terrible cracks of that flaming fire to haue their eyes blinded with the bitter smoke of that fuming gulfe to be drowned in the deepe lake of Gehenna and to be torne eternally with most greedie wormes to thinke on these things and many such like is a sure way to renounce all vice and refraine all allurements of the flesh Apparently then the fire of hell by the confession of all these ancient aud Christian writers is locall as kept vnder the earth externall as inclosing the damned both men and diuels and sensible to the eyes with obscure flames tormenting all the parts of the body with an horrible paine of burning but not consuming them And that the fire of hell shal be an externall and true fire what proofe can be fairer or fuller than that Scriptures and Fathers with one voice professe that Christ shall come to iudge the world in flaming fire which shall melt the elements with heat and dissolue the heauens and threfore without question must needs be a true substantiall externall fire and that the same fire with which he shall come to iudge shall deuoure his aduersaries Behold sayth Esay the Lord will come with fire that he may render his indignation with the flame of fire for the Lord will iudge with fire There shall goe a fire before him when he commeth to iudge sayth Dauid and burne vp his enemies roâ—…nd about The Lord Iesus sayth Paul shall shew himselfe from heauen in flaming fire rendring vengeance to them that know not God and obey not the Gospel For to such remaineth no sacrifice for sin but a fearefull expectation of iudgement and a violence of fire which shall deuoure the aduersaries Fire sayth Arnobius shall go before Christ comming to iudgement euen fire which shall performe two offices with one and the same aspect it shall lighten the friends and inflame the enemies of God for the fire which shall burne the sinfull shal be made brightnesse to the iust The end of this present world saith Iustine Martyr is the iudgement of the wicked by fire as the scriptures of the Prophets Apostlesdeclare and likewise thâ—… writings of Sibylle so blessed Clemens that liued with the Apostles in his Epistle to the Corinths affirmeth Christ shall come sayth Ambrose with his heauenly army and with fire as his minister to giue vengeance â—…or the sire of iudgement shall serue him to reuenge the reprobate sayth Gregorie Paul sheweth sayth Theodoret that iudgement shal be full of terror noting first the Iudge comming from heauen then their power which minister vnto him who are the angels lastly thâ—… kinde of punishment for the wicked shall be deliuered to the flame of fire There are two properties in fire to burne and to shine the shining propertie the assembly of Saints shall enioy by the other shall wicked men be punished So Basil There are two forces in fire one to burne the other to shine the sharpnesse of â—…ire which punisheth is layed vp for those that deserue burning the light and shining thereof is allotted to the ioy of the blessed And Athanasius Fire hath two forces the one of shining which shall be giuen to the iust the other of burning which shall be diuided to sinners Ierom likewise Fire shal be light to the faithfull and punish the vnbeleeuers And Theophylact Christs comming shall be in flaming fire as Dauid professeth of him A fire shall goe before him and shall burne his enemies round about For this fire shall offer burning to sinners and no shining but to the iust it shall giue light and shining and no heat or burning The fire I trust which hath these two properties to lighten the iust and torment the wicked is an externall and sensible fire and with that fire Christ shall come to dissolue the heauens melt the elements and punish the wicked neither shall the spirituall and internall paine of the soule which the Discourser maketh his hell fire come neere the Saints or be ioyous and comfortable to any as the fire of iudgement shal be to the saints of God Then all sorts of writers Prophets Euangelists Apostles and Diuines of all ages Yea Philosophers Poets and Sibyls haue taught the wicked shall â—…e punished with true fire and not with metaphores and the Sonne of God in person hath confirmed the same and all sectes Iewes Pagans and Christians haue beleeued it God taking speciall care as well by deeds as words that the truth and terror of his vengeance vpon sinne should not be vnknowen to all the world For which cause he hath not only made the earth in many places as Aetna Vesuuis and else where to burne with perpetuall fire but hath often destroyed sinfull persons and places with fire from heauen to let all men see and know that the vengeance decreed threatned and executed on the wicked is sensible and true fire from God which he hath made of all senseles creatures the most violent potent and fearefull meanes to punish Therefore did he raine fire and brimstone vpon Sodome and Gomorre when their sinnes were at full punished the people that murmured at him with fire calling the name of the place THABHERAH because the fire of the Lord burnt amongst them as likewise he sent Firie serpents to bite them