next Enter thou into thy chambers Whence we did observe that in times of storm and calamity the onely way to withdraw our selves from the violences of discontents and troubles is to retire to Praiers and Closet exercises of Devotion If I should go to prove this I might read you the whole book of Psalms the Psalter being but Davids Liturgy in time of sadness the service and the refreshments of his sorrows To tell you that he says In my trouble I will go call upon the Lord Psal. 18. 6. and when I was in trouble I called upon the Lord Psal. 120. 1. or again for the love that I bear unto them they take now my contrary part but I give my self unto praier Psal. 109. 4. this would be to no purpose for the whole book is but doing this And indeed to do it is the best counsel God himself do's give 't is that he do's invite us to in such a discourse come my people enter And for the comforts of it I shall enclose them in the application which shall pass by that strange mistake that is in some men who seek to quench the sorrows of calamity by the entertainments of sin to divert sad thoughts by vicious company to refresh themselves with the jollities of iniquity to choak the remembrance of their afflictions with riot and drown it in excesses Alas 't is not go abroad unto the open lodgings of intemperance and to the Inns of pleasure but come and enter thou into thy chambers And secondly it shall omit that very near as great mistake of them who in times of impending calamity busy themselves with the cares of the world whose hearts are then especially set on thriving and they immerse themselves in the wayes of gain looking on that as the thing that is to be their great security and that they shall provide against all sad events by that Strange that in the time of pungent troubles when they are encompassed with misery to run into the thorns and briars as our Savior calls them should be our onely hopeful refuge and retiring place that men should be then most griping after that the cares of keeping which and the fears of loosing it are the onely great things that make calamity grievous He who then makes himself Master of possessions gives pledges to Affliction Shall I then put my self further out into the world when Gods discretion bids me enter thou into thy chambers But thirdly I apply directly to the calamitous however destitute and unhappy When thou art brought at once low enough for pity but so unhappy as to be scorn'd ruin'd and contemn'd too come here and pour out thy soul into the bosom of him who thou art sure will not refuse thee nor turn away his face from thee but stands here to invite thee with all the compellations of love Here thou mayst lay open thy case to him that had so much kindness to thee as to die for thee and mingle thy own tears with the bloud of God that was shed for thee To have any friend whom to impart thy griefs to is in good measure to unlade and emty thy self of them thou hast here the most faithful bosom of thy Savior whom thou mayst behold in the same postures of affliction that thou thy self art in out of affection to thee and suffering for thee in Agonies of one and the other sweating as much with heats of love to thee as of pain for thee hanging down his head upon the cross with languishments of kindness and of weakness and his arms stretch'd into the posture of receiving thee to his embraces and his side open'd not onely to shed bloud and water for thee but to receive thy tears and give thee passage to his very heart Come then my People come to me if thy sad expectations be like plummets at thy heart and weigh it down yet lift up thy heart together with thy hands in assur'd confidence that that kindness which did thus express it self will never fail thee If notwithstanding this the pressure make thy thoughts to sink and thy soul to grovel let it be but a bowing down in submission to my will who certainly know what is best for thee come then and give thy self up into my hands as into the hands of a faithful Redeemer Now the devout soul doing so by often betaking himself to God upon these occasions becomes acquainted with his Maker and in all discontents he will strait run to his Acquaintance there to disburden himself and in all fears thither he hasts for shelter with the very same complacencies that our Savior says the young one does to the wings of the hen at the approach of danger there the soul nestles and is hugely pleas'd with the apprehensions of its comfortable warm security By frequent converses of this kind and other practices of Devotion and Meditations on the mercies of his providence and his protecting kindnesses besides the glories of his Preparations towards his future Estate the soul mounts up to great degrees of confidence and familiaritie with God and God does use when a heart does thus ply and follow him and become intimate with him to reveal himself also to that heart in the midst of his devotions when he is conversing with the Lord he will breathe into him the inspirations of Heaven and with soft whispers speak peace close to his heart break in upon him with flashes of joy warm him with gleams of comfort which ravish the soul with delight in the emploiment Hence grow strange intercourses betwixt them the Lord pours in of his Holy Spirit that bond and ligament of God and the soul that maintains perpetual commerce between them they do nothing but close and mingle as it were till the heart mount up to those extasies that we read of in devout persons that entertain themselves to miracle in the enjoyment of those Contemplations which these exercises do afford them The heart then melts no longer in the tears and sorrows of affliction but with the dissolvings of love when thro excess of complacency in God and in his joys the soul hath a kind of impotency of Spirit so as it cannot contain it self within it self but as a liquid thing hath its overflowings and is poured out into the bosom of the beloved and by an outgoing faints from it self into an union with the Object of its affections And the Soul that by the practices of Devotion is brought to be thus affected hath not onely fulfill'd the counsel of the Text retir'd into his chambers but is also brought into Gods chambers so the Spouse in the Canticles expresses c. 1. 4. The King hath brought me into his chambers and c. 2. 4. He brought me into his banquetting house and his banner over me was love and in c. 3. 10. she describ'd the bed-chamber whether she was brought the midst whereof was pav'd with love and all this means but the entertainments of devout Contemplations And Christ in
and so on to glory and to be partakers of his Nature as a kindness that is in great degree Divine And certainly if acts of Mercy be as we have seen so well pleasing to God 't is certain that the acts of greatest Mercy must be most well-pleasing and it is as certain that those Mercies are the greatest which releive from greatest miseries and invest with highest blessedness but the eternal happy preparations for the Penitent and the as infinite and immortal torments that await the Sinner transcend all comparison with other things Both of them indeed were propos'd in Mercy Hell it self was threatned merely in compassion to affright our passage and to make our entry inaccessible 'T is true it must be executed on the final impenitent that God may be true he is engag'd in his veracity to inflict it and yet he scarce knows how to do it or to punish How shall I give thee up O Ephraim how shall I deliver thee O Israel My heart is turn'd within me my repentings are kindled together Hos. 11. 8. Since thou wilt not do it not turn not repent sure I must for how shall I give thee up Yea he does it till that he be weary with repenting Jer. 15. 6. till he be in passion so as that with oaths he does expostulate as I live saith the Lord I would not the death of the wicked turn ye turn ye from your evil waies for why will ye die yea more he sent his Son out of his bosom to prevent it Would you know the value of that kindness that endeavors to reform such Sinners it was worth the Incarnation of the Son of God the Word was made flesh purposely to call such to repentance so my text saith I came to call Sinners to repentance But to call them to it Lord out of thine own mouth we will challenge more from thee for thou didst answer to this very same reproch of being a guest to one that was a Sinner The Son of man came to seek and to save that which is lost Luke 19. 10. not to call onely but to seek and how he shews you in the Parable chap. 15. v. 4 5. What man of you having an hundred sheep if he lose one of them doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost until he find it and when he hath found it he laieth it on his shoulders rejoicing The Sinner he hath straid into by paths gon away from the Shepherd of his soul is a lost sheep but yet when he is gon his farthest is in mazes knows not which way to betake himself then this good Shepherd do's not onely call invite to a return or as the Father in the Parable run to meet him in his coming back but goes himself to seek him seems to mind the recovery of each single one that 's lost and contributes as carefully to his return as if that one were all his charge and the whole flock not dearer to him then that sheep he leaves the ninety and nine to seek that one and he seeks till he finds it and then laies it on his shoulders the wandring sheep it seems had strai'd till it was weary and had tir'd it self with running from its Shepherd so as that it neither could come nor be driven home but that too is provided for for therefore he is carried that none how far soever he hath gon away may yet despair of coming back This sheep had wandred to so great a distance and to so much weariness that he was fain to be born back when he was found Yea and the burden was most acceptable for he laid it on his shoulders rejoicing assure thy self he will refuse no burden for thy sake who was willing to bear the Cross for thee be but contented to be found by him and he will carry thee with gladness the joy will spread it self to Heaven also v. 7. There is joy in heaven over one Sinner that repenteth The kindness that effects this is worth a triumph in Gods presence among all God Angels it is worth a passion of the Son of God it is fit to make a joy in Heaven and fit to make the Lord of Heaven descend to earth and to the grave for it Nor yet content with having don all this himself he gave his Spirit to ordain and qualify a state of men to agitate this onely work to the worlds end For saith St Paul we are Ambassadors for Christ as tho God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead be ye reconciled to God I know not whether the Ambassadors are likely to prevail in what the Son himself hath fail'd and whether Gods beseeching us will do that which his dying for us hath not yet bin able to effect or whether they that come with the same Ambassy have not reason to expect the same unkind reception for it is no wonder if that Message which did cause Christ to be crucifi'd and his Heralds martyr'd which was so unwelcome that they shed the blood of intire Nations almost to extinguish it and lay'd wast whole Regions to extirpate it should not now be any whit more grateful for without all doubt men love their vices now as well as ever and indeed 't is hard to love the men that come to tear their bosome inclinations from their heart whose words are corrosives and caustics lances sawes and whatsoever other instruments that serve to mortify and to cut off men that design to sower all their satisfactions they have in the world by throwing in the thoughts of present guilt and after torments whom if they beleive not they must needs despise and hate them for assuming so to check and censure lay such black dooms on their actions if they do beleive them they must needs be tortur'd by them feel convulsions wracks within at their discourses and by consequence cannot much affect them 'T is hard not to be enemies to them who tho they say they come to treat a reconciliation are Ambassadors of war and whose commission 't is to cry aloud not spare but lift up their voice like a trumpet to proclaime defiance sound a charge against them and to shew the people their transgressions and the house of Jacob their sins Now to be told of faults to have ones bosome ript up and the guilt displai'd was hardly ever acceptable good counsel admonitions and reproofs never have bin welcome and then how should they be so whose office 't is to bring them and who are as the Wise Man saith Ordain'd to reproving But 't is as unhappy sure as 't is unreasonable to dislike the greatest kindnesses for being such if mercy shall be thought to merit hate because it is the highest mercy what then shall oblige The poor man does not scorn the garment that is sent to cloth his nakedness or the food that is bestow'd upon his croaking clinging bowels tho the
Benedictions of those Gods chiefest Officers of blessing those that are consecrated to bless in the Name of the Lord and will have them in love for his works sake Their Third work is Government which may be some do look upon as priviledge and not as work the expectation and delight of their ambitions and not the fear and burthen of their shoulders But ambition may as rationally fly at Miracles as Government and as hopefully gape after diversity of Tongues as at presiding in the Church the powers of each did come alike from Heaven and were the mere gifts of the Holy Ghost 1 Cor. 12. 18. It was so in the Law when God went to divide part of Moses burthen of Government amongst the Lxx he came down and took off the Spirit that was upon him and gave it to the Lxx Num. 11. 25. A work this that may have reason to supersede much of that which I first mentioned For notwithstanding all Saint Paul's Assistances of Spirit he does reckon that care that came upon him daily from the Churches amongst his persecutions and it summes up his Catalogue of sufferings 2 Cor. 11. Such various Necessities there are by which Government is distracted and knows not how to temper it self to them For sometimes it must condescend Paul notwithstanding Apostolical decrees made in full Council that abrogated Circumcision as the Holy Ghost had declared it void before yet is fain to comport so far with the violent humours of a party as to Circumcise Timothy at the very same time when he delivered those decrees to the Churches to keep Act. 16. 3 4. yet afterwards when Circumcision was lookt on as Engagement to the whole Law and to grant them that one thing was but to teach them to ask more and to be able to deny them nothing then he suffers not Titus to be Circumcised nor gave place to them by submission no not for an hour Gal. 2. 3 5. Thus the Spirit of Government is sometimes a Spirit of meekness does it work by soft yieldings and breaks the Adamant with Cushions which Anvils would not do The Ocean with daily billows and tides helpt on with storms of violence and hurried by tempests of roaring fury assaults a rock for many Ages and yet makes not the least impression on it but is beat back and made retire in empty some in insignificant passion when a few single drops that distil gently down upon a rock though of Marble or a small trickle of water that only wets and glides over the stone insinuate themselves into it and soften it so as to steal themselves a passage through it and yet Government hath a rod too which like Moses's can break the rock and fetch a stream out of the heart of quarre and which must be used also The Holy Spirit himself breathed tempest when he came blew in a mighty boisterous Wind nor does he always whisper soft things he came down first in a sound from heaven and spoke thunder nor did it want lightning the tongue was double flame Of some we knowwe must have a Compassion but others must be saved with terror Jude 22. 23. which drives me on to the last piece of their work The Censures of the Church the burthen of the Keys which passing by the private use of them in voluntary penitences and discipline upon the sick as they signifie publick exclusion out of the Church for scandalous Enormities and re-admission into it upon repentance have been sufficiently evinc'd to belong to the Governours of the Church The Exercise of these is so much their work that Saint Paul calls them the Weapons of their spiritual Warfare by which they do cast down imaginations and every high things that exalteth it self against the Knowledge of God and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 4 5. A blessed victory even for the Conquered and these the only Weapons to atchieve it with If those who sin scandalously and will not hear the admonitions of the Church were cast out of the Church if not Religion Reputation would restrain them somewhat Not to be thought fit Company for Christians would surely make them proud against their Vices Shame the design'd Effect of these Censures hath great pungencies the fear of it does goad men into actions of the greatest hazard and the most unacceptable such as have nothing lovely in them but are wholly distastful There is a Sin whose face is bloody dismal and yet because t is countenanc'd by the Roysting Ruffian part of the World men will defie Reason and Conscience Man's and God's Law venture the ruine of all that is belov'd and dear to them in this World and assault death and charge and take Hell by violence rather then be asham'd before those valiant sinners Satans Hectors and they must â—ever come into such Company if they do not go boldly on upon the sin is of more force with them than all the indearments of this World than all their fear of God and Death and that which follows Now if Religion could but get such Countenance by the Censures of the Church and every open sinner had this certain fear I should be turn'd out of all Christian company shall be avoided as unfit for Conversation would it not have in some degree the like effect and if the motive beas much exactly would not men be chast or sober or obedient for that very reason for which they will now be kill'd and be damn'd Without all question Saint Peter's Censure on the intemperate 1 Cor. 5. must needs be reformation to him 'T is such a sentence to the drunkard not to company with him whose Vice is nothing but the sauce of Company and who does sin against his Body and against his faculties and against his Conscience is sick and is a Sott and goes to Hell meerly for Societies sake Now the infliction of these Censures is so much the work to which Church-governours are call'd by the Holy Ghost that they are equally call'd by him to it and to Himself both are alike bestow'd upon them Receive the Holy Ghost whose sins ye retain they are retained John 20. 22. And in the first derivations of this office it was performed with severities such as this Age I doubt will not believe and when they had no temporal sword to be auxiliary to these Spiritual weapons And now to make reflections on this is not for me to undertake in such a state of the Church as ours is wherein the very faults of some do give them an Indemnity who having drawn themselves out of the Church from under its authority are also got out of the power of its Censures So Children that do run away from their Fathers house they do escape the Rod but they do not consider that withal they run away from the inheritance And many times in those that do not do so but stay within the family long intermission of the Rod and
apparent Miracle to all Jerusalem the suns prodigious Eclipse when it was impossible by nature he should be eclips'd it being then full moon was so to the whole Hemisphere It serves the use I am to make of this that 't is here recorded but withal Heathen Historians and Chronologes bear witness to it for when they relate that in the 4th year of the 202 Olympiad the year that is assign'd to Christ's death there was such a great Eclipse as never had bin day at noon turn'd into night tâ—e stars appearing and earthquakes as far as Bythyma since 't is apparent by the motions of the Heavens and the calculations of Astronomy there could be none such then according to the course of nature it must be this the â—ospel speaks of But beyond all this 't is registred here that according as he had foretold he rais'd himself from death the 3d day yea and many bodies of the Saints that had bin buried long it may be some of them he rais'd with him That notwithstanding all the art and treachery of the Cheif Priests to conceal it yet that very day he appear'd First to Mary Magdalen 2dly the Women 3dly Peter 4thly to them that went to Emaus last of all on that day to the eleven except Thomas being seen and handled by and eating with them 6thly eight daies after to the same eleven with Thomas 7thly at the sea of Galilee appearing in a miracle of fishes 8thly to all his Disciples and 500 Brethren more in Galilee then to James then to all his Apostles promising them the Holy Ghost and lastly all of them beholding he ascended into Heaven and ten daies after as he promised sent the Holy Ghost upon them in the shape of fiery tongues so as that they spoke all Languages immediatly to the amazement of the Jews of every Nation under Heaven to which they were scatter'd that the Miracle might spread as far Now if all this be true he that did these must have communication with a power above all that we account the powers of Nature such an one most certainly as can perform whatsoever he in this book promises inflict what e're he threatens such as is Divine And since he wrought all these on purpose to evince he came commission'd from that Divine power brought these Miracles as seals of that commission that we might believe him therfore whatsoever he delivers must be embrac't by us as we hope for those blessed rewards that he proposeth and on pain of those eternal torments if we do not of both which it is not possible to doubt if these accounts be true 2d ly Since the most and greatest of these must be don but once he could not be incarnated and born and live and preach and dye and rise again and go to Heaven every day of every age in every place to convince every man by his own senses to all those that did not see the matter of fact therefore faith of all these must be made by witnesses And 3dly If we can be sure the witnesses that do assert a fact understand it exactly if the things be palpable and they must certainly know whether they were really don or no and if we can be sure too that they are sincere will not affirm that which they do not know and do not lye their testimony of it must be most infallible because it is impossible such witnesses can be deceiv'd or will deceive 4thly The witnesses in this case the Apostles and the 70 Disciples for I 'le name no more must needs know most perfectly for they not only saw the Miracles but were instruments parties in some of them sent to cure diseases cast out Devils and knew whether all this were in earnest And most certainly they saw as all the Jews did too Christ crucified his heart pierc'd with a spear and his body buried and whether they did see him risen handle him eat with him they knew And if they might mistake in his Ascention yet the fiery tongues if such did light on them they must needs see and whether they themselves who spoke no Languages could then speak Tongues it cannot be but they must know In these there is no possibility they could err unless they did it wilfully but then 't is as impossible that they could do it wilfully if they were sincere and honest such as would not lye Now that they were such I might urge their simplicity and openness without disguise not covering their own errors men who seem'd to live as well as preach against all artifice and to have no design on any thing but the amendment and salvation of mankind For he that can suppose it possible that they were otherwise men of art and finess that they contriv'd the story must needs know First that such would not seal their falsehood with their blood design no recompense to all their travels but contemt and hatred persecutions prisons whippings wounds and death to be the scum and the off-scouring of the world lay out their lives against their conscience to preach that Jesus who did only call them out to be a spectacle to all the world just such as Malefactors when expos'd to fight with and to be devour'd of wild beasts Their sufferings are too known to stay upon St Pauls own catalogue of his for five whole verses 2 Cor. 11. is such that to sustain them only for this end to put a cheat on mankind count a so laborious vext torn miserable life and an infamous death gain so the fable might be beleiv'd to think they could do this is sure as great a madness as to do it But yet I will suppose that possible that those who wove the fable pleas'd themselves so infinitly with the expectations of imposing on mankind as that those hopes could make misery and death it self look lovely to them But Then 2dly that all and every of them should be of that mind that amongst so many that bare witness of Christs Miracles and resurrection not a man should discover the cheat that when their persecutors did with arts of torment as it were examin them upon the rack they should work not one single confession out of them that no ones courage should be broke nor have a qualm so far as to acknowledg how it was disclose the plot lay open the confederacy the whole mystery and the contrivance of it When of twelve Disciples one was so false to betray his Masters person at a vile rate yet that all of them and many more in a feign'd story of his Miracles should be so true to one another that no engin of mans cruelty ever could screw out the sacret not one should betray the forgery and be a Judas where he ought to be no not that Judas whose concern it was whose treason to his Master had bin justified had he bin an impostor yet that he should stir no least suspicion
