everlasting and after preached by the Apostles both to Iew and Gentile was finally committed unto writing to this end and purpose that by reading it or hearing it read and declared by others we may believe that IESVS is the CHRIST the Son of God and that believing we may have life through his name as St. Iohn assures us And though this be affirmed by him of his Gospel only I mean that written by himself yet we may safely say the same of all the rest of the Apostolical and Evangelical writings as being dictated by the same Spirit writ by men equally inspired and all conducing to this end to teach us to know IESVS CHRIST and him crucifyed and to enable us to give a reason to all that aske of the faith that is in us But being the writings of the Evangelists and Apostles were of too great a bulk to be committed unto memory and that there were some things in them so obscure and difficult that many ignorant and unstable but well meaning men both might and did wrest them to their own destruction other things which related rather unto moral duties then to points faith it was thought fit by the Apostles to draw the points of saving faith such as were necessarily to be believed of all Christian people into a briefe and narrower compasse It was not for the ordinary sort of men to trouble themselves with doubtful disputations as St. Paul calleth them whereof many do occurre in his Epistles disputes of too great difficulty and sublime a nature for every man especially the weak in faith either to understand or conceive aright Nor was it possible that men of mean parts and laborious callings of which the Church consisted for the most part in the first beginning should either have so much leasure as to read over their writings or so much judgment as to gather and collect from thence what of necessity was to be believed that they might be saved what not or so much memory as to treasure up and repeat by heart the infinite treasures of divine knowledge which are comprehended in the same And if it were so as no doubt it was when the Apostles and Evangelists had left those excellent Monuments of themselves in writing which the Church hath ever since enjoyed to which men might resort as occasion was for their information and instruction how necessary then must we think it was for some such Summarie and Abstract of the Christian faith to be resolved upon amongst them which men of weak memories might repeat by heart and men of shallow comprehensions righly understand Those blessed souls knew well none better how to apply themselves to the capacities of the weakest men that there were many Babes in Christ who were to be fed with milk and not with meats and that if they became not all things unto all men they must resolve amongst themselves to save but few Upon this ground then which what juster could there be to induce them to it it is conceived they drew up that brief abstract of the Christian faith which we call the CREED and couched therein whatever point was necessary for all sorts of men in all times and all places of the world both to believe in their hearts as also to professe and confesse upon all occasions though to the apparent hazard of their lives and fortunes And why this might not be that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that form of sound words whereof St. Paul saith to Timothy Hold fast that form of sound words thou hast heard of me I must confesse that I could never yet see a convincing reason Certain I am that Irenaeus who lived very near the Apostles times hath said of this confession of the faith this Creed which hath so generally and unanimously been received over all the world Ecclesia per universum orbem usque ad fines terrae c. The Church saith he throughout the world even to the ends of the earth received from the Apostles and their Disciples that faith which believeth in one God the Father Almighty maker of heaven and earth c. and in IESVS CHRIST the Son of God incarnate for our salvation and in the holy Spirit which preached by the Prophets the dispensation and coming of God and the birth of CHRIST our Lord by the Virgin his passion resurrection and ascension with his flesh into heaven and his coming from heaven in the glory of his Father to raise up all flesh and to give just judgement unto all Which words lest possibly we might interpret of the doctrine of faith which questionlesse was alwayes one and the same over all the world and not of any summary or abstract which they had digested for the use and benefit of Gods people or think that they relate rather to the substance of faith then to any set and determinate form of words in which that substance was delivered let us behold what the same Father hath delivered in another place This faith saith he which the Church though dispersed through the world received from the Apostles and their Disciples yet notwithstanding doth it keep it as safe as if it dwelt within the wals of one house and as uniformly hold N. B. as if it had but one only heart and soul and this as consonantly it preacheth teacheth and delivereth as if but one tongue did speak for all He addes which makes the point more plain that though there be different languages in the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet the effect and summe of the tradition i. e. the faith delivered in that forme is one and the same and I presume he means not by tradition those doctrines of faith which are delivered in the books and writings of the Evangelists and Apostles Finally he concludes with this expression and it is worthily worth our marking in the present case that he amongst the Governours of the Church who is best able to speak saith no more then this and no lesse then this the simplest and the most ignorant person which certainly he had not said but that there was one uniforme and determinate order of words which every one was bound to learn and adhere unto Tertullian he speaks plainer yet and affirmes expresly regulam fidei unam omnino esse solam immobilem et irreformabilem that there is but one rule of faith at all and that unmoveable and unalterable How could he say that there was but one rule of faith in the Church if every several Church had a several rule or that it was unmoveable and unalterable as he saith it was if there were no certain form of words prescribed which men were to keep to but every one might change and alter as he saw occasion So that I take it for a truth unquestionable that in the first ages nay the first beginnings of the Church of CHRIST there was a certain form of words prescribed for the ease and benefit of the Church a summarie or abstract of the Articles
from the sight of men And if the wise Gentile could affirme so sadly nunquam minus solum esse quam cum solus esset that he was never lesse alone then when he was by himself what need can any rational man suppose in Almighty God of having more company then himself in If this suffice not for an answer to that needlesse demand What God did before he made the World let him take that of Augustine on the like occasion who being troubbled with this curious and impertinent question is said to have returned this answer Curiosis fabricare inferos that he made Hell for all such troublesome and idle Questionists But it pleased God at last when it seemed best unto his infinite and eternal wisdome to create the World and all things visible and invisible in the same contained A point so clear and evident in the Book of God that he must needs reject the Scripture who makes question of it And as the Scripture tels us that God made the World so do they also tell us this that because he made the World he is therefore God For thus saith David in the Psalms The Lord is great and very greatly to be praised he is to be feared above all Gods As for the Gods of the Heathen they are but Idols but it is the Lord which made the Heavens Where plainly the strength of Davids argument to prove the Lord to be God doth consist in this because it was he only not the gods of the Heathen which created the World The like we also finde in the Prophet Ieremy The Lord saith he is the true God he is the living God and an everlasting King and the Nations shall not be able to abide his indignation Thus shall ye say unto them The Gods that have not made the Heavens and the Earth even they shall perish from the Earth and from under these Heavens He hath made the Earth by his power and established the World by his wisdome and hath stretched out the Heavens by his discretion In which two verses of the Prophet we have proof sufficient first that God made the World by his power and wisdome and secondly that this making of the World by his power and wisdome doth difference or distinguish him from the gods of the Heathen of whom it is affirmed expressely that they were so far from being able to make Heaven and Earth that they should perish from the Earth and from under Heaven But what need Scripture be produced to assert that truth which is so backed by the authority of the Learned Gentiles whose understandings were so fully convinced by the inspection of the Book of nature especially by that part of it which did acquaint them with the nature of the Heavenly Bodies that they concluded to themselves without further evidence that the Authour of this great Book was the only God and that he only was that great invisible power which did deserve that Soveraign title And this Pythagoras one of the first founders of Philosopie amongst the Grecians who in all probability had never seen the works of Moses as Plato and those that followed after are supposed to have done doth most significantly averre in these following verses which are preserved in Iustin Martyr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which may be thus paraphased in our English tongue He that will say I am a Power divine A God besides that one let him first make A world like this and say that this is mine Before he to himself that title take For the next point that God the Father Almighty did create the World it is a truth so clear and evident in the Book of God that he must needs reject the Scripture who makes question of it it being not only told us in the holy Scriptures that God made the World but also when he made it and upon what reasons with all the other circumstances which concern the same The very first words of Gods book if we look no further are in themselves sufficient to confirme this point In the beginning saith the Text God created the Heaven and the Earth As Moses so the royal Psalmist He laid the foundations of the Earth and covered it with the deep as it were with a garment and spreadeth out the Heavens like a curtain He made Heaven and Earth the Sea and all that therein is And so the whole Colledge of the Apostles when they were joyned together in their prayers to God Lord said they thou art God which made Heaven and Earth the Sea and all that in them is Made it but how not with his hands assuredly there is no such matter The whole World though it be an house and the house of God cum Deo totus mundus sit und domus said the Christian Oratour yet it is properly to be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an house not made with hands How then He made it only by his word Dixit et facta sunt He spake the word and they were made saith the sweet finger of Israel There went no greater paines to the Worlds creation then a Dixit Deus And this not only said by Moses but by David too Verbo Domini coeli firmatī sunt et spiritu oris ejus omnis virtus eorum i. e. By the word of the Lord were the Heavens made and all the hosts of them by the breath of his mouth In which it is to be observed that though the creation of the World be generally ascribed unto God the Father yet both the Son and the holy Ghost had their parts therein Verbo Domini by the word of the Lord were the Heavens made saith the Prophet David In the beginning was the Word All things were made by him and without him was nothing made saith St. Iohn the Apostle The Spirit of God moved upon the waters saith Moses in the Book of the Law and Spiritu oris ejus by breath of his mouth were all the hosts of Heaven created saith David in the book of Psalmes Made by his word but yet not made together in one instant of time to teach us men deliberation in our words and actions and to set forth unto us both his power and wisdome His power he manifested in the Method of the worlds creat on in that he did produce what effects he pleased without the help of natural causes in giving light unto the World before he had created the Sun and Moon making the earth fruitfull and to bring forth plants without the motion or influence of the Heavenly bodies And for his wisdome he expressed in as high a degree in that he did not create the Beasts of the field before he had provided them of fodder and sufficient herbage nor made man after his own image before he had finished his whole work filled his house and furnished it with all things necessary both for life and pleasures
of Canaan on the Priests and Levites being his in his own right Originally by the law of Nature and by him challenged and appropriated as his own domaine All the Tithe of the land whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the tree is the Lords Here 's the Lords claim and title to them as his own propriety Behold I have given the children of Levi all the Tenth or Tithes in Israel for an inheritance for the service which they serve even the service of the Tabernacle of the Congregation There 's the collation of his right on the Tribe of Levi whom he made choyce of to attend in his holy Tabernacle and to do service at his Altar And they continued the inheritance of the Tribe of Levi until the Priesthood was translated unto Christ our Saviour who being made by God the true owner of Tithes a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech became invested ipso facto with that right of Tithing which God had formerly conferred on the Priests and Levites and consequently with a power of disposing of them to them that minister in his Name to the Congregation The second argument which the Apostle doth afford us in this case of Tithes is the Prerogative which Melchisedech haâ— iâ— that particular above Aaron and the sons of Levi. Levi also saith he which received Tithes paid Tithes in Abraham for he was yet in the loyns of his Father when Melchisedech met him Heb. 7.9 10. Then which there cannot be a stronger and more pregnant argument to prove that Tithes are no Mosaical institution or the peculiar maintenance of the Levites but that they are derived from an higher Author and are to be continued to the Ministers of a better Testament For the Apostle taking on him to prove this point that the Priesthood after the Ordâ—â— of Melchisedech was better and more perfect then that which was according to the Order of Aaron useth this argument to evince it and it is a weighty one indeed that Levi himself though he received Tithes of his brethren by the Lords appointment yet he and all his Tribe paid their Tithes to Melchisedech being all vertually and potentially in the loyns of Abraham at such time as Melchisedech met him and consequently being as effectually tithed in Abraham as all mankinde have sinned in Adam from whose loyns they sprung Nay we may work this argument to an higher pitch and make the full scope of it to amount to this That if the Tribe of Levi had been in full possession of the Tithes of their Brethren when Melchisedech met with Abraham and blessed him as became the High Priest of God to do or if Melchisedech had lived in Canaan till their setling in it they must and ought to have done as their Father did and paid their Tithes unto Melchisedâ—eh as the Type of Christ in reference to his everlasting and eternal Priesthood But seeing that this common place hath been so much beaten on I shall only alter some few words of that Noble Gentleman and great Antiquarie Sir Henry Spelman to make his argument more suitable to my present purpose and so close this point Insomuch saith he as Abraham did not pay his Tithes to a Priest that offered a Levitical Sacrifice of Bullocks and Goats but unto him that presented him with Bread and Wine which are the Elements of the Sacrament ordained by Christ this may serve well to intimate thus much unto us that we are to pay our Tithes unto that High Priest an High Priest of Melchisedechs Order who did ordain the Sacrament of Bread and Wine and unto them in his behalf who by his Ordinance and appointment in the Word Hoc facite administer the same unto us And so much for the Sacerdotal Office of our Lord and Saviour which he doth execute for our good at the right hand of God we now proceed unto the Regal which though it is most eminent in his coming to Iudgement and so more properly to be handled in the following Article yet for so much thereof as is exercised at the right hand of God we shall reduce it under this in the following chapter CHAP. XIV Of the Regal or Kingly Office of our Lord as far as it is executed before his coming unto Iudgement Of his Vice-gerents on the Earth and of the several Vice-roys put upon him by the Papists and the Presbyterians WE have not yet done with this branch of the Article that of our Saviours sitting at the right hand of God For of the three Offices allotted to him that of the Priest the Prince and the Prophet all which are comprehended in the name of CHRIST that of the Priest is wholly executed as he sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty And so is so much also of the King or the Regal Office as doth concern the preservation of his Church from the hands of her enemies the Regulating of the same by his holy laws and indeed every act and branch thereof except 〈◊〉 of Iudicature which is most visibly discharged in the day of judgement Of all the rest we shall now speak and for our better method and proceeding in it must recall to minde that we told you in our former Chapter how both the Kingdome and the Priesthood of our Saviour Christ did take beginning at the time of his Resurrection He was before a King Elect designed by God to this great Office from before all worlds but not invested with the Crown nor put into the possession of the Throne 〈◊〉 David till he had conquered Death and swallowed up the grave in victory That he was King Elect and in designation is evident by that of the Royal Psalmist where he brings in God Almighty speaking of his only Son and saying I have set my King upon my holy hill of Sion as evident by that of the Prophet Daniel where he telleth us that in those days those days which the Apostle calleth the fulness of time the God of Heaven shall set up a Kingdome which shall never be destroyed which can be meant of none but the Kingdome of Christ. And that we may not have the testimony only of Kings and Prophets which were mortall men but also of the blessed Angels those immortal Spirits we have the Angel Gabriel saying of him to his Virgin-Mother that the Lord would give unto him the Throne of his Father David and of his Kingdome there should be no end But yet he was but King Elect and in designation born to the Crown of the Celestial land of Canaan as the Heir apparent and by that name enquired for by the Wise men saying Vbi est ille qui natus est Rex Iudaeorum i. e. where is he that is born King of the Iews as our Englâ—sh reads it And so do all translations else which I have seen except Bezas and the French which doth follow him And he indeed doth
us out the way unto life eternal both by thy Doctrine and Example Conduct us we beseech thee in the pathes of righteousness suppress that itch of curiosity which hath not left one Article of the holy Faith without stain or censure and make us chearfully submit our Reason to the Rule of Faith And thou O God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth send down thy holy Spirit into our hearts that by his Grace we may believe in thine onely begotten son JESUS CHRIST our Lord place all our hopes upon the merits of his most precious death and passion our comforts in his glorious Resurrection and Ascension That by his means and mediation we may be made true Members of thy Catholick Church enjoy a right Communion with thy blessed Saints and the remission of our sins in this present world That so we may be made partakers of the Resurrection unto Life eternal in the world to come So be it Amen FINIS Eccl. 12.12 Plautus Rom. 2.1 Eccl. 4.7 Tacit. Ann. Pag. 350. Pacian in Biblioth Patr. Whitac Contr. 2. q. 9. c. 8. Horat. de arte Poet. Ovid. Triâ—t Eleg. 1. Virg. Aen. l. 1. Ambros. in Hexaemer 1 Cor. 12.20 Ephes. 5.32 De Civit. dei l. 22. c. 17. Hos. 2.19 Eph. 5.30 Eph. 4.5 1 Cor. 12.13 Tacit. Annal. lib. 15. Joh. 3.16 Joh 20.31 2 Pet. 3.16 Rom. 14.1 Heb. 5 13 14. 2 Tim. 1.13 Iren. adv haeres l. 1. c. 2. Id. ibid. c. 3. Iren. adv haeâ—es l. 1. c. 3. Tertull. de veland Virgin Aug. Serm. de Temp. 115. Aug. de fide Symb. c. 1. Id. in Encheirid a Laur. Ruffin in Symbol Aug. Serm. 115. de Temp. Ambros. Serm. 38. Hieron Epist ad Pammach 61. Leo Epi. 13. ad Palcher De Eccl. Officiis l. 2 c. 3. Cap. 56. Terent. in Andria Aug. Encheir ad Laurent Id. lib. de fide Symb. c. 1. Epist. 61. ad Pammach c. 9. Lib. 1. c. 3. Tertul. adv Praxeam Ignat. Epist. ad Trallian Euseb. Hist. l. 1. c. ult Examen Concil Trident. sess 4. Articl of 1562. Art 134. Contra Donat. l. 4. c. 23. Field l. 4. c. 21. Vigilius contra Eutych l. 4. Hooker Eccles. Polit. l. 5. Apolog. pro Confess Remon Durand Rationale Divin Field of the Church l. 2. c. 1. Ruffinus in Exposit. Symb. Concil Agathens Can. 13. Aug. Homil 42. Conc. Foro-Iuliens Apud Binium Tom. 3. par 1. l. 1. p. 262. Durand Rational Divin Anast. apud Platinam in Collect. Concil Durand Rational Divin Baron Annal Eccl. A. 44. Perk. Exposition of the Creed Id. ibid. B. Bilsons Survey p. 664. August de doctr Christian. Id. de Civit. l. 11. c. 3. B Bilsons Survey p. 664. Binuis in Annot. in Concil Tolet. IV. Tom. Concil 2. part 2. Perk. Exposition of the Creed Mar. 16.15 Isocrat in Orat. ad Nicoclen Aristol Analytic prior Quintilian l. 2. cap. 13. Philo de vita Mofis l. 3. Iulii Etist decretal c. 8. Mat. 28 20. Paci Epist. 1. ad Symp. Downs of the Authors and Authority of the Creed Ruffinus in posit Symb. Lact. l. 2. c. 9. Act. 17.28 1 Cor. 15.33 Tit. 1.12 B. Iewels challenge Pet. Mart. de votis coelebat Chemnit Examen de Tradition c. 6. August Epist 19. Hieronyn ad Damas. Epist. 57. Vincent Lirin adv haeres c. 38. Id. ibid. c. 2. Augustin in Epist. 118. Id. contr Iulian. Pelagi l 2.9 Id. ibid. c. 10. Canon An. 1571. cap. de Concionator An. 1. Eliz. cap. 1. Saravia de divers ministerii gradibus Calvin Inst l. 2. c. 16. sect 1â— (b) Coke in Calvins case (c) Phocylid sentent (d) Rom. 8.38 (e) Philip. 1.6 (f) Valla in Annotat. in N. Test. (g) Zanch. de Natura Dei c. 3. (h) Melancht in Exam. Artic. de Iustificatione (i) Vrsin in Exposit. praecept 1. (k) Arist. in lib. Demonstrat (l) Joh. 4.39.41 42. (m) 2 Pet. 1.21 (n) 2 Thes. 2 10 11 12. (o) Heb. 11.1 (p) Beza in Heb. c. 11. v. 1. (q) Haymo in Heb. c. 11. v. 1. (r) 2 Tim. 2.18 (s) Haymo in Heb. c. 11. v. 1. (t) Heb. 3.14 (u) Budaeus in Comment Gr. Linguae (x) 2 Cor. 9.4 11.17 (y) Ephes. 6.12 (z) Haymo in Heb. 11. v. 1. (a) Id. ibid. (b) Rev. 1.20 (c) Beza in Heb. c. 11. v. 1. (d) August in Psalm 77. (e) Id. in Iohan tract 29. (f) Compend Theol. lib. 5. c. 21. (g) Zuinglius in Matth. 23.13 (h) Muscul. loci commun loco de Fide n. 3. (i) Wotton de Reconcil Peccat part 1. lib 2. c. 14. n. 3. (k) Mat. 8.26 (l) Mat. 28.2 c. (m) Calvin in Ioh. cap. 2. v. 11. (n) Joh. 4.39 (o) Davenant in Coloss. 2. v. 2. (p) Joh. 11.42 (q) Calvin in Ioh. cap. 11. v. 42. (r) Joh. 1.12 (s) Joh. 2.23 (t) Calv. in locum cap. 2. v. 23. (u) Joh. 2.24 (x) Muscul Loci commun de fide (y) Exod. 14. v. 31. (z) Muscul. ut supr (a) Exod. 19.9 (b) Basil. de sancto Spiritu c. 14. (c) Socrat. hist. Eccles. l. 1. c. 25. (d) Ruffin in Exposit. Symboli (e) Paschas de Spirit sancto lib. 1. (f) August in Ioh. tractat 29. (g) Wotton de Reconcil Peccat part 1. l. 2. c. 14. (h) Joh. 2.23 (i) Act. 16 31. (k) Hermes (l) Origen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in prooemio (m) Hilar. de Trinitate l. 10. (n) Symbol Caroli M. (o) Heb. 11.6 (p) Iewel Apol Eccles. Anglic (q) Act. 8.13 (r) Calvin Instit. l. 3. c. 2. â— 10. (s) Idem in Act. 8.13 (t) Act. 8.21 22. (u) Ignat. Epi. (x) 1 Tim. 1.19 20. 2 Tim. 2.17 18. (y) 1 Tim. 1.20 (z) Calvin Instit l. 3. c. 2. n. 11. (a) Rom. 6.22 (b) Act. 5.4 (c) Act. 8.23.21 (d) 1 Tim. 1.19 (e) Act. 8.22 (f) 1 Tim. 1.20 (g) 1 Cor. 5.4 (h) Rom. 1. 18.20 (i) Jude v. 6. (k) Mat. 25.30.1 (l) Mark 1.24 (m) Mat. 8.29 (n) Heb. 2.16 (o) Sect. 1. ch 2. (p) Vrsin Theses Theol. c. 13. (q) Id. ibid. (r) Iackson of justifying faith c. 2. (s) Vrsin Cutech part 2. qu. 21. n. 2. (t) Matth. 13.20 21. (u) Bucan Com. loc de Fide (x) Vrsin Catech part 2. qu. 21. (y) Mat. 17.20 (z) 1 Cor. 12.8 9 10. (a) Cicer. in Tusc. quaest l. 1. (b) Lactant. l. 3.8 (c) Act. 14.16 17. (d) Tacit. de mor. German (e) Lactant. l. 1.2 (f) Ap. Morâ— de vera Relig. (g) Lactant l. 1. c. 11.13 c. (h) Lucan Pharsal l. 10. (i) Lactant. l. 2. (k) Iuvenal Sat. 13. (l) August de civit Dei l. (n) Minut. Fel in Octavio (o) Lactant. l. 1.6 (p) Minut. Fel. in Octavio (r) Mereur Trism in Paeman c. 2 3 4 c. El in Asclep c. 6 7. (s) Lactant. l. 1.6 (t) Id. cap. 7. (u) Minut. Fel. in Octavio (x) Clem. Alexand in Proâ—rept (y) Laert. in vita Socrat. (z) Tertul. in Apolog. c. 46. (a) Laert. in vita Socr. (b) Plato in Epist. 13. ad
to him therefore must we sue and address our prayers as often as we stand in need of his help and succour either in stirring up the diligence of our own proper Angels or sending us such for their succour as the case requireth The Angels are his Ministers but not our Masters our Guardians at the best but by no means our Patrons Therefore we must not pray to them in our times of danger but to God that he would please to send them Not unto them because we know no warrant for it in the holy Scripture nor any means might it be done without such warrant to acquaint them ordinarily with our present need by which they may take notice of our distresses and come in to help us 'T is true the Daemons or evil Angels in the state of Gentilism were honoured both with Invocation and with Adoration and the Colossians being newly weaned from their Idolatries thought it no great impiety to change the subject and to transfer that honour on the Angels of light which formerly they had conferred on the Angels of darkness But doth St. Paul allow of this No he blames them for it Let no man saith he beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of Angels Not in a voluntary humility as if we thought our selves unworthy to look up to God and therfore must employ the Angels for our Mediators For this was formerly alleadged as it seems by Zonaras by some weak Christians in the infancy and first days of the Church Of whom he telleth us that they were verily perswaded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say That we ought not to invocate Christ to help us or to bring us to God but to desire that favour of the Angels rather immediate address to Christ being a thing too high for our great unworthiness Nor in the worshipping of Angels which being an effect of their former Gentilism Of which consult St. August Confess l. 10. cap. 42. De Civit. Dei l. 8 9 10. Theodoret upon the Text Clemens of Alexandr Strom. l. 3. Can. 35. Concil Laodicensis was therefore by St. Paul condemned and forbidden as a thing plainly derogatory to the honour of Christ whom they did hereby rob of the glorious Office of being the Mediator between God and man 'T is true that there were some in the Primitive times who were called Angelici who intermingled the Worship of God with the adoration of Angels and lived about the end of the second Century But then it is as true withall that they were reckoned Hereticks for so doing both by Epiphanius in his Pannaion and by St. Augustine in his 39. chap. ad quod vult Deum And not the adoration only but even the invocation of Angels also invocation being an act of Divine worship is by the same Epiphanius condemned for heresie Haer. 38. where he speaks of it as a thing in usual practise amongst the Hereticks called Caini Nor was this worshipping of Angels condemned only by them but by all the Fathers of the Council of Laodicea Canon 35. nor by them only who were guided by a fallible spirit nor by St. Paul only though directed by the Spirit of God but by the very Angels themselves who constantly have refused this honour whensoever by mistake or otherwise it was offered to them For when Manoah in testimony of his joy and thankfulness would have offered a Kid unto that Angel which brought him news from Heaven of the birth of his son the Angel did refuse it saying If thou wilt offer a Burnt-offering thou must offer it unto the Lord By which modest and religious refusal of so great an honour Manoah knew as the Text hath it that he was an Angel And if we may not offer to them the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving then certainly they do as little expect our incense or the oblation of our prayers And therefore it was both piously and acutely said by divine St. Augustine that if we would rightly worship Angels we must first learn of them that they will not be worshipped The like we also finde in the Revelation Where when St. Iohn astonished at the sight of the Angel fell down at his feet to worship him the Angel did refuse it saying See thou do it not for I am thy fellow-servant and of thy Brethren Concerning which we have this memorable passage of the same St. Augustine Quare honoramus eos c. We honour saith he the angels with love not service neither do we build Temples to their honour for they will not so be honoured by us because they know that we our selves are the Temples of God And therefore it is rightly written that a man was forbidden by an Angel that he should not worship him but one God alone under whom he was a fellow-servant with him They then which do invite us to serve and worship them as Gods and so do all which do invite us to pray unto them are like to proud men who would be worshipped if they might though to say truth to worship such men is less dangerous then to worship Angels Finally he resolves it thus and with his Resolution I shall close this point though much more might be said in the prosecution Let Religion therefore binde us to one God Omnipotent because between our mindes or that inward light by which we understand him to be the Father and the truth there is no creature interposed Pray to them then we may not we have no ground for it But pray to GOD we may to send them to our aid and succour when the extremity of danger doth invite us to it And having made our prayers we may rest assured that God will send them down from his holy hill from whence comes Salvation and give them charge to succour us as our need requireth Calvin himself alloweth of this and gives it for a Rule or Precept Vt in periculis constituti a Deo petamus protectionem Angelorum confidamus eos ex mandato Dei praesto fore But behold a greater then Calvin here For our most blessed Mother the Church of England not only doth allow of so good a rule but hath reduced his rule to as good a practise By whom we are taught to pray in the Collect for St. Michael the Archangels day that God who hath ordained and constituted the service of all Angels and men in a wonderful order would mercifully grant that they who always do him service in Heaven may by his appointment succour and defend us on earth through IESVS CHRIST our Lord. Amen Further then this we may not go without entrenching deeply upon Gods Prerogative which as these blessed spirits expect not from us so neither will they take it if it should be offered Non nobis Domine non nobis is the Angels song But so it is not with the Devil or the Angels of darkness who do not only accept of those
this objection she might make not out of any disbelief of the Angels words for being then as faulty as old Zachary was she had been as punishable since God is no respecter of persons nor that she had vowed chastity as the Papists say and Gregory Nyssen doth report from an unknown Author whose history he doth confess to be Apocryphal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as his words there are for then she had done very ill to betroth herself unto an husband the vow of Chastity being inconsistent with the state of Matrimony But this she did because the Angel seemed to speak of her Conception as a thing instantly to be done and then in fieri at the least as Logicians phrase it and she though then betrothed to Ioseph was a Virgin still for the Text saith it was before they came together and more then so there was perhaps some part of the time remaining which usually intervened amongst the Iews betwixt the first Espousals and the consummation of the marriage But this bar was easily removed For it followeth that the Angel answered and said The holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee The holy Ghost shall come upon thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek Text hath it that is to say the holy Ghost shall fall upon thee like rain into a fleece of wooll or like the dew of heaven upon a barren and thirstie land where no moisture is and make thee no less fruitful without help of man then was the Virgin Earth in its first integrity when no outward or extrinsecal moysture had yet fallen upon it but that there went up a mist only out of the very bowels thereof and watered the whole face of the ground And the power of the most High shall overshadow thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Greek and cover thee with the wings of his quickning virtue as the Hen doth Egges when she brings forth young To make this matter plainer yet we shall illustrate it by two Texts of holy Scripture equal to this both in the wonder and the agent In the beginning saith the Text God created the Heaven and the Earth and the Earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep And in the second of the same Book we read that God created man out of the dust of the earth vers 7. In each of these there is a subject some matter such as it was to be wrought upon that confused mixture of Earth and waters to be disposed into a world the dust and Atoms of that world to be contrived into a man The fashioning and accomplishment of which great works both of them seeming as impossible to sense and reason as the Conception of our Saviour in a Virgins Womb is in the Scripture attributed to the holy Ghost The Spirit of God saith Moses moved upon the face of the waters Hence the digestion of that matter fashioned into that goodly fabrick of Heaven and Earth which we so visibly behold with such admiration God breathed into his nostrils the breath or spirit of life inspiravit in faciem ejus spiraculum vitae from whence the Animation and soul of man This action then ascribed unto the holy Ghost which St. Luke calleth a supervenience or a coming upon and an obumbration or over-shadowing is likely to have been much of the same nature with that of moving in the first and that of breathing in the 2. of Genesis Gods Spirit as it breatheth where it listeth so can it quicken where it pleaseth Some there have been if Maldonate do report them rightly Qui turpe aliquid hoc loco somniant who have made some impure construction of this holy Text most impudently affirming Spiritum sanctum ad modum viri cum Maria concubuisse I abhor to English it but who they were he either was afraid or ashamed to tell us No doubt but they were some of the Romish party For had such a blasphemous and ungodly saying dropped from the mouth or pen of a Protestant all Christendome had been told of his name and Nation And therefore certainly this quidam whom he spares to name must be some such good fellow of the Catholick faction as Fryer Albert of the frock as they use to call him Of whom I remember I have read in some of their Authors that being a great Votary of the blessed Virgins she appeared nightly to him in her bodily shape espoused her self to him by a ring and suffered himself to converse with her in familiar manner Insomuch as he might say in the Poets language Contrectatque sinus forsitan oseula jungit He dallied with her Paps And kissed her too perhaps But I do ill to mingle these impurities with this sacred argument if the unmasking of the obscoenities of those great Professors of vowed chastity do not plead my pardon And yet I cannot choose but adde that these lazy lives of some of the Monks and Fryers have carryed them so far into spiritual fornications or rather into contemplative lusts that many of them have fancied to themselves such unclean commixtures as that of Fryer Albert with the blessed Virgin To what end else served those large Faculties which were given unto Tekelius a Dominican Fryer when he was sent to publish the pardons or Indulgences of Pope Leo the tenth in the upper Germany Who spared not to affirm even in common Alehouses that by his Buls he had authority to absolve any man whatsoever Etiamsi Virginem matrem vitiaverit though he had vitiated or deflowred the Virgin Mother as Sleidan tels the storie in his book of Commentaries I know that in the later Editions of this Author as in that of Colen printed An. .... the words are changed to Virginem aut matrein a maid or a mother and so to mend the matter they have marred the sense For what need such large faculties as Tekelius bragged of for pardoning fornication or Adultery for the deflowring of a Virgin or lying with another mans wife which every ordinary Priest can absolve of course Besides in the first Edition of that Author printed at ..... An. .... it is plainly Virginem Matrem the Virgin Mother And so 't is in an old English Translation of him printed at London and la Veirge Mere as plainly in a French Translation printed at Geneva An. 1574. Marvail it is that Maldonate hath not undergone the like castigation whose Quidam whatsoever he was offended more against the Majesty of the holy Ghost then Tekel did save that the Popes authority was concerned in it against the modesty and piety of the Virgin Mary To return therefore where I left as I abominate the impieties of these Romish Votaries so neither can I approve the conceit of Estius though otherwise a very learned and sound Expositor of holy Scripture where the interest of the Church of Rome
