here with this Ass my Body till I with the Boy that is my Reason and Vnderstanding shall worship and return saith the same Father wittily alluding to the journey of Abraham for his sacrifice Wherefore then did Christ climbe up this high hill Not to look about him but saith S. Luke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to pray not for prospect but for devotion that his thoughts might climbe up yet nearer to Heaven Behold how Christ entred upon all his great works with Prayers in his mouth When he was to enter into that great work of his Humiliation in his Passion he went into the garden to pray when he is to enter into this great work of his Exaltation in his Transfiguring he went up into the mountain to pray he was taken up from his knees to both O noble example of Piety and Devotion to us He was God that prayed the God that he prayed to he might have commanded yet he prayed that we men might learn of him to pray to him What should we men dare to doe without prayers when he that was God would doe nothing without them The very heathen Poet could say A Jove principium and which of those verse-mongers ever durst write a ballad without imploring of some Deity which of the heathens durst attempt any great enterprise insalutato numine without invocation and sacrifice Saul himself would play the Priest and offer a burnt-offering to the Lord rather then the Philistins should fight with him unsupplicated as thinking any devotion better then none and thinking it more safe to sacrifice without a Priest then to fight without Prayers Vngirt unblest was the old word as not ready till they were girded so not till they had prayed And how dare we rush into the affairs of God or the State how dare we thrust our selves into actions either perillous or important without ever lifting up our eyes and hearts unto the God of Heaven Except we would say as the devillish malice of Surius slanders that zealous Luther Nec propter Deum haec res coepta est nec propter Deum finietur c. This business was neither begun for God nor shall be ended for him How can God bless us if we implore him not how can we prosper if he bless us not How can we hope ever to be transfigured from a lump of corrupt flesh if we do not ascend and pray As the Samaritan woman said weakly we may seriously The well of mercies is deep if thou hast nothing to draw with never look to tast of the waters of life I fear the worst of men Turks and the worst Turks the Moors shall rise up in Judgement against many Christians with whom it is a just exception against any witness by their Law that he hath not prayed six times in each naturall day Before the day break they pray for day when it is day they give God thanks for day at noon they thank God for half the day past after that they pray for a good Sun-set after that they thank God for the day passed and lastly pray for a good night after their day And we Christians suffer so many Suns and Moons to rise and set upon our heads and never lift up our hearts to their Creatour and ours either to ask his blessing or to acknowledge it Of all men under Heaven none had so much need to pray as Courtiers That which was done but once to Christ is always done to them They are set upon the hill and see the glory of the Kingdoms of earth but I fear it is seen of them as it is with some of the Mariners The more need the less devotion Ye have seen the Place see the Attendents He would not have many because he would not have it yet known to all hence was his intermination and sealing up their mouths with a Nemini dicite Tell no man Not none because he would not have it altogether unknown and afterwards would have it known to all Three were a legall number in ore duorum aut trium in the mouth of two or three witnesses He had
Disciples Mutabilitas in Aeternitatem when he rose again and ascended to Heaven to reign for ever Ye see this is one of them and as Tabor did rise out of the valley of Galilee so this Exaltation did rise out of the midst of Christ's Humiliation Other marvels do increase his dejection this onely makes for his Glory and the glory of this is matchable with the humiliation of all the rest That Face wherein before saith Esay there was no form nor beauty now shines as the Sun That Face which men hid their faces from in contempt now shines so that mortall eyes could not chuse but hide themselves from the luster of it and immortall receive their beams from it He had ever in vultu sidereum quiddam as Hierome speaks a certain heavenly Majesty and port in his countenance which made his Disciples follow him at first sight but now here was the perfection of supercelestiall brightness It was a Miracle in the Three Children that they so were delivered from the flames that their very garments smelt not of the fire it is no less Miracle in Christ that his very garments were dyed Celestiall and did savour of his Glory like as Aaron was so anointed on his head and beard that his skirts were all perfumed His cloaths therefore shined as snow yea that were but a waterish white as the Light it self saith S. Mark and Matthew in the most Greek Copies That seamless Coat as it had no welt so it had no spot The King's Son is all fair even without O excellent Glory of his Humanity The best Diamond or Carbuncle is hid with a case but this brightness pierceth through all his garments and makes them lightsome in him which use to conceal light in others Herod put him on in mockage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 23. not a white but a bright robe the ignorance whereof makes a shew of disparity in the Evangelists but God the Father to glorifie him cloaths his very garments with Heavenly splendour Behold thou art fair my beloved behold thou art fair and there is no spot in thee Thine head is as fine gold thy mouth is as sweet things and thou art wholly delectable Come forth ye daughters of Sion and behold King Solomon with the Crown wherewith his Father crowned him in the day of the gladness of his heart O Saviour if thou wert such in Tabor what art thou in Heaven if this were the glory of thy Humanity what is the presence of thy Godhead Let no man yet wrong himself so much as to magnifie this happiness as another's and to put himself out of the participation of this glory Christ is our head we are his members As we all were in the First Adam both innocent and sinning so are we in the Second Adam both shining in Tabor and bleeding sweat in the Garden And as we are already happy in him so shall we be once in our selves by and through him He shall change our vile bodies that they may be like his glorious body Behold our pattern and rejoyce like his glorious body These very bodies that are now cloddy like the earth shall once be bright as the Sun and we that now see clay in one anothers faces shall then see nothing but Heaven in our countenances and we that now set forth our bodies with cloaths shall then be cloathed upon with Immortality out of the wardrobe of Heaven And if ever any painted face should be admitted to the sight of this Glory as I much fear it yea I am sure God will have none but true faces in Heaven they would be ashamed to think that ever they had faces to daub with these beastly pigments in comparison of this Heavenly complexion Let us therefore look upon this flesh not so much with contempt of what it was and is as with a joyfull hope of what it shall be And when our courage is assaulted with the change of these bodies from healthfull to weak from living to dead let us comfort our selves with the assurance of this change from dust to incorruption We are not so sure of death as of transfiguration All the days of our appointed time we will therefore wait till our changing shall come Now from the Glory of the Master give me leave to turn your eyes to the Errour of the Servant who having slept with the rest and now suddenly awaking knoweth not whether he slept still To see such a light about him three so glittering persons before him made him doubt now as he did after when he was carried by the Angel through the iron gate whether it were a pleasing dream or a real act All slept and now all waked onely Peter slept waking and I know not whether more erred in his speech or in his sleep It was a shame for a man to sleep in Tabor but it is more a shame for a man to dream with his eyes open Thus did Peter Master it is good for us to be here Let us make us three Tabernacles I could well say with Optatus in this or any other occasion Ipsius Sancti Petri beatitudo veniam tribuat dubito dicere peccâsse tantam Sanctitatem Let blessed Peter pardon me I fear to say so great Holiness offended Yet since our adversaries are so over-partiall to this worthy Saint in whom they have as little as they boast much that they can be content his praise should blemish the dignity of all the rest yea that God himself is in danger to be a loser by the advancement of so dear a Servant give me leave to lay my finger a little upon this blot God would never have recorded that which it should be uncharitable for us to observe It was the injurious kindness of Marcion in honour of Peter to leave out the story of Malchus as Epiphanius notes It shall be our blame if we do not so note that we benefit our selves even by his imperfections S. Mark 's Gospel is said to be Peter's O blessed Apostle can it be any wrong to say of thee that which thou hast written of thy self not for insultation not for exprobration God forbid but that men may be ashamed to give that to him which he hath denied to himself Let me therefore not doubt to say with reverence to so great a Saint that as he spake most so he is noted to have erred most Not to meddle with his sinking striking Judaizing one while we find him carnally insinuating another while carnally presuming one while weakly denying another while rashly misconstruing Carnally insinuating Master favour thy self Which though some Parasites of Rome would fain smooth up that he in this shewed his Love to Christ as before his Faith out of S. Hierome and S. Austin yet it must needs be granted which Bernard saith diligebat Spiritum carnaliter he loved the Spirit in a carnal fashion Let them chuse whether they will admit Christ to have chid unjustly or Peter worthy of chiding Except perhaps with
find leisure to bestow our commiseration on those who need it perhaps less then our selves Even now O Saviour when thou wert within the view of thy Calvary thou canst foresee and pity the vastation of thy Jerusalem and givest a sad Prophecy of the imminent destruction of that City which lately had cost thee tears and now shall cost thee bloud It is not all the indign cruelty of men that can rob thee of thy Mercy Jerusalem could not want Malefactours though Barabbas was dismissed That all this execution might seem to be done out of the zeal of Justice two capital offenders adjudged to their Gibbet shall accompany thee O Saviour both to thy death and in it They are led manicled after thee as less criminous no stripes had disabled them from bearing their own Crosses Long agoe was this unmeet society foretold by thine Evangelical Seer He was taken from prison and from judgment He was cut out of the land of the living He made his grave with the Wicked O Blessed Jesu it had been disparagement enough to thee to be sorted with the best of men since there is much sin in the perfectest and there could be no sin in thee but to be matched with the scum of mankind whom vengeance would not let to live is such an indignity as confounds my thoughts Surely there is no Angel in Heaven but would have been proud to attend thee and what could the earth afford worthy of thy train yet malice hath suited thee with company next to Hell that their viciousness might reflect upon thee and their sin might stain thine Innocence Ye are deceived O ye fond Judges This is the way to grace your dying malefactours this is not the way to disgrace him whose guiltlesness and perfection triumph'd over your injustice his presence was able to make your Thieves happy their presence could no more blemish him then your own Thus guarded thus attended thus accompanied art thou Blessed Jesu led to that loathsome and infamous hill which now thy last bloud shall make Sacred now thou settest thy foot upon that rising ground which shall prevent thine Olivet whence thy Soul shall first ascend into thy Glory There whilst thou art dressing thy self for thy last Act thou art presented with that bitter and farewell-potion wherewith dying Malefactours were wont to have their senses stupified that they might not feel the torments of their execution It was but the common mercy of men to alleviate the death of Offenders since the intent of their last doom is not so much pain as dissolution That draught O Saviour was not more welcome to the guilty then hatefull unto thee In the vigour of all thine inward and outward senses thou wouldst incounter the most violent assaults of death and scornedst to abate the least touch of thy quickest apprehension Thou well knewest that the work thou wentest about would require the use of all thy powers it was not thine ease that thou soughtest but our Redemption neither meantest thou to yield to thy last enemy but to resist and to overcome him which that thou mightest doe the more gloriously thou challengedst him to doe his worst and in the mean time wouldst not disfurnish thy self of any of thy powerfull faculties This greatest combat that ever was shall be fought on even hand neither wouldst thou steal that Victory which thou now atchievedst over Death and Hell Thou didst but touch at this cup it is a far bitterer then this that thou art now drinking up to the dregs thou refusedst that which was offered thee by men but that which was mixed by thine eternal Father though mere Gall and Wormwood thou didst drink up to the last drop And therein O Blessed Jesu lies all our health and salvation I know not whether I do more suffer in thy pain or joy in the issue of thy Suffering Now even now O Saviour art thou entring into those dreadfull lists and now thou art grappling with thy last enemy as if thou hadst not suffered till now now thy bloudy Passion begins a cruell expoliation begins that violence Again do these grim and merciless Souldiers lay their rude hands upon thee and strip thee naked again are those bleeding wales lay'd open to all eyes again must thy Sacred Body undergoe the shame of an abhorred nakedness Lo thou that cloathest man with raiment beasts with hides fishes with scales and shells earth with flowers Heaven with Stars art despoiled of cloaths and standest exposed to the scorn of all beholders As the First Adam entred into his Paradise so dost thou the Second Adam into thine naked and as the First Adam was cloathed with Innocence when he had no cloaths so wert thou the Second too and more then so thy nakedness O Saviour cloaths our Souls not with Innocence onely but with Beauty Hadst not thou been naked we had been cloathed with confusion O happy nakedness whereby we are covered from shame O happy shame whereby we are invested with glory All the beholders stand wrapped with warm garments thou onely art stripped to tread the wine-press alone How did thy Blessed Mother now wish her veil upon thy shoulders and that Disciple who lately ran from thee naked wish'd in vain that his loving pity might doe that for thee which fear forced him to for himself Shame is succeeded with Pain Oh the torment of the Cross Methinks I see and feel how having fastned the transverse to the body of that fatal Tree and laid it upon the ground they racked and strained thy tender and sacred Lims to fit the extent of their fore-appointed measure and having tentered out thine arms beyond their natural reach how they fastned them with cords till those strong iron nails which were driven up to the head through the palms of thy Blessed hands had not more firmly then painfully fixed thee to the Gibbet The tree is raised up and now not without a vehement concussion settled in the mortise Woe is me how are thy joynts and sinews torn and stretched till they crack again by this torturing distension how doth thine own weight torment thee whilst thy whole body rests upon this forced and dolorous hold till thy nailed feet bear their part in a no-less-afflictive supportation How did the rough iron pierce thy Soul whilst passing through those tender and sensible parts it carried thy flesh before it and as it were rivetted it to that shamefull Tree There now O dear Jesu there thou hangest between Heaven and earth naked bleeding forlorn despicable the spectacle of miseries the scorn of men Be abashed O ye Heavens and earth and all ye creatures wrap up your selves in horrour and confusion to see the shame and pain and curse of your most pure and Omnipotent Creatour How could ye subsist whilst he thus suffers in whom ye are O Saviour didst thou take flesh for our Redemption to be thus indignly used thus mangled thus tortured Was this measure fit to be offered to that Sacred
