Jesseans And so Philo Judaeus in that book which he writes de Jessaeis intends by his Jesseans Christians And in divers parts of the world into which Christians travell now they finde some elements some fragments some reliques of the Christian religion in the practise of some religious men whom those Countreys call Jesseans doubtlesly derived and continued from the name of Jesus So that the Christians took many names to themselves for distinction Brethren Disciples Faithfull and they had many names put upon them in scorn Nazarites Galileans Jews Christians yet they were never by custome amongst themselves never by commandment from the Church never in contempt from others called Trinitarians the profession of the Trinitie being their specifick form and distinctive character Why so Beloved the name of Christ involved all not onely because it is a name that hath a dignitie in it more then the rest for Christ is an anointed person a King a Messiah and so the profession of that name conferres an unction a regall and a holy unction upon us for we are thereby a royall priesthood but because in the profession of Christ the whole Trinitie is professed How often doth the Sonne say that the Father sent him And how often that the Father will and that he will send the holy Ghost This is life eternall John 17. 3. sayes he to know thee the onely true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent and sent with all power in heaven and in earth This must be professed Father and Sonne and then no man can professe this no man can call Jesus the Lord but by the holy Ghost So that as in the persecutions in the Primitive Church the Martyrs which were hurried to tumultuary executions and could not be heard for noise in excusing themselves of treason and sedition crimes imputed to them to make their cause odious did use in the sight of the people who might see a gesture though they could not heare a protestation to signe themselves with the signe of the Crosse to let them know for what profession they died so that the signe of the Crosse in that use thereof in that time was an Abridgement and a Catechisme of the whole Christian religion So is the professing of the name of Christ the professing of the whole Trinitie As he that confesseth one God is got beyond the meer naturall man And he that confesseth a Sonne of God beyond him so is neither got to the full truth till he confesse the holy Ghost too The fool sayes in his heart There is no God The fool sayes David the emphaticall fool in the highest degree of folly But though he get beyond that folly he is a fool still if he say There is no Christ for Christ is the wisdome of the Father And a fool still if he denie the holy Ghost Etiam Christiani nomen superficies est is excellently said by Tertullian The name and profession of a Christian is but a superficiall outside sprinkled upon my face in Baptisme or upon my outward profession in actions if I have not in my heart a sense of the holy Ghost that applies the mercies of the Father and the merits of the Sonne to my soul As S. Paul said Whilest you are without Christ you are without God It is an Atheisme with S. Paul to be no Christian So whilest you are without the holy Ghost you are without Christ It is Antichristian to denie or not to confesse the holy Ghost For as Christ is the manifestation of the Father so the holy Ghost is the application of the Sonne Therein are we Christians that in the profession of that name of Christ we professe all the three Persons In Christ is the whole Trinitie because as the Father sent him so sent he the holy Ghost And that is our specifick form that is our distinctive character from Jew Gentile the Trinitie But then is this specifick form this distinctive character the notion of the Trinitie conveyed to us exhibited imprinted upon us in our creation in this word this plurall word in the mouth of our own God Faciamus Let Vs Vs It is here and here first This is an intimation and the first intimation of the Trinitie from the mouth of God in all the Bible It is true that though the same faith which is necessary to salvation now were alwayes necessary and so in the old Testament they were bound to beleeve in Christ as well as in the new and consequently in the whole Trinitie yet not so explicitely nor so particularly as now now Christ calling upon God in the name of the Father sayes I have manifested thy Name unto the men which thou gavest me out of John 17. 6. the world They were men appropriated to God men exempt out of the world yet they had not a cleare manifestation of Father and Sonne the doctrine of the Trinitie till Christ manifested it to them I have manifested thy Name thy name of Father and Sonne And therefore the Jewish Rabbins say that the Septuagint the first Translatours of the Bible did disguise some places of the Scriptures in their translation lest Ptolomey for whom they translated it should be scandalized with those places And that this text was one of those places which say they though it be otherwise in the copies of the Scriptures which we have now they translated Faciam and not Faciamus that God said here I will make in the singular and not Let us make man in the plurall lest that plurall word might have misled King Ptolomey to think that the Jews had a plurall religion and worshipped divers gods So good an evidence do they confesse this text to be for some kinde of pluralitie in the Godhead Here then God notified the Trinitie and here first For though we accept an intimation of the Trinitie in the first line of the Bible where Moses joyned a plurall name Elohim with a singular verb Bara and so in construction it is Creavit