is not concerned who by the power of the most High understands here the very person of God the Son and by this over-shadowing of the blessed Virgin his voluntary Incarnation in her sanctified womb His words are these Per virtutem Altissimi intelligi ipsum Dei Filium qui est virtus brachium potentia Patris quique obumbraturus significatur Virginem illapsu suo in uterum Virginis per occultum Incarnationis mysterium But by his leave I cannot herein yeild unto his opinion though Chrysostom and Gregory for the antient Writers Beda and Damascene for the Authors of the middle times do seem to contenance it For not St. Augustine only as himself confesseth and Euthymius a good writer also are against him in it but the plain text and context of the holy Scripture which makes the quickning of the womb of this blessed Virgin to be the work only of one Agent though it be expressed by different titles Nor are such repetitions strange or extraordinary in the Book of God nor can it give any colour to distinguish the power of the most High from the holy Ghost as if they were two different Agents unless we can distinguish the Lord our God from him that dweleth in the Heavens because we finde them both together in the 2. Psalm He that dwelleth in the Heavens shall laugh them to scorn the Lord shall have them in derision And though it cannot be denyed but that the Son of God is the very power and strength of his Father yet himself doth give this very name of power to the holy Ghost For when he commanded the Apostles to abide in the City of Hierusalem donec induantur virtute ex alto i. e. until they were â—ndued with power from on high what else did he intend thereby but that they should continue there until they were endued with the holy Ghost Of which see Act. 2.4 Besides if this opinion should be once admitted we must exclude the holy Ghâ—st from having any thing to do in so great a mysterie and so not only bring the Creed under an Expurgatorius Index but the Scripture too Letting this therefore stand for a truth undeniable that the over-shadowing as the Text calleth it of the blessed Virgin was the proper and peculiar work of the holy Ghost let us next see whether the nature of the miracle be not agreeable to the operatioâ—s of the holy Spirit or such as may not be admitted for a truth undoubted by equal and indifferent men though they be not Christians nor take it up upon the credit of the Word of God And first that of it self it is agreeable to the operations of the Spirit the course of his Divine power in the works of nature doth expresly manifest For as in the spiritual regeneration though it be Paul that planteth and Apollo that watereth yet it is God who gives the increase without whose blessing on their labours their labours will prove fruitless and ineffectual so also in the act of carnal generation though the man and woman do their parts for the pro creation of children yet if the quickning Spirit of God do not bless them in it and stir up the emplastick virtue of the natural seed they may go childless to their graves It is the Spirit which quickneth what the womb doth breed And therefore in my minde Lactantius noted very well Hominem non Patrem esse sed generandi Ministrum that man was nothing but the instrument which the Lord did use for the effecting of his purpose to raise that goodly edifice of flesh and bloud which he contemplates in his children It is the Spirit of God as the Scripture tels us which first gave form unto the world from whence that known passage of the Poet Spiritus intus alit had its first Original of which we have made use in our former book And if the chief work or rather the principal part in the work of nature in the ordinary course of Generation and first production of the Word may be ascribed as most undoubtedly it must unto the powerful influence of this quickning Spirit with how much more assurance may he be entituled to the Incarnation of the Word to which one sex only did contribute and that the weakest without the mutual help and co-operation of the seed of man Nor is the greatness of the Miracle so beyond belief but that there is sufficient in the holy Scripture to convince the Iew and in the writings of the Poets to perswade the Gentiles to the admission of this truth and consequently to confirm all good Christians in it Out of the Virgin-Earth did God first make Adam and out of Virgin Adam he created Eve Adam first made without the help of man or woman and Eve made after out of Adam who had no wife but this which was made out of him Why might not then the blessed Virgin be as capable of conceiving a Son by the sole power and influence of the holy Ghost without help of man as Adam was of being Father unto Eve by the self same power without the use of a woman Without a Mother Eve without Father CHRIST Adam without both Father and Mother but all the handy-work of God by the holy Spirit Equivalent in effect to the creation of Adam and the production of Eve was the birth of Isaac conceived by Sarah when it had ceased to be with her after the manner of women by consequence as indisposed to the act of conception as if she had been still a Virgin or which is more then that under years of marriage The strength that Sarah had to bring forth that Son was not natural to her for she was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 past the age of childe-bearing as the Text informs us but a strength supernatural given from God on high and therefore called a received strength she received strength to conceive seed Heb. 11.11 because not naturally her own but received extraordinarily from God As Isaac was in many things a Type of CHRIST so in no one thing more exactly then that he was the only Son or the dearly beloved Son of his Father begotten on a woman past the time of her age whose dead womb could not but by such a miracle be revived again To this the Iews most cheerfully do give assent boasting themselves to be the children of Abraham by this very venter What reason have they then not to yeild to this but that they resolved not to yeild to reason Next for the Gentiles do we not finde it in their Poets that Venus was ingendred of the froth of the Sea animated by the warmth and influence of the Sun that Pallas issued from Ioves brain and Bacchus from the thigh of Iupiter Do we not read that most of their Heroes so much famed of old were begotten by their Gods upon mortal creatures as Hercules on Alcmena by Iupiter Phaeton on Clymene by Phoebus and Paâ—
said he addes this of the Saints 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that thus in fine they saw Hell spoyled Epiphanius in this order marshalleth the acts of Christ He was crucified buried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he descended to places under the earth he took captivity captive and rose again the third day By which we see that the taking of captivity captive was one of the effects of his descent into Hell and that both his descent and victory over Hell and Satan are placed between his burial and Resurrection In the Homiliâ—s which Leo the Emperour made for the exercise of his style and the Confession of his Faith wherein no doubt he had the judgement and advice of the ablest men that were about him he doth thus deliver it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Christ is risen saith he bringing Hades or the Devil prisoner with him and proclaiming liberty to the Captives He that held others bound is now bound himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ is now come from Hell or Hades with his ensign of triumph as appeareth by the sowre and heavy looks of those which were overthrown that is to say of Hades meaning there as first the old Satan himself together with Death also and the hateful Devils Dorotheus in his Book de Paschate very plainly thus What means this that he led captivity captive It means saith he that by Adams transgression the Enemy had made us all captives and had us in subjection and that Christ took us again out of the Enemies hand and conquered him who made us captive And then concludes Erepti igitur sumus ab Inferis ob Christi humanitatem that we were then delivered from the power of Hell by the manhood or humanity of Christ our Saviour St. Cyprian though more antient and not so clear as he in this particular doth yet touch it thus Descendens ad inferos captivam ab antiquo duxit captivitatem that Christ descended into Hell brought back those captives which had before been captivated And in another place which we saw before When in the presence of Christ Hell was broken open and thereby captivity made captive his conquering soul being first presented to his Father returned unto his body without delay But to look back again to the old Greek Fathers who are far more positive and express in this then the Latines are we are thus told by Athanasius in another place that the Lord rose the third day from the dead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having spoyled hell trodden the enemy under foot dissolved death broken the chains of sin with which we were tyed and freed us which were bound from the chains thereof St. Cyril of Alexandria thus Our Lord saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. having spoyled death and loosed the number of souls which were detained in the dens of the earth rose again the third day from the dead Which words of Cyril are repeated and approved in the Councel of Ephesus and afterwards confirmed in the fifth General Councel holden at Constantinople St. Hierom finally on the parable of the strong man which was bound and spoiled Mat. 12. gives this observation which I had almost pretermitted viz. that this strong man was tyed and bound in Hell and trodden under the Lords feet and the Tyrants house being spoyled captivity also was led captive In which quotations from the Fathers we must take this with us that when they speaking of spoyling Hell and vanquishing the powers thereof they do allude as evidently to the spoyling of principalities and powers mentioned in that to the Colossians as they insist upon the taking of captivity captive expressed in that to the Ephesians In a word take the sum of all which by the Antients is delivered upon those two Texts in these words of Zanchius a very learned Writer of the Reformed Churches The Fathers saith he for the most part are of this opinion that Christ in his soul came to the place of the damned to signifie not in words but with his presence that the justice of God was satisfied by his death and bloudshed and that Satan had no longer power over his Elect whom he held captive c. As also that he might carry all the Devils with him in a triumph as it is Coloss. 2. He spoyled powers and principalities and made an open shew of them leading them as captives in a triumph by the vertue of his Cross by which he had purged away sins and appeased the justice of God So Zanchius But the most clear and pregnant place of holy Scripture for proof of Christâ— descent into Hell is that of the 2. of the Acts where the Apostle citing those words of David Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hell nor suffer thine holy One to see corruption applyeth it thus unto our Saviour that David seeing this before spake of the Resurrection of Christ that his soul was not left in Hell neither did his flesh see corruption In which particular words those before recited it is clear and manifest that the soul and body of Christ were by God appointed to be superiour to all contrary powers that is the soul to Hell and the flesh to the grave and that from both Christ was to rise an absolute conquerour that he might sit on his heavenly Throne as Lord over all not by promise only as before but in fact and proof But for the whole Sermon of St. Peter made on this occasion it may be summed up briefly to this effect that is to say that the Prophesie of David neither was nor could be fulfilled in any no not in David himself but only in the promised Messiah for that his soul should not be left in Hell or Hades nor his flesh see corruption but was fulfilled in that Christ whom ye cruelly crucified He it is that is risen Lord of all in his own person the sorrows of death being loosed before him he is ascended up to Heaven as David likewise foretold of him and there sitteth on the right hand of God untill all that be his enemies in the rest of his Members be made his foot-stool and thence hath he shed forth this which you now see and hear even the promise of the holy Ghost received of the Father for all his And therefore know ye for a surety that God hath made him both Lord and Christ i. e. Lord over all in Heaven Earth Hell and Christ even the Anointed Saviour of all his Elect. And to this purpose saith St. Augustine Quamobrem teneamus firmissime c. Wherefore let us most firmly hold that which is comprehended in our Faith or the heads thereof confirmed by most sound authority namely that Christ dyed according to the Scriptures and was buried and according to the Scriptures also rose again the third day with the rest of those things which are most clearly testified of him in the written Word
after Easter which is the Anniversary feast of the Resurrection are those of the Ascension of our Lord and Saviour and the coming of the holy Ghost or the Feast of Whitsuntide Which method of the Church in these great solemnities seemes to be borrowed from the method of the Creed which we have before us wherein unto the Article of the Resurrection is presently subjoyned that he ascended into Heaven there sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty and there shall tarry and abide untill he come to judge both the quick and the dead and after that the Article of the holy Ghost And there was good reason for this too For therefore did our blessed Saviour raise himself from the shame and obloquie of the grave that he might ascend in glory to the Heaven of Heavens that being gone from thence and ascended thither he might send them as he had foresignified another Comforter that should abide with them for ever And as it seems the Royal Psalmist the sweet singer of Israel fore-saw the neer conjunction of those two great Festivals the necessary dependance which the coming of the holy Ghost had on Christs Ascension Thou art gone up on high saith he thou hast led Captivity Captive and received gifts for men that the Lord God might dwell amongst them So that the Text beginneth with the ascending of CHRIST and ends with the descending of the holy Ghost For if a man should ask as the Eunuch did of whom doth the Prophet speak this of himself or of some other man we must needs answer with St. Philip and say that it relateth unto Jesus Christ. That so it is we have St. Paul to be our warrant who thus cites the Text with reference unto Christ the Lord When he ascended up on high he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men He received gifts for men saith the Psalmist he gave gifts to men saith the Apostle He did reâ—eive them of his Father that he might give them unto us Well then what gifts are they that he tels us after And he gave some to be Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers to the gathering together of the Saints to the work of the Ministration and to the edifying of the Body of Christ. These were the gifts which Christ conferred upon his Church by the holy Ghost first by his first descent or coming upon Whitsunday when he gave Apostles and Evangelists falling upon their heads in likeness of cloven tongues and ever since by furnishing the Pastors and Teachers of it with those gifts and graces of the Spirit which are expedient for their Calling And this is evident enough from the Psalmists words where it is said that He received gifts for men that the Lord God might dwell amongst them Which cannot be applyed unto Christ himself for then it must not have been said that he had ascended up on high and was parted from us but that he tarried here below to be always with us Therefore God here must needs he God the holy Ghost who came not down till after Christ was gone up and then came down noâ— only to remain among us but to be in us saith our Saviour and to abide with us for ever So that this Text containing as you see it doth the substance and occasion of these two great Festivals we will begin first with the holy Thursday part thereof which is Christs Ascension according as the method of the Creed doth lead me Where by the way the Feast of holy Thursday of the Lords Ascension is of as great Antiquity as eminencie in the Christian Church it being reckoned by St. Augustine amongst those feasts and there were but four of them in all which had been generally received in all ages past and thought to be of Apostolical Institution Now for this great act of the Ascension St. Mark delivereth it in brief that When he had spoken unto them he was received into heaven and sate him down on the right hand of God St. Luke a little more fully in his Gospel thus that he led them out into Bethany and blessed them and it came to pass that as he blessed them he departed from them and was carryed up into Heaven But in the Acts the story is laid down at large and with more particulars There we are told that from the time of his Resurrection he continued forty days upon the earth appearing many times in that space or Interim unto his Apostles and speaking to them of the Kingdome of God that on the fortieth day he led them to a Mount which is called Olivet being from Hierusalem a Sabbath days journey which some conceive to be a mile or but two at most that being there and speaking unto his Apostles about the Kingdome of Israel while they beheld he was taken up on high and a Cloud received him out of their sight And finally that as they followed him with their eyes towards Heaven behold two men stood by them in white apparel which also said Ye men of Galilee why stand ye gazing up into Heaven This same IESVS which is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come even as ye see him go into Heaven This is the substance of the story in which we have some passages to be further looked on and others to be reconciled with the Creed from which they seem in words to differ For first whereas it is said that he appeared unto them forty days which is not to be so interpreted as if he shewed himself unto them every one of those days but that in the said forty days from his Resurrection frequenter se eis viÌ„dâ—â—dum exhibuerat he had offered himself to them oftentimes to be by them and to discourse with them of the things of the Kingdom of God In the next place St. Luke who tels us in the Acts that our Saviour made his ascent from the Mount of Olives informs us in the Gospel that it was at Bethany Which difference is easie to be reconciled would there were no worse For Bethanie was a village neer unto Hierusalem about fifteen furlongs from it as the Text instructs us and seated at the foot of the Mount called Oâ—ivet In which respect it is called Bethanie at the Mount of Olives Mark 1.1 So that whether Mount Olivet was esteemed to be within the limits and precincts of the Village of Bethanie or Bethanie was reckoned for the lower part of the Mount of Olives it comes all to one But the main point to be considered is the seeming difference which is between the words of the Creed and the words of the Gospel Ascendit ad Coelum saith the Creed he ascended into Heaven 't is his own act here Assumptus est in Coelum saith St. Mark ferebatur in Coelum saith St. Lukes Gospels elevatus est saith the Book of the Acts he was carryed up into
being typified in the Sanctum Sanctorum and by that entituled as before we saw unto which none might enter but the High Priest only From Types proceed we next unto the way of Prophecy and there we finde assured proof not only for the Substance of the Lords Ascension but for every Circumstance First for the substance thus saith the Prophet David Psal. 24. Lift up your heads O you gates and be you lift up you Everlasting doores and the King of Glory shall come in Who is the King of Glory the Lord strong and mighty the Lord mighty in battel Which Psalm as it was framed by that sweet singer of Israel on the reduction of the Ark to the City of David and literally meant of the Gates of the Tabernacle through which the Ark the glory of the Lord of Hosts was to have its entrance so was it mystically and Prophetically spoken of our Saviour Christ who in a mighty battel had subdued all the powers of hell and afterwards by his Ascension did set open the Gates of Heaven as all the Fathers generally down from Iustin Martyr do expound the place The Gates were lift up in the Psalm for the King of glory and opened in the Gospel for the Lord of glory as the Apostle with some reference to the Psalmist cals him Where by the way I think we need not go much further to resolve a doubt which hath been made by some in the Church of Rome that is to say whether the Heavens did open to make way to our Saviours passage an vero sine diversione eos penetravit or that he pierced or passed through the Coelestial bodies as they conceive he came unto his Disciples when the dores were shut The reason of this querie we know wel enough It is to help them at a pinch when they are put to it in maintenance of that monstrous Paradox of Transubstantiation which utterly destroys the being of Christs natural body But unto this the lifting up of the Gates gives a ready answer and such an answer as hath countenance from the Gospel also For if the Heavens were opened to make way for the Spirit of God to descend upon him at his Baptism as we know it was with how much greater reason must they then be opened when he ascended into Heaven not in Spirit only but also in his body in his humane nature Next for the circumstances which occur in the Lords Ascension we have the time thereof the fortieth day precisely from his Resurrection prefigured in the forty days of respit which God gave to Nineveh before he purposed to destroy it The correspondence or resemblance doth stand thus between them that as God gave the Ninivites forty days of Repentance after the miraculous deliverance of Ionah from the belly of the Whale had in all probability been made known unto them to confirm his Preaching so he gave forty days to the Iews also after Christs Resurrection to see if they would turn from their sins or not before he did withdraw the presence of their Saviour from them and lay them open to that desolation which he had denounced against them for their wickedness And this I am the more confirmed in by another passage of this kinde in the Book of Ezekiel where it is said Thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days I have appointed thee each day for an year Which Prophesie what ever it might aim at at that present time in which it was declared by the mouth of the Prophet was questionless most punctually fulfilled in those forty days which Christ continued on the earth untill his Ascension For having born those forty days the iniquities of the house of Iudah and kept off by his presence all those plagues and punishments which were due unto them for the same he left them unto that destruction which at the end of forty years reckoning each day for an year as the Prophet bids us befell both their Temple and their Nation For the place next we finde it on record in the Prophet Zachary in these words His feet shall stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives which is before Hierusalem on the East and the Mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof Which part of the Prophesie concerning the feet of God which were to stand on the Mount of Olives was never before so literally verified as in the day of oâ—r Saviours Ascension his sacred feet making such an impression on the ground where he took his rise if I may so say as seemed to cleave the ground in twain and there continued for the space of four hundred years if the Tradition of the Antients be of any credit Certain I am that so it is affirmed by Paulinus no fabulous Writer but of a very great esteem for piety in the best times of the Church and he tels it thus Mirum vero inter haec quod in Basilica Ascensionis locus ille tantum de quo in nube susceptus ascendit ita sacratus divinis vestigiis dicitur ut nunquam tegi marmore aut paviri receperit semper excussis se respuente quae manus adornandi studio tentavit apponere Itaque in toto Basilicae spacio solus in sui caespitis specie virens permanet impressam divinorum pedum venerationem calcati Deo pulveris perspicua simul irrigua venerantibus conservat I have put down the words at large on the Authors credit and so commit them to the censure of the learned Reader Then for the cloud in which our Saviour made his Ascent to Heaven we have it thus fore-signified by the Prophet Daniel Behold saith he one like unto the Son of man came in the Clouds of Heaven and approached unto the antient of days and they brought him before him And he gave him Dominion and honour and a Kingdome that all people Nations and languages should serve him his Dominion is an everlasting Dominion which shall never be taken away and his Kingdome shall never be destroyed Where by the way we have a full description of that power and honour which God conferred upon our Saviour and by St. Mark is intimated in that form of speech and sate down on the right hand of God But this I touch but on the by referring the full disquisition of it to the next branch of this Article to which it properly belongeth In the mean time let us behold the pomp and ceremonie of the Lords Ascension which David hath described in the words before that is to say When he ascended up on high he led captivity captive and received gifts for men He gave gifts to men saith the great Apostle which how they do agree was before delivered In which it seemes to me that the sacred Pen-men have made the course and order of the Lords Ascension like to the pomp and glory of the antient Triumphs It was we know the custome of the
yet take him in perfecta gloriae suae exhibitione in the full and perfect manifestation of of his glorious Majesty and then he may be said most truly to have his habitation in the Heaven of Heavens For thus the Prophet Moses in the Book of Deuteronomie Looke down from Heaven thy holy habitation 26.15 Thus David in the Psalms The Lords seat is on high from the place of his dwelling he beholdeth all things Psal. 112. Thus Solomon the Son of David Hear thou from Heaven thy dwelling place 1 King chap. 8. Finally thus the Prophet Isaiah Look down from Heaven the habitation of thine happiness and of thy glory Chap. 63. He is no Christian I dare say who will stick at this And this bâ—ing granted I consider that in a place of such immensitie as the Heaven of Heavens in a large house wherein there are so many Mansions as our Saviour telleth us the Lord hath chosen one place above all the rest in which to fix his Throne and advance his Scepter and shew himself in all the Majesty of his Glory to the Saints and Angels For as the Lord was present in all parts of the Temple but most effectually in the Sanctum Sanctorum where the Ark was kept and into which none entred but the High Priest only was thought fit to enter so though his dwelling be in Heaven in all parts thereof all which may properly be called his Court or Imperial Palace yet hath he placed his Throne in that part of Heaven which the Apostle by allusion calleth the Holy of Holies where the Ark of his incomprehensible Majesty is most conspicuous to be seen and into which none but our High Priest IESVS CHRIST was permitted to enter Of all the Apostles only two were so highly favoured as to be carried in the Spirit into Heaven above where they not only heard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such things as are impossible for a man to utter though he could speak with all the tongues both of men and Angels but saw 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even the invisible things of God which never mortal man had beheld before and both of them describe God sitting on a Throne St. Iohn most copiously thus Immediately saith he I was in the Spirit and behold a Throne was set in Heaven and one sate on the Throne Ver. 2. About the Throne were four and twenty seats for the four and twenty Elders vers 4. and out of it proceeded Lightnings and Thunderings and Voyces vers 5. And when the time came and the Q. was given the four and twenty Elders fell down before him that sate on the Throne and worshipped and cast their Crowns before the Throne saying Thou art worthy O Lord our God to receive glory and honour and power because thou hast created all things and for thy pleasure sake they are and were created vers 10 11. more to this purpose doth occur in the following Chapter And last of all I do consider that though the Throne Imperial of Almighty God hath neither a right side or a left as indeed it hath not yet seeing that our Saviour is ascended in his natural body and hath his left hand and his right hand like to other bodies it will be logically inferred that our Redeemer sitting by the Throne of God with his left hand next unto the Throne in true propriety of speech without Trope or figure may be said to sit at the right hand of God or on the right hand of the Throne of God which comes all to one St. Paul who had been rapt up into the third Heaven and had a glimpse at least if not a full and perfect sight of the heavenly glories hath it so expressely where he affirms that our Redeemer the Author and finisher of our faith having endured the Cross and despised the shame is set down on the right hand of the Throne of God And St. Iohn intimates as much when he tels us as it were from the mouth of Christ in these very words To him that overcometh I will grant to sit with me in my Throne even as I overcame and have sitten with my Father in his Throne Where plainly Christ our Saviour sitting in the same Throne wiâ—h Almighty God as St. Iohn expressely saith he doth may properly be said to sit at the right hand of God in regard that the left hand of his natural body was in site nearest to the splendour of his heavenly Majesty for otherwise God must be said to sit on the right hand of Christ. The like may be affirmed of St. Stephen also where it is said that being full of the holy Ghost that is to say transported from himself by the holy Spirit he looked stedfastly into Heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God In which we have the glory of God conspicuoâ—sly manifested in his Royal Throne and Iesus standing at the right hand of the Throne or at the right hand of God take which phrase you will and standing either as an Advocate to plead for his afflicted servants or as a suiter in behalf of the Proto-martyr or as General in chief ready to march against the enemies of his best beloved So far we may consider of the literal sense of this branch of the Article without any derogation â—rom the Majesty of God the Father and much unto the honour of our Lord and Saviour and without any prejudice unto faith and piety And in such Cases as I take it the best way is to stand to this good old Rule that where the literal sense of holy Scripture doth hold an analogy and correspondence with the Rule of Faith it is to be preferred before any other But whether this be so or not for I propose it only as a consideration I have delivered freely my opinion in it and have delivered it no otherwise then as my opinion to which I never was so wedded but that a clearer judgement might at any time divorce me from it My opinions as they are but opinions so they are but mine As mine I have no reason to impose them upon other men or seek to captivate their understanding and make it subject to my sense And as opinions I am not bound to adhere to them my self but lawfully may change and vary according to that light and evidence of holy truth which either shall or may be given unto me In matters doctrinal concluded and delivered by the Church my Mother I willingly submit my self unto her Decisions Where I am left at large to my own election I shall as willingly take leave to dissent from others as others I am sure will take and on Gods name let them to dissent from me This was the amicable temper of the Fathers in the Primitive times which more preserved the Church both in peace and unity then all the Canons of Councils and Edicts of Princes to that purpose were of
for ostentation of our Savious power in regard that every man receives his judgement either life or death as soon as he is freed from his earthly tabernacle For which there is sufficient proof in the book of God This day said Christ our Saviour to the penitent theef shalt thou be with me in paradise As plain is that of the Apostle It is appointed unto men once to die and after death the judgement The same we finde exemplifyed in the rich man and Lazarus the soul of the one as soon as dead being carried into Abrahams bosome the other being plunged in unquenchable flames If so as so it is most certain what use can be conceived of a general judgement when all particular persons have already received their sentence what further punishments or glory can be added to them then Paradise to Gods Saints and servants and the unquenchable flames of hell for impenitent sinners Which difficulty though removed in some part before as to the vindicating of the justice of Almighty God and the participation of the body in that blisse or misery which the soul presently is adjudged to on the separation and finally the manifesting of Christs power and glory in the sight of his enemies shall now be also cleared as to that part thereof which seems to place the soul in the height of happinesse as soon as separate from the body or in the depth of anguish and disconsolation And first that the souls of just and righteous persons are in the hands of God in Paradise in Abrahams bosome yea in the very heavens themselves I shall easily grant But that they are in the same place or in the same estate and degree of glory to which they shall be preferred by Christ in the day of judgement I neither have seen text nor reason which could yet perswade me Certain I am the Scripture seems to me to be quite against it the current of antiquity and not a few Moderns of good note and eminencie to incline very strongly to the other side For Scriptures first St. Paul doth speak indeed of a Crown of righteousnesse to be given to him and to all those that love the appearing of Christ but not to be given them till that day i. e. the day of his appearing St. Peter next informeth of an incorruptible inheritance reserved for us in the heavens and more then so prepared already but not to be shewed till the last time In the last place we have St. Iohn acquainting us with the condition of the Saints as in matter of fact where he telleth us that the souls of the Martyrs under the Altar where they were willed to rest themselves till the number of their fellow servants was accomplished And though we grant the souls of righteous men departed are in heaven it self yet doth it not follow by any good consequence that therefore they are in the highest Heaven where God himselfe refideth in most perfect majesty The name of Heaven is variously used in holy Scriptures First for the Aire as where we finde mention of the birds of heaven Mat. 26. and the cloudes of heaven Mark 14. Next for the Firmament above in which the Lord hath placed those most glorious lights which frequently are called the Stars of heaven as Gen. 20. Then for that place which St. Paul calleth in one text by the name of the third heaven 2 Cor. 12.2 and in another place shortly after by the name of Paradise vers 4. which is conceived to be the habitations of the Angels their proper habitation as St. Iude calleth it vers 6. Into this place the soul of Lazarus was carried as to Abrahams bosom to this our Saviour promised to bring the soul of the penitent theef Hitherto Enoch and Eliah were translated by God and St. Paul taken up in an heavenly rapture And to this place or to some one or many of those heavenly mansion for in my Fathers house there are many mansions said our Lord and Saviour the souls of righteous men are carryed on the wings of Angels there to abide till they are called upon to meet their bodies in day of day of judgement And last of all it â—ignifyeth the highest heaven to which Christ our Saviour is ascended and sitteth at the right hand of God in most perfect glory Of which St. Paul telleth us that he was made higher then the heavens Heb. 7. and that he did ascend above all the heavens Ephes. 4. This is the seate or Palace of Almighty God called as by way of excellency the heaven of heavens where his divine glory and majesty is most plainly manifested and therefore called by the Prophet the habitation of his holinesse and of his glory So then the souls of righteous men deceased may be in Paradise in the third heaven in Abrahams bosome and yet not be admitted to the highest heaven wherein God reigns in perfect glory till Christ shall come again to judgment and take them for ever to himself into possession and participation of his heavenly Kingdome That in this sense the Fathers understand the Scriptures which mention the estate of the Saints departed will best be seen by looking over their own words according as they lived in the severall Churches First for the Eastern Cherches Iustin Marter telleth us that the the souls of the righteous are carryed to Paradise where they enjoy the company of Angels Archangels and the vision of Christ our Saviour and are kept in places fit for them till the day of the resurrection and compensation Next Origen The Saints saith he departing hence do not presently obtain the full reward of their labours but they expect us though staying and slacking For they have not perfect joy so long as they grieve at our Errours and lament our sins Then Chrysostome more then once or twice Though the soul were a thousand times immortall as it is yet shall she not enjoy those admirable good things without the body And if the body rise not again the soul remaineth uncrowned without heavenly blisse Theodoret lived in the same times and was of the same opinion also saying The Saints have not yet received their Crowns for the God of all expecteth the conflict of others that the race being ended he may at once pronounce all that overcome to be Conquerers and reward them together Finally not to look so low as Oecumenius and Theophylact who say almost as much as Theoderet did we have at once the judgement of many of the Fathers delivered by Andreas Caesariensis in a very few words It is saith he the judgement of many godly Fathers that every good man after this life hath a place fit for him by which he may conjecture at the glory which is prepared Look we now on the Western Churches and first we have Irenaeus B. of Lyons in France affirming positively thus Manifestum est c. It is manifest that the souls