when they spake against him So Fire came out from the Lord and consumed the two hundred and fiftie men of Corahs company that presumed to offer incence vnto the Lord as before it had destroyed Nadab and Abihu for offering strange fire before the Lord. And at Eliahs word Fire came downe from heauen twice and deuoured two Captaines with their two bands of an hundred men Insomuch that when Satan would haue Iob beleeue he was punished by Gods owne hand he gate fire to fall from heauen vpon Iobs sheepe and seruants the messenger making this report The fire of God is fallen from heauen and hath burnt vp thy sheepe and seruants and deuoured them Which kind of vengeance Iames and Iohn the Disciples of Christ desired when their master was repelled by the Samaritans and denyed lodging as willing to haue that inhumanitie punished to the example of all others but that they were repressed by him who came to saue and not to destroy Thus hath God often by true and sensible fire from heauen declared and verified the certaintie of his generall and finall iudgement when his Sonne shall appeare in flaming fire to render vengeance to all that know not God and obey not the Gospell and that fire of Iudgement which shall burne heauen and earth shall shine to the Saints with ioy and comfort and punish the wicked by tormenting them for euer This you thinke is not against you for you deny that Now there is corporall fire in hell whatsoeuer there shall be hereafter when bodies also shal be there vnited and tormented with the soules and this
sayth d 1. Tim. 5. I charge thee in the presence of God and of the Lord Iesus Christ and of the elect Angels that thou obserue these things without preiudice or partiaâ—…tie And againe we are made a e â—… Cor. 4. spectacle to the world to angels and to men And likewise s The woman ought to haue power on her head because of the Angels that is she ought to couer her head in signe of subiection to the power of the man because the Angels beholde this as all other actions of men either in the Church or in the world From this power to heare and see what is sayd and done on the face of the earth euen in the secret and darke places thereof the diuell is not excluded in that he is an Angel though fallen from heauen and cast vnto the earth yet an g Reuel 12. accuser and so a beholder of good whom he impugneth and of badde ouer whom he ruleth And what maruell that Angels who by their creation excell vs in power and might haue this incident to their condition when as men God opening their eyes can see things done in heauen and earth which naturally they can by no meanes see When Dothan was besieged by the Aramites to apprehend Elizeus and his seruant was afrayd at the sight of them the Prophet encouraging his seruant sayd h 2. Kings 5. Feare not for they that be with vs are moe then they that be with them and prayed God to open his seruants eyes which the Lord did and h 2. Kings 5. he looked and beholde the mountaine was full of â—…ierie charets and horses round about Elizeus i Mark 1. Assoone as Iohn was come out of the water where he baptized Iesus in Iordan Iohn saw the heauens cleaue asunder and the Holy Ghost descending on Christ like a Doue Steuen likewise not only had his face changed in the Councell k Acts 7. as the face of an Angell but looking stedfastly into heauen saw the glory of God and Iesus standing at the right hand of God Which though the incredulous Iewes did no wayes beleeue but stopped their eares when they heard him so say and ranne vpon him all at once and cast him out of the citie and stoned him as a blasphemous liar yet can he be no Christian Christ might see what he would that doubteth whether Steuen saw this with his bodily eyes or no the Scripture being so resolute for it how impossible soeuer it be to our eyes This power to beholde things farre distant notwithstanding all impediments interiected not onely Christ had when he would as appeareth by his words to Nathaniel l Ioh. 1. v. 48. Before Philip called thee being vnder the figge tree I saw thee for which Nathaniel acknowledged him to be the Sonne of God but he promised his that they should see greater things m Vers. 50. Because I sayd to thee I saw thee vnder the figge tree beleeuest thou Thou shalt see greater things then these n Vers. 51. Verily verily I say vnto you henceforth you shall see the heauens open and the Angels of God ascending and descending vpon the Sonne of man Since then Christ could and o Luke 10. vers 18. did see Satan like lightning fall downe from heauen I make no doubt but he could open his owne eyes to see the remote parts of the earth when it pleased him though vsually he did it not by reason he needed it not for he knew all things and euen what was in man which the Angels doe not and therefore needed not any such vse of his eyes but when he saw his time which in this case he might like lest the dâ—…uell should despise him as hauing greater power and cleerer sight then Christ did or could shew himselfe to haue For which cause also Christ would stand on the pinnacle of the Temple without the diuels helpe to let him know that he wanted not power to doe greater things then the diuell vrged him vnto but onely that hee would take his owne time and do nothing at the diuels instigation or motion nor repugnant to the will and pleasure of God A third way the diuell had if Christ would permit it to set these things before our Sauiours eyes Satan is able not onely to assume what shapes he will and to transforme himselfe into an Angell of light but also to make specters and shewes of any thing in the aire and to deceiue the eyes of men when he is suffered by God so to do which not onely experience of all ages but the Scriptures themselues confirme wherein all p 2. Thess. 