the work of Man's Redemption which could not have been perform'd but in such a Body as his own nor could the Seed of the Woman be said to bruise the Serpent's head had not Christ been conceived of that Seed nor the Promise renew'd to Abraham Gen. 22. 18. In thy seed shall all the Nations of the Earth be blessed have been made good had not the Mother of our Lord descended from his loins too And surely well may she be call'd Blessed without whom we could never have been so since 't was she that furnish'd those Materials that repair'd our ruines from whose Bloud also flow'd that most pretious One which alone can cleanse and redeem us Our Mother Eve could brag when she had brought forth her first-begotten and he but an untoward Child for St. John tells us he was of that wicked one the Devil 1 John 3. 12. as all other Reprobates are there said to be vers 10. I have gotten a Man from the Lord Gen. 4. 1. i. e. as some interpret the words That famous Man the Lord fancying Cain to be that Seed of the Woman that should bruise the Serpent's head But how truly may each of us now say Possedi Deum per Virginem I have gotten the Lord my Redeemer by the means of a pure Virgin of whom my Saviour was made Man that I might be made the Son of God How much better may the Virgin Mary deserve the name of the Mother of all the Living than Eve did Gen. 3. 20. who at best convey'd unto us but a Natural whereas the former a Spiritual life in giving us Him who is the Life so far was Eve from being Mater Viventium in this sense that she brought forth all her Posterity still-born into the World dead in trespasses and sins She indeed hearkned to the Suggestions of an evil Spirit but the Holy Virgin to the Message of a good one If she were the Mother of the Living then this of the Predestinate and if by the former Satan bruised our heel by this Anti-Eve we crush his head being instated in a better condition than we had forfeited Now if they who were the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Benefactors to Mankind were thought worthy of divine Honours the first occasion of Idolatry there being nothing that renders a person more like God than to doe good especially to oblige all Manking nothing that could raise such Persons so high in the Esteem of Mortals as such a large and comprehensive Goodness surely none came so near the Almighty in this so divine a quality as the Holy Virgin did by whose means not only the Inhabitants of the Earth but in some sort too those of Heaven became certainly and immutably Blessed confirm'd in such a state of happiness by her Son as they are uncapable of losing And therefore well might the Angel pronounce her Blessed who with the rest of his Order were so much obliged by her And surely all generations of Men much more who in part owe unto her their recovery and those hopes they have of being one day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alike Blessed with them and if St. Paul was Blessed in being a chosen Vessel to bear Christ's name then the Holy Virgin much more by conveying a humane Nature to him who alone makes us partakers of the divine one All these advantages had the Mother of God glorious indeed but not the chiefest part of her happiness nor was she to value her self for her relation purely considered in its self Yea rather Blessed are they says our Lord who hear the Word of God and keep it Whereby it appears how little he set by any carnal propinquity and how much nearer and dearer to him the Righteous are than his own bloud not that he did in the least despise his Parents for his own Example preaches Subjection to them Luke 2. 51. but only preferr Spiritual kindred to Carnal as he often does letting us know That to doe the will of his Father which is in Heaven is to be his Brother Sister and Mother Matth. 12. 50. That true Christian Heraldry is founded in Grace and not in Bloud That to be joined unto him in one Spirit is a closer Union than to be united to him in the flesh and to be obedient to his Commands far more advantageous than to relate to his Person Nay so little would our Lord have us too to prize such outward things as these that unless in some cases we hate Father and Mother Wife and Children Brethren and our selves too he plainly tells us we cannot be his Disciples Luke 14. 26. And for this reason Moses blessed Levi Deut. 33. 9. Who said unto his Father and to his Mother I have not seen him neither did he acknowledge his Brethren nor knew his own Children but observed God's Word and kept his Covenant This is certain that all outward favours and privileges how pompous soever in themselves are wholly insignificant and ineffectual without the grace of Obedience being at best but gratioe gratis datoe non gratum facientes rather ornaments than benefits which as we are not thanklesly to over-slip so neither presumptuously to over-ween See how little account St. Paul makes of them 2 Cor. 5. 16. Though we have known Christ after the flesh have familiarly convers'd with him been eye-witnesses of all those glorious things he did as his Apostles yet now henceforth know we him no more we disclaim all such carnal acquaintance and if we should know Christ no better he would not know us nor own us for his we might be nearly related to him and yet be far enough from him and without him for so 't is expresly recorded of some of his Brethren that they did not believe in him Joh. 7. 5. So far were they from looking upon him as their Saviour that they took him for no better than a mad-man one besides himself Mark 3. 21. though in process of time some of them indeed became his disciples and no doubt of Christ's Genealogy not a few were eternally lost The Jews much prided themselves in being Abraham's sons and yet one of them that calls himself so fryes in Hell What did it avail Saul to be a Prophet or Judas an Apostle when such privileges serv'd them for no other purpose but to enhanse their damnation We reade not of any dignified with more glorious Prerogatives than these two the Blessed Virgin and St. John the Evangelist the one for bearing our Saviour in her Womb and the other for leaning on his Breast yet how little had these things benefited them had not Faith and Piety seasoned such outward privileges and made them as gracious as they were glorious Happier Mary for bearing Christ's Sayings in her Heart than Himself in her Womb in that she partook of the Merit than imparted the Matter and Substance of his bloud 'T was not so much the loveliness of her Motherhood as the lowliness of her Handmaidship that He regarded
in the Flesh justified in the Spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed on in the World received up into Glory were then all riddle And as our Knowledge now is far clearer than that of God's ancient People was so is our Consolation and Joy also being established on better Promises revealed with more Evidence and embraced with more Firmness and Certitude Death is now swallowed up in victory and hath lost its sting so that our Fears are less as our Hopes are stronger sweeter and more comfortable being now not under the Spirit of Bondage but of Adoption which makes us go boldly to the Throne of Grace The Result of all is this That the Oeconomy of the Spirit followed that of the Father and of the Son That the Holy Ghost was not properly to be styled a Comforter till Christ went up from Earth to Heaven and that if our Lord had remained here below the blessed Comforter would not have come down in that plentifull Effusion of his Gifts and Graces as he did after our Lord's departure which is the Third thing proposed But before I enter upon this subject I shall first take notice of the sender of Him which our Lord says was Himself I will send him unto you Christ had before told his Disciples That He would pray the Father that He would send them another Comforter Joh. 14. 16. v. 26. That the Father would send Him in his Name But chap. 15. 26. as here in the Text He takes it upon Himself to send him I will send Him unto you from the Father And both with Truth For the Father and the Son sent and had an equal share in sending Him He is therefore called The Spirit of the Father Mat. 10. 20. and The Spirit of the Son Gal. 4. 6. For he proceedeth from both From the Father 't is said expresly Joh. 15. 26. and from the Son if not in express terms yet virtually imply'd in that He is said to be the Spirit of Christ as well as of the Father and must therefore come from Him because sent from Him too The only difference being this That the Holy Ghost is sent by the Father as from Him who hath by the Original Communication a right of Mission which denotes only distinction of Order The Father being as the Spring the Son as the Fountain and the Holy Ghost as the Stream flowing from both From whence we may collect two Things 1. That the Holy Ghost is a real distinct Person from the Father and the Son in as much as He is sent by them For how can He be the same with them that send Him If he proceed from the Father he must be distinct in subsistence and if his Coming depended on the Son 's going away and sending Him after he was gone He cannot be the Son who therefore departed that He might send Him 2. It follows hence That the Holy Ghost is equal to the Father and the Son For whatsoever proceedeth from God must be God whatsoever partakes of his Essence must be equal with Him And surely if the Son have the same right of Mission with the Father as we learn from the Text he must be acknowledged to have the same Essence with him too And had not the Holy Ghost been Equal with the Son as with the Father how could He have supplied his Place Or what Expediency could there have been in the Holy Spirit 's coming when being less than Christ he could have never been able to doe as much as Christ did and so the exchange must needs have been to the Apostle's loss and not as Christ himself had told them it should prove to their benefit and advantage St. Augustine's Prayer then was not impertinent Domine da mihi alium Te alioqui non dimittam Te Give me Lord another as good as thy self or I will never leave Thee nor ever consent that Thou shouldst leave me Nor is it any diminution to the Deity of the Holy Ghost that He is said here to be sent by the Son These Expressions To be sent or To come and the like being not Expressions of disparagement For He was so sent as to come too and to come of his own accord His coming being free and voluntary He came in no servile manner but as a Lord as a friend from a friend in a Letter the very Mind of him that sent it which shews an agreement indeed and concord with Him that sent him but implies no Inferiority nor any the least degree of Subjection 'T is the Spirits honour to be sent to be a Leader and though sent He be yet is He as free an Agent as He that sent him Tertullian calls Him Christi Vicarium Christ's Vicar on Earth But if that argued any inequality in the Spirit it might as well in the Son too who is styled in Scripture the Angel and Messenger of God and is said to go about his Father's business that sent Him But to leave this Argument as more proper to convince a Macedonian Heretick than needfull for any true Believer I shall proceed to the third Thing namely The time when the Holy Ghost was to be sent and that was after our Lord's departure If I depart I will send him unto you But what necessity was there may some say of Christ's departing in order to the Spirit 's Coming Might He not have tarried here and the Spirit have come for all that Was the stay of the one any lett or hinderance to the coming of the other Or might not Christ have sent for as well as go away himself to send him To this I say 1. That it was decreed from all Eternity That God the Father should draw us to his Son Joh. 6. 44. 2dly That God the Son should instruct us chap. 17. 6 8. And 3dly That God the Holy Ghost should assist and establish us in all Truth And so the whole Work of our Redemption should be ascribed to the Father as electing To the Son as consummating and to the Holy Ghost as applying it God the Father had done his part God the Son was at this instant doing his too It remained only that the Comforter should come to perfect both which could not be till the Son had performed his Task here on Earth and should go away to Heaven For the Acts of the Holy Ghost pre-suppose those of a Redeemer 'T is the part of that Blessed Spirit to inflame our Souls with the Love of God but in order to this effect 't is absolutely necessary that the Redeemer should first appease God Our first Parent was not able to endure the terror of the voice of his provoked Majesty but was forc'd to hide his head And what is each Sinner but as Flax before the consuming fire of his Justice Till our Redeemer then had disarm'd that Justice till he had made men's Peace and Reconciliation the Holy Ghost could not excite any motions of Love in them