Dii Gods created heaven and earth yet besides that that is rather a mysterious collection then an evident conclusion of a pluralitie of persons though we reade that in that first verse before this in the 26 yet Moses writ that which is in the beginning of this chapter more then 2000. yeares after God spake this that is in our text so long was Gods plurall before Moses his plurall Gods Faciamus before Moses Bara Elohim So that in this text begins our Catechisme here we have and here first the saving knowledge of the Trinitie For when God spake here to whom could God speak but to God Non cum rebus creandis non cum re nihili sayes Athanasius speaking of Gods first speaking when he said of the first creature Let there be light God spake not then to future things that were not When God spake first there was no creature at all to speak to when God spake of the making of man there were no creatures But
so no second birth without Baptisme no Baptisme but in the name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost It was the entertainment of God himself his delight his contemplation for those infinite millions of generations when he was without a world without creatures to joy in one another in the Trinitie as Gregorie Nazianzene and a Poet as well as a Father as most of the Fathers were expresses it Ille suae splendorem cernere formae Gaudebat It was the Fathers delight to look upon himself in the Sonne Numénque suum triplicique parique Luce nitens And to see the whole Godhead in a threefold and equall glorie It was Gods own delight and it must be the delight of every Christian upon particular occasions to carry his thoughts upon the severall persons of the Trinitie If I have a barre of iron that barre in that form will not nail a doore If a sow of lead that lead in that form will not stop a leak If a wedge of gold that wedge will not buy my bread The generall notion of a mighty God may lesse fit my particular purposes But I coyn my gold into currant money when I apprehend God in the severall notions of the Trinitie That if I have been a prodigall son I have a Father in heaven and can go to him and say Father I have sinned and be received by him That if I be a decayed father and need the sustentation of my own children there is a Sonne in heaven that will do more for me then my own children of what good means or good nature soever they be can or will do If I be dejected in spirit there is a holy Spirit in heaven which shall bear witnesse to my spirit that I am a childe of God And if the ghosts of those sinners whom I made sinners haunt me after their deaths in returning to my memorie reproaching my conscience with the heavy judgements that I have brought upon them If after the death of my own sinne when my appetite is dead to some particular sinne the memorie and sinfull delight of those passed sinnes the ghosts of those sinnes haunt me again yet there is a holy Ghost in heaven that shall exorcise these and shall overshadow me The God of the whole world is God alone in the generall notion as he is so God but he is my God most especially most appliably as he is received by me in the severall notions of Father Sonne and holy Ghost This is our East here we see God God in Part. II all the persons consulting concurring to the Occidens making of us But then my West presents it self that is an occasion to humble me in the next word he makes but man a man that is but Adam but Earth I remember 4. names by which man is often called in the scriptures of these foure three do absolutely carry miserie in their significations three to one against any man that he is miserable One name of man is Ish and that they derive à sonitu Man is but a voice but a sound but a noise he begins the noise himself when he comes crying into the world when he goes out perchance friends celebrate perchance enemies calumniate him with a diverse voice a diverse noise A melancholick man is but a groning a sportfull man but a song an active man but a trumpet a mighty man but a thunder-clap every man but Ish but a sound but a noyse An other name is Enosh Enosh is meer calamitie miserie depression It is indeed most properly oblivion And so the word is most elegantly used by David Quid est homo where the name of man is Enosh And so that which we translate What is man that thou art mindfull of him is indeed What is forgetfulnesse that thou shouldest remember it that thou shouldest think of that man whom all the world hath forgotten first man is but a voice but a sound but because fame honour may come within that name of a sound of a voice therefore he is overtaken with another damp man is but oblivion his fame his name shall be forgotten One name man hath that hath some taste of greatnesse and power in it Gheber and yet I that am that man sayes the Prophet for there that name of man Gheber is used I am the man that hath seen affliction by Lam. 3. 