9. 4. They shall not be pleasing unto him but their Sacrifices shall be as the bread of Mourners and as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those Sacrifices for their carcases shall not come into the house of the Lord. Yea he would not let those Melancholly people keep others company in his service but there was porta lugentium a gate for Mourners to enter by themselves into the Temple-service as if the mirth were among their precepts and to be sad were to be defil'd and unclean But it is not so with us in the Gospel where the onely Sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit a broken and contrite heart he will not despise but the bread of Mourners shall be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from which he will never turn away his face and a few penitent tears are the scope and the fulfilling of all the Jewish purifyings and the Spirit of the Lord moveth upon the face of these waters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he flutters and hovers over them and as he did out of the first waters so out of those tears he hatches a new creation they being the very first effects and signs of life in the new creature and the new birth also natural to both Infants and the Child of God also are born weeping and crying this being the very first throw in regeneration Yea so far is this sorrow from displeasing God that it is the great engagement to him to give us comfort both here and hereafter and it is put amongst Christs first beatitudes here Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted The words present either a bare description of persons or withall involve a duty the being Mourners Secondly import a designation of their condition that they are Blessed Thirdly they give the reason and the manner of that condition For they shall be comforted so that mourning may be doubly understood either as a duty or as an aphorisme in the later case mourning is taken not to be prescrib'd at all but onely Christ looking upon his Disciples who were in the worlds esteem in a sad low condition he does encourage them that notwithstanding their unequal estimate yet they are in a blessed condition for they shall be sure to be comforted And thus first it may be as an appendage to the former aphorisme in that he had by the assurance of a reward encourag'd them in the entertainment of poverty and calamities had advanc't the lowly into heaven and enrich't the patient poor with the inheritance of a Kingdom those that were poor in Spirit content with their condition and then this follows blessed are those that mourn for they shall be comforted as if it were after this manner but what if our calamities do grow upon us and we are not able to bear them with an even mind and a serene countenance but they cast us down we greive and mourn under them and cannot be comforted yet even for this condition there is promise Christ is so far from breaking this bruised reed that he confirms and strengthens it the greivousness of our calamities shall not exclude all hope of ease neither shall our weakness and infirmity exclude us from the number of the blessed he will neither impute our want of courage that groans and faints under the burthen provided that we be not heated by it into impatience at his dispensations nor chaft into wrath against them that lay it on us tho we do mourn if we do not vexe we are blessed neither will he suffer our calamities when he hath tried and purg'd us by them quite to oppress us but how greivous soever they be they shall find multitudes of comfort even the comfort of mitigation for to that Gods faithfulness is engag'd 1 Cor. 10. 13. God is faithful who will not suffer you to be temted above that ye are able but will with the temtation make a way also to escape that ye may be able to bear it Secondly the internal comforts of Gods grace 2 Cor. 1. 3 4. God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort who comforteth us in all our tribulations Thirdly the comfort of a joyful recompence even here for the most part John 16. 20 21. I say unto you ye shall weep and lament but the world shall rejoyce and ye shall be sorrowful but your sorrow shall be turned into joy A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow because her hour is come but as soon as she is deliver'd of the child she remembreth no more the anguish for joy that a man is born into the world Our afflictions may be throws but they shall end in birth and have the ease and joy of a delivery and therefore our Savior said of himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 12. 50. how am I straitned as a woman in child to accomplish his Baptism that Baptism of agony sweat and bloud or certainly however an eternal recompence of joy hereafter everlasting consolations as St Paul saith 2 Thess. 2. 16. When instead of this hunger and thirst and tears the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes and there shall be no more death neither sorrow nor crying neither shall there be any more pain Rev. 7. 17. and 21. 4. And first we learn hence the compassion of our Savior who hath indulg'd us the infirmities of our nature he hath not made our weak affections to be sins but hath shew'd us a way to make them advantages towards blessedness God that was made flesh remembers that we are but flesh and does not require of us to be insensible it is not a vice not to be a stock such as the Stoicks requir'd their wise man should be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no greif nor no sense of any external calamity tho you thrust his hand into the fire it must be no more to him than if you burn his staff for his body is but his organ his instrument no part at all of him but Christ requires no such hard tasks of us Had he deni'd us our tears and forbid us the ease of mourning in afflictions and made weeping to be cowardise and sin it had bin a hard saying we had had reason to have thought ourselves severely dealt withal but he gives us leave as it were to love the dear things of this world a little to weep when they leave us if we do not love them so as not to love our brother and our God leaving them if the world leave us and when by calamities our comforts are taken from us by frettings and vexations throwing off our God from us repining at him and casting his commands away of not envying not returning provided in our tears we have humble perfect submissions and resignations of our selves throwing our selves down at his feet and from our very souls
confidence to present a Strumpet to him for a Bride and care not that he find us Virgins at the Marriage of the Lamb Or can we expect any thing but an eternal divorce from him whom we have thus us'd I have given you some expressions by which you may judg what kind of Purity we are to aim at I shall come a little nearer that of the Text by one or two more 3. Purity and Holiness are exprest in Scripture by White Raiment Revel 3. 18. a White Robe c. 7. 9. for the Fine Linnen is the Righteousness of the Saints as it there follows Now the reason of this compellation is it is call'd Raiment because it is to cover our nakedness and our shame for our sins are accounted such In Gods eyes every wicked person is the same thing as a deform'd creature with his nakedness shamefully uncover'd and prostituted This is clear out of those places Rev. 16. 15. least he walk naked and they see his shame Rev. 3. 18. Buy of me White Raiments that thou maist be cloth'd and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear For that it is call'd Raiment and White Linnen because of the Purity White is the purest color the least spot or stain is immediatly discern'd upon it and if it be upon Fine Linnen makes it presently cast off by them whose glory it is to be neat and clean it shall no more come neer them till the spots and stains be wash'd off And Oh that we had but this pride for our souls that we were but as ambitious to have our immortal Spirits neatly deckt when we appear in Gods sight as our putrifying carkasses when we go in company that when we slip or fall and when a spot does stain this Linnen even of Righteousness that we would instantly wash it in our tears and the bloud of Christ the laver that is prepar'd for this Linnen for they made their garments white in the bloud of the Lamb and that for the time to come we would be but as careful of keeping it neat of preserving it from stains as we are of finer linnen And God himself makes use of our pride in that kind to be our exprobation Jer. 2. 32. Can a maid forget her ornaments or a bride her attire yet my people have forgotten me dayes without number And sure I am the expression of Fine Linnen aims at a great degree of Purity when it calls that careful conscionable duty the walking worthy of the Christian calling whereunto we are called even the walking diligently in all the Commandments of God calls I say this Righteousness fine linnen clean and white for it is the very expression of that pure clothing that we shall be drest in at our wedding with Christ it is our spousal linnen when we go to meet our Bridegroom Rev. 19. 7 8. The Marriage of the Lamb is come and his wife hath made her self ready and to her was granted that she should be arraied in fine linnen clean and white to teach us that we should be always as careful of our ways always drest in mind and so prepar'd as if we were to go and meet our Bridegroom Yea it is the expression of that pure Clothing which we shall be cloth'd in Heaven with where we shall be pure as God is pure perfectly holy Rev. 3. 4. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments and they shall walk with me in white to let us see that this expression by which our Righteousness is call'd white clothing requires us to have our conversation in Heaven even while we are here to make our lives here but as a preparation to that Marriage-feast to be but the time of dressing our selves before hand For we must array our selves in fine linnen the very same dress in which we must walk with Christ for they shall walk with me in white saith he yea 't is his own dress also for the garments of Christ Moses and Elias in the Mount was white shining Raiment Holiness is transfiguration upon earth so that this compellation from our daily diligence in the cleansing and the keeping of our linnen does direct us to the same diligence in neatness of our souls and requires of us such a Purity as with which God is pure 4. Purity it is called light as also sin is called darkness Rom. 13. 12. Put ye off the works of darkness and put ye on the armor of light and Matth. 5. 16. Let your light so shine before men and that very fitly because nothing so pure as light so clear as shine and noon-day it is the most pure of all visible creatures it is not possible so much as to sully shine or to spot the light the foulest dung-hill that it can shine upon does not at all defile it you may put out the day but you cannot stain it And truly no expression comes near the Purity of Light for it is so clean as it is set to express the very Holiness of God himself 1 John 1. 5. This then is the message which we have heard of him and declare unto you that God is Light and in him is no darkness at all And therefore while our Piety is called light it teaches us that we labor to be pure as he is pure the kind of Purity which how it is St James hath set down c. 1. 17. where he explains this very expression Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variableness neither shadow of turning They are Astronomical expressions belonging to the Lights of Heaven God is not like them that change oft not like the Moon that hath its tides of light now full and then dark nor is he like the Sun he hath not any 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tropick who when he is come near to us and makes summer then turns back again and goes fromward us neither must our Light have any such our Holiness must have no Solstice our Devotion sometimes mounting with a bright and holy flame as it would breath up into Heaven it self sometimes fainting and sinking as it would expire and die now our endeavors strong and violent we strive pant and climb afterwards we slacken and go backwards Neither yet a waning Moon Holiness ebbing and flowing now increasing then again decaying which tho it be sometimes glorious with a full shine is yet otherwhile the darkest part of the whole Firmament It must not be so with our Piety sometimes at a Sermon or before a Communion or upon some sharp rebuke of Gods in an affliction cross or other occasion very high and shining but then again at another time like the New-Moon no light at all the Devotion is sunk and extinct and our vanities possess us wholy No fits of Purity Paroxysms of Piety that come like the heats of agues now and then but with great intervals
and with strict Religion followest after Holiness thou maist securely give the Scoffers of the world and the wicked leave to call thee miserable to deride thy strictnesses and thy austerities to say thy mortifications do make thy life sad and uncomfortable alas they do not see the Hope that is laid before thee such a Hope as made thy Savior endure the cross and despise the shame They look upon thy strict performances but they do not look upon thy expectations they consider not the Crown of those performances for if they did they would not certainly think the present momentany pleasures of their sins could countervail that Crown Be the hardship what it will it is a comfortable Hope and that sufficiently confirm'd to us full of assurance it leans upon the whole Trinity 1 Pet. 1. 21. That our hope might be in God and Tim. 1. 1. Our Lord Jesus Christ our Hope Rom. 5. 5. That we may abound in Hope thro the power of the Holy Ghost The Power of the whole God-head ingag'd both to secure and to support our Hope A blessed Hope Tit. 2. 13. a Hope that is enjoyment And if it be a blessed Hope what will the possession be if there be happiness in the expectation what will there be in the fruition O purify your selves and come and see which brings me to the last part how this Hope does set a man on purifying for every man that hath this Hope purifies himself Now to declare and prove this to you I shall do two things First prove that this is such a Hope as hath in it motive enough to set a man on purifying Secondly that he that does not purify cannot have this Hope 1. This Hope hath certainly motive enough to set a man on purifying had we laid the hopes of heaven near our hearts were our thoughts but once set and bent upon the joys above we would easily perswade our selves to set upon the mending of our selves What will not hope do All the emploiments of the world do but serve this passion They that plow plow in hope saith St Paul because the heavens promise them a season of harvest tho they do frown in seed-time and storm against their labors with inundations of tempest or freez the earth into an untam'd hardness till it become iron as their instruments yet will they melt themselves or they will thaw those frosts and toil as if they would vie drops with winter clouds in showers of sweat as well as rain merely because they hope to reap And they that plow the sea are yet more slaves to Hope for they out-face death with all its terrors for the hopes of a gainful venture they do charge thro a shower a deluge of waves that do assail them with foaming wrath and sustain an inundation of billows that fall like Gods swelling cataracts as if they came from heaven out against them and are fearless when they are but an inch remov'd from an Abyss of ruin that gapes like hell men of confidence hard as those rocks which they despise for hopes of a little profit And what shall we say to the poor Soldier who for hopes of rags and roots will charge fire whom the promise of God knows a thin salary will make to run into as great a storm and tempest of flame as the Seaman does of water even into a shower of death The most active of our passions either submit to Hopes or owe their violence to an activity deriv'd from them Do not men bridle in all their desires and the furies of their passions to the peevish will and liking and become perfect compliance to the otherwise intolerable humors of one whom they hope to please or from whom they hope for some inheritance or preferment And the Tragedies of Ambition which useth towade thro a sea of bloud and sin that does scorn Relations defy God and its own Conscience reverse States and confound all rather than miss its aim are but the issues of a most uncertain Hope And then my Brethren would not the Hopes of Heaven be able to do somthing with us when the Hopes of a little know not what 's will do all this Would we not sow to the Spirit where the harvest is Blessedness Would we not war against the Flesh when he that overcomes should have a Crown immortal and incorruptible Would we not comply with Christ and please him to get his inheritance and have some ambition for the Throne of God if we did but hope for these as we do for the other Yes my Brethren I will give an example of one who slighted all the most glorious satisfactions of the most swelling earthly hopes and when he had every thing brought to him that ambition could gape for yet threw off all upon these onely Hopes Hebr. 11. 24 25 26 c. When he was coâ—â— to years when he came to the age of understanding the honors of a Court and when his appetite was grown ripe for the delights that do attend one and he fit for the enjoyment of them and the opportunity of them thrown into his hands by being taken in Son of the Crown and so Possessor of all the advantages of pleasure which such a Relation can afford and when on the other side there was nothing in the other scale but the sorrows of a low vassalage and the afflictions of a hard slavery nothing but a brickiln to be set against the Palace and instead of the rich variety of earthly entertainments not so much as straw to make their brick of that he should chuse the afflictions and as if his will were not alone engag'd that way but his understanding also led that he should esteem that wanting that contemtible condition the reproach of Religion to be greater riches than the treasures of Egypt And indeed the very reproach of Christ is greater riches riches I shall carry with me to that great Tribunal at the dreadful day that will be the great Kings Badge his Livery upon me when I stand before his Throne when all the spangles of your pomps shall be faln off and look as gastly to the wicked as their own sad carcasses or sadder expectations as if there were more shine and splendor in the dirt which scorn does throw into the face of Piety than in the Pomps of Wealth Now this must sure be from some strange consideration Why all was upon this score he had respect to the recompence of the reward he hop'd for better things what 's the Son of Pharaoh's Daughter to the Son of God or the succession to the Crown of Egypt in comparison with the possessing the Inheritance of Heaven 'T is true the treasures of that Crown may furnish me with the aims of all my appetites what'ere my heart or what my lust can wish that will get me the opportunity of having it will allow me all those pleasures which all the world gapes after riches to procure for them whatever
cannot hope yet will in despite of that knowledge hope and do notwithstanding all think to come to Heaven Certainly while a man goes on to sin to hope for mercy is presumtion in him and so another sin added to the rest yea 't is a disbelieving of Gods threatning an affronting him in his veracity an imputing falsehood to his menaces and a putting himself almost out of the possibility of repenting For he that do's hope for Salvation in the condition he is in hath no temtation at all to change his condition but is likely to go on confidently and hopingly to eternal perdition it were a mercy to such a person to be struck into despair that he may be taught the wretchedness of his condition and hurried out it in which as long as he does hope there 's no reason to expect that he should leave it but by becoming hopeless in it may be frighted from it and the gates of hell is the onely probable means to let that man into the way of heaven O the Christians Hope it is the hope of righteousness Gal. 5. 5. Nothing else but holiness and righteousness can give a man ground for it And certainly my Brethren it is such a Hope as would countervail the trouble and the pains of reforming our selves What will not a man undertake which he can but hope to go thro and is assur'd of a large recompence for doing and surely Heaven is worth the endeavouring after and that blessed Hope worth purifying our selves for For it was worth the death of the Son of God Christ was content to be crucified to compass it and cannot we be content to purify our selves for it Will you see what hope can perswade a man to do See Abraham to whom God promis'd onely the Land of Canaan and that not to be enjoied by himself nor by his Son but onely by the Posterity of Isaac his Son and his Promises were further off than Heaven yet after that before Isaac had any Posterity when he was but a child God commands him to go and sacrifice his Isaac and go to cut off all hopes of ever enjoying it yet against hope he believed in hope saith St Paul and he that had receiv'd the promises of God offer'd up his onely begotten Son Heb. 11. 17. i. e. having entertain'd and embrac'd the promise of a numerous seed and people that should spring from him and having no other Son but this from whom they should spring nor possibility in nature nor promise above nature that he should have any more children but a plain affirmation that this People to whom the Promises belong'd should come from Isaac yet having once truly hop'd that God would perform his promise he absolutely obei'd that command of Gods resolving to kill the Son on whom all those Promises depended And now my Brethren there is no such puzles in our Hope nor no such hard thing requir'd of us no Sons to be sacrific'd but onely a few vices no doubtful perplext promise of a Canaan onely but plain assured Heaven and then had we but the least degree of his hope as we have infinitely greater reason how would we sacrifice any thing to Christs command how would we offer up a lust and think a sin a good exchange for the hopes of Heaven and he that had this hope would certainly purify himself as he is pure It is but now the Church hath celebrated the Ascension of our Lord Christ and the great Proposal of the Angels Acts 1. 11. to all those Disciples that beheld him going up to Heaven and gaz'd after him so wishly was that they should see him come again Now the particular comfort of that coming so again is when he shall appear we shall be like him 1 John 3. 2. and the hopes of being so St John thought a sufficient motive to set every man on purifying and that himself for this lustration cannot be perform'd by Proxy and be remitted to another for even our Saviors Righteousness will not be imputed unto those who will have none besides he redeems and saves none but them whom he has sav'd from their sins Reveal O Blessed God some of thy Glory which thou hast prepar'd for them that love thee some of that blessed Hope of a Christian calling to our hearts that it may stir our desires and longings and heat them into hopes and that we having the hopes of seeing thee may purify and may escape that day of fire which shall melt the Heavens and purge those glorious bodies which are not pure in thy sight Behold O God we tremble with horror of thy dreadful Judgment The Angels are not clean in thy sight and the Seraphims cover their faces what then shall become of us vile filthy Sinners whose daily impurities have so defil'd both our souls and bodies that we are but one mass and heap of uncleaness Blessed God we know that as long as we continue such we cannot hope to see thee in mercy we know that if we repent not we shall all perish we know that if we live after the Flesh we shall die eternally we know that neither fornicators c. shall have any inheritance O let this knowledg apply it self to our hearts and consciences that the terrors of it may fright us from the vain hopes that we do cherish of being happy notwithstanding we go on in our sinful courses for alas those hopes will perish with us and that those terrors may so work on us to set upon amendment Cleanse and wash we pray thee all our impurities in the bloud of thy Son bury them in his grave never to rise hereafter and melt our hearts into repentant tears that so our hearts may become purer O thou that didst cleanse us with thy bloud baptize us with thy Holy Spirit and with fire that it may purge out our dross and filthiness and be an earnest to us of that glorious Purity which we shall have in Heaven seeing thee as thou art and becoming like thee where we shall sin no more but for ever serve and praise thee SERMON VIII OF THE HIDING PLACE From Indignation Isaiah 26. 20. Come my people enter thou into thy chambers and shut thy doors about thee hide thy self as it were for a little moment until the Indignation be overpast UPON the Eve as it were and the Vigils to the day of Indignation when we cannot but look upon it as ready to be pour'd out on us in a full stream when we see destruction make close approches to us work round about us and punishment like our sin lies at the very door ready either to enter in upon us or seize us if we offer to come out to offer at a way to prevent all this that should discover to you a safe retreat from those threats that pursue this Nation in general open a shelter from the present storm cannot chuse but be seasonable yet such a thing the Text do's venture at