2. false woonders and signes are ascribed to the operation of Satan By this meanes Simon the Sorcerer so bewitched the whole citie of Samaria that q Acts 8. they all from the least to the greatest gaue heed vnto him and sayd This man is the great power of God The Sorcerers of Pharaoh r Exod 7. turned their rods into serpents and changed the riuers into r Exod 7. bloud and brought s Exod. 8. frogs vpon the land of Egypt as Moses and Aaron did and other miracles could the diuell haue done as we see by killing of Iobs t Iob. 1. sheepe and seruants with fire from heauen and the u Iob. 2. smiting of Iobs bodie with sore boiles had not the hand of the Almightie stopped him and thereby made the Sorcerers confesse that x Exod. 8. v 19 there was the finger of God It was therefore no hard thing for Satan to frame the appearances of kingdomes and cities and shew the similitudes of them from euery part of the earth since they are but the figures and semblances of things that we see with our eyes which Angels good and badde haue in their power when they are sent of God to do his will Howbeit Satan could not delude the eyes of Christ without his knowledge and leaue though Satan did not so thinke And therefore all these wayes being possible yet I thinke the second most agreeable to the words and see no cause why we should measure Christs sight when pleased him by mans reason when as he did so many things heere on earth aboue all humane power and reason For he often y Marke 4. walked on the sea and z Iohn 20. came and stood in the midst of his disciples when the doores were shut and made the ship that receiued him in the sea of Tiberias a Iohn 6. to be by and by at the land whither they went besides many thousand miracles which he wrought with his word and hand whiles he conuersed amongst men Of which if no Christian may make any question why flie you to imaginations or visions so long as Christ had power enough with his eyes to behold whatsoeuer Satan could shew him It was Satans act you will say to shew them and not Christes Satan as an angell might see
had God chiefly respected the execution of his iustice against sinne his owne sonne was most vnfit to be subiected to that vengeance which was prepared for deuils but God in the recompense which he required for sinne chose rather to haue his holinesse contented and his glory aduanced than to haue his iustice inflicted to the vttermost And therefore he selected the person of his owne sonne that might fully satisfie his holinesse and maruellously exalt his glorie but on whom of all others his iustice could take least holde not that his iustice should be neglected but that a moderate punishment in his person for the worthinesse thereof would weigh more euen in the balance of Gods exact iustice than the depth of Gods wrath executed on all the transgressours The chastisement of our peace layd vpon him will proue the same For where the wages of sinne is death and death due to sinne is threefold spirituall corporall and eternall as I haue formerly shewed such was the person of our Sauiour that two parts of death due to sinne could by no rule of Gods iustice fasten on Christes humane nature The gifts of Gods spirit and grace could not be quenched nor diminished in him he was full of grace and trueth he had not the spirit by measure as we haue but of his fulnesse we all haue receiued It is my father saith he that honoureth me whom ye say to be your God yet haue ye not knowen him but I know him and if I should say I know him not I should be a liar like vnto you but I know him and keepe his word and do alwayes the things that please him The cleerenesse of trueth knowing Gods will and fulnesse of grace keeping his word beeing continually present with the humane soule of Christ most apparently the death of the soule which excludeth all inward sense and motion of Gods spirit could haue no place in him by reason the death of the soule is the want of all grace and height of all sinne from which he was free much lesse could any part of Christs manhood by Gods iustice be condemned to euerlasting death or to hell fire since there could nothing befall the humanitie of Christ which was vnfit for his Diuinitie they both being inseparably ioyned together or repugnant to that loue which God so often professed and proclamed from heauen or iniurious to the innocencie and obedience which God so highly accepted and rewarded or preiudiciall to