Omnipotent God a power able to break in pieces the chains even of death its self strong ones indeed to hold all others but weak to hold him who was as well God as Man Whom God hath raised up c. From which words Four things are to be gather'd 1. The Certainty of Christ's Resurrection set down here as matter of fact Hath raised up 2. The principal Agent or rather the sole efficient Cause of Christ's Resurrection God Whom God hath c. 3. The Manner how 't was done Removendo impedimentum by taking away whatsoever might obstruct it the rowling away the stone as it were from the door of the Sepulchre the untying of a hard knot Having loosed the pains of Death 4. And lastly the Necessity of all this a most convincing and irresistible Argument and therefore brought up in the rear to make all sure Because it was not possible he should be holden of it Of these in their order and of such practical Inferences as doe arise out of them And first of the first Particular the Certainty of Christ's Resurrection in these words Hath raised up 1. There is not any truth in Scripture which God has been so carefull or as I may so say curious to secure as that of his Son's Resurrection Which he did as by taking away all grounds of doubting of it so by making use of all manner of proofs to ascertain it For first whereas Sceptical Men might have questioned whether Christ died truly or no or if so whether his disciples did not come by night and steal him away These two grounds of suspition God took care to remove The first by that Evidence the Centurion gave in to Pilate of his real dying besides that of so many Spectators who beheld that stream of bloud wherein he poured forth his Soul unto death And the second by the exact care of the High Priest who caused a vast stone to be rowled before the door of the Sepulchre adding his Seal and Souldiers of his own chusing to guard it from the attempts of the Disciples who had they had a will had neither power nor courage to break open a Sepulchre hewen out of a new entire Rock or force such a strong guard as kept it much less Money to bribe their silence as the High Priests and Scribes did And to say that his Disciples stole him away while the stout Watch-men slept was surely no better than a Dream or rather not a Dream but a studied Lie and yet such a Lie too as does most clearly confirm the truth of our Lord's Resurrection But then secondly As God took away all cause of doubt so did he draw Arguments from all Topicks to prove this great Truth Heaven and Earth here gave in their Evidence For not only the Souls of Holy Men were fetcht thence to be united to their Bodies for proof of that Resurrection by which themselves were raised but the Blessed Inhabitants of Heaven the Angels came down on purpose to publish it to the Women as these did to the Apostles to whom Christ shewed himself alive too after his Passion by many infallible proofs and expos'd himself to their very Senses who did not only see and hear but converse and eat with him after he was risen from the dead that they might not mistake his Body as once they did for a Phantasm or Christ for a Spirit having flesh and bones as they found he had and retaining still the marks and prints of the nails and spear to shew the Identity as well as Reality of that Body which arose The very Infidelity of an Apostle being not the least confirmation of our Faith too in this particular Not to mention other instances the Earthquake the empty grave the stone rowled away the linnen cloths curiously wrapt up together as dead Witnesses when there were so many living ones Angels and Men and among these such as were ready to seal this Truth with their dearest Bloud of such credit and honesty too as might highly recommend their Testimony to our belief of such Prudence Experience and Holiness withall as neither could betray them to Error nor suffer them to abuse the credit of others Such were the Holy Apostles who with great power gave witness of the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus and whose principal office it was to doe so as appears upon the Election of St. Matthias into the place of Judas grounded upon this necessity Act. 1. 21 22. To whom we may add no less than five hundred Brethren at once all agreeing in the same story Nemo omnes neminem omnes fefellerunt which made their Evidence rise to such a strong demonstration as was sufficient to stop the mouths of Christ's most contradicting Enemies and open ours to confess with the Disciples and Primitive Christians The Lord is risen indeed Luk. 24. 34. Thus we see how exact the Holy Ghost was as in removing all such Doubts as might in the least obstruct our Faith so in using all manner of Arguments to confirm and establish the undoubted Truth of Christ's Resurrection not only to show the possibility of a Resurrection in general by so pregnant and visible an Example but the importance of it in regard of ours whereof our Lord 's was the Fountain and Pledge 1. I say the clearing of the Truth of Christ's Resurrection was absolutely necessary in regard of the slowness and indisposition of most Men and in all times to admit of the possibility of a Resurrection The Philosopher we see could not digest it To the Stoicks and Epicureans it became matter of laughter who took it for some new Goddess Act. 17. 18 32. Nay some of the Disciples themselves lookt upon it as a Fable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luk. 24. 11. A considerable Sect too among the Jews the Sadducees utterly deny'd it Act. 23. 8. Simon Magus and the Gnosticks were of the same persuasion and so was Marcion as Tertullian informs me who deny'd the truth of Christ's flesh and consequently his Nativity and Resurrection as Valentinus's Disciple did the Resurrection of that Flesh he convers'd in Some there were who affirm'd 't was already past as Hymenaeus and Philetus Others turn'd it into a meer Allegory a Renovation Matth. 19. 28. A state of the Gospel call'd a New Heaven and a new Earth 2 Pet. 3. 13. And the World to come Heb. 2. 5. And lastly how doe all loose Christians decry it as a thing utterly inconsistent with their interest It was requisite then that this foundation should be laid very deep in men's Hearts which the Holy Ghost fore-saw so many would endeavour to over-throw 2. 'T was absolutely necessary to clear this Truth in regard of the importance of it to Christ's glory and the happiness of all true Christians 1. To Christ's glory which in the esteem of Men being much eclipsed by his Death was to shine out brighter by his Resurrection for nothing but this could take
all sin both original and actual whereas her self by calling Christ her Saviour professes her need of him so especially by making her a vast and inexhaustible Ocean of all perfection the property of him alone in whom all fulness dwells and of whose fulness we all the Virgin Mary not excepted have received and all this upon a plain mistake of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which implies not any infus'd qualities or inherent gifts but God's meer gratious acceptation of her And yet as great an affront as this is to the divine Majesty there is yet one thing more intollerable that these Men not content to allow the Virgin equal to her Son will needs give her a kind of Command and Authority over him as if now in Heaven he were to be subject to her as once on Earth and she were a Queen Regent to govern and comptroll him as it were in his Minority Witness those expressions Monstra te esse Matrem and Jussu Matris impera salvatori words which I dare not English and which their Rosaries and Litanies are stufft with Nor does their Practice bely their Expressions their Addresses being more to the Mother than to the Son and her Temples having almost swallow'd up his which are now become Shops of lying Miracles one of them especially that of Loretto all Wainscoted within with them and its self the greatest of all as having been carried if we will believe them from Bethlehem by Angels and by them plac'd where now it stands I shall not trouble you with a description of all their fopperies their superstitious bowings cringings and lighting of Candles to our Ladies Images their ridiculous dressing and undressing them their vows offerings and presents to these dumb Idols so like the Cakes offered up to the Queen of Heaven Jer. 7. and the like which if they do not out-doe at least they bid fair for Heathenish Idolatry if this be not to worship the Creature more than the Creator 't is at least to doe service to her who by Nature is no God and who can no more endure it than St. Paul could a sacrifice Act. 14. or the Angel in the Revelations chap. 19. 10. divine Worship or to come a little more home than St. Peter to be styl'd Universal Bishop of God's Church a Title they will needs force upon him though himself expresly disclaims it 1 Pet. 5. 3. No let us honour the Blessed Virgin as becomes the Mother of God not as a Goddess she is but a Creature how glorious soever and we are not to make her an Idol neither to invoke her Name nor adore her Person we allow her God's Mother but not his Rival place her we may as near his Throne as Religion will suffer us not in it in the Throne God will be greater than any style her Queen of Saints while Christ remains the Sovereign King of them and 't is honour enough for this Queen to be solo Deo minor to be blessed even above the Angel that proclaim'd her so yea if they will have it above all Saints and Angels too but still below her Son who is over all God blessed for ever Rom. 9. 5. In a word Our endeavour should be to copy out those Perfections which were so eminent in this Blessed Mother of our Lord Her Faith by our ready assent to God's Word Her Devotion by frequently meditating on it a book which like Ezekiel's rowl must be eaten and well digested Her Purity by keeping our selves unspotted from the World and hating even the garment spotted by the flesh always remembring that they who follow the Lamb are Virgins Her Prudence by trying the Spirits by proving all things but holding fast that which is good suspecting even an Angel from Heaven could he propose any thing to us that should seem to cross a Precept of Christ and dreading not only every little stain but the very suspition of it Her Obedience by an entire submission to God's revealed Will and which is the crown and perfection of all grace her Humility These are the Copies we are to transcribe the best Gifts to be coveted such as will adorn and perfect us make us holy and glorious other may have more pomp and lustre in themselves these most use and benefit to us and therefore let our aim be to be pure as the Mother of God we who are commanded to strive to be perfect even as our Father which is in Heaven is perfect And if we hear the Word of God and keep it as she did the Lord will as certainly be with us as He was with her and we at last be with him where she now is eternally Blessed in the fruition of the most Blessed Trinity the Father Son and Holy Ghost To whom let us ascribe as is most due everlasting glory c. Amen A SERMON Preached on Christmas-day TITUS II. 14. Who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works THE greatest blessing God could bestow upon us or we receive took its rise from Man's sin The sin of the first Adam was the cause or at least the occasion of the Incarnation of the second Had the former still continued in Paradise the latter had not come down from Heaven Innocence was to be lost before it could be recovered nor was the Physician but for the sick nor the Redeemer but for the captive But as the first Man did not therefore sin or was ordained to sin that the Son of God might be incarnated so his Goodness who can fetch light out of darkness took advantage by that sin to manifest its self in its expiation and his Wisedom contriv'd a way to make that very sin instrumental to a greater good than Man had forfeited which gave occasion to a Father to style Adam's first Transgression Foelicem culpam a happy crime that procur'd him such a Redeemer as could doe him more good than 't was in his own or Satan's power to doe him hurt and so well repair his Ruine as to make it more advantageous to him than his Innocence He is now a gainer by his loss his falling so low has but rais'd him up the higher being made more happy by his very unhappiness so that where Man's sin did abound God's grace has much more abounded And never sure did it more abound than at this time when the Son of God took our humane nature upon him that he might unite it to his divine one Visited us from on high to this end that he might redeem us was born only to dye for us cloathed with our flesh to be in a capacity to suffer in it and by his own suffering to advance us to glory in Heaven And next to that his transcendent Mercy of giving us Heaven is this That He prepares us for it That He is pleased to refine as well as to exalt us We may now