as some do by their poor mean Relations but this shame will be return'd severely when the Son shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy Angels And then compare the disreputes to be asham'd of virtue because debauchees that are as far from knowing what is true repute as they are from being virtuous will think meanly of me for it or to have the Son of God in glory with all his Host of Heaven think contemtibly of me when I shall be asham'd so as to call out to the mountains and the hills to cover my confusion at the valley of Jehoshaphat before all the world Let them delight and satisfy themselves with their choice of their commendable vices sins that are in reputation rejoyce with glory in their shame But as for me I will behold thy face in Righteousness And what remains but that we take up this resolution and put on the courage of it firmly purposing to do it tho by doing so we should go against the general customs of the world To make a resolv'd open avowed profession of a good life provided that we do it without ostentation or hypocrisy is a great advantage towards living so makes it much easier For however some it may be the prime ministers of hell Satan's cheifest agents in temtations such as cannot bear that any other should be virtuous 't is such a reproch to them will the more endeavor to betray such 't is their luxury yet generally speaking most men will not offer it but rather fear them having an aw of them and will themselves avoid the doing ill before them in some measure Indeed since none can promise themselves that such will comply with them if they temt them nor think it probable that they will most men however forward in assaulting innocence will let them alone Besides that such have put themselves by having publickly profest whatever the world does they will live righteously under a necessity of avoiding all their evil practices and 't is a happy and great advantage towards a good life to be under a known obligation of well living such as they themselves have taken on them out of perfect aversation to ill actions Do not you think that most men miscarry out of want of that which resolution would be able to effect with its own strength We see in other things it does attemt it go's thro with much greater difficulties than lie in the way to virtue which is so known so every day an object of mens eyes that I should be asham'd to go about to prove it But when this resolution secondly shall be taken up and be avow'd against the open practice of the world out of a dislike and abhorrency to it when it is made eager too by aversation sharpned by much opposition and by being publickly profest and own'd as a peculiar concern since the very shame of being foil'd in the contest and proving false to ones own solemn resolution would have stings in point of honor to push it forwards for to that shrine even Atheists are contented to pay homage this must prosper unless men have a mind to be conquer'd think it easier to retreat and sordidly desert their resolutions they cannot fail Especially thirdly if men consider all this is manag'd in Gods presence to his face if they set the Lord always before them as the object and the end of all their resolutions and their actions and do this with all sincerity as seeing his eyes over them as witness and judg of their behavior and behold his face too with all hope and confidence imaginable knowing he looks over them to encourage their endeavors to behold their needs of help and to give them grace sufficient and to crown their fidelity then such resolutions cannot possibly miscarry What success soever they may have in that war which the world here that is at enmity with all that love and serve God wages with them and tho it do not onely frown on them but humble them into the dust of death yet keeping firm to their resolutions of beholding Gods face in Righteousness when they awake out of that dust after his likeness they shall be satisfied with it SERMON XII OF CHRISTS BEING LORD and GOD. John 20. 28. My Lord and my God THAT which we have seen with our eies which we have lookt upon and our hands have handled of the word of life declare we unto you saith St John Epist. 1. c. 1. v. 1. And truly these same senses did declare to Thomas the richest Article of the Christian Faith the Resurrection and helpt him to conclude that Christ was therefore Lord and God For when he had beheld Christ's hands and thrust his own hands into his side he answered and said My Lord and my God We have another sense comes in to evidence and makes the application we have this day not onely seen and handled but also tasted the Bread that is this Lord and if we have received it worthily and being become one with him we may upon our own most sure and close experience cry out My Lord and my God The Text you see answers both the Solemnities of the day The Resurrection evidenced him to be Lord and God to Thomas and so also to us and our faithful receiving him will evidence him to be our Lord and our God and in order to both these I shall handle them for there be in the words these parts 1. A Compellation given to Christ upon his appearance at his being risen Lord and God 2. The Relation of these applied My Lord and my God I shall shew 1. That the Resurrection did instal him to that title Lord. 2. Shew what that title does import 1. By way of requiring what kind of relation it hath to respect and homage 2. By way of promise what it holds out for hope Then as to a word of application I will shew how the Sacrament applies both those importances 1. How it is an assurance to perform what that title requires 2. How it does confer what the title does promise To the first that the Resurrection did install Christ to the Title Lord. As Christ was God he had indeed all Power and Autority from everlasting that comes not under our consideration But as he was the person sent and commissioned by God to bring mankind to Salvation he was first to die for them then to rule over them and first to be their Priest and then their Lord. After his crucifying when he was risen again then he says All power is given to me both in heaven and earth Matt. 28. 18. or in more express words Acts 2. 36. Let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that fame Jesus whom they have crucified both Lord and Christ. His Cross was a step to his Throne it merited that Autority for him and was in part undertaken for it Phil. 2. 8 9. And then for the importance of this Title as to that
brings him more care and more parsimony and by consequence more want Now is there any thing that is like this in those others who pretend to aim at Heaven and the Blessedness that God is happy in Nay do they mind it cordially when they stand before him in his house in order to it Or is their heart upon it there while they are praying for it Whenever we discern religious performances are uneasy or unpleasing to us we may then assure our selves the mind is not intent upon the end of them For 't is impossible he should not busy concern himself extremely in the things that his affections are engag'd in which possess him mainly and which are his treasure But 't is as when God askt the question by the Prophet Jeremy c. 2. 32. Can a maid forget her ornaments or a bride her attire Yet my people have forgotten me days without number He asks a gentler question by the Prophet Isaiah c. 49. 15. Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not remember the fruit of her womb There is some object for an heart that it should mind and pour out it self in tenderness to that dear part of its own breast and bowels it is no wonder if it be not with so sensible affection set on any of those remoter objects such as God and Salvation in Heaven but that they should be less considerable than attire the Robe of Immortality not so much minded as a dress that to be gay should challenge morning hours and cares but to be blessed scarce engage a praier wish or thought is sad The truth is such is man's corruption that there is scarce any inclination left in nature that desires or is indeed content to be upon the way to Life Eternal Before any thing can be don for man he must be made willing not to destroy himself for St Paul tells us 't is God that by his power worketh in us both to will and to do We must not onely be oblig'd by duty not to neglect and forsake our own mercies but we must be wrought and made contented to receive them all God's arts and methods us'd the terrors of the Lord and the promises of Heaven and the strivings of the Holy Spirit and the power of Grace emploied to work in us to will for it is God that worketh in us to will In this the men of this World have especial advantages over the generality of Christians that they mind and are intent upon their aim For the mere being so engages them to the observance of that Rule of Prudence which above all others is to regulate the counsels and the actions of all men in order to their several ends if they mean to act wisely in relation to them which is this namely to be true to their own ends still observing their main point I say not they should never look off from it mind no other secondarily they must do that For as in the wise Government of Nations Princes must take care not onely that their Subjects live in Godliness and honesty and keep all the Laws but that they may live as St Paul says peaceable and quiet lives secure as far as may be from the danger of their Enimies abroad or at home in all tranquillity and plenty and the like in Oeconomical and Military Wisdom So in Christian Prudence we are so to look at everlasting life hereafter as not to neglect this here but may contrive for the conveniences of this life to avoid what may be dangerous or incommode us provided we do nothing that 's against the other So St Paul was wise when both the Sadduces and Pharisees conspir'd against his life to break that their confederacy by throwing in the question of the Resurrection of the dead which was certain to divide them since the thing he said was true and consequently since the means he us'd did not at all clash with his higher purposes the Rule thus signifying that wise men in order to whatever end their wisdom lies must still be true to their own end be careful to do nothing that may take them off from or oppose their main aim for that were to destroy their own design and must be certain never to avoid whatever tends most to attain their purposes Accordingly the Children of this World are us'd to stick at nothing that is likely to advance their ends This was the case expresly of the Text and thereupon our Savior pronounces they are wiser The unjust Stewards aim was to provide what should maintain him and his ease and reputation the remainder of his life a comfortable plentiful subsistence when his office should be taken from him and discerning no way to this but to cheat his Master and engage his Master's debtors in the wrong too making them as false and wicked as himself regards not the injustice but pursues his mark And so the Child of Light so far as he is wise in order to his aim the price of his high calling looks directly forward to it If he cannot at once do his duty in relation to his great end life eternal and take care of the conveniences of this life he will not for these let go the other never will look after these but when and so far as they will consist does not turn aside to any other ends that thwart that is neither byass'd from his mark by any flattering considerations of whatever this World temts with nor is forc'd from it by terrors or whatever sufferings We have great instances of this in the second book of Maccabees the seventh chapter the Mother and her seven Sons who looking to obtain a blessed resurrection as St Paul saith Heb. 11. 35. did in order to it resolve to die under God's Covenant of everlasting Life would not therefore accept life here and deliverance from most cruel torments on condition to transgress the Laws Thus the three wise men in Dan. 3. 17 18. told Nebuchadnezzar Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace and he will deliver us out of thine hand But if not be it known unto thee that we will not serve thy Gods nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up Thus Eleazar 2 Macc. 6. from v. 19. chose to die gloriously rather than to live stain'd with an abomination as it behov'd them that are resolute to stand out against such things as are not lawful to be tasted tho the penalty propos'd were loss of life and tho the Officers that were his friends besought him to bring flesh of his own provision such as was lawful for him to use and make as if he did eat of the flesh taken from the Sacrifice he began to consider discreetly and as became his age and his most honest Education from a child or rather the holy Law made and given by God Therefore he willed them straitways to send him to the grave v. 24 25. For it becometh
to this rencounter of the object of its strong affections no rest but in the labors that work towards it no calm but in those violences And much of this there must be in Religion where the heart is set upon the hopes of it on heaven He must be eager in it as the covetous is on his gains the proud man on his pomps the pleasurist on his sports the Epicure on his excesses It is not possible a man should have no heart to that on which his heart is set He therefore that hath set his heart on heaven must be religious and holy and so it is concluded that the liberal-minded must needs be so The progress of which proof is this he whose heart is in heaven his conversation will be there his life will be Christian and holy he whose treasure is in heaven his heart is in heaven he that hath taken off his heart from the world and out of liberality of heart gives alms he laies his treasure up in heaven and then it is concluded that he is religious And this now may apply it self without my help to press it to you Ah my Brethren chuse and strive towards a vertue that will help you to all the rest that will calm and moderate your affections to this world and the dying follies of it and that will draw your hearts to heaven and set them on the world to come Who would not labor for one disposition of mind that comes with such a train of pieties that hath all Christianity in its attendance and brings all into the soul with it Who would not give alms if by doing so he give himself a shole of vertue to whom is this man bountiful but to himself indeed Here is a ground for men to beg after the fashion of Lombardy Be good to your self Sir and bestow an alms upon me for he indeed is good unto himself who what he gives laies up in heaven as a treasure for eternity and at the same time entertains the disposition to all piety in his heart receives all vertue into him I sahll not need to call in accessory proofs fetch in auxiliary motives tell you that works of charity are called good works in Scripture and the liberal man good So Rom. 5. 7. the good man signifies and Tit. 2. 5. where the women are commanded to be good it is merciful so works of mercy are call'd good works Acts. 9. 36. doing good Matt. 12. 12. Heb. 13. 16. good fruits James 3. 17. So to work good signifies Gal. 6. 9. and every good work 2 Cor. 9. 8. is works of mercy as if he did engross all goodness and that same vertue did fulfil the title Nay I tell you more that the merciful man and the perfect man are but two words for the same person Matt. 5. 48. Luke 6. 36. all Christianity is so sure appendant to this disposition of the heart when it is in the soul I tell you not when it is now and then in the actions that this alone is perfectness 't is entire lacking nothing And then here is a clear account why at the last great trial nothing should come upon account but charity that is the only thing the Judg takes cognizance of at the day of final doom When I was hungry ye gave me meat the words of everlasting Judgment pass only in relation to this nothing but charity do's come into that sentence for all the rest is implied in this and where the heart is liberal the whole life will be Christian this is an evidence will pass at God's Assise stand before the Searcher of the heart and reins And therefore it may well be a sign to us and make proof that this grace in the heart bounty of mind is a great evidence of a truly Christian heart the second Proposition Blessed Savior thou that wert all bounty to us that didst emty thy self to enrich us and didst chuse rather to die thy self than not relieve us when we were sick to everlasting death give us grace to be like-minded shed into our hearts this disposition of soul that will make us so remember thee a disposition that will make our affections even and moderate to things of this earth which by teaching us to part with wealth contentedly will work us out of the world and teach us not to be enamoured on the advantages of wealth not to be passionate for pomps or pleasures or for any superfluities which wealth procures which will set our hearts in heaven and lay up treasures for us there which if it rob us of the pomps and the magnificences of this world will give us for them pomps of piety the whole train of vertues a long attendance of graces if it deprives us of some heights or some excess of pleasures it will recompence with the satisfactions of relieving Christ in his members here and reigning with him hereafter in Kingdom SERMON XXII THE LIGHT OF THE BODY is the Eye Matt. 6. 22 23. The light of the body is the eye if therefore thy eye be single thy whole body shall be full of light But if thine eye be evill thy whole body shall be full of darkness If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness PHILOSOPHY do's say that all vertues are so annext and tied together that it is not possible for any man to have any one truly and compleat but he must needs have all they are like pearls upon the necklace from which if any violence pull one the string is broke and all are shatter'd and disorder'd And S. James saith c. 2. 10. Whosoever shall offend in one point is guilty of all and sure the vertue of the Text makes good both these Positions if liberality of heart be that one point he that excludes it from his Soul shuts out the rest at once All the graces are as train to that leading vertue are its such close attendants that they must needs have the same fate and either dwell together in the heart or all together be thrust thence for if thine eie be single thy whole body shall be full of light but if thine eie be evil thy whole body shall be full of darkness An envious discontent uncharitable mind makes the whole life un-Christian and he that do's offend in that one point must needs be guilty of all and if Charity that bond of perfectness in S. Paul that tie of graces that do's unite them to it self and with each other if that be there all graces must be there and liberality of heart makes the life Christian for if thine eie be single thy whole body shall be full of light But I am now to shew you that bounty in the heart is a great Sign of a true Christian heart that that person who not out of easiness or modesty of constitution not knowing how to deny when he is askt nor out of inconsideration or vanity bestows an alms or else when importunities
them use to pursue them as far as they are able and set no bounds to themselves but those of possibility will not be limited in their prosecutions by considerations of a vertue as this man's are and therefore he is too strong for these temtations and so hath overcome the world And now if we consider the advantages of this conquest either in gross it is a victory over such Enemies as were in Christ's opinion almost invincible such as did so block up all passages and avenues to blessedness that he affirms and repetes it is impossible for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Let men think what they will of those occasions of sin which their dislikes of a low condition or of poverty makes them believe it do's abound with but I tell you there are such ineluctable temtations to vice in an estate of plenty as that without a greater measure of God's grace than is sufficient for any other state of life a man will never overcome them It is so insuperable a temtation to have that which will furnish him with all his heart or lust can wish for to have every thing that is in his desires put into his power and so impossible to part with that which serves all his inclinations when God calls for it as he do's when we cannot at once keep the estate and obey Christ which was the occasion of our Savior's words and wealth it do's so sawce and invite every vice it do's so dress objects for lust and feed with those full plenties that heat men into it and strengthen for it do's so pour in provocatives by idleness and excesses it do's so fill with insolence or pride or ostentation and vain glory it do's so swell and so puff up with heights and scorns makes men contemn others and oppress them think any thing almost is lawful in their usage of them yea become careless of Religion and by degrees contemn it too wax insolent with God scoffers at piety rude in profaness any thing forsooth they may do and a whole shole of other such like qualities are the almost certain appendages of men in estate at least in some degree In a word it takes off the heart quite from the Love of God and those things that relate to him it fixes them so to these worldly satisfactions yea when it comes to such a pinch that a man must either wound his conscience do some great deliberate sin or part with this so forsooth happy utensil his estate break with all the duty in the world rather than part with that which furnisheth him with such convenience of sins that 't is no wonder if it be impossible for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven And then for a man to have overcome the General of this great Army of ruinous vices the only leader that can draw them up against him to have cut off the source that feeds this inundation of mischeifs these overflowings of ungodliness from the heart is a good strong evidence to a man's heart that he is well resolv'd against the vices when that he do's resolvedly deprive himself of the instrument of them the thing that do's advance them and hath perfectly divorc'd from them he needs not doubt but that if it please God to bring him to straits that he shall rather be content to part with a good portion of his estate than part with a good conscience who is content to give away good part of his estate merely to exercise a vertue in obedience to God He will give it if Christ call for it who gives it if the poor call for it He is well secur'd from feeding pride excesses and the other sins of fulness with his plenty who gives all superfluities away to feed the hungry his wealth is otherwise emploied than in ministring to vice and however 't is certain his heart is taken off from the sins that are occasioned by riches who heartily gives away the occasion of those sins and tho the gate of Heaven be as strait as any needle's eie yet this wealthy Man this Camel in one sense of the word as it do's signify a cable rope when his wealth is divided thus and scattered when the rope is separated into little threads then it will go thro the straitest needle's eie and this rich man enter inter into the Kingdom of Heaven And here were argument enough for the triumphs of comfort to an heart that can discern this sign of his Election this fruit of the Holy Spirit this instance of like-mindedness to Christ this assurance of his conquest over that same Enemy which is the Fleshes auxiliary and the Devil's instrument without which neither of them could much prevail upon us for they do it by the aids the World do's bring by the temtations and the baits which it do's minister A consequent fit for Christ to glory in I have overcome the World saith he Matt. 16. 33. and truly if any man the religiously sincerely bountiful man hath don so to a great degree He hath unglued his heart from it they part with ease you see how he distributes it and throws it from him and this is sure incouragement enough to set you upon searching whether you can find this Evidence within you if it were not a certain sign also of more things a sign of particular evidences and effects of having overcome the world For first it is a sign of a perfect contentedness in ones condition for apparently he is not unsatisfied with what he hath who not only is content but who contrives to have less and gives away good part of what he hath He cannot be discontented that he hath no more than he hath who is resolved not to have so much but searches for occasions to distribute what he hath And if this be an infallible sign of a contented mind still I speak of the liberal heart not only of a scattering hand it is an evidence of the greatest happiness in this world for God hath prescribed one certain remedy for all the evils in the world a contented heart This is the only aim of all the arts and all the plenties of the world it is for this alone men dig the mines of treasures search the whole circuit of delights run thro the hurry of an universe of pleasures wherein God knows they seldom find it but all intend only content Whether they would be great or rich or be luxurious or every thing it is because they seek content in these things which he that hath in whatsoever state he be he hath the scope the price of all the treasures in the world he hath the sum and comprehension of its felicities which therefore the liberal heart hath the sure sign of yea in this he hath the certain evidence of S. Pauls temper that he so much exults in Phil. 4. 11 12 13. I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content I know both how