autem quem nihil latet omnium enim merita novit promerendum suffragatore non est opus sed mente devota Vbicunque enim talis ei loquutus fuerit respondebit illi that is to say We therefore have recourse to Kings by Lords and Courtiers because the King is but a man and knows not whom to trust with the Publick Government But to obtain the favor of God from whom nothing is hid for he knoweth what every man deserveth we need no other spokesman than a pious soul with which whosoever comes unto him shall graciously be both heard and answered by him In the next place We grant that in some cases as before is said some of the Saints do pray for some of us in particular but yet we do not think as the Papists do that there is any ordinary way to give them notice of our wants or make them privy unto our necessities If so then it is in vain for us to make our Prayers to them who can neither hear us nor know in any Ordinary way what we pray for to them And so far it is granted by the greatest Champions of the adverse party Si non cognoscant nostr◠orationes videtur otiosum supervacaneum ad ipsos orare saith their great Schoolman Fr. Suares Now that the Saints departed have no knowledge of our wants or wills conceive me still of any ordinary way of communication is evident by that passage in the Prophet Isaiah Abraham saith he is ignorant of us and Israel doth not acknowledge us If so if Abraham himself to whom the promises were made and Israel the father of all the Tribes were ignorant of the affairs of that very people which descended from them what knowledge then should we conceive in the Saints departed after so many ages as have intervened since the death of most of them concerning us and our affairs who are so very strangers to their Blood and Families But lest perhaps it may be thought that the Communion of the Saints supplieth that defect or that the Saints of the New Testament are invested with a greater privilege than were the Patriarcks of the old It is assured us by St. Augustine that they know nothing of our actions or of our occasions Spiritus defunctorum non videre quaecunque eveniunt aut aguntur in ista vita hominum as that Father hath it More positive and particular is St. Ierome in it who speaking of Nepotianus hath this notable passage viz. Quicquid dixero quia ille non audit mutum videtur cum quo loqui non possumus de eo loquinon desinamus i. e. Whatsoever I shall speak doth but seem as dumb because Nepotian doth not hear me and therefore since I can no more speak with him I will be the longer in speaking of him And though the Fathers in their Funeral and Anniversary Orations which they made in honor of the Saints and at the Tombs of the Martyrs make many Rhetorical compellations of them and Apostrophes to them to which the Popish Invocation of Saints owes much of its Original as the learned Primate of Armagh very well observeth yet was it but with ifs and ands as in that of Nazianzen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hear saith he O thou soul of renowned Constantine if thou have any sense or notion of these affairs And now at last the point is brought unto an issue By them of Rome it is supposed that there is knowledge in the Saints departed of all things hapning in the Earth that they take notice of our prayers are privy unto our necessities and therefore that it were a Solecism in the way of piety not to address unto them our Petitions We stand on the defensive part and so reply upon them with an Absque hoc Sans ceo no such matter verily Let them prove this and if they prove not this sufficiently then they prove just nothing and we will either be non-suted and acknowledge judgment or yeeld so far at lest unto them that though this praying unto Saints be the furthest way about yet we may think it possibly the next way home And first out of the Old Testament they produce Iacob and Moses to give in evidence on their side Reverend men against whom we shall not take exception Of Iacob it is said That in his Benediction of the sons of Ioseph he used these words And let my name be named on them or called on by them as the Margin of our last translation and the name of my Father Abraham and Isaac And Moses saith the Text besought the Lord his God and said Remember Abraham and Isaac and Jacob thy servants unto whom thou swarest by thine own self To both which Texts the one being but an Exemplification of the other onely this Answer is returned by Calvin Iudaeos patres suos ad ferendas sibi suppetias non implorasse c. That Moses and the sons of Ioseph and the other Iews did not in these and other places of this nature make any prayers to Abraham Isaac or Iacob but onely did desire of God to call to minde the Covenant he had made with them and in them to and with their whole posterity which though it satisfie very fully as to the objection yet we will go to work in another manner and against this and all the other Testimonies which they either have produced already or shall produce hereafter to the point in hand out of the Books of the Old Testament shall save unto our selves the benefit of exception exception not against their persons but against their evidence For in the opinion of the Papists the Patriarcks all of them were in Limbo Patrum before the Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour in the retired and secret Caverns of the Earth debarred from all access to Almighty God from all commerce and traffick with us mortal men in as much want of Heavenly comforts as those by them supposed to be in Purgatory though in far less pain The truth or probability of this opinion I dispute not here having declared my self in that point already All that I shall from hence infer be it true or false is That according to their own Divinity the Fathers before Christs Resurrection could very ill sollicite the affairs of the Iews their children as being not till then admitted to the Court and presence of the Lord Almighty nor yet possessed though sure enough at last of their own felicities Bellarmine that great master of Controversies hath resolved it so Because saith he the Saints and other holy men who died before Christ came in the flesh did not enter into Heaven did not see God nor could by any Ordinary means understand the prayers of those who sued unto them therefore it was not used in the Old Testament to say Holy Abraham pray for me but men prayed by themselves for themselves to God and alleged the merits of the Saints
to the water but the institution nor to the Sacramental water of it self alone but to the holy Spirit which is active in it Et ipsi soli hujus efficienciae privilegium manet to which belongeth the prerogative in this great effect For as the Spirit of God moving upon the waters of the great Abyss did out of that imperfect matter produce the world so the same Spirit moving on the waters of Baptism doth by its mighty power produce a regenerate Creature From hence it is that in the setting forth of so great a work the water and the Spirit are oft joyned together as in St. Iohn Except a man be born again of Water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven And in St. Paul accrrding to his mercy hath he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost And in St. Iohns Epistle also There be three that bear witness on the earth the Spirit and the Water and the Blood And if the Spirit go along with the Waters of Baptism as we see them joyned together in the holy Scripture no question but it will be made effectual to the work intended which is the washing away of sins whether smal or great whether Original or Actual of what sort soever For proof whereof besides what hath been said of this Point already let us behold the practise of the Primitive times when the Discipline of the Church was grown so severe that some were hardly admitted at all unto publick Penance others removed from the communion of the Church for three four or seven years together and sometimes as the quality of the sin appeared for the whole time of their lives A Discipline which the Church used onely towards those which had given up their names in baptism to be visible members of that body whereof Christ was Head and that made more unpleasing to most sort of men upon the growth and spreading of the Novatian Heresie who mistaking the Apostles meaning declared all those to be uncapable of mercy who sinned after Baptism and therefore neither would admit them unto publick penance nor otherwise restore them to the Churches peace of whom St. Cyprian thus complaineth Sic obstinatos esse quosdam ut dandam non putent lapsis poenitentiam And though the Orthodox party did abominate these Novatian rigors yet were they too strait-laced towards those who fell into any publick or notorious sin after they had received the Sacrament of Regeneration it being conceived that after Baptism major in sordibus delictorum reatus as it is in Augustine the smalest sins seemed greater than indeed they were Upon this ground and an assurance which they had that all their sins whatever were expunged in Baptism it was the custom of too many to defer their Baptism till the hour of their death or till they lay so far past hope on the bed of sickness that nothing but the stroke of death was to be expected Thus doth the Story tell us of the Emperor Constantine that in extremo vitae die when he was even brought to the point of death he was baptized in Nicomedia by the hands of Eusebius the like of Theodosius a most pious Prince upon these grounds St. Austine did defer his baptism a long time together that so he might more freely enjoy those pleasures to which he was addicted in his younger years On the like fear of such relapses as were censured so severely in those rigid times he put off the baptizing of Adeodatus his own natural Son till he came to thirteen years of age at what time the severity of the Church began to slaken or rather the good Fathers judgement was then changed to the better on the right understanding of the use and nature of that holy Sacrament A custom as ill taken up so as much condemned and subject to the Churches censures when occasion served those which were so baptized and escaped from death whom they called Clinici because they were baptized on the bed of sickness being disabled by the Canons from the holy Ministery But whether censured or not censured it comes all to one as to the point I have in hand which was to shew that in the practise and opinion of those elder times the Sacrament of Baptism was held to be the general plaster for all manner of sins and though sometimes deferred till the hour of death on the occasion and mistakes before remembred yet then most earnestly desired ad delenda erratu illa quae quoniam mortales erant admiserant as the Historian saith of the Emperor Constantine for expiating of those sins which they had committed But on the other side as some did purposely defer it till the time of their death out of too great a fear of the Church's censures and a desire to injoy the pleasures of sin yet a little longer so others and those the generality of the people of God out of a greater care of their childrens safety procured it to be administred unto them in their â—endrest infancy almost as soon as they were born And this they did on very pious and prudential considerations though there be no express command nor positive precept for it in the holy Scripture for when we read that we were shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin Psal. 51.5 that all men are by nature the children of wrath Ephes. 2.3 and that except a man be born again of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Joh. 3.5 What Parent can so far put off all natural affections as not to bring his child to baptism especially if there be any danger of death as soon as all things fitting can be had in readiness for that ministration And though there be no positive precept nor express command for Infant-baptism in the holy Scripture it is sufficient ground for the Church to go on if it be proved to be an Apostolical practise and that it is at least an Apostolical practise there will appear sufficient evidence to any man not prepossessed with prejudice and mis-perswasions For when we finde particular mention of the baptizing of whole housholds as of that of Lydia Act. 16.15 of the Gaoler vers 33. of the same Chapter and of Stephanus 2 Cor. 1.16 Either we must exclude children from being part of the houshold which were very absurd or else admit them with the rest to this holy Sacrament But because many exceptions have been made against these instances some thinking it possible enough that those housholds had no children in them as we see many families in great Towns and Cities where no Infants are others restraining the administration of Baptism unto such of the houshold as by giving testimony of their Faith and Repentance were made capable of it we must for further proof make use of a Rule in Law and back that Rule of Law by a practical Maxim delivered by the
time to enquire any further after the beginnings of things who made them and did first extract them out of the common masse or Chaos where before they lay Quid quaeâ—am saith he quae sint initia universorum quis rerum formator qui omnia in uno mersa et materia inerti convoluta disâ—reverit Macrobius speaks more plainly yet although he somewhat failed in his computation affirming that the World must be lately made Cujus cognitio bis mille annos non excedat considering that there was no monument or record thereof which could entitle it to the age of two thousand years The like may be affirmed of the Poets who do ascribe the glory of the Worlds Creation unto God alone Ovid in plain significant termes Sine ulla nominis dissimulatione as Lactantius hath it without boggling or scrupling at the name of God Virgil more covertly under the names of Mens and Spiritus under the which names the old Philosopers used to mask him For Ovid having before described the general Chaos then addes Hanc Deus et melior litem natura diremit Nam Coelo terras et terris abscidit undas That is to say But God the better nature this decides Who Earth from Heaven the Sea from Earth divides And shortly after speaking of the Creation of Man he gives God these most honourable titles the Maker of all things the Authour of a better World or Ille opifex rerum mundi melioris origo in his proper language Virgil although he speaks more covertly as before was said yet he ascribeth that to his Mens or Spiritus which Ovid in more plain terms doth assigne to God and so coâ—es somewhat near the truth Non longe fuit a veritate as Lactantius noteth For in his Aeneads thus he tels us Principio Coelum et Terras camposque liquentes Lucentemque globum Lunae Titaniaque Astra Spiritus intus alit totamque infusa per artus Mens agitat molem et magno se â—orpore miscet Which may be Englished thus in brief Heaven Earth and Seas the Sun and Moons bright sphere In the beginning by some Spirit were Divinely cherish'd which diffus'd through all Did like the Soul quicken this massie Ball. In which we have not only intimated the powerfull influence of the Spirit but the words In principio which are used by Moses But to returne again to the Word of God we finde not only there that God made the World and that he made it in such time as himself best pleased but also the course and method which he used in so great a work A work which took up six whole dayes as before was said God taking a delight as it were in his own productions and giving them the commendation of good as they were created or pretermitting that commendation as sometimes he did when any thing was wanting unto that perfection which was after added For in the work of the second day wherein God did divide the waters above the firmament from those which were disposed beneath it we do not finde this approbation et vidit Deus quod esset bonum because that did not bring the waters to that use and perfection which after they received when they were separated from the Earth and gathered together into one body which he called the Sea And this consideration is alone sufficient to consute a strange conceipt of some late Divines Who on pretence of some authority out of Augustines works have told us that all things were created at once by the power of God and that not only in one day sed in eodem momento or eodem nunc as Vallesius phraseth it the distinction of six days being made by Moses the better to complie with our incapacities For questionlesse there cannot be a better reason why God should passe no approbation on the second days work and double it upon the third but that the separation of the Waters not being fully perfected till the said third day required one special approbation from the mouth of God as the production of the earth and the fruits thereof which was the work of that day also did require another But here a question may be made concerning those waters which are said to be above the firmament or rather of the firmament which is said to divide them I know the general opinion of most writers is that by the Firmament in that place we are to understand the Air as being interposed inter aquosam et humidam superioris Regionis molem etâ— aquas marium fluminumque between the waters of the upper Regions and that which is dispersed in the Seas and Rivers So Iunius for the Protestant Doctors and Estius for those of the Church of Rome do expound that Text and for my part I have not been unwilling to conforme to that in which both parties are agreed But I have met of late with the Observations of a right learned man upon some passages of Scripture in which I finde some strong presumptions that an Abysse of Waters must needs be granted to be above the highest Orbe whose Arguments I shall lay down as I finde them there and so refer the matter wholly to the Readers judgment For first he saith and I think very truly that the Waters above the Heavens called upon by David and the three Children in their Song to praise the Lord cannot be taken for the watery Region of the Air because in the same Canticle by an expresse enumeration of all the Meteors this Region is invited to the like celebration O every showres and dew blesse ye the Lord and magnifie his name for ever saith the Benedicite Fire and hail snow and vapour winde and storm fulfilling his word saith the book of Psalmes Psal. 148. He telleth us secondly that in the separation of the waters spoken of by Moses the waters below the firmament were gathered together into that Receptacle which he called the Sea and that in the space above the firmament he laid up the rest of the deep as in a store-house Psal. 33.7 From whence when he uttered his voice as at the flood there was a multitude or noise of waters in the Heavens Ier. 10.13 Which lest it might be gratis dictum he proves it by the story of the generall Deluge in which the waters being said to prevail at least 15. cubits above the top of the highest mountains must needs have more time then 40. days and 40. nights for their falling down according to the course of nature unlesse there had been some supply from this great Abysse and that God by an high hand had forced down those waters which he had laid up there as in a store-house And that there was such a supplie from this infinite and inexhaustible store-house he shewes out of those words of the 7. of Genesis where it is said that the fountains of the great deep or as the Angell calleth them in the Book of
answer is that Moses did therein consult the frailty of the Iewes his Countrymen who having been very well acquainted with the Idolatries of Egypt might easily have been induced to the worship of Angels had they found any thing in Scripture of that noble subject or else because being acquainted with the things of God he would not trust them with a secret of so high a nature Angelorum non meminit quia scribebat rudibus Judaeis illius secretioris doctrinae parum capacibus saith Estius the Iesuite for the Pontificians That he did purposely omit it Peter Martyr granteth but saith that it was propter hominum proclivitatem ad Idololatriam because of their inclination to Idolatrie For my part I confess these answers do not satisfie me For neither were the Iews so untaught a people as not to have been told of those Ministring Spirits which did so frequently appear to Abraham Isaac and Iacob And if they were so prone unto Idolatrie as they say they were I cannot see but that the pretermission of the Creation of Angels might rather give them some occasion to commit Idolatry then any way divert them from it For when they found by reading in the book of Genesis that not only Lot bowed himself down before the Angels which appeared unto him but that the same reverence or worship call it which we will had been performed unto them by their Father Abraham and yet could not meet with nothing touching their creation might not they probably conclude that sure the Angels were no creatures but rather a nature so divine and excellent that it were no impiety to worship them with religious worship There must be therefore somewhat else which did occasion this omission whatsoever it was And why that reason may not be because it did not fall within the compass of the six days work which Moses only undertook to lay down before us I must confesse for my part I can see no reason That they were made before the fourth day is most plain in Scripture Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the Earth said God to Iob when the morning stars sung together and all the Sons of God shouted for joy St. Augustine hereupon inferreth Iam ergo erant Angeli quando facta sunt sydera facta autem sunt sydera die quarto Therefore saith he the Angels were created before the stars for other Sons of God there were none but they to magnifie and applaud that most glorious work Before the fourth day then that 's clear And I am apt enough to think till I see better evidence to the contrary that they were made before the first Certain I am the Tenor of the Greek Fathers went this way confessedly whose testimonies I would here produce to make good the assertion but that I have confitentem reum For Estius himself doth confesse ingenuously Quod multi Patres Graeci tradunt Angelos aliquandiu creatos ante Mundum corporeum that many of the Greek Fathers were of opinion that the Angels were created for some space of time before this visible and corporeal World And Estius himself for ought I can see is of the same opinion also who telleth it for a manifest truth in another place that the Angels did not fall from the love of God in the first moment as it were of their Creation Sed aliquanto tempore in justitia stetisse but that they did abide awhile in the state of righteousness though they did not persevere therein as the others did Assuredly had they been created in the six days work their continuance in the state of Grace had been so short that it could hardly have been called Aliquantum temporis But whether Estius might so mean I determine not The Greek Fathers as he saith for the most part did and so did many of the Latines Lactantius I am sure was of this opinion and thereby answereth the objection which Hortensius made touching the loneliness and solitude of Almighty God before the making of the World Tanquam nos qui unum esse dicimus desertum ac solitarium esse dicamus Habet enim Ministros quos vocamus nuncios How far this satisfyeth the objection we have shewn before but certainly it doth sufficiently declare his judgment that the Angels were created before the World The old Hermit Cassianus is more plain and positive and he a Latine writer too of approved antiquity Ante conditionem hujus visibilis Creaturae spiritales coelestesque virtutes Deum fecisse c. nemo fidelium est qui dubitat That God before the making of this visible World had made those heavenly and spirituall powers so he cals the Angels there is not any of the faithful who so much as doubteth In which it is to be observed that Cassian doth not only speak this as his own opinion but the opinion of all Orthodox and faithful Christians and an opinion grounded on the words of Iob before remembred by him alledged and applyed for the proof hereof Finally having cleared the received opinion from being any way derogatory to the honour of Christ by whom and for whom all things were created he doth again repeat what he said before though he differ somewhat in the words saying Ante istud Geneseos temporale principium omnes illas Potestates Coelestesque virtutes Deum creasse non est dubium This then was the opinion of the antient Church and it stood uncontrouled by any publick authority till the Lateran Councel about 30. years agoe in which indeed it was declared Omnipotenti Dei virtute mundum et Angelos simul ab initio temporis de nihilo esse condita that by the Almighty God the Angels and the World were both created together in the beginning of time This was indeed determined then But I ascribe not so much to the Lateran Councell or the decrees and definitions which were therein made was not the point of Transubstantiation first established there as to recede from the authority of the antient writers because Pope Innocent the third did not like their tenets especially when I have some advantage of the holy Scriptures to rely upon For when I find that David in marshalling the works of the Creation puts the Angels first not only before the Sun and Moon but before all Heavens I cannot think that he observed only the order of dignity but that he had an eye especially on the order of time And so the Angels being placed before Heaven must consequently be created before that beginning in which as Moses tels us Heaven and Earth were created But whensoever they were made it is out of question that they were all created by the word of God and that they were created both for glory excellent and for their numbers almost infinite Lactantius telleth us in general termes that they were innumerable and so no question but they were For besides those many thousands which fell from God
of mankinde and a necessity was laid upon them to obey his pleasure Nec quicquam est in Angelis nisi parendi necessitas said Lactantius truly And so far we have all things clear from the holy Scriptures But if we will beleeve the learned as I think we may there is no signal punishment of ungodly people ascribed to God in the old Testament but what was executed by the ministry of these blessed spirits except some other means and ministers be expresly named That great and universal deluge in the time of Noah was questionless the work of Almighty God I even I do bring a flood of waters upon the Earth Gen. 6.17 But this was done by the ministery and service of the holy Angels Ministerio Angelorum saith Torniellus whom he employed in breaking up the fountaines of the great deep and opening the cataracts of Heaven for the destruction of that wicked unrepenting people Thus when it is affirmed in the 14. of Exodus that the Lord looked into the hoste of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and overthrew them in the midst of the Sea v. 24.27 Non intelligendum est de Deo sed de Angelo qui erat in nube we must not understand it of the Lord himself as Tostatus hath it but only of the Angel or ministring spirit of whose being in the cloud we had heard before And when we read that in the battail of the five Kings against the Israelites the Lord cast down great stones upon them from Heaven Iosh. 10. it is not to be thought saith he Quod Deus mitteret sed Angelus jubente Deo that this was done by Gods own hand but by the holy Angels at the Lords appointment The like may be affirmed of those other acts of power and punishment whereof we finde such frequent mention in the book of God which though they be ascribed to God as the principall Agent yet were they generally effected by his holy Angels as the means and instruments But the most proper office of the holy Angels is not for punishment but preservation not for correction of the wicked but for protection of the just and righteous person That 's the chief part of their imployment the office which they most delight in and God accordingly both hath and doeth employ them so from time to time For by the ministery of his Angels did he deliver Ismael from the extremity of thirst Daniel from the fury of hunger Lot from the fire and trembling Isaac from the sword our infant Saviour from one Herod his chief Apostle from another all of them from that common prison into the which they had been cast by the Priests and Pharisees But these were only personal and particular graces Look we on such as were more publick on such as did concern his whole people generally and we shall finde an Angel of he Lord incamping between the hoste of Egypt and the house of Israel to make good the passage at their backs till they were gotten on the other side of the Sea another Angel marching in the front of their Armies as soon as they had entred the land of Canaan and he the Captain of the Lords hostes Princeps exercituum Dei as the vulgar readeth it but whether Michael Gabriel or who else it was the Rabbins may dispute at leasure and to them I leave it Moreover that wall of waters which they had upon each side of them when they passed thorow the Sea as upon dry ground facta est a Deo per Angelos exequentes that was the work of Angels also directed and imployed by Almighty God as the learned Abulensis notets it Which also is affirmed by the Iewish Doctors of the dividing of the waters of Iordan to make the like safe passage for them into the promised land the land of Canaan The like saith Peter Martyr a learned Protestant touching the raysing of the Syrians from before Samaria when the Lord made them hear the noise of Cariots and the noise of horse-men that it was ministerio Angelorum effected by the ministery of the holy Angels whom God imployed in saving that distressed people from the hands of their enemies And by an Angel or at least an angelical vision 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a dream or Oracle delivered to them in their sleep as Eusebius telleth us did he forwarne the Christians dwelling in the land of Palestine to remove thence to Pella a small town of Syria and so preserved them from the spoyle and fury of the Roman Armies This was Gods way of preservation in the times before us and it is his way of preservation in all ages since GOD is the same God now as then his holy Angels no lesse diligent in their attendance on us then they have been formerly Let us but make our selves by our faith and piety worthy to be accounted the Sons of God and the heires of salvation and doubt we not of the assistance of these ministring spirits in all essaies of personall or publick dangers T is true the apparitions of the Angels in these late times have been very rare not many instances to be found in our choycest Histories But then it is as true withall one of the most eternall truths of holy Scripture that the Angel of the Lord encampeth about all them that fear him and delivereth them Whether we see or see them not it comes all to one and so resolved by Clemens of Alexandria an old Christian writer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord saith he doth still preserve us by the ministery of his holy Angels though we behold them not in any visible shape as the antients did And to say truth this general protection of the Angels is a point so clear so undeniable in true Divinity that he must needs renounce the Scripture which makes question of it Some difference indeed hath been about Angel-gardians and the particular protection which we have from them to whom God hath committed the tuition of our severall persons And yet even this if we make Scripture to be judge according to the exposition of the antient Writers will prove a point as clear and as undeniable as that of the protection which we have in general For Origen who lived in the third century from our Saviours birth reckoneth it for a tenet of undoubted truth and generally imbraced in the Christian Church long before his time that all Gods children from their birth or at least their Baptisme had their angel-keepers Lactantius speaks more generally as of all mankind Ad tutelam generis humani misit Angelos though possibly he might mean no otherwise then did the other Catholick writers of the times he lived in and those who followed close in the age succeeding St. Basil in Psal. 33. and Psal. 58. St. Chrysost. on the 18. of Matthew The Authour of the Imperfect work Hom. 40. Theodoret in l. 5. divinorum Decretorum do
prayers and offerings which are made unto them by that miserable and infatuated people whom they have captivated in the chains of sin and ignorance but they look for it at their hands and threaten most severe punishments if it be neglected The Devil is still sick of his old disease of being like to God both in power and greatness And being still possessed of his old ambition no marvel if he stand on Temples Altars Sacrifices both upon Invocation and on Adoration and whatsoever else is requisite to the Worship of God It was the pride and vanity of this glorious humor which made them uncapable of long stay in Heaven and hath since plunged them in the depths of disconsolation They were at first created by Almighty God in the state of perfection as were the blessed spirits who still stand in Grace endued with a most excellent understanding and a conformity of will to the Will of God Good they were made as all the rest of Gods creatures were but not good unchangeably That was the priviledge and Prerogative of the Lord most high But made so good that they were also capable of doing evil if they would themselves and put into a power or liberty of condition either of placing their whole comforts in the service of God or by falling off from that felicity to make themselves the authors and the servants of sin Which power or liberty of their will call it how you please some of them did abuse so far unto Gods dishonour that they were presently removed from that glorions dwelling banished for ever from the presence of Almighty God and kept in chains of darkness to the day of Judgement So witnesseth the holy Scripture both old and new Behold he put no trust in his servants and his angels he hath charged with folly or rather in his Angels he found wickedness In Angelis invenit pravitatem saith the Vulgar Latine Which though they were the words of Eliphaz the Temanite a man not altogether Orthodox in points of Divinity yet that which he intends thereby is countenanced by other passages of Canonical Scriptures For if by finding wickedness or folly in the Angels themselves be meant no more then this as indeed there is not quod illi a Deo propria voluntate discesserunt that by the impulsion of their own will they fell off from God as the learned Estius well obsereth then doth this Temanite say no more in the Book of Iob then what St. Peter and Iude have also said in their two Epistles God spared not the Angels which sinned as St. Peter hath it but cast them down to Hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgement St. Iude affirms the very same The Angels saith he which kept not their first estate but left their own habitation he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgement of the great day By both it is as clear as day that the Angels sinned and that the punishment due unto their transgression was inflicted on them but what the particular sin was which they did commit and in what state they stand in regard of the punishment we shall crave leave to look into with some further search as being necessary to be known in reference to the fall of man the incarnation of our Lord and Saviour and his last coming unto Iudgement For being fallen themselves from the love of God they have practised ever since on Adam and his whole posterity to make them also liable to the same damnation In solatium calamitatis suae non desinunt perditi jam perdere saith Minutius Felix And this calamity of man induced the ever gracious and most merciful God to send his onely begotten Son into the World to redeem such as were under the law of sin that so they might receive the adoption of sons First for their sin the general opinion of the Church hath been that it was an ambitious pride to be equal with God For being made by God of so pure a substance of such an excellent comprehension and so rare abilities they thought themselves too glorious and sublime an essence to obey a superiour and that it was sufficient honour to the Lord their God if they admitted him for an equal and let him be half sharer with them in the Supreme power Just like some proud ambitious favorite in the Courts of Princes who being raised from nothing to be next in dignity to their Soveraign Lord are not content with those preheminences which their King hath given them but are resolved to strike at all and either get the Regal Diadem or perish in the glory of their undertaking But being this could not be the hope of all those Angels who forsook their God it is supposed to be the aim of some chief amongst them of him who in the Scripture is called sometimes Satan and sometimes Lucâ—fer and sometimes Beelzebub the Prince of Devils The rest of the apostate Angels were drawn into the plot either upon a hope of having a supreme Lord of their own nature which should bear rule over them or fancying to themselves a more moderate reign by living under a Prince of their own Election Now that it was ambition which caused Lucifers fall it is expresly said by the Prophet Esay How art thou fallen from Heaven O Lucifer son of the morning How art thou cast down to the ground which didst weaken the Nations For thou hast said in thine heart I will ascend above the height of the Clowds I will be like the most High Yet shall thou be brought down to Hell to the sides of the pit Upon which words S. Hierom giveth us this short Gloss Qui per superbiam dixerat In Coelum ascendam ero similis altissimo non solum ad infernum sed ad Inferorum ultimum detrahitur He that said through the pride of his heart I will ascend above the height of the Heavens and be like the most High is not only brought down to Hell but to the lowest pit of that dreadful Lake And to this fall of Lucifer as I conceive our Saviour doth allude in St. Lukes Gospel saying I saw Satan as lightning fall from Heaven 10.18 Upon which passage take this short note from the pen of Theophylact Marvel not that the Devils are made subject to you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for their Prince is long since fallen from Heaven and hath no power left which although mortal men beheld not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet was it visible to me who see things invisible The like Ezekiel saith as of Lucifers fall under the name and notion of the King of Tyre Thus saith the Lord God Thou hast been in Eden or Paradise as the Vulgar reads it the Garden of God thou art the anointed Cherub that coverest thou wast upon the holy Mountain of God and perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wert