have found out a platform of Government among the fallen Angels who though their Principles be crooked yet being obey'd by Wills as crooked observe an irregular Rule and a perverse Order even in Hell so Sin rules in us too by Principles For there is saith St. Paul a Law of Sin But then 't is such a Law as if it should be Treason for any Subject not to Murther his Natural Prince or Adultery not to Ravish or Blasphemy not to take God's Name in vain 'T is such a Law as if two Anti-Tables should be written which should make it Sin not to break the Commandments Lastly Let the Apostle tell you what Law it is 'T is a Law of the Members warring against the Law of the Mind and not only warring but bringing it into Captivity Rom. 7. 23. Sin herein far exceeding the Author of it For he only aspir'd to be like the Highest but Sin hath made an inversion in the Soul advancing Sense into the Chair of Reason and placing the Beast above the Man And though it may leave us to a natural liberty in moral actions for 't is harsh to think that Justice and Temperance are but guilded Sins yet for actions of Grace it has so glewed and settered the Soul that it cannot possibly mount up to Heaven 2. Next for Death Men have made a Covenant with that saith the Scripture and if Contract be not enough we reade Wisd. 1. v. 14. of a Kingdom of Death so that Christ did not only find us Captives but Captives slain Teneo à primordio homicidam culpam says Tertullian Adam's Throat was our open Sepulchre who in that fatal Apple did not only murther his Children like Saturn but like Thyestes in the Tragedy did eat them After that Transgression there pass'd an Act upon us It is appointed for all Men once to dye Nay it were a degree of happiness to dye but once if nothing remained for punishment for nothing can suffer nothing But we were to be raised to another Death and like drowsie Malefactors that had lain down with their Sentence were to be awakened out of sleep to be put upon the Rack 3. The Scripture almost every-where styles the Devil the Prince of this World His Kingdom had enlarg'd its self from that place about which the Schools dispute to every rebellion and disorder of the Soul where as in a conquer'd Province per cupiditates regnavit saith St. Augustine He reigned by his Proconsul Sins There also making himself the Prince of Darkness by our ignorance and the Prince of the Air by raising Tempests through all the Regions of Man and exercising an universal and absolute Power over him For such was his power in the World when the Saviour of it came into it There was then a general defection from God Satan's Synagogue had in a manner swallowed up God's Church who had but one corner of the World left him and therein for a long time but a moving Tabernacle and when a fix'd habitation but one house wherein a very few to serve him while the Devil's Temples were every-where crowded with Priests and Sacrifices and his Altars smoak'd in all places with Incense so that the Earth and the fulness thereof seem'd now his and he though cast out of Heaven to have reveng'd himself in some sort of God by thus dispossessing him as it were of the Earth Nor was the Devil's power more Universal than 't was Absolute over men's Bodies and over their Souls too Their Bodies he possest and tormented at pleasure insomuch that his very Priests might have receiv'd Death with as much ease as they did his Oracles entring into Men as he did into the Hoggs hurrying them violently into perdition commanding Parents to make their Sons and Daughters pass through the fire to him tearing and bruising those he had got into and casting them sometimes into the water and sometimes into the fire Nor did he tyrannize less over Men's souls than bodies blinding their understanding putting out the light of natural reason in them first corrupting their Judgments and then their Manners from Error in judgment the passage being natural and easie to Error in practice and accordingly St. Paul tells us how vain men became in their imaginations even to worship the Creature instead of the Creator to change the glory of the uncorruptible God into Images made like to corruptible Men and to birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things which made God give them up to all manner of uncleanness as you may reade at large Rom. 1. 21 c. In such slavery had the Devil not only Heathens his own people as I may call them but even the Jews themselves God's chosen people who after so many Miracles of Power and Mercies so many excellent Statutes and Ordinances to direct them in the true manner of his Worship as had not been delivered to any Nation besides did not for all this fall short of the worst of Heathens either in matter of erroneous judgment or vitious practices The profane Sadducee had corrupted all good Manners and the hypocritical Pharisee perverted the Law by his false Glosses and Comments on it so that when our Saviour appeared on Earth an universal deluge of Wickedness had over-spread the face of it And thus all Mankind being the Devil 's by right of Conquest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken by him as it were in War the true import of that word and bound fast to him with his Chains of darkness of gross error and vitiousness 't was high time for the Son of God to come down to rescue miserable Men from these several Captivities which he did three manner of ways 1. By Commutation 2. By Conquest and 3. By way of Ransome or Purchase 1. By Commutation For when we were prisoners to Death by sin God made an exchange delivered his Son over to it for us became our Scape-goat like the Ram substituted in the place of Isaac and as the Apostle speaks tasted death for every man that we might not be devoured and swallowed up by it 2. By Conquest as it referrs to Power and thus our Lord offered violence to Hell snatcht us as brands out of its fire and rescued us as so many preys out of the teeth of the roaring Lion delivering us from the power of darkness and translating us into his kingdom vanquishing death and him that had the power of death the Devil and treading him under our feet And not content with that he spoiled principalities and powers making a shew or as the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports an example of them openly and triumph'd over them in himself or in his Cross. 3. By way of Purchase or Ransome as it referrs to Justice Thus Christ made a perfect satisfaction to God by laying down a price for us and paying the very utmost farthing of our debt and so came not only to give us an Example as Socinians
off that stain which his ignominious Sufferings had cast upon his Honour And hence Christ scarce mentions his Death but he still closeth with his rising again the third day Which was the reason of the Jews exquisite care to secure his Sepulchre that the last error as they call'd it might not be worse than the first That is lest the reputation of a glorious Resurrection should bely and confute all their former Calumnies and Reproaches as indeed it did For by this his Resurrection his Godhead was clearly manifested which else must needs have been obscur'd and call'd in question there being nothing so unsuitable to a God as to suffer especially to dye A little loss of Bloud we reade made Alexander the Great quit all his Pretensions to Godhead And St. Augustine tells us out of Varro That the Egyptians made it Capital to affirm that their God Apis was dead forbidding any mention of his Sepulchre Nay St. Peter v. 29. concludes David inferiour to Christ from his Death and Burial and Sepulchre still remaining For although Christ's Sepulchre did remain still to St. Peter's as it does yet to our times yet his Body did not abide in it as David's did and still does in his if we will take an Angel's word for it Come see the place where the Lord lay and again He is risen he is not here For had he remained there as David did in his Grave he had then seen corruption and so had been no God 2. This Truth was to be clear'd and confirm'd in regard of our advantage For had not Christ risen we should still have remain'd in our sins and been of all men most miserable by depriving our selves of the Goods of this life and having no expectation of those of a better Nay in a worse condition than the Beasts that perish who innocently following their natural appetites have nothing to check or restrain them All our Theological Vertues would be to no purpose too Our Faith our Hope our Charity vain the substance of St. Paul's whole discourse 1 Cor. 15. All our Moral Vertues also would be not only useless but troublesome Justice Temperance Fortitude and the like but so many insignificant Cyphers adding nothing to the summ of our Happiness but much to the abatement of it Si post mortem nihil ipsáque mors nihil For who would stick to devour others who should himself so quickly be made a prey to Death and be swallowed up of the Grave Who would deny himself the use of those Pleasures which should never return There would be no Hope for us if no Resurrection and no Resurrection for us to be sure if Christ had not risen Which consideration made the Apostles one main part of whose Office as I told you 't was to be Witnesses of his Resurrection to lay that still in all Churches as the first corner-stone in that spiritual Fabrick as 1 Cor. 15. 4. St. Paul does That Christ rose again according to the Scriptures calling this his Gospel 2 Tim. 2. 8. and placing it among his grand fundamentals Heb. 6. 2 3. as it is a principal Article of our Creed which St. Peter offers here to his Auditors as most necessary for them to know in order to their Conversion who would never have been persuaded to embrace a crucified Saviour a stumbling-block to Jews 1 Cor. 1. 23. and a rock of offence which was to be taken out of their way that they might come to Christ who being now represented to them in a more pompous and glorious shape of a triumphant Conqueror might in some sort be more suitable to those Idea's they had of a Messiah and so be more willing to become his Subjects Thus did these few words hath raised up take away that veil that had hitherto been over their eyes and made them see him they had pierced and readily own him for their Saviour who had so visibly been rescued from the Jaws of Death that the bare mentioning of the matter of fact whereof many of them had been eye-witnesses without any other argument was sufficient to change those late implacable Persecutors into Converts II. And here to stop the mouth of Carnal reason which might be apt to fancy a Resurrection impossible it was necessary for St. Peter in order to a full persuasion and assurance of Christ's being truly raised from the dead to let them know that this was done by a divine Power That God to whom nothing was impossible was the only Agent here He who could kill and make alive That 't was his Hand alone which brought this mighty thing to pass his own right hand that had purchased himself this victory over Death An Act beyond the activity of any created Being Whence it is that the Resurrection is in Scripture called the power of God Matth. 22. 19. and the glory of God Luk. 11. 40. and the glory of the Father Rom. 6. 4. Such power and such glory as he can no more give away to another than his Godhead And therefore the Lord is said to descend from Heaven to raise the dead 1 Thess. 4. 17. It being his own proper work that For although an Angel shall blow the trump at the last day yet the voice of the Son of God must be heard before the dead can live Angels may gather the Elect from the four corners of the Earth but God must enliven them An act so incommunicably his that the Devil cannot doe it He who is God's Ape in other things would fain be in this or at least be thought able to effect it to raise his credit among the Sons of perdition For that Samuel the Witch of Endor call'd up was but a counterfeit he was not the Prophet himself but Satan under his Mantle Nay all those Heathens who seem'd to have bid fair to such Miracles as Christ did as Apollonius Tyanoeus and Vespasian whom therefore Julian the Apostate opposes to our Saviour to lessen and decry him although they are said to have done many strange things yet doe I not find that ever they pretended to be able to raise the dead As Pharaoh's Magicians who could counterfeit most of Moses's Miracles could not with all their skill put life into one single insect Here they confess'd the finger of God and such is the Resurrection not only God s finger but his arme an equal act of Power in him to restore as to create which St. Paul going about to describe uses such an Exaggeration of lofty Expressions as no humane Eloquence can parallel Ephes. 1. 19. That we may know says he there what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe according to the work of the Might of his power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him up from the dead Where we may observe a sixfold Gradation Power and Might the Greatness and Might of his Power the exceeding Greatness of his Power and a working of the Might