let their strictnesses take in some temporal aim besides as Reputation with their Party or getting Praise or Wealth they serve Mammon or Fame with Gods Religion and make the very Worship of the Lord be the Idolatry of Covetousness or of Honour If Jehu in his Executions on Ahab and his Family intend the cutting off the Regal Line as well as Baals worship and with their Blood to purple his own Royalty though God did bid him shed that blood yet does it stain his Soul with crimson guilt and God will punish him for his Obedience I will visit the blood of Jezreel upon the House of Jehu Hos. i. 4. But he that lets a vicious aim mix with his Vertue and does good to an ill end addresses Gods Religion to the Devil and makes Christ minister to Belial he does sin multipliedly both in his vicious intention and in debauching Vertue to serve Vice and he might much more innocently not have been Pious Neither is that Vertue or Heart sincere whose intentions are not purely and meerly vertuous but intend to compass some Religious end by means that are not lawful For such intentions are not clean but mixt with Vice and 't is sure I cannot please God with such kind of holy meanings If Saul will sacrifice with the Sheep and Oxen he was bid to destroy his very worship loseth him the Throne of Israel Nor an I serve God with such Pieties God never does require an action which he sees I cannot compass without sin for he requires no man to sin for that were to command me to break his Commands and I were bound to disobey him in obedience to him Shall I speak wickedly for God saith Job and then shall I do so Such Religious intentions the justice of those ends will never qualifie me for Gods goodness when it but makes Damnation just to me for so S. Paul affirms Rom. iii. 5 6 7 8. In fine if there be any wickedness in the heart it gives so foul a tincture to whatever pious actions we perform that they become sin to us 'T is true Prayer is as the Incense David says and the lifting up of our hands is like the Evening Sacrifice but if the heart of him that Prays have any heats of Malice in it truly that man does light his Incense with strange fire kindles his sacrifice with the flames of Hell for so S. James does call those heats He that gives God any of his performances and hath a naughty Heart like Nadab and Abihu he presents his Offering in an unhallowed Censer and all his holy worship will get nothing else from Heaven for him but a consuming fire as theirs did He that will offer any thing to God must take a care it be not tainted with such mixtures which spoil all the Religion making it not sincere and also spoil the Heart by making it not clean and undefiled The last remaining sense A Clean and undefiled Heart Of those things which our Saviour says defile the man some are meerly sins of the Heart such as may be consummated within the Soul and for the perpetration of which a spirit is sufficient to it self such are Pride especially spiritual pride the sin of those that think none holy as themselves and cast the black doom of Reprobation upon all that do not comply with their Opinions and interests such also are uncontentedness with our estates inward repinings at the dispositions of Providence concerning us black malice bitter envyings Now in these as the mind does need no outward members to consummate them requires no accessary Organs to work them out so neither does it require any outward accessary guilt to make them liable to condemnation we know 't was one sin of the spirit onely that made Angels Devils If a foul body be abominable to the Lord shall a foul spirit be less odious he that defiles his Soul offends God in a much nearer concern of his because that speaks nearer relation to him than the Body this was only his workmanship made out of Earth the Spirit was created out of himself a foul body is but filthy Clay but he that does pollute his Soul does putresie the Breath of God and stains a beam of the Divinity The other sort of things that are said to come from the Heart and to Defile are those which S. Paul calls works of the Flesh such as if they be committed must be committed outwardly Murders Drunkenness Revellings Revenge Wrath and Contentions Seditions Factions Schisms all Vncleannesses c. In these indeed the Heart can be but partial Actor the utmost it can do is to desire and to intend them and to contrive and manage the designs of compassing them which yet Providence or the Innocence of others may put out of the reach of mans power or his own temporal fears may make him not dare to set upon them though he do cherish the desires Now if they be obstructed from committing most men use to conclude gently of their guilts while they do keep within the Heart the Execution of them is the onely thing that does look mortal and till the sin be perfected there is no death in it And truly I confess that as it happens many times on a sudden surprize of soul when a bright gilded temptation strikes the heart and dazles the mind we see that the Will rushes on it instantly consents and wishes heartily yet within a while the Spirit does recover out of the surprize puts by the thrusts of fancy and the stabs of the temptation and that Will languishes and dies like a velleity as if it had been nothing but a woulding and now the man would not by any means consent to the commission In this case though there be a guilt to be repented of and cleansed with many tears yet this is Innocence in the comparison but if the Will purpose contrive and do its utmost it is the same to the man as if he had committed 'T were easie to demonstrate this that whatsoever evil thing a man intends and does fixedly resolve he is guilty of though he do nothing or though the thing he chance to do be never so much lawful Those sayings of St. Paul I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus that there is no meat unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing unclean to him it is unclean Rom. xiv 14. and he that doubteth is damned if he eat ver 23. These could have no truth in them unless the heart by choosing and pursuing to the utmost any thing that it does judg unlawful incurr'd the guilt of that unlawfulness even to Damnation and all that meerly by it self without the Action which in that case had nothing sinful in it A weight that is upheld by a mans hand and otherwise would rush down to the earth does surely gravitate as much it is as heavy though it do not fall quite down as if it did and were it let alone
Bones Psal. Cix 17 18 19. And truly amongst those things which we did Curse there are that will fulfill all that most literally the Riots of thy gaudy bravery that make thee gripe extort spend thy own Wealth and other mens undo thy self and Creditors be sordid and in Debt meerly to furnish trappings to dress thy self for others eyes and may be sins these bring a Curse to cover thee as does thy Garment yea and they gird it to thee The draughts of thy Intemperance carry the malediction down into the Bowels like Water yea like the Wine into the very Spirits There is another of them too that will conveigh the Curse like Oil into the Bones till it eat out the marrow and leave nothing but it self to dwell within them yea till it putrefie the Bones till it prevent the Grave and Judgment too while the living Sinner invades the rottenness of the one and torments of the other and then the Lents and abstinencies that the sin prescribes shall be observed exactly onely to qualifie them for more sin and condemnation may be at the best but to recover them from what it hath inflicted when â—et alas they are too soft and tender the Lord knows to endure any â—rities to work out their Repentance and Atonement and yet sure â—se the Sinner does go through have nothing to commend them which these others do not much more abound with If those are not grievous to thee because they are so wholesom and though it be a miserable thing to go through all their painful squalid methods yet how disgustful soever by the benefit of their Cure they excuse their offensiveness and ingratiate the present injury they do the Flesh by the succeeding health they help thee to and by the Death they do secure thee from Why sure to omit that the other have all these advantages none have so calm and so establish'd health as the abstemious and continent and their mind is still serene their temper never clouded but besides this the Christians bitter Potions do purge away that sickness that would end in Death eternal his fastings starve that worm that otherwise would gnaw the Soul immortally his weepings quench the everlasting burnings yea there is chearful Pleasure in the midst of these severities when God breaks in in Comforts into them The Glory of the Lord appears in that Cloud too that is upon the penitent sad heart when he is drench'd in tears the Holy Ghost the Comforter does move upon those waters and breaths Life and Salvation into them and he who is the Vnction pours Oil into those wounds of the Spirit and we are never nearer Heaven than when we are thus prostrate in the lowest dust and when our Belly cleaveth unto the ground in humble penitence then we are at the very Throne of Grace And this our light afflicting of the Soul which is but for a moment does work for us a far more exceeding weight of Glory To which c. The Fourth SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL October 12. 1662. JOHN XV. 14. Ye are my Friends if ye do whatsoever I Command you THE words are a conditional Assertion of Christ's concerning his Apostles and in them all Christians And they do easily divide themselves into two parts The First is a positive part wherein there is a state of great and Blessed advantage which they are declared to be in present possession of In these words Ye are my Friends In which there are two things that make up that advantage 1. A Relation 2. The Person related to Friends and My Friends The Second is a Conditional part wherein there are the terms upon which that Possession is made over and which preserve the Right and Title to them in these words If ye do whatsoever I command you in which there are two things required as Conditions I. Obedience If ye do what I command you II. That Obedience Universal If ye do whatsoever I command you The first thing that offers it self to our consideration is the Relation Friends It is a known common-place Truth that a Friend is the most useful thing that is in whatsoever state we are It is the Soul of life and of content If I be in prosperity We know abundance not enjoy'd is but like Jewels in the Cabinet useless while they are there It is indeed nothing but the opinion of Prosperity But 't is not possible to enjoy abundance otherwise than by communicating it a man possesseth plenty onely in his Friends and hath fruition of it meerly by bestowing it If I be in adversity to have a person whom I may intrust a trouble to whose bosom is as open and as faithful to me as 't is to his own thoughts to which I may commit a swelling secret this is in a good measure to unlade and to pour out my sorrow from me thus I divide my grievances which would be insupportable if I did not disburthen my self of some part of them Now there is no bosom so safe as that where friendship lodges take Gods Opinion in the case Deut. xiii 6. If thy Brother the Son of thy Mother or thy Son or thy Daughter or the Wife of thy bosom or thy Friend that is as thine own Soul This is the highest step in the Gradation And there is all the reason in the World for though Parent and Child are as near one to other as any thing can be to part of it self Husband and Wife are but two different names of the same one yet these may become bitter and unkind A Parent may grow cross or a Child refractory a Mother may be like the Ostrich in the Wilderness throw off her bowels with her burthen and an ungracious Son is constant pangs and travail to his Mother his whole life gives her after-throws which are most deadly Dislikes also may rest within the Marriage-Bed and lay their heads upon two wedded Pillows but none of these unkindnesses can untie the Relation that ends not where the bitterness begins he is a Parent still though froward and a Child though stubborn but a true Friend can be nothing but kind it does include a dearness in its essence which is so inseparable from it that they begin and end together A man may be an Husband without loving but cannot be a lover that is a Friend without loving And sure to have no one Friend in this Life no one that is concerned in any of my interests or me my self none that hath any cares or so much as good wishes for me is a state of a most uncomfortable prospect The Plague that keeps Friends at a distance from me while I live out of the sphere of my infection and after gives me Death hath yet less of Malignity than this that leaves me the Compassions the Prayers all the solitary Comforts all indeed but the outward entertainments of my Friends that though it shut the Door against all company yet puts a Lord have Mercy on the Door But this
Miracles but to assist our Worldliness Ambitions and Lusts to be our opportunities of Vice and provocation of him And being thus affronted and refused his Enemy preferr'd not this God but Barrabas any the vilest thing for Friend rather than Christ must he not needs be more our Enemy than heretofore And if he be that question will concern us Are we stronger than God It should behove us not to fall out with him till we are See how he does prepare himself for the Encounter Wisd. v. Taking his Jealousie for Armour putting on Justice severe and vindicative Justice as a Breastplate and his Wrath sharpening as a Sword and arming all the Creatures for Auxiliaries Alas when Omnipotence does express it self as scarcely strong enough for Execution but Almightiness will be armed also for Vengeance will assume Weapons call in Aids for fury who shall stand it Will our Friends think you keep it off us and secure us did we consider how uneasie God accounts himself till he begin the Storm while he keeps off his Plagues from overrunning such a Land we would expect them every moment and they must come Ah says he I will ease me of mine Adversaries and avenge me of mine Enemies and then in what condition are we if God can have no ease but in our ruine if he does hunger and thirst after it go to his Vengeance as to a Feast And if you read the 25th Chapter of Isaiah you will find there a rich Bill of Fare which his Revenge upon his Enemies does make view the sixth Verse He that enjoys his morsels that lays out his Contrivances and studies on his Dishes so as if he meant to cram his Soul let him know what delight soever he finds when he hath spoiled the Elements of their Inhabitants to furnish his own Belly and not content with Natures Delicacies neither hath given them forc'd Fatnesses changing the very flesh into a marrow suppling the Bones almost into that Oyl that they were made to keep all â—his delight the Lord by his expressions does seem to take in his dread Executions on his Enemies a sinful People And if the vicious Friendships of the World have so much more attractive than Christ's love and favour and the happy consequences of it as to counterpoise all the danger of such enmity you may joyn hands with them But if His be the safer and more advantageous then hearken to his Propositions and beseechings for He does beg it of you As he treated this reconciliation in his Blood so he does in Petitions too For saith S. Paul We are Ambassadours for Christ as if God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christ's stead Be you reconciled and then be Generous towards your GOD and Saviour and having brought him as it were upon his knees reduc'd him to entreaties be friends and condescend to him and your own Happiness If He be for you take no care then who can be against you His Friendship will secure you not onely from your Enemies but from Hostility it self for when a man's ways please the Lord he will make even his Enemies to be at peace with him Prov. xvi 7. He will reconcile all but Vices And afterwards see what a blessed throng of Friends we shall be all initiated into Heb. xii 23. To an innumerable company of Angels to the general Assembly and Church of the First-born that are written in Heaven to God the Judg of all and to the Spirits of Just men made perfect and to Jesus the Mediatour of the new Covenant c. And of this blest Corona we our selves shall be a noble and a glorious part inflamed all with that mutual love that kindles Seraphims and that streams out into an heavenly glory filling that Region of immortal love and blessedness and being Friends that is made one with Father Son and Holy Ghost that Trinity of Love we shall enjoy what we do now desire to ascribe to them All Honour Glory Power Majesty and Dominion for evermore Amen The Fifth SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL Third Wednesday in LENT EZECH XXXIII 11. Why will ye Dye THE Words are part of a Debate which God had with the sinful House of Israel in which there are three things offer themselves to be considered First The Sinners Fate and Choice He will Die That 's his End yea 't is his Resolution he will die Secondly Gods inquiry for the Ground of this he seems astonished at the Resolution and therefore reasons with them about this their so mad choice and questions Why will ye dye Which words are also Thirdly The debate of his Affections the reasoning of his Bowels and a most passionate Expostulation with them on account of that their Resolution Why will ye dye which as it is addrest by God directly to the House of Israel so it would fit a Nation perverse as that which mutinies against Miracles and Mercies is false to God Religion and their own Interests led by a Spirit of giddiness and frenzy unsteddy in all things but resolutions of Ruine that would tear open their old Wounds to let out Life and they will dye And though the Lord be pleased to work new prodigies of mercy for us and to say unto us in despite of all our Enemies both Forein and Domestick Live The use we make of all is onely to debauch the Miracles and make Gods Mercies help to fill the measure of our Judgments live as if we would try all the ways to Ruine and since God will thus deliver us from dangers we would call for them some other way But to prescribe to these is above the attempt of my endeavours May the blessed Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding the Spirit of Holiness and Peace and Order breath on their Counsels whom this is committed to I shall bend my Discourse to the Conviction of Sinners in particular and treat upon the words as if they had been spoke to us under the Gospel The first thing which my Text and God supposeth is the Sinners Fate and Choice He will dye Even the second Death for it is appointed for all men once to dye and then cometh the Judgment which shall sentence him to another death that is immortal in which he and his misery must live for ever that is he must die everlastingly Such is first his Fate That Sin and Death are of so near so complicated a relation as that though they were Twins the birth and Issue of one Womb and moment yet they are also one anothers Off-spring and beget each other while Sin bringeth forth Death as S. James saith and is the Parent of Perdition and yet the Man of Sin is the Son of Perdition as S. Paul saith and Iniquity is but destruction's birth onely itself derived And that this Death and Perdition is Eternal in the most sad sense of the word there are a thousand Texts that say This is the Message of God in the mouth and Blood
own Indictment yea and his own Sentence too for our own heart condemns us saith S. John And when ever it does so Oh that we would follow it through all the gradations that brought Christ to Death and use our wickedness as he was us'd strip it from its Cloaths bare it from its fair pretexts it useth to be dress'd in Lay our anger naked from all those excuses which our provocations that either wrath or humour will be sure to think intolerable do make for it strip our Pride and Vanity from those paints and dresses which the Custom of the Age that does require and warrant strange things dawbs the sin with use our Luxuries and Intemperances so and the other greater and more thirsty dropsie that of Wealth and of unjust unworthy gains which there are richer Luxuries in too And there are none of these but have their pleas their colours which they set themselves out in to please the Appetite and to deceive the Mind all which we must strip off and then when we have laid them naked spit upon them vomit all our spleen and contumelious despite at that which hath made us so ugly in Gods sight scourge it with Austerities and buffet it as they did Christ and S. Paul did himself 1 Cor. xvi 27. And when the Body of Sin is thus tamed and weakened it will be easie then to lead it out and crucifie it A Crucifiction this that does make our Good-Friday be a day of Expiation and Atonement to us A sight which next to that of his own Son upon the Cross is the most acceptable to the Lord when he does see us execute his Enemies although they be our selves and Crucifie the dear Affections of our bosom as God did This is indeed to be conform'd unto the death of Christ. If I might have leave to go before you and to let you into the Example draw the Curtain from before the Passion I would call my Sins out drag them to behold that Prospect hale them into the Garden shew them how he was us'd there You my Extravagancies of my youth my mad follies and wild jollities come see my Saviour yonder how he swoons when guilt began to make approaches towards him and can I make my self merry with nothing else but that which made him die tickle chear and heighten my self with Agonies You my intemperate Draughts my full Bowls and the riotous Evenings I have past look yonder what a sad night do these make Christ pass look what a Cup he holds which makes him fall lower to deprecate than ever my Excesses made me lie You my lazy Luxuries Fulness of Bread and Idleness whereby I have controul'd Gods Curse and onely in the Sweat of others Faces eat my Bread and in that dew drank up the Spirits of those multitudes that toil to faintings to maintain my dissolute life see how he is forc'd to bear the whole Curse for me how the Thorns grow on his head and how he Sweats all over You my supine Devotions which do scarce afford my God a knee and less an heart not when I am deprecating an Eternity of all those Torments which kill'd Christ look yonder how he prays behold him on his Face petitioning see there how he sweats and begs You my little Malices and my vexatious Anger 's that are hot and quick as Fire it self and that do fly as high too that are up at Heaven strait for the least wrong on Earth look how he bears his how his patience seems wounded onely in a wound that fell upon his Persecutors and when one that came to apprehend him wrongfully was hurt as if the Sword of his defence had injur'd him he threatned and for ever curs'd the black deeds of that angry Weapon and made restitution of what he had not taken made his Adversary whole whom he had not hurt See how with his cruel Judges he is as a Sheep that not before his shearers onely but before his Butcher too is dumb You my Scorns and my high Stomach that will take no satisfaction but Blood and Soul for the faults of inadvertency for such as not the wrong but humour makes offences lookhow they use him they buffet and revile and spit upon him Ye my dreadful Oaths and bitter imprecations which I use to lace my speeches with or belch out against any one that does offend me in the least making the Wounds and Blood of God and other such sad words either my foolish modes of speaking or the spittings of my peevishness There you may see what 't is I play with so you may behold the Life of Christ pouring out at those Wounds which I speak so idly of and what I mingle with my sportive talk is Agony such as they that beheld afar off struck their breasts at and to see them onely was a Passion Ye my Atheisms and my Irreligion but alas you have no prospect yonder it 's but faint before you who out-do the Example whatsoever Judas and the rest did to the Man Christ Jesus you attempt on God you invade Heaven Sentence Cruicifie Divinity it self And now having shewed my Sins this Copy of themselves what they are in their own demerits when my bowels do begin to turn within me at that miserable usage which Christ underwent it will be a time to execute an act of Indignation at my self who have resetted in my bosom all these Traytors to my Saviour made those things the joy and entertainment of my life which had their hands in the Blood of my God and what a stupid sensless Soul have I that was never troubled heartily at that which did make him almost out of hope and if this be the effect of sin then it is time for me to throw it off O my Jesu sure I am I am not able to support the weight of that thou didst sink under Thou didst come to bear our sins in thy own Body on the Tree therefore in thy Body they were nailed to the Cross and then certainly I will not force and tear them thence No there I leave them and will never re-assume them more which resolution is the effect of that vertue and efficacy which is in the Cross of Christ to the crucifying of sin which is the second sense in which the Christian does profess with S. Paul I am Crucified with Christ. There are some Learned Men that when they would assign reasons sufficient to move God to lay the punishment of our iniquities upon his Son and execute that Indignation that was due to us on the most innocent most Holy Jesus give this onely that this was the highest and most signal way imaginable to discover Gods most infinite displeasure against Sin and by consequence to terrifie men from the practice of it For if any thing in Heaven or in Earth could make us fear and from henceforth commit no such evil it was surely this to see Sin sporting in the Agonies of Christ Iniquity