Women the first witnesses of the Resurrection as also of the two Disciples walking to Emmaus whose hearts burning within them had set their tongues on fire in a zealous relation of those happy occurrences with the assured reports of the rising and re-appearance of many Saints in attendence of the Lord and giver of life yet still he struggles with his own distrust and stiffly suspends his belief to that truth whereof he cannot deny himself enough convinced As all bodies are not equally apt to be wrought upon by the same Medicine so are not all Souls by the same means of Faith one is refractory whilst others are pliable O Saviour how justly mightest thou have left this man to his own pertinacy whom could he have thank'd if he had perished in his unbelief But O thou good Shepherd of Israel that couldst be content to leave the ninety and nine to go fetch one stray in the wilderness how carefull wert thou to reduce this straggler to his fellows Right so were thy Disciples re-assembled such was the season the place the same so were the doors shut up when that unbelieving Disciple being now present with the rest thou so camest in so stoodst in the midst so shewedst thy hands and feet and singling out thy incredulous client invitest his eyes to see and his fingers to handle thine hands and his hand to be thrust into thy side that he might not be faithless but faithfull Blessed Jesu how thou pitiest the errours and infirmities of thy servants Even when we are froward in our misconceits and worthy of nothing but desertion how thou followest us and overtakest us with mercy and in thine abundant compassion wilt reclaim and save us when either we meant not or would not By how much more unworthy those eyes and hands were to see and touch that immortall and glorious Body by so much more wonderfull was thy Goodness in condescending to satisfy that curious Infidelity Neither do I hear thee so much as to chide that weak obstinacy It was not long since thou didst sharply take up the two Disciples that walk'd to Emmaus O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken but this was under the disguise of an unknown traveller upon the way when they were alone Now thou speakest with thine own tongue before all thy Disciples in stead of rebuking thou onely exhortest Be not faithless but faithfull Behold thy Mercy no less then thy Power hath melted the congealed heart of thy unbelieving follower Then Thomas answered and said unto him My Lord and my God I do not hear that when it came to the issue Thomas imployed his hands in this triall his eyes were now sufficient assurance the sense of his Master's Omniscience in this particular challenge of him spared perhaps the labour of a farther disquisition And now how happily was that doubt bestowed which brought forth so faithfull a confession My Lord my God I hear not such a word from those that believed It was well for us it was well for thee O Thomas that thou distrustedst else neither had the world received so perfect an evidence of that Resurrection whereon all our Salvation dependeth neither hadst thou yielded so pregnant and divine an astipulation to thy Blessed Saviour Now thou dost not onely profess his Resurrection but his Godhead too and thy happy interest in both And now if they be blessed that have not seen and yet believed blessed art thou also who having seen hast thus believed and blessed be thou O God who knowest how to make advantage of the infirmities of thy chosen for the promoting of their Salvation the confirmation of thy Church the glory of thine own Name Amen LI. The Ascension IT stood not with thy purpose O Saviour to ascend immediately from thy grave into Heaven thou meantest to take the earth in thy way not for a sudden passage but for a leisurely conversation Upon thine Easter-day thou spakest of thine Ascension but thou wouldst have forty days interposed Hadst thou meerly respected thine own Glory thou hadst instantly changed thy grave for thy Paradise for so much the sooner hadst thou been possessed of thy Father's joy we would not continue in a Dungeon when we might be in a Palace but thou who for our sakes vouchsafedst to descend from Heaven to earth wouldst now in the upshot have a gracious regard to us in thy return Thy Death had troubled the hearts of many Disciples who thought that condition too mean to be compatible with the glory of the Messiah and thoughts of diffidence were apt to seize upon the holiest breasts So long therefore wouldst thou hold footing upon earth till the world were fully convinced of the infallible evidences of thy Resurrection of all which time thou onely canst give an account it was not for flesh and bloud to trace the ways of Immortality neither was our frail corruptible sinfull nature a meet companion for thy now-glorified Humanity the glorious Angels of Heaven were now thy fittest attendents But yet how oft did it please thee graciously to impart thy self this while unto men and not onely to appear unto thy Disciples but to renew unto them the familiar forms of thy wonted conversation in conferring walking eating with them And now when thou drewest near to thy last parting thou who hadst many times shewed thy self before to thy severall Disciples thoughtest meet to assemble them all together for an universall valediction Who can be too rigorous in censuring the ignorances of well-meaning Christians when he sees the domestick Followers of Christ even after his Resurrection mistake the main End of his coming in the flesh Lord wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel They saw their Master now out of the reach of all Jewish envy they saw his power illimited and irresistible they saw him stay so long upon earth that they might imagine he meant to fix his abode there and what should he doe there but reign and wherefore should they be now assembled but for the choice and distribution of Offices and for the ordering of the affairs of that state which was now to be vindicated Oh weak thoughts of well-instructed Disciples What should an Heavenly body doe in an earthly throne How should a spirituall life be imployed in secular cares How poor a business is the Temporall Kingdom of Israel for the King of Heaven And even yet O Blessed Saviour I do not hear thee sharply controll this erroneous conceit of thy mistaken Followers thy mild correction insists rather upon the time then the misconceived substance of that restauration It was thy gracious purpose that thy Spirit should by degrees rectify their judgments and illuminate them with thy Divine truths in the mean time it was sufficient to raise up their hearts to an expectation of that Holy Ghost which should shortly lead them into all needfull and requisite verities And now with a gracious promise of that Spirit of thine
her travail have been destitute of lodging in the City of David Little did the Bethlehemites think what a Guest they refused else they would gladly have opened their doors to him who was able to open the gates of Heaven to them Now their Inhospitality is punishment enough to it self They have lost the honour and happiness of being Host to their God Even still O Blessed Saviour thou standest at our doors and knockest every motion of thy good Spirit tells us thou art there Now thou comest in thine own name and there thou standest whilst thy head is full of dew and thy locks wet with the drops of the night If we suffer carnal desires and worldly thoughts to take up the lodging of our Heart and revell within us whilst thou waitest upon our admission surely our judgement shall be so much the greater by how much better we know whom we have excluded What do we cry shame on the Bethlehemites whilst we are wilfully more churlish more unthankfull There is no room in my heart for the wonder at this Humility He for whom Heaven is too streight whom the Heaven of heavens cannot contain lies in the streight cabbin of the womb and when he would inlarge himself for the world is not allowed the room of an Inne The many mansions of Heaven were at his disposing the Earth was his and the fulness of it yet he suffers himself to be refused of a base Cottage and complaineth not What measure should discontent us wretched men when thou O God farest thus from thy creatures How should we learn both to want and abound from thee who abounding with the glory and riches of Heaven wouldst want a lodging in thy first welcome to the earth Thou camest to thine own and thy own received thee not How can it trouble us to be rejected of the world which is not ours What wonder is it if thy servants wandred abroad in sheep-skins and goat-skins destitute and afflicted when their Lord is denied harbour How should all the world blush at this indignity of Bethlehem He that came to save Men is sent for his first lodging to the Beasts The Stable is become his Inne the Cratch his Bed O strange Cradle of that great King which Heaven it self may envy O Saviour thou that wert both the Maker and Owner of Heaven of Earth couldst have made thee a Palace without hands couldst have commanded thee an empty room in those houses which thy creatures had made When thou didst but bid the Angels avoid their first place they fell down from Heaven like lightning and when in thy humbled estate thou didst but say I am he who was able to stand before thee How easie had it been for thee to have made place for thy self in the throngs of the stateliest Courts Why wouldst thou be thus homely but that by contemning worldly Glories thou mightest teach us to contemn them that thou mightest-sanctify Poverty to them whom thou calledst unto want that since thou who hadst the choice of all earthly conditions wouldst be born poor and despised those which must want out of necessity might not think their Poverty grievous Here was neither friend to entertain nor servant to attend nor place wherein to be attended onely the poor Beasts gave way to the God of all the world It is the great mystery of godliness that God was manifested in the flesh and seen of Angels but here which was the top of all wonders the very Beasts might see their Maker For those Spirits to see God in the flesh it was not so strange as for the brute creatures to see him who was the God of spirits He that would be led into the wilderness amongst wild beasts to be tempted would come into the house of beasts to be born that from the height of his Divine Glory his Humiliation might be the greater How can we be abased low enough for thee O Saviour that hast thus neglected thy self for us That the visitation might be answerable to the homeliness of the place attendents provision who shall come to congratulate his birth but poor Shepherds The Kings of the earth rest at home and have no summons to attend him by whom they reign God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the mighty In an obscure time the night unto obscure men Shepherds doth God manifest the light of his Son by glorious Angels It is not our meanness O God that can exclude us from the best of thy mercies yea thus far dost thou respect persons that thou hast put down the mighty and exalted them of low degree If these Shepherds had been snorting in their beds they had no more seen Angels nor heard news of their Saviour then their neighbours Their vigilancy is honoured with this heavenly Vision Those who are industrious in any calling are capable of farther Blessings whereas the Idle are fit for nothing but Temptation No less then a whole Chore of Angels are worthy to sing the Hymn of Glory to God for the Incarnation of his Son What joy is enough for us whose nature he took and whom he came to restore by his Incarnation If we had the tongues of Angels we could not raise this note high enough to the praise of our glorious Redeemer No sooner do the Shepherds hear the news of a Saviour then they run to Bethlehem to seek him Those that left their beds to tend their flocks leave their flocks to enquire after their Saviour No earthly thing is too dear to be forsaken for Christ If we suffer any worldly occasion to stay us from Bethlehem we care more for our sheep then our souls It is not possible that a faithfull heart should hear where Christ is and not labour to the sight to the fruition of him Where art thou O Saviour but at home in thine own house in the assembly of thy Saints Where art thou to be found but in thy Word and Sacraments Yea there thou seekest for us if there we haste not to seek for thee we are worthy to want thee worthy that our want of thee here should make us want the presence of thy face for ever IV. The Sages and the Star THE Shepherds and the Cratch accorded well yet even they saw nothing which they might not contemn neither was there any of those Shepherds that seemed not more like a King then that King whom they came to see But O the Divine Majesty that shined in this Basenesse There lies the Babe in the Stable crying in the Manger whom the Angels came down from Heaven to proclaim whom the Sages come from the East to adore whom an heavenly Star notifies to the world that now men might see that Heaven and Earth serves him that neglected himself Those Lights that hang low are not far seen but those that are high placed are equally seen in the remotest distances Thy light O Saviour was no lesse then heavenly The East saw that which Bethlehem might
that Christ who gives us these blessings who is given to us in them This seemed too great an honour for the modesty of John to receive If his mother could say when her Blessed Cousin the Virgin Mary came to visit her Whence is this to me that the Mother of my Lord should come to me how much more might he say so when the Divine Son of that mother came to call for a favour from him I have need to be baptized of thee and comest thou to me O holy Baptist if there were not a greater born of woman than thou yet thou couldst not be born of a woman and not need to be baptized of thy Saviour He baptized with fire thou with water Little would thy water have availed thee without his fire If he had not baptized thee how wert thou sanctified from the womb There can be no flesh without filthiness Neither thy supernatural conception nor thy austere life could exempt thee from the need of Baptism Even those that have not lived to sin after the similitude of Adam yet are they so tainted with Adam that unless the Second Adam cleanse them by his Baptism they are hopeless There is no less use of Baptism unto all then there is certainty of the need of Baptism John baptized without Christ within The more holy a man is the more sensible he is of his unholiness No carnal man could have said I have need to be baptized of thee neither can he find what he is the better for a little Font-water The sense of our wretchedness and the valuation of our spiritual helps is the best trial of our Regeneration Our Saviour doth not deny that either John hath need to be baptized of him or that it is strange that he should come to be baptized of John but he will needs thus far both honour John and disparage himself to be baptized of his Messenger He that would take flesh of the Virgin education from his Parents sustenance from his creatures will take Baptism from John It is the praise of his mercy that he will stoop so low as to be beholden to his creatures which from him receive their being and power both to take and give Yet not so much respect to John as obedience to his Father drew him to this point of Humiliation Thus it behoves us to fulfill all righteousness The Counsels and Appointments of God are Righteousness it self There needs no other motive either to the Servant or the Son then the knowledge of those righteous purposes This was enough to lead a faithfull man through all difficulties and inconveniencies neither will it admit of any reply or any demur John yieldeth to this honour which his Saviour puts upon him in giving Baptism to the Authour of it He baptized others to the remission of their sins now he baptizes him by whom they are remitted both to the Baptizer and to others No sooner is Christ baptized then he comes forth of the water The element is of force but during the use it turns common when that is past Neither is the water sooner poured on his head then the Heavens are opened and the Holy Ghost descendeth upon that head which was baptized The Heavens are never shut whiles either of the Sacraments is duly administred and received Neither do the Heavens ever thus open without the descent of the Holy Ghost But now that the God of Heaven is baptized they open unto him which are opened to all the faithfull by him and that Holy Ghost which