those Prophesies which himself delivered of a spiritual Kingdome in the souls of men such as our Saviour Christ erected in his holy Church in whom the said predictions were accomplished and of whom intended and not rather of the flourishing and continuance of his temporal Kingdome the Royal seat whereof was by him setled on Mount Sion and the renown of his magnificence and personal valour had made so formidable to the Nations which were round about him And may it not be questioned also if not out of question whether that famous Prophesie Behold a Virgin shall conceive had any reference in the intention of the Prophet Isaiah to the Virgin Mary and the birth of Christ But of this more hereafter in another place The like whereof might be made good in most of the rest of the Prophets if one would put himself to the trouble of searching into all particulars which might be disputed or rather if our Saviour CHRIST himself had not already put it beyond all disputes when he thus said to his Disciples that many Kings and Prophets have desired to see the things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them upon which words we may infer that the Evangelists and Apostles being bound to teach no other things in the Church of CHRIST then what had been foretold by Moses and the holy Prophets both knew and taught others also to believe many things of CHRIST which the Prophets no not David himself the Kingly Prophet although they very much desired it did not see nor hear of and therefore that they did not distinctly apprehend the meaning of the holy Ghost in all those things which he was pleased to utter by their mouths or express by their pens touching CHRIST to come For otherwise they must have seen all that the Evangelists saw and have known all the mysteries of the Kingdome of Heaven which the Apostles after our Saviours resurrection either knew or taught which is directly contradictory to our Saviours words and to the truth of his assertion When therefore it is said so often in the holy Gospel that some things were either done or suffered that the sayings of the Prophets might be fulfilled we must not understand it in that sense alone whereof the Prophets did intend it or of that natural proper and immediate end to which the Prophets did direct it but of some further mystical or mysterious meaning reserved in the intention of the holy Ghost and in the fulness of time accomplished by our Lord and Saviour according unto that intention though no such meaning was imparted to the Prophets themselves whose mouths he made the pen of a ready writer But then perhaps it will be said that if the Prophets had not a distinct and explicite apprehension of every thing by them delivered in the way of Prophesie but either knew not what they spake or spake what they did not understand they differed little if at all from the Heathen Sooth-sayers who foretold many things which did come to pass but without any apprehension of the truth thereof For satisfying of which scruple we may please to know that when the evil spirit did intend to foresignifie any thing to come by the mouth of the Sooth-sayers or Diviners amongst the Heathens he used to cast them into a trance or extasie so that they used to rave or speak in those sudden fits that which they neither understood at the time they spake it nor could remember when they came to their sense again These they called Arreptitii in the Latine as being snatched up as it were from the use of their senses to move divine and immaterial contemplations but generally both in Greek and Latine they were called Ecstatici from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Hierome rightly rendreth excessus mentis an exilience or transport of minde adding that he can tell of no other word by which to express it in the Latine Aliter enim Latinus sermo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exprimere non potest nisi mentis excessum Tertullian doth not only make it a transport of minde but such as is conjoyned with a spice of madness Extasin dicimus excessum sensus amentiae instar And such an extasie he thought had been fallen on Peter when saying on the sight of his Masters glorious transfiguration Bonum est nobis esse hic that it was good for them to continue there the Evangelist gives this character or censure of him Nesciens quid diceret that he understood not what he said Luk. 9.33 But this was only a device or conceit of his being now fallen into the heresie of Montanus to countenance by the like frenzy of St. Peter the raving follies or plain madness of Maximilla Prisca and such other Prophetesses to whom that wretched and infatuated man had given up himself Of those or one of them he telleth us in his Book De Anima that in those extasies which she suffered by the Spirit of God she had the grace of Prophesie imparted to her Est hodie soror apud nos Revelationum charismata sortita quas in Ecclesia inter Dominica solemnia per Extasin in Spiritu patitur and this he plainly calleth in another place Spiritalis extasis i. e. amentia a spiritual extasie or madness Whereof he gives this reason in another of his Books against the Marcionites In spiritu enim homo constitutus praesertim quum gloriam Dei conspicit vel quum per ipsum Deus loquitur necesse est ut excidat sensu obumbratus scilicet virtute divina that is to say a man being ravished in the Spirit especially when he beholds the glory of God which he took to be S. Peters case or when God doth please to speak by him which was the case of Prisca and her fellow Prophetesses must needs be ravished from his senses being so fully over-shadowed by the Spirit of God His exposition of the word we allow well of and doubt not but it was a plain spirit of madness which fell on Maximilla and her fellow Prophetesses as well as on any of the Heathen Soothsayers at the time of their prophesying whom for this cause the Latines called Furentes or Furiosos men besides themselves Hi sunt Furentes quos in publicum videtis excurrere vates ipsi absque Templo sic insaniunt sic bacchantur sic rotantur as Minutius hath it In which we do not only finde their name but those frantick and absurd gesticulations which they did commonly express in the time of those extasies to signifie what an heavy burden of the Spirit did then lie upon them But so it was not with the Prophets inspired by God who very well understood what they said and did and did not only prophesie what should come to pass but did it in a constant and coherent way of expression and with a grave
the children of Infidels are saved partly by vertue of the Covenant and partly by Gods Election By vertue of the Covenant in regard they are descended of such Ancestors as were themselves within the Covenant though it be long since and that there be some interruption in the whole succession Gods mercy reaching as he tels us Exod. 20. unto a thousand generations By Election because God hath not barred himself from a power and right to communicate his Grace to those whose Ancestors were not of the Covenant For if he called those Adulti men of riper years to be partakers of the Covenant who were not within the same before why may he not in like manner if he please elect children also Finally as he doth believe that all who are elected or within the Covenant shall most undoubtedly be saved so he doth charitably conceive that those whom God takes out of this world in the state of infancy servari potius secundum electionem providentiam ipsius paternam quam a regno Coelorum abdicari are rather saved by Gods election and paternal providence then utterly excluded out of the Kingdom of Heaven If the same charity make me hope the like of those famous men among the Gentiles who were not wanting to the grace of God which was given unto them why should I fear worse fortune then was found by Iunius who never yet was censured for ought I have read for that so charitable resolution in the case of Infants no not by those of the Reformed who differ in opinion from him as to that particular And so far I conceive I may go with safety without opposing any text of holy Scripture or any publick tendry of the Church of England 'T is true St. Peter telleth us in the 4. of the Acts that there is no name under Heaven given among men whereby they be saved but that of our Lord and Saviour IESVS CHRIST v. 12. But this is spoken with relation to the times of the Gospel when CHRIST had broken down the partition wall and that the Gentiles were admitted to the knowledge of the word of life a general command being laid by CHRIST on his Apostles to preach the Gospel to all Nations After this time the case was altered and the Gentiles altogether left without excuse if they embraced not the ordinary meanes of their salvation which by the universall preaching of Christ crucifyed had been offered to them And so I understand that Article of the Church of England by which all they are to be accursed who presume to say that every man shall be saved by the Law or Sect that he professeth so that he be diligent to frame his life according to that Law and the light of nature Act. 18. For certainly the Article relates not to the times before Christs coming or the condition of the Gentiles in those elder dayes but only to the present condition of the Church of Christ as it now stands and hath stood since his death and passion in opposition both to Iewes and Gentiles unto Turkes and Saracens with reference to the Familists and such modern Sectaries who made the external profession of the faith of Christ but a thing indifferent so they conformed themselves by the light of nature Of which opinion one Galcalus Martius also is affirmed to be by Paulus Iovius in his Elog. doct virorum So that for ought appeares from that place of the Acts and from this Article of the Church we may conceive the charitable hope of the salvation of some of the more noble Gentiles the great example of whose vertues is transmitted to us in Classical and approved Authors But this was only in some extraordinary and especial cases some Casus reservati as the Lawyers call them which God reserved to his own Power and dispensation and not of any ordinary and common right For generally the Heathen people as they knew not God having extinguished that light of nature which was given unto them so having their understanding darkned and that light put out their will forthwith became depraved the affections of their hearts corrupted and their lusts exorbitant And as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge so did God give them over to a reprobate minde to do those things which are not convenient dishonouring their owne bodies amongst themselves and being filled with all unrighteousnesse and uncleannesse Nay even their greatest Clerks men of wit and learning professing themselves wise did become fooles in that they sought not after God the true fountain of wisdome and holding the truth which was revealed to them in unrighteousnesse as St. Paul saith of them were thereby made without excuse And as the light of nature was thus generally extinguished amongst the Gentiles so was the light of Prophecie as much neglected amongst the Iewes who though they were Gods chosen and peculiar people had so degenerated from the piety of their Predecessors that there was hardly either faith or charity to be found amongst them Insomuch as all the world was now of the same condition in which it was before the flood Of which God said that all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth the wickedness of man grown great and all the imaginations of the thoughts of his heart continually and only evill Nothing could have prevented a second deluge but Gods gratious promise that there should never more be a flood to destroy the Earth nothing have respited the World from more grievous punishment had not Christ come into the World and by his suffering on the Crosse for the sinne of Man appeased Gods anger for the present and caused his Gospell to be preached unto every nation that so they might escape the wrath of the time to come Nothing required by him for so great a mercy but that we would believe in him that to the faith which every man was bound before to have in God the Father Almighty by whom we were created when we were just nothing there might be added a beliefe in IESVS CHRIST his only Sonne by whom we were redeemed being worse then nothing He knew the frailty of our nature that we were but dust that we were utterly unable to observe the Law which Adam either could not or would not keep in the state of innocency and therefore did not look so far as to the Covenant of works to require them of us but to the Covenant of faith as the easier duty God in the Covenant of works required of every man for his justification an absolute and entire obedience to the Law which he had prescribed and that obedience to the Law had it been performed had justifyed the performance of it in the sight of God But finding man unable to fulfill the Law he made a second Covenant with that sinfull Creature and required nothing of him for his justification but only faith in God and his gracious promises for the redemption of the world
Servator on us in the place thereof Concerning which St. Augustine hath this observation that antiently Salvator was no Latine word but was first devised by the Christians to express the greatness of the mercies which they had in Christ. For thus the Father Qui est Hebraice JESUS Graece 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nostra autem locutione Salvator Quod verbum Latina lingua non habebat sed habere poterat sicut potuit quando voluit Nay Cicero the great Master of the Roman elegancies doth himself confess that the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a word of too high a nature to be expressed by any one word of the Latine tongue For shewing how that Verres being Praetor in Syracusa the chief town in Sicily had caused himself to be entituled by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he addes immediately hoc ita magnum est ut Latino uno verbo exprimi non possit And thereupon he is compelled to use this Paraphrase or circumlocution Is est nimirum Soter qui salutem dedit i. e. He properly may be called Soter who is giver of health So that the Latine word Servator being insufficient to express the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and consequently the Hebrew IESVS the Christians of the first times were necessitated to devise some other and at last pitched upon Salvator which to this purpose hath been used by Arnobius l. 1. adv Gentes Ambros. in Luk. c. 2. Hieron in Ezek. c. 40. August de doctr Chr. l. 2. c. 13. contr Crescon l. 2. c. 1. besides the passages from Ruffinus and the same St. Augustine before alleadged So then the name of Iesus doth import a Saviour and the name of IESVS given to the Son of God intimates or implieth rather such a Saviour as shall save his people from their sins This differenceth IESVS our most blessed Saviour from all which bare that name in the times foregoing Iesus or Ioshua the son of Nun did only save the people from their temporal enemies but IESVS CHRIST the Son of the living God doth save us from the bonds of sin from our ghostly enemies IESVS the son of Iosedech the Priest of the Order of Aaron did only build up the material Altar in the holy Temple but IESVS the High Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech not only buildeth up the spiritual Temple but is himself the very Altar which sanctifieth all those oblations which we make to God Iesus the son of Sirach hath no higher honour but that he was Author of the book called Ecclesiasticus a book not reckoned in the Canon of the holy Scripture but IESVS CHRIST the Son of God and the Virgin Mary not only is the subject of a great part of Scripture but even the Word it self and the very Canon by which we are to square all our lives and actions I am the way the truth and the life as himself telleth us in St. Iohn Look on him in all these capacities he is still a IESVS a Saviour of his people from their sins and wickednesses a builder of them up to a holy Temple fit for the habitation of the holy Ghost a bringer of them by the truth and way of righteousness unto the gates of life eternal a true IESVS still So properly a IESVS and so perfectly a Saviour to us that there is no salvation to be found in any other nor is there any other name under Heaven given amongst men whereby they must be saved but this name of IESVS Aâ— name if rightly pondered above every name and given him to this end by Almighty God that at the Name of Jesus every knee should bow of those in Heaven and earth and under the earth And there may be good reason besides Gods appointment why such a sign of reverence should be given to the very name not only a name above other names and therefore to be reverenced with the greater piety but as a pregnant testimony of that exaltation to which God hath advanced him above all other persons We bow the knee unto the persons of Kings and Princes And therefore Pharaoh when he purposed to honour Ioseph above all the Egyptians appointed certain Officers to cry before him saying bow the knee CHRIST had not been exalted more then Ioseph was had bowing of the knee been required to his Person only and therefore that there might appear some difference betwixt him and others the Lord requires it at his name And though the Angels in the heavens and the Spirits beneath have no knees to bow which is the principal objection of our Innovators against the reverent use of bowing at the Name of Iesus used and enjoyned to be used in the Church of England yet out of doubt the spirits of both kindes both in Heaven and Hell as they acknowledge a subjection to his Throne and Scepter so have they their peculiar ways such as are most agreeable to their several natures of yeilding the commanded reverence to his very Name Certain I am St. Ambrose understood the words in the literal sense where speaking of the several parts of the body of man he maketh the bowing at the name of JESUS the use and duty of the knee Flexibile genu quo prae caeteris Domini mitigatur offensa gratia provocatur Hoc enim patris summi erga filium donum est ut in nomine JESU omne genu curvetur The knee is flexible faith the Father whereby the anger of the Lord is mitigated and his grace obtained And with this gift did God the Father gratifie his beloved Son that at the Name of JESUS every knee should bow Nor did St. Ambrose only so expound the Text and take it in the literal sense as the words import but as it is affirmed by our Reverend Andrews there is no antient Writer upon the place save he that turned all into Allegories but literally understands it and liketh well enough that we should actually perform it Conform unto which Exposition of the Antient Writers and the received usâ—ge of the Church of Christ it was religiously ordained by our first Reformers that Whensoever the Name of IESVS shall be pronounced in any Lesson Sermon or otherwise in the Church due reverence be made of all persons young and old with lowness of curâ—esie and uncovering of the heads of the mankinde as thereunto doth necesâ—aâ—ily belong and heretofore hath been accustomed Which being first established by the Queens Injunctions in the yeer 1559. was afterwards incorporated into the Canons of King Iames his reign And if of so long standing in the Church of England then sure no Innovation or new fancy taken up of late and bâ—t of laâ—e obtruded on the Church by some Popish Bishops as the Novators and Novatians of this present age the Enemies of Iesu-Worship as they idlely call it have been pleased to say And should we grant that this were no duty of
least some secret influence in the work if not a publick and Oracular admonition And that it was not done but upon serious consultation had amongst themselves and a devout invocation of the name of God the greatness of the business the piety of the first Professors and other good authorities do most strongly assure For if upon the naming of Iohn the Baptist there was not only a consultation held by the friends and mother but the dumb father called to advise about it and if we use not to admit the poorest childe of the parish into the Congregation of Christs Church by the dore of Baptism but by joint invocation of the Name of God for his blessings in it with how much more regard of ceremony and solemnity may we conceive that the whole body of Christs people were baptized into the name of Christians But besides this we have an evidence or record sufficient to confirm the truth of our affirmation For Suidas and before him Iohannes Antiochenus an old Cosmographer first tels us that in the reign of Claudius Caesar ten years after the Ascension of our Lord into Heaven Euodius received Episcopal consecration and was made Patriarch of Antioch the great in Syria succeeding immediately to St. Peter the Apostle And then he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. i. e. And at this time the Disciples were first called Christians Euodius calling them to a solemn conference and putting this new name upon them For before they were called Nazarites and Galileans Some of the Heathens not knowing the Etymon of the name called them Chrestiant and our most blessed Saviour by the name of Chrestos For thus Tertullian of the Christians perperam a vobis Christianus appellatur and thus Lactantius for our Saviour qui eum immutata litera 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 solent dicere But this was only on mistake not on studyed malice Et propter ignorantium errorem as Lactantius hath it the very name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Chrestianus intimating nothing else but meekness and sweetness as Tertullian very well observeth And though Suetonius following the errours of the times calleth our Saviour CHRIST by the name of Chrestos yet Tacitus who lived in the same age with him hits right as well on Christus as on Christianus Quos vulgo Chrestianos appellabat And then he addeth Auctor nominis ejus Christus qui Tiberio imperitante per Procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat Having thus rectified the name and asserted it to its true Original we may do well to have a care that we disgrace not the dignity of so high a calling by the unworthiness and uncleanness of our lives and actions In nobis patitur Christus opprobrium in nobis patitur lex Christiana maledictum that Christ and Christianity were ill spoken of by reason of the wicked lives of Christian people was the complaint of Salvians time God grant it be not so in ours And God grant too that as we take our name from CHRIST so the like minde may be in us as was also in him that is to say that we be as willing to lay down our lives for the brethren especially in giving testimony to his Faith and Gospel as he was willing to lay down his life for us and that as his Fathers love to him brought forth in him the like affections towards us and to his Commandements so his affection unto us may work in us the like love towards our brethren and to all his precepts For hereby shall men know we are his Disciples if we abide in his love and keep his Commandements as he hath kept his Fathers Commandements and abide in his love But see how I am carried to these practical matters if not against my will yet besides my purpose I proceed now to that which followeth ARTICVLI 3. Pars 2da 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Filium ejus unicum Dominum nostrum i. e. His only Son our Lord. CHAP. II. That JESUS CHRIST is the Son of God why called his only or his only begotten Son Proofs for the God-head of our Saviour Of the title of Lord. THat which next followeth is the first of those two Relations in which we do behold our Saviour in this present Article his only Son i. e. the only Son of God the Father Almighty whom we found spoken of before That God had other sons in another sense there is no question to be made All mankinde in some sense may be called his sons The workmanship of his creation Have we not all one Father hath not one God created us saith the Prophet Malachi in the Old Testament Our Father which art in Heaven saith Christ our Saviour for the New The Saints and holy men of God are called his sons also in the more peculiar title of adoption For who else were the sons of God in the 6. of Genesis who are said to take them wives of the daughters of men but the posterity of Seth the righteous seed by and amongst whom hitherto the true worship of the Lord had been preserved More clearly the Evangelist in the holy Gospel To as many as received him gave he power to become the sons of God even to them which believed in his Name Most plainly the Apostle saying As many as are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God having received the Spirit of Adoption whereby they cry to him Abba Father And in this sense must we understand those passages of holy Scripture where such as are regenerate and made the children of God by adoption of grace are said to be born of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Iohns phrase is both in his Gospel and Epistle Not that they have the Lord God for their natural Father for so he is the Father only of our Lord Iesus Christ but because being begotten by immortal seed the seed of his most holy Word they are regenerate and born again unto life eternal This is the seed of God spoken of by St. Iohn which remaineth in us by which we are begotten to an inheritance immortal undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved for us in the Heavens as St. Peter tels us In neither of these two respects can we consider Christ as the Son of God For if he were the Son of God in no other respect then either in regard of Creation or Adoption only he could not possibly be called Gods only Son or his only begotten Son but at the best multis e millibus unus one of the many thousands of the sons of God There is a more particular title by which some more selected vessels both of grace and glory have gained the honourable appellation of the sons of God that is to say by being admitted to a clearer participation and fruition of eternal blisse or made more intimately acquainted with his secret will In the
first of these respects the blessed Angels have the title of the sons of God Where wast thou saith the Lord in the book of Iob when I laid the foundation of the earth when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy The sons of God that is to say the holy Angels Per filios Dei Angeli intelliguntur saith the learned Estius on the place And so St. Augustine doth determine who hereupon inferreth that the Angels were created before the stars and not after the six days were finished as some it seems had taught in the times before him Iam ergo erant Angeli quando facta sunt sydera facta sunt autem sydera die quarto as he most rationally concludes from this very text In this respect also the Saints in glory are called the sons or children of God and said to be equall to the Angels in St. Lukes Gospell not that they have all the prerogatives and properties which the Angels have sed quod mori non possunt saith the text but because they are become immortall and no longer subject as before to the stroke of death In the last meaning of the word though all the Saints and holy men of God may be called his children because they are adopted to the right of sons and made co-heires with CHRIST their most blessed Saviour yet is the title more appliable to the Prophets of God at least appliable unto them after a more peculiar manner then unto any others of the children of men I have said saith David ye are Gods and ye are all the children of the most High Of whom here speaks the Psalmist of Gods people generally or only of some chosen and select vessels Not of Gods people generally there 's no doubt of that though both St. Augustine and St. Cyril seem to look that way but of some few particulars only as Euthymius and some others with more reason thinke And those particulars must either be the Princes and Judges of the earth who are called Gods by way of participation because they do participate of his power in government or else the Prophets of the Lord who are called Gods and the sons or children of the most High by way of communication because God doth communicate and impart to them his more secret purposes that they might make them known to the sons of men Them he called Gods as Christ our Saviour doth expound it then whom none better understood the meaning of the royal Psalmist ad quos sermo dei factus est i. e. to whom the word of the Lord came as our English reads it And what more common in the Scripture then this forme of speech factum est verbum Domini c. The word of the Lord came to Isaiah Isa. 38.4 The word of the Lord came to Ieremiah Ier. 1.2 The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel Ezek. 1.3 et sie de caeteris If then such men to whom the word of the Lord came might justly be entituled by the name of Gods and called the sons of the most High assuredly there was not any of the children of men which could with greater reason look to be so called then the holy Prophets And yet in none of these respects abstracted from an higher consideration is CHRIST our Saviour here called by the name of the Son of God or so intended in this Creed For Angel he was none in the proper signification of the word though called the Angel of the Covenant in the way of Metaphore Nor did he take the nature of Angels but the seed of Abraham as St. Paul tels us to the Hebrews We may not think so meanly of him as to ranke him only in the list of the Saints departed it being through the merits of his death and passion that the Saints are made partakers of the glories of heaven and put into an estate of immortality T is true indeed he was a Prophet the Prophet promised to succeed in the place of Moses that Prophet in the way of excellence in the first of Iohn v. 21 25. But then withall as himself telleth us of Iohn the Baptist he was more then a Prophet that word which came unto the Prophets in the times of old and to whom all the Prophets did bear witness for the times to come A King indeed he is even the King of Kings though not considered in that notion here upon the earth nor looked on in that title in the present Article Or if we could reduce him unto any of these yet take him as an Angel or a Saint departed or a King or Prophet every of which have the name of Sons in the book of God he could not be his only Son the only begotten Son of God the Father Almighty who hath so many Saints and Angels so many Kings and Prophets which are called his Sons It must needs follow hereupon that IESVS CHRIST our Lord is the Son of God by a more divine and near relation then hath been hitherto delivered And hereunto both God and Man the Angels and internal spirits give sufficient testimony The Lord from heaven procliamed him at his Baptisme and Transfiguration to be his well beloved Son in whom he was well pleased And Peter on the earth having made this acknowledgement and confession saying Thou art Christ the Son of the living God received this confirmation from our Saviours mouth that flesh and bloud had not revealed it unto him but that it came from God the Father which is in Heaven The Angel Gabriel when he brought the newes of his incarnation foretold his mother that he should be called the Son of God the Son of the most High in a former verse And a whole Legion of unclean Spirits in the man possessed joynes both of these together in this compellation IESVS thou Son of God most high A thing not worthy so much noise and ostentation had he not been the Son of God in another and more excellent manner then any of the sons of men who either lived with him or had gone before him had there not been something in it extraordinary which might entitle him unto so sublime and divine a priviledge Though Iohn the Baptist were a Prophet yea and more then a Prophet yet we do not finde that the Devils stood in awe of him for Iohn the Baptist did no miracles or looked upon him in the wilderness as the Son of God To which of all the holy Angels as St. Paul disputes it did the Lord say at any time Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee And who can shew us any King but him that was the Son of God as well as of David whom God the Lord advanced to so high an honour as to cause him to sit down at his own right hand till his enemies were made his footstoole Though Angels Kings and Prophets were the sons
but Dominus nosier our Lord the Lord of all that doe confess his holy Name and agree in the truth of his holy Word A title which accreweth to him in many respects as first in regard of our Creation For if all things were made by him and without him was nothing made that was made as St. Iohn affirmeth If by him all things were created both in Heaven and Earth visible and invisible as St. Paul informs us good reason that he should have the Dominion over the work of his own hands and that we should acknowledge him for the Lord our Maker In the next place he is our Lord in jure Redemptionis in the right of Redemption Concerning which we must take notice as before was said that man was made by God in his first Creation just righteous and devoide of malice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the words of Damascen Created to this purpose after Gods own Image Vt imitator sui autoris esset that so he might more perfectly imitate his Creators goodness But falling from this happiness in which he might have served the Lord with perfect innocency he made a new contract with the Devil and became his servant and put himself directly under his dominion Do ye not know saith the Apostle that unto whom you yeild your selves servants to obey his servants ye are whom ye obey If then they were the Devils servants the Devil of necessity was their Lord and Master for Dominus servus sunt relata as our Logick teacheth us A miserable and most wretched thraldome from which there was no other way to set mankinde free but by the death and passion of our Saviour CHRIST which he being willing for our sakes to undergo did by the offering of himself once for all become the propitiation for our sins and obtain eternal redemption for us cancelling the bond or obligation which was against us and nayling it to his Cross for ever Nor were poor mankinde only servants to this dreadful Tyrant but for the most part they had listed themselves under him and became his souldiers fighting with an high hand of presumptuous wickedness against the Lord God and the Hosts of Heaven And they continued in that service taking part with the Devil upon all occasions till he received his final overthrow at the hands of our Saviour who by his death overcame him who had the power of death which is the Devil and having spoiled principalities and powers made a shew of them openly and triumphed over them By means whereof another title did accrew unto him of being the sole Lord over all mankinde and that is jure belli by the laws of war that rule of Aristotle being most unquestionably true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say those which are taken in the wars are in the power and at the disposal of the Conquerour And by the same right also of successful war men became servants unto him whose service as our Church hath taught us is perfect freedome For Servi are so called a servando from being saved and preserved in the day of battail Vocabuli origo inde ducta creditur quod ii qui jure belli possint occidi a victoribus conservabantur as St. Augustine from the Lawyers hath it because although they might be slain by the Law of Armes yet by the clemency of the Victor they were saved from slaughter and so made servants to the Conquerour And last of all he is our Lord jure Promotionis by the right of promotion because we hold of him all those temporal and eternal blessings which we enjoy in this life and expect in that which is to come He is the Lord of Life as St. Peter telleth us Act. 3.15 the Lord of glory saith S. Paul 1 Cor. 2.8 the Lord of joy Enter into the joy of the Lord as St. Matthew hath it 25.21 And he conferreth on us his servants life joy and glory out of the abundant riches of his mercy towards us and whatsoever else is his within the title and power of Lord. For having thereto a double right first by inheritance as the Son whom God appointed heir of all things Heb. 1.2 and then by purchase as a Redeemer for therefore he dyed and rose again that he might be Lord of all Rom. 14.9 contenting himself with the first alone he is well pleased to set over the latter unto us and to advance us to an estate of joynt-purchase in Heaven of life joy and glory and whatsoever else he is owner of For to that end it pleased him to come down from Heaven and be made man and be incarnate by the holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary which is the first of those great works which were performed by him in order to our Redemption and next in order of the Creed ARTICLE IV. Of the Fourth ARTICLE OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. ANDREW 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Qui conceptus est de Spiritu sancto natus ex Virgine Maria. i. e. Which was conceived by the holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary CHAP. III. Of Gods free mercy in the Redemption of Man The Word why fittest to effect it The Incarnation of the Word why attributed to the holy Ghost The miracle thereof made credible both to Iews and Gentiles IT is a very ingenious conceit of Cameracensis that when God first created Adam he gave him all precious and excellent endowments as truth to instruct him justice to direct him mercy to preserve him and peace to delight him but that when he was fallen from God and forgot all the good which the Lord had done for him they returned back to him that gave them making report of that which had happened on the earth and earnestly moving the Almighty but with different purposes concerning this forlorn and unhappy creature For Iustice pleaded for his condemnation and called earnestly for the punishment which he had deserved Truth pressing for the execution of that which God had threatned on his disobedience But on the other side Mercy intreated for poor miserable man made out of the dust of the earth seduced by Satan and beguiled under faire pretences and Peace endevoured to take off the edge of Gods displeasure and reconcile the creature unto his Creatour When God had heard the contrary desires and pleas of those excellent Orators there was a councell called of the blessed Trinity in which it was finally resolved that the Word should be made flesh and take unto himself the nature of Man that he might partake of his infirmities be subject to the punishments which man had deserved and so become the propitiation for the sins of the world By this means the desires of all parties were fully satisfyed For man was punished according as Iustice urged the punishment threatned on mans disobedience inflicted as Truth required the offender pitied and relieved as Mercy intreated and God was