very place where God himself enjoyn'd the Law and all the Blessings of it to be publish'd to the People on Mount Gerizim which therefore seem to have pretences to vye with Mount Zion for there also the Lord commanded the Blessing An Altar too saith Benjamin in his Itinerary made of the same stones that God commanded to be taken out of Jordan and set up for a memorial of his Peoples passage through it And besides all this having the Law of Moses too when they had all these pretensions to the God of Israel they clave to him alone and wholly threw off their Idolatry So Epiphanius does affirm expresly And their Countrey being as Josephus says the receptacle of all discontented fugitive Jews a great part of it too planted with them by Alexander they espoused the Worship of the Jews and came to differ very little either in the Doctrine or the practice of Religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having all things as it were the very same the only distance seems to be betwixt their Temples 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 just as the Woman states it to our Saviour Joh. iv Our Fathers Worshipped in this Mountain but ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to Worship So that if we audit the account of the Samaritan guilt they separated from the place of Worship which God had appointed and set up another in a word they were Schismaticks Whether this be such a guilt as should make those terms equivalent He is a Samaritan and hath a Devil I shall not say but it is such as makes our Saviour say somewhat exclusively Salvation is of the Jews All the Blessings and Salvations of the Law did indeed hover on Mount Gerizim were given thence that was the place of them but they were cut away when Schism came The Church is not a place of blessing when 't is built against the Church The Altar hath no Horns to lay hold on for refuge but to push and gore onely when it is set up against the Altar And Gerizim is Ebal when it stands in competition with Mount Zion Well this onely thing does breed the greatest distances imaginable in the Nations nothing more divides than Separation and Schism and then these Samaritans as all Separatists do grew such Opiniastres and so violent in their way as to deny humanity to those that would not join with them they would not grant the Civilities of Passage to one that intended for Jerusalem to Worship They refuse it to our Saviour here because his Face was thitherward ver 53. A Schismatick will reject a Christ if his Face be fromward their new Establishment if he but look towards the Antient Worship At this the Sons of Zebedee are offended zealous for their Master as being most particularly concern'd in him two of his nearest intimates and their zeal would needs break out into flame And why not a rudeness to Elijah was reveng'd by him with Fire from Heaven which consumed twice fifty Soldiers and their Captains though they came to do the King's Command And shall these hated Schismaticks be rude to Thee and reject the Messiah and yet go unpunished Lord shall we command fire to come down from Heaven to consume them even as Elias did Which our Saviour answers with this sharp rebuke Ye know not what manner of Spirit ye are of Not to divide but to explain my Text and so instead of parts present you with some Subjects of Discourse By Spirit here is meant that disposition and complexure of Christian Piety and Vertues that course and Method of Religion which the Spirit does prescribe to Christ's Disciples and does guide them in or in a word the temper of the Gospel is so called And this in opposition to the Law the difference of these being express'd by a diverse manner of Spirit the one is called Spirit of Bondage the other Spirit of Adoption so here Ye know not of what Spirit ye are ye do not judg aright if you believe the temper of the Gospel is like that of the Law The course that I prescribe to my Disciples differs much from that of Prophets under the Old Testament you must be guided by another Spirit than Elijah's was in calling for Fire if my Spirit dwell in you For I came not to destroy mens lives on any such account In this sense it affords these Propositions First To destroy Mens lives or other temporal rights on this account meerly because they are Apostates Schismaticks or otherwise reject the true Religion or Christ himself is inconsistent with the temper of the Gospel This is that which Christ reproves here telling them that would do so Ye know not what manner of Spirit ye are of Secondly Because the Spirit of Elias which the Gospel Christian Spirit here is set in opposition to oppos'd the Magistrate destroy'd those that came commission'd from the Prince and Christ designedly does say ye must not do now what Elias did therefore to attempt upon or against the Magistrate on the account of Christ or of Religion is inconsistent with the Spirit of the Gospel First Of the first that to destroy mens lives c. But here I must observe that since these fiery Disciples that did give occasion for our Saviours rebuke here were no Magistrates nor did Christ himself that gave the rebuke assume but renounce openly all such Authority therefore no observation grounded on these words can controul the Magistrates just Power in punishing Offences done against his Laws although pretences of Religion and Conscience give colour to those offences the Gospel does diminish no rights of the secular Powers Now Supreme Magistrates though as such they have no right to judg in Articles of Faith to define what is true Religion what not for then the Pagan Princes who had never heard of Christ and yet are as much Magistrates as any would have right to judg what Doctrines Christ delivered down to be believed But certainly when Christ Commission'd his Faith to run through all the World not onely independently from all the Powers of it but in perfect opposition to them they can have no right to judg in that which whatsoever they shall Judg we are alike bound to receive the Faith of Christ without any the least difference to their judgment But though they have no right to judg of this they have Authority to determine what Faith shall have the priviledges of their State and what shall not which shall be publiquely profess'd and which they will inhibit with Penalties For sure the Priviledges of the State and power of Penalties are the proper rights of the Supreme Power and therefore none but that can judg and determine of them In a word since it is most evident that the tranquillity of a State does depend upon nothing more than the profession and priviledging of Religion it follows that those Powers to whose Judgment and Decrees the care and
Tranquillity of the State is committed must have the power to judg and to determine what Faith shall be publiquely profess'd and priviledg'd by the State In which Judgment and administration if they err and priviledg a false Faith and inhibit the true they use their Power ill and are responsible to God for doing so but they do not invade or usurp a Power that is not their own Rather 't is most certain if the Principles of any Sect or else if not they yet the pursuance of any Principles do tend directly towards or are found to work Commotions and Treasonable enterprises the Supreme Power hath as much right to restrain yea and Punish them although with Death according to their several merits as he hath to punish those effects in any other instances wherein they do express themselves Nor must Religion secure those practices which it cannot sanctifie but does envenome For by putting an everlasting concern into mens Opinions and actions their undertakings are made by it more desperate and unreclaimable What Wounds and what Massacres must the State expect from them that stab and murder it with the same Zeal that the Priest kills a Sacrifice that go to act their Villanies with Devotion and go to their own Execution as to Martyrdom 'T were easie for me to deduce the practice of this Power from the best Magistrates in the best times if that were my business who had onely this temptation to say thus much that I might not seem to clash with the Magistrates Power of coercion in Religious causes when I did affirm that to destroy mens Lives or other temporal Rights on this account meerly because they are Apostates Schismaticks or otherwise reject the true Religion or Christ himself is inconsistent with the temper of the Gospel If you would discover what the temper of the Gospel is you may see it in its Prophecy and Picture in the Prophet Isay The Wolf shall dwell with the Lamb and the Leopard shall lye down with the Kid the sucking Child shall play on the hole of the Asp and the weaned Child shall put his hand on the Cockatrice den and the Serpent shall eat the dust Whatever mischief these have in themselves there 's nothing of devouring or of hurt to one another in this state 't is like Paradise restor'd the prospect of the Garden of the Lord. Rather whereas there these Creatures onely met here they lye down and dwell together And the Asp and Serpent that could poyson Paradise it self have now no venomous tooth to bite no not the heel nor spiteful tongue to hiss But to speak out of Figure the Gospel in it self requires not the Life of any for transgression against it self it calls all into it and waits their coming those that sin against it it useth methods to reform hath its Spiritual Penalties indeed whereby it would inflict amendment and Salvation on Offenders But because final impenitence and unbelief are the onely breaches of the Covenant of this Religion therefore it does wait till life and possibilities of Repentance are run out and then its Punishments indeed come home with interest but not till then The Law 't is true was of another temper it required the life of an Apostate to Idolatry whether 't were a single Person or a City Deut. xiii To the Jew that was a Child as S. Paul says and so not to be kept in awe by threats of future abdication things beyond the prospect of his care but must have present punishments the Rod still in his eye and was a refractory Child that seem'd to have the Amorite and Hivite derived into him a tincture of Idolatry in his Constitution that was as ready to run back into the superstitions as the Land of Egypt as eager for their Deities as their Onions and had the same appetite to the Calf and to the fleshpots to make the one a God the other a Meal to such a People Death that was the onely probable restraint was put into the Law by God who was himself Supream Magistrate in that Theocraty against whom 't was exact Rebellion and Treason to take another God and therefore was by him punish'd with Death But the Spirit whom Christ sends breaths no such threats for he can come on no Designs but such as Christ can join in but saith Christ I came not to destroy mens lives Secondly The temper of the Gospel is discovered in its Precepts I shall name but one Matth. v. 43 44. Ye have heard that it hath been said Thou shalt love thy Neighbour and hate thine Enemy But I say unto you love your Enemies c. Where if Enemy did not mean the man whom private quarrel had made such and Him it could not mean it being said to them that they must love that Enemy Exod. xxiii 4 5. But as the Jews neighbour was every one of his Religion and he liv'd near him that lived in the same Covenant with him so enemy being oppos'd to that must signifie one not of his Religion An Alien an Idolater with any of which they were indeed to have no exercise of love or friendship no commerce and to some Enemies the Canaanites no mercy but they were to hate them to destruction Deut. vii If so then our Saviours addition here But I say unto you love your Enemies does say that we must love even these the Christian hath no Canaanites but the most prosligated adversaries of his Religion he must love and pray for them although they persecute him Which makes appear it does at least include Enemies of Religion for Persecutions seldom were on any other ground and Religion which should have nothing else but Heaven in it as if it had the malice and the Flames of Hell breaths nothing else but Fire and Faggot to all those that differ in it But whether it be an addition and mean thus or no since it is sure that both they and we are bound to love the Neighbour and Christ hath prov'd Luke x. that the Samaritan he whom our two Disciples would consume that Schismatick and rejecter of Christ is yet a Neighbour therefore him also we must love and pray for Now 't is a strange way of affection to destroy them to love them thus to the death to get admission to their hearts with a Swords point to pray for them by calling for Fire down from Heaven to consume them S. Greg. Nazian calls the founder of that Faction that began this practice in the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and if so we know well of what Spirit he is that does call for fire to devour those that differ from him in Religion 't is sure one of this Legion or it rather is the leader of them that did dwell in Tombs and does in flames things which he loves so to inflict one that was the first Rebel too which leads me to my second Observation That Secondly To attempt upon or against the Prince on the
utmost that they understood if so be that there were no Treason to discolour it and they that did inflict all this appear but Christian Dioclesians and stand at that sad Day in the train of the Persecutions on the same hand O then those Fires which these Boutefeus called for and kindled shall blaze out into everlasting burnings And now it may seem strange that they who most of all pretend the Spirit of Christ are yet of the most distant temper in the World from that of Gospel always endeavouring to do that which our Saviour here checks his Disciples for proposing and did threaten Peter for attempting There are among our selves that seem to live by Inspiration that look and speak as in the frame of the Gospel as if every motion were impulse from Heaven and yet as if Christ had fulfilled his promise to them without Metaphor baptized them with the Holy Ghost and fire onely that they might kindle fire and the unction of the Spirit did but add Oyl to those flames as if the cloven Tongues of fire in which the Spirit did descend were made to be the Emblems of Division and to call for fire these mens life their garb their very piety is faction they pray rebel and murder and all by the Spirit 'T is true indeed they plead now what we seem to say that they should not be persecuted for not being satisfied in their Conscience so they mince their breaking of the Laws for which they suffer But do these know themselves what manner of Spirit they are of or are we bound not to remember when they had the Power how they persecuted all that would not do at once against their King their Conscience and the Law And we do thus far know what Spirit they are of and if they have not yet repented of all that then it is plain if they can get an opportunity they will do it again nay they must by their Spirit think themselves obliged to do it But these are not all those that above all the World pretend to the Infallible assistance of the Spirit our Church is bold in her Offices of this day to say do turn Religion into Rebellion she said it more severely heretofore and the attempts of this day warrant the saying when not like our Disciples that would call for fire from Heaven on the Village that rejected Christ these will raise up fire from Hell to consume their own Prince and his Progeny the whole line of Royalty the Church and Nation also in their Representative and all this onely for refusing him that calls himself Christ's Vicar There are I must confess among them that renounce the practice and say 't was the device onely of some few desperate male-contents wicked Catholiques and design'd by the Devil And they will allow their Father Garnett to have had no other guilt but that he did not discover it having received it in Confession And this gives me occasion to propose a story to your patience and conjectures Not long before the time of this Attempt a Priest of the Society of Jesus in a Book he publish'd does propose this case of Conscience Whether a Priest may make use of what he hath learn'd in Confession to avert great impendent mischiefs to the Government as for Example One confesses that himself or some other had laid Gunpowder and other things under such an House and if they be not taken thence the House will be burnt the Prince must perish all that pass throughout the City will be either certainly destroy'd or in great peril and resolves it thus 'T is the most probable and safe Opinion and the more suitable to Religion and to that reverence which is due to the Sacrament of Confession that it is not lawful to make use of this his knowledg to that end That his Holiness Clement the 8. had just before by a Bull sent to the Superiours of the Regulars commanded most studiously to beware they make not use of any thing which they come to know by Confession to the benefit of the secular Government He adds that in cases of Confession the Priest must not reveal though death be threatned to him but may say he knows it not nor ever heard it quia reverà non scit nec audivit ut homo seu pars reipub Yea he may swear all this if he but mentally reserve so as to tell you 'T is Del Rio in 6th Book of his Mag. dis 1. Cap. Sec. 2. It seems 't is safer to break all the Obligations to Allegiance and to truth his duty and his Oaths the Princes and Gods bonds than the Seal of Confession But I did not mention this to let you see the kindness these men have to Princes and their Government I shall avoid producing any the Opinions of particular persons howsoever horrid in my arguments this day but I onely ask whether it be not very probable this instance was the thing to be attempted on this day Whether the resolution was not publish'd the Pope's Bull if not made yet produc'd at least to caution any Priest that should receive it in Confession and should be so honest as to abhor the Fact yet from betraying it and hindring the Execution of it If it were the case this was not then any rash attempt of some few desperate malecontents but a long contrivance and of many heads and its taking its effect was the great care of their Church Well they are even with us yet and lay as horrid Projects to the charge of Protestants Among our other Controversies this is one whether are the worse Subjects bloody sayings are produc'd from Authors on both sides yea there is the Image of both Churches Babel and Jerusalem drawn by a Catholique Pen and then you may be sure all Babel's divisions and confusions make the draught of ours and are said to be the issue of the Protestant Doctrines Whereas such things are countenanc'd by some particular Authors of their Church were never own'd by any publique Act or Doctrine of a general Council to which they provoke us I must confess our Calendar can shew a thirtieth of January as well as a fifth of November There are indeed that say the Romanists hatch'd that days guilt and challenge any man to call them to account for saying so But whether so or not which Churches Doctrines such things are more suited to I will now put to trial that we may know what Spirit each is of And I will try it by the publique Acts and most establish'd Doctrines of the Churches and here undertake to shew the Church of England most expresly does declare against all practices against the Prince for the cause of Religion But the Romish in those acts wherein she hath most reason to expect infallibility of Spirit also in the publique Acts of the Church representative in General Councils does abett the doing them not onely for Religion but for the cause of Holy