1. the rod of Gods wrath Man Ish is so miserable as that he afflicts himself cries and whines out his own time and man Enosh so miserable as that others afflict him and bury him in ignominious oblivion and man that is Gheber the greatest powerfullest of men is yet but that man that may possibly that may justly see affliction by the rod of Gods wrath And from Gheber he made Adam which is the fourth name of man indeed the first name of man the name in this text and the name to which every man must be called and referre himself and call himself by earth and red earth Now God did not say of man as of other creatures Let us or let the earth bring forth herbs and fruits and trees as upon the third day Now let the earth bring forth cattell and worms as upō the sixth day the same day that he made man Non imperiali verbo sed familiari manu sayes Tertullian God calls not man out with an imperious command but he leads him out with a familiar with his own hand And it is not Fiat homo but Faciamus not Let there be but Let us make man Man is but an earthen vessell It is true but when we are upon that consideration God is the potter if God will be that I am well content to be this let me be any thing so that that I am be from my God I am as well content to be a sheep as a lion so God will be my shepherd and the Lord is my shepherd to be a cottage as a castle the house as a citie so God will be the builder and the Lord builds and watches the citie the house this house this citie me to be rye as wheat so God will be the husbandman and the Lord plants me and waters and weeds and gives the increase and to be clothed in leather as well as in silk so God will be the merchant and he clothed me in Adam and assures me of clothing in clothing the lilies of the field and is fitting the robe of Christs righteousnesse to me now this minute Adam is as good to me as Gheber a clod of earth as a hill of earth so God be the potter God made man of earth not of aire not of fire Man hath many offices that appertain to this world and whilest he is here must not withdraw himself from those offices of mutuall societie upon pretence of zeal or better serving God in a retired life A ship will no more come to the harbour without ballast then without sails A man will no more get
SIX SERMONS UPON SEVERALL OCCASIONS PREACHED before the King and elsewhere By that late learned reverend Divine JOHN DONNE Doctour in divinitie and Dean of S. Pauls LONDON ¶ Printed by the Printers to the Vniversitie of CAMBRIDGE And are to be sold by Nicholas Fussell and Humphrey Mosley at their shop in Pauls Church-yard 1634. TWO SERMONS PREACHED BEFORE KING CHARLES Upon the xxvi verse of the first Chapter of GENESIS By Dr. DONNE DEAN OF PAVLS ¶ Printed by the Printers to the Vniversitie of CAMBRIDGE MDCXXXIIII Genesis 1. 26. And God said Let us make man in our image after our likenesse NEver such a frame so soon set up as this in this chapter For for the thing it self there is no other thing to compare it with for it is all it is the whole world And for the time there was no other time to compare it with for this was the beginning of time In the beginning God created heaven and earth That earth which in some thousands of yeares men could not look over nor discern what form it had for neither Lactantius almost three hundred yeares after Christ nor S. Augustine more then a hundred yeares after him would beleeve the earth to be round That earth which no man in his person is ever said to have compassed till our age That earth which is too much for man yet for as yet a very great part of the earth is unpeopled That earth which if we will cast it all but into a Map costs many moneths labour to grave it nay if we will but cast a piece of an acre of it into a garden costs many yeares labour to fashion and furnish it all that earth And then that heaven which spreads so farre as that subtill men have with some appearance of probabilitie imagined that in that heaven in those manifold Spheres of the Planets and the Starres there are many earths many worlds as big as this which we inhabit That earth and that heaven which spent God himself Almightie God six dayes in finishing Moses sets up in a few syllables in one line In principio In the beginning God created heaven and earth If a Livie or a Guicciardine or such extensive and voluminous authours had had this story in hand God must have made another world to have made them a library to hold their books of the making of this world Into what wire would they have drawn out this earth Into what leaf-gold would they have beat out these heavens It may assist our conjecture herein to cōsider that amongst those men who proceed with a sober modestie and limitation in their writing make a conscience not to clog the world with unnecessary books yet the volumes which are written by them upon the beginning of Genesis are scarce lesse then infinite God did no more but say Let this this be done and Moses doth no more but say that upon Gods saying it was done God required not Nature to help him to do it Moses required not Reason to help him to beleeve The holy Ghost hovered upon the waters and so God wrought The holy Ghost hovered upon Moses too and so he wrote And we beleeve these things to be so by the same Spirit in the mouth of Moses by which they were made so in Gods hand Onely Beloved remember that a frame may be thrown down in much lesse time then it was set up A childe an ape can give fire to a cannon and a vapour can shake the earth and when Christ said Throw down this Temple and in three dayes I will raise it they never stood upon the consideration of throwing it down they knew that might be soon done but they wondered at the speedy raising of it Now if all this earth were made in that minute may not all come to the generall dissolution in this minute Or may not thy acres thy miles thy shires shrink into feet and so few feet as shall but make up thy grave when he who was a great lord must be but a cottager not so wel for a cottager must have so many acres to his cottage but in this case a little piece of an acre five foot is become the house it self the house and the land the grave is all lower then that the grave is the land and the tenement the tenant too He that lies in it becomes the same earth that he lies in they all make but one earth and but a little of it But then raise thy self to a higher hope again God hath made better land the land of promise