turn'd Men into destruction to say Come again ye Children of Men. If the Disputer of this World the conceited Rationalist should deny a possibility of a return from a privation to a habit a re-production of the same thing once corrupted Let me ask him why that God who created our Bodies out of nothing cannot be able to recall them out of something For since even Philosophy its self will grant that in every dissolution the parts dissolved doe not perish the Materials still continuing All the Skill here will be but to join and reunite the scattered parcels Quasi non majoris miraculi sit animare quà m jungere Tertullian's reasoning here is very concluding and we cannot resist the argument Utique idoneus est reficere qui fecit quanto plus est fecisse quam refecisse initium dedisse quà m reddidisse Ita restitutionem carnis faciliorem credas institutione An Artificer can take a Watch or Clock asunder and put it together again and shall not the great Creator be able to doe as much here to re-unite what he has severed having still reserved the loose scattered pieces and fragments The separation of our Bodies and Souls by death as 't was violent so their desire of re-union being natural shall not be frustrated They are incompleat Substances in that state and long for their perfection which is their re-union for by that are the spirits of just Men departed made perfect and God will not leave them in an imperfect condition lest a power and inclination should for ever be in the root and never rise up to fruit This may suffice to silence though not to satisfie Natural reason especially if we consider that many Philosophers have had strong apprehensions of a Resurrection upon the dissolution of the World by fire a reduction of all things to a better state as Seneca terms it Nor was there any Article of the Faith more generally believed among the Jews than this as appears by Joh. 12. 24. and Act. 23. 8. The Patriarchs were certain of it witness their great care before their death to have their Bones carried away by the Children of Israel out of Egypt that they might be buried in Abraham's Field out of a hope no doubt of being the first that by vertue of Christ's Resurrection might rise from the dead as 't is very probable they were of the Number of those many Saints which arose and came out of their Graves after his Resurrection and went into the holy City and appeared unto many Matth. 27. 53. But then to the Faith of a Christian nothing is so easie as a Resurrection since God's Word clearly tells us That Christ is our Resurrection and our Life Joh. 11. 25. and that our life which is now hid with him in God shall one day be revealed Colos. 3. 3. That God is not the God of the dead but of the living Matth. 22. 32. Nay the Lord of dead and living Rom. 14. 9. For that he will one day raise them up to life again For the dead Bodies of Saints while they lye rotting in the Grave being still united to Christ as his Body there was to the Deity cannot be for ever separate from him the Members must at last be joined to their Head If the first-fruits be risen the whole lump shall follow Not one hair of our head shall perish He that numbers the sand of the Sea numbers our dust nor can the least Attom escape him All our members are written in God's book He that puts our tears into his bottle locks up the pretious dust of his Saints in his Cabinet can recall our dispers'd Ashes and require our Bloud of every Beast that has drunk it fetch those several parcels of us which have been buried in a thousand living Graves and been made a part of those Graves which have devoured them God can make the Earth cast out her dead cause the Sea to disgorge them and our dry bones to gather together as in Ezekiel's Vision ch 37. He that calleth all the Stars by their names knows his by name for their names are written in Heaven and will call them by their names as he did Lazarus bid them come forth and by bidding enable them to doe so in spight of all their bands Now that we may be of the number and partake of the lot of these happy ones we must hear Christ's voice here calling us to repentance and newness of life that we may hear that with comfort which shall hereafter call us to Judgment and be able to answer it with joy and confidence Here we are Let us be sure of our part in the first Resurrection that the second death may have no power over us All shall one day be raised All must one day appear before the Judgment-seat of Christ good and bad But there is a Resurrection of damnation for these and for those of life Both shall come out of their Dungeons but the one like Pharaoh's Baker to an Execution the other like his Butler to an Exaltation The former shall have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the latter only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sinners shall arise but the godly be quickned How happy would it be for wicked Men if they should never have been born or should never rise again since they shall rise no otherwise than as drowsie Malefactors who lying down with their Sentence are afterwards awakened to be set on the Rack But 't is not so with the Godly who sleeping in Christ doe rest in hope I would not have you ignorant Brethren concerning them which are asleep says St. Paul that ye sorrow not even as other which have no hope For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him What doest thou fear then O good Christian Sin Behold the Resurrection of thy Redeemer publishes thy discharge Thy Surety has been arrested and cast into the prison of his Grave for thee Had not the utmost farthing of thine Arrearages been paid he could not have come forth But now that thou seest he is come forth now that the summ is fully satisfied what danger can there be of a discharged debt Or is it the Wrath of God thou dreadest Wherefore is that but for Sin And if thy Sin be defrayed that quarrel is at an end And if thy Saviour suffered it for thee how canst thou fear to suffer it in thy self Surely that infinite Justice hates to be twice paid He is risen and therefore he hath satisfied Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again Rom. 8. 34. Lastly Is it Death that affrights thee Behold thy Saviour overcoming Death by dying and triumphing over it in his Resurrection And canst thou fear a conquered Enemy What harm is there in this Serpent but for his sting The sting of death is sin And when thou seest
humanity they must needs have been highly concern'd to hear that He was to leave them Happy sure not only the Womb that bare and the Paps that gave him suck but the Ears which heard the Eyes which saw the Feet which followed and the Hands which ministred unto Him Abraham rejoyced to see the Lord's day though at a great distance and St. Augustine could not propose a greater satisfaction to himself next to the Beatifical Vision than to have seen Christ in the flesh But these Disciples had not only the happiness to see Him but withall to be of his train to be instructed by his Divine Lessons comforted by his Christian Promises animated and encouraged by his Example and fortify'd by his Aid and Assistance Upon all which accounts our Lord Himself pronounceth them Blessed above those Prophets and Righteous Men who wanted such advantages Mat. 13. 16 17. Blessed then they were in this as well as other respects and therefore by how much the enjoyment of Christ's presence was beneficial unto them by so much the more was the very apprehension of losing Him harsh and unpleasing For although our Lord's Ascension-day which was the day of his leaving the Earth was to Him a day of Glory yet to the Disciples it could not be but a day of Sorrow It was his going to the Father indeed but it was a going from them And how could it be but that these Children of the Bridegroom should mourn when the Bridegroom was to be taken from them This sole Consideration was enough to beget sorrow in them but there were other Circumstances which help'd to fill up the measure of it and the chiefest this That He was to forsake them in their greatest needs For troubles were now hard at hand persecutions were suddenly to arise a storm was coming and all lookt black they were to be put out of the Synagogues nay the time was now coming That whosoever should kill them should think that he did God good service v. 2. So that to lose a friend such a friend and at such a time was a very uncomfortable prospect and there was but too much reason that their hearts should be filled with sorrow Nor does our Lord altogether blame it 'T was not his business to root out those affections which Nature had given Men but to moderate them He that took our infirmities was not severe to those of his disciples It was indeed a mistake in them to think that their Lord's departure would be disadvantageous to them but a mistake of carnal Love to his Person that was so dear to them which he minds them of and rectifies Quam incertoe providentioe nostroe How short-sighted are the best of us even in those things which most nearly concern us How apt are we to fancy a loss in our greatest benefit How earnestly bent many times on that which would be inconvenient if not mischievous to us And how ill a Judge is flesh and bloud of what tends to God s glory and Man's good St. Peter had no sooner been allarm'd with the news of Christ's Passion but he presently suggests Be it far from thee O Lord Matth. 16. 21 22. And while He and the rest of the Disciples here were possessed with Carnal thoughts how ill did they relish Spiritual things Nothing so much barrs up Men's minds against God's truths as worldly prejudice While they thought Christ was to reign on Earth they could not so much as dream of Heaven Upon the strength of this fancy so deeply rooted in them they give all for lost if they lose their Master It was high time then for him to shew them their error to let them know That that supposed loss would be their gain and the cause of his absence if well understood would raise a joy in them above their present sorrow since his going away for a time was only to prepare a place for them to all Eternity where He and they should one day so meet as never more to be parted In the mean while He assures them That he would not leave them comfortless but after his departure send one from Heaven who should more than supply the defect of his Presence on Earth even the Comforter Himself who yet could not come till He were gone A truth which though never so ungratefull yet being profitable they must hear and that from the mouth of Truth it self Nevertheless I tell you c. In the handling of which words I shall briefly and plainly discourse of these following Heads Shew you 1. Who the Person promised here is and how described 2. Who was to send him 3. When not till Christ was gone away 4. How expedient it was that the Holy Ghost should come and that not only to the Apostles but to all faithfull Believers by representing to you the infinite Benefits we and all the Faithfull do reap by his coming Of these in their order and 1. Of the Person promised here and his Office It cannot be deny'd but that the knowledge of the Third Person in the Ever-blessed Trinity was a Mystery lockt up for many Ages Holy Men of old spake indeed as they were moved by the Holy Ghost but 't is to be question'd whether they were well acquainted with Him they spake by They were his Organs and Instruments but at that time perhaps little sensible of that divine Breath that did inspire them He was scarce at all known before under the legal Dispensations those passages of Scripture being dark and obscure which point at him and Men not ripe then for so high a Revelation Which is so true that till the Holy Ghost came down upon the Apostles and appeared in cloven tongues as of fire on their heads the knowledge of him was very imperfect It being reported of some who had been baptized into John's baptism Act. 19. that they had not so much as heard whether there were any Holy Ghost not that they had never heard any thing at all of his Being having been baptized by John who had seen him descend upon Christ at his baptism in the visible shape of a Dove Mat. 3. Joh. 1. but that they had not yet been so throughly acquainted with his Gifts and Graces as afterwards they were Our Blessed Lord then was the first who clearly revealed him in his Gospel especially in that of our Evangelist As Joh. 14. 26. he promiseth Him to his Disciples to be their Instructer But the Comforter which is the Holy Ghost whom the Father will send in my name He shall teach you all things He repeats it again chap. 15. 26. When the Comforter is come whom I will send unto you from the Father even the Spirit of Truth which proceedeth from the Father He shall testifie of me And so here in the Text where there is such a manifest discovery both of his Person and Godhead that none but an Arrian or a Macedonian none but He that resists can doubt of his Existence Taking