Church First If the Church of Rome have reason to expect infallible assistance of the Spirit in any case it is as much in Canonizing of a Saint as in any other it being as unhappy to determine a false Object for Religious Worship to their Church as a false Article of Faith there is as much need that there should be an infallible proposal of the one as other for when she does Decree by the Authority of the Omnipotent God such a one is a Saint receiv'd in Glory and so renders him the Object of their Worship if he should chance to be a Reprobate to cause the People to fall prostrate to the Shrine of one that 's damn'd and call his flames to warm Gods Altar and the Votaries breast to make the whole Church worship one that is in Hell is liable to greater aggravations of impiety than an erroneous Opinion in very many of their points of Faith can be But it is known their Church hath Canoniz'd one of this Nation Becket who though he was indeed illegally and barbarously Murthered yet 't is not the Suffering but the Cause that makes the Martyr now he did not fall a Sacrifice for his Religion but was slain because he did disturb the State by suspending all the Bishops that upheld the Kings just cause against him so that neither King nor State could live in peace for him for opposing also those Laws which himself had sworn to Laws that were not onely truly Sovereign Rights but are maintain'd even unto this day as Priviledges by the Gallican Church and they not branded for so doing In a word he was slain for those actions which his own Bishops condemned him for as a perjur'd man and a Traytor And for persisting in them to the death he was Sainted Now whatever the estate of this man be in the next World I meddle not with that Yet for Disobedience and Rebellion to place one in Heaven whence for those things Lucifer did fall does seem to shew what Spirit they are of that Canonize such Saints For the Church to pray to Christ that by the wounds of this Saint he would remit their sins does express what rate their Church does set upon the merits of resisting Princes and disturbing States in the behalf of Holy Church When such actions make men fit to be joynt purchasers with Christ in the Redemption of the World But when the French Histories say 't was disputed long after in Paris whether he were Damn'd or Sav'd that the Church in her publique Offices should pray to go thither where he is gone to have his Society though it express their most infallible assurance of the condition of those men who for their sakes resist the Secular Powers yet O my Soul enter not thou into their counsels in this world neither say a Confederacy to whom they say a Confederacy much less pray to be in their Society who by resisting S. Paul says do receive unto themselves Damnation Secondly It is notorious that in their first General Council at Lyons Anno 1245. the Emperour Frederick the second by the Sentence of the Pope and the whole Council after long deliberation and producing several Arguments which they say are not sleight but effectual to prove the suspicion of Heresie is depriv'd of his Empire all his Subjects are absolv'd from their Oath of Allegiance and by Apostolical Authority forbidden to obey him Therefore that such things may be done in the cases of Religion hath the Authority of a General Council 't was that Council that Decreed Red Hats to Cardinals Hats red it seems not onely with the Royal Purple but with the Blood of Kings and of Royalty it self Thirdly I should have urged the well known Canon of the General Council of Lateran the greatest their Church ever boasted of which says That if the temporal Lord shall neglect to purge his Territories from such as the Church there declares Hereticks he shall be Excommunicated by the Metropolitan and if he do not mend within a year complained of to the Pope that so he may declare his Subjects absolv'd from their Allegiance and expose his Lands to be seiz'd by Catholicks who shall exterminate the Hereticks saving the right of the chief Lord Provided he give no impediment to this But the same law shall be observed to those that have no chief Lords that is who are themselves Supream This I should urge but that some say that penal Statutes which are leges odiosae tantum disponunt quantum loquuntur Therefore this Canon since it does not name Kings it does not they say concern them although 't is plain it do sufficiently enough But that there may be therefore no evasion Fourthly In the General Council of Constance that part of it I mean that is approv'd by their whole Church The Pope and Council joyn together in commanding all Arch-Bishops Bishops and Inquisitors to pronounce all such Excommunicate as are declared Hereticks in such and such Articles and that of Transubstantiation half-Communion and the Pope's Supremacy are among them or that favour ot defend them or that Communicate with them in publique or in private whether in sacred Offices or otherwise etiamsi Patriarchali Archiepiscopali Episcopali Regali Reginali Ducali aut aliâ quâvis Ecclesiasticâ aut mundanâ proefulgeant dignitate And Commands them also to proceed to Interdicts and deprivation of Dignities and Goods and whatsoever other Penalties vias modos Thus that Council though it took away the Peoples right to the Blood of Christ denying them the Cup in the Sacrament gave them in exchange the Blood of their own Kings making them a right to that And that they extend the force of these Canons to the most absolute Princes even to him that pleads exemption most to the King of France is plain because when Sixtus the fifth thundred out his Bulls against the then King of Navarre afterwards King Henry the fourth of France and the Prince of Conde depriving them not onely of their Lands and Dignities but their Succession also to the Crown of France absolving their Subjects from their Oaths forbidding them to obey them he declared he did it to them as to relapsed Hereticks favourers and defenders of them and as such fal'n under the Censures of the Canons of the Church Now there are no other Canons that do take in Kings but these which can touch him for that of Boniface the eighth which says the Pope hath power to judg all temporal Powers is declared not to extend to France Cap. meruit de priviledg in extravag communibus Thus by the publique Acts of their Church and by the Canons of their General Councils we have found in causes of Religion Deprivation of Princes Wars and Bloodshed and the other consequent Miseries are establish'd Rebellion encouraged by a Law And if Rebellion be as the sin of Witchcraft then we know what manner of Spirit they are of that do
encourage it sure Witches have no spirit but the Devil for familiar But the Church of England on the other side in her publique Doctrine set down in the Book of Homilies establish'd in the 39. Articles of her Religion says in express words that it is not lawful for Inferiours and Subjects in any case to resist and stand against the Superiour Powers that we must indeed believe undoubtedly that we may not obey Kings Magistrates or any other if they would command us to do any thing contrary to Gods Commands In such a case we ought to say with the Apostle we must rather obey God than Man But nevertheless in that case we may not in any wise withstand violently or Rebel against Rulers or make any Insurrection Sedition or Tumults either by force of Arms or otherwise against the Anointed of the Lord or any of his Officers 1 Book of Hom. 2 part of the Serm. of Obed. Not for Reformation of Religion for what a Religion 't is that such men by such means would restore may easily be judged even as good a Religion surely as Rebels be good men and obedient Subjects 2 Book of Hom. 4 part of the Serm. against wilful Rebellion The very same thing is defined in the first of the Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical of the year 1640. for Subjects to bear Arms against their King offensive or defensive upon any pretence whatever is at least to resist the Powers which are ordain'd of God and though they do not invade but onely resist S. Paul tells them plainly he that resists receives unto himself damnation This was the Doctrine of the Church in those her Constitutions and although there was no Parliament then sitting to enact these Canons into Laws yet since that time the Law of England is declar'd to say the same and we obliged by it to acknowledg that it is not Lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take up Arms against the King by this Parliament whose memory shall be for ever blessed And now it is not hard to know what manner of Spirit our Church is of even that Spirit that anoints the Lords Anointed that is which Commissions them Gods Spirit as we find it phras'd in Scripture And 't is obvious to each eye that there is much more resemblance betwixt present Rome and the Image of Babylon as S. John hath drawn it in the Revelations than there is of Babel and the Church of England as to those Confusions which seditious Doctrines make as the Romanists pourtrai'd her But far be it from me to conclude hence that all of their Communion do allow their Doctrines Though they stand on the same bottom that their Faith of half-Communion and Transubstantiation do even Acts of the same Councils yet I doubt not multitudes of loyal Souls of this our Nation do abhor the Tenents by what Rule of theirs I know not I confess Nor shall I enquire what Security a Prince can have of the Allegiance of those who by the most infallible Rules of their Religion can be loyal onely on Condition by the leave of those who are his Enemies on whose will and power all their Oaths and duty are depending If the most essential interest of Princes will not move them to consider this sure I am I shall not undertake it But I shall take the confidence out of the premises to infer that no Religion in the World does more provide for the security of Kings than the Christian as it is profess'd in our Church does And when we see the Interest of the Crown and Church were twisted by God in the preservations of this day nor could be separated in the late dismal Confusions but died and reviv'd together in the Resurrection they that hate the execrable mischiefs of those times or love the Crown or do not come to mock God when they come to give him thanks for his great glories of this day cannot choose but have good will for our Sion cannot have an unconcernedness for this Religion a cold indifference to it or any other which where-ere it is alas I fear betrays too openly indifference and unconcernedness for Religion it self For if I should appeal to our most Sceptick Statists and not beg one Principle of a Religion but take their own Religion was contriv'd they say by pretending to engage a God to uphold his Vicegerent and by putting after everlasting punishments before mens fears for they saw present ones restrained not Treason was contriv'd I say to uphold States Then that must be the best with them that best upholds and then I have evinc'd the Christian is secure as 't is prosess'd by our Church But then shame to those who to gratifie their lusts meerly labour to perswade themselves and others there is no such thing in earnest as a Resurrection to punishments who by publique raillery in sacred things and turning all to merriment endeavour to take off the sense of all Religion and have done it in great measure and so thrown down the best-Basis on which Government subsists which they themselves confess was necessary to be fram'd on purpose for it For if there be no after fears he that is stronger than to need to fear the present may rebel kill Kings These Atheists are Fanaticks I am sure in Politicks more traiterous than our mad Enthusiasts or than the Canons of the Popish Councils To these Sadduces in Christianity we may say ye know not what spirit ye are of who know not whether there be any Spirit But it is indeed because they are all flesh themselves But then if the works of the flesh be manifest Adultery Fornication Seditions Heresies Murders Drunkenness c. we know what manner of Spirit they are of even the spirit that did enter into the Swine the Legion indeed of Spirits one Spirit is not Devil enough to animate the flesh into so many of those works But the fruits of the Spirit that Gospel Spirit which we Christians are of are love peace long-suffering gentleness goodness faith meekness temperance joy in the Holy Ghost and they that do bring forth such fruits are baptised indeed with the Holy Ghost and if with fire fire that came down from Heaven too 't was onely to consume their dross that they may be pure mettal fit as for the King's Inscription meek Christians good Subjects so for Gods Image to be stamp'd upon that is renewed in Righteousness and true Holiness Fire this that will sublime our very flesh into spiritual body that we may begin here that incorruptible which our corruptible must put on when our vile Bodies shall be made like to the glorious Body of our Saviour To which state that Spirit which rais'd up Jesus from the dead bring us by quickning our mortal Bodies To whom c. The Eleventh SERMON Preached at CHRIST-CHURCH IN OXFORD Novemb. 8. 1665. Being the Monthly Fast-day for the Plague LUKE XVI 30 31. Nay Father Abraham but if one went unto
it self in the sackcloth and neglected rudenesses of a pious penitent sorrow The prides of this side Hell are of a different garb I 'm sure if theirs be such if they design by those just means to settle the inheritance of Heaven in their Families sure the vices of Hell may be fit patterns for our Religious performances and 't were to be desired that all Christians had this mans ardencies and flames in their affections to their Houses Yet neither can I from this one particular instance draw any general proposition concerning the kindness of that place to Sinners upon Earth although all those that make this History not Parable would give me colour for it But waving that since Christ hath so framed the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is a relation of such words as they would have spoke had they spoke on this occasion I shall take that as ground enough to apply it to the conviction of those who are so far from these Charitable designs to the Souls of others that they contrive nothing more than how to have the company of their Friends in those ways that lead to this place of Torment prevail with them to join in sinning and shew a Vice how to insinuate into them The kindnesses of our man here in the flames were divine God like Charities compared to these Our Saviour says Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones for I say unto you that in Heaven their Angels do always behold the Face of my Father which is in Heaven Matth. xviii 10. Which one expounds if we neglect to do what is in our power to preserve the meanest Christians from Vice and sleight their sinning their Tutelary Angels that have continual recourse to God and are high in his favour will make complaints of us in their behalf at least they will if we offend them and any action of ours prove an occasion of their sins And if a favourite of Heaven shall accuse us to the Lord for that Then how will he complain of us when we tempt when he shall have to say against us that we have ensnared and drawn such a Soul into a Custom that will ruin it eternally and when he shall bring against us an instance out of Hell here and the kindnesses of one among the Devils shall come in Judgment against us where we see the Rich Man thought not of his own condemnation so much he thought of the averting that of his Brethren We might suppose a man in his condition could not consider any thing but his own Tortures O yes to preserve others from them yet when the man in Hell does so the men on Earth do think of nothing more than to entice others into them And is it not a strange Age then when to tempt is the onely mode of kindness and men do scarcely know how to express themselves civil to their Friends but by pressing them to sin and so be sick with them as if this were the gentile use of Societies to season Youth into good Company and bring the Fashionable Vices into their acquaintance And 't is well if they stay there it happens so that Parts and Wit Faculties and Acquisitions do ingratiate men into these treacherous kindnesses and qualifie them for the desires and friendships of such persons as entertain them by softning them into loosness and then into prophaneness debauch their manners and then their Principles teach them to sport themselves with Vice and then with Holy things and after with Religion it self which is a greater Luxury than that their Riots treat their Appetites withal the Luxury of Wit And thus they educate them into Atheism and these familiar Devils are call'd Acquaintances and Friends And indeed the Companions in sin a man would think should be dear Friends such as pour an heart into one another in their common Cups shed Souls in their Lusts are friends to one another even in ruin and love to their own Condemnation are kind beyond the Altar-flames even to those everlasting fires such communications certainly cement affections so that nothing can divide them And let them do so but Lord send me the kindness of Hell rather one that will be a friend like this man in his Torments that with unsatisfied cares minded the reformation of his Friends Nay Father Abraham but if one went unto them from the dead they will repent which brings me to the Choice the second thing If a Ghost should indeed appear to any of us in the midst of our Commissions it would certainly hurry us from our Enjoyments and there are no such ties unions by which the advantages of sin do hold us fix'd and jointed to them but the shake and tremble we should then be in would loosen and dissolve them all and make us uncling from them if we may believe discourses that tell us such a sight is able to startle a man however he be fix'd by his most close Devotions for what the Jews were wont to say we shall die because we have seen an Angel of the Lord from Heaven most men do fear if they should see the Spirit of a dead man from the Earth Indeed the affrights which men do usually conceive at the meer apprehension of such an Apparition do probably arise from a surprise in being minded hastily of such a state for which they are not then prepared so as they would wish or hope to be to which they think that is a Call for we shall die said the Jews But not to ask the reason of this now but find the reason why our Rich Man thinks when Moses and the Prophets cannot make a man repent such a Ghost should We have it in ver 28 they do but discourse to us but one from the dead could testifie he could bear witness that it is so as they say speak his own sight and knowledg and therefore though they hear not Moses and the Prophets yet if one went unto them from the dead they will repent For First One from the Dead could testifie that when we die we do not cease to be and he would make appear that our departing hence is not annihilation and so would dash the hopes of Epicures such as I was and I may fear they are who as they live like Beasts do think to die so too and who are rational in this alone that they desire to be but Animal And all the rest of men whether worldly or sensual that enclose their desires and enjoyments within this life and above all the Atheist that dares not look beyond it all these would be convinc'd by such an evidence Indeed this would take away the main encouragement of all ungodliness which upon little reasonings how thin soever that there 's no life after this does quicken and secure it self Wisd. 2. and therefore every Sect of men that did prescribe Morality did teach an after life nothing was more believ'd among the Heathen Their Tribunal below where three most
Miracle and the Rock must give them drink yet having no Imployment they made Feasts They sate down to eat and drink and rose up to play Nor would eating to the uses of their nature serve them but they must have entertainments for their wantonness Had they been imployed to get their Bread their labour would have made their morsels sweet But since God as the Wise-man says sent them from Heaven bread prepared without their labour they must have varieties to sweeten it they require him to prepare a Table also in the Wilderness and furnish them with choice And although they had the food of Angels able to content every mans delight and agreeing to every taste and serving to the appetite of the eater it temper'd it self to every mans liking and what could they fancy more The latitude of Creatures the whole Universe of Luxury could do nothing else in every single morsel they had sorts Variety all choice as if that Desert had been Paradise that Wilderness the Garden of the Lord Yet so coy is Idleness so apt to nauseate that they abhor the constancy of being pleas'd And though they were not sated neither he that gather'd much had nothing over onely to his eating God as well providing for their Health and Vertue as Necessity and dieting their Temperance as he did their Hunger Yet their very liking does grow loathsom to them When their Bodies were thus excellently well provided for having no imployment nothing to take up their Minds and Entertain their Souls they require 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meat for their Souls meat not to serve the uses of their bodies but to feed their fancies their extravagant minds Thus Idleness requires to be dieted And all this but to pamper and feed high mens inclinations so to make Temptations irresistible and by consequence Vice necessary It were easie to recount more of those ways by which the Devil does make use of mens want of Imployment to debauch their lives and ruin all the hopes of Vertue in them S. Jude finds more of its effects at Sodom They gave themselves over to Fornication and went after other flesh and are set forth for an Example suffering the vengeance of Eternal fire Indeed these are most certain consequents of not being imployed Quaeritur Aegysthus is too known an instance and great holy David is another But it s dire influence is sufficiently visible in that which it rain'd down upon those Cities Since it did fulfill the guilt of Sodom and made Heaven furnish Hell for it and God himself turn Executioner of fire and brimstone to revenge it this shall serve to prove it is one of the Devil's Master-pieces 3. Next succeed his fiery darts as S. Paul calls them namely Persecutions or Calamities of any kind Which he manageth either by inflicting pressures and he was so confident of the force of these that he did tell God he would make Job curse him to his face with them Or if he find men in necessities and pressures then by tempting them to get from under them by methods which he shall direct and he had such assurance of the strength of this Temptation that by it he tried our Saviour to find out whether he were the Son of God or no believing none but he that was so would be able to resist it Indeed the trials are severe which this Temptation does present to draw men from their Duty and to overcome their Constancy Whether it solicite by inflicting punishment as on the Mother and her Children 2 Maccab. vii or by offering to withdraw it if they will submit to their unlawful terms and so they tried her youngest Son there verse 24. or at leastwise by some feigned act some ambiguous words or practices will pretend compliance so they dealt with Eleazar Chap. vi 21. whom they would have had to bring flesh of his own provision such as he might use without offence and so onely seem to eat forbidden meat Each of which is as great a trial also and to stand against them reckon'd up amongst as vigorous acts of Faith as those that held out in the greatest tortures persecuting malice could invent Heb. xi 17. They were stoned sawn asunder were tempted Now to fetch an instance of the sad success of these I shall not need to go so far as to those Persecutions of Antiochus nor those of the primitive times of Christianity when they had no other choices but these to deliver up their Bibles or their Lives either to sacrifice to Idols or at least procure a Ticket which should certifie that they had done it or to be themselves an Holocaust and give those Idols a Burnt-offering with their martyr-flames Which made the Traditores Lapsi the Thurificati and the Libellatici to be so numerous Through Gods blessed mercy there is no use of such instances as there is no fear of such a trial 't is not death to be a Christian now For if the Son of Man or Satan's self should come to try us at those rates 't were a great doubt whether the one or other would find Faith upon the Earth whether they would sacrifice a life to our Religion who are not content to sacrifice a little interest or pleasure to it whether they are likely to resist unto blood fighting against sin who will not resist to tears nor sober resolutions Alas what Religion should we be of if God should raise a Dioclesian come to tempt us with the fiery trial Martyrs as we are to nothing but our Passions and our lusts Nor shall I produce more known and near experiences when by reason of such storms of Persecution men made shipwreck if not of their Faith yet of good Conscience When by order or permissions of Providence they were brought to such a streight that either they must let go their possessions or their honesty acting against Principles and Conscience of Duty I shall not remember how when God did shake his angry hand thus over them they fled to the Devils kindness and made Hell their refuge to save them from their Fathers rod how they grew so Atheistical as to believe a Perjury or other crime greater security that would preserve their selves and their condition better than all God had promis'd were such Infidels that they did rather trust their being here to the commission of a sin than to the Providence and the Engagements of the Almighty For indeed what need I instance in these greater cases where the trial was so sharp as not to offer any easier choice than this either to part with Conscience or with all they had God knows we find less Interests will do The Devil by no more than this driving the Gadarens swine into the Sea was able to drive Christ out of their Coasts You have the story Matth. viii from the 28. verse A legion of those evil spirits did possess two men and finding Christ would cast them out