mans saluation which God so long before purposed and promised No weight of sinne no heat of wrath no rigour of iustice could preuaile against the least of these to cast Christ out of heauen and combine him with diuels in the second death which is the lake burning with fire and brimstone There is onely left the third kinde of death which is corporall to which Christ yeelded himselfe willingly for the conseruation of Gods iustice who inflicted that paine on all men as the generall punishment of sinne for the demonstration of his power who by death ouercame death together with the cause and consequents thereof and for the consolation of the godly that they should not faint vnder the crosse nor feare what sinne and Satan could do against them It was loue then in God towards vs to giue his sonne for vs So God loued the world that he gaue his only begotten sonne that whosoeuer beleeueth in him should not perish but haue life euerlasting but farre greater loue to his sonne than to vs though the burden of our sinnes which we could not beare were layd vpon him For since God hath adopted vs through Christ Iesus vnto himselfe and made vs accepted in his beloued of force he must be much better beloued for whose sake we all are beloued And if to make the world by his sonne were an excellent demonstration of Gods euerlasting and exceeding loue towards his sonne to send him into the world that the world through him might be saued doth as farre in honour and loue exceed the former as our Redemption by which heauen is inherited doth passe our creation whereby the earth was first inhabited Neither was it possible that God should remit the rigor of iustice against sinne for the loue of any but onely of his owne sonne whom because he loued as deerely as himselfe and had made heire of all things worthily and rightly did the wrath of God against man asswage and yeeld to the loue of God towards his owne sonne against whom no punishment could proceed but such as was fatherly and serued rather to witnesse obedience than to execute vengeance For though you Sir Discourser in the height of your vnlearned skill resolue that Christ could suffer no chastisement but all his sufferings were the true and proper punishment or iust vengeance of God for sinne yet the Prophet Esay telleth vs the chastisment of our peace was vpon him and the word Musar which the Prophet there vseth deriued from Iasar is the proper word that in the Scripture signifieth the correction of a father towards his sonne and of God likewise towards his Church Chastise thy sonne saith Salomon while there is hope As a father chasteneth his sonne ‖ so ‖ the Lord chasteneth thee sayth Moses to Israel My Sonne refuse not the chastening of the Lord. Blessed is the man whom thou Lord doest chasten The like may be seene by those that will looke Deutr. 21. vers 18. Ierem. 2. vers 30. Ierem. 31. vers 18. Psal. 118. vers 18. The Apostle concurreth with the Prophet Esay touching Christes sufferings and sayth Though he were the sonne yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered He learned obedience which is the subiection of a sonne to his fathers chastisement he tasted not vengeance which is the indignation of an enemie requiting Yea the very death which Christ suffered in the body of his flesh was so farre from being an effect of Gods proper wrath that it was an increase of Gods loue towards him and as well the price of our Redemption as the cause of all his honor following Therefore the Father loueth me sayth our Sauiour because I lay downe my soule or life to take it againe And so much the Prophet foretolde Therefore will I giue him sayth God a part in many things and he shall diuide the spoile of or with the mightie because he poured out his soule or life vnto death Which the Apostle sheweth to be thus verified in Christ. He humbled himselfe being obedient vnto the death euen the death of the Crosse. Wherefore God also highly exalted him and gaue him a name aboue euery name that in the name of Iesu euery knee should bow of things celestiall terrestrial and infernall euery tongue confesse that Iesus Christ is the Lord to the glory of God the father All power honour and iudgement in heauen earth and hell are therefore deliuered
that whatsoeuer it were though you can neither prooue nor expresse what it was Gods very wrath and proper vengeance for sinne though outwardly executed on the body could not but sinke deeper into the Soule and wound the soule properly yea chiefly though the anguish thereof bruised the bodie ioyntly also It is well yet at last that you find your selfe ignorant of some things and that you will not take vpon you to expresse in what precise manner or iust measure the wrath of God was reuealed and executed on Christ. For whiles you broched those secrets more boldly then wisely or truely you ranne your selfe out of breath and brought neither substance nor shadow of holy Scripture to warrant your vanities but daunced vp and downe with certaine licentious and ambiguous phrases of GODS PROPER VVRATH MEERE IVSTICE VERY VENGEANCE and such like flowers