proceeded from him together with the Father joyns with the Father in a sensible testimony of him that now the world might see what interest he had in the Heavens in the Father in the Holy Spirit and might expect nothing but divine from the entrance of such a Mediator IX Christ Tempted NO sooner is Christ come out of the water of Baptism then he enters into the fire of Temptation No sooner is the Holy Spirit descended upon his head in the form of a Dove then he is led by the Spirit to be tempted No sooner doth God say This is my Son then Satan says If thou be the Son of God It is not in the power either of the gift or seals of Grace to deliver us from the assaults of Satan They may have the force to repell evil suggestions they have none to prevent them Yea the more we are ingaged unto God by our publick vows and his pledges of favour so much more busie and violent is the rage of that Evil one to encounter us We are no sooner stept forth into the field of God then he labours to wrest our weapons out of our hands or to turn them against us The voice from Heaven acknowledged Christ to be the Son of God this Divine Testimony did not allay the malice of Satan but exasperate it Now that venomous Serpent swells with inward poison and hasts to assail him whom God hath honoured from Heaven O God how should I look to escape the suggestions of that Wicked one when the Son of thy love cannot be free when even Grace it self draws on enmity That enmity that spared not to strike at the head will it forbear the weakest and remotest limb Arm thou me therefore with an expectation of that evil I cannot avoid Make thou me as strong as he is malicious Say to my soul also Thou art my Son and let Satan doe his worst All the time of our Saviour's obscurity I do not find him set upon Now that he looks forth to the publick execution of his Divine Office Satan bends his forces against him Our privacy perhaps may sit down in peace but never man did endeavour a common good without opposition It is a sign that both the Work is holy and the Agent faithfull when we meet with strong affronts We have reason to be comforted with nothing so much as with resistence If we were not in a way to do good we should find no rubs Satan hath no cause to molest his own and that whilst they go about his own service He desires nothing more then to make us smooth paths to sin but when we would turn our feet to holiness he blocks up the way with Temptations Who can wonder enough at the sawciness of that bold Spirit that dares to set upon the Son of the everliving God Who can wonder enough at thy meekness and patience O Saviour that wouldst be tempted He wanted not malice and presumption to assault thee thou wantedst not humility to endure those assaults I should stand amazed at this voluntary dispensation of thine but that I see the susception of our humane nature lays thee open to this condition It is necessarily incident to manhood to be liable to Temptations Thou wouldest not have put on Flesh if thou hadst meant utterly to put off this consequence of our infirmity If the state of innocence could have been any defence against evil motions the First Adam had not been tempted much
performance meets him one half of the way and he that believed somewhat ere he came and more when he went grew to more Faith in the way and when he came home inlarged his Faith to all the skirts of his Family A weak Faith may be true but a true Faith is growing He that boasts of a full stature in the first moment of his assent may presume but doth not believe Great men cannot want clients their example sways some their authority more they cannot go to either of the other worlds alone In vain do they pretend power over others who labour not to draw their families unto God XV. The Dumb Devil ejected THat the Prince of our Peace might approve his victories perfect wheresoever he met with the Prince of darkness he foiled him he ejected him He found him in Heaven thence did he throw him headlong and verified his Prophet I have cast thee out of mine holy mountain And if the Devils left their first habitation it was because being Devils they could not keep it Their estate indeed they might have kept and did not their habitation they would have kept and might not How art thou faln from heaven O Lucifer He found him in the Heart of man for in that closet of God did the evill Spirit after his exile from Heaven shrowd himself Sin gave him possession which he kept with a willing violence thence he casts him by his Word and Spirit He found him tyrannizing in the Bodies of some possessed men and with power commands the unclean Spirits to depart This act is for no hand but his When a strong man keeps possession none but a stronger can remove it In voluntary things the strongest may yield to the weakest Sampson to a Dalilah but in violent ever the mightiest carries it A spirituall nature must needs be in rank above a bodily neither can any power be above a Spirit but the God of Spirits No otherwise is it in the mentall possession Where ever Sin is there Satan is As on the contrary whosoever is born of God the seed of God remains in him That Evill one not onely is but rules in the sons of disobedience in vain shall we try to eject him but by the Divine power of the Redeemer For this cause the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devill Do we find our selves haunted with the familiar Devills of Pride Self-love Sensuall desires Unbelief None but thou O Son of the ever-living God can free our bosoms of these hellish guests O cleanse thou me from my secret sins and keep me that presumptuous sins prevail not over me O Saviour it is no Paradox to say that thou castest out more Devils now then thou didst whilst thou wert upon earth It was thy word When I am lifted up I will draw all men unto me Satan weighs down at the feet thou pullest at the head yea at the heart In every conversion which thou workest there is a dispossession Convert me O Lord and I shall be converted I know thy means are now no other then ordinary If we expect to be dispossessed by miracle it would be a miracle if ever we were dispossessed O let thy Gospell have the perfect work in me so onely shall I be delivered from the powers of darkness Nothing can be said to be dumb but what naturally speaks nothing can speak naturally but what hath the instruments of speech which because spirits want they can no otherwise speak vocally then as they take voices to themselves in taking bodies This Devill was not therefore dumb in his nature but in his effect The man was dumb by the operation of that Devill which possessed him and now the action is attributed to the spirit which was subjectively in the man It is not you that speak saith our Saviour but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you As it is in bodily diseases that they do not infect us alike some seize upon the humours others upon the spirits some assault the brain others the heart or lungs so in bodily and spirituall possessions in some the evill spirit takes away their senses in some their lims in some their inward faculties like as spiritually they affect to move us unto severall sins one to Lust another to Covetousness or Ambition another to Cruelty and their names have distinguished them according to these various effects This was a dumb Devill which yet had possessed not the tongue onely of this man but his ear nor that onely but as it seems his eyes too O subtle and tyrannous spirit that obstructs all ways to the Soul that keeps out all means of grace both from the door and windows of the Heart yea that stops up all passages whether of ingress or egress of ingress at the Eye or Ear of egress at the Mouth that there might be no capacity of redress What holy use is there of our Tongue but to praise our Maker to confess our sins to inform our brethren How rise is this dumb Devill every-where whilst he stops the mouths of Christians from these usefull and necessary duties For what end hath man those two privileges above his fellow-creatures Reason and Speech but that as by the one he may conceive of the great works of his Maker which the rest cannot so by the other he may express what he conceives to the honour of the Creatour both of them and himself And why are all other creatures said to praise God and bidden to praise him but because they doe it by the apprehension by the expression of man If the heavens declare the glory of God how doe they it but to the eyes and by the tongue of that man for whom they were made It is no small honour whereof the envious Spirit shall rob his Maker if he can close up the mouth of his onely rationall and vocall creature and turn the best of his workmanship into a dumb Idol that hath a mouth and speaks not Lord open thou my lips and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise Praise is not more necessary then complaint praise of God then complaint of our selves whether to God or men The onely amends we can make to God when we have not had the grace to avoid sin is to confess the sin we have not avoided This is the sponge that wipes out all the blots and blurs of our lives If we confess our sins he is faithfull and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness That cunning Man-slayer knows there is no way to purge the sick soul but upward by casting out the vicious humour wherewith it is clogged and therefore holds the lips close that the heart may not dis-burthen it self by so wholsome evacuation When I kept silence my bones consumed For day and night thy hand O Lord was heavy upon me my moisture is turned into the drought of summer O let me confess against my self my wickedness unto
be our strong helper that hath not given us over to be a prey unto their teeth Or if some scope have been given to that envious one to afflict us hath it been with favourable limitations it is thine onely mercy O God that hath chained and muzzled up this band-dog so as that he may scratch us with his paws but cannot pierce us with his fangs Far far is this from our deserts who had too well merited a just abdication from thy favour and protection and an interminable seisure by Satan both in soul and body Neither do I here see more matter of thanks to our God for our immunity from the external injuries of Satan then occasion of serious inquiry into his power over us for the spiritual I see some that think themselves safe from this ghostly tyranny because they sometimes find themselves in good moods free from the suggestions of gross sins much more from the commission Vain men that feed themselves with so false and frivolous comforts will they not see Satan through the just permission of God the same to the Soul in mental possessions that he is to the Body in corporal The worst Demoniack hath his lightsome respites not ever tortured not ever furious betwixt whiles he might look soberly talk sensibly move regularly It is a wofull comfort that we sin not always There is no Master so barbarous as to require of his Slave a perpetual unintermitted toil yet though he sometimes eat sleep rest he is a vassal still If that Wicked one have drawn us to a customary perpetration of evil and have wrought us to a frequent iteration of the same sin this is gage enough for our servitude matter enough for his tyranny and insultation He that would be our Tormentour always cares onely to be sometimes our Tempter The possessed is bound as with the invisible fetters of Satan so with the material chains of the inhabitants What can bodily force prevail against a spirit Yet they endeavour this restraint of the man whether out of charity or justice charity that he might not hurt himself justice that he might not hurt others None do so much befriend the Demoniack as those that bind him Neither may the spiritually possessed be otherwise handled for though this act of the enemy be plausible and to appearance pleasant yet there is more danger in this dear and smiling tyranny Two sorts of chains are fit for outrageous sinners good Laws unpartial Executions that they may not hurt that they may not be hurt to eternal death These iron chains are no sooner fast then broken There was more then an humane power in this disruption It is not hard to conceive the utmost of nature in this kind of actions Sampson doth not break the cords and ropes like a thread of tow but God by Sampson The man doth not break these chains but the Spirit How strong is the arm of these evil angels how far transcending the ordinary course of nature They are not called Powers for nothing What flesh and bloud could but tremble at the palpable inequality of this match if herein the mercifull protection of our God did not the rather magnifie it self that so much strength met with so much malice hath not prevailed against us In spite of both we are in safe hands He that so easily brake the iron fetters can never break the adamantine chain of our Faith In vain do the chafing billows of Hell beat upon that Rock whereon we are built And though these brittle chains of earthly metall be easily broken by him yet the sure tempered chain of God's eternal Decree he can never break That Almighty Arbiter of Heaven and Earth and Hell hath chained him up in the bottomless pit and hath so restrained his malice that but for our good we cannot be tempted we cannot be foiled but for a glorious victory Alas it is no otherwise with the spiritually possessed The chains of restraint are commonly broken by the fury of wickedness What are the respects of civility fear of God fear of men wholsome laws carefull executions to the desperately licentious but as cobwebs to an hornet Let these wild Demoniacks know that God hath provided chains for them that will hold even everlasting chains under darkness These are such as must hold the Devils themselves their Masters unto the judgment of the great Day how much more those impotent Vassals Oh that men would suffer themselves to be bound to their good behaviour by the sweet and easie recognizances of their duty to their God and the care of their own souls that so they might rather be bound up in the bundle of life It was not for rest that these chains were torn off but for more motion This prisoner runs away from his friends he cannot run away from his Jaolour He is now carried into the Wilderness not by meer external force but by internal impulsion carried by the same power that unbound him for the opportunity of his tyranny for the horrour of the place for the affamishment of his body for the avoidance of all means of resistence Solitary Desarts are the delights of Satan It is an unwise zeal that moves us to doe that to our selves in an opinion of merit and holiness which the Devil wishes to doe to us for a punishment and conveniency of temptation The evil Spirit is for solitariness God is for society He dwells in the assembly of his Saints yea there he hath a delight to dwell Why should not we account it our happiness that we may have leave to dwell where the Authour of all happiness loves to dwell There cannot be any misery incident unto us whereof our gracious Redeemer is not both conscious and sensible Without any intreaty therefore of the miserable Demoniack or suit of any friend the God of spirits takes pity of his distress and from no motion but his own commands the evil Spirit to come out of the man O admirable precedent of mercy preventing our requests exceeding our thoughts forcing favours upon our impotence doing that for us which we should and yet cannot desire If men upon our instant solicitations would give us their best aid it were a just praise of their bounty but it well became thee O God of mercy to go without force to give without suit And do we think thy goodness is impaired by thy glory If thou wert thus commiserative upon earth art thou less in Heaven How dost thou now take notice of all our complaints of all our infirmities how doth thine infinite pity take order to redress them What evil can befall us which thou knowest not feelest not relievest not How safe are we that have such a Guardian such a Mediatour in Heaven Not long before had our Saviour commanded the winds and waters and they could not but obey him now he speaks in the same language to the evil Spirit he intreats not he perswades not he commands Command argues superiority He onely is