terris as St. Bernard hath it Who could be fitter to make us the Sons of God by adoption and grace then the word by which we were to be begotten unto life eternal or to repair the image of God decayed in us then he that was the brightnesse of his Fathers glory and the expresse image of his Person Finally who more fit to settle the minds of men in a certain and undoubted perswasion of the truth of such things as are necessary to be believed and thereby bring us into the way of life everlasting then he that was the way the truth and the life as himself telleth us of himself in St. Iohns Gospell Vt homo fidentius ambularet ad veritatem ipsa veritas Dei filius homine assumpto constituit et fundavit fidem as St. Augustine hath it That man saith he might with more confidence travell in the wayes of truth the truth it self even the Son of God taking the nature of man upon him did plant and found that faith which we are to beleive By which it is apparent that it was most agreeable both to our condition and the nature of the word it self that he should take upon himself the office of a Mediator between God and Man but so that he was bound thereto by no necessity but only out of his meer love and goodness to that wretched Creature The Scriptures and the Fathers are expresse in this Walke in love saith the Apostle as Christ hath also loved us and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God a sweet smelling savour And anon after Husbands love your wives even as Christ also loved his Church and gave himself for it And in pursuance of this love he took upon himself the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of man and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the Cross. So that first out of his love and goodness towards us he offered himself to serve and suffer in our places and after out of the same love submitted himself unto the punishment which our sins deserved God not imposing this upon him by necessity of any inevitable decree but mercifully accepting his compassionate offer which did so powerfully conduce unto mans salvation and the most inexpressible honour of his only Son The sufferings of CHRIST in regard of man do take their value from his Person the excellency of which did prevail so far as to make the passion of one available for the sins of all But the merit of those sufferings in regard of himself is to be valued by that cheerful freedom with which he pleased to undergo them and had not been so acceptable nor effectual neither if they had not been voluntary For Fathers which affirm the same we need take no thought having both Reason and the Scriptures so expresly for it though this be universally the Doctrine of all Catholick wrirers some of whose words I shall recite and for the rest refer the Reader to their Books For the Greek Church thus saith Athanasius CHRIST seeing the goodness of his Father and his own sufficiency and power 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was moved with compassion towards man and pitying our infirmities cloathed himself with the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. and willingly took up his cross and went uncompelled unto his death And thus St. Augustine for the Latâ—ne The Word saith he was made flesh by his own power and was born suffered died and rose again nulla necessitate sed voluntate potestate by no necessity laid upon him but meerly of his own good will and that authority which he had to dispose of himself See to this purpose the same Augustine in Psal. 8. de Trinit l. 4. c. 10. Chrysost. in Gen. Hom. 55. in Ioh. Hom. 82. Amb. in Psal. 118. Serm. 6. De Fide l. 2. c. 1. Hieron in Isai. cap. 3. in Psal. 68. Not to descend to those of the later Ages The passages being thus laid open we now proceed to the great work of the incarnation wherein the holy Ghost was to have his part that so none of the Heavenly powers might be wanting to the restauration of collapsed man That our Redeemers Incarnation in the Virgins womb was the proper and peculiar work of the holy Ghost is positively affirmed in St. Matthews Gospel first in the way of an historical Narration Before they came together as man and wise she was found with childe of the holy Ghost ch l. 1. 18. and afterwards by way of declaration from an Angel of Heaven saying Ioseph thou son of David fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife for that which is conceived in her 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is of the holy Ghost vers 20. Nor wanted there especial reason if at least any reasons may be given in matters of so high a nature why this miraculous Conception was committed rather to the holy Ghost then either acted by the sole power of God the Father or by the sole vertue of the Word who was aboundantly able to have wrought his own Incarnation For as the Word was pleased to offer himself to take humane flesh the better to accomplish the great work of the Worlds redemption and as God the Father knowing how unable poor man must be to work out his own salvation otherwise then by such a Saviour was graciously pleased to accept the offer so it seemed requisite that God the holy Ghost should prepare that flesh in which the Word of God was to be incarnate Besides the power of quickning and conferring fruitfulness is generally ascribed to the Spirit in the Book of God who therefore in the Nicene or rather the Constantinopolitane Creed is called the Lord and giver of life For thus saith David for the Old Testament Thou sendest forth thy Spirit and they are created and thus the son of David for the New Testament Spiritus est qui vivificat i. e. It is the Spirit that quickneth The holy Ghost then was the proper Agent in the Incarnation So St. Matthew tels us But for the manner and the means by which so wonderful a conception was brought to pass that we finde only in St. Luke The blessed Virgin as it seemed made a question of it how she should possibly conceive and bring forth a son considering that as yet she had not had the company of her husband Ioseph Quandoquidem virum non cognosco that is to say since as yet I do not know my husband for so I rather choose to read it then to translate it as it stands in our English Bibles seeing I know not a man For that both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek and Vir in Latine do sometimes signifie an Husband every Schoolboy knows and so the words are rendred in our English Bibles Ioh. 4.16 17 18. and in other places And
in his Tribunal or Judgement Seat he caused the Souldiers of his Guard to fall upon them not with swords but staves who wounded many and killed some and for the rest falling on one another in an hasty flight as commonly men do in such affrightments they came unto a wretched and calamitous end Such another wicked and ungodly act was the slaughter of the Galileans who being more tender conscienced then the rest of the Iews would not as they did offer sacrifice for the health of the Romans and therefore came not to the Temple the place of sacrifice but held their Congregations and performed their sacrifices by themselves apart This coming unto Pilates ear and notice being given withal when they met together he caused his men of war to fall upon them and most cruelly put them to the sword And these were those poor Galileans which the Gospel speaks of whose bloud Pilate is there said to have intermingled with their Sacrifices This was not long before the time of our Saviours death that is to say about the third year of his Ministerie So that being in himself of a barbarous and cruel nature and fleshed in a continual course of shedding bloud he was the more like to serve the turn of those murderous Iews whom nothing else would satisfie but the death of the Saviour their crucifying of their long expected Messiah What became of him afterwards I shall let you know towards the conclusion of this Article when he had put an end by death to those many temptations and afflictions which our Saviour suffered during the time of his command This is enough by the way of Preamble to give the reader a short touch and character of him and so to let him see with what truth and plainness S. Austin tels us of the man that he was put into the Creed or Symbol not for the merit of his person propter signationem temporis non propter dignitatem personae as the Father hath it but for the pointing out of the time of our Saviours passion which he doth also touch at in his Encheiridion to Laurentius cap. 5. And so much briefly shall suffice for this present time touching the life and manners of this Pontius Pilate under whom CHRIST suffered let us next look upon Christs sufferings under Pontius Pilate Now for the sufferings of our Saviour they may be principally divided into internal and external the inward or internal being either temptations or afflictions the outward or external either shame or corporal punishments and these again may be considered either as being inflicted on him before his crucifying or in the act of crucifixion Of these the first were those temptations which were laid before him by the Devil immediately upon his Baptism at the performance of which ceremony he was acknowledged by Iohn Baptist to be the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world anointed for his following Ministery by the unction of the holy Spirit descending visibly upon him in the shape of a dove and publickly proclaimed by a voice from heaven to be the beloved Son of God in whom he was well pleased This is the first alarm which the Devil took and it concerned him to betake himself to his weapons presently The Devil was an expert warrier and was resolved not to be set upon in his own Dominions but to give the first blow as we use to say and take the enemie whom he feared at the best advantages which were presented and as unprovided as he could And therefore he drew after him into the Wilderness of Iudaea into which our Saviour had been led by the holy Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was led into the Wilderness by the Spirit as St. Matthew hath it that is to say a Spiritu Sanctitatis as the Translatour of the Syriack 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the holy Spirit as we read in Chrysostom And so no question but it was For by what spirit else but the Spirit of God could he be led into the Wilderness to whom all other spirits in the world were subject as they themselves confess in sundry places of the Gospel especially considering that the word is a word of violence such as our Lord and Saviour was not subject to For though 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in St. Matthew be a word more gentle and may imply a peaceable and quiet leading yet in St. Mark we finde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he was driven into the Wilderness by the Spirit the holy Ghost or Spirit of God conducting him into the Desert half against his will that is to say with such reluctance in his will considering to what end he was carried thither which was ut tentaretur a Diabulo that he might be tempted of the Devil as many of Gods Saints have found within themselves distracted between hope and fear upon the undertaking of some dangerous enterprise Of which St. Chrysostom in his Homilies on St. Matthew gives us this good note that we are not rashly and unadvisedly to thrust our selves into temptations which is a thing so contrary to Christs example though we are bound by his example to resist temptations as often as the Devil doth suggest them to us In which it is a great part of our Christian duty to call upon the Lord our God that he would be pleased not to lead us into temptation or if he do that he would graciously deliver us from the evil of it and doing so to be assured that no temptation shall be laid upon us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but such as incident to man and may well be born that God will not suffer us to be tempted beyond our power but will make way for us to escape that being tryed in this fiery furnace of temptation we may receive that Crown of life which the Lord hath promised to all those which overcome it Now in this story of the temptations of our Saviour there are these three parts to be considered the place the preparation and the temptation it self The place or scene of this great action was the Wilderness of Iudaea as before we said not the inhabited parts thereof for there were many villages interspersed therein as commonly there are in al great Forrests but those which were the furthest and the most remote from humane society The spirit led him not saith Chrysostom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into the City or the Market place but into the Wilderness and more then so into the least frequented and most savage part of it where he conversed with none but Beasts as St. Mark informs us And this was done on great and weighty considerations First he was led into the Wilderness the better to comply with the type or figure of the Levitical Scape-goat of which it is thus said in Scripture that the Goat on which the lot fell to be the Scape-goat shall be presented alive before the Lord to
as good authority as the Laws and Statutes of the Realm can give unto it Which holy time had it been as carefully and conscionably observed by all sorts of people as it was prudently and piously ordained at first we had no doubt escaped many of those grievous plagues with which the Lord of late hath scourged us and even consumed us unto nothing by our own licentiousness But to proceed to the third general point contained in the story of the Lords temptation in which there is a doubt as before was said touching the very moment and point of time which the old Tempter took to give the onset occasioned by the different narrations of the three Evangelists that is to say whether the Devil tempted him all those forty days and then gave him over or that he did not trouble him and begin the business until the forty days were past and his fast was ended St. Matthews words do seem to intimate nay to say expresly that the Tempter did not come unto him till his fast was ended and that afterwards he was an hungred and this more literally agrees with the particulars of the following story But on the other side it is said in Luke that he was led into the Wilderness being forty days tempted by the Devil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek text reads it and then how could the Devil set him upon one of the Pinnacles of the Temple if he were all the time of his Temptation within the bowels of that Desert For resolution of which point Eusebius and St. Cyril two Greek Fathers though they keep the words yet they do point them otherwise then we read them now in our printed copies referring the forty days which are there spoken of not to his being tempted of the Devil but to his being in the Wilderness And then the reading will be thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say And he was led into the Wilderness forty days being tempted of the Devil c. And so it seems it stood in those antient copies which were consulted by the Author of the Vulgar Latine whosoever he was in which we read Et agebatur in Spiritu in deserto diebus quadraginta tentatur a Diabolo Which reading if it be allowed of as I see no reason but it may then the doubt is ended and the appearing difference fairly reconciled Otherwise we may say and no doubt most safely that he was tempted by the Devil all those forty days as is said by Luke and after they were ended also as we finde in Matthew that is to say as Euthymius very rightly noteth the Devil tempted him in those days the said forty days as it were a far off by sleep sloth heaviness and the like but after he knew him once to be hungry then he set upon him prope manifeste as the Author hath it more visibly and hand to hand namely in those three great temptations which the story mentioneth So then the nick and point of time in which the Devil did apply himself most closely to the work intended was cum esuriret when he began to be an hungry As long as our Redeemer kept himself unto prayer and fasting the Devil either did not trouble him or it was either with such trivial and light temptations as made no impression and neither interrupted him in his holy course nor caused him to intermit the business he was then upon by making any necessary replies to his lewd suggestions But when he began to be an hungry when his minde seemed to be upon his belly if I may so say then did the Devil think it was time to work him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it was notably well observed by Chrysostom to this very purpose So excellent is the force and efficacy of an holy fast that it keeps the Devil at a distance This difficulty thus passed over we shall next look on the particular temptations which those Gospels speak of In which it is to be observed that whereas St. Iohn makes mention of three kindes of lust which mightily prevail on the affections of us mortal men viz. the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life the Devil tempted CHRIST in all and in all was vanquished He tempted him in the first place with the lust of the flesh when he found that after such and so long a fast he began to be hungry and was reduced to such extremities as to be forced to seek his bread even in desolate places and said unto him if that thou beest the Son of God as the late voyce from heaven did seem to signifie command that these stones be made bread to appease thy hunger and satisfie that natural necessity which is now upon thee An opportunity well taken and as strongly followed had it been answered with success For commonly when men are in distress and want they are then most apt either to distrust the Lord their God as if he left them to themselves without hope of relief or else to use unlawful means to relieve themselves which was the point the Devil thought to bring him to by this first temptation But when he failed of this design he pressed him in the next place with the lust of the eye taking him up upon an exceeding high mountain shewing him all the Kingdomes of the World and the glories of them and offering to bestow them all upon him if he would only yeild so far as to fall down and worship him Impudent wretch thou worst of all wicked spirits saith Ignatius how was it that thou didst not fear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to utter such a sawcy voyce to the Lord of all things And yet a far more impudent braggart to make an offer of those things which he had no power of the Kingdomes of the earth and the glories of them being holden of no other Lord then the Lord our God And here it is to be observed that whereas in the former onset which only did relate unto Christ himself he only did reply upon him with a Scriptum est in this wherein the glorie of his heavenly Father was concerned so highly he addes an Apage or rebuke Get thee hence thou Satan So that the Devil failing at the two first weapons betakes himself unto the last the pride of life setting him on a pinnacle of the holy Temple saying if thou bee the Son of God as credulous men are made believe by the late great miracle of a voyce supposed to be from heaven do somewhat to confirm them in that belief teque assere coelo somewhat which may indeed make manifest that thou art from heaven and answerable to the testimony which that voyce gave of thee and a more sure and easie trial thou canst never meet with then by casting thy self down from hence knowing so well how all the Angels are at hand to attend upon thee and carry thee upon their
of them in their severall Commentaries on the text saying the same thing though in divers words And finally it is so interpreted by St. Augustine also Nec frustra fortasse non satis fuit ut diceret mors aut infernus sed utrumque dictum est c. that is to say Nor happily without cause did he not think it enough to say that death or hell divisively had cast up their dead but he nameth both death for the just who might only suffer death and not also hell hell for the wicked and unrighteous who were there to be punished Thus have we looked over all those places where the word Hades doth occurre in the new Testament except that one which is in question whereof more anon and finde it constantly both englished and interpreted by that of hell according as we commonly understand the word for the place of torments T is true the word admits of other notions amongst some Greek Authors But that makes nothing to us Christians who are to use it in that sense in which it is presented to us in the book of God interpreted and expounded by the Antient Fathers and the tradition of the Church For though the sacred Penmen of the new Testament writing in Greek were of necessity to use such words as they found ready to their hands yet they restrained them many times to some certain and particular meaning which they retain unto this day as words of Ecclesiastical use and signification Of this kinde are Ecclesia Evangelium Episcopus Presbyter Diaconus Martyr and the like which being words of a more general signification in their first original are now restrained to such particular notions as the first Preachers of the Gospel thought most fit to reserve them for Of this kind also is Diabolus which properly and originally did signifie no more then an Accuser but is now used by all writers both in Greek and Latine to denote the Devil And of this kind is Hades also which whatsoever it might signifie in some old Greek writers more then the Place or Region of hell or the Prince thereof is now restrained in general speech to signifie only hell it self or the house of torments the habitation of the Devill and his Angels But this we shall the better see by taking a short view of the use and signification of the word amongst the best and most approved of the old Greek Ecclesiastical writers And first Iosephus though no Christian yet one that very well understood the difference between heaven and hell telleth us of those whose souls were cleansed and favoured of God that they inhabit in the holiest places of heaven but that they whose hands wax mad against themselves or who laid hands upon themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their soules were to be received in the dark vaults of hell or Hades Theophilus the sixt B. of Antioch about 170. years after Christ citeth this verse out of the works of the Sibyls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they sacrificed to the Devils in hell or Hades In the same times lived Iustin Martyr who doth thus informe us After the soul saith he is departed from the body straightwayes there is a separation of the unjust from the just both being carryed by the Angels into places meet for them that is to say the souls of the just into Paradise where is the fellowship and sight of Angels and Arch-angels with a kind of beholding of Christ our Saviour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the souls of the unjust to places in hell or Hades of which it was said in Scripture unto Nebuchadnezzar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Hades below was stirred to meet him Isa. 14. And to this purpose he both citeth and alloweth those words of Plato where he affirmes that when death draweth near to any man then tales are told 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the things in Hades how he that here doth deal unjustly shall there be punished c. Next him Eusebius speaks thus in the person of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I see my descent to hell or Hades approach and the rebellion against me of the contrary powers which are enemies to God And that we may be sure to know what he means by Hades he tels us out of Plato in another place that the souls of wicked men departing hence immediately after death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 endured the punishments of hell or Hades of their doings here After man was fallen saith Athanasius and by his fall death had prevailed from Adam to Christ the earth was accursed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hell or Hades opened Paradise shut up and heaven offended but after all things were delivered by Christ the earth received a blessing Paradise was opened 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hades or hell did shrink for fear and heaven set open to all believers And in another place he speaketh of two severall mansions provided by Almighty God for the wicked man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the grave and Hades whereof one is to receive his body and the other his soul. St. Basil thus Death is not altogether evill except you speak of the death of a sinner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. because that their departure hence is the beginning of their punishments in hell or Hades and besides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the evils which are in hell or Hades have not God for their cause but our selves c. And after shewing that Dathan and Abiram were swallowed up of the earth he addes that they were never a whit the better for this kind of punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for how could they be so that went down to Hades or hell but they made the rest wiser by their example Infinite more might be alleaged from the Fathers of the Eastern Church to shew that when they spake of Hades they meant nothing but hell and should be here produced were not these sufficient Only I shall make bold to add the evidence of two or three of the most eminent of the latter writers to shew that in all times and ages the word retained that notion only which had been given it in the Scriptures and the old Greek Fathers Thus then Cydonius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that there is in Hades hell vengeance for all sinnes committed not only the consent of all wise men but the equity of the divine justice doth most fully prove Aeneas Gazaeus he comes next and he tels us this that he who in a private life committeth smal sins and laments them escapeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the punishments that are in Hades And finally Gregentius thus Christ took a rod out of the earth viz. his precious Crosse and stretching forth his hand struck all his enemies therewith and conquered them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that is to say Hades or hell death sin and that subtile serpent So
absurde credi videtur c. If saith he it may seem to be believed without absurdity that the Saints of the Old Testament which believed in Christ to come were in places most remote from the torments of the wicked in locis tormentis impiorum remotissimis and yet amongst the Inferi in the lower places until the bloud of Christ ad ea loca descensus and his descent unto those places did deliver them thence then certainly the godly believers now redeemed with the price of that bloud-shed prorsus inferos nesciunt shall never come into that place where those inferi are that is to say within the mansions below to the time that recovering again their bodies they do receive the blessings prepared for them So far and to this purpose he Now by this last passage cited from the works of Augustine it is clear and evident that in those times it was an opinion generally received in the Christian Church and such as might be well believed as himself acknowledgeth without any absurdity that the Patriarchs and others of the Saints of the Old Testament were detained in some lower places amongst the Inferi but without any sense of those infinite torments which were endured by the wicked and that they were detained there till the coming of Christ till he by his descent thither did release them thence Which opinion as he did not very well approve of so in regard it was so generally received he was very tender in confuting it All he thought fit to say was no more then this Illud me nondum invenisse confiteâ—r inferos appellatos ubi justorum animae requiescunt that he had no where found as yet in holy Scripture that the place where the souls of the just did rest was called by the name of Inferi So wary was that Reverend and learned Prelate from pronouncing rashly in a point wherein the general current of the Church â—eemed to be against him and the like wariness I hope I may have leave to observe here also For though this be the reason as before I said which I am to consider as a matter questionable yet I shall consider it as a matter questionable only I shall not dare to say it is false or impious The joynt consent of such and so many of the Antients both Greek and Latine which have been formerly alleadged besides others as considerable but not here alleadged who have in terminis and expresly affirmed the same make me hold off my hand from that presumption The rather in regard it carries no impiety with it nothing derogatory to the Gospel or Kingdome of Christ but rather seemes to adde much lustre to our Saviours Person and much conduceth to the honour of the Faith and Gospel For what can be more honourable to the Person of Christ then that the Patriarchs and other holy men of God who dyed under the Law were kept from being admitted into a participation of the joys of heaven till he by his Divine power took them by the hand conducted them into the blessed gates of Paradise and having overcome the sharpness of death set open the Kingdome of Heaven unto all believers What could adde more unto the dignity and reputation of the Gospel of Christ then that all such as faithfully believe the same and frame themselves to live thereafter should have a greater priviledge then their Father Abraham and all the rest who dyed in the fear of God before the coming of our Saviour and be admitted presently to the joys of Paradise And this is that which is affirmed by St. Hierom and some other Fathers Ante Christum Abraham apud inferos post Christum latro in Paradiso that before CHRIST Abraham and the bosom of Abraham was in the lower regions in some parts of the Inferi but after Christ the penitent theef was admitted presently admitted into Paradise For this saith he is the land of the living in which the good things of the Lord are prepared for meek and holy men to which before the coming of our Lord and Saviour in the flesh neither Abraham nor Isaac nor Iacob nor the Prophets nor other just men could attain With whom accords St. Chrysostom also in his Homilie on the Parable of the rich man and Lazarus Luk. 10. But here perhaps it will be said that being both the Greek Hades and the Latine Inferi have been before declared to be hell and the place of torments how can the Patriarchs and other holy men of God be said to be in or amongst the Inferi and not participate of the torments of that wretched place In answer whereunto it may be replyed that there might be some part or region of the Inferi wherein the greatest or rather the only punishment was poena damni a want of those Celestial comforts which were reserved for them in the land of Paradise which to a soul that longed for the sight of God could be no small infelicity And secondly it may be said that though the Inferi in it self were a place of punishment yet God was able to command the fire that it should not burn them and to the torments of the pit that they should not touch them That God who so preserved the three Hebrew Salamanders in the middle of a fierie furnace that the hairs of their head were not â—indged nor the colour of their coats changed nor so much as the smell of the fire passed upon them and did so shut the mouths of the ravenous Lyons that they could not hurt his servant Daniel though he was cast amongst them into their den is also able to afford his people such a proportion of refreshing as to him seems meet even in the middle of the flames and in the dens of those roaring Lyons who day and night have had an expectation to devoure them Nor is this all that may be said in justification and defence of those antient Writers which have looked this way if one did seriously set about it For possibly they might mean no more by those expressions of bringing back the souls of the just from Hades then that by the descent of Christ into hell all claim and challenge which the Devil could pretend unto them were utterly made void and of none effect and that our Saviour by subduing the whole forces of hell and spoyling the powers and principalities thereof communicated the benefit and effect of so great a triumph aswell to those who went before as to us that come after assuring both that neither hell it self nor the Rulers of it have any interest in either or should be able from thenceforth to disturb their rest But I pronounce not this way neither but shall still look upon it as a matter questionable And so I leave this point with these words of Bullinger a man of eminent note in the Protestant Churches Sinus Abrahae nil aliud est quam portus salutis c. The bosome of Abraham is
to proceed with them by the authority of Scripture and of reason both To the old Testament and our proofs from thence we shal challenge an obedience from them because by them confessed for Scripture and reverenced as the Oracles of Almighty God And for the new the writings of the holy Evangelists we shall expect submission to the truths thereof so far forth as it shall appear to be built on reason and unavoydable Demonstration Now the old Testament consisteth in that part thereof which doth reflect upon the birth and actions of our blessed Saviour either of types and figures or else of Prophecies and examples and the first type which looks this way is that of Isaac the only son the only beloved son of a tender father a type both of his death and his resurrection In which observe how well the type and truth do agree together The Altar was prepared the fire kindled Isaac fast bound and ready to receive the blow the knife was in his Fathers hand and his arme stretched out to act the bloudy part of a Sacrificer And yet even in the very act and so near the danger God by his holy Angel and a voice from heaven delivered the poor innocent from the jawes of death and restored him back unto his father when all hopes had failed him How evidently doth this fact of Abrahams stretching out his hand to strike the blow and being withholden by the Angel from the blow it self fore-shadow those sacred fundamentall truths which we are bound to believe concerning the true bodily death and glorious resurrection of our Lord and Saviour The Iews themselves in memorie of this deliverance did celebrate the first of Tisri which is our September usually called the Feast of Trumpets with the sound of Rams hornes or Corners and counted it for one of the occasions of that great solemnity which shews that there was somewhat in it more then ordinary somewhat which did concern their nation in a speciall manner Needs therefore must the Iews of our Saviours time be blinde with malice at the least with prejudice that look upon this story of Isaac the child of promise only as the relation of a matter past not as a type and shadow of the things to come this only son of Abraham this child of promise the only hope or pledge of that promised seed which was expected from the beginning being to come thus near to death and yet to be delivered from the power thereof that so the faith of Abraham touching the death and resurrection of his son the heir of promise might be tryed and verifyed or rather that by experiment our Saviours death and resurrection might be truly represented and foreshadowed in Isaacs danger and delivery And this is that to which St. Paul alludeth saying By faith Abraham when he was tryed offered up Isaac and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son of whom it was said that in Isaac shall thy seed be called accounting that God was able to raise him up even from the dead from whence also he received him in a figure i. e. a figure of the resurrection of Christ the promised seed represented by it though Abraham probably looked no further then the present mercy Isaac then was the true representation and foreshadowing of our Saviours death and resurrection And so the wonderfull increase of Isaacs seed in whom all the nations of the world were to be blessed was as full an embleme of our Saviours seed and generation which cannot be numbred he having begotten unto God since his resurrection more sons and daughters throughout all nations then all the children of Abraham or Isaac according to the flesh though like unto the sands of the Sea for multitude But the circumstances of our Saviours selling and betraying his cruell persecution both by Priests and people the whole story of his humiliation unto death and exaltation after his resurrection are more perfectly foreshadowed by the cruel persecutions of Ioseph procured by his brethren by his calamity and advancement in Egypt The story is so well known it needs no repeating And the afflictions laid on both by the sonnes of Iacob in a manner parallel themselves Both of them were the first-born of their several Mothers both of them the best beloved sons of their Fathers and for this cause both of them envied and maligned by their wicked and ill natured brethren by whom they were both severally betrayed and sold for a contemptible piece of money So far the parallel holds exactly goe we further yet The pit whereinto Iosephs brethren cast him as also the pit or dungeon unto which he was doomed by a corrupt and partial Iudge on the complaint of an imperious whorish woman without proof or witnesse what was it but the picture of our Saviours grave to which he was condemned in the sentence of death by as corrupt a Judge as Potiphar on the bare accusation and complaint of an Adulterous generation as the Scripture cals them without proof or evidence And the deliverance of Ioseph from both pit and dungeon his exaltation by Pharaoh over all the land of Egypt and his beneficence to his Brethren whom he not only pardoned but preservation from famine what were they but the shadowes and resemblances of Christs resurrection his sitting at the right hand of God the Father by whom all power was given him both in heaven and earth and finally his mercie to the sons of men whose sins he doth not only pardon but preserve them also from the famine of the word of God The Kings ring put on Iosephs hand the gold chain put about his neck and the vesture of fine linnen or silke wherewith he was arraied by the Kings command what were they as the Antients have observed before but the resemblances of those glorious endowments with which the body or Humanity of Christ our Saviour hath been invested or apparelled since his resurrection More then this yet The name of Zaphnath Paaneah given to Ioseph by the Kings appointment and the Proclamation made by Pharaoh that every knee should bow before him what is it but a modell or a type of that honour which God the King of Kings hath ordered to be given to Christ to whom he hath given a name above every name that at the name of JESUS every knee should bowe of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth Where by the way and that addeth something farther to the parallel also the name of Zaphnath Paaneah as the Hebrew reads it but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psonthem Phanech as the Septuagint is naturally as the learned Mr. Gregory very well observeth a Coptick or Egyptian word and signifyeth an Interpreter of hidden things or a revealer of secrets And so not only the Babylonish Targum and others of the Rabbins do expound the word but we finde the same exposition in Theodoret also 〈◊〉