neither confirmed by the Scriptures nor so much as expounded by your selfe but because you checke your owne presumption I will spare it and come to that which you professe your selfe so resolutely to know that Gods very wrath and proper vengeance for sinne though outwardly executed on the body of Christ could not but sinke deeper into the soule and wound the soule properly yea chiefly though the anguish thereof bruized his bodie also Wherein notwithstanding you keepe your accustomed phrases of Gods very wrath and proper vengeance which you neither doe nor dare describe by the parts thereof that we may discerne the trueth of your speech yet for their sakes that are simple I am content shortly to examine what wrath from God Christ suffered as farre as the Scriptures direct vs at whose hands he suffered it and what he did and must conceaue of those his sufferings There is no question but power to feele conceaue and discerne by sense reason or faith in man belongeth properly yea onely to the soule of man Life sense and motion appeare in the body and haue their actions perfourmed by the instruments of the body but euen in them the power and force that quickneth and mooueth the body and discerneth by the senses of the body commeth from the soule and so dependeth on the soule that the soule departing from the body leaueth it voyd of all motion sense and life Then in all Christs sufferings when any violence lighted on his body the paine pearced into his soule and his soule not onely fully felt the anguish thereof but rightly discerned the fountaine whence the cause why and the meanes by which it came Christ likewise knew himselfe to be endewed with such might and strength that of him selfe he could not onely resist the whole world if he would but euen commaund and represse men and diuels His ouerruling of seas windes and wicked spirits and giuing his Disciples power ouer them is so euident and often in the Scriptures that no Christian may be ignorant of it After his agony in the Garden with the word of his mouth he threw to the ground the whole band of men that came with Iudas to take him and when by this meanes he had shewed him selfe not destitute of his wonted force and vertue he voluntarily submitted him selfe not onely to be bound and brought whether they would but euen to be whipped mocked wounded hanged and euery way vsed at their pleasure Which he did not to satisfie their wicked rage but to obey the will of his heauenly Father who when he would punish the sinnes of men in the person of his owne Sonne Deliuered him into the hands of sinners from them to suffer whatsoeuer the hand and counsell of God had determined before to be done For those things which God before had shewed by the mouthes of all his Prophets that Christ should suffer he thus fulfilled by the malice of some and ignorance of others whom Satan incited with the greatest contumely and crueltie they could deuise to take Christs life from him In all which Christ suffered nothing but what the determinate counsell and foreknowledge of God purposed and appointed should be done For this was the Cup which his father gaue him to drinke and this was the houre and power of darknes when the Prince of the world came against him howbeit neither man nor deuill could haue any power at all against him but what was giuen them from aboue So that in all those wronges reproches and paines which were offered and inflicted on him by the rage of Satan and the wicked he saw the secret counsell and hand of God punishing our sinnes in his bodie and by that meanes satisfiyng the diuine iustice that was prouoked by our transgressions But no where doe the Scriptures deliuer that God with his immediate hand tormented the soule or body of his Sonne much lesse that he impressed the very paines of hell and of the damned on the soule of Christ which is your new found Redemption and satisfaction for the sinnes of men By his agonie in the garden you boldly and rashly presume it but by what logick you conclude it neither doe I conceaue nor can you declare Christ was SORROVVFVLL and AFRAID in the garden and began to be AMAZED ergo you thinke he felt or foresaw he should suffer the paines of the damned from the immediate hand of God Well these may be your hastie thoughts but this hath no ground in Arte reason nature or Scripture For many other things Christ might feare and this of all other things he could not feare How many things are there in God when we approach his presence how many things proceede there from God when we aduisedly marke his counsels and iudgements which may iustly ouerwhelme the weakenes of mans flesh with admiration and feare euen to astonishment The brightnes of Gods glory the greatnes of his power the deepenes of his counsels the sound of his voice the presence of his Angels the sight of his vengeance prepared or executed on others how many good and perfect men haue these things strooken into feares and mazes When Saint Iohn in the spirite sawe the shape of the sonne of man and heard his voice he fell downe as dead for feare When Daniel had seene the vision of the goat and the Ram he was afraid and fell vpon his face yea he was stricken and sicke certaine daies being astonished at the vision When the parents of Sampson saw the Angell ascend toward heauen in the flame of the Altar they fell on their faces to the ground and one of them said we shall surely die because we haue seene the Lord. When a light from heauen suddainly shined round about Paul as he was trauayling to Damascus he fell to the earth trembling and amazed When Isaac perceaued that he had ignorantly blessed Iacob in steede of Esau he was stricken with an exceeding great feare and trembling When the people saw the Creeple walking that was dayly layd at the gate of the Temple to aske almes and