therefore this truth for granted I shall only speak to his Office described here by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies two things 1. A Comforter 2. An Advocate 1. A Comforter and such He was to be 1. To the Apostles themselves 2. To the whole Church 3. To each faithfull Believer 1. To the Apostles themselves It was indeed a seasonable time to talk to them of a Comforter when sorrow and distress were coming upon them and they were to be as sheep without a shepherd They had left all for Christ but while he was with them they found all in Him who was dearer to them than all their possessions While He lived with them their joy and satisfaction was full and compleat but a joy that was to last no longer than his Corporal presence which the Holy Spirit was to supply and that abundantly For although they could no longer have recourse to their Lord for Resolution of Doubts or Protection from Dangers yet should they not want an Oracle to clear the one nor a Sanctuary to secure them from the other The Holy Ghost should both enlighten their Understandings and dispell their Fears Being endewed with power from on high Afflictions themselves should prove Consolations unto them and they should find more satisfaction in their very Sufferings than worldly Men in their highest Enjoyments as we find they did Act. 5. 41. when departing from the presence of the Counsel they rejoyced and that with joy unspeakable that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Christ's Name But then 2. The Holy Ghost was to be a Comforter not only to the Apostles but to the whole Church of God The Father under the ancient legal Dispensation was a severe Law-giver rewarding Obedience and strictly punishing Rebellion He appeared terrible on Mount Sinai Nothing was to be seen there but Fire and Smoak and thick Darkness Nothing to be heard but Thunder and the Trump of an Angel insomuch that Moses himself trembled and quaked Such an Appearance suiting well with the Promulgation of the Law as denouncing nothing but Woes and Curses to Offenders But under the Gospel-Oeconomy there was another face of things The Son of God while in the Flesh had no such marks of terror and severity attending him more proper to a Creator than a Redeemer He came not with a Rod but in the Spirit of Meekness His condition was a condition of Humility agreeable to one whose Kingdom was not of this World and suitable to his appearance in the Flesh was that of the Holy Ghost whose descent was indeed in Fire but to warm and cherish not to consume In a mighty rushing Wind to represent his divine Power and Efficacy not his Impetuosity 'T was not such a Wind as God came to Elijah in which rent the Mountains and brake the Rocks in pieces The motions of the Holy Spirit are not violent He does not affright those He lights on nor create Fear but Love in that Heart he fills 'T is He that makes us cry Abba Father That begets in us a holy generous Confidence and speaks peace to his People The cords he brings with Him are those of a Man such as chain and captivate Hearts The Oeconomy of the Divine Spirit was to be an Oeconomy of Sweetness and Consolation to the Church becoming the Gospel of Peace and the God of all Consolation 3. The Holy Ghost was to be a Comforter to all true Believers not only as begetting Faith in their Hearts and dispelling that Darkness which naturally possesseth their Understandings but as giving them Peace of Conscience and that unspeakable joy which the World is unacquainted with and cannot take from them Hence He is said to seal them unto the day of their Redemption Ephes. 4. 30. To be the Earnest of their heavenly Inheritance and to make them fore-tast the joys of Heaven here on Earth What comfort what ravishing joys does he still raise in the Souls of all the Faithfull by the apprehension and sense he gives them of the Love of God and that certain hope they have by him of enjoying Him in Heaven Grace is the Paradise of the Soul Holiness its Crown and the assurance it has of God's Love to it the choicest flower of that Crown Nor is he thus only a Comforter to each true Believer but he is so too as his Teacher and another-guess Teacher than Men are to one another For let their Methods of Teaching be never so perspicuous and their care and pains to inform us never so great yet when all is done they cannot communicate unto us either clearness of Apprehension faithfulness of Memory or soundness of Judgment and where they find us dull or stupid all their pains and skill are but thrown away upon us But the Holy Ghost does so teach as withall to change the natural temper and disposition of men's Minds working so upon their Understandings by the clearness and evidence of those Reasons he proposeth that they are not able to resist or stand out against the force of his Demonstrations drawing them to Him in so sweet and yet effectual a manner that although sensible of the effect yet the way of his Attraction is as imperceptible to them as the power thereof is uncontroulable The Manner of the Holy Spirit 's operation on Believers now is very different from that on the Prophets of old which was so forcible that Elisha could not Prophecy without the help of Musick to compose and tune his Spirit But under the Gospel-Dispensation the Holy Ghost deals otherwise with his Servants No such Enthusiasms or Transports here Their Understandings are enlightned without any disturbance to their Bodies They receive the Holy Ghost's Inspirations without the least astonishment or discomposure while he gently glides and descends into them like rain into a fleece of wool in the Prophet David's expression Psal. 72. 6. And thus the Holy Ghost is a Comforter But then 2dly He is withall an Advocate The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly signifies so much one that maintains the Cause of a Criminal or at least of an Accused Person Now the Spirit does so by justifying our Persons and pleading our Causes against the Accusations of our Spiritual Enemies 1. Against the Severity of God's Law and that most righteous undeniable Charge of Sin laid thereby upon us 2dly Against the Devil who we know is styled the Accuser of the Brethren and doth not only load our Sins upon our Consciences but farther endeavoureth to exclude us from the benefit of Christ by charging us with Impenitency and Unbelief Here the Spirit enableth us to clear our selves against this Father of lyes to secure our Title to Heaven against the Sophistical Exceptions of this our subtle Adversary and when by Temptations our Eye is dimmed or by the mixture of Corruptions our Evidences defaced he by his Skill helpeth our infirmities and bringeth those things which are blotted out and forgotten into our
remembrance again Joh. 14. 26. He admonisheth and directeth us his Clients how to order and solicit our own business what Evidences to produce how to manage and plead them making up our failings by his Wisdom and not only so but as the word Paraclete here imports he intercedeth also with God for us not in such a manner as Christ is said to doe whom St. John also calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Advocate with the Father 1 Joh. 2. 1. For as much as that Bloud which He shed for us on the Cross speaks for us better things than that of Abel and continually pleads our Pardon before the Tribunal of God but the Holy Ghost is said to make intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered because he stirreth us up to Prayer prompting and teaching us also how to pray as we ought to doe in all our Necessities So that as Christ is the first Advocate by working our Reconciliation with God so is the Spirit our other or second one by testifying and applying the same unto our Souls 2dly He is our Advocate not only in respect of God but of Men too by maintaining our Cause against the World against Tyrants and Persecutors 1. Against the World as oft as it accuseth us by false and slanderous Calumniators laying to our charge things we never did The Spirit in this case maketh us not only plead our Innocency but rejoyce in the Reproaches of Christ count our selves happy in this that it is not such low marks as we are which the malice of the World aimeth at but the Spirit of glory and of God which resteth upon us who is on their part evil spoken of 1 Pet. 4. 14. 2dly Against Tyrants and Persecutors Whence it is that our Saviour Mat. 10. 19. bids his Disciples not be concern'd what they should speak when they should be delivered up to Men because it should be given them in that same hour what they should speak And he adds vers 20. It is not ye that speak but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you And we know how that God in all Ages did by the mouths of Infants maintain his Truths to the shame and confusion of Tyrants who endeavour'd to suppress them But here it may be objected Was not the Holy Ghost given to the Jewish Church before the coming of Christ Did He not comfort and support them under a long and tedious expectation of his appearance Was He not then a Teacher of the Faithfull and when that Cloud of Witnesses suffered for the Cause of the God of Jacob when they were sawn in pieces and stoned was not the Holy Ghost their Advocate as well as the Martyrs under the Gospel Did He not speak by the Mouth of Daniel when cast to the Lions and of the three Children who chanted out the Praises of God in the midst of the flames of the firey furnace How then does our Lord say here If I go not away the Comforter will not come to you since so many Ages before He was come and as a Comforter too For Resolution hereof we are to observe That although the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity be equally the Principles of all those Acts they produce without according to the received Maxim of the Schools yet with a considerable difference in relation to those three distinct Oeconomies or Dispensations towards the Church That of the Father lasted till the Coming of Christ in the Flesh yet so as that in that space of time 't is generally believed that the Son of God did sometimes appear as to Abraham Jacob and Joshua being a kind of Essay or Prelude to his Incarnation and the Holy Ghost did then also impart some degree of Efficacy to the Faithfull However This is properly to be reckoned the Oeconomy of the Father The second was That of the Son from his Incarnation to his Ascension yet so as that the Father made his voice to be heard at Jordan and Mount Tabor This is my beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased hear ye Him As at another time in the Audience of the People Joh. 12. 28. I have both glorified it and will glorifie it again Then also did the Holy Ghost appear in the form of a Dove yet still this is to be accounted the Oeconomy of the Son That of the Holy Spirit commenced from his Descent upon the Apostles and shall last unto the end of all things Differing herein from the other two That in the two first Dispensations Men's senses were usually affected with some extraordinary miraculous and sensible Objects God the Father shewing himself in a Cloud and Pillar of Fire giving out his Oracles from between the Cherubins consuming the burnt-offerings with Fire from Heaven and filling the Sanctuary with his Glory And the Son of God conversing so familiarly with Men that it made St. John say That which was from the beginning which we have heard which we have seen with our eyes which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the word of life declare we unto you Whereas I say All was as it were visible and palpable here 'T was far otherwise in the Dispensation of the Spirit The Heavens were not seen to part nor was God's terrible Voice heard in the Air no Shechinah no Glory or sensible Mark of the Presence of the living God in his Temple For which reason the third Person in the Trinity has the Special Name of Spirit given Him For as He is styled Holy in respect of that Sanctification he worketh in us though that same Title belongs also to the other two Persons as having the same Spiritual Essence yet the Holy Ghost bears the name of Spirit in regard of his altogether Spiritual Dispensation and those Graces he imparts to each faithfull Soul which are Heavenly and Spiritual such as are the Knowledge of the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven and his inward Vertues and Consolations As for Knowledge it was so weak and imperfect under the Ancient Oeconomy that in respect of that our Lord preferrs the least in the Kingdom of Heaven i. e. the meanest Christian to all the Prophets not excepting the Baptist himself Nor can it be deny'd but that the very first Principles and Rudiments of Christianity do far surpass the highest Attainments of the Law The Jews were under a Cloud and the Doctrine of the Prophets was but as a light shining in a dark place All was then Shadow or rather Night and Moses his Veil was over the Eyes of the whole Nation God made himself known to the Jews as the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob not as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ of whom They had a very wrong Notion looking upon him as the Conqueror of the World such was the very Apostle's fancy of him and that even after his Resurrection Act. 1. The ineffable Mystery of the Trinity that of Godliness which without controversie is great God manifested