a stronger citie the new Jerusalem inhabitants for that everlasting citie us whom he made not by saying Let there be men but by consultation by deliberation God said Let us make man c. We shall pursue our great examples God in Divisio doing Moses in saying and so make haste in applying the parts But first receive them and since we have the whole world in contemplation consider in these words the foure quarters of the world by application by fair and just accommodations of the words First in the first word that God speaks here Faciamus Let Vs in the plurall a denotation of divers persons in the Godhead we consider our East where we must begin at the knowledge and confession of the Trinity for though in the way to heaven we have travelled beyond the Gentiles when we come to confesse but one God the Gentiles could not do that yet we are still among the Jews if we think that one God to be but one person Christs name is Oriens Zech. 6. 12. the East if we will be named by him called Christians we must look to this East the confession of the Trinitie there is then our East in the Faciamus Let Vs Vs make man And then our West is in the next word Faciamus hominem Though we be thus made made by the councell made by the concurrence made by the hand of the whole Trinity yet we are made but men and man but in the appellation in this Text and man there is but Adam and Adam is but earth but red earth died red in bloud in bloud in soul the bloud of our own souls To that West we must all come to the earth The sunne knoweth his going down even Psal 104. 19. the sunne for all his glory and height hath a going down and he knows it The highest cannot devest mortality nor the discomfort of mortality When you see a cloud rise out of the Lue. 12. 54. west straightway you say There cometh a storm sayes Christ When out of the region of your West that is your latter dayes there comes a cloud a sicknesse you feel a storm even the best morall constancie is shaken But this cloud and this storm and this West there must be and that is our second consideration But then the next word designes a North a strong and powerfull NOrth to scatter and dissipate these
the Spirit of God is expressely named so that we do but exercise reason and nature in directing our selves upon God we exercise not Faith and without faith it is impossible to please God till we come to that which is above nature till we apprehend a Trinitie we know God we beleeve in the Trinitie The Gentiles multiplied gods there were almost as many gods as men that beleeved in them and I am got out of that throng and out of that noise when I am come into the knowledge of one God but I am got above stairs got into the bed-chamber when I am come to see the Trinitie and to apprehend not onely that I am in the care of a great powerfull God but that there is a Father that made me a Sonne that redeemed me a holy Ghost that applies this good purpose of the Father and Sonne upon me to me The root of all is God But it is not the way to receive fruits to dig to the root but to reach to the boughs I reach for my creation to the Father for my redemption to the Sonne for my sanctification to the holy Ghost and so I make the knowledge of God a tree of life unto me and not otherwise Truely it is a sad contemplation to see Christians scratch and wound and teare one another with the ignominious invectives and uncharitable names of Heretick and Schismatick about ceremoniall and problematicall and indeed but criticall verball controversies and in the mean time the foundation of all the Trinitie undermined by those numerous those multitudinous ant-hills of Socinians that overflow some parts of the Christian world and multiply every where And therefore the adversaries of the Reformation were wise in their generation when to supplant the credit of both those great assistants of the Reformation Luther Calvin they impute to Calvin fundamentall errour in the divinitie of the second person of the Trinitie the Sonne And they impute to Luther a detestation of the word Trinitie and an expunction thereof in all places of the Liturgie where the Church had received that word They knew well if that slander could prevail against those persons nothing that they could say could prevail upon any good Christians But though in our Doctrine we keep up the Trinitie aright yet God knows in our Practise we do not I hope it cannot be said of any of us that he beleeves not the Trinitie but who amongst us thinks of the Trinitie considers of the Trinitie Father and Sonne do naturally imply and induce one another therefore they fall oftener into our consideration but for the holy Ghost who feels him when he feels him who takes knowledge of his working when he works Indeed our Fathers provided not well enough for the worship of the whole Trinitie nor of the holy Ghost in particular in the endowments of the Church and consecrations of the Churches and possessions in their names what a spirituall dominion in the Prayers worship of the people what a temporall dominion in the possessions of the world had the Virgin Marie Queen of heaven and Queen of earth too She was made joynt-purchaser of the Church with the Sonne and had asmuch of the worship thereof as he though she paid her Fine in milk and he in bloud And till a new sect came in her Sonnes name and in his name the name of Jesus took the Regencie so farre out of that Queen-mothers hands and sued out her sonnes liverie so farre as that though her name be used the Virgin Marie is but a Feofee in trust for them all was hers And if God oppose not these new usurpers of the world posteritie will soon see S. Ignatius worth all the Trinitie