interpose to hinder it and hide the possibilities of mercy from their eyes that they may never see them nor recover What can then become of those for whom God does contrive that they shall not escape when instead of those bowels that did make him swear he would not have the sinner die but would have him return and live he puts on so much indignation at such Sinners as to take an order they shall not repent and take an order that they shall be damn'd And yet all this is onely to those men who being dull of hearing the suggestions of the Spirit and not willing to give entertainment to his holy motions grieve him so that they repell and drive him quite away and so by consequence onely make way for the Devil Whereas there are others that directly call him force him to them ravish and invade occasions to serve him Some there are that study how to disbelieve and with great labour and contrivance work out arguments and motives to persuade themselves to Atheism Others practise discipline and exercise themselves to be engag'd in Vice Some dress so as to lay baiâ—s snares to entrap Temptation that they may be sure it may not pass them Others feed high to invite and entertain the Tempter do all that is possible to make him come and to assure him that he must prevail when they have made it most impossible for themselves to stand and to resist Some there are indeed whom he does not overcome so easily but is put to compound with them takes them upon Articles for when he would ingage them to a sin to which he sees they have great inclinations with some fears he is fain to persuade them to repent when they have done to lay hold upon the present opportunity and not let the satisfaction escape them but be sorry after and amend For where these resolutions of Repentance usher in transgression there we may be sure it is the Devil that suggests those resolutions But if he can get admittance once thus by prevailing with a person to receive him upon purposes of after-Penitence he is sure to prosper still in his attempts upon the same condition For Repentance will wash out another sin if he commit it and so on And it is evident that by this very train he does draw most men on through the whole course of sin and life For never do they till they see themselves at the last stage begin repenting When they are to grapple with Death's forces then they are to set upon resisting of the Devil And when they are grown so weak that their whole Soul must be imployed to muster all its spirits all their strength but to beat off one little spot of phlegm that does besiege the avenues of breath the ports of life and sally at it and assault it once again and a third many times and yet with all the sury of its might cannot break through nor beat off that little clot of spittle when it is thus yet then are they to wrestle with and Conquer Principalities and Powers all the Rulers of the utter darkness pull down the strong holds of sin within cast down imaginations and every high thing that did exalt it self against the knowledg of God and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ and with those feeble hands that they are scarcely able to lift up in a short wish or prayer they must do all this resist the Devil and take Heaven by force Now sure to put it off to such a fatal season is a purpose of a desperate concern In God's Name let us set upon the doing it while there is something left of Principle and vigor in us ere we have so griev'd Gods Spirit that he do resolve to leave us utterly and before the Devil have so broke us to his yoke that we become content and pleas'd to do his drudgery We deceive our selves if we think to do it with more ease when Constitution is grown weaker as if then Temptations would not be so â—rong For the Habits will be then confirm'd Vice grown Heroical and we wholly in the power of Satan dead and sensless under it not so much as stirring to get out But if we strive before he have us in his clutches we have an Enemy that can vanquish none but those who consent to and comply and confederate with him those that will be overcome So that if we resist he must be Conquer'd and Temptation must be conquer'd too for he will flie and then by consequence must cease to trouble and molest us This is the sure way to be rid of Temptations to put to flight the great Artificer and Prince of them subdue and overcome him and our selves And to him that overcometh thus Christ will grant to sit with him on his Throne as He also overcame and sate down with his Father on his Throne To which c. The Fourteenth SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL Last Wednesday in LENT 1667 8. PHILIPP III. 18. For many walk of whom I have told you often and now tell you even weeping that they are the Enemies of the Cross of Christ. THough many by the Cross of Christ here understand any sort of Suffering for the sake of Christ or Religion it being usual with the Scripture to entitle Christ to every evil that befals a man for doing of his duty yet others looking on it properly as that on which Christ himself suffered by the Enemies of the Cross understand those that set themselves against the whole design and influence of Christ's death upon it Now to name that in few words the Cross of Christ not onely is one of the greatest Props on which our Faith of the whole Gospel leans which it establisheth the truth of as Christs Bloud shed upon it was the sanction of the Covenant on Gods part who by that federal Rite of shedding Bloud engag'd himself and we may certainly assure our selves he cannot fail to make good whatsoever he hath promised in that Covenant who would give the Bloud of his own only Son who was so holy and who was himself to Seal that Covenant and his Bloud is therefore called the Bloud of the Everlasting Covenant But besides this extrinsick influence of it all the blessed Mercies also of the Gospel are the Purchase of this Cross and all the main essential duties of the Gospel are not onely Doctrines of the Cross such as it directs and does inforce but the Cross also hath an immediate efficacy in the working of them in us For S. Paul saith by the Cross of Christ the World is Crucified to me and I unto the World On it the Flesh is also crucified with the Affections and Lusts And to say all that comprehensive Duty of the Gospel Self-denial is but another word for taking up the Cross And then as for the Mercies of the Gospel on the Cross the satisfaction for our sins was made the Price of
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that mind earthly things the fourth sort in whicâ— all their wisdom lies Which two last sorts of Enemies I shall attaque together The Cross of Christ amongst its other ends was set to be an instrument whereby the World is to be Crucified to us and we unto the World to be the means whereby we are enabled to prevail upon and overcome our worldly lusts and inclinations and to sleight yea and detest all the temptations of its Wealth Delights and Heights when they attempt to draw us into sin or take us off from Duty Now to this it works by these three steps First shewing us the Author and the finisher of our Faith nailed himself to that Cross his joints rack'd on it his whole Body strip'd and nothing else but Vinegar and bitter potions allow'd his thirst and thus convincing us that if we will be his Disciples we must take up his Cross and follow him at leastwise we must have preparedness of mind to take it up when ever it is fix'd to Duty to renounce all profits honours and delights of this World that are not consistent with our Christian profession This is the Doctrine of the Cross of Christ it being otherwise impossible to to be the Disciples of a Crucified Master And when this great Captain of our Salvation was himself consecrated by his sufferings and had for his Standard his own Body lifted up upon the Cross we that are listed under him and with that very badg the Cross too crucis Consecranei Votaries and fellow Soldiers of that Order if we shall avoid our Duty when it is attended with a Cross or straitned any ways and the provisions of this World are cut off from it and betake our selves rather to the contents of Earth we do not onely shamefully fly from our Colours Fugitive and Cowards Poltrons in the Spiritual Warfare but are Renegadoes false and traytours to our selves too such as basely ran away not onely from our Officer but from Salvation which he is the Captain of and which we cannot possibly attain except we be resolv'd to follow him and charge through whatsoever disadvantages to attend Religion vanquishing all those temptations with which the World assaults us in our course to Duty Thus the Cross of Christ first shews us the necessity we have to renounce and Crucifie the World But to encourage and enable us to do so it does also shew us Secondly The certainty of a good issue in the doing it assures us that those who deny themselves forbidden satisfactions here that will be vertuous maugre all the baits and threats of Earth will embrace Duty when it is laden with a Cross although so heavy as to crush out life and kill the body assures us that those lose not but exchange their lives shall save their Souls and that there is another World wherein their losses shall be made up to them and repaired with all advantage To the truth of this the Cross of Christ is a most pregnant and infallible testimony For as by multitudes of Miracles Christ sought to satisfie the World that he was sent from God to promise all this and justified his Power to perform it by experiment raising some up from the dead so when they said he did his Miracles by Beelzebub he justified it â—urther with his Life affirming that he was the Son of God no 't is impossible but he must know whether he were or no and consequently sent and able to do all he promised and resolv'd to do it also for our more assurance in himself that he would raise himself up from the dead within three days and saying this when he was sure he should be Crucified for saying so and sure that if he did not do according to his words he must within three days appear a meer Impostor to the world and his Religion never be receiv'd Now 't is impossible for him that must needs know whether all this were true or no to give a greater testimony to it than his Life For this that Bloud and Water that flowed from his wounded side upon Cross which did assure his Death is justly said to bear witness to his being the Son of God and consequently to the truth of all this equal to the testimony of the Spirit whether that which the Spirit gave when he came from Heaven down upon him in his Baptism or the testimony which he gave by Miracle for there are three that bear witness upon Earth the Spirit the Water and the Blood Thus by his Death Christ did bring Life and Immortality to light his choosing to lay down his own life for asserting of the truth of all this was as great an argument to prove it as his raising others from the dead and Lazarus's empty Monument and walking Grave-cloaths were not better evidence than this Cross of Christ. 4. Once more this Cross not onely proves the certainty of a future state but does demonstrate the advantage of it and assures us that it is infinitely much more eligible to have our portion in the life to come than in this life That to part with every thing that is desireable in this World rather than to fail of those joys that are laid up in the other that to be poor here or to be a spoyl to renounce or to disperse my wealth that so I may lay up treasures for my self in Heaven and may be rich to God never to taste any one of these puddle transient delights rather than to be put from that right hand where there are pleasures for evermore to be thrown down from every height on Earth if so I may ascent those everlasting Hills and Mount Sion that is above that this is beyond all proportion the wisest course it does demonstrate since it shews us him who is the Son of God who did create all these advantages of Earth and prepare those in Heaven and does therefore know them both Who also is the Wisdom of the Father and does therefore know to value them yet for the joys that were set before him choosing to endure the Cross and despising the shame On that Beam he weigh'd them and by that his choice declar'd the Pomps of this World far too light for that exceeding and eternal weight of Glory that the whole earth was but as the dust upon the Ballance and despis'd it and to make us do so is both the Design and direct influence of the Cross of Christ. But as at first the Wise men of this World did count the Preaching of the Cross meer folly to give up themselves to the belief and the obedience of a man that was most infamously Crucified and for the sake of such an one to renounce all the satisfactions suffer all the dire things of this Life and in lieu of all this onely expect some after Blessednesses and Salvations from a man that they thought could not save himself seemed to them most ridiculous So truly
in conscience to that superior to depart from their own Judgment and to yield and sign their assent to his determinations Witness the matter of Jansenius Yea their great Cardinal is positive that If the Pope could err so far as to call evil good good evil to prohibit vertues or command vices the Church were bound in conscience to believe those vices good and honest and those vertues evil So far he Indeed if that Church be the Mother and Nurse of all Christians 't is from her breasts only they must seek the sincere Milk of the word Now that she is so they must take her word as Children do their Parents words that they are so And indeed this is properly to receive the Doctrine as a little Child not judge nor reason not examin but believe it And such legendary doctrines as well as Histories which they deliver are most fit to be receiv'd by such as Children Yet as if this had been the proper method among Christians always in S. Austin's time we find the Manichees derided Christianity that discipline of Faith because by that men were commanded to believe and were not taught how to distinguish truth from falshood by clear reason and again that it requires us to assent before we have a reason for it And long before that Celsus did advise the Christians to receive no doctrines but on the account of reason credulity being the inlet to deceit saying they that without grounds believe are like those that admire and â—e satisfied with juglers and take appearances and sleight of hand for truth adding many of the Christians neither would receive nor give a reason of their faith but us'd to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do not you examin but believe 't is your faith shall save you and as if from the beginning it were so we cannot but have heard the story of that man that reading Genesis where Moses says In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth And he said let there be light and there was light c. Swore at him saying this Barbarian only asserted boldly but prov'd nothing As if Argument and Reason never had place in the Jewish or the Christian Religion only those who were the inâ—titutors of each Religion did deliver it others had no more to do but to believe it that is to receive it as a little Child Whether these reproaches and the Oath of these known enemies may go for proofs that it was so I shall not now enquire But it is certain on the other side S. Paul requires of his new Christian Corinthians that they be not Children in understanding that they be in malice Children but in understanding Men. Now a Man and a Child differ not in this that the one hath an understanding reasonable soul and the other hath not but in that the one cannot use his understanding or his reason and the other where he acts as man does So that our Religion in requiring that we be in understanding men does require of us that we use our reason in it And since assenting to a thing as truth is an Act of the highest faculty of the soul of man as it is properly and truly reasonable namely as it understands and judges it is not possible a man should really believe a thing unless he satisfie himself that he hath reason for so doing Yea whether that be true or not which many men so eagerly contend for that the will though free is bound and cannot choose but will that which appears best at that time it wills yet it is sure that he who with his understanding which is not free in her apprehensions and judgments but must necessarily embrace that which hath most evidence of truth He I say who really assents to any proposition does satisfie himself that he hath better and more cogent reasons for that then the contrary And therefore it is impossible that any man can verily believe a thing which he is throughly convinc't is contrary to clear and evident right reason for he cannot have a better reason for the thing that is so and were it possible for any man to believe so there could be neither grounds nor Rules for such a ones belief for there is nothing in the World so false and so absur'd although he were assur'd it were so but he might assent to it for whatever demonstrations could be offer'd why he should not yet it seems he might believe against acknowledg'd evident truth and reason but this were onely wish or fancy and imagination not belief And to prevent such Childish weak credulity was the great work and care of Christ so far is he from requiring we should be as Children in this kind For when he was ascended up to heaven he gave some Apostles some Evangelists some Pastors and Teachers he shed down the Holy Spirit and his gifts that we might not be as Children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of Doctrine Eph. 4. 14. First For want of rational grounds instable in our Faith as Children are in body and in judgment also taking all appearances for truths If men were only to believe there must needs be as great variety of Religions as of teachers And though God hath appointed that some Church should be as perfectly infalliable as that of Rome pretends to be yet since there are so many Churches and the true one therefore could be known no otherwise then by some marks there must be disquisition before Faith and men must reason and examin ere they can believe upon good grounds for were they to receive Religion as a little Child be nurst up with the Doctrine as with milk a Child we know may suck infection from the poyson'd breast of an unwholesom mother or some other person for it knows not to distinguish and so may be nurst to death A soul like theirs that is but rasa tâ—bula white paper is as fitted to receive the mark of the beast as the inscription of the living God just as the first hand shall impress Therefore we are bid not to believe every Spirit not every Teacher though he come with gifts pretend and seem to be inspir'd but try them and our Saviour forewarn'd the Jews of false Christs that should come with signs and wonders Something therefore must be known first and secur'd before the understanding can be thus oblig'd to give up its assent and Captivate every thought into obedience as S. Paul directs Now what that was here to the hearers in the Text is easily collected namely that he was the Christ that does require it And S. Paul expresses it in the forecited place where he says we must bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ to wit of that Christ who as he does himself profess that if he had not done among them the works which no other had done they had not had sin John 15. 24. If his
Royal. My LORD WHEN I consider with what reluctancies I appear thus in publick I have all reason to suspect and fear lest this offering which like an unwilling Sacrifice was dragg'd to the Altar and which hath great defects too will be far from propitiating either for its self or for the votary But I must crave leave to add that how averse soever I was to the publishing this rude Discourse I make the Dedication with all possible zeal and ready cheerfulness For I expect your Lordship to be a Patron not only to my Sermon but to my Subject Such a separate eminence of virtue and of sweetness mixt together may hope to ingratiate Your Function to a Generation of men that will not yet know their own good but resist mercy and are not content to be happy And for my self Your Lordships great goodness and obligingness hath encourag'd me not 〈◊〉 to hope that you will pardon all the miscarriages of what I now present but also to presume to shelter it and my self under your Lordships Name and Command and to honour my self before the World by this address and by assuming the relation of My Lord Your Lordships most humbly devoted and most faithful Servant RICH. ALâ—â—STRY SERMON XVI IN St PETERS WESTMINSTER January 6. 1660. ACTS XIII 2. The Holy Ghost said Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them AND as they ministred to the Lord and fasted the holy Ghost said Although that ministring to God by prayer and fasting be the indicted and appropriate acts to preface such Solemnities as this and that not Sermons but Litanies and intercessions are the peculiar adherents of Embers and of Consecrations and those vigorous strivings with Almighty God by Prayer are the birth-pangs in which Fathers are born unto the Church Yet since that now this Sacred Office is it self oppos'd and even the Mission of Preachers preach'd against and the Authority that sends despis'd as Antichristian whilst separation and pretence unto the Holy Ghost set up themselves against the strict injunction of the Holy Ghost to separate the Pulpit that otherwhiles hath fought against it must now attone its errours by attending on the Altar and the bold ungrounded claims of Inspiration that false Teachers have usurp'd be superseded by the voice of the Holy Ghost himself who in this case becomes the Preacher and says Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have call'd them My Text is a Commission parole from Heaven in it you have First the Person that sends it out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Holy Ghost said Secondly the Persons to whom it is directed imply'd in the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate more particularly exprest in the foregoing words Thirdly the thing to which they were impowr'd by the Commission or which was requir'd of them set down in the remaining words of the Text wherein you have 1. The Act injoyn'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate 2. The Object 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate me Barnabas and Saul 3. The end for what 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for a work 4. The determination of that work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the work whereunto I have called them Of these in their Order and first I The Holy Ghost said Of those five things for want of which the second Jewish Temple sunk below the first and its Glory seem'd faint in the comparison the Chiefest was the Holy Ghost who became silent his Oracles ceast then and he spake no more by the Prophets A thing not only confest by the Thalmudists who say our Rabbins have deliver'd to us that from the time of Haggai Zechary and Malachy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Holy Ghost was taken away from Israel but so notorious in experience that when St. Paul meets Disciples at Ephesus Acts 19. 1. and asks them if they have received the Holy Ghost whether at their Baptism the Spirit came down upon them as he did then on others they answer ver 2. We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost any extraordinary effusions of the Spirit whether he do come down in Gifts and Afflations such as we know were usual in the first Jewish Temple but have not been for a long time and we have not yet heard they are restored for of this pouring out of the Holy Ghost they must needs mean it not of himself of whom they could not doubt nothing was more known in the Jewish Church But as our Saviour did supply the other four with all advantage and so fulfilled the Prophecy and made the glory of that Temple greater so for the fifth the spirit he was restored in kind with infinate improvement that of Joel fulfill'd I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh for they were all baptized with the Holy Ghost baptized in rivers of living waters which did flow out of the belly of themselves for this he spake of the Spirit which all that believed on him should receiue Joh. 7. 39. so that Joel did scarce feel or fore see enough to prophesie of this abundance but the inundations were almost like Christ's receivings without measure Nor were his Inspirations as of old dark and mysterious Oracles direction in rapture where the Message it self was to have another revelation and it must be prophecy to understand as well as utter But in the Gospel his effusions run clear and transparent as the Water that expresseth them revealing even all the unknown languages that were the conduits and conveighances all plain express direction such as that of the Text. Now amongst all the several uses of the Holy Ghost for which he was pour'd out in this abundance amongst all the designs he did engage himself in and advance he does not seem to have a greater agency nor to interess himself more in any than in qualifying for and separating to Church-Offices This seems to be his great work And indeed how can he choose but be particularly concern'd in those Officer which are his own 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his gifts Timothy's is expresly call'd so in each of his Epistles 1 Tim. 4. 14. 2 Tim. 1. 6. And when our Saviour Ephes. 4 8. is said to give the gifts of the Holy Ghost to men it is added how ver 11. He gave some Apostles some Evangelists some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry namely because those gifts enabled for those Offices and all the reason in the World that he should have a special hand in giving where himself is to be receiv'd Receive the Holy Ghost that was from the beginning and is yet the installation to them And if we take them from their divine original from that great Pastor and Bishop of our souls who was the maker of them too Thus he was consecrated the spirit of the Lord is upon me therefore he hath anointed me to preach