of the liuing sacrifices what needed the burning of the same after it was dead and senselesse obscurely to intimate if not falsely that the fire of affliction as you would haue it should consume the Messias God had therefore another meaning as I take it in commanding ech sacrifice after it was slaine to be offered to him by fire Forwhere of all creatures subiect to mans sight and sense fire was the fittest for the light heate force and motion thereof to designe vnto the people the brightnesse of Gods glorie the zeale of his holinesse the grace of his Spirit and seate of his habitation in the heauens God gaue the Iewes fire from heauen to burne perpetually on his Altar which did teach them with what cleannesse of hands and feruentnesse of heart the things which hee required should bee offered vnto him and did separate the sacrifices dedicated vnto God from all prophane abuse and humane vse and made them ascend towardes the place of his glorious presence that he might accept them with fauour and be pleased with them All which significations of heauenly fire were most perfectly accomplished in the sacrifice of Christ Iesus For neuer man nor Angel offered vnto God any seruice with like puritie and charitie as the Lord Iesus offered himselfe to his Fathers will and that his oblation did not onely clense his body from all corruption of mortalitie and infirmitie as appeared by his resurrection but pearced the heauens with admirable celeritie and efficacie and preuailed in the presence of God to bee a sweete smelling sauour for all the sonnes of God Some of these things you seeme to acknowledge As fire to signifie the Acceptation of Christs death in that it was a sacrifice of a sweete sauour ascending vp to God What reason then haue you that fire should note the wrath of God powred out on Christes soule and body before he died Shall one and the same fire in one and the same sacrifice import both gracious acceptance with God and terrible vengeance from God These be contraries in mine eyes whatsoeuer they be in yours That fire in sacrifices did shew Gods fauour and not his anger the sacrifices of Gedeon Salomon and Elias doe plainly prooue which God with fire from heauen consumed not in token of any displeasure against them or dislike of their offerings but in signe of very fauorable acceptations both of their persons and sacrifices Euen so at the first offerings of Aaron the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people and there came a fire from the Lord and consumed the burnt offering vpon the Altar which when all the people saw they gaue a shout for ioy and fell on their faces This fire descending from God and consuming that sacrifice God commaunded to keepe burning for euer on his Altar and none might approch to him with any other fire in incense or offering in so much that when Nadab and Abihu the sonnes of Aaron tooke strange â—…ire to offer before the Lord and not of that which alwaies burned on the Altar God destroyed them with fire The fire then which consumed the sacrifices of the Iewes was miraculously deliuered them by God and ioyfully receaued of all the people and therefore did not argue to them any wrath or vengeance on their sacrifices but rather the fauour and good liking of God which the Scripture noteth by the sweete odour of the sacrifice As when Noah made his burnt offerings to ascend by fire the Scripture saith the Lord smelled a sauour of rest that is he shewed himselfe to be appeased and his anger to rest So when Aaron and his sonnes were to be consecrated Priests God said to Moses Thou shalt make to smell by fier that is thou shalt burne the whole Ram as a burnt offering it shall be to the Lord a sauour of rest that is a pleasing sacrifice And for that cause God willed the Iewes in their peace offerings whereby they gaue thanks for their safetie and prosperitie to vse fire and saith of it ISSHE this burning by fire or this sacrifice made by fire is a sauour of rest vnto the Lord. And so in incense which Saint Iohn resembleth to the prayers of the Saints fire was likewise required to teach them that their prayers went vp before God as the smoke of sweete odours and were accepted of him Then not affliction or indignation on the Sacrifice was declared by the fire which God commaunded to be vsed in all kinds of sacrifices but rather an ascending vp to the presence of God and an accepting