in possessions and endowments and that sumptuous and splendid foundation of his first Temple at Rome may well create a conjecture and suspicion Travell no farther Survey but this Citie and of their not one hundred Churches the Virgin Marie hath a dozen The Trinitie hath but one Christ hath but one the holy Ghost hath none But not to go into the Citie nor out of our selves which of us doth truely considerately ascribe the comforts that he receives in dangers or in distresses to that God of all comfort the Comforter the holy Ghost We know who procured us our presentation and our dispensation you know who procured you your offices and your honours Shall I ever forget who gave me my comfort in sicknesse who gave me my comfort in the troubles and perplexities and diffidencies of my conscience The holy Ghost the holy Ghost brought you hither The holy Ghost opens your eares and your hearts here Till in all your distresses you say Veni Creator Spiritus Come holy Ghost and that you feel a comfort in his coming you can never say Veni Domine Jesu Come Lord Jesus come to judgement Never to consider the day of judgement is a fearfull thing but to consider the day of judgement without the holy Ghost is a thousand times more fearfull This seal then this impression this notion of the Trinitie being set upon us in this first plurall word of our Text Faciamus Let us for Father Sonne and holy Ghost made man and this seal being reimprinted upon us in our second Creation or Regeneration in Baptisme man is baptized in the name of the Father and of the Sonne and of the holy Ghost this notion of the Trinitie being our distinctive character from Jew and Gentile this being our specificall form why doth not this our form this soul of our Religion denominate us why are we not called Trinitarians a name that would embrace the profession of all the persons but onely Christians which limits and determines us upon one The first Christians amongst whose manifold persecutions scorn and contempt was not the least in contempt and scorn were called Nazaraei Nazarites in the mouth of the vulgar and Galilaei Galileans in the mouth of Julian Judaei Jews in the mouth of Nero when he imputed the burning of Rome his own art to them and Christiani Christians so that as Tertullian sayes they could accuse Christians of nothing but the name of Christians and yet they could not call them by their right name of Christians which was gentle quiet easie patient men made to be troden upon but they gave them divers names in scorn yet never called them Trinitarians Christians themselves amongst themselves were called by divers names in the Primitive Church for distinction Fideles the Faithfull and Fratres the Brethren and Discipuli Disciples after by common custome at Antioch Christians and after that they say by a councell which the Apostles held at the same Citie at Antioch there passed an expresse Canon of the Church that they should be called so Christians And before they had this name at Antioch first by common usage after by a determinate Canon to be called Christians from Christ at Alexandria they were called most likely from the name of Jesus
in the merit so of all people there was none with me without me so as to be excluded by me without their own fault from the benefit of the merit This rednesse he carried up to heaven for by the bloud of his crosse came peace both to the things in heaven and the Col. 1. 21. things on earth For the peccabilitie that possibilitie of sinning which is in the nature of the angels of heaven would break out into sinne but for that confirmation which those angels have received in the bloud of Christ This rednesse he carried to heaven and this rednesse he hath left upon earth that all we miserable clods of earth might be tempered with his bloud that in his bloud exhibited in his holy blessed Sacrament our long robes might be made white in the bloud of the Lambe that though our sinnes be robes habits of long continuance in sinne yet through that rednesse which our sinnes have cast upon him we might come to participate of that whitenesse that righteousnesse which is his own We that is all we for as to take us in who are of low condition and obscure station a cloud is made white by his sitting upon it He sat upon a white cloud so to let the highest see that they have no whitenesse but from him he makes the throne white by sitting upon it He sat upon a great white throne It had been great if it had not been white white is the colour of dilatatiō Goodnesse enlarges the throne It had not been white if he had not sat upon it That goodnesse onely which consists in glorifying God and God in Christ and Christ in the sinceritie of the truth is true whitenesse God hath no rednesse in himself no anger towards us till he considers us as sinners God casts no rednesse upon us inflicts no necessitie no constraint of sinning upon us we have died our selves in sinnes as red as scarlet we have drowned our selves in such a red sea But as a garment that was washed in the Red sea would come out white so wonderfull works hath God Psal 106. 22. done at the Red sea sayes David so doth his whitenesse work through our red and makes this Adam this red earth Calculum candidum that white stone that receives a new name not Ish not Enosh not Gheber no name that tasts of miserie nor of vanitie but that name renewed and manifested which was imprinted upon us in our elections the sonnes of God the irremoveable the undisinheritable sonnes of God Be pleased to receive this note at parting that there is Macula alba a spot and yet white as well as a red spot a whitenesse that is an indication of a leprosie as well as a rednesse It is whole-Pelagianisme to think nature alone sufficient half-Pelagianisme to think grace once received to be sufficient super-Pelagianisme to think our actions can bring God in debt to us by merit and supererogation Catharisme imaginarie puritie in canonizing our selves as present saints and condemning all that differ from us as reprobates All these are white spots and have the colour of goodnesse but are indications of leprosie So is that that God threatens Decorticatio ficûs albi rami that Joel 1. 