the Gospel Luke 4. 18. And when he comes to ordain succession he says as my Father sent me so send I you And he breathed upon them and said Receive the Holy Ghost Joh. 20. 21. And after bids them tarry at Jerusalem 'till they should be endued with power from above Luk. 24. 47. That is endued with the Holy Spirit Act. 1. The present Barnabas and Saul were sent by his Commission in the Text and v. 4. And Saint Paul tells the Elders of the Churches of Asia the Holy Ghost made them overseers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 20. 28. Timothy had his Office 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by immediate designation of the Holy Ghost 1 Tim. 4. 14. Clemens Rhomanus saith the Apostles out of those they had converted did ordain Bishops and Deacons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having first try'd them by the Holy Ghost and so taught by his revelation who should be the men And Clemens Alexandrinus says John after his return to Asia ordain'd throughout all the regions about 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as were signified and design'd by the Holy Ghost So that Oeâ—â—menius pronounces in the general 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Bishops that were made they made not inconsiderately on their own heads but such whom the Spirit did command Chrysostom said as much before and Theoplylact Nor can we doubt that he maintains his interest in this affair even at this day But that our Veni Creator Spiritus come Holy Ghost eternal God does call him to preside in these so concerning Solemnities For Christ when he commission'd his Apostles assuring them behold I am with you even to the end of the World which promise he performs only vicriâ Spiritûs prasentiâ by the presence of the Holy Ghost who is his Vicar as Tertullian expresses nor can the Spirit be with them till then but by making them be till then which being done by Ordination that Ecclesiastical procreation for so they derive themselves to the Worlds end upon the strength of that promise we may assure our selves he does assist as truly though not so visibly as when he said here separate The Ghost's concernment being thus secured I have this one thing only to suggest that they who set themselves against all separation to these Offices and Orders in and for which the Holy Ghost hath so appear'd what they be I dispute not now they â—ight against the Holy Ghost and thrust him out of that in which he hath almost signally interessed himself And they that do intitle the Spirit to this opposition do not onely make Gods Kingdom divided against it self or raise a faction in the Trinity and stir up division betwixt those Three One Persons but they set the same Person against himself and make the Holy Spirit resist the Holy Ghost You know the inference prest upon them that did this but interpretatively in the Devils Kingdom and did make Satan cast out Satan And is 't not here of force And they who make the Spirit cast out the Holy Ghost contrive as much as in them lies Gods Kingdom shall not stand I will not parallel the guilts Those Pharisees blasphemed the Holy Spirit in his Miracles ascribing that to Beelzebub which was the immediate work of the Holy Ghost and such indeed do sin unpardonably because they sin irrecoverably for Miracles being the utmost and most manifest express wherein the Holy Ghost exerts himself they who can harden their understandings against them have left themselves no means of conviction and cannot be forgiven because they cannot be rectified or reclaimed These others do blaspheme the Spirit in his immediate inspirations and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ascribing to the spirit of Antichrist all those Offices and Orders which these gifts of the Holy Ghost were power'd from Heaven immediately to qualifie for and separate to things in which he hath as signally appeared as in his Miracles and as he made these means to convince the World so he made those the Officers of doing it and set them to out last the other Now in the same nearness that these two guilts come up one towards the other just to the same degree these sin the sin against the Holy Ghost For the Holy Ghost said separate So I pass to the second to those whom this Injunction is directed to And thence I do observe in general that Notwithstanding all the interest and office that the Holy Ghost assumes in these same separations yet there is something left besides for Man to do Although he superintend they have a work in it He is the Vnction but it must be apply'd by laying on of hands I have call'd them saith he in the Text and yet to them that ministred the Holy Ghost said do ye separate I do not now examin what degree and order of men they were whom the Holy Ghost here commissions for this Office The Judgement of the Antient Church in this affair is enough known by the condemnation of Aerius and by the Fate of Ischyras and Colluthus and for the present instance in which they are call'd Doctors that are bid to do it there hath enough been said to prove 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Title of a Bishop to which I shall only add that it was a variation of Name that stuck by them untill Bede's age in which what Bishops signified does come under no question for he does say that Austin call'd together to the Conference Episcopos sive Doctores the Bishops or the Doctors of the Province Besides that there was then in Antioch a Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the time of Claudius Emperour of Rome and of Euodius whom the Apostle Peter had ordain'd at Antioch those that before were call'd Nazarenes and Galileans were call'd Christians A thing which happen'd a little before this separation in the Text as you find Chap. 11. 26. But who they were that us'd to separate for every Execution of these holy Offices will appear from the Instances that I shall make to prove the present Observation that besides that of the Holy Ghost there was an outward call And whom soever the Spirit sent he commanded that they should have Commission from Men. And all my former Testimonies for the Holy Ghost bear witness for this too The Text is positive here was a Congè d'estire for Barnabas and Saul Timothy had his Office 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be designation of the Spirit 1 Tim. 4. 14. yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with laying on of hands ibid. yea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the laying on of my hands 2 Tim. 1. 6. And Timothy was plac'd at Ephesus as Titus also left at Creet to ordain others in the same manner St. Paul providing for the succession of the Rite and Ceremony as well as of the Office And in St. Clement's Testimony 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Spirit try'd but the Apostles constituted And down as low as
Angels met us in to Worship and God dwelt in to bless us there the place appointed for the Divinest Mysteries of our Redemption for the Celebration of Christ's Agonies for the Commemoration of the blessed Sacrifice the place for nothing but Christ's Blood then to become the place of a most odious and insolent uncleanness If I had worded this more aggravatingly it had been only to infer that then to see a consecrated person to polute himself with those black foulnesses that made hell and made fiends is sure a sadder and a more unhappy spectacle If an Apostle become wicked he is in our Saviour's Character a Devil Have I not chosen Twelve and one of you is a Devil Yea if the good Saint Peter do become a scandal tempt to that which is not good Get thee behind me Satan Christ calls his nearest Officers Stars Emblems of a great separateness those that teach them how far their Conversation should be remov'd from Earth for they are of another Orbe Heaven is the Region of Stars But they are Emblems of a greater purity there 's nothing in the World so clean as light 't is not possible so much as to fully shine it may irradiate dung-hills but they do not defile it you may Eclipse a Star but cannot spot it you may put oâ— the light you cannot stain it 'T is a word for God's purity only his light is glory and as his holiness is so separate that it is incommunicable so his Light is inaccessible Yet sure they that are stars in Christ's right hand they do come neer and mix their light with his and they of all men must be pure and holy whom the spirit calls to that place as he does all whom he calls to that separation that he did Barnabas and Saul the Persons and the next Part Separate me Barnabas and Saul I intend not to make particular reflections upon these persons although the Character of Barnabas be registred the 11. Chap. v. 24. He was a good man full of Faith and of the Holy Ghost and the good influence that that had upon the people follows And much people was added to the Church And as for Saul though he began the Christian persecution and was baptiz'd in the first Martyr-blood and breath'd out threatnings so that nothing but thunder could out-voice him and at last was born as an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as an untimely birth aborting through those wounds which his own hands had made in the Church and making himself a birth with ripping up her bowels yet this Abortive prov'd the strongest birth and 't was a Miscarriage into the chiefest Apostle As he began the after-sufferings of Christ in Stephen so he fulfill'd the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and made up all that was behind in himself being in deaths more than those he inflicted The sound of his preaching was louder than that at his Conversion out-voic'd the thunder for this went out into all lands as if himself alone meant to execute the whole Commission Preach the Gospel to every creature which he did almost not only preaching to those places where Christ was not named without the other Apostles line but even where the rest imploy'd themselves he wrought as much as they in Asia as Saint John at Antioch as Peter yea and at Rome too having as much to do in their foundation If I had said more I could have brought the Popes own Seal for evidence where not only both are but Saint Paul hath the right hand And truly if they had had the luck to think at first of founding all their pretensions on Saint Paul his care of all the Churches would have born them out as well as feed my Lambs does now But these considerations I pass though they would give a Man that hath done mischief in the Church a pattern for the measures of his future Service to the Church The thing I shall concern my self in is the solemn separation here of those who were before separated to the work of the Gospel Barnabas sent by the Church of Jerusalem to Antioch Act. 11. 22. and Paul not only separated from his Mothers womb Gal. 1. 15. but chosen by express Revelation and by the laying on of Ananias's hands that so he might receive the Holy Ghost qualified to Preach the Gospel to the Gentiles and to Kings In which work both of them had for some years â—ercised themselves Yet here is a new consecration and they are taken up to a condition more separate and distinct from what they were before And all those vast advantages in which these persons did excell the one of Faith and fulness of the Holy Ghost the other besides those of express and immediate mission from Heaven and the most strange success their labours had been blest with all these I say did not qualifie them to assume these powers which the Holy Ghost commands another separation to enstall them in And 't was this 〈◊〉 that call'd Paul to be an Apostle Rom. 1. 1. as from this time he is always call'd Paul not sooner Nor do we find any least footsteps of their being Apostles before though Barnabas were sent to Antioch yet he does not undertake what Peter and John did at Samaria in the very same case for they confirm and give the Holy Ghost Act. 8. 15 37. but Barnabas does nothing but Exhort Act. 11. 23. and he and Paul together Preacht the Word abroad but we find nothing else they enterpriz'd but from this time they exercise Jurisdiction settle Churches and ordain them Elders in the Churches Ch. 14. 22 23. and as it does appear singly deriv'd these powers to others to be exercised by them singly To Titus most expresly Tit. 1. 5. the like also to Timothy with all the other Acts of Jurisdiction of which their Epistles are the Records particularly that of Censures which Paul himself had inflicted on offenders in the Churches he had planted Powers these which by such steps and by degrees of separation an Apostle himself receives and does not execute 'till he ascend the highest that which they have a new solemnity ordain'd from Heaven to enstate them in by a new laying on of hands and the holy Ghost himself commanding separate The separateness of this highest order in the Church is a doctrine handed down to us both by the writings of all Ages and the practices two things which as they scarcely do concur in such a visible degree in any other things in our Religion so also when they do concur they make and secure tradition beyond all contradiction give it sufficient infallibility and truly he that does refuse the evidence which such tradition gives to all the motives of believing Christianity if he be not a Socinian he must be an Enthusiast and can receive his Religion only from Revelation Now the matter of fact of this tradition is a subject for Volumes not for
and came on purpose to to prove by their own onely argument they had of providential Miracles they were not in the right but that destruction and misery were in their ways yet these chuse rather to deny their own conclusions and resist Gods goodness then to be convinced and repent For we have seen them as bold Martyrs to their Sin as ever any to Religion signalize their resolv'd impenitence with chearful suffering as if the fire they were condemn'd to were that Triumphal Chariot in which the Prophet mounted up to Heaven Others that did not go so far in condemnation nor guilt as they and therefore think they have no reason to repent of that do they repent of what they did contribute to it Of those that lifted up their hands to swear and fight how many are there that have made them fall and smite their own thigh saying What have I done Do not all rather justifie as far as they themselves proceeded And if all that were well why do not we repent of our Allegiance and Loyalty If all that were well what hath thy goodness done O Lord that hath reverst it all And for the rest those that do not partake the plenties of thy goodness murmur and repine at it are discontent at having what they pray'd for what they would have died for Those that have been partakers of it have turned it into wantonness have made it furnish them for base unworthy practices such as have not the generosity of Vice have not a noble manly wickedness are poltron sins have made it raise a cry on the Faithfullest party the best Cause and the purest Church in the World While we have debauched Gods own best Attribute made his goodness procure for our most wicked or self-ends and the face of things is so vicious in every order and degree and sex that But the Confession is onely fit for Litanies and we have need to make the burthen of ours be Lord give us some afflictions again send out thy Indignation for we do fear thy goodness it hath almost undone us and truly where it does not better it is the most fearful of Gods Attributes or Plagues for it does harden there St. Paul says so in the forecited place and Origen does prove this very thing did harden Pharaohs heart indulgence was his induration Now induration is the being put into Hell upon the Earth There is the same impenitence in both and judgment is pronounced already on the hardned and the life they lead is but the interval betwixt the Sentence and the Execution and all their sunshine of Prosperity is but kindled Brimstone onely without the stench And then to make the treasures of Gods bounty be treasures of wrath to us to make his kindness his long-suffering that is St. Peter says salvation condemn us his very goodness be Hell to us But sure so great a goodness as this we have tasted cannot have such deadly issues and it was great indeed so perfectly miraculous in such strange and continued successes resisting our contrivances and our sins too overcoming all opposition of our vices and our own policies that do not comport with it and in despight of all still doing us good it was fatality of goodness Now sure that which is so victorious will not be worsted by us But Oh! have we not reason so much more to fear the goodness The greater and more undeserved it is the more suspicious it is As if it were the last blaze of the Candle of the Lord when its light gasps its flash of shine before it do go out the dying struggles and extream efforts of goodness to see if at the last any thing can be wrought by it And if we did consider how some men manage the present goodness make use of this time of it and take and catch we would believe they did fear the departure of it But yet it is in our power to fix it here If we repent Gods gifts then are without repentance but one of us must change Bring Piety and Vertue into countenance and fashion and God will dwell among us Nay St. Paul says Goodness to thee if thou continue in his goodness If we our selves do not forsake it and renounce it not fear it so as to flie from it but with the fears of sinking men that catch and grasp lay fast dead hold upon it if as God promises he so put his fear in our hearts that we never depart from it fear that hath love in it and is as unitive as that then it shall never depart from us but we shall see the goodness of the Lord in the Land of the Living and shall be taken thence to the eternal fulness of it This day shall be the Birth-day of Immortal Life the entring on a Kingdom that cannot be moved A Crown thus beautified is a Crown of Glory here and shall add weight and splendor to the Crown hereafter A Church thus furnished is a Church Triumphant in this World and such a Government is the Kingdom of Heaven upon Earth and then we shall all reign with him who is the King of Kings and who washed us in his Blood to make us Kings and Priests to God and his Father To whom be glory and dominion for ever Amen SERMON XVIII AT CHRIST'S-CHURCH IN OXFORD ON St STEVEN's Day MATH V. 44. But I say unto you love your Enemies bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you I Need no Artifice to tie this Subject and this Day together The Saint whose memory we celebrate was the Martyr of this Text And 't is impossible to keep the Feast but by a resolution of obeying these Commands you being call'd together on this day to beseech God to grant that you by the Example of this first Martyr St. Stephen who pray'd for his Murderers may learn to love your Enemies and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you A strange command in an Age in which we scarcely can find men that love their Friends nor any thing but that which serves their interests or pleasures that indeed love nothing but themselves nor is it onely injury that works their hate and enmity but difference in opinion divides hearts and men are never to be reconcil'd that have not the same mind in every thing as if one Heaven should not hold them that have not one judgment in all things we see that one Church cannot hold them and they that have but one same God one Redeemer and Saviour one Holy Spirit of Suplication cannot agree yet in one Prayer to him though they have but one same thing to pray for to him will not meet in their Worship because they do not in some Sentiments and 't is no wonder all Christ's reasonings and upbraidings all the Advantages he does propose to them that love the shames he casts on them
For them it is very necessary for persecution or despightful usage offending God as by a disobedience to his precept so also by the sufferings it does inflict on man to forgive or require which that man hath right God does not use to put the injur'd person by this right or by its paramont Authority assume to pardon the mans part of the wrong but does retain the sin till that either in deed or desire do satisfied for or remitted there being 'till then an obstruction to Gods forgiveness for 'till then the man hath not repented but when the fufferer does pray for him in doing so he pleads that that obstruction is remov'd that his part is remitted and so leaves no bar in the way to that pardon which he begs for him of God and which that bar being gone the Lord is us'd to grant with all advantage the prayers of our Martyr in the seventh of the Acts are a demonstration to which the Fathers say the Church did owe not only her deliverance from all the violent intentions of Saul but all that Christianity which St. Paul planted the dying voice of that petition Lord lay not this sin to their charge was answered by that voyce from Heaven which converted Saul in his career of fury One prayer for a persecutor puts an end to persecution si Stephanus non or asset Ecclesia non habuiesset Paulum Jobs miserable comforters whose visits prov'd afflictions to him could not a tone themselves to God by their burnt offerings but Job must pray for them 42. Chr. 8. seven Bullocks and seven Rams cannot expiate but one petition from the sufferer will do it for him I will accept saith God and he accepted him not for them only but for himself for the Lord turned the Captivity of Job when he prayed for them vers 10. These intercessions speed sooner then direct supplications and such a petition is heard to our selves when 't is made for others And reason good for such requests lay the condition of our pardon before God making evidence of our performance and they cry for we forgive and so call for pardon And to encourage this procedure our Saviour before he did commend his own spirit into the hand of his Father he commended his Executioners to the mercies of his Father Our Martyr did not so indeed but first pray'd for himself Lord Jesus receive my Spirit Acts. 7. 59. But though Heaven opening he saw that Jesus standing at the right hand of God as ready to receive it yet his spirit would not leave his body so yet made him live yet to endure more stoning from his persecutors for whom he had not pray'd yet but when he once fell on his knees not beaten down by their storm but his Charity and pray'd Lord lay not this sin to their charge when he had said so he fell asleep v. 60. his Spirit taken hence as it were osculo pacis though by the most violent death and he lies down in a perpetual rest and peace that thus lies down in Love These are requests to breath out a soul into heaven in and heaven it self did open to receive that soul that came so wafred And now we are at the top of Christ's Mount the highest and the steepest point of christianity which view with that â—o which our Martyrs Spirit did ascend For it makes perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect it sets our heads within those higher and untroubled Regions wherein there are no Meteor-fires the flame of Passion cannot wing it thither for he that is above the power of injury discontent cannot look up to him it is with him as in the upper Orbs where there is only harmony and shine all is peace and love the state of heaven it self Now as it does happen to them that look down from great heights every Object below is dwarf'd And if the distance of the prospect be as great as that from Heaven to Earth they tell us this whole Globe would be but like a spot all being swallowed in it self so if from this great height of duty we should look down upon the World of Christianity would it not almost wholly disappear and vanish Something like a dark spot of it you may perchance behold stain'd and discolour'd with the Blood of Christians which their constant quarrels shed Some it may be dye that Blood in colours of Religion their Animosity is christened Zeal they kill only for Sacrifice thus they interpret and fulfill Christs precepts this they call holy love as if Christ when he bid his Disciples take no Staves with them meant they should carry Swords as if the love he had commanded we should have for them that are in errour if our enemies be so indeed were but to murder them forsooth out of their errours Next for the kindnesses that Christians do to those that hate them or have disoblig'd them they are God knows so little that no perspective can shew them from this height we are upon And yet 't is not for want of light we cannot see them 't is very rare men do those things in the dark for if they do not blazon them themselves the enemy whom they oblige must do it The distance also is too great to hear the prayers that are made for those that treat men with despiteful usage perhaps it is because they are put up in secret bur then what means the yelling of those curses That ill Language that is banded to and fro While none will be behind in the returns of these how far soever we are off like Thunder these are heard And thence you may behold them also tearing Christs wounds wider to mouth their swelling passion We may see their anger redden with his Blood and themselves spitting out that Blood by imprecations at the face of him that did provoke them we may see them raking Hell to word these prayers sending themselves thither in wishes that they may express them with more horrour The Hatreds and Revenges which men act on them that have offended them hates that seldom ever dye 'till themselves do which the Frost of the Grave onely cools yea many times they are rak'd up and keep their heat in the ashes live in the grave and are as long liv'd as the families which for the most part is more careful and tenacious of them than of their Inheritance The executions of these are often writ in Characters legible at utmost distance in this Mount of the Lord they may be seen but where now are the Christians of my Text and of this day There 's no appearance of them in the face of the whole Globe of our Profession nay worse it is scarce possible they should appear the Duties of loving enemies of returning affronts with kindnesses these are banisht thence other virtues are practic'd down but these are scorn'd and quarrel'd down 'T is become a base thing and not to be endur'd to be a Christian