This piece of the clause was spoken like a Saint Jesus the Son of the Most high God the other piece like a Devil What have I to doe with thee If the disclamation were universal the latter words would impugn the former for whilst he confesses Jesus to be the Son of the Most high God he withall confesses his own inevitable subjection Wherefore would he beseech if he were not obnoxious He cannot he dare not say What hast thou to doe with me but What have I to doe with thee Others indeed I have vexed thee I fear in respect then of any violence of any personal provocation What have I to doe with thee And dost thou ask O thou evil Spirit what hast thou to doe with Christ whilst thou vexest a Servant of Christ Hast thou thy name from Knowledge and yet so mistakest him whom thou confessest as if nothing could be done to him but what immediately concerns his own person Hear that great and just Judge sentencing upon his dreadfull Tribunal Inasmuch as thou didst it unto one of these little ones thou didst it unto me It is an idle misprision to sever the sense of an injury done to any of the Members from the Head He that had humility enough to kneel to the Son of God hath boldness enough to expostulate Art thou come to torment us before our time Whether it were that Satan who useth to enjoy the torment of sinners whose musick it is to hear our shrieks and gnashings held it no small piece of his torment to be restrained in the exercise of his tyranny Or whether the very presence of Christ were his rack For the guilty spirit projecteth terrible things and cannot behold the Judge or the executioner without a renovation of horrour Or whether that as himself professeth he were now in a fearfull expectation of being commanded down into the deep for a farther degree of actual torment which he thus deprecates There are Tortures appointed to the very spiritual natures of evil Angels Men that are led by sense have easily granted the Body subject to torment who yet have not so readily conceived this incident to a Spiritual substance The Holy Ghost hath not thought it fit to acquaint us with the particular manner of these invisible acts rather willing that we should herein fear then enquire but as all matters of faith though they cannot be proved by reason for that they are in a higher sphere yet afford an answer able to stop the mouth of all reason that dares bark against them since truth cannot be opposite to it self so this of the sufferings of Spirits There is therefore both an intentional torment incident to Spirits and a real For as in Blessedness the good Spirits find themselves joyned unto the chief good and hereupon feel a perfect love of God and unspeakable joy in him and rest in themselves so contrarily the evil Spirits perceive themselves eternally excluded from the presence of God and see themselves settled in a wofull darkness and from the sense of this separation arises an horrour not to be expressed not to be conceived How many men have we known to torment themselves with their own thoughts There needs no other gibbet then that which their troubled spirit hath erected in their own heart And if some pains begin at the Body and from thence afflict the Soul in a copartnership of grief yet others arise immediately from the Soul and draw the Body into a participation of misery Why may we not therefore conceive meer and separate Spirits capable of such an inward excruciation Besides which I hear the Judge of men and Angels say Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels I hear the Prophet say Tophet is prepared of old If with fear and without curiosity we may look upon those flames why may we not attribute a spiritual nature to that more then natural fire In the end of the world the elements shall be dissolved by fire and if the pure quintessential matter of the sky and the element of fire it self shall be dissolved by fire then that last fire shall be of another nature then that which it consumeth What hinders then but that the Omnipotent God hath from eternity created a fire of another nature proportionable even to spiritual essences Or why may we not distinguish of fire as it is it self a bodily creature and as it is an instrument of God's justice so working not by any material virtue or power of its own but by a certain height of supernatural efficacy to which it is exalted by the Omnipotence of that Supreme and Righteous Judge Or lastly why may we not conceive that though Spirits have nothing material in their nature which that fire should work upon yet by the judgment of the Almighty Arbiter of the world justly willing their torment they may be made most sensible of pain and by the obedible submission of their created nature wrought upon immediately by their appointed tortures besides the very horrour which ariseth from the place whereto they are everlastingly confined For if the incorporeal spirits of living men may be held in a loathed or painfull body and conceive sorrow to be so imprisoned why may we not as easily yield that the evil spirits of Angels or men may be held in those direfull flames and much more abhor therein to continue for ever Tremble rather O my soul at the thought of this wofull condition of the evil Angels who for one onely act of Apostasie from God are thus perpetually tormented whereas we sinfull wretches multiply many and presumptuous offences against the Majesty of our God And withall admire and magnifie that infinite mercy to the miserable generation of man which after this holy severity of justice to the revolted Angels so graciously forbears our hainous iniquities and both suffers us to be free for the time from these hellish torments and gives us opportunity of a perfect freedome from them for ever Praise the Lord O my soul and all that is within me praise his holy Name Who forgiveth all thy sins and healeth all thine infirmities who redeemeth thy life from destruction and crowneth thee with mercy and compassions There is no time wherein the evil Spirits are not tormented there is a time wherein they expect to be tormented yet more Art thou come to torment us before our time They knew that the last Assises are the prefixed term of their full execution which they also understood to be not yet come For though they knew not when the Day of Judgment should be a point concealed from the glorious Angels of heaven yet they knew when it should not be and therefore they say before the time Even the very evil spirits confess and fearfully attend a set day of universal Sessions They believe less then Devils that either doubt of or deny that Day of final retribution O the wonderfull mercy of our God that both to wicked men
and Spirits respites the utmost of their torment He might upon the first instant of the fall of Angels have inflicted on them the highest extremity of his vengeance he might upon the first sins of our youth yea of our nature have swept us away and given us our portion in that fiery lake He stays a time for both though with this difference of mercy to us men that here not onely is a delay but may be an utter prevention of punishment which to the evil Spirits is altogether impossible They do suffer they must suffer and though they have now deserved to suffer all they must yet they must once suffer more then they do Yet so doth this evil Spirit expostulate that he sues I beseech thee torment me not The world is well changed since Satan's first onset upon Christ Then he could say If thou be the Son of God now Jesus the Son of the Most high God then All these will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me now I beseech thee torment me not The same power when he lists can change the note of the Tempter to us How happy are we that have such a Redeemer as can command the Devils to their chains O consider this ye lawless sinners that have said Let us break his bands and cast his cords from us However the Almighty suffers you for a judgment to have free scope to evil and ye can now impotently resist the revealed will of your Creatour yet the time shall come when ye shall see the very masters whom ye have served the powers of darkness unable to avoid the revenges of God How much less shall man strive with his Maker Man whose breath is in his nostrils whose house is clay whose foundation is the dust Nature teaches every creature to wish a freedome from pain The foulest Spirits cannot but love themselves and this love must needs produce a deprecation of evil Yet what a thing is this to hear the Devil at his prayers I beseech thee torment me not Devotion is not guilty of this but fear There is no grace in the suit of Devils but nature no respect of glory to their Creatour but their own ease they cannot pray against sin but against torment for sin What news is it now to hear the profanest mouth in extremity imploring the Sacred Name of God when the Devils do so The worst of all creatures hates punishment and can say Lead me not into pain onely the good heart can say Lead me not into temptation If we can as heartily pray against sin for the avoiding of displeasure as against punishment when we have displeased there is true Grace in the soul Indeed if we could fervently pray against sin we should not need to pray against punishment which is no other then the inseparable shadow of that body but if we have not laboured against our sins in vain do we pray against punishment God must be just and the wages of sin is death It pleased our Holy Saviour not onely to let fall words of command upon this Spirit but to interchange some speeches with him All Christ's actions are not for example It was the errour of our Grandmother to hold chat with Satan That God who knows the craft of that old Serpent and our weak simplicity hath charged us not to enquire of an evil Spirit Surely if the Disciples returning to Jacob's Well wondred to see Christ talk with a woman well may we wonder to see him talking with an unclean Spirit Let it be no presumption O Saviour to ask upon what grounds thou didst this wherein we may not follow thee We know that sin was excepted in thy conformity of thy self to us we know there was no guile found in thy mouth no possibility of taint in thy nature in thine actions Neither is it hard to conceive how the same thing may be done by thee without sin which we cannot but sin in doing There is a vast difference in the Intention in the Agent For as on the one side thou didst not ask the name of the Spirit as one that knew not and would learn by enquiring but that by the confession of that mischief which thou pleasedst to suffer the grace of the cure might be the more conspicuous the more glorious so on the other God and Man might doe that safely which meer Man cannot doe without danger Thou mightest touch the leprosie and not be legally unclean because thou touchedst it to heal it didst not touch it with possibility of infection So mightest thou who by reason of the perfection of thy Divine nature wert uncapable of any stain by the interlocution with Satan safely confer with him whom corrupt Man predisposed to the danger of such a parly may not meddle with without sin because not without peril It is for none but God to hold discourse with Satan Our surest way is to have as little to doe with that Evil one as we may and if he shall offer to maintain conference with us by his secret temptations to turn our speech unto our God with the Archangel The Lord rebuke thee Satan It was the presupposition of him that knew it that not onely men but Spirits have names This then he asks not out of an ignorance or curiosity nothing could be hid from him who calleth the Stars and all the hoasts of Heaven by their names but out of a just respect to the glory of the Miracle he was working whereto the notice of the name would not a little avail For if without inquiry or confession our Saviour had ejected this evil Spirit it had passed for the single dispossession of one onely Devil whereas now it appears there was a combination and hellish champarty in these powers of darkness which were all forced to vail unto that almighty command Before the Devil had spoken singularly of himself What have I to doe with thee and I beseech thee torment me not yet our Saviour knowing that there was a multitude of Devils lurking in that breast who dissembled their presence wrests it out of the Spirit by this interrogation What is thy name Now can those wicked ones no longer hide themselves He that asked the question forced the answer My name is Legion The authour of discord hath borrowed a name of war from that military order of discipline by which the Jews were subdued doth the Devil fetch his denomination They were many yet they say My name not Our name though many they speak as one they act as one in this possession There is a marvellous accordance even betwixt evil Spirits That Kingdome is not divided for then it could not stand I wonder not that wicked men do so conspire in evil that there is such unanimity in the broachers and abetters of errours when I see those Devils which are many in substance are one in name action habitation Who can too much brag of unity when it is incident unto wicked Spirits All the
an happy thing to hear the report of them back from Heaven but if we always do not so it is not for us to be dejected and to accuse either our infidelity or thy neglect since we find here a faithfull suitour met with a gracious Saviour and yet he answered her not a word If we be poor in spirit God is rich in mercy he cannot send us away empty yet he will not always let us feel his condescent crossing us in our will that he may advance our benefit It was no small fruit of Christ's silence that the Disciples were hereupon moved to pray for her Not for a meer dismission It had been no favour to have required this but a punishment for if to be held in suspense be miserable to be sent away with a repulse is more But for a mercifull grant They saw much passion in the woman much cause of passion they saw great discouragement on Christ's part great constancy on hers Upon all these they feel her misery and become suitours for her unrequested It is our duty in case of necessity to intercede for each other and by how much more familiar we are with Christ so much more to improve our interest for the relief of the distressed We are bidden to say Our Father not mine Yea being members of one body we pray for our selves in others If the Foot be prickt the Back bends the Head bows down the Eyes look the Hands stir the Tongue calls for aid the whole man is in pain and labours for redress He cannot pray or be heard for himself that is no man's friend but his own No Prayer without Faith no Faith without Charity no Charity without mutual Intercession That which urged them to speak for her is urged to Christ by them for her obtaining She cries after us Prayer is as an Arrow if it be drawn up but a little it goes not far but if it be pull'd up to the head it flies strongly and pierces deep If it be but dribbled forth of careless lips it falls down at our foot the strength of our ejaculation sends it up into Heaven and fetches down a blessing The child hath escaped many a stripe by his loud crying and the very unjust Judge cannot endure the widow's clamour Heartless motions do but teach us to deny fervent suits offer violence both to earth and heaven Christ would not answer the Woman but doth answer the Disciples Those that have a familiarity with God shall receive answers when strangers shall stand out Yea even of domesticks some are more intire He that lay in Jesus his bosome could receive that intelligence which was concealed from the rest But who can tell whether that silence or this answer be more grievous I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel What is this answer but a defence of that silence and seeming neglect Whilst he said nothing his forbearance might have been supposed to proceed from the necessity of some greater thoughts but now his answer professeth that silence to have proceeded from a willing resolution not to answer and therefore he doth not vouchsafe so much as to give to her the answer but to her solicitours that they might return his denial from him to her who had undertaken to derive her suit to him I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel Like a faithfull Embassadour Christ hath an eye to his commission that may not be violated though to an apparent advantage whither he is not sent he may not go As he so all his have their fixed marks set at these they aim and think it not safe to shoot at rovers In matter of morality it is not for us to stand onely upon inhibitions avoiding what is forbidden but upon commands endeavouring onely what is injoyned We need no other rule of our life then the intention of our several stations And if he that was God would take no farther scope to himself then the limits of his commission how much doth it concern us frail men to keep within compass or what shall become of our lawlesness that live in a direct contrariety to the will of him that sent us Israel was Jacob's name from him derived to his posterity till the division of the Tribes under Jeroboam all that nation was Israel then the Father's name went to the most which were ten Tribes the name of the Son Juda to the best which were two Christ takes no notice of this unhappy division he remembers the ancient name which he gave to that faithfull wrastler It was this Christ with whom Jacob strove it was he that wrencht his hip and changed his name and dismist him with a blessing and now he cannot forget his old mercy to the house of Israel to that onely doth he profess himself sent Their first brood were Shepherds now they are Sheep and those not guarded not empastured but strayed and lost O Saviour we see thy charge the house of Israel not of Esau sheep not goats not wolves lost sheep not securely impaled in the confidence of their safe condition Woe were to us if thou wert not sent to us He is not a Jew which is one without Every Israelite is not a true one We are not of thy fold if we be not sheep thou wilt not reduce us to thy fold if we be not lost in our own apprehensions O Lord thou hast put a fleece upon our backs we have lost our selves enough make us so sensible of our own wandrings that we may find thee sent unto us and may be happily found of thee Hath not this poor woman yet done Can neither the silence of Christ nor his denial silence her Is it possible she should have any glimps of hope after so resolute repulses Yet still as if she saw no argument of discouragement she comes and worships and cries Lord help me She which could not in the house get a word of Christ she that saw her solicitours though Christ's own Disciples repelled yet she comes Before she followed now she overtakes him before she sued aloof now she comes close to him no contempt can cast her off Faith is an undaunted grace it hath a strong heart and a bold forehead Even very denials cannot dismay it much less delays She came not to face not to expostulate but to prostrate her self at his feet Her tongue worshipt him before now her knee The eye of her Faith saw that Divinity in Christ which bowed her to his earth There cannot be a fitter gesture of man to God then Adoration Her first suit was for mercy now for help There is no use of mercy but in helpfulness To be pitied without aid is but an addition to misery Who can blame us if we care not for an unprofitable compassion The very suit was gracious She saith not Lord if thou canst help me as the father of the Lunatick but professes the power whilst she begs the act