7. the fig-tree shall be barked and the boughs thereof left white To be left white without bark was an indication of a speedy withering Ostensa candescunt arescunt sayes S. Gregorie of that place the bough that lies open without bark looks white but perisheth The good works that are done openly to please men have their reward sayes Christ that is shall never have reward To pretend to do good and not mean it to do things good in themselves but not to good ends to go towards good ends but not by good wayes to make the deceiving of men thine end or the praise of men thine end all this may have a whitenesse a colour of good but all this is a barking of the bough and an indication of a mischievous leprosie There is no good whitenesse but a reflexion from Christ Jesus in an humble acknowledgement that we have none of our own and in a confident assurance that in our worst estate we may be made partakers of his We are all red earth In Adam we would not since Adam we could not avoid sinne and the concomitants thereof miseries which we have called our West our cloud our darknesse But then we have a North that scatters these clouds in the next word Ad imaginem that we are made to another pattern in another likenesse then our own Faciamus hominem So farre we are gone East and West which is half our compasse and all this dayes voyage for we are struck upon the sand and must stay another tide and another gale for our North and South FINIS THE SECOND SERMON PREACHED BEFORE KING CHARLES Upon the xxvi verse of the first Chapter of GENESIS By Dr. DONNE DEAN OF PAVLS ¶ Printed by the Printers to the Vniversitie of CAMBRIDGE MDCXXXIIII Genesis 1. 26. And God said Let us make man in our image after our likenesse BY fair occasion from these words we proposed to you the whole compasse of mans voyage from his launching forth in this world to his anchoring in the next from his hoysing sail here to his striking sail there in which compasse we designed to you his foure quarters first his East where he must begin the fundamentall knowledge of the Trinitie for that we found to be the specification distinctive character of a Christian where though that be so we shewed you also why we were not called Trinitarians but Christians and we shewed you the advantage that man hath in laying hold upon God in these severall notions That the prodigall sonne hath an indulgent father that the decayed father hath an abundant sonne that the dejected spirit hath a Spirit of comfort to fly to in heaven And as we shewed you from S. Paul that it was an Atheisme to be no Christian Without God sayes he as long as without Christ so we lamented the slacknesse of Christians that they did not seriously and particularly consider the persons of the Trinitie and especially the holy Ghost in their particular actions And then we came to that consideration whether this doctrine were established or directly insinuated in this plurall word of our text Faciamus Let us make man and we found that doctrine to be here and here first of any place in the Bible and finding God to speak in the plurall we accepted for a time that interpretation which some had made thereof That God spake in the person of a Soveraigne Prince and therefore as they do in the plurall We And thereby having established reverence to Princes we claymed in Gods behalf the same reverence to him that men would demean themselves here when God is spoken to in prayer as reverently as when they speak to the King But afterwards we found God to speak here not onely
that which is naturally indifferent is necessarie to them who are under his obedience some things are sinnes at one time which are not so at another as all the ceremoniall Law created new sinnes which were not sinnes before that Law was given nor since it expired some things are sinnes in a man now which will not be sinnes in the same man to morrow as when a man hath contracted a just scruple against any particular action it is a sinne to do it during the scruple and it may be a sinne in him to omit it when he hath digested the scruple Onely God hath Judicium detestationis he knows and therefore detests evil and therefore flatter not thy soul with a Tush God sees it not or Tush God cares not doth it disquiet him or trouble his rest in heaven that I break his sabbath here doth it wound his bodie or draw his bloud there that I swear by his bodie and bloud here doth it corrupt any of his virgins there that I sollicit the chastitie of a woman here are his martyrs withdrawn from their allegeance or retarded in their service to him there because I dare not defend his cause nor speak for him nor fight for him here Beloved as it is a degree of superstition and an effect of an indiscreet zeal perchance to be too forward by making indifferent things necessarie and so to imprint the nature and sting of sinne where naturally it is not for certainly it is a most slipperie and irreligious thing to be too apt to call things meerly indifferent and to forget that even in eating and drinking walking and sleeping the glorie of God is intermingled as if we knew exactly the presence and foreknowledge of God there could be