It was the design of his Spirit to imprint his Image in their Hearts which consisted in true holiness and righteousness But how could that Image be imprinted on them till they were first adopted his Children Or how could they be owned for his Children but in and through Christ his only begotten and beloved Son That Peace which his Holy Spirit brings into and settles in our Consciences is founded in that other which our Mediator hath procured and merited for us by his Death and Sufferings nor could our Minds ever have been calmed had not the Lamb of God taken away the sins of the World Our Peace was to be prepared by the Father ere it could be purchased by the Son and purchased by the Son ere it could have been applied by the Spirit The Gift of the Comforter was an effect of Christ's Intercession I will pray the Father and He shall send you another Comforter And it was requisite that He should go away to send that Comforter since he was the Effect of his Intercession and that Intercession the last Act of his Sacrifice in the Heavenly Sanctuary But then 2dly it was not fit that Christ should bestow his best and most excellent Gifts on us till he had recovered his first Majesty or that the Members should be thus adorned till the Head was perfectly glorious 'T is at the time of their Coronation and Triumph that Kings and Emperors scatter their Largesses When our Lord had ascended up on high and had led Captivity captive then was it a proper time for him to give gifts unto men and among the rest of his Gifts the Fountain and Giver of all Gifts and Graces the Holy Spirit it self This St. Peter tells his Auditors Act. 2. 33. That Christ being by the right hand of God exalted and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost he hath shed forth this which ye now see and hear Christ was first to rise from the dead and to be glorified before he could send down the Spirit And this we learn from Joh. 7. 39. where 't is said That the Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified nor could he be fully glorify'd without the descent and testimony of the Spirit For 1. It had been some impeachment to Christ's equality with the Father had our Lord still remained on Earth for as much as the sending of the Spirit would have been ascribed to the Father alone as his sole Act. This would have been the most That the Father for his sake had sent Him but He as God had had no honour of sending Him 2. Nor indeed till he ascended up to Heaven could he have been fully glorified on Earth his appearance here having been very mean void of all pomp and state nothing about Him to strike men's Senses nothing of worldly grandeur to affect them who conversed with him neither wealth nor honour exposed he was to want and other inconveniencies of life and put at last to a cruel and an ignominious Death What strong prejudices had both Jews and Gentiles against Him upon this account And how could those prejudices be removed so long as he continued in that low state and condition But they were now quite taken away by the descent of the Holy Ghost which he had so often promised to send after his departure and which when they saw he made good their mean opinion of him was soon changed into veneration when they saw him who was made a little lower than the Angels nay who had appeared on Earth lower than the lowest of Men for the suffering of death crowned with such glory and honour And how can we but adore Him as God when we now behold Him that once stood before Herod and Pilate as a criminal exalted above all the Kings and Potentates of the Earth whose pride and glory now it is to be his Disciples to doe him homage and to lay down their Crowns and Scepters at the foot of his Cross We now see Temples every-where erected to his honour The most remote obscure Regions of the World enlightned by his beams That Jesus once so much despised become now the glory of the Earth His Name dreadfull to Devils adored by Turks and Infidels so that his Kingdom knows no bounds as it shall never have an end Had he still remained here below he had been lookt upon as no better than what the Arrians once styled Him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But now his Godhead is as visible to each Christian as his Manhood heretofore was to each Man the Spirit of God whom He sent down having born witness to Him in all those wonderfull Signs and Miracles that were wrought by his Apostles through his Name And thus we see how that Christ could not have been glorify'd on Earth as God had he not ascended up into Heaven and from thence sent down the Holy Ghost Nor 3. could the Holy Ghost himself otherwise have been discovered Christ's stay here would have been a lett to the manifestation of his Godhead also which appearing in those many great signs and wonders done by Him had not our Lord gone away those glorious Works would in all probability have been wholly ascribed unto him and so the Holy Ghost should have lost that honour which was due to him while his Deity should have been concealed from the notice of the World 4. A fourth reason of the necessity of Christ's departure respects his Apostles and all other his Disciples 1. His Apostles who we know were to be sent abroad into all Coasts to be dispersed over the whole Earth to preach the Gospel and not to stay in one place Now Christ's corporal Presence could herein have availed them little in order to this purpose He could not have been with St. James at Jerusalem and St. John at Ephesus whatever Ubiquitaries Papists or Lutherans say to the contrary in flat contradiction to all Philosophy and Scripture too which allows not this priviledge to Christ's Body now glorified Whom the Heavens must receive saith St. Peter untill the times of Restitution of all things Act. 3. 21. There He must be till He comes to fetch us to Him and when He promised his Apostles to be with them always even to the end of the World Mat. 28. 20. He meant no otherwise than by his Holy Spirit who should comfort and guide them into all Truth And therefore it was expedient for them as our Lord says here in the Text that himself should go away to make room for the Spirit as fitter for his Disciples in their dispersed disconsolate condition since He could be and was present with them all and with every one of them by himself as filling the compass of the whole World which cannot be affirmed of our Lord 's bodily Presence 2. Besides had this manner of Christ's Presence been possible without confounding the Properties of his humane and divine Nature it had been very
some Protestant Divines on the affirmative And were this the worst opinion of the Romanists we should not quarrel much with them since some passages of Scripture seem to favour it Whether this be so or no I shall not here undertake to determine nor indeed need I. For to what purpose were it to prove that every Man has a peculiar Angel assign'd him when we are here and elsewhere so clearly told that all of them do serve every one of us while we serve and obey God He hath given his Angels charge over thee says the Psalmist in the fore-cited Psal. 91. 10. i. e. many Angels over one particular Man And as we find more than one appointed to carry Lizarus's Soul into Heaven Luk. 16. 22. so sometimes we reade of one Angel attending many Men as in the case of Israel in the expulsion of the Canaanites and Amorites Gen. 24. 7. and at other times of many Angels attending one Man as in that of Jacob Gen. 32. 1 2. and of Elisha 2 King 6. 17. 'T is not for us to limit the Almighty nor to retrench that guard He has assign'd us While we have an heavenly Host about us why should we content our selves with one single Assistant And when we are certain of their protection why should we dispute their Number And as it may seem some scanting of the bountifull provision of the Almighty who is pleas'd to express his gracious respects to one Man in the allotment of many Guardians so a Platonick piece of Divinity in the School-men to reduce them to one single one for each individual person But to let this pass as an innocent though perhaps erroneous Opinion their conceit of an exterior and interior Mission whereby some are said to illuminate others and fit them for their several Charges but never to stir abroad themselves may justly in St. Paul's expression be styl'd an intruding into things which they have not seen nor can see and is indeed no better than a flat contradiction to the Text which tells us That All none excepted are Ministring spirits to serve the necessity of God's Elect ones These blessed Spirits know no such state as to think it a disparagement to wait on the meanest Saint When God sends them the best of them go be the errant never so slender They measure not their Obedience by the lowness of their employment but the Will of him that employs them thinking no message beneath their Dignity which God is pleas'd to put them upon The highest Angel does not esteem himself too good to obey his Commands in the lowest instances of Obedience And since the Son of God came down on Earth to minister to Men no Arch-angel will deem it an abasement unbefitting him to serve them The measures of humane Grandeur are not to be apply'd to that of Heaven where every abasement if there can be any such thing in doing God's Will is Exaltation Let us then imitate them in their humble submissions to their Maker but then let our Prudence be as Angelical as our Humility if that teaches us to go when God sends us this should teach us also not to stir or act till he sends us which leads me from their Office to their Commission They are sent The very name Angel signifies a Messenger and consequently implies a subordination and dependence on some superior Being that employs him 'T is a name of Office not of Nature This belongs to him as he is a Spirit That as he is an Agent God is the supreme cause and disposer of all things Angels but his instruments They act not but by his Commission nor do they run till he sends them The Heavenly Host do nothing without Orders from their General and like the Centurion's Souldiers in the Gospel go and come when he bids them He gives his Angels charge says the Psalmist and as his Ministers they doe his pleasure not their own ours much less They are not our Familiars And though their Help be more powerfull yet is it not more absolute than that of other means since it dependeth still on the Will of God too and what-ever Message they deliver or Commands they execute 't is that Will still that gives them Motion and Authority And therefore when St. Stephen says the Law was received by the disposition of Angels we must not fancy them to be Authors of it but only the Heralds 'T was Christ that gave these did but publish it The Law was ordained by Angels but still in the hand of a Mediator Gal. 3. 19. The Ministry was indeed of Angels but the Authority of Christ. And therefore Junius renders those words Act. 7. 53. You have received the Law in the midst of the ranks of Angels i. e. among them attending God when he delivered it Thither then they came only to assist at the Ceremony not as Law-givers but Attendants That being a Title peculiar to the one great Law-giver who gives Laws as well to Angels as to Men. These they constantly observe and if we doe so they shall be Ministring spirits to us for their Employment lasts still and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Particle of the Present tense implies it Thus as they are God's Ministers they shall still be ours too if we be God's Servants and consequently heirs of Salvation The last Particular Who shall be heirs of Salvation i. e. To those that shall one day possess what they now doe certainly expect and wait for They who are already in Heaven need not the assistance of Angels being themselves though not Angels yet like them and equally happy in the fruition of the same God Their Ministry is necessary to bring us thither but ceases when we are there They are our Guides here There they shall be our Companions Nor are their Services design'd but for those whom God has chosen out of the rest of lost Mankind to fill up the void places of Apostate Spirits For as Christ himself is by our Apostle styl'd the Saviour of all Men but in an especial manner of those that believe So may Angels be said to be in some sort Ministring spirits to Mankind but with a reserve to those who are God's chosen Vessels Those may possibly have their common protection but their particular attendance is on these For as the Almighty makes his Sun to shine as well upon the just as the unjust and sometimes more gloriously on the latter than the former so is it in the Ministry of Angels from which even wicked Men may reap a general benefit in some instances more perhaps of an external help and assistance than the good while the best of their Offices are reserved for the best We know that whosoever stept down first into the Pool of Siloam was cured whether good or bad and the Angels brought down Manna in the Wilderness to the rebellious as well as to the obedient Israelites These are favours