mourning thy chief pleasure is the comfort of the afflicted What a confusion there is in worldly sorrow The mother shreeks the servants cry out the people make lamentation the minstrells howl and strike dolefully so as the ear might question whether the Ditty or the Instrument were more heavy If ever expressions of sorrow sound well it is when Death leads the quire Soon doth our Saviour charm this noise and turns these unseasonable mourners whether formal or serious out of doors Not that he dislikes Musick whether to condole or comfort but that he had life in his eye and would have them know that he held these Funeral ceremonies to be too early and long before their time Give place for the maid is not dead but sleepeth Had she been dead she had but slept now she was not dead but asleep because he meant this nap of death should be so short and her awakening so speedy Death and Sleep are alike to him who can cast whom he will into the sleep of Death and awake when and whom he pleaseth out of that deadly sleep Before the people and domesticks of Jairus held Jesus for a Prophet now they took him for a Dreamer Not dead but asleep They that came to mourn cannot now forbear to laugh Have we piped at so many Funerals and seen and lamented so many Corpses and cannot we distinguish betwixt Sleep and Death The eyes are set the breath is gone the lims are stiff and cold Who ever died if she do but sleep How easily may our Reason or Sense befool us in Divine matters Those that are competent Judges in natural things are ready to laugh God to scorn when he speaks beyond their compass and are by him justly laughed to scorn for their unbelief Vain and faithless men as if that unlimited power of the Almighty could not make good his own word and turn either Sleep into Death or Death into Sleep at pleasure Ere many minutes they shall be ashamed of their errour and incredulity There were witnesses enough of her death there shall not be many of her restoring Three choice Disciples and the two Parents are onely admitted to the view and testimony of this miraculous work The eyes of those incredulous scoffers were not worthy of this honour Our infidelity makes us incapable of the secret favours and the highest counsels of the Almighty What did these scorners think and say when they saw him putting the minstrels and people out of doors Doubtless the maid is but asleep the man fears lest the noise shall awake her we must speak and tread softly that we disquiet her not What will he and his Disciples doe the while Is it not to be feared they will startle her out of her rest Those that are shut out from the participation of God's counsells think all his words and projects no better then foolishness But art thou O Saviour ever the more discouraged by the derision and censure of these scornfull unbelievers Because fools jear thee dost thou forbear thy work Surely I do not perceive that thou heedest them save for contempt or carest more for their words then their silence It is enough that thine act shall soon honour thee and convince them He took her by the hand and called saying Maid arise and her spirit came again and she arose straightway How could that touch that Call be other then effectual He who made that hand touched it and he who shall once say Arise ye dead said now Maid arise Death cannot but obey him who is the Lord of life The Soul is ever equally in his hand who is the God of Spirits it cannot but go and come at his command When he says Maid arise the now-dissolved spirit knows his office his place and instantly re-assumes that room which by his appointment it had left O Saviour if thou do but bid my Soul to arise from the death of Sin it cannot lie still if thou bid my Body to arise from the grave my Soul cannot but glance down from her Heaven and animate it In vain shall my sin or my grave offer to withhold me from thee The Maid revives not now to languish for a time upon her sick-bed and by some faint degrees to gather an insensible strength but at once she arises from her death and from her couch at once she puts off her fever with her dissolution she finds her life and her feet at once at once she finds her feet and her stomack He commanded to give her meat Omnipotency doth not use to go the pace of Nature All God's immediate works are like himself perfect He that raised her supernaturally could have so fed her It was never the purpose of his Power to put ordinary Means out of office XXVI The Motion of the two fiery Disciples repelled THE time drew now on wherein Jesus must be received up He must take death in his way Calvary is in his passage to mount Olivet He must be lift up to the Cross thence to climb into his Heaven Yet this comes not into mention as if all the thought of Death were swallowed up in this Victory over Death Neither O Saviour is it otherwise with us the weak members of thy mystical body We must die we shall be glorified What if Death stand before us we look beyond him at that transcendent Glory How should we be dismay'd with that pain which is attended with a blessed Immortality The strongest receit against Death is the happy estate that follows it next to that is the fore-expectation of it and resolution against it He stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem Jerusalem the nest of his enemies the Amphitheater of his conflicts the fatall place of his death Well did he know the plots and ambushes that were there laid for him and the bloudy issue of those designs yet he will go and goes resolved for the worst It is a sure and wise way to send our thoughts before us to grapple with those evils which we know must be incountred The enemy is half overcome that is well prepared for The strongest mischief may be outfaced with a seasonable fore-resolution There can be no greater disadvantage then the suddenness of a surprisall O God what I have not the power to avoid let me have the wisedom to expect The way from Galilee to Judaea lay through the Region of Samaria if not through the City Christ now towards the end of his Preaching could not but be attended with a multitude of followers It was necessary there should be purveyours and harbingers to procure lodgings and provision for so large a troup Some of his own retinue are addressed to this service they seek not for palaces and delicates but for house-room and victuals It was He whose the earth was and the fulness thereof whos 's the Heavens are and the mansions therein yet He who could have commanded Angels sues to Samaritans He that filled and comprehended Heaven sendeth for shelter in a
and decrepit age of the world into which we are fallen How many are there that think there is no wisedom but in a dull indifferency and chuse rather to freeze then burn How quick and apprehensive are men in cases of their own indignities how insensible of their Saviour's But there is nothing so ill as the corruption of the best Rectified zeal is not more commendable and usefull then inordinate and misguided is hatefull and dangerous Fire is a necessary and beneficial element but if it be once misplaced and have caught upon the beams of our houses or stacks of our corn nothing can be more direfull Thus sometimes Zeal turns Murther They that kill you shall think they doe God service sometimes Phrensie sometimes rude Indiscretion Wholsome and blessed is that Zeal that is well grounded and well governed grounded upon the word of Truth not upon unstable fancies governed by Wisedom and Charity Wisedom to avoid rashness and excess Charity to avoid just offence No motion can want a pretence Elias did so why not we He was an holy Prophet the occasion the place abludes not much there wrong was offered to a servant here to his Master there to a man here to a God and man If Elias then did it why not we There is nothing more perillous then to draw all the actions of Holy men into examples For as the best men have their weaknesses so they are not privileged from letting fall unjustifiable actions Besides that they may have had perhaps peculiar warrants signed from Heaven whether by instinct or special command which we shall expect in vain There must be much caution used in our imitation of the best patterns whether in respect of the persons or things else we shall make our selves Apes and our acts sinfull absurdities It is a rare thing for our Saviour to find fault with the errours of zeal even where have appeared sensible weaknesses If Moses in a sacred rage and indignation brake the Tables written with God's own hand I find him not checked Here our meek Saviour turns back and frowns upon his furious suitours and takes them up roundly Ye know not of what spirit ye are The faults of uncharitableness cannot be swallowed up in zeal If there were any colour to hide the blemishes of this misdisposition it should be this crimson die But he that needs not our Lie will let us know he needs not our Injury and hates to have a good cause supported by the violation of our Charity We have no reason to disclaim our Passions Even the Son of God chides sometimes yea where he loves It offends not that our Affections are moved but that they are inordinate It was a sharp word Ye know not of what spirit ye are Another man would not perhaps have felt it a Disciple doth Tender hearts are galled with that which the carnal mind slighteth The spirit of Elias was that which they meant to assume and imitate they shall now know their mark was mistaken How would they have hated to think that any other but God's Spirit had stirred them up to this passionate motion now they shall know it was wrought by that ill spirit whom they professed to hate It is far from the good Spirit of God to stir up any man to private revenge or thirst of bloud Not an Eagle but a Dove was the shape wherein he chose to appear Neither wouldst thou O God be in the whirlwind or in the fire but in the soft voice O Saviour what do we seek for any precedent but thine whose name we challenge Thou camest to thine own thine own received thee not Didst thou call for fire from Heaven upon them didst thou not rather send down water from thy compassionate eyes and weep for them by whom thou must bleed Better had it been for us never to have had any spirit then any but thine We can be no other then wicked if our mercies be cruelty But is it the name of Elias O ye Zelots which ye pretend for a colour of your impotent desire Ye do not consider the difference betwixt his Spirit and yours His was extraordinary and heroical besides the instinct or secret command of God for this act of his far otherwise is it with you who by a carnal distemper are moved to this furious suggestion Those that would imitate God's Saints in singular actions must see they go upon the same grounds Without the same Spirit and the same warrant it is either a mockery or a sin to make them our Copies Elias is no fit pattern for Disciples but their Master The Son of man came not to destroy mens lives but to save them Then are our actions and intentions warrantable and praise-worthy when they accord with his O Saviour when we look into those sacred Acts and monuments of thine we find many a life which thou preservedst from perishing some that had perished by thee recalled never any by thee destroyed Onely one poor fig-tree as the reall Emblem of thy severity to the unfruitfull was blasted and withered by thy curse But to man how ever favourable and indulgent wert thou So repelled as thou wert so reviled so persecuted laid for sold betrayed apprehended arraigned condemned crucified yet what one man didst thou strike dead for these hainous indignities Yea when one of thine enemies lost but an ear in that ill quarrel thou gavest that ear to him who came to take life from thee I find some whom thou didst scourge and correct as the sacrilegious money-changers none whom thou killedst Not that thou either lovest not or requirest not the duly severe execution of justice Whose sword is it that Princes bear but thine Offenders must smart and bleed This is a just sequel but not the intention of thy coming thy will not thy drift Good Princes make wholsome Laws for the well-ordering of their people there is no authority without due coercion The violation of these good Laws is followed with death whose end was preservation life order and this not so much for revenge of an offence past as for prevention of future mischief How can we then enough love and praise thy mercy O thou preserver of men How should we imitate thy saving and beneficent disposition towards mankind as knowing the more we can help to save the nearer we come to thee that camest to save all and the more destructive we are the more we resemble him who is Abaddon a murtherer from the beginning XXVII The Ten Lepers THE Samaritans were tainted not with Schism but Heresie but Paganism our Saviour yet balks them not but makes use of the way as it lies and bestows upon them the courtesie of some Miracles Some kind of commerce is lawfull even with those without Terms of intireness and leagues of inward amity are here unfit unwarrantable dangerous but civil respects and wise uses of them for our convenience or necessity need not must not be forborn Ten Lepers are here met those that