nothing contingent or casuall for though there be a contingencie in the nature of the thing yet it is certain to God so if we consider duely wherein the glorie of God might be promoted in every action of ours there could scarce be any action so indifferent but that the glorie of God would turn the scale and make it necessarie to me at that time but then private interests and private respects create a new indifferencie to my apprehension and call me to consider that thing as it is in nature and not as it is conditioned with the circumstance of the glorie of God and so I lose that judicium detestationis which onely God hath absolutely and perfectly to know and therefore to detest evil And so he is a Judge As he is a Judge so judicat rem he judges the nature of a thing he is so too that he hath judicium discretionis and so judicat personam he knows what is evil and he discerns when thou committest that evil Here you are fain to supply defects of laws that things done in our countrey may be tried in another and that in offences of high nature transmarine offences might be enquired and tried here but as the Prophet sayes Who hath measured the waters in the hollow Isa 40. 12. of his hand or meted out the heavens with a spanne who comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure or weighed the mountains in a scale so I say Who hath divided heaven into shires or parishes or limited the territories or jurisdictions there that God should not have and exercise judicium discretionis the power of discerning all actions in all places when there was no more to be seen nor considered upon the whole earth but the garden of Paradise for from the beginning Deliciae ejus esse cum filiis hominum Gods delight was to be with the sonnes of men and man was onely there Shall we not diminish God or speak too vulgarly of him to say that he hovered like a falcon over Paradise and that from the height of heaven the piercing eye of God saw so little a thing as the forbidden fruit and what became of that and the reaching eare of God heard the hissing of the serpent and the whispering of the woman and what was concluded upon that shall we think it little to have seen things done in Paradise when there was nothing else to divert his eye nothing else to distract his counsels nothing else done upon the face of the earth take the earth now as it is replenished and take it either as it is torn and crumbled in rags and shivers not a kingdome not a family not a man agreeing with himself or take it in that concord which is in it as all the kings of the earth set themselves and all the rulers of the earth take counsel together against Psal 2. 2. the Lord take it in this union or this disunion in this concord or this disconcord still the Lord that sitteth in the heavens discerns all looks at all laughs at all and hath them in derision Earthly judges have their districtions and so their restrictions some things they cannot know what mortall man can know all some things they cannot take knowledge of for they are bounded no cloud no darknesse no disguise keeps him from discerning and judging all our actions and so he is a Judge too And he is so lastly as he hath Judicium retributionis God knows what is evil and he knows when that evil is done and he knows how to punish and recompense that evil For the office of a judge who judges according to a law being not to contract nor to extend that law but to know what was the true meaning of the lawmaker when he made that law God hath this judgement in perfection because he himself made that Law by which he judges When he hath said Stipendium peccati mors est Every sinne shall be rewarded with death If I sinne against the 1. Sam. 2. 25 Lord who shall intreat for me who shall give any other interpretation any modification any Non obstante upon his Law in my behalf when he comes to judge me according to that Law which himself hath made who shall think to delude the Judge and say Surely this was not the meaning of the Law-giver when he who is the Judge was the Law-maker too And then as God is Judge in all these three respects so he is a Judge in them all Sine appellatione and Sine judiciis man cannot appeal from God God needs no evidence from man For the appeal first to whom should we appeal from the Soveraigne wrangle as long as we will who is chief Justice and which Countie hath jurisdiction one over another I know the chief Justice and I know the Soveraigne court the King of heaven and earth shall send his ministring spirits his Angels to the wombe and bowels of the earth and to the bosome and bottome of the sea and earth and sea shall deliver Corpus cum causa all the bodies of the dead and all their actions to receive a judgement in his court when it will be an erroneous and frivolous appeal to call to the hills to fall down