Heaven or taken up on high as our English reads it it was Gods act there And so it was indeed it was Gods and his the Persons having such an interest in one another that what was done by the one is ascribed to the other without wrong or prejudice to either as it is also in the case of the Resurrection in which although we find it to be his own act his Resurrexit only in the holy Gospels yet is it quem Deus suscitavit a mortuis him hath God raised from the dead in St. Peters Sermon Or else it may be answered thus that though our Saviour did ascend by his own power and vertue yet he may properly be said to be assumptus taken or carried up into Heaven in three regards that is to say either as taken up on the wings of Angels whereof we shall say more anon as Lazarus was carryed into Abrahams bosom or because he seemed to be wrapt up in a cloud and so taken up out of their sight or finally that the man CHRIST IESVS was taken up into Heaven by the power and vertue of the Godhead in separably united to him Either of these constructions will atone the difference and reconcile the Creed with the words of the Text though we may further add and ex abundanti that St. Luke doth not only say ferebatur in Coelum or he was carryed up into Heaven as if he were passive in it only but that Recessit ab iis first he left them of his own accord gave the first rise to his Ascension and after ferebatur for so it followeth suffered himself to be assumpted taken or carryed up into Heaven either by the Cloud or by the Angels or how else he pleased Lastly it is to be observed that he ascended into Heaven videntibus illis saith the Text whilest his Apostles looked on to signifie that he did ascend by little and little that he might feed their eyes and refresh their souls and by his leisurely ascent make them more able to attest it as occasion served For had he been caught up into Heaven as Elias was who had but one witness to affirm it or rapt up into Heaven as St. Paul was afterwards without any witness but himself and scarce that neither for whether it were in the body or out of the body he could hardly tell the truth thereof had wanted much of that estimation which the mouths of so many witnesses as beheld the mirâ—â—le were able to afford unto it And yet it was strange that many witnesses should need to confirm that truth which had so clearly been fore-signified both by Types and Prophecies that none who did believe the Scriptures could make question of it For if we look upon the Substance or the quod â—it of it or on the circumstances of the time the place the cloud the pomp and manner of the same or finally on the consequent or effect thereof as to Christ himself we finde all signified before-hand in the Book of God and that so fully and expressely as must needs convince the Iews of the greatest obstinacy that ever had been entertained in the hearts of men first in the way of Type or Figure we have that of Enoch before the Law and that of Elias under the Law Of Enoch it is said in the holy Scripture that he walked with God that is to say as the text doth expound it self in the case of Noah he was a just man and perfect in his generation for the times he lived in So righteous was he as it seems in the sight of God that we finde no mention of his death Only the Scriptures say that he was not found because God took him i. e. because God took him to himself translating him both body and soul to his heavenly Kingdome And so St. Paul expounds it saying By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death neither was he found because God had taken him And of Elijah it is said that being talking with Elisha one of his Disciples there appeared a Charet of fire and horses of fire and parted them asunder and that Elijah went up in a whirlwinde into Heaven Here then we have two Types or figures of the Lords Ascension the one delivered in the person of a righteous man who was unblameable in his conversation walking in the commandements of God without reproof the other of a Prophet mighty both in WORD AND WORK who did not only reprove sin and foretel of things which were to come but did confirm his Doctrine with signs and miracles And being that the Iews cannot but confess as Iosephus did that Christ was not only a wise man a Teacher of the people in the ways of truth one that wrought miracles and had gained many both of the Iews and Gentiles to adhere unto him being they cannot but acknowledge of our Saviour Christ as the good Theif did ille autem nil mali fecit that he had done nothing amiss or as Pilate that there was no fault to be found in him they have no reason but to think that Enoch and Elijah were the Types of the Lords Ascension aswell as of his life and doctrine But here perhaps it will be objected that either Enoch and Elijah were not taken up into Heaven and so no Types and figures of the Lords Ascension or if they were then was not Christ the first which opened the gates of Heaven and ascended thither in his body to make a way for others in due time to follow as all Antiquity in a manner do affirm he was grounding their judgement on the evident and plain texts of Scripture For doth not the Apostle expressely say that the way into the Holiest of all was not yet manifest while the first Tabernacle was yet standing Heb. 9.8 And doth not Christ our Saviour as expressely say that no man had ascended into Heaven but he that came down from Heaven even the Son of man Ioh. 3.13 How then were Enoch and Elijah Types of Christs Ascension if they were not taken up into Heaven or how was Christ the first if they there before him Our Saviour Christ himself makes answer unto this objection where he saith that in his Fathers house there were many mansions that is to say several degrees of happiness and estates in glory though all most glorious in themselves To some of which degrees of happiness and estates in glory unto some one or other of those heavenly Mansions both Enoch and Elijah were by God translated there 's no doubt of that the Scripture is expressely for it But that they were in Coelosummo in the highest Heaven that unto which the Lord ascended and where he now sitteth at the right hand of God the Father that as the Scriptures doe not say so there is no necessity why we should believe it Our Saviour was the first who ascended thither that place of supreme glory
antient Romans when any of their Generals did return victorious against a powerful and considerable enemy to honour him with a Triumphant reception into the City of Rome The pomp and manner of which was that the General apparelled in a garment of state called Trabea or Vestis Triumphalis and having on his head a garland of lawrel and sometimes a Crown of gold which the Senate had bestowed upon him was carried in a rich and open Chariot the Senators and others of the principal Citizens going forth to meet him and conduct him in the spoyls and treasures gotten in the war passing on before the souldiers with their Coronets their bracelets and other militarie rewards following next the General and in the Rere of all those miserable men whether Kings or others whom the unlucky chance of war had now made Captives Examples of this kinde in the Roman stories are obvious to the eye of every Reader And such as this if I may safely venture upon such comparisons is the Ascension of the Lord described to be by the Royal Psalmist He made a chariot of the clouds and so ascended up on the wings of the winde apparelled in the Robe of his own righteousness more glorious then a Rayment of needlework wrought about with divers colours and having on his head that Crown of eternal Majesty which the Lord God his Heavenly Father had conferred upon him in testimony of that Soveraign power over Heaven and Earth which he since hath exercised But of this we shall speak more anone To make his entrance into Heaven the more magnificent the Blessed Angels those great Citizens of the new Hierusalem did attend upon him conducting him into the place of endless glories as erst they had done Lazarus into Abrahams bosome St. Austin so affirmed it saying Sublatus est Christus in manibus Angelorum c. The Lord was carryed up by the hands of Angels when he ascended into Heaven not that he would have fallen had not they supported but that they might serve him in that work so saith St. Athanasius for the Greek Church also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that being carryed up by Angels he ascended thither as man and took our flesh upon him into Heaven St. Cyprian saith that though he did not need the Angels to support or carry him yet that they did attend him in that glorious triumph and praecedentes subsequentes applaudebant victori And thereto Nazianzen agrees also if Christ ascend saith he to Heaven ascend thou with him and joyn thy self unto the Angels which did accompany him or receive him Take which of these you will and we finde the Angles to have no small part in our Saviours Triumph And certainly it stood with reason that they who had ministred unto him in the whole course of life when he did seem to be in disgrace and poverty should have the honour to attend him in the time of his glories and if we do observe it well we shall finde no special passage of our Saviours life in which the blessed Angels did not do him service An Angel served to usher in his incarnation to proclaim his birth unto the Shepheards to join in consort with the rest of the Quire of Heaven and sing the Anthem of Gloria in excelsis Deo No sooner was he born but all the Angels of the Lord did adore and worship him saith St. Paul to the Hebrews when he had overcome the Devil in the Wilderness the Angels came and ministred unto him as St. Matthew hath it and being at his last conflict with him in the garden of Gethsamene an Angel of the Lord did come down to comfort him To testifie unto the truth of his resurrection we have two Angels cloathed in white proclaiming this glad news that the Lord was risen and here we have two men in white which were Angels doubtlesse assuring the Apostles of their Lords ascension Not that there were no more then two because no more spoke of but that two only staid behinde to testifie unto the truth of so great a miracle Who as they also certifyed them in the way of prediction that in the same manner as he went from thence into heaven he should return again in the day of judgment so in that day they shall not only wait upon him but have their speciall place and ministry as we shall see hereafter in the following Article But in our Saviours train there were more then Angels To make this triumph answerable to the former Platforme there must be Souldiers also to attend his Chariot which must receive their severall rewards and crowns for their well deservings and captives there must be to be led in triumph and to be made a spectacle unto men and Angels And so there was Ignatius telleth us in plain termes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he went down to hell alone but he ascended to his father with a great train after him And before him Thaddeus whom St. Thomas the Apostle sent to the Prince of Edessa used the self same words More company there was then than the holy Angels of more sorts at least for those of whom Thaddeus and Ignatius spake were such as did ascend from the parts below but who these were hath been a matter much disputed in these latter times Shall we affirme as generally the Papists do that they were the souls of the Fathers who died under the Law whom our redeemer brought from Limbo when he went down into hell I thinke we need not be reduced into that straight neither And as for my opinion in that point it hath been shewn already in another place All I shall add now in brief is this that they which did ascend in our Saviours train and made up a great part of his glorious triumph were either his Souldiers or his Captives His Souldiers I call those of the Saints departed whose graves were opened at the time of his resurrection who being united to their bodies rose and came out of the their graves and went into the holy City and appeared unto many It was not probable that they were raised from the dead to die again much lesse to be left wandering up and down the earth as if they had no certain ubi to repair unto Nor could they ascend into the heavens before our Saviour who as in all things so in that also was to have the preeminence They must then ascend with him as a part of his train and go in with the Bridegroome as the wise Virgins did when the doors were open For my part I can see no reason why being made partakers of his resurrection they should be rejected or cast off at his ascension That they were Saints whose bodies had been raised by so great a miracle is affirmed expressely in the text and therfore were in some possession of the heavenly glories And that their bodies had been putrefyed
we shall come to speak of the Communion of Saints yet I shall ask this question first and then dismiss the cause to another day My question is if we must call upon the Saints as our Mediatours but Mediators only of Intercession whether they do commend our requests to God immediately by themselves or by the mediation of Christ our Saviour If they reply immediately and by themselves as certainly their doctrine doth import no less what then shall we return in answer to our Saviour words No man comes unto the Father but by me No nor the Saints departed neither if St. Ambrose erre not Eo nisi intercedente nec nobis nec Sanctis omnibus quicquam est cum Deo Nor we nor any of the Saints saith that Reverend Prelate have access to God but only by the intercession of our Saviour Christ. But if they say they do it by the mediation of our Saviour as needs they must and indeed some of them do of late we do but put our selves to a needless trouble in making our address to them which cannot help us nor aid us in our prayers to Almighty God without first going unto Christ for his furtherance in it Especially considering that our blessed Saviour to whom the Saints themselves must become Petitioners hath called us nay commanded us to come to him as often as we are heavy laden with sin or misery upon his gracious promise to relieve us in it Certainly did these men remember the good old rule Frustra fieri per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora they would not make more Mediators then their case requires nor set up such a number of superfluous Priests to become Intercessors for us in the Court of Heaven instead of that one High Priest whom God hath ordained one so compassionate to us in our distresses and every way so sensible of our infirmities For though there be many other qualifications necessary to the constituting of this great High Priest our Saviour Christ for ever blessed as namely to be holy blameless undefiled separate from sinners and higher then the highest Heavens yet none doth speak such comfort to the souls of men as that he had been compassed with infirmities and therefore like to have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way And such is our High Priest our most blessed Saviour who in the dayes of his flesh had been so afflicted exposed unto the scorn of men and the Temptations of Satan that he was fain to make his prayers and supplication to his heavenly Father and that too with strong cries and tears to be delivered from the dangers which did seem to threaten him His bloudy conflict in the Garden and that of Eli Eli Lamasabachtbani when upon the Cross are proof sufficient that he had need of Consolation And they are proof sufficient for this purpose too that being he suffered and was tempted he is able yea and willing too to succour them that are tempted as the Apostle doth infer concerning him For seeing that such an especial part of the Priestly Office is to make intercession for us in all our distresses it seemed expedient to the wisdome of God that he should finde just occasion in his own person to offer up prayers and supplications with strong cries for himself Non ignara mali miseris succurrere disco said the gallant Lady in the Poet. It was a plausible answer which Matthias Corvinus King of Hungary gave a great undertaker in School Divinity upon a pretty question which himself proposed The question was What reason might induce our Saviour to make S. Peter Head of the Church who had thrice denyed him rather then St. John the dear Disciple whom he loved a Virgin and one never tainted with any crime To which when the great Clerk could make no reply but rambled up and down in Gods secret Councels the King thus solved the Probleme for him Si virgo Johannes in fide firmus Pontifex fuisset c. The words are many in the Author but the sum is this That if our Saviour had made St. Iohn to be the Head of the Church he would have looked that all men should have been as perfect and sincere as himself and so have proved more rigorous and severe in correcting sinners then the infancy of the Church could bear whereas St. Peter being conscious of his own infirmities would sympathize the better with them and proceed more in his government towards them with the spirit of meekness Assuredly did I believe that Peter was made Head of the Church I could not have conceived a more plausible reason which might induce our Saviour unto that Election But howsoever I shall make this use of the story that God dealt most exceeding mercifully with the sons of men in providing such an High Priest for them as had in all things been tempted like unto themselves sin only excepted having made himself an offering for sin knew better then any of the Saints or Angels could how to apply the benefit of it to our wants and weaknesses And that indeed is the main business of the Priesthood For every High Priest is ordained for men in things pertaining unto God to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins as St. Paul defines him Which gifts and sacrifices as they were only types of that gift and sacrifice which Christ made of himself for the sins of the world so that oblation being made there was no longer use of the Legal sacrifice nor consequently of the Aaronical Priesthood By this one offering of himselfe hath â—e made perfect for ever all them that were sanctified and thereby out a signal remarkable difference between that one Sacrifice of himself and the sacrifices formerly required by the Law of Moses For in the time of the Law the Priesthood daily ministring and oftentimes offering the same things which yet considered in themselves and without reference to his own Sacrifice in Gods secret purpose could not take away sin But CHRIST by this one offering of himself for sin did not only take away the sins of many even of all those which faithfully believe in him and sanctifie them in his bloud by that one offering of his body once for all but having so done what he undertook and knowing that there remained no other sacrifice to be performed he sate him down at the right hand of God expecting there untill his enemies be made his footstool No further sacrifice to be offered then that already offered upon the Cross for what could follow after Consummatum est when all which was foreshadowed in the Legal Sacrifices was in that accomplished And as for that upon the Cross how it alluded to the Sacrifices of the Old Testament in what particulars the shadow and the substance held the best resemblance and of the benefit thereof unto all mankinde we have already spoke in the
alone Who when he findes his heavenly Father troubled with our perversness our high hand of sinning and ready to execute vengeance on us for our great misdeeds doth interpose the merit of his death and passion shews him the print of the Thorns in his sacred head his hands and feet boared through with nayls and his side pierced with the spear At sight whereof Gods heavy anger fals away and his wrath is pacified and he lays by the instruments of his rage and vengeance Tela reponuntur manibus fabricata Cyclopum as the Poet hath it and he resolves to tarry a little longer and expect the amendment of his people An Office from the which our High Priest never can desist whilest there are men upon the world to provoke God to anger and though we dare not say of him as St. Paul did of himself that he dyeth daily yet we may safely say and make it the rejoycing which we have in CHRIST IESVS our Lord that the merit of his death and passion are daily hourly nay continually presented by him to the view and consideration of Almighty God A point of no mean consolation to us whilest we are subject to the sins and lusts which we bear about us in the flesh and cannot otherwise be excused from them but by changing our mortal into immortality And this is that which was prefigured in the Law of Moses by the High Priests entring into the Sanctum Sanctorum which was parted with a vail or traverse Curtain from the rest of the Temple to make atonement with the Lord for the peoples sins The parallel stands thus between them First none might enter into the Sanctum Sanctorum or the holiest of all but the High Priest only Levit. 16.3 So Christ our High Priest and none but he hath entred into the holy places not made with hands to appear in the presence of God for us Heb. 9.24 Secondly as the veil of the Temple was lifted up or drawn aside to make room for the High Priest to enter into it so did the vail of the Temple rent in sunder at the very instant when the soul of our High Priest did depart from his body and enter the Celestial Sanctuary Mattb. 27. Thirdly the High Priest was apparelled in his Priestly vestments Levit. 16.10 and so our Saviour is described in the Rev. 13.13 Fourthly the High Priest entred into the Sanctuary but once a year which was upon the Feast of the Expiation Exod. 30.10 So did Christ enter once into the holy place which was upon the day of his death and passion whereon he obtained eternal redemption for us Heb. 9.12 And last of all as the High Priest made an offering for the sins of the people though it were only of the bloud of Calves and Goats before he went within the veil Levit. 16.12 15. which bloud he was to sprinkle on the Mercy-seat vers 14 15. and thereby made atonement in the holy place for all the Congregation of Israel vers 17. So before Christ our High Priest entred into the Heaven of glories he made an offering of himself Heb. 9.25 and by his own bloud entred into the holy places vers 12. which bloud of his that is to say the merits of it he sprinkleth on the Mercy-seat of Almighty God and thereby doth avert him from his displeasure and reconcile him daily to poor sinful man Which Parallel thus made we may the better understand St. Pauls drift and meaning in comparing the High Priests together and the excellency of Christs Priesthood above that of Aaron The Priests saith he i. e. those of inferiour order went into the first Tabernacle accomplishing the service of God But into the second went the High Priest alone once every year not without bloud which he offered for himself and for the errors of the people But Christ being made an High Priest of good things to come by a greater and more perfect Tabernacle not made with hands neither by the bloud of Goats and Calves but by his one bloud did he enter into the holy place having obtained eternal Redemption for us Not that he should offer himself often as the High Priest entred into the holy place every year with the bloud of others but that being offered once a sacrifice for sin he might for ever sit at the right hand of God chap. 10. ver 12. to appear in the sight of God for us unto our Salvation and to make intercession for us Thus standeth the case with our High Priest in the point of Sacrifice in which as in the other Offices of offering up our prayers to God interceding for us and pouring down his blessings on us he doth perform the Office or Function of an High Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech But there is yet one Argument more that St. Paul brings in proof of Melchisedechs Priesthood which is that he tithed Abraham or took Tithes of him Heb. 7.2 9. And if we prove not this also of our Saviour Christ the parallel betwixt him and Melchisedech will not be complete nor his high Priesthood so asserted as it ought to be But herein the Apostle will not fail us neither affording us two arguments to make good this point the one derived from the eternity of our Saviours Priesthood the other from the Prerogative which Melchisedech had in this particular above Aaron and the sons of Levi. The first stands thus Melchisedech took Tithes of Abraham in his own right as Priest of the most high God whose Priesthood being everlasting in the Person of Christ for he hath an unchangeable Priesthood vers 24. the right of taking Tithes is inherent in him on the meer taking on himself of Melchisedechs function I mean in being made a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech And this is that to which St. Paul alludeth saying Here men that die receive Tithes that is to say Here in the land of Canaan by the Law of Moses the Priests and Levites of our Nation being mortal men and subject to the stroke of death aswell as we do receive tithes of us to shew that we acknowledge them to be our Superiours in their place and Ministery But there he receiveth them of whom it is witnessed that he liveth His meaning is that when Melchisedech received Tithes of Abraham he received them as a Type of our Saviour Christ who now liveth with God and by his Resurrection did make known that he liveth for ever and lived to execute the Office of a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech He then of whom it is witnessed that he liveth receiveth Tithes or hath at least a right and title to receive them in regard of his unchangeable and eternal Priesthood But he receiveth them not in person having transferred all his interests in them and title to them upon the Ministers of his Gospel No otherwise then God conferred the Tithes of the land
of Christs disciples shall goe to an invisible place appointed them by God and there shall remain unto the resurrection and after receiving their bodies and rising perfectly that is corporally as Christ did rise shall so come to the Vision or sight of God Tertullian next It is saith he apparent to any wise man that there is a place determined which is Abrahams bosome for the receiving of the souls of his sons which region I mean Abrahams bosome though it be not heavenly but Tertullian was out in that sublimior tamen inferis yet being higher then the inferi or places below shall give comfort to the souls of the righteous untill the resurrection and the end of all things bring the full reward So Hilarie B. of Poyctiers The day of judgment is the day of everlasting happinesse or punishment till which time death hath every one under his dominion whilest either Abrahams bosome or the house of torments reserveth every man to judgement St. Ambrose to the same effect till the fullnesse of time come the souls expect their due reward for some of which pain for others glory is provided Next him St. Augustine his convert After this short life thou shalt not as yet be where the Saints shall be to whom it shall be said in the day of judgement Come ye blessed of my father c. Thou shalt not be there as yet who knoweth not that but there thou shalt be where poor Lazarus was seen a far off by the proud richman In that rest shalt thou securely expect the day of judgment in which thou shalt receive thy body and be changed and be made equall with the Angels St. Bernard thus you perceive that there be three states of the soul the first in this corruptible body the second without the body the third in perfect blessednesse The first in the Tabernacles the second in the Courts the third in the house of God into which most blessed house of God the souls of the Saints shall not enter without us nor without their own bodies I had not named St. Bernard amongst those Antients but only to the end that it might be seen that this was generally the doctrine of the Western Church as to this particular untill the invocation of the Saints departed became first to be put in practise and afterwards to be defended and imposed as good Catholick Doctrine For they saw well that unlesse it were received for an Orthodox truth that the Saints departed were admitted presently into the beatificall vision of Almighty God and in him see as in a Mirrour what things soever could be done or said on the earth beneath it were in vain to make unto them either prayers or vows not being yet estated in their own full glories and consequently not admitted to the presence of God And on the very same reasons for which the Church of Rome doth admit the Saints to enjoy the blessed vision of Almighty God in the heaven of glories did Calvin labour to decrie the received opinion in that point though by long tract of time engendering prejudice and prepossession in the hearts of men against any contrary position it was become the generall tenet of the Protestant Schools For well he knew that if that doctrine could be rooted out of the minds of men by which the Saints were brought though before their time into an habitation in the highest heavens that of the invocation of the Saints departed which depends upon it must of necessity perish with it But whatsoever moved him to opine so of it for I am confident it was not any love to the antient Fathers certain it is that he hath freely declared his opinion in it in several places of his writings In that entituled Psychopannychia he doth thus expresse it The souls of the Saints after death be in peace saith he because they are escaped from the power of the enemie but shall not raign with Christ their King untill the heavenly Hierusalem shall be advanced to her glory and the true Solomon the King of peace shall sit on high on his tribunal And this he doth not only say and leave the proof thereof to his ipse dixit as if that were enough to carry it over all the world but cites Tertullian Chrysostome Augustine Bernard some of whose words we saw before to confirme the point But seeing that tract of his hath been called in question as if it did incline too much towards the Anabaptists we will next look upon his book of Institutions where we finde him saying That since the Scripture every where biddeth us to depend upon the expectation of Christs coming and deferreth the Crown of glory till that time we are to be content with the bounds that God hath appointed us viz. that the souls of the godly having ended their warfare depart unto an happy rest where with a blessed joy they look for the fruition of the promised glory and that so all things shall stand suspended untill Christ appeare The same he also intimateth in another place where he resolveth That not only the Fathers under the Law but even the holy men of God since the death of Christ are but in profectu in progresse as it were to that perfect happinesse which is to be conferred upon them in the day of doom that in the mean time they abide in atriis in the out-courts of Heaven and there expect the consummation of their beatitude And finally none but our Saviour Christ saith he hath entred into the heavenly Sanctuary where to the end of all the world Solus populi eminus in atrio residentis vota ad deum defert he alone represents to God the desires of his people sitting a far off in the outward Courts I know that Bellarmine doth quarrell at these passages of Calvins and I cannot blame him He and the common interesse of the Church of Rome were so ingaged in the defence of the other opinion without which that of the invocation of Saints must needs fall to the ground that it concerned them all to calumniate Calvin as the broacher of new Doctrines in the Church of Christ though in this point they finde him countenanced by most antient writers Neither doth Calvin stand alone in this opinion being seconded though not in so expresse terms as himself delivereth it by Bucer Bullinger Martyr Musculus and some others also And wonder t is not that he was followed by so many but by so few prime men of the reformation to whom his name and authority were exceeding dear And if the case stand so with the Saints above no question but it standeth so too with the souls below For contrariorum par est ratio as the old rule is And to the truth we have not only the testimonie of the holy Scriptures saying expressely that God reserveth the unjust unto the day of judgement to be punished 2 Pet. 2. but of so many of the
like this of Camerarius we finde in Espencaeus also in his Comment on the 3. Chap. of the 2. of Tim. touching the Hutites a by-branch of the sect of Anabaptists Of the next sort Alstedius a late famous writer and Professor of Herborn in high Germanie hath presumed so far as to define the year of Christs coming to judge both the quick and the dead which after his accompt shall be in the year of CHRIST 3694. The best is he takes time enough not to be disproved For being of opinion as t is plain he is that there shall be a corporall resurrection of the Saints and Martyrs at least a thousand years before the generall resurrection of all flesh during which time they shall enjoy all possible felicity that the world can give and fixing the beginning of those thousand years in Ann. 2694. it must needs follow thereupon that the day of the generall resurrection and of Christs coming to judgement must be in the year 3694. as before was said But before him Napeir a Scot one of the Ancestors of the now right noble Lord of Marchiston adventured on the like attempt although he differed very much in his computation For publishing a Commentary on the Revelation Ann. 159â— he will defer the end of the world no longer then to ninety two years after that publication which fals into the year 1685. Which though it comes two thousand years before that of Alsted yet was it put off long enough to save his credit the good man being like to die long before that time Whereupon one of our own Countrymen wrote this following Epigram Nonaginta duos durabit mundus in Annos Mundus ad arbitrium si stat obitque tuum Cur mundi finem propiorem non facis ut ne Ante obitum mendax arguerere Sapis Which I finde thus Englished to my hand Ninety two years the World as yet shall stand If it do stand or fall by your command But say why plac'd you not the worlds end nigher Lest ere you dyed you might be found a lyer Add unto this a pleasant jest which King Iames put upon the Author of the book aforesaid for such adventurers cannot be too much exposed to the publick scorne and in brief is this The Gentleman holding lands of the Crown of Scotland petitioned the King to have a longer terme granted in his estate The King demanded of him how long time he desired to have added to it To which when he had answered five hundred years God a my soul replyed the King that is four hundred years more then the world shall last and I conceive you do not mean to hold my Land in the world to come And so dismissed him for that time although he after gratifyed him in his request having thus made him sensible of his own absurdities But leaving these Knights errant to seek new adventures we will next look unto the place appointed for this general Sessions in which we have some light of Scripture and probabilities of reason to direct our search This by some very learned men is supposed to be in the Aire over the valley of Iehosaphat which is near mount Olivet and both of them Eastward of Hierusalem And this they do upon these grounds For first they say the holy Scriptures seem to say it in as plain words as may be For thus saith God the Lord Jehovah I will gather all nations into the valley of Jehosaphat and plead with them there Cause thy mighty ones to come down O Lord Let the heathen be wakened and come upon the valley of Jehosaphat for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about Besides the name of Iehosaphat doth signifie as much as The Lord will judge And in this valley did God give Iehosaphat a signall victory over the Ammonites Moabites and the inhabitants of Mount Seir which was a type or figure of that finall victory which Christ the supreme Iudge shall give his Elect overall their enemies in the last day and in that very place as the Iewish Doctors do expound it That of the Prophet Zechariah And his feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of Olives which is before Hierusalem to the East c. though formerly applyed by us unto Christs Ascension may be accommodated also to his coming to judge the world The rather in regard it was said by the holy Angel unto his Disciples This same Jesus which is taken up from you into Heaven being then upon the mount of Olives shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go hence Which possibly may as wel be meant of the place as of other the circumstances of his coming and therefore by Aquinas and all the rest of the old Schoolmen except Lombard and Alexander of Hales is made to be the second reason which they build upon for nominating this valley or rather some place over it in the Ayr to be the place appointed for the future judgement The third reason they take from a passage in the Prophet Ezekiel compared with Christs own words in his holy Gospel The Prophet tels us of Hierusalem that it is placed in medio Gentium in the very midst of the world and so accordingly it is seated by some Cosmographers And Christ hath told us of the Angels that they shall gather together the Elect from the four windes from one end of Heaven unto the other If then the Termini a quibus be the four parts of the world and Hierusalem be seated in the midst of the earth as they say it is the terminus ad quem must be Hierusalem or some place neer it and such is this Valley of Iehosophat or else some Angels must be thought to be of a more quick dispatch then others which were ridiculous to imagine But that which is of greatest moment is that our Lord and Saviour for ever blessed was crucified and put to open shame very neer that place Mount Calvary and the Valley of Iehosaphat being not far asunder if not close together and conterminous And what can be more probable for they propose not these proofs for Demonstrations then that where Christ was put unto publick shame he should again receive a more publick honour and that where he himself was condemned and punished with so much malice and injustice he should appear to judge the world with such truth and equity These are the reasons brought to make good this Tenet which as I cannot easily grant to be convincing so I am far from saying any thing in reproof of that which hath such handsome probabilities to gain credit to it And now I am fallen upon these points I will adventure on another though more nice then necessary At least it may be so accounted and I pass not for it Quilibet abundet in suo sensu Let every man injoy that liberty I mean in matters of this nature which I take my self We said