eternally possessed the glory of his Father without any witnesses in time the Angels were blessed with that sight and after that two bodily yet Heavenly witnesses were allowed Enoch and Elias Now in his humanity he was invested with glory he takes but three witnesses and those earthly and weak Peter James John And why these We may be too curious Peter because the eldest John because the dearest James because next Peter the zealousest Peter because he loved Christ most John because Christ most loved him James because next to both he loved and was loved most I had rather to have no reason but quia complacuit because it so pleased him Why may we not as well ask why he chose these twelve from others as why he chose these three out of the twelve If any Romanists will raise from hence any privilege to Peter which we could be well content to yield if that would make them ever the honester men they must remember that they must take company with them which these Pompeian spirits cannot abide As good no privilege as any partners And withall they must see him more taxed for his errour in this act then honoured by his presence at the act whereas the Beloved Disciple saw and erred not These same three which were witnesses of his Transfiguration in the mount were witnesses of his Agony in the garden all three and these three alone were present at both but both times sleeping These were arietes gregis the Bell-weathers of the flock as Austin calls them Oh weak devotion of three great Disciples These were Paul's three pillars 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gal. 2.9 Christ takes them up twice once to be witnesses of his greatest Glory once of his greatest Extremity they sleep both times The other was in the night more tolerable this by day yea in a light above day Chrysostome would fain excuse it to be an amazedness not a sleep not considering that they slept both at that Glory and after in the Agony To see that Master praying one would have thought should have fetcht them on their knees especially to see those Heavenly affections look out at his Eyes to see his Soul lifted up in his Hands in that transported fashion to Heaven But now the hill hath wearied their lims their body clogs their Soul and they fall asleep Whilst Christ saw Divine visions they dreamed dreams whilst he was in another world ravished with the sight of his Father's Glory yea of his own they were in another world a world of fancies surprized with the cousin of death sleep Besides so gracious an example their own necessity quia incessanter pecco because I continually sin Bernard's reason might have moved them to pray rather then their Master and behold in stead of fixing their eyes upon Heaven they shut them in stead of lifting up their hearts their heads fall down upon their shoulders and shortly here was snorting in stead of sighs and prayers This was not Abraham's or Elihu's ecstatical sleep Job 33. not the sleep of the Church a waking sleep but the plain sleep of the eyes and that not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a slumbring sleep which David denies to himself Psal 132. but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sound sleep which Solomon forbids Prov. 6.4 yea rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the dead sleep of Adam or Jonas and as Bernard had wont to say when he heard a Monk snort they did carnaliter seu seculariter dormire Prayer is an ordinary receit for sleep How prone are we to it when we should mind Divine things Adam slept in Paradise and lost a Rib but this sleep was of God's giving and this rib was of God's taking The good Husband slept and found tares Eutychus slept and fell Whilst Satan lulls us asleep as he doth always rock the cradle when we sleep in our devotions he ever takes some good from us or puts some evil in us or indangers us a deadly fall Away with this spiritual Lethargy Bernard had wont to say that those which sleep are dead to men those that are dead are asleep to God But I say those that sleep at Church are dead to God so we preach their Funeral Sermons in stead of hortatory And as he was wont to say he lost no time so much as that wherein he slept so let me adde there is no loss of time so desperate as of holy time Think that Christ saith to thee at every Sermon as he did to Peter Etiam Petre dormis Sleepest thou Peter couldst thou not wake with me one hour A slumbring and a drowzy heart do not become the business and presence of him that keepeth Israel and slumbers not These were the Attendents see the Companions of Christ As our glory is not consummate without society no more would Christ have his therefore his Transfiguration hath two Companions Moses Elias As Saint Paul says of himself Whether in the body or out of the body I know not God knows so say I of these two Of Eliah there may seem less doubt since we know that his body was assumed to Heaven and might as well come down for Christ's glory as go up for his own although some grave Authours as Calvin Oecolampadius Bale Fulk have held his body with Enoch's resolved into their elements sed ego non credulus illis Enoch translatus est in carne Elias carneus raptus est in coelum c. Enoch was translated in the flesh and Elias being yet in the flesh was taken into Heaven saith Hierome in his Epistle ad Pammachium And for Moses though it be rare and singular and Austin makes much scruple of it yet why might not he after death return in his body to the glory of Christ's Transfiguration as well as afterwards many of the Saints did to the glory of his Resurrection I cannot therefore with the Gloss think there is any reason why Moses should take another a borrowed body rather then his own Heaven could not give two fitter companions more admirable to the Jews for their Miracles more gracious with God for their Faith and Holiness Both of them admitted to the conference with God in Horeb both of them Types of Christ both of them fasted forty days both of them for the glory of God suffered many perils both divided the waters both the messengers of God to Kings both of them marvellous as in their life so in their end A chariot of Angels took away Elias he was sought by the Prophets and not found Michael strove with the Devil for the body of Moses he was sought for by the Jews and not found and now both of them are found here together on Tabor This Elias shews himself to the Royall Prophet of his Church this Moses shews himself to the true Michael Moses the publisher of the Law Elias the chief of the Prophets shew themselves to the God of the Law and Prophets Alter populi informator aliquando alter reformator
there is happiness as sure as we know there is misery and mutability upon earth Oh our miserable sottishness and infidelity if we do not contemn the best offers of the world and lifting up our eyes and hearts to Heaven say Bonum est esse hîc Even so Lord Jesus come quickly To him that hath purchased and prepared this Glory for us together with the Father and Blessed Spirit one Incomprehensible God be all praise for ever Amen XXXI The Prosecution of the Transfiguration BEfore the Disciples eyes were dazzled with Glory now the brightness of that Glory is shaded with a Cloud Frail and feeble eyes of mortality cannot look upon an Heavenly luster That Cloud imports both Majesty and obscuration Majesty for it was the testimony of God's presence of old the Cloud covered the Mountain the Tabernacle the Oracle He that makes the clouds his chariot was in a cloud carried up into Heaven Where have we mention of any Divine representation but a Cloud is one part of it What comes nearer to Heaven either in place or resemblance Obscuration for as it shew'd there was a Majesty and that Divine so it shew'd them that the view of that Majesty was not for bodily eyes Like as when some great Prince walks under a Canopy that veil shews there is a Great person under it but withall restrains the eye from a free sight of his person And if the cloud were clear yet it shaded them Why then was this cloud interposed betwixt that glorious Vision and them but for a check of their bold eyes Had they too long gazed upon this resplendent spectacle as their eyes had been blinded so their hearts had perhaps grown to an over-bold familiarity with that Heavenly Object How seasonably doth the cloud intercept it The wise God knows our need of these vicissitudes and allays If we have a light we must have a cloud if a light to chear us we must have a cloud to humble us It was so in Sinai it was so in Sion it was so in Olivet it shall never be but so The naturall day and night do not more duely interchange then this light and cloud Above we shall have the light without the cloud a clear vision and fruition of God without all dim and sad interpositions below we cannot be free from these mists and clouds of sorrow and misapprehension But this was a bright cloud There is difference betwixt the cloud in Tabor and that in Sinai This was clear that darksome There is darkness in the Law there is light in the grace of the Gospel Moses was there spoken to in darkness here he was spoken with in light In that dark cloud there was terrour in this there was comfort Though it were a Cloud then yet it was bright and though it were bright yet it was a Cloud With much light there was some shade God would not speak to them concerning Christ out of darkness neither yet would he manifest himself to them in an absolute brightness All his appearances have this mixture What need I other instance then in these two Saints Moses spake oft to God mouth to mouth yet not so immediately but that there was ever somewhat drawn as a curtain betwixt God and him either fire in Horeb or smoak in Sinai so as his face was not more veiled from the people then God's from him Elias shall be spoken to by God but in the rock and under a mantle In vain shall we hope for any revelation from God but in a cloud Worldly hearts are in utter darkness they see not so much as the least glimpse of these Divine beams not a beam of that inaccessible light The best of his Saints see him here but in a cloud or in a glass Happy are we if God have honoured us with these Divine representations of himself Once in his light we shall see light I can easily think with what amazedness these three Disciples stood compassed in that bright Cloud expecting some miraculous event of so Heavenly a Vision when suddenly they might hear a voice sounding out of that Cloud saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear him They need not be told whose that voice was the place the matter evinced it No Angel in Heaven could or durst have said so How gladly doth Peter afterwards recount it For he received from God the Father honour and glory when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory This is my beloved Son c. It was onely the ear that was here taught not the eye As of Horeb so of Sinai so of Tabor might God say Ye saw no shape nor image in that day that the Lord spake unto you He that knows our proneness to idolatry avoids those occasions which we might take to abuse our own fancies Twice hath God spoken these words to his own Son from Heaven once in his Baptism and now again in his Transfiguration Here not without some oppositive comparison Not Moses not Elias but This. Moses and Elias were Servants this a Son Moses and Elias were sons but of grace and choice this is that Son the Son by nature Other sons are beloved as of favour and free election this is The Beloved as in the unity of his essence Others are so beloved that he is pleased with themselves this so beloved that in and for him he is pleased with mankind As the relation betwixt the Father and the Son is infinite so is the Love We measure the intension of Love by the extension The love that rests in the person affected alone is but streight true Love descends like Aaron's Ointment from the head to the skirts to children friends allies O incomprehensibly-large love of God the Father to the Son that for his sake he is pleased with the world O perfect and happy complacence Out of Christ there is nothing but enmity betwixt God and the Soul in him there can be nothing but peace When the beams are met in one center they do not onely heat but burn Our weak love is diffused to many God hath some the world more and therein wives children friends but this infinite love of God hath all the beams of it united in one onely Object the Son of his Love Neither doth he love any thing but in the participation of his Love in the derivation from it O God let me be found in Christ and how canst thou but be pleased with me This one voice proclaims Christ at once the Son of God the Reconciler of the world the Doctour and Law-giver of his Church As the Son of God he is essentially interessed in his Love as he is the Reconciler of the world in whom God is well pleased he doth most justly challenge our love and adherence as he is the Doctour and Law-giver he doth justly challenge our audience our obedience Even so Lord teach us to hear and obey thee as our Teacher to love thee and believe in
absence as doubting it might savour of some neglect Christ was glad of it for the advantage of his Disciples Faith I cannot blame them that they were thus sorry I cannot but bless him that he was thus glad The gain of their Faith in so Divine a Miracle was more then could be countervailed by their momentany sorrow God and we are not alike affected with the same events He laughs where we mourn he is angry where we are pleased The difference of the affections arises from the difference of the Objects which Christ and they apprehend in the same occurrence Why are the Sisters sorrowfull because upon Christ's absence Lazarus died Why was Jesus glad he was not there for the benefit which he saw would accrue to their Faith There is much variety of prospect in every act according to the severall intentions and issues thereof yea even in the very same eyes The father sees his son combating in a Duell for his Country he sees blows and wounds on the one side he sees renown and victory on the other he grieves at the wounds he rejoyces in the Honour Thus doeth God in all our Afflictions he sees our tears and hears our groans and pities us but withall he looks upon our Patience our Faith our Crown and is glad that we are afflicted O God why should not we conform our diet unto thine When we lie in pain and extremity we cannot but droop under it but do we find our selves increased in true Mortification in Patience in Hope in a constant reliance on thy Mercies Why are we not more joyed in this then dejected with the other since the least grain of the increase of Grace is more worth then can be equalled with whole pounds of bodily vexation O strange consequence Lazarus is dead nevertheless Let us goe unto him Must they not needs think What should we doe with a dead man What should separate if death cannot Even those whom we loved dearliest we avoid once dead now we lay them aside under the board and thence send them out of our houses to their grave Neither hath Death more horrour in it then noisomeness and if we could intreat our eyes to endure the horrid aspect of Death in the face we loved yet can we perswade our sent to like that smell that arises up from its corruption O love stronger then Death Behold here a friend whom the very Grave cannot sever Even those that write the longest and most passionate dates of their amity subscribe but Your friend till death and if the ordinary strain of humane friendship will stretch yet a little farther it is but to the brim of the grave thither a friend may follow us and see us bestowed in this house of our Age but there he leaves us to our worms and dust But for thee O Saviour the grave-stone the earth the coffin are no bounders of thy dear respects even after death and buriall and corruption thou art graciously affected to those thou lovest Besides the Soul whereof thou saiest not Let us goe to it but Let it come to us there is still a gracious regard to that dust which was and shall be a part of an undoubted member of that mysticall body whereof thou art the Head Heaven and earth yield no such friend but thy self O make me ever ambitious of this Love of thine and ever unquiet till I feel my self possessed of thee In the mouth of a mere man this word had been incongruous Lazarus is dead yet let us goe to him in thine O Almighty Saviour it was not more loving then seasonable since I may justly say of thee thou hast more to doe with the dead then with the living for both they are infinitely more and have more inward communion with thee and thou with them Death cannot hinder either our passage to thee or thy return to us I joy to think the time is coming when thou shalt come to every of our graves and call us up out of our dust and we shall hear thy voice and live XLI Lazarus Raised GReat was the opinion that these devout Sisters had of the Power of Christ as if Death durst not shew her face to him they suppose his presence had prevented their Brother's dissolution And now the news of his approach begins to quicken some late hopes in them Martha was ever the more active She that was before so busily stirring in her house to entertain Jesus was now as nimble to goe forth of her house to meet him She in whose face joy had wont to smile upon so Blessed a Guest now salutes him with the sighs and tears and blubbers and wrings of a disconsolate mourner I know not whether the speeches of her greeting had in them more sorrow or Religion She had been well catechized before even she also had sate at Jesus his feet and can now give good account of her Faith in the Power and Godhead of Christ in the certainty of a future Resurrection This Conference hath yet taught her more and raised her heart to an expectation of some wonderfull effect And now she stands not still but hasts back into the Village to her Sister carried thither by the two wings of her own hopes and her Saviour's commands The time was when she would have called off her Sister from the feet of that Divine Master to attend the houshold occasions now she runs to fetch her out of the house to the feet of Christ Doubtless Martha was much affected with the presence of Christ and as she was over-joyed with it her self so she knew how equally welcome it would be to her Sister yet she doth not ring it out aloud in the open Hall but secretly whispers this pleasing tidings in her Sister's ear The Master is come and calleth for thee Whether out of modesty or discretion It is not fit for a woman to be loud and clamorous nothing beseems that Sex better then silence and bashfulness as not to be too much seen so not to be heard too far Neither did Modesty more charm her tongue then Discretion whether in respect to the guests or to Christ himself Had those guests heard of Christ's being there they had either out of fear or prejudice withdrawn themselves from him neither durst they have been witnesses of that wonderfull Miracle as being over-awed with that Jewish edict which was out against him or perhaps they had withheld the Sisters from going to him against whom they knew how highly their Governours were incensed Neither was she ignorant of the danger of his own person so lately before assaulted violently by his enemies at Jerusalem She knew they were within the smoak of that bloudy City the nest of his enemies she holds it not therefore fit to make open proclamation of Christ's presence but rounds her Sister secretly in the ear Christianity doth not bid us abate any thing of our wariness and honest policies yea it requires us to have no less of the