who as He is the Fountain of the Deity and of all operations in the Divine Nature so of all our gifts and graces too Every good and every perfect gift whether of Nature Grace or Glory coming down to us from the Father of lights Jam. 1. 17. especially the Inheritance in light which is so peculiarly his gift that our Saviour appropriates it to Him telling his Apostles Mat. 20. 23. That it is not his to give but the Father's Hence that Blessing of St. Paul Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ Ephes. 1. 3. directing his Thanks to Him as the Original of all our Blessings whether Temporal or Spiritual Now of these two sorts the latter being far the greatest our Thanks for them ought to be so too We are to thank God then 1. That He hath made us partakers and 2. meet partakers of the Inheritance in light First I say That He hath made us partakers of so glorious an Inheritance as that in light it being nothing less than his very self who is Essential light and who dwelleth in that light which no Man can approach unto 1 Tim. 6. 16. A rich and a glorious Inheritance indeed fit for the Majesty and Mercy of an Almighty God to bestow the unvaluable Bloud of his Son to purchase and the dearly beloved of his Soul to enjoy How thankfull ought we then to be for being made partakers of such an Inheritance as is as far above those here below as Heaven is above the Earth or God above All things But this is not All. We are in the second place to thank God the Father for making us meet partakers thereof which is a greater Blessing than we are aware of We would fain have the Inheritance at any rate but we consider not whether we be fit for it or no and if we be not Heaven it self will be no place of Happiness to us nor shall we take pleasure therein For Pleasure being nothing else but the suitableness of the Object to the Faculty because things agreeable alone can agree together then what satisfaction should we find in Heaven while our selves were altogether Earthly Light is a pleasant thing to an Eye prepared for and that can bear it not to that of a Bat or of an Owl nor to that of a Man that should suddenly be brought into it out of a dark Dungeon it would rather blind his Eyes than delight them And what would the Inheritance in light be to a Child of Darkness but as the pleasure of a rational Man is to a Beast or of an Intelligence to a bruitish Man He who is wholly taken up with Sensual Objects and so unacquainted with Intellectual rests there and seeks no farther Tell a Mahumetan of such a Heaven as the Gospel describes and you may then make him fall in love with that place when you can persuade a Hog to leave his Stye for a Palace or that to lye in perfumes were better for him than to wallow in the mire What a Transcendent blessing then is it and how thankfull ought we to be to God for it that He makes us meet for the Inheritance above in order to our better partaking of it that He gives us his Grace here as a preparative to Glory hereafter makes us Holy in this life that we may be capable of being Happy in the next his Goodness being not more conspicuous in the reward He designs us than in the manner of bestowing it in giving us a Crown of Glory than in fitting our Heads for it 'T is a greater honour to be accounted worthy of it than to wear it As Vertue is beyond a Title and a Man more than a Place And now since our lot is fallen unto us in so fair a ground and that we have so goodly a Heritage let us highly value it make it our chief Treasure that our Hearts may still be there where we have such a glorious Inheritance laid up for us and such an indefeisible Estate as shall never be either in another's power to defeat us of or in our own to lose when once possest of How do we value our Earthly Inheritances How dear are they to us How loth are we to part with them The Lord forbid it me that I should give the Inheritance of my Fathers unto thee said Naboth to Ahab when he would have wrested it from him 1 King 21. 3. And yet this being but an Earthly Inheritance whereas ours is an Heavenly He chose rather to part with his Life than with the Inheritance of his Fathers and we are willing to part with the Inheritance of the Saints in light for nothing to sell our spiritual Birthright with profane Esau for a mess of Pottage while every trifling Argument shall make us disbelieve and every trifling Lust make us forfeit it Is the price of Christ's bloud the purchase he has made for us of an Eternal Inheritance become so cheap unto us in comparison of those uncertain perishing ones which the malice of Men can and death in a very short time will be sure to strip us of so subject to alteration and decay so polluted and defiled The Inheritance of the Saints in light is by St. Peter described by three such properties so peculiar to it that they are not to be found in worldly ones He tells us 1 Pet. 1. 4. That 't is an Inheritance incorruptible undefiled and that fadeth not away Now 1. Worldly Inheritances even Kingdoms are Transitory whereas that of Heaven cannot be moved Heb. 12. 28. Estates here shift their Landlords what is one Man 's to day is another's to morrow nay all the evidence Men have of their Estates here shall one day be burnt with the World and be made void at the Day of Judgment And yet how do they call their Lands after their own names when those names and those very lands that are called after them shall perish together when they who are Owners of them shall one day become part of their own lands retain nothing of all their Possessions but Graves and in a short time scarce be distinguished from that Earth wherein they were buried 2. Again Should Inheritances here be continued to their Owners never so long yet are they fading still losing their beauty verdure and lustre there is some moth or canker that continually frets and at last eats them up But in Heaven as we shall have an Incorruptible so an Immarcessible Crown Not like Olympick ones of Bays or Herbs which immediately withered even on the heads of those that wore them but always fresh and green 3. Lastly Worldly Inheritances are so far from being undefiled that their Owners may well blush when they consider how many times they come by them with how much sin Themselves enjoy and Others to whom they must leave shall spend them Yet as pitifull things as they are how thankfull
not any Excellency they had in their own Nature being not good but only in respect of what was worse It being better to sacrifice to God than to Devils nor otherwise than as Types of the Lamb slain from the Foundation of the World and did therefore vanish as soon as He was once offered upon the Cross Whereas true Religion remains still a Juge Sacrificium and is more lasting than the Heavens themselves which as it was long in the World before any Command came forth for Sacrifice So is it now most glorious when Jewish Altars are down 'T is not confin'd to time or place nor ever to be dispenc'd with as we find legal Sacrifices oft-times were And as 't is in the sight of God the best of all Sacrifices who requires Mercy and not bruitish Oblations so is it a most Reasonable Service being not founded in mera voluntate imponentis but in the Reason of the thing it self the Sacrifice not of a Brute Beast but of a man endued with Reason and withal most suitable to the Nature of God who as He is a Spirit will be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth and as He is a most wise God will not away with the Sacrifice of Fools Eccles. 5. 1. But will have the Evangelical as well as the Legal Sacrifices salted with salt our words and actions seasoned with discretion For we are fed with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well as with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well with the Rational as with the sincere milk of the Gospel so far is Christian Religion from divesting men of their reason that it strictly requires them to be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh them a reason of the hope that is in them 1 Pet. 3. 15. Being in it it self as 't is easie to demonstrate of all other the most Reasonale service and to present God with any other worship were but to offer strange Fire before him And now let me bespeak you in like manner as Naaman's Servants did their Master 2 Kings 5. 13. If the Lord had bid us do some great thing should we not do it Might he not require of us as of the Jews whole Herds of Cattle and Woods of Spices and Incense Nay which is more the Sacrifice of our Bodies in the most strict and severe Sense He might surely as being Lord of all but here we see He does not No other Bloud now to be shed but what St. Bernard calls sanguinem animi vulnerati that of a wounded troubled Spirit of a broken and contrite heart Slay thy lust and thou shalt offer him a Beast give him thy Reason or which is perhaps dearer to thee Thy Will and thou shalt sacrifice a Man to him He will accept thy Tears for drink-offerings and prefer thy very Fasts to meat-offerings Thou needest not appear before thy God empty while thou presentest thy self to him every part of thy Body and every faculty of thy Soul nay every thing thou possessest and which many times thou accountest more pretious than that very Soul of thine may be a Sacrifice and a far more acceptable one too than all the Beasts of the Forrest Give the Lord thy Heart and that will be the Fat of thy Sacrifice As thy Charity the true fire of it without which the Incense of thy Prayers and of thy Devotions will not smoak nor ever ascend up to Heaven nay without which Martyrdom it self will prove a vain and insignificant oblation and though thou shouldst give thy Body to be burnt yet thou shouldst be nothing In a word give thy God thy self and in such a manner as He requires thee to do it and thou canst give him no more and yet when all this is done no more than what he first gave thee Thus shalt thou make him Thine and be infinitely more thy self by being His. 'T is like laying up Treasure in the Temple which thereby becomes more sacred and more assured too But then in the last place let us remember that what we have once solemnly dedicated to God cannot without Sacriledge be alienated Our Bodies being once his they are no more then our own For to whom we yield our selves Servants to obey his Servants we are to whom we obey Rom. 6. 16. Our gifts here like God's must be without Repentance nor can we recall much less employ them to any other use either of the World or Satan as we cannot serve God and Mammon so neither ought we to give him the Lean and this the Fat of our Sacrifice If our God will not part stakes surely he will not content himself with the worser share Let us then give him all and that all will be our Heart and our Affections that when we appear before him our Souls may ascend up to him as the Angel did in the flame of the Altar and that Flame may still be kept alive upon it be a continual Sacrifice such as may never cease and we may do that constantly on Earth which shall be our Eternal Employment in Heaven still praise and adore our Creator Then shall he change these our Sacrifices into everlasting Temples for himself to dwell in what we now present him natural Bodies turn into spiritual and make these our vile ones like unto his glorious one Which God of his Infinite Mercy grant c. Amen Soli Deo Gloria in aeternum A SERMON ON ESAY V. 20. The former Part of the Verse Wo unto them that call Evil good and Good Evil. THE great Creator has never been wanting to Man in prescribing him such Laws as might be sufficient if obeyed to make him happy whether we consider him in the State of Primitive Integrity or out of it In the former God so left him in the hands of his own Councel as to make himself his own Rule Nature was to him instead of Revelation he had then the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil planted in him Conscience was his Oracle and Reason his Guide and to know his Duty was but to consult himself God did not only wind him up as a Watch to a regular Motion but did withal place in him a Sun-dial to set himself by if he should go false so that his very Essence and Rule was then so much the same that to transgress was not so much to break a Law as a Man Nor did he by his Fall wholly forfeit all his natural Advantages either to himself or his Posterity For though our first Parent brake the natural Tables as Moses afterwards did those of Stone yet from the scattered pieces thereof set together we may all of us though imperfectly spell out our Duty The worst of men are born with a certain Decalogue Their Souls are not mere Rasae Tabulae there is a Book of Conscience wherein the different Characters of Good and Evil are plainly legible and by the help of those practical Notions which make