the soule and by a metaphor the motions of the minde whether good or evill are called spirits also as the spirit of giddiness Isa. 19.14 the spirit of error 1 Tim. 4.1 the spirit of envie Iam. 4.5 which come all from the unclean spirit mentioned Luk. 11.24 And thus in general the pious motions in the mind are called Spirits too Quench not the spirit saith St. Paul i. e. those godly motions to the works of Faith and Piety which the Holy Spirit of God doth secretly kindle in thee For the word Ghost it is originally Saxon and signifieth properly the soul of a man as when we read of Christ that he gave up the Ghost Mark 15.37 and in the rest of the Evangelists also the meaning is that his soule departed from his body he yeelded up his soule to the hands of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Original Expiravit as the Latine reads it that is to say he breathed out his soul or he breathed his last Nor doth it signifie the soule onely though that most properly but generally also any spiritual substance as doth the word spiritus in the Latine a touch whereof we have still remaining in the Adjective Ghostly by which we mean that which is spiritual as our Ghostly Father Ghostly Counsel i. e. our Father in the spiritual matters counsel that savoreth of the spirit So then the Holy Ghost and the Holy Spirit are the same Person here though in different words and the word Holy which is added doth clearly difference him from all other spirits Not that God being a spirit is not holy also or that the Angelical spirits are not replenished with as much holinesse as a created nature can be capable of but because it is his Office to sanctifie or make holy all the elect Children of God therefore hath he the title or attribute of holy annexed unto him And yet the title of holy is not always added to denote this person though when we find mention of the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit it is meant and spoken of him onely For sometimes he is called the Spirit without any adjunct the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or by way of eminency but still with reference to those gifts which he doth bestow The manifestation of the spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the Article demonstrative is given to every man to profit withall For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdome to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit Sometimes he is called the Spirit of the Father as Matth. 10.20 It is not yee that speak but the Spirit of the Father which speaketh in you sometimes the Spirit of the Son as Gal. 4.6 where it is said that God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts crying Abba Father Most generally he is called the Spirit of God as Gen 1.2 and Matth. 3.16 and infinite other places of the holy Scripture and more particularly the Spirit of Christ Rom. 8.9 in which place he is also called the Spirit of God Ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if that the Spirit of God dwel in you there the Spirit of God if any have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his So the Spirit of Christ. The Spirit both of God and Christ and in one verse both So far we are onwards on our way for discoverie of the nature of this blessâ—d Spirit as to have found him out to be the Spirit of God the Father from whom he doth proceed by an unspeakable way of emanation and unknown to man for he proceedeth from the Father as our Saviour telleth us and to be also the Spirit of Christ the Son of God by whom he was breathed on the Apostles and so proceeding from the Son doth proceed from both Sent from the Father at the desire and prayer of the Son I will pray the Father and he shall send you another Comforter Iohn 14.16 Sent by the Son with the consent and approbation of the Father whom I will send unto you from the Father Iohn 15.26 and so sent of both And yet not therefore the less God because sent by either than IESUS CHRIST is God God for ever blessed as St. Paul calls him Rom. 9.5 because he was sent by God the Father He sent his Son made of a woman Gal. 4.4 saith the same Apostle If any doubt hereof as I know some do he may be sent for resolution of his doubt to the beginning of Genesis where he shall finde the Spirit of God moving on the waters Gen. 1.2 And to the Law where he shall read how the same Spirit came down on the Seventy Elders Numb 11.26 And to the Psalms Thou sendest forth thy Spirit and they are created Psal. 104.30 And to the Prophets The Spirit of God is upon me saith the Prophet Isaiah Chap. 61.1 which was Christs first Text And I will pour my Spirit upon all flesh saith the Prophet Ioel Chap. 1.28 which was Peters first Text The Spirit of God is God no question for in Deo non est nisi Deus say the Schoolmen rightly Not a created Spirit as the Angels were For in the beginning when God created the Heaven and the Earth and all things visible and invisible then the Spirit was and was not onely actually in a way of existence but was of such a powerful influence in the Creation of the World that on the moving of this Spirit on the face of the Waters the darkness was removed from the face of the deep and the Chaos of undigested matter made capable of Form and Beauty In the New Testament the evidence is far more clear than that of the Old by how much the Sun of Light did shine more brightly in the times of the Gospel than in those of the Law Saith not St. Peter in the Acts Why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie unto the Holy Ghost and then addes presently Thou hast not lied unto men but unto God What saith St. Austin on this Text The Holy Ghost saith he is God Unde Petrus cum dixisset ausus eâ— mentiri Spiritui Sancto continuo secutus adjunxit quid esset Spiritus Sanctus ait non mentitus es hominibus sed Deo i. e. Therefore when Peter said unto Ananias thou hast dared to lie to the Holy Ghost he added presently to shew what was the Holy Ghost Thou hast not lied unto men but unto God Saith not St. Paul Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God How so Because the Spirit of God dwelleth in you What saith the Father unto this Ostendit Paulus deum esse Spiritum Sanctum ideo non esse Creaturam that is to say St. Paul by this sheweth That the Holy Ghost is God and so no Creature Doth not the same Apostle say in another place Know ye not that your bodies are the Temple of the Holy Ghost
Of the Authority or Power of remitting sins we shall speak more appositely hereafter in the following Article At this time I shall onely speak of the Form of words which some of the pretenders unto Reformation in Queen Elizabeths time did very much except against affirming That to use the words of our Redeemer and not to give the gifts withal was nothing but a meer mockery of the Spirit of God and a ridiculous imitation of our Saviours actions But unto this it is replied by Judicious Hooker that not onely the ability of doing miracles speaking with tongues curing diseases and the like but the authority and power of ministering holy things in the Church of God is contained in the number of those gifts whereof the Holy Ghost is the Author And therefore he which gives this power may say without folly or absurdity Receive the Holy Ghost meaning thereby such power as the Spirit of Christ hath pleased to endue his Church withal And herein he is seconded by that living Magazin of Learning Bishop Andrews who reckoneth the Apostleship or the very office to be a Grace one of the graces doubtless of the Holy Ghost such as St. Paul calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The grace we English it the gift of ministring unto the Saints 2 Cor. 8.4 For that the very Office it self is a grace St. Paul saith he avoweth in more places than one and in particular Mihi data est haec gratia according to the gift of the grace of God which is given unto me Ephes. 3.7 Where he speaks of his Office and of nothing else And such as this saith he was the grace here given of Spiritum called a Spiritual and of Sanctum an holy Calling from them derived unto us by us to be derived on others to the end of the World and that in the same form of words which our Saviour used For being the especial power which Christ at that time gave unto his Apostles consisted in remitting and retaining of sins and seeing that the same power is given by the Church of Christ why should not the same words be used as were used at first why may not the same words be used in conferring this grace of an holy calling whereby their persons are made publick and their acts authentical and they inabled to do somewhat about remitting of sins which is not of the like avail if done by others though perhaps more learned than they and more vertuous too but have not the like warrant nor the same accipite as is conferred in holy Orders Nor do I utterly deny but that together with the power the Holy Ghost doth give some fitness to perform the same though not in any answerable measure to the first times of the Church when extraordinary gifts were more necessary than in any time since For as the ointment which was poured upon Aarons head did first fall down upon his Beard and after on the skirts of his garments also So we may reasonably believe That the holy Spirit which descended on the head of Christ and afterwards on his Apostles as upon his beard hath kept some sprinklings also to bestow on us which are the lowest skirts of his sacred garments So far we may assuredly perswade our selves That the Spirit which calleth men to that holy Function doth go along with him that is called unto it for his assistance and support in whatsoever he shall faithfully do in discharge thereof and that our acts are so far his as that Whether we Preach Pray Baptize Communicate Condemn or give Absolution or in a word whatsoever we do as the Despensers of Gods Mysteries our Words Acts Judgements are not ours but the Holy Ghosts For this I have the testimony of Pope Leo the first a Learned and Religious Prelate of the Primitive times Qui mihi oneris est Autor ipse administrationis est adjutor Ne magnitudine gratiae there gratiae is used for the office or calling as before St. Paul succumbat infirmus dabit virtutem qui contulit dignitatem Which is in brief He that hath laid the burden on us will give strength to bear it But behold a greater than Pope Leo is here Behold saith Christ to his Apostles I am with you always to the end of the world that is to say Cum vobis successoribus vestris as Denys the Carthusian rightly with you and your Successors in the Work of the Ministry to guide them and assist them by his holy Spirit And when he said unto them upon other occasions He that heareth you heareth me and whatsoever ye binde on Earth should be bound in Heaven Did he not thereby promise so to own their actions that whatsoever they should say or do in order to the propagation of his Gospel and the edification of his Church should be esteemed as his act his act by whose authority and power it is said or done But the assisting of the Church and Ministers thereof with his Power and Spirit is not the onely publick benefit though it be the greatest which it receiveth immediately from the Holy Ghost Without some certain standing Rule by which the Ministers of the Gospel were to frame their doctrine and the rest of the people guide their paths in the way of godliness both Priest and People would be apt to pretend new Lights and following such ignes fatui as they saw before them be drawn into destruction both of body and soul. And on the other side Tradition hath been always found to be so untrusty in the conveyance of Gods will and pleasure to the ears of his people that in small tract of time the Law of God became obliterated in the hearts of men the righteous Seed degenerating after carnal lusts and Abraham himself serving other gods for want of a more certain rule to direct their actions Therefore to take away all excuse from back-sliding men it pleased God first to commit his Law to writing the Two Tables onely and afterwards to inspire many holy Men with the Spirit of Wisdom Power and Knowledge to serve as Commentators on that sacred Text whose Prophecies Reproofs and Admonitions being put into their mouths by the Holy Ghost for Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man but holy Men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost as St. Peter hath it So by direction of the same Spirit were they put into writing Propter vivendi exemplum libros ad nostram etiam memoriam transmiserunt in the words of Ierom The Lord himself did on Mount Sinai give the Law the very Letter The Prophets and other holy Men of God being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 especially inspired to that end and purpose did compose the Comment By the same Spirit were the Evangelists and Apostles guided when they committed unto writing the most glorious Gospel and other the Records and Monuments of the Christian Faith The
Ecclesia malignantium as the Psalmist calls it Or if you will we may by these behold the Church in her chief ingredients which are the sanctimony of life and conversation it is an holy Church and the integrity of her doctrine free from all Heresie and Error in the title Catholick For the word Catholick is not onely used to signifie Universality of extent but purity of doctrine also The first in the natural the second in the borrowed sense of the word In the first sense the Church is called Catholick in respect of place Thou hast redeemed us by thy blood out of every kinred and tongue and people and nation To which accordeth that of an Antient writer saying Ab ortu solis ad occasum lex Christiana suscepta est That the Gospel of Christ had been admitted from the rising of the Sun to the setting of it that is to say In all parts of the world And it is called Catholick too in respect of persons who are promiscuously and indefinitely called to the knowledge of Christ In whom there is neither Iew nor Gentile bond nor free male nor female but all called alike And so Lactantius telleth us also Universos homines sine discrimine sexus vel aetatis Minutius addes Aut dignitatis ad coeleste pabulum convocamus Lastly it hath the name of Catholick in respect of times as comprehending all the faithful since our Saviours days unto the age in which we live and to continue from henceforth to the end of the world Of which duration or extent of the Church of Christ the Angel Gabriel did fore-signifie to his Virgin-mother that he should reign in the house of Jacob for ever and of his Kingdom there should be no end And in this sense it doth not onely include that part of the Church which is now Militant on the Earth but also that which is Triumphant in the Heaven of Glories Both they with us and we with them make but one Body Mystical whereof Christ is Head and all together together with the Antient Patriarcks and other holy men of God which lived under the Law shall make up that one glorious Church which is entituled in the Scriptures The general Assembly the Church of the first-born whose names are written in the Heavens For the better clearing of which Vnion or Concorporation which is between these different Members of the Body Mystical the Fathers of the Constantinopolitan Council added the word One unto the Article reading it thus And I believe one holy Catholick and Apostolick Church Catholick then the Church may be rightly called in regard to extent whether it do refer to time place or persons and it is called Catholick too in respect of Doctrine with reference to the same extensions that being the true Catholick Doctrine of the Church of Christ Quae semper quae ubique quae ab omnibus credita est which hath always and in every place been received as Orthodox and that too by all manner of men according to the Golden Rule of Lerinensis Catholick in this sense is the same with Orthodox a Catholick Christian just the same with a true Professor by which the Doctrine is distinguished from Heretical and the men from Hereticks Iustinian in the Code doth apply it so Omnes hanc legem sequentes Christianorum Catholicorum nomen jubemus amplecti That for the persons the Professors it followeth after for the Doctrine Is autem Nicenae adsertor fidei Catholicae Religionis verus cultor accipiendus est c. A National or Topical Church may be called Catholick in this sense and are often times entituled so in Ecclesiastical Authors For Constantine the Emperor writing to the Alexandrians superscribed his Letters in this form 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. To the Catholick Church of Alexandria And Gregory Nazianzen being then Bishop of Constantinople calls himself in his last Will and Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. The Bishop of the Catholick Church in the City of Constantine Of this word Catholick in this sense there hath been different use made as the times have varied The Fathers of the purest times made use of it to distinguish themselves from Hereticks according to that so celebrated saying of Pacianus Christianus mihi nomen est Catholicus cognomen Christian saith he is my name and Catholick my sirname by the one I am known from Infidels by the other from Hereticks And so long as the main body of Christianity retained the form of wholesome words and kept the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace it served exceeding fitly for a mark distinctive to known an Orthodox Professor from those who followed after Heretical and Schismatical Factions But when the main Body of the Church was once torn in peeces and every leading faction would be thought the true Church of Christ they took unto themselves the names of Catholicks also as if the truth was not more Orthodoxly held by the soundest Christians than it was by them And this hath been a device so stale and common that the Nestorians in the East though antiently condemned for Hereticks in the Third General Council do call their Patriark by the name of Catholick that is to say The Catholick or Orthodox Bishop as Leunclavius telleth us very rightly not Iacelich as the Copies of Brochardus and Paulus Venetus do corruptly read it In the same Error are our great Masters in the Church of Rome who having appropriated to themselves the name of Catholicks and counting all men Hereticks but themselves alone First cast all others out of the Church by the name of Hereticks who do not hold communion with them in their sins and errors and then defend themselves by the name of Catholicks from having dealt unjustly with their Fellow-Christians men every way more Orthodox than they be themselves Just so the Collier justified himself for a true Believer because he believed as the Church believed though he knew not the doctrine of the Church and the Church believed as he believed though the Church troubled not it self about his opinions I know the great Cardinal presumes very much on the name of Catholick making it to be one of the signs of the true Church now because an adjunct of the true Church in the Primitive times And wonder it is that we are grown so prodigal of late as to give it to them A courtesie which they receive with a great deal of joy and turn the bare acknowledgement to their great advantage there being no Argument more convincing than that which is drawn from the confession of an adversary Upon this ground doth Barclay build his Triumph for the cause of Rome Adeo probanda est ecclesia nostra à nomine Catholicae quod extorquet etiam ab invitis hareticis as he brags it there For my part as I never gave it them in writing nor in common speech as thinking
it a greater condemnation to our selves than men were aware of So could I wish the like Caution in all others also lest unawares they utterly exclude themselves out of Christianity For as Pope Gregory the first said unto some of the Bishops of his time concerning the Patriarch of Constantinople who had then took unto himself the title of Oecumenical or Vniversal Bishop viz. Si ille universalis or which is the same Catholicus est restat ut vos non sitis Episcopi so may we also say in the present case if we once grant them to be Catholickâ— we thereby do conclude our selves to be no Christians or at best but Hereticks Christian perhaps they have no fancy to be called the name of Christian in most parts of Italy being grown so despicable that Fool and Christian in a manner are become Synonyma Italico Idiomate per Christianum hominem stupidum stolidum solent intelligere as Hospinian tells us from the mouth of one Christian Franken who had lived amongst them Since then they have no minde to be called Christians nor reason to be called Catholicks let us call them as they are by the name of Papists considering their dependance on the Popes decision for all points of Faith And possibly we may gratifie them as much in this as if we did permit them the name of Catholicks For Bellarmine seems very much delighted with the Appellation flattering himself that he can bring in Christ our most blessed Saviour within the Catalogue of Popes and that he hath found a Prophecy in St. Chrysostom to this effect Quandoque nos Papistas vocandos esse That Papist in the times then following should be the stile and title of a true Professor Great pity it is but he and his should have the honor of their own discovery and Papists let them be since the same so pleaseth Now as the Papists make ill use of the name of Catholick so do their opposite faction in the Church of Christ conclude as falsly and erroneously from the title of Holy The Church is called Holy and is called so justly because it trains men up in the ways of godliness because it is so in its most eminent and more noble parts whom God hath sanctified by the Graces of his holy Spirit and finally because redeemed by the blood of Christ to the intent that all the faithful Members of it being by him delivered from the hands of their enemies might serve him without fear in righteousness and holiness all the days of their lives Not holy in the sense of Corah and his factious complices who made all the Congregation holy and all holy alike nor holy in the sense of some Antient and Modern Sectary who fancy to themselves a Church without spot or wrinkle a Church wherein there are no vessels of wrath but election onely and where they finde not such a Church they desert it instantly for fear they should partake of the sins and wickednesses which they observe to be in some Members of it Our Saviour Christ who better knew the temper of his Church than so compares the same in holy Scripture to a threshing floor in which there is both Wheat and chaff and to a fold wherein there are both Sheep and Goats and to a casting net which being thrown into the Sea drew up all kinde of Fishes both good and bad and to an house in which there are not onely vessels of honor as Gold and Silver but also of dishonor and for unclean uses and to a field in which besides the good Seed which the Lord had sown Infelix lolium steriles dominantur avenae the enemy had sowed his Tares In all and every one of which heavenly Parables our Saviour represented unto his Disciples and in them to us the true condition of his Church to the end of the world in which the wicked person and the righteous man are so intermingled that there is no perfection to be looked for here In which erroneous doctrines are so mixt with truth that it can never be so perfectly reserved and purified but errors and corruptions will break out upon it Perplexae sunt istae duae civitates in hoc seculo invicemque permistae saith the great St. Augustine The City of the Lord and the City of Satan are so intermingled in this world that there is little hope to see them separated till the day of judgement Though the foundation of the Church be of precious stones yet there is wood and hay and stubble in her superstructures and those so interwoven and built up together that nothing but a fatal fire is of power to part them I mean the fire of conflagration not of Popish Purgatory Were it not thus we need not pray to God for the good estate of the Church Militant here on Earth but glory as in the Triumphant as they do in Heaven And yet the Church is counted Holy and called Catholick still this intermixture notwithstanding Catholick in regard of time place and persons in and by which the Gospel of our Saviour Christ is professed and propagated Holy secundùm nobiliores ejus partes in reference to the Saints departed and those who are most eminent for grace and piety And it is called Ecclesia una one holy Catholick and Apostolick Church though part thereof be Militant here upon the Earth and part Triumphant in the Heavens The same one Church in this World and in that â—o come The difference is that here it is imperfect mixt of good and bad there perfect and consisting of the righteous onely Accordingly it is determined by St. Augustine Eandem ipsam unam Sanctam Ecclesiam nunc habere malos mixtos tunc non habituram For then and not till then as Ierom Augustine and others do expound the place shall Christ present her to himself a most glorious Church without spot or wrinkle and marry her to himself for ever Till that day come it is not to be hoped or looked for but that many Hypocrites False Teachers and Licentious livers will shroud themselves under the shelter of the Church and pass for Members of it in the eye of men though not accounted such in the sight of God The eye of man can possibly discern no further than the outward shew and mark who joyn themselves to the Congregation to hear the Word of God and receive his Sacraments Dominus novit qui sunt sui The Lord knows onely who are his and who are those occulti intus whose hearts stand fast in his Commandments and carefully possess their Souls in Truth and Godliness And yet some men there are as there have been formerly who fancy to themselves a Church in this present world without spot or wrinkle and dream of such a Field as contains no Tares of such an House as hath no Vessels but of honor sanctified and prepared for the Masters use The Cathari in
of the Church is confirmed unto them Those in the world to come are the fruits of these that is to say A Resurrection of the Body held by the chains of sin in the shades of death and a more full Communion with the Saints departed than in this life can be enjoyed that Fellowship which we have with them being here but inchoate and imperfect there compleat and absolute Of these the first is the Communion which the Saints have with one another and with Christ their Head whereof before I shall discourse as it lieth before me I shall first take the words asunder and shew what is the true meaning of the word communio then who they be that are presented to us by the name of Saints First for the word communio it signifieth that sacred action in which the faithful do communicate of the Body and Blood of Christ in the holy Eucharist Thus Hugo Cardinalis hath it Post hoc dicatur communio quae appellatur ut omnes communicemus i. e. After this let the communion be said so called because all should communicate or let it be so said That all my communicate Micrologus before him to the same effect Non potest propriè dici communio c. It cannot properly be called a Communion unless many do receive together Cassiodorus before either in his Tripartite History Stant rei velut in lamentationibus constituti cum sacra celebratio fuerit adimpleta communionem non recipiant i. e. They which lay under the Churches censures stood a far off full of great heaviness and lamentation and when the service was concluded received not the Communion but when they had fulfilled the course of their penance Cum populo communionem participant they were then suffered to communicate with the rest of the people More antient than them all is that Dionysius whether the Areopagite or not I dispute not here who wrote the Books De Hierarchia Caelesti Ecclesiastica in whom we do not onely finde the name but the reason of it Dignissimum hoc Sacramentum c Most worthy saith he is this Sacrament and far to be preferred before any other and for that cause it is deservedly and alone Meritò singulariter saith the Latine Copies called the Communion For although every Sacrament aims at this especially to unite those that are divided to the Lord their God Attamen huic Sacramento Communionis vocabulum praecipuè peculiariter contingit yet to this Sacrament the name of the Communion doth chiefly and properly belong as that which doth more nearly joyn us unto Christ our Saviour and entirely unite us unto one another And so his meaning is expressed by Pachymeres an old Greek Writer who hath paraphrased on the whole works of this Dionysius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Therefore saith he did Dionysius call it the Communion because all which were worthy did communicate of the holy Mysteries From which Communion of the Faithful in those holy Mysteries not onely the profession of the Christian Faith but that sweet Fellowship and Conjunction of heart and soul which was amongst them got the same name also and was generally called Communio from that sacred Action which was most solemnly used amongst them at their publick meetings In this sense it is used by St. Augustine saying Mulier illa est communionis nostrae That the woman which he there speaketh of was of their Communion And in another place to the same effect Donatus non nisi in sua communione baptismum esse credit That Donatus thought that Baptism was onely to be had in the Churches of his Profession In the same sense it is used by Ierome speaking of his relations to the same St. Augustine It is not meet saith he that I who have been trained up in a little Monastery from my youth till now Aliquid contra Episcopum Communionis meae scribere audeam should presume to write against a Bishop of the same Communion or Profession with me and such a Bishop whom I began to love before I knew him The like he writes also to Pope Damasus where saying that he followed no chief but Christ he yet acknowledgeth Beatitudini tuae i. e. Cathedrae Petri communione consâ—cior That he was joyned in communion or in love and fellowship or consent of Doctrine and Religion with his Holiness or Chair of Peter In both acceptions of the word that is to say In the communion or communication of the holy Mysteries and in that union of affections which usually is held by those of the same Profession There is a Communion of the Saints whether they be Activè or Passivè Sancti whether triumphant in the Heavens or finishing their natural course upon the Earth For the word Sancti also hath its various notions and must be looked upon in each or the chief at lest before we can proceed to a certain issue And first the word Sancti hath been used for those who onely have the outward calling called to be Saints as they are stiled by the Apostle Rom. 1.7 and 1 Cor. 1.2 Though neither Saints by the infusion of inherent holiness nor by the piety and sanctimony of their lives and actions In this sense all the Romans and Corinthians to whom St. Paul wrote his Epistles were Saints by calling or called to this end and purpose that they might be Saints though there were many profane and carnal persons amongst them Next it is used for those who are Sancti renovati Saints by the renovation of the holy Spirit by which co-operating in the Laver of Regeneration they are washed and sanctified And such were also some of you But ye are washed but ye are sanctified saith the same Apostle that is to say By the washing of Regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost which he hath shed abundantly in us as himself expounds it These are Passivâ— Sancti as before I called them because both in the outward calling and the effusion of the inward graces of the Holy Ghost we are simply passive But if we do obey that calling and manifest the grace which is given unto us by our lives and actions If from our hearts we do obey that form of doctrine which hath been delivered and yeeld our members as servants of righteousness to holiness then are we not passivè but activè sancti right Saints indeed walking in all the Commandments and Ordinances of the Lord without reproof And if the fruit be unto holiness there is no question but the end thereof will be life everlasting when we shall stand before the Throne of the Lord our God and serve him day and night in his holy Temple advanced to those felicities of eternal glory which is designed by White Robes and the Palms of victory in the Revelation Never so fully Saints as then though we must first be Saints in the Militant Church before we can
them from the miseries of this sinful world as also for those manifold and admirable gifts and graces which he hath manifested in them and those examples of good living which he hath pleased to leave us in their lives and actions Finally calling upon God That we by following their good examples in all vertuous and godly living may come to those unspeakable joyes which are prepared for them who unfeignedly love him that we with them and they with us may have one perfect consummation and bliss both in body and soul in his everlasting and eternal Kingdom And more than this we still preserve an honorable remembrance of them as men that having fought a good fight against Sin and Satan have glorified their Saviour in his earthly members and to the memory of the principal and most chief amongst them have set apart some particuliar days that so the piety of their lives and conversations might redound more unto Gods glory and to the better stirring up of the sons of men to serve the Lord in righteousness and holiness as they did before all the days of their lives This was the judgment and the practise of the best times of the Church when superstitious vanities had not yet prevailed according as I finde it registred in the works of Augustine Honoramus sane memorias eorum tanquam sanctorum hominum Dei qui usque ad mortem corporum pro veritate certarunt And this they did unto the ends before remembred Vt sc. ea celebritate Deo vero gratias de eorum victoriis agamus nos ad imitationem talium coronarum eorum memoriae renovatione adhortemur Of this I know no sober man can make any question nor do I finde it scrupled at by any of the Reformation who have not wholly studied Innovations in the things of God For my part I shall venture a little further and think it no error in divinity to allow the Saints a little more particular intercession for us than possibly hath been granted in the Protestant Schools That those Celestial Spirits which are now with God do constantly recommend unto him the flourishing estate and safety of the Church in general I suppose as granted The current of Antiquity runs most clearly for it That some of them at some times and on some occasions do also pray for some of us in particular I think I have sufficient reasons to perswade me to so far forth as by revelation from the Lord their God or by remembrance of the state that they left us in or any other means whatever they can be made acquainted with our several wants If it should please God to take away a man that is ripe for Heaven whose bosom-friend is guilty of some known infirmities I little doubt but that the spirit of him departed will pray for the amendment of his friend in the Heavens above for whose wel-doing on the Earth he was so solicitous To think that any of the Saints in the state of bliss were utterly unmindful of such friends as they left behinde were to deprive them of a quality inseparable from the soul the memory And to suppose them negligent of such pious duties as the commending of a sinner to the throne of grace were to deprive them of a vertue inseparable from the Saints their charity Potaemiana a Virgin-Martyr in Eusebius promised the Executioner at the time of her death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That she would pray unto the Lord for his conversion The story doth not onely say that she kept her promise but prevailed also in her sute her Executioner his name was Basilides becoming thereupon a Christian and dying in defence of the Faith and Gospel Thus doth Ignatius write unto the Trallenses nor is the credit of the Epistle questioned by our nicer Criticks that he did daily pray for them to the Lord his God and that he would not onely do it whiles he was alive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but that he would continue in the same good office even in the estate of immortality Origen for his part was of this opinion That the Saints helped us by their Prayers Ego sic abitror saith he quod nos adjuvant orationibus suis So was St. Cyprian too that most godly Martyr Sanctos defunctos jam de suâ immortalitate securos de nostro adhuc esse sollicitos The Saints saith he though sure of their own salvation are yet sollicitous for ours Which if it be too general to be brought in evidence he telleth us a solemn covenant made betwixt him and other Bishops to this effect Si quis nostrum prior hinc praecesserit c i. e. That he who first departed to the state of bliss should recommend to God the estate of those whom he left behinde him And so far we are right enough in my poor opinion and if our adversaries in the Church of Rome would proceed no further the difference between us would be soon made up The error is not in the Doctrine but the Application For as it hapneth many times that an ill use may be made of a very good doctrine so in the darker and declining times of the Church of Christ it was conceived to be a solecism in the way of piety not to commend our prayers and desires to them who had so carefully commended our estate to God And so at last as there is seldom any medium inter summa praecipitia in the words of Tacitus no stop in tumbling down an hill till we come to the bottom The Saints in Heaven against their wills and besides their knowledge became the ordinary Mediators between God and Man And this I finde to be the very process of the Council of Trent in drawing up the Article for the Invocation of Saints First That the Saints do pray for us Sanctos una cum Christo regnantes orationes suas pro hominibus Deo offerre And so far Orthodox enough had they gone no further but then comes in the Inference or Application which is all as dangerous That therefore we must pray to them Proinde bonum atque utile esse simpliciter eos invocare ob beneficia à Deo impetranda c. ad eorum orationes opem auxiliumque confugore And here we have the point in issue We grant because indeed we must unless we absolutely mean to renounce our Creed That the Saints pray for us in the general as being some part of that Communion which belongs to them as fellow-members with us of that Mystical Body whereof Christ is the Head But yet we do not think it lawful to pray to them but to praise God for them which is that part of the Communion which belongs to us And we grant this because we may that some of them at sometimes and on some occasions do pray for some of us particularly as before was noted but yet we do not think as the Papists do That in