thing here had horrour The Place both solitary and a Sepulcher Nature abhors as the visage so the region of Death and Corruption The Time Night onely the Moon gave them some faint glimmering for this being the seventeenth day of her age afforded some light to the latter part of the night The Business the visitation of a dead Corps Their zealous Love hath easily overcome all these They had followed him in his Sufferings when the Disciples left him they attended him to his Cross weeping they followed him to his Grave and saw how Joseph laid him even there they leave him not but ere it be day-light return to pay him the last tribute of their duty How much stronger is Love then death O Blessed Jesu why should not we imitate thy love to us Those whom thou lovest thou lovest to the end yea in it yea after it even when we are dead not our Souls onely but our very dust is dearly respected of thee What condition of thine should remove our affections from thy person in Heaven from thy lims on earth Well did these worthy Women know what Joseph of Arimathaea and Nicodemus had done to thee they saw how curiously they had wrapped thee how preciously they had embalmed thee yet as not thinking others beneficence could be any just excuse of theirs they bring their own Odours to thy Sepulture to be perfumed by the touch of thy Sacred Body What thank is it to us that others are obsequious to thee whilst we are slack or niggardly We may rejoyce in others forwardness but if we rest in it how small joy shall it be to us to see them go to Heaven without us When on the Friday-evening they attended Joseph to the intombing of Jesus they mark'd the place they mark'd the passage they mark'd that inner grave-stone which the owner had fitted to the mouth of that tomb which all there care is now to remove Who shall roll away the stone That other more weighty load wherewith the vault was barred the seal the guard set upon both came not perhaps into their knowledge this was the private plot of Pilate and the Priests beyond the reach of their thoughts I do not hear them say How shall we recover the charges of our Odours or How shall we avoid the envy and censure of our angry Elders for honouring him whom the Governours of our Nation have thought worthy of condemnation The onely thought they now take is Who shall roll away the stone Neither do they stay at home and move this doubt but when they are well forward on their way resolving to try the issue Good hearts cannot be so solicitous for any thing under Heaven as for removing those impediments which lie between them and their Saviour O Blessed Jesu thou who art clearly revealed in Heaven art yet still both hid and sealed up from too many here on earth Neither is it some thin veil that is spred between thee and them but an huge stone even a true stone of offence lies rolled upon the mouth of their hearts Yea if a second weight were superadded to thy Grave here no less then three spirituall bars are interposed betwixt them and thee above Idleness Ignorance Unbelief Who shall roll away these stones but the same power that removed thine O Lord remove that our Ignorance that we may know thee our Idleness that we may seek thee our Unbelief that we may find and enjoy thee How well it succeeds when we go faithfully and conscionably about our work and leave the issue to God Lo now God hath removed the cares of these holy Women together with the grave-stone To the wicked that falls out which they feared to the Godly that which they wished and cared for yea more Holy cares ever prove well the worldly dry the bones and disappoint the hopes Could these good Visitants have known of a greater stone sealed of a strong watch set their doubts had been doubled now God goes beyond their thoughts and at once removes that which both they did and might have feared The stone is removed the seal broken the watch fled What a scorn doth the Almighty God make of the impotent designs of men They thought the stone shall make the grave sure the seal shall make the stone sure the guard shall make both sure Now when they think all safe God sends an Angel from Heaven above the earth quakes beneath the stone rolls away the Souldiers stand like carkasses and when they have got heart enough to run away think themselves valiant the Tomb is opened Christ is risen they confounded Oh the vain projects of silly men as if with one shovel-full of mire they would dam up the Sea or with a clout hang'd forth they would keep the Sun from shining Oh these Spiders-webs or houses of cards which fond children have as they think skilfully framed which the least breath breaks and ruines Who are we sorry worms that we should look in any business to prevail against our Creatour What creature is so base that he cannot arm against us to our confusion The Lice and Frogs shall be too strong for Pharaoh the Worms for Herod There is no wisedom nor counsell against the Lord. Oh the marvellous pomp and magnificence of our Saviour's Resurrection The Earth quakes the Angel appears that it may be plainly seen that this Divine person now rising had the command both of Earth and Heaven At the dissolution of thine Humane nature O Saviour was an Earthquake at the re-uniting of it is an Earthquake to tell the world that the God of Nature then suffered and had now conquered Whilst thou laiest still in the earth the earth was still when thou camest to fetch thine own The earth trembled at the presence of the Lord at the presence of the God of Jacob. When thou our true Sampson awakedst and foundest thy self tied with these Philistian cords and rousedst up and brakest those hard and strong twists with a sudden power no marvell if the room shook under thee Good cause had the earth to quake when the God that made it powerfully calls for his own flesh from the usurpation of her bowells Good cause had she to open her graves and yield up her dead in attendence to the Lord of Life whom she had presumed to detain in that cell of darkness What a seeming impotence was here that thou who art the true Rock of thy Church shouldst lie obscurely shrouded in Joseph's rock thou that art the true corner-stone of thy Church shouldst be shut up with a double stone the one of thy grave the other of thy vault thou by whom we are sealed to the day of our Redemption shouldst be sealed up in a blind cavern of earth But now what a demonstration of power doth both the world and I see in thy glorious Resurrection The rocks tear the graves open the stones roll away the dead rise and appear the Souldiers flee and tremble Saints and Angels
attend thy rising O Saviour thou laiest down in weakness thou risest in power and glory thou laiest down like a man thou risest like a God What a lively image hast thou herein given me of the dreadfull majesty of the generall Resurrection and thy second appearance Then not the earth onely but the powers of Heaven shall be shaken not some few graves shall be open and some Saints appear but all the bars of death shall be broken and all that sleep in their graves shall awake and stand up from the dead before thee not some one Angel shall descend but thou the great Angel of the Covenant attended with thousand thousands of those mighty Spirits And if these stout Souldiers were so filled with terrour at the feeling of an Earthquake and the sight of an Angel that they had scarce breath left in them for the time to witness them alive where shall thine enemies appear O Lord in the day of thy terrible appearance when the earth shall reel and vanish and the elements shall be on a flame about their ears and the Heavens shall wrap up as a scroll O God thou mightest have removed this stone by the force of thine Earthquake as well as rive other rocks yet thou wouldst rather use the ministery of an Angel or thou that gavest thy self life and gavest being both to the stone and to the earth couldst more easily have removed the stone then moved the earth but it was thy pleasure to make use of an Angel's hand And now he that would ask why thou wouldst doe it rather by an Angel then by thy self may as well ask why thou didst not rather give thy Law by thine own immediate hand then by the ministration of Angels why by an Angel thou struckest the Israelites with plagues the Assyrians with the sword why an Angel appeared to comfort thee after thy Temptation and Agony when thou wert able to comfort thy self why thou usest the influences of Heaven to fruiten the earth why thou imployest Second causes in all events when thou couldst doe all things alone It is good reason thou shouldst serve thy self of thine own neither is there any ground to be required whether of their motion or rest besides thy will Thou didst raise thy self the Angels removed the stone They that could have no hand in thy Resurrection yet shall have an hand in removing outward impediments not because thou neededst but because thou wouldest like as thou alone didst raise Lazarus thou badest others let him loose Works of Omnipotency thou reservest to thine own immediate performance ordinary actions thou doest by subordinate means Although this act of the Angels was not merely with respect to thee but partly to those devout Women to ease them of their care to manifest unto them thy Resurrection So officious are those glorious Spirits not onely to thee their Maker but even to the meanest of thy servants especially in the furtherance of all their spirituall designs Let us bring our Odours they will be sure to roll away the stone Why do not we imitate them in our forwardness to promote each others Salvation We pray to doe thy will here as they doe in Heaven if we do not act our wishes we do but mock thee in our Devotions How glorious did this Angel of thine appear The terrified Souldiers saw his face like lightning both they and the Women saw his garments shining bright and white as snow such a presence became his errand It was fit that as in thy Passion the Sun was darkened and all creatures were clad with heaviness so in thy Resurrection the best of thy creatures should testifie their joy and exultation in the brightness of their habit that as we on Festivall-days put on our best cloaths so thine Angels should celebrate this blessed Festivity with a meet representation of Glory They could not but injoy our joy to see the work of man's Redemption thus fully finished and if there be mirth in Heaven at the conversion of one sinner how much more when a world of sinners is perfectly ransomed from death and restored to Salvation Certainly if but one or two appeared all rejoyced all triumphed Neither could they but be herein sensible of their own happy advantage who by thy mediation are confirmed in their glorious estate since thou by the bloud of thy Cross and power of thy Resurrection hast reconciled things not in earth onely but in Heaven But above all other the Love of thee their God and Saviour must needs heighten their joy and make thy Glory theirs It is their perpetuall work to praise thee how much more now when such an occasion was offered as never had been since the world began never could be after when thou the God of Spirits hadst vanquished all the spirituall powers of darkness when thou the Lord of Life hadst conquered death for thee and all thine so as they may now boldly insult over their last enemy O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory Certainly if Heaven can be capable of an increase of joy and felicity never had those Blessed Spirits so great a cause of triumph and gratulation as in this day of thy glorious Resurrection How much more O dear Jesu should we men whose flesh thou didst assume unite revive for whose sake and in whose stead thou didst vouchsafe to suffer and die whose arrerages thou payedst in death and acquittedst in thy Resurrection whose Souls are discharged whose Bodies shall be raised by the power of thy rising how much more should we think we have cause to be overjoyed with the happy memory of this great work of thy Divine Power and unconceivable Mercy Lo now how weak soever I am in my self yet in the confidence of this victorious Resurrection of my Saviour I dare boldly challenge and defie you O all ye adverse Powers Doe the worst ye can to my Soul in despite of you it shall be safe Is it Sin that threats me Behold this Resurrection of my Redeemer publishes my discharge My Surety was arrested and cast into the prison of his Grave had not the utmost farthing of mine arrerages been paid he could not have come forth He is come forth the Sum is fully satisfied What danger can there be of a discharged Debt Is it the Wrath of God Wherefore is that but for sin If my sin be defrayed that quarrell is at an end and if my Saviour suffered it for me how can I fear to suffer it in my self That infinite Justice hates to be twice paid He is risen therefore he hath satisfied Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen Is it Death it self Lo my Saviour that overcame death by dying hath triumph'd over him in his Resurrection How can I now fear a conquered enemy What harm is there in the Serpent but for his sting The sting of death is sin that is pulled out by my powerfull Redeemer it cannot now