who is our Comforter if so the following Verse here will tell us That He can Reprove as well as Comfort But on the other side if we obey his Motions submit to his Dictates follow his Guidance and Direction in a word be led by Him we shall then be the Sons of God and the only-begotten of the Father will not fail to send him to us as He did to his Apostles Then especially above all other times when we eat and drink his flesh and bloud in the Holy Sacrament For as his Bloud was the meritorious Cause to procure us his Spirit so is his Holy Sacrament the Pipe or Conduit to convey Him unto us For hereby we are all made to drink into one Spirit 1 Cor. 12. 13. And then as there is plentifull Redemption here on Christ's part so if we duly partake of that Redemption there will be plentifull Effusion of his Spirit on us Which God of his infinite Mercy grant c. Amen Soli Deo gloria in aeternum A SERMON Preached on Michaelmas-day HEB. I. 14. Are they not all ministring spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation 'T IS the great happiness and priviledge of Saints to be under the care and protection of an Almighty God Others have the benefit of his general Providence These of his particular Love and Kindness The clearest Evidence of that his Love appears in sending his only beloved Son into the World to merit Salvation for them and next to that in employing Angels to further it He being our alone Saviour These our Guardians and Assistants Wherein the Almighty has abundantly provided as well for the honour as the security of his Servants For what greater honour next to the having Christ for our Brother than that we should have such glorious Creatures as Angels for our Ministers Their Nature we know places them above us and yet God's Love and their Humility sets them here below us Even while those excellent Spirits attend on the Throne of God we may see them waiting on us Men While they behold his Face there they cast a benign aspect on us here These bright Morning-stars do at the same time praise Him and assist and guide us Their Employment in Heaven does not exempt them from their Services on Earth dividing them as it were between those two places ever ascending and descending i. e. perpetually employ'd in discharging their Duties to their Creator and for his sake performing all good Offices to their fellow Creatures 2. And hence it is That in consideration of those great and various Benefits she receives by their appointed Aid and Ministration The Church has set apart this Day as to praise Him who makes use of such glorious Instruments for her safeguard and protection so gratefully to commemorate those advantageous Services they doe her And although the Title of this Festival carries but a particular denomination of St. Michael's Day yet does the Church herein celebrate the general Memorial of all Angels and the Text I have chosen leads us to it as the Scope thereof does to the whole Chapter wherein the Apostle's design is to compare Christ with Angels and to prove his Superiority over them which He does by several Arguments taken 1. From his Sonship He God's Son by Eternal generation These only by Creation and Resemblance v. 2. 2. From his Name more excellent than that of Angels v. 4. 3. From the Worship peculiarly due to Him even from Angels themselves v. 6. 4. From his being the Head of Angels who at best are but his Ministring spirits v. 7. 5. From his Kingly Authority over all Creatures Men and Angels too v. 8. 6. From his creating the Heavens and the Earth which Angels neither did nor could doe v. 10. 7. And lastly from his sitting as Equal with God at his right hand whereas the most glorious Angels doe but stand there as Ministers of his Will and Commands and to serve the necessities of his Chosen ones in the question here put Are they not all c. In which Words you may observe 1. Something imply'd or suppos'd and that is Their Existence Are they not c. The Apostle speaks of them as of persons really and actually subsisting 2. Something plainly exprest and those are four Particulars here mention'd 1. The Essence or Nature of Angels They are Spirits i. e. intellectual immortal and incorporeal Substances 2. Their Office Ministring spirits and that without any reserve All of them such none excepted not the most glorious not the most excellent of their Order 3. Their Commission from God who sends them forth deputing them their several Ministerial Charges and Employments 4. The End or Design for which they are employ'd viz. God's glory and the benefit of those who shall be heirs of Salvation These be the several Stages through which I shall lead you And first of the Existence or Being of Angels suppos'd in the question Are they not all c. 1. Since the Being of Angels is here suppos'd and taken for granted one would think there should need no farther proof of it and surely 't would be needless did not the Infidelity of some Men make it necessary And 't is strange that Divine Revelation should not be sufficient to settle this Truth among Christians which Heathens by the dim light of Nature have so clearly discern'd For what-ever mistakes they were guilty of as to the Nature they believ'd the Existence of spiritual Substances and we find them very curious in ranking and disposing them into their several Classes and describing the Hierarchy of their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with as much exactness I had almost said as good ground as the pretended Dionyfius has done that of Angels whom the Schoolmen so passionately doat on And the same reason which taught Heathens so much Divinity fetches this Truth also from the Order of Nature which seems to require it For as here we find some things without life others living but without sense some again sensible and others rational yet so as to be of a mixt Nature partly Corporal and partly Spiritual there would want one main link in the Chain of Providence had not the Divine Power made some Creatures purely Intellectual such as might be a Mean between God and Man as Man is between them and Beasts to prevent a chasm or vacuum in Nature Besides since every part and place in the World is fill'd with Inhabitants proper for it it seems but requisite that the highest Heavens should not be left void of such as might be fit to dwell in those pure and glorious Mansions But not to build so necessary and important a Truth on meer rational Conjectures we have a more solid foundation for it which is Divine Revelation the Scriptures every-where not only mentioning the Being of Angels but giving us a clear account of their Creation of their manifold Apparitions and Discoveries to Men on Earth together
with their several Actions and Operations All which clearly demonstrate their Existence For the first Their Creation may be gathered though it be not set down in express terms from the first and second Chapters of Genesis where they are styl'd the Host of Heaven an usual Title afforded to all Creatures in Scripture-language but in a more especial manner appropriated to Angels as 't is by the Psalmist Psal. 148. 2. and most suitable to them in regard of their great Power and exact Order And so all Expositors allow it 'T is true indeed there is no such express mention of the Creation of Angels in Moses's Writings as in those of the other Holy Pen-men which he omits not so much as some would have it to prevent Idolatry in the Israelites who had they known Angels would have been apt to have ador'd them as for these two Reasons 1. Because Moses applies himself to the simple Capacity of that People and describes the Creation of visible and sensible things leaving spiritual as above their lower apprehensions and 2dly lest Men should think God needed the help of Angels either in the production or disposition of other Creatures As if the Fabrick of the World had been too great a Task for Himself alone to undertake as Heathens and some Hereticks also have fancied to the manifest derogation of the Divine Omnipotency But for what reason soever Moses forbore to speak out here the Psalmist is plain enough By the Word of the Lord were the Heavens made and all the Host of them by the breath of his mouth Psal. 33. 6. and clearer yet Psal. 104. 4. He maketh his Angels spirits and his Ministers a flaming fire And whereas our Apostle v. 4. tells us That God made the Worlds Colos. 1. 16. He explains the meaning of that expression by things visible and invisible and these invisible things by Thrones Dominions Principalities and Powers the usual Titles Angels are design'd by So void of all Reason as well as of Religion is that bold or rather impudent Assertion of the Author of the Leviathan concerning the Creation of Angels there is nothing delivered in Scripture 2. A second proof of the Existence of Angels may be taken from their sundry Apparitions both before and under the Law and in the first dawning of the Gospel There is nothing more certain than that under those several Dispensations especially at the beginning of them such Apparitions were very frequent Holy Men in those times had a familiar acquaintance and correspondency with Heaven 'T was no news then to see an Angel of God The Patriarchs scarce convers'd so much with Men as with blessed Spirits They were their Guests and their Companions of their Family and of their Counsel Nothing of importance was done either at home or abroad without their privity and direction And he must be a great stranger to the New Testament that finds them not there too very often among the Servants of God For though God had for a long time withdrawn from the Jews all means of supernatural Revelations yet at the first publication of the Gospel he began to restore them 'T was no marvel that when that wicked people became strangers to God in their Conversation God should grow a stranger to them in his Apparitions But when the Gospel approacht he visited them afresh with his Angels before he visited them with his Son Joseph Mary Zachary the Shepherds Mary Magdalen the gazing Disciples at the Mount of Olives Peter Philip Cornelius St. Paul St. John the Evangelist were all blessed with the sight of them In succeeding times 't is also very credible what Ecclesiastical Writers report That the good Angels were nowhit more sparing of their Presence for the comfort of Holy Martyrs and Confessors who suffered for the Name of Christ. I doubt not but Constant Theodorus saw and felt the refreshing hand of the Angel no less than he reported to Julian the Persecutor Nor do I question but that those retired Saints too of the prime Ages of the Church had sometimes such heavenly Companions for the Consolation of their forced Solitude as St. Jerome reports of them But this is evident too that the elder the Church grew the more rare was the use of these Apparitions as of all other Miracles Actions and Events not that the Arme of God is shortned or his Care and Love to his abated but that his Church being now setled in an ordinary way has no need of any extraordinary ones no more than the Israelites had of Manna when they were once got out of the Wilderness Nay such extraordinary ones now would perhaps be not useless only but dangerous and we may justly suspect those strange Relations of the Romanists concerning later Angelical Apparitions to Saints of their own Canonizing when we see them made use of to countenance Doctrines of Men. And yet notwithstanding their false play here 't is hard to say that all those instances which sober learned Men have given us of Modern Apparitions are utterly incredible But it has often fallen out indeed that Evil spirits have appeared in this wicked and corrupt Age more than good ones The frequent experience of later days gives in here its Evidence and 't is unreasonable wholly to reject it there being no other reason but this to doe so that our selves doe not see what others so peremptorily affirm they did which were to call in question all that our own Eyes have not been witnesses to and if we will believe nothing but what we see we may as well doubt whether there be Souls as Devils And yet so far as men's Eyes may discern Spirits they may doe it in those possessed Bodies they usurp For that such Possessions have been and still are in the World though more frequent in our Saviour's time than ours is as hard to deny as that there are Witchcrafts which yet many will not allow of and the Papists would take it ill we should deprive them of this one great Argument to prove the truth of their Doctrines who though they feign Possessions where there are none and conjure up imaginary Devils that they may have the credit to lay them yet this is no good reason to say there are no such things at all And this once granted as we must needs doe unless we will contradict all credible sensible Experience there will be no ground left to dispute the real Being of bad Angels which is an Argument of equal force to prove that there are good ones But then 3dly What if we do no longer now-a-days see Angels in visible shapes may we not discover them by their several actions and operations And do not these necessarily imply the Being of things Now besides the Testimony of Scripture which represents Angels standing moving talking and the like It is apparent that there are many effects in Nature which as they cannot be attributed to any natural Causes unless we will have continual