Peters Sermon so that they asked him What they were to do that they might be saved He presently chalked them out a way by Baptism and Repentance to obtain the remission of sins even of that bloody sin it self of crucifying by their wicked hands the Lord of glory If any had more reason to despair than they it must be none but such of the Scribes and Pharisees who saying that our Saviour Christ had cast out Devils by Beelzebub the Prince of Devils may properly be said to have blasphemed against the Holy Ghost and consequently to have committed such a sin as in the judgment of our Saviour is pronounced unpardonable He that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven him as St. Luke expresly And yet St. Ambrose is so charitable as to think that some of them were pardoned it being probable that some of those very Scribes and Pharisees were present at St. Peters Sermon and so within the compass of repentance and forgiveness of sins And then withal we may observe that though it be expresly said That the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven yet it may well be understood with a qualification impossibility being sometimes used in holy Scripture to denote a difficulty As where it is affirmed as positively and expresly to be impossible for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Where certainly it was not the intent of Christ utterly to exclude all rich men from the hopes of Heaven but onely to declare how hard and difficult it was for those who trusted in their riches and wallowed in the pride and pleasures of a prosperous fortune to set their mindes upon the blessings of eternal life And so it is also in the present case in St. Chrysostoms judgment Ideo dici nunquam remitti quia difficilius remittitur Of the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost saith he it is therefore said that it shall never be forgiven because it is more hardly pardoned and with greater difficulty than any other sin whatever And that this qualification or the like is to be admitted appears yet further by the words which are next before it and to which these in question must needs have relation where it is said That all sins and all blasphemies shall be forgiven unto men In which he did not could not mean that all sins and at all times should be pardoned to all sorts of men for then no sin were damnable but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost which is most untrue Therefore the sense must be in both That all sins ordinarily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be forgiven unto men upon true repentance but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not so ordinarily be forgiven or shall more hardly be forgiven than any other Not that it cannot be forgiven at all Non utique quod remitti non possit as most truly Maldonat But because they who do blaspheme against the Holy Ghost Nullam peccati sui excusationem habent have seldom any thing to allege in excuse thereof and so were more unpardonable than other men As for those passages pretended from the holy Scripture in maintenance of the irremissibility of some kinde of sin and in particular of this against the power of the Holy Ghost they neither prove the point which they are produced for nor were intended by the Sacred Penmen of the Word of God of that sin or blasphemy In the first place it is alleged from St. Paul to the Hebrews To be impossible for those who were once enlightned and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost if they shall fall away to renew them again to repentance seeing they crucifie to themselves the Son of God afresh But this the Fathers understand not of a difficulty or impossibility of admitting such men unto repentance but that they could not be admitted to a second Baptism and thereby to be renovated and illuminated to die be buried and rise a second time in Christ in so facile and compleat a washing of sin as the Sacrament of Regeneration did afford at first Chrysostom is express for this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He doth not take away repentance but a second Baptism St. Ambrose also saith the same and sheweth that the meaning of this Text is and must be De non iterando baptismate not of repelling sinners from the thought of repentance and the remission of their sins by the Churches Ministry as the Novatians falsly taught but of the not admitting them to a second Baptism which some began to introduce upon that occasion And that the Apostle speaks of a second Baptism is evident by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or illuminatos which was used antiently to signifie those that were baptised as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or illumination for Baptism the very Sacrament it self Secondly by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or renovare which intimates or implies our renovation by that holy Sacrament Per lavachrum enim renovamur per quod renascimur as St. Ambrose notes it We are renewed by the laver of regeneration by which we are new-born to the life of righteousness And thirdly from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of crucifying again the Lord of life our Baptism being as the figure of his death or crucifixion in which our old man is crucified with him as St. Paul hath told us That the body of sin might be destroyed and buried in his grave by Baptism And thereupon if followeth by St. Pauls illation Non magis quenquam bis baptizari quam Christum bis crucifigi posse saith the learned Knight Sir Daniel Heinsius That the impiety is as great for a man to be baptized again as if Christ should again be crucified The like may be affirmed of a second Text alleged from the same Apostle where it is said That if we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin Which Text as that before is applied by Calvin to such as fall away from the Faith and Gospel whom he excludes utterly from all hope of pardon as men that sin against the holy Spirit of God but very wrongfully in all For first although we read it wilfully in our last Translation yet is it onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek originals which Beza rendreth uliro the Vulgar Latin voluntario our old Translation willingly as the Rhemists do And to say truth the word doth signifie no more though to comply with Calvins Comment on the Text our last Translators who inclined too much unto his opinions do now read it wilfully And if it be but willingly as indeed it is not I would know in what a desperate estate we Christians were if every sin which is committed willingly after truth embraced shall either be reputed in the sight of God for
a full discourse which he entituled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Discourse of Promises and finding that he grounded his erroneous Tenets on the Revelation he wrote another on that Book which he inscribed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or The confutation and reproof of the Allegorists Nor did he labour by his pen onely but by conference too making a journey or Episcopal Visitation into Arsenois a Province of Egypt where this opinion was most cherished of purpose to dispute down this erroneous Doctrin◠In which he sped so answerably unto his desires that many of the chief Sticklers in it did recant their error et veritatem una nobiscum confite bantur and chearfully imbrace that truth which he brought unto them This Doctrine being set on foot though by such vile Hereticks and seeming to have ground and countenance from the Revelation was by the Fathers and other Writers of the first times of the Church thought fitter to be rectified and reformed than abandoned wholly And thereupon a new conceit was taken up and dispersed abroad unto this effect That after the Resurrection Christ should have an Earthly Kingdom the principal Seat whereof should be Hierusalem Hierusalem new built of gold and most precious stones Hierusalem aurea gemmata as St. Hierom calleth it in which the Saints should reign with him for a Thousand years in all manner of happiness and after that accompany him to the Heaven of Heavens and there live for ever This was the sum of the Opinion thus refined and rectified But for the Readers satisfaction and my own together I shall describe it more at large that we may see the better what we are to think of it and therein I shall follow Lactantius chiefly who hath more copionsly presented the true state thereof than any other of the Antients By him we are informed that after the destruction of the Roman Empire which must be utterly subverted before any of these things shall come to pass there shall follow great plagues unseasonable weather a general mortality of all living Creatures many strange Prodigies in the Air the Stars fall down from Heaven and the whole course of nature shall be out of order Things being in this dreadful state the Lord shall send into the world the great Prophet Elias who shall convert many unto God with great signs and wonders but in the midle of his work Antichrist shall arise out of Syria encounter with that great Prophet kill him in the Fight leaving him for three daies unburied after which time he shall revive and be taken up into Heaven After this shall presently ensue a terrible persecution of those righteous persons who will not worship this proud Tyrant calling himself the Son of God and practicing to seduce the people after the working of Satan by power and signs and lying wonders insomuch that all the Saints shall be compelled to retire themselves into the Wilderness and there abide in great distress calling continually for help to the Lord their God For their relief Christ shall descend at last with the Hosts of Heaven fight with this dreadful Tyrant overthrow him often and finally take him and his Confederates Prisoners whom he shall presently condemn to their merited torments Then shall the graves be opened and the bodies of the Saints shall arise and stand before the Iudgement seat of Christ the Conqueror and being united to their souls shall be incorporated with those righteous persons which are found alive and both together constitute an earthly Kingdom to our Lord and Saviour who shall reign over them or with them rather for a Thousand years triumphing over the remainder of their mortal Enemies who shall not be extinguished but preserved to perpetual slavery During this time the Devil shall be bound in chains that he do not hurt the Saints inhabiting the holy City in all peace and happiness the Sun shall shew more glorious than ever formerly the Earth become more fruitful than it was before producing most delicious fruits of its own accord the Rocks shall yeeld the sweetest hony and all the Rivers flow with Milk and Wine After which Thousand years expired the Devil that old Murderer shall get loose again stir up the Nations of the Earth to destroy the Saints and not onely lay siege unto the holy City But fire and hail and tempests from the Heavens above shall make so general and terrible a destruction of them that for Seven years there shall no other wood be burat but their Spears and Targets Then shall the Saints be brought into the presence of Almighty God whom they shall serve for evermore and at the same time shall be the Second and most general Resurrection in which the wicked shall be raised to eternal torments and damned for ever to the lake of fire and brimstone This is the substance of the Story as Lactantius telleth it which whether it have more of the Iew or of the Poet in it it is hard to say That of the great defeat of Antichrist and the burning of the Spears and Shields for Seven years together is branded by St. Hierom for a peece of an old Talmudical Tale the Iewish Rabbins making the like endless fables interminabiles fabulas as the Father calleth them of Gog and Magog who for a while shall tyrannize so cruelly over those of Israel but be at last subdued and slain with as great an overthrow as he affirmeth of Antichrist and his Confederates That of the flourishing estate of Christs earthly Kingdom was reckoned in those times when it was most countenanced to be but a Poetical fiction Figmenta haec esse Poetarum quidam putant as Lactantius doth himself acknowledge And more than so he seemeth to refer his Reader for a further description of this Kingdom to the works of the Poets affirming positively that all those characters shall be verified of this Kingdom of Christ I mean this Millenarian Kingdom Quae Poetae aureis temporibus facta esse dixerunt which by the Poets are affabulated of the golden age for proof whereof for fear we should not take his word he puts down a description of it out of Virgils works But in my minde his own description of it comes more near to Ovids who thus concludes his Map or Character of that blessed time Mox etiam fruges Tellus inarata ferebat Nec renovatus Ager gravidis canebat aristis Flumina tum Lactis tum flumina Nectaris ibant Flavaque de viridi stillabant Ilice Mella Which is thus Englished by Geo. Sandys The fruitful Earth Corn un-manured bears And every year renews her golden Ears With Milk and Nectar were the Rivers fill'd And yellow Honey from green Elmes distill'd But whether it were Iewish or Poetical or compounded of both the fancy being once taken up proved very acceptable as it seems in those elder times to most sorts of people both in the East and Western Churches who did
of the Souls immortality but onely to assert it in such a manner as to prepare my way to the present Article which doth in part depend upon it For if there were no Soul at all or if the Soul did perish as do those of Beasts it were in vain to think of a Resurrection or flatter our selves with expectation of eternal life The immortality of the Soul is to be premised before we speak of Heaven and the life to come and that premised or granted as I hope it will be we must next fit it with an Ubi with a constant place of as great perpetuity as a soul it self and with a life as permanent as the place can be Which place or life being we cannot finde it in this present world we must look for it in another and therefore that which in this Creed is called Life everlasting is called in the Nicene Creed The life of the world to come And if it be a Life of the world to come this world and all the beauties of it must first pass away before we can possess our estates in that even as St. Paul hath told us of our Saviour Christ That he took away the first Covenant to establish the second Now that the world shall have an end is a thing so clear in Christianity that never any Heretick in all ages past did call the truth hereof in question And so it was conceived in Philosophy also till Aristotle and the Peripateticks which followed him began to hammer a conceit De aeternitate mundi of the worlds eternity Certain I am that all the old Philosophers before his time and namely Heraclitus Empedocles Anaxagoras Democritus and divers others as also the Stoicks and the whole Sect of the Epicures though in other things they did agree like fire and water were all agreed upon this point That as the world had a beginning so it should have an end The judgment in this case of those old Philosophers Diogenes Laertius will afford us on an easie search And for the said two Sects to take one of each Seneca telleth us for the Stoicks Unus hominum genus condet dies That one day shall bury all mankinde and not all mankinde onely but the whole frame of the Creation totum hunc rerum omnium contextum as he elswhere hath it dies aliquis dejiciet shall in one day be cast down and brought to end The like Lucretius saith for the Epicureans of which Sect he was Una dies dabit exitio multosque per Annos Sustentata ruet moles machina mundi In English thus The goodly frame and engine of this All So many years upheld shall one day fall Nor did they thus agree as by joynt consent touching the Quod sit of this truth That the world should end but they descended to the Quomodo or the manner of it affirming That it shall be consumed with fire St. Ierom doth affirm it of the Gentiles generally that they so conceived it I mean still the Philosophers or the learned Gentiles Quae quidem Philosophorum mundi opinio est omnia quae cernimus igne peritura The Stoiks and the Epicureans also did agree in this Quod mundus hic omnis ignescat That the whole world should be burnt with fire as Octavius telleth us in the Dialogue Eusebius not content to deal in such general terms gives us the names of Zeno Cleanthes and Chrysippus antient Stoicks all who have so declared The like saith Cicero of Panaetius whose fear it was Ne ad extremum mundus ignesceret lest the world should be consumed with fire See to this purpose also Seneca in his Book De Consolatione ad Mart. c. 26. Pliny in his Natural History l. 7. c. 16. The Sibylline Prophecies lib. 2. Oracul Lucans Pharsal and Ovids Metamorph. l. 1. who doth thus express it Esse quoque in fatis reminiscitur affore tempus Quo mare quo tellus correptaque Regia Coeli Ardeat mundi moles operosa laboret Which may be Englished as followeth Besides he call'd to minde that by the doom Of certain Fate a certain time should come When Sea and Land the Court of Heaven the frame Of this great work the world should burn in flame Who can peruse these passages of those Antient Gentiles and not conceive they had consulted with the writings of the Prophet Isaiah where it is said That the Heavens shall vanish away like smoke and the Earth wax old as doth a garment and also in another place That the Heavens shall be rolled together like a peece of parchment that is to say Like a Peece of Parchment shrivelled and shrunk up together by a scorching fire Who can peruse those passages of the antient Gentiles but must conceive that they were partly enlightned by the self-same Spirit with which St. Peter was enspired when he told us in his second Epistle saying The day of the Lord will come as a Thief in the night in which the Heavens shall pass away with a great noyse and the Elements shall melt with fervent heat the Earth also and the works that are therein shall be utterly burnt Cap. 4.10 And in the next save one as followeth Looking for and hastning to the coming of the day of God in which the Heavens shall perish with fire and the Elements melt with fervent heat Were it a thing to be admitted in Chronology I could not but believe that these antient Gentiles had ploughed with St. Peters Heifer and from him borrowed their discourses of the worlds conflagration And now I am faln into the writings of those antient Gentiles and found what they conceived of the Souls immortality and the consumption of this world by a burning fire I will not leave them till they have delivered their opinions also concerning the estate of the soul departed and the glories of eternal life in the world to come In which they have expressed themselves in so clear a manner that we may justly say as Octavius did Aut nunc Christianos Philosophos esse aut Philosophos fuisse jam tunc Christianos That either the Christians are Philosophers or the old Philosophers were Christians For that there was a Paradise or some place of delight and pleasure for the reception of the souls of vertuous persons appeareth by that sacred speech of Zoroaster the antientest of the Sages amongst the Gentiles and one not much short of the time of Abraham with whom he is supposed to have been contemporary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seek Paradise saith he that is to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all enlightned recess of souls as Pletho the Scholiast doth expound it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Quire of the divine powers encircling the Father as Psellus glosseth on that Text but Psellus on occasion of the words aforesaid goes a little further 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It concerneth us saith he to make haste unto the light
doth exclude a Metaphor Nor do there want good Reasons to confirm this truth against the cavils and exceptions of unquiet men For first considering that the fire of Hell is so often threatned in the Scriptures to ungodly men unless we hold fast to this good old Rule in expounding Scripture to take it in the literal sense according as the native meaning of the words import but where the same may be against the truth of faith and honesty of manners it is St. Augustines Rule we shall leave nothing safe nor sound in the Book of God And then it is to be considered That Christ our Saviour shall pronounce this sentence in the day judgment Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels Which if it be not spoken in the literal sense according to the plain meaning of the words neither the guilty can perceive what they are to suffer nor the Ministers what they are to execute nor the Saints what belongs to them to approve and applaud but all things will be left in most strange perplexities Besides it was the custom of our Lord and Saviour when he had spoken to the Iews in Tropes and Parables to make an exposition of them to his own Disciples and in that exposition to speak so plainly that every one might be able to understand him As in the Parables of the Tares and the Casting Net delivered in the thirteenth of St. Matthews Gospel the Disciples understood not what he meant by either but were as ignorant of his scope and purpose as the rest of the Iews But when he did expound himself unto them in private touching the sending of his Angels in the day of judgment to sever the wicked from the just and to cast them being severed so into the furnace of fire and then demanded if they understood what was said unto them they made answer yea It must not therefore be a Metaphor but a proper Speech by which our Saviour Christ did expound his meaning and open the obscurity of the said two Parables for to expound a Parable by a Trope or Metaphor had neither been agreeable to our Saviours goodness nor any way conducing to their Edification So then the fire of Hell shall be true and real not Figurative and Metaphorical and as it is a real fire a devouring fire so is it ignis inextinguibilis an unquenchable fire in the third and ignis aeternus an everlasting fire in the five and twentieth of Matthew The smoke whereof goeth up for ever saith the Prophet Isaiah A fire which feedeth both on the body and the soul yet shall never consume them and such a fire as breeds a kinde of worm within it which shall never die but always gnaw upon the conscience of the man condemned and create far more anguish to him than all bodily torments And of this worm it is which St. Basil speaketh where reckoning up the terrors which shall be presented to the wicked in the day of judgment amongst them he recounteth a darkish fire which though it hath lost his light shall retain its burning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a most venemous kinde of worm feeding on flesh and raising intolerable torments with continual biting See to this purpose also that of Gregory Nyssen in his Homily De Resurrectione Christi nor is it thus delivered in the writings of the Christians onely Iosephus also hath the like a Iew but a learned and a modest Iew in an Oration of his which he made to the Grecians not extant in his works indeed but mentioned by Damascene and preserved by Zonaras For speaking also his opinion of the final judgment to be executed by the Messiah in the last day he saith That there remaineth for the lovers of wickedness an unquenchable and never ending fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And a fiery worm not dying nor destroying the body but breaking forth of the body with unceasing anguish And to this truth as to the miserable state of those in Hell all the old Catholick Doctors do attest unanimously whether Greeks or Latines Tatianus one of the most antientest of the Grecian Doctors calleth the estate of the damned in Hell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a death which never dieth an immortal misery Tertullian the most antient Latin Cruciatum non diuturnum sed sempiternum Not onely a long and lingring torrant but an everlasting one St. Augustine answerably unto that of Tatianus doth call it Mortem sine morte adding more over of those sires Punire non finire corpora that they torment the body but destroy it not Tertullian he goeth further yet saith That it burns the body but repairs it also and calls it poenam nutrientem A fire which so devoureth that it also nourisheth With him Lactantius doth consent so also doth Minutius Felix Prudentius Cassiodorus and indeed who not And why should this be thought a wonder so far beyond the reason and belief of a meer natural man or such who taking on themselves the names of Christians will yet believe no more than will stand with reason Doth not the Scripture tell us of a burning bush a bush that burned with the fire and was not consumed And the Historians of the Hills of Aetna and Vesuvius which do almost continually send out dreadful flames and yet never waste And the Philosophers of a Worm or Beast which they call the Salamander whose natural habitation is in the midst of the fire and the Poets of Prometheus and Titius Vultures which having fed so many hundred years upon their Bowels had not yet devoured them Doth not experience tell us daily That the lightning glanceth on our Bodies often but doth seldom hurt us And doth not Ovid say expresly Nec mortis poenas mors altera finiet hujus That there is a second death which shall never end yet I confess that the prevailing Heresie which pretends to such wit and piety hath no small reason to declare Interire posse animas aut ab exitio liberari That the souls of wicked and impenitent men shall either be annihilated or in fine released For we may safely say of these new Pretenders as once Minutius did of the old Philosophers Malunt penitus extingui quam ad supplicia reparari Considering how they have subverted all the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith it is all the reason in the world that they should rather wish to be annihilated than survive to torments such torments as shall know neither end nor measure BUt blessed JESUS why do we waste our time in such nice disputes in proving and disproving points of so clear an evidence which were much better spent in pursutes of those ways and courses by which we might have hope to flie from the wrath to come Thou Lord hast set before us both Heaven and Hell commandest us to choose the one and avoid the other and tracedst
otherwise then now they are For neither is the prescience or foreknowledge of almighty God for by that name his infinite knowledge may be styled the necessary and adaequate cause that things shall fall out as they do not otherwise but rather because things shall in time so fall out therefore GOD fore-knowes them Nor doth his infinite wisdome in pursuit of the means conducing to the end proposed so fetter and intangle his most infinite power but that he is still liberum agens and is at liberty to produce his end by things plainly contingent as well as by such whereon he hath imposed an everlasting necessity or to suspend the execution of some former edict according as he seeth just occasion for it which liberty in the holy one of Israel is an high perfection For as his eternal knowledge of all things doth not make all things which he knoweth to be eternal so neither doth the immutability of his decrees make every thing which he decrees to be immutable there being many temporal and mutable things which he eternally both knew and decreed accordingly So that for GOD to alter his proceedings with men according as they stand or fall in the acts of piety now punishing where he lately rewarded and presently rewarding where before he punished argueth no mutability in the counsails of GOD but rather an unmovable constancy to the immutable rule of justice which being alwayes one and the same without variation must needs afford different measure unto different deserts and sit contrary dispositions with contrary recompences And on the other side to make this conclusion that because God fore-knoweth by his infinite knowledge and by his infinite wisdome hath decreed of all things even from all eternity therefore it is as impossible for any thing to be otherwise then it is or otherwise then it hath been or will be hereafter as to recall again that which is past already were either to make GOD an impertinent agent in the continuall governance of humane affaires or that he hath nothing else to do but to behold the issue of his former counsails For plainly they which so conceive of the counsails of GOD that all things are decreed and predetermined by him even to the taking up of a straw which was Cartwrights phrase although they have not said it in terms express yet do they necessarily infer or involve thus much That God by his eternall and immutable decrees did set the whole course of nature going with an irresistible and untractable swindge and doth since only look upon it with an awfull eye as Masters sometimes watch their servants to see how willingly or unwillingly how carefully or negligenly they attend his businesse Which how derogatory it is to the truth of the Gospell those words of CHRIST Et pater adhuc operatur i. e. I work and my Father also worketh do declare sufficiently it being evident by that Text if considered rightly that there is altogether as much need of Gods power and wisdome to manage and direct the affaires of the world as at first to make it Thus are we come at last to the fourth and last species of Infinity which is that of Power or of Omnipotence and therein to behold GOD as the Father Almighty the Father because the fountain and root of being and the Almighty Father too because that being in himself an eternal being he had withall a power invested or inherent in him to give a being to the Creatures and to make all things out of nothing which needs must be the act of a power most mighty To this the former part of this Chapter served but as a preamble or a necessary introduction to bring us to the knowledge of this part of the Article viz. That GOD is not only a Father but a Father Almighty which could not otherwise have been fully cleered and made known unto us then by a serious looking on him in his names and attributes For finding in the name IEHOVAH that he is existing of himself and that from him all things that are receive their being his mighty strength in the name of El his eminent power in that of Adonai or Lord that he is God most high in Helion and a Judge in Elohim and then concluding out of these that being such he must be of an uncompounded and most simple essence by consequence eternal and incomprehensible of infinite knowledge to foresee and wisdome to effect what he meaneth to do we may from all together come to this result that he can be no other then the Father Almighty And this was the result which was made of old by the most learned of the Gentiles who having made a muster of his severall Attributes resolved all into this at last that he was the general Father both of God and Men the Parent of the Universe both of Heaven and Earth and therefore without question an Almighty Father Mercurius Trismegistus calleth him in termes expresse Patrem mundi the Father or Parent of the world affirming that the name of good and of a Father belong only to him and so Pythagoras cals him too as is said by Clement Plato entituled him Universi Patrem the Father or Parent of the Universe Iamblichus one of Plato's followers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or self-father as before was noted By Aristotle in his book de Mundo he is called Pater deorum et hominum the Father both of Gods and Men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the words of Homer By Virgil in the same sense Hominum sator atque Deorum in the first of the Aeneids By Orpheus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Original Ancester of all and by Apollo himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the unspeakable Father And for the titile of Almighty I finde it given expresly to him in a verse of one of the Sibyls where he is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Omnipotent invisible and yet seeing all things The like doth frequently occurre in the Latine Poets who call him the Almighty Father in as positive termes as he is called here in the Creed Tum Pater Omnipotens foecundis imbribus c. And in another place At pater Omnipotens speluncis abdidit atris as we read in Virgil. At Pater Omnipotens misso perfregit Olympum c. so it is in Ovid And by Valerius Soranus one of elder times their Iupiter or supreme deity had the title of Almighty and King of Kings assigned unto him Iupiter Omnipotens Regum Rex ipse Deusque as St. Augustine citeth him out of Varro More might be added unto this were not this sufficient to shew that even the learned Gentiles did acknowledge God to be the Father Almighty We must next see how and in what respects he is called a Father and doth stand so entituled in the front of the Creed And first the name of Father as applyed to God in holy Scripture is taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Personally as
it denotes the first person in the Oeconomie of the glorious Trinity There are three that bear record in heaven as St. Iohn hath it the Father the Word and the holy Ghost and these three are one And in this notion or acception of the word GOD is the father of our Lord and Saviour IESVS CHRIST whom he hath begotten to himself before all worlds generatione 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by such a kind of generation as neither the tongue of Men nor Angels can expresse aright In this respect our Saviour saith of GOD the first person I and my Father are one and in another place which we saw before on another occasion I work and my Father also worketh In this sense God the Father saith of the second person This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased And finally in this as no man living no not any of the host of Heaven is to be called the Son of God but the second Person so none of the three Persons takes the name of Father but the first alone Though GGD hath severall sons and by severall means as shall be shewed anone in the place fit for it yet only CHRIST is called his begotten son and therefore God a naturall Father if I may so say unto none but him And this is that which Gregory Thaumaturgus hath told us saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God hath no other son by nature but thee my Saviour The name of this generation I forbear to speak of It is a point I waived from the very first when first I undertook to expound this Creed as being of too sublime and transcendent nature for the shallowness of my capacity to inquire into It is enough that I acknowledge God to be the Father of our Lord IESVS CHRIST by an eternall generation though I professe my self unable to discourse thereof with any satisfaction to my self or others And for the generation of our Saviour in the fulnesse of time by which he was conceived of the Virgin Mary I shall have opportunity to speak in a place more proper So that not having more to speak of the name of Father as it is personall and hypostaticall in the first Person only I shall proceed to that acception of the word wherein it is taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or essentially and so given to GOD that every person of the Trinity doth partake thereof But first I cannot choose but note that even in that equality or unity which is said to be between the Persons of the blessed Trinity the Father seems to me to have some preheminency above the others For not only the Greek Church doth acknowledge him to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the root and fountain of the God-head but it is generally agreed on by all Orthodox writers that the Father is first in order though not in time Pater est prior ordine non tempore as Alstedius states it and by Aquinas amongst those of the Church of Rome that the Son or second person is Principiatus non essentiatus that is to say if I rightly understand his meaning that there was a beginning of his existence though not of his essence or a beginning of his Filiation but not of his God-head And yet I dare not say that I hit his meaning for I professe my self uncapable of these Schoole-niceties because I finde it generally agreed on by most learned men that CHRIST receiveth the being and essence which he hath from the Father although not in the way of production of an other essence which was condemned as an impious heresie in Valentinus Gentilis but by communication of the same Add here that those who have most constantly stood up in the defence of the doctrine of the Trinity against some Hereticks of this Age doe notwithstanding say and declare in publick that CHRIST though looked upon as the Son of God in his eternall generation cannot be said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or self-essentiate And that both Genebrard Lindanus and some others of the Romish Doctors have quarrelled Calvin whom Beza laboureth to excuse in that particular for saying that he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and hath his God-head from himself wherein he is deserted by Arminius also and those of the Remonstrant party in the Belgick Countries But that the Father Almighty mentioned in my Creed was not and is not both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too hath never been affirmed nor so much as doubted of by any Christian writer of what times soever Next look we on the name of Father as it is taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 essentially in the holy Scriptures and then it is appliable to every person of the blessed Trinity each of which in his severall person or subsistence may be called our Father Thus read we of the second person for of the first there is no question to be made in the 9. of Esay that unto us a Son is born and that he shall be called wonderfull the mighty God the everlasting Father Vers. 6. Thus in St. Iames we finde that the holy Ghost is called Pater luminum the Father of lights it being his office to illuminate every soul which is admitted for a member of the Church of CHRIST in which respect the Sacrament of Baptisme in which men are regenerated and born again of water and the holy Spirit was antiently called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or illumination The reason why the name Father doth in this sense belong respectively to each is because they equally concur as in the work of Creation God the Father creating the world in the Son by the holy Ghost so in those also of Redemption and Sanctification From whence that maxim of the Schools Opera Trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa that is to say the outward or externall actions of the Trinity are severally communicable to the whole essence of GOD and not appropriated unto any particular person And yet the name of Father even in this acception is generally 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in the common course of speech referred to the first Person only as he that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the root and fountain of the God-head as before was said For thus hath CHRIST himself instructed us to pray and say Our Father which art in heaven And the Church following his command who hath willed us to pray after that manner beginneth many of her prayers in the publick Liturgy with this solemn form of compellation Almighty and most mercifull Father Not that we do exclude the Son or the holy Ghost in our devotions but include them in him In Patre invocantur filius et spiritus sanctus as Bellarmine hath most truly noted And therefore though we commonly begin our prayers with a particular address to God the Father yet we conclude them all with this through Christ Iesus our Lord and sometimes add to