with a carefull charge renewed unto thy Disciples for the promulgation of thy Gospel with an Heavenly Benediction of all thine acclaiming attendents thou takest leave of earth When he had spoken these things whilst they beheld he was taken up and a cloud received him out of their sight Oh happy parting fit for the Saviour of mankind answerable to that Divine conversation to that succeeding Glory O Blessed Jesu let me so far imitate thee as to depart hence with a blessing in my mouth let my Soul when it is stepping over the threshold of Heaven leave behind it a legacy of Peace and Happiness It was from the mount of Olives that thou tookest thy rise into Heaven Thou mightest have ascended from the valley all the globe of earth was alike to thee but since thou wert to mount upward thou wouldst take so much advantage as that stair of ground would afford thee thou wouldst not use the help of a Miracle in that wherein Nature offered her ordinary service What difficulty had it been for thee to have styed up from the very center of earth But since thou hadst made hills so much nearer unto Heaven thou wouldest not neglect the benefit of thine own Creation Where we have common helps we may not depend upon Supernaturall provisions we may not strain the Divine Providence to the supply of our negligence or the humouring of our presumption Thou that couldst alwaies have walked on the Sea wouldst walk so but once when thou wantedst shipping thou to whom the highest mountains were but valleys wouldst walk up to an hill to ascend thence into Heaven O God teach me to bless thee for means when I have them and to trust thee for means when I have them not yea to trust to thee without means when I have no hope of them What Hill was this thou chosest but the mount of Olives Thy Pulpit shall I call it or thine Oratory The place from whence thou hadst wont to showr down thine Heavenly Doctrine upon the hearers the place whence thou hadst wont to send up thy Prayers unto thy Heavenly Father the place that shared with the Temple for both In the day-time thou wert preaching in the Temple in the night praying in the mount of Olives On this very hill was the bloudy sweat of thine Agony now is it the mount of thy Triumph From this mount of Olives did flow that oyl of gladness wherewith thy Church is everlastingly refreshed That God that uses to punish us in the same kind wherein we have offended retributes also to us in the same kind and circumstances wherein we have been afflicted To us also O Saviour even to us thy unworthy members dost thou seasonably vouchsafe to give a proportionable joy to our heaviness laughter to our mourning glory to contempt and shame Our agonies shall be answered with exaltation Whither then O Blessed Jesu whither didst thou ascend whither but home into thine Heaven From the mountain wert thou taken up and what but Heaven is above the hills Lo these are those mountains of spices which thy Spouse the Church long since desired thee to climbe Thou hast now climbed up that infinite steepness and hast left all sublimity below thee Already hadst thou approved thy self the Lord and commander of Earth of Sea of Hell The Earth confess'd thee her Lord when at thy voice she rendered thee thy Lazarus when she shook at thy Passion and gave up her dead Saints The Sea acknowledged thee in that it became a pavement to thy feet and at thy command to the feet of thy Disciple in that it became thy treasury for thy Tribute-money Hell found and acknowledged thee in that thou conqueredst all the powers of darkness even him that had the power of death the Devil It now onely remained that as the Lord of the Air thou shouldst pass through all the regions of that yielding element and as Lord of Heaven thou shouldst pass through all the glorious contignations thereof that so every knee might bow to thee both in Heaven and in Earth and under the earth Thou hadst an everlasting right to that Heaven that should be an undoubted possession of it ever since it was yea even whilst thou didst cry and spraul in the Cratch whilst thou didst hang upon the Cross whilst thou wert sealed up in thy Grave but thine Humane nature had not taken actuall possession of it till now Like as it was in thy true type David he had right to the Kingdom of Israel immediately upon his anointing but yet many an hard brunt did he pass ere he had the full possession of it in his ascent to Hebron I see now O Blessed Jesu I see where thou art even far above all Heavens at the right hand of thy Father's Glory This is the far country into which the Nobleman went to receive for himself a Kingdom far off to us to thee near yea intrinsecall Oh do thou raise up my Heart thither to thee place thou my Affections upon thee above and teach me therefore to love Heaven because thou art there How then O Blessed Saviour how didst thou ascend Whilst they beheld he was taken up and a cloud received him out of their sight So wast thou taken up as that the act was thine own the power of the act none but thine Thou that descendedst wast the same that ascendedst as in thy descent there was no use of any power or will but thine own no more was there in thine ascent Still and ever wert thou the Master of thine own acts Thou laidst down thy own life no man took it from thee Thou raisedst up thy self from death no hand did or could help thee Thou carriedst up thine own glorified flesh and placedst it in Heaven The Angels did attend thee they did not aid thee whence had they their strength but from thee Elias ascended to Heaven but he was fetch'd up in a chariot of fire that it might appear hence that man had need of others helps who else could not of himself so much as lift up himself to the Aiery Heaven much less to the Empyreall But thou our Redeemer needest no chariot no carriage of Angels thou art the Authour of life and motion they move in and from thee As thou therefore didst move thy self upward so by the same Divine power thou wilt raise us up to the participation of thy Glory These vile bodies shall be made like to thy glorious body according to the working whereby thou art able to subdue all things unto thy self Elias had but one witness of his rapture into Heaven S. Paul had none no not himself for whether in the body or out of the body he knew not Thou O Blessed Jesu wouldst neither have all eyes witnesses of thine Ascension nor yet too few As after thy Resurrection thou didst not set thy self upon the pinnacle of the Temple nor yet publickly shew thy self within it as making thy presence too cheap but madest choice
of those eyes whom thou wouldst bless with the sight of thee thou wert seen indeed of five hundred at once but they were Brethren So in thine Ascension thou didst not carry all Jerusalem promiscuously forth with thee to see thy glorious departure but onely that selected company of thy Disciples which had attended thee in thy life Those who immediately upon thine ascending returned to Jerusalem were an hundred and twenty persons a competent number of witnesses to verify that thy miraculous and triumphant passage into thy Glory Lo those onely were thought worthy to behold thy majesticall Ascent which had been partners with thee in thy Humiliation Still thou wilt have it thus with us O Saviour and we embrace the condition if we will converse with thee in thy lowly estate here upon earth wading with thee through contempt and manifold afflictions we shall be made happy with the sight and communion of thy Glory above O my Soul be thou now if ever ravished with the contemplation of this comfortable and blessed farewell of thy Saviour What a sight was this how full of joyfull assurance of spirituall consolation Methinks I see it still with their eyes how thou my glorious Saviour didst leisurely and insensibly rise up from thine Olivet taking leave of thine acclaiming Disciples now left below thee with gracious eyes with Heavenly benedictions Methinks I see how they followed thee with eager and longing eyes with arms lifted up as if they had wished them winged to have soared up after thee And if Eliah gave assurance to his servant Elisha that if he should behold him in that rapture his Master's Spirit should be doubled upon him what an accession of the spirit of joy and confidence must needs be to thy happy Disciples in seeing thee thus gradually rising up to thy Heaven Oh how unwillingly did their intentive eyes let go so Blessed an Object How unwelcome was that Cloud that interposed it self betwixt thee and them and closing up it self left onely a glorious splendour behind it as the bright track of thine Ascension Of old here below the Glory of the Lord appeared in the Cloud now afar off in the sky the Cloud intercepted this Heavenly Glory if distance did not rather doe it then that bright meteor Their eyes attended thee on thy way so far as their beams would reach when they could goe no farther the Cloud received thee Lo yet even that very screen whereby thou wert taken off from all earthly view was no other then glorious how much rather do all the beholders fix their sight upon that Cloud then upon the best piece of the Firmament Never was the Sun it self gazed on with so much intention With what long looks with what astonished acclamations did these transported beholders follow thee their ascending Saviour as if they would have look'd through that Cloud and that Heaven that hid thee from them But oh what tongue of the highest Archangel of Heaven can express the welcome of thee the King of Glory into those Blessed Regions of Immortality Surely the Empyreall Heaven never resounded with so much joy God ascended with jubilation and the Lord with the sound of the Trumpet It is not for us weak and finite creatures to wish to conceive those incomprehensible spirituall Divine gratulations that the Glorious Trinity gave to the victorious and now-glorified Humane nature Certainly if when he brought his onely-begotten Son into the world he said Let all the Angels worship him much more now that he ascends on high and hath led captivity captive hath he given him a Name above all names that at the Name of JESVS all knees should bow And if the Holy Angels did so carol at his Birth in the very entrance into that estate of Humiliation and infirmity with what triumph did they receive him now returning from the perfect atchievement of Man's Redemption And if when his type had vanquished Goliah and carried the head into Jerusalem the damsels came forth to meet him with dances and timbrels how shall we think those Angelicall Spirits triumphed in meeting of the great Conquerour of Hell and Death How did they sing Lift up your heads ye gates and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors and the King of glory shall come in Surely as he shall come so he went and behold he shall come with thousands of his Holy ones thousand thousands ministred unto him and ten thousand thousands stood before him From all whom methinks I hear that blessed applause Worthy is the Lamb that was killed to receive power and riches and wisedom and strength and honour and glory and praise Praise and honour and glory and power be to him that sitteth upon the throne and to the Lamb for evermore And why dost not thou O my Soul help to bear thy part with that happy Quire of Heaven Why art not thou rapt out of my bosome with an ecstasy of joy to see this Humane nature of ours exalted above all the Powers of Heaven adored of Angels Archangels Cherubin Seraphim and all those mighty and glorious Spirits and sitting there crowned with infinite Glory and Majesty Although little would it avail thee that our Nature is thus honoured if the benefit of this Ascension did not reflect upon thee How many are miserable enough in themselves notwithstanding the Glory of their humane nature in Christ None but those that are found in him are the happier by him who but the Members are the better for the glory of the Head O Saviour how should our weakness have ever hoped to climb into Heaven if thou hadst not gone before and made way for us It is for us that thou the fore-runner art entred in Now thy Church hath her wish Draw me and I shall run after thee Even so O Blessed Jesu how ambitiously should we follow thee with the paces of Love and Faith and aspire towards thy Glory Thou that art the way hast made the way to thy self and us Thou didst humble thy self and becamest obedient to the death even to the death of the Cross Therefore hath God also highly exalted thee and upon the same terms will not fail to advance us we see thy track before us of Humility and Obedience O teach me to follow thee in the roughest ways of Obedience in the bloudy paths of Death that I may at last overtake thee in those high steps of Immortality Amongst those millions of Angels that attended this triumphant Ascension of thine O Saviour some are appointed to this lower station to comfort thine astonished Disciples in the certain assurance of thy no-less-glorious Return Two men stood by them in white apparell They stood by them they were not of them they seemed Men they were Angels Men for their familiarity two for more certainty of testimony in white for the joy of thine Ascension The Angels formerly celebrated thy Nativity with Songs but we do not find they then appeared in white thou wert then to undergoe much sorrow
many conflicts it was the vale of tears into which thou wert come down So soon as thou wert risen the women saw an Angel in the form of a young man cloathed in white and now so soon as thou art ascended Two men cloathed in white stand by thy Disciples thy task was now done thy victory atchieved and nothing remained but a Crown which was now set upon thy Head Justly therefore were those blessed Angels suited with the robes of light and joy And why should our garments be of any other colour why should oyl be wanting to our heads when the eyes of our Faith see thee thus ascended It is for us O Saviour that thou art gone to prepare a place in those celestiall mansions it is for us that thou sittest at the right hand of Majesty It is a piece of thy Divine Prayer to thy Father that those whom he hath given thee may be with thee To every bleeding Soul thou saiest still as thou didst to Peter Whither I goe thou canst not follow me now but thou shalt follow me hereafter In assured hope of this Glory why do I not rejoyce and beforehand walk in white with thine Angels that at the last I may walk with thee in white Little would the presence of these Angels have availed if they had not been heard as well as seen They stand not silent therefore but directing their speech to the amazed beholders say Ye men of Galilee why stand ye gazing into Heaven What a question was this Could any of those two hundred and forty eyes have power to turn themselves off to any other Object then that Cloud and that point of Heaven where they left their ascended Saviour Surely every one of them were so fixed that had not the speech of these Angels called them off there they had set up their rest till the darkness of night had interposed Pardon me O ye Blessed Angels had I been there with them I should also have been unwilling to have mine eyes pull'd off from that dear prospect and diverted unto you Never could they have gazed so happily as now If but some Great man be advanced to Honour over our heads how apt we are to stand at a gaze and to eye him as some strange meteor Let the Sun but shine a little upon these Dialls how are they look'd at by all passengers Yet alas what can earthly advancement make us other then we are dust and ashes which the higher it is blown the more it is scattered Oh how worthy is the King of Glory to command our eyes now in the highest pitch of his Heavenly exaltation Lord I can never look enough at the place where thou art but what eye could be satisfied with seeing the way that thou wentest It was not the purpose of these Angels to check the long looks of these faithfull Disciples after their ascended Master it was onely a change of Eyes that they intended of Carnall for Spirituall of the eye of Sense for the eye of Faith This same Jesus which is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him goe into Heaven Look not after him O ye weak Disciples as so departed that ye shall see him no more if he be gone yet he is not lost those Heavens that received him shall restore him neither can those Blessed mansions decrease his Glory Ye have seen him ascend upon the chariot of a bright Cloud and in the clouds of Heaven ye shall see him descend again to his last Judgment He is gone can it trouble you to know you have an Advocate in Heaven Strive not now so much to exercise your bodily eyes in looking after him as the eyes of your Souls in looking for him Ye cannot O ye Blessed Spirits wish other then well to mankind How happy a diversion of eyes and thoughts is this that you advise If it be our sorrow to part with our Saviour yet to part with him into Heaven it is our comfort and felicity if his absence could be grievous his return shall be happy and glorious Even so Lord Jesus come quickly In the mean while it is not Heaven that can keep thee from me it is not Earth that can keep me from thee Raise thou up my Soul to a life of Faith with thee let me ever injoy thy conversation whilst I expect thy return THE END Books Printed for or sold by Jacob Tonson at the Judge's Head in Chancery-Lane near Fleet-street THE Heroin Musquetier or the Female Warriour in Four Parts Containing many true and delightfull Adventures of a French Lady in the late Campagnes of 1676. and 1677. Sir Patient Fancy a Comedy Acted at the Duke 's Theatre and written by the Authour of the Rover. Friendship in Fashion a Comedy written by Thomas Otway Acted at the Duke 's Theatre Mr. Rimer's Criticisms upon the Plays of Beaumont and Fletcher in a Letter to Fleetwood Sheppard Esq The Art of Making Love or a Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in the affairs of Love Price 1 s. Pleas of the Crown Written by Sir Matthew Hales late Chief Justice of the Court of King's-Bench An Historical Discourse of Parliaments in their Original before the Conquest and continuance since together with the Original growth and continuance of these Courts following viz. The High Court of Chancery King's-Bench Common Pleas Exchequer Dutchy and other inferiour Courts Price 1 s. Brutus of Alba or the Enchanted Lovers a Tragedy written by N. Tate Acted at the Duke's Theatre The Counterfeits a Comedy Acted at the Duke's Theatre A Treatise of the Principall Grounds of the Law Written by W. Noy late Attorney Generall to King Charles the First Ready for the Press A Treatise of Sublimity Translated out of Longin by H. Watson of the Inner Temple Gent. Matth. 17.14 compared with Mark 9.14 Luk. 4.31 compared with 38. Vide Chap. 10. ver 31 39. For the full explicaâ—ion whereof I refer my Reader to my Passion-Sermon wherein the particularities are largely discussed Gal. 4.9