upon us and to the mountains to cover and hide us from the wrathfull judgement of God He is Judge then Sine appellatione Without any appeal from him he is so too Sine judiciis Without any evidence from us Now if I be warie in my actions here incarnate devils detractours and informers cannot accuse me if my sinne come not into action but lie onely in my heart the devil himself who is the Accuser of the brethren hath no evidence against me But God knows the heart Doth not he that pondereth the heart understand Prov. 24. 12 it where it is not in that faint word which the vulgar edition hath expressed it in Suspector cordium that God sees the heart but the word is Fochen that is every where to weigh to number to search to examine as the word is used by Solomon again The Lord weigheth the spirits and Prov. 16. 2. it must be a steadie hand and exact scales that shall weigh spirits so though neither man nor devil nay nor my self give evidence against me yea though I know nothing by my self I am not thereby justified Why where is the further danger in this which follows there in S. Paul He that judgeth 1. Cor. 4. 4. me is the Lord and the Lord hath means to know my heart better then my self And therefore S. Augustine makes use of those words Abyssus Psal 42. 9. abyssum invocat One depth calls up another the infinite depth of my sinnes must call upon the infinite depth of Gods mercie for if God who is a Judge in all these respects Judicio detestationis he knows and abhorres evil and Judicio discretionis he discerns every evil person and every evil action and Judicio retributionis he can and will recompense evil with evil and all these Sine appellatione we cannot appeal from him and Sine judiciis he needs no evidence from us if this Judge enter into judgement with me not onely not I but not the most righteous man nay nor the Church whom he hath washed in his bloud that she might be without spot or wrinkle shall appeare righteous in his sight This then being thus that judgement is an inseparable Part. II character of God and God the Father being Fons deitatis the root and spring of the whole deitie how is it said that the Father judgeth no man not that we should conceive a wearinesse or retiring in the Father or a discharging of himself upon the shoulders and labours of another in the administration and judging of this world for as it is truely said that God rested the seventh day that is he rested from working in that kinde from creating so it is true that Christ sayes here My Father worketh yet and I work and so it is truely said here The Father judgeth no man it is truely John 8. 5. said by Christ too of the Father I seek not mine own glorie there is one that seeketh and judgeth still it is true that God hath Judicium detestationis Thy eyes are pure eyes O Lord and cannot behold iniquitie sayes the Prophet still it is true that he hath Judicium discretionis Because they committed Jer. 29. 23. Villanie in Israel even I know it saith the Lord still it is true that he hath Judicium retributionis The Lord killeth and maketh alive he bringeth 1. Sam. 2. 6. down to the grave and bringeth up still it is true that he hath all these Sine appellatione for go to the sea or earth or hell as David makes the distribution and God is there and he hath them Sine judiciis for our witnesse is in heaven and our record on high All this is undeniably true and besides this that great name of God by which he is first called in the Scriptures ELOHIM is not inconveniently derived from Elah which is jurare to swear God is able as a Judge to minister an oath unto us and to draw evidence from our own consciences against our selves so that then the Father judgeth still but he judges as God and not as the Father In the three great judgements of God the whole Trinitie judges In the first judgement before all times which was Gods judiciarie separating of vessels of honour from vessels of dishonour in our election and reprobation In his second judgement which is in execution now which is Gods judiciarie separating of servants from enemies in the seals and in the administration of the Christian Church And in the last judgement which shall be Gods judiciarie separating sheep from goats to everlasting glorie or condemnation In all these three judgements all the three persons of the Trinitie are Judges Consider God all together and so in all outward works all the Trinitie concurres because all are but one God but consider God in relation in distinct persons and so the severall persons of the Trinitie do some things which the other persons of the Trinitie are not interessed in the Sonne had not generation from himself so as he had from the Father and the holy Ghost as a distinct person had none at all the holy Ghost had a proceeding from the Father and the Sonne but from the Sonne a person who had his generation from another but not so from the Father Not to stray into clouds or perplexities in the contemplation God that is the whole Trinitie judges still but so as the Sonne judgeth the Father judgeth not for that judgement he hath committed That we may husband our houre as well and rescribe as much as we can for our two last considerations the Cui and the Quid To whom and that is to the Sonne and what he hath committed and that is all judgement we will not stand much upon this more needs not then this that God in his wisdome foreseeing that man by his weaknesse would not be able to settle himself upon the consideration of God and his judgements as they are meerly spirituall and heavenly out of his abundant goodnesse hath established a judgement and ordained a judge upon earth like himself and like our selves too that as no man hath seen God so no man should go about to see his unsearchable decrees judgements but rest in those sensible and visible means which he hath afforded that is Christ Jesus speaking in his Church and applying his bloud unto us in the sacraments unto the worlds end God might have suffered Abraham to rest in the first generall promise Semen mulieris The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpents head but he would bring it nearer to a visible to a personall covenant In semine tuo In thy seed shall all nations be blessed he might well have let him rest in that appropriation of his promise to his race but he would proceed further and seal it with a sensible seal in his flesh with circumcision He might have let him rest in that ratification that a Messias should come by that way but he would refresh it by a