thereof in the sight of God which is farre from your suffering of hell paines in the soule of Christ for which you bable so much in both your bookes But the Apostle sayth as the bodies of beasts were burnt without the campe so Christ suffered without the gate Were it granted that fire in Sacrifices did signifie probation or affliction which is no way proued you are no whit the neerer to your suffering of hell paines in the soule of Christ. For the bodies of beasts sayth the Apostle were burnt which can by no pretense of these wordes be stretched farder than the afflictions of Christes bodie when he was carried to be crucified without the gate And the chopping of the holocaust in pieces that it might the more conueniently be layed on the wood to burne maketh as slender proofe that Christes soule suffered the paines of hell notwithstanding your graue deuice that Christes soule was chopt in pieces and not his bodie which conceits of yours declare your follie but helpe not your cause Those Sacrifices whereof part was burnt by fire and the rest reserued for the Priest and sometimes for the owner that brought them to feast before the Lord had their bloud shed at the doore of the Tabernacle as well as the other and so resembled the death of Christ no lesse than the other though God would haue no part of the one to be eaten by the Priests or people as the other were but to be wholly consumed by fire because they were wholly reserued or dedicated vnto him And this the Apostle respecteth in that comparison which he maketh of the bodies of beasts burnt without the campe whereof the Priests that serued in the Tabernacle could not be partakers They were consumed by fire because the Priests should not eat thereof to foreshew as the Apostle noteth that such as were addicted to the seruice and ceremonies of the Law and the outward Temple could not be partakers of the trueth which is in Christ except they did leaue those elements of the Law which seemed so glorious in their eyes and followed Christ out of the gate bearing his reproch whose bloud was most holy and most sufficient to sanctifie the people though hee were cast out of the citie to suffer as a malefactour and wicked person Neither were the dead bodies of those beasts consumed by fire out
you must bring stronger stuffe then such wordes as besides their diuers significations haue manie figuratiue translations and applications which will not serue you to conclude any thing for your hell paines suffered in this life These are the mightie proofes that were vnanswered which indeed I neglected as prouing nothing and so would yet haue donne had not you so mouthly called for an answeare as if the things had beene verie materiall which in truth are weake and faint u Defenc. pag. 119. li. 31. The confession and behauior of the reprobate do sundry times in this life testifie so much What is their confession in things which they know not euen as much as your assertion That they are somtimes inwardly and fearefully either tormented by satan or by their owne consciences I easily admit but what is the feare of hell either in the elect or in the reprobate to the true paines thereof which the wicked after this life shall feele that they feele an horror confounding them I neuer denied as also the godly may feele a terror pursuing them but if you determine this to be all the torment the wicked shal find in hell you were best take heed of deluding Gods iudgments against sinne and playing with fiery words in steed of euerlasting fire It is another manner of torment that there abideth the damned then this guilt of conscience remorse of sinne and a fearefull expectation of iudgement and fire in which the wicked sometimes lead their liues with horror and confusion and yet it is open blasphemy to ascribe any of these horrors or feares of the reprobate vnto Christ since they vtterly quench all persuasion of Gods fauour loue and patience towards them which if we affirme of him we wrap him within their reprobation x Defenc pag. 119. li. 32. The Diuels are many times out of the locall hell as when they are in this world But Diuels are neuer released of hell sorrowes Therefore the true sorrowes of hell are euen in this world and then possibly may be inflicted on wicked men as they are on Diuels which are sometimes out of the locall hell We speake of men here liuing on earth and you runne to Diuels ranging in the aire or compassing the earth for proofe of your hell-paines Which is as much as if you did plainely confesse you can find no Scripture to prooue that mortall men in this life may endure the torments of hell For the example of Diuels inferreth no more the paines of hell to be suffered of men in this life then the presence of elect Angels here on earth doth prooue that men in this life may enioy the perfection of Gods heauenly ioies and glory since the angels of God whithersoeuer they goe or wheresoeuer they are cannot be depriued or diminished of that inward power and light blessednesse and glory in which they are confirmed for euer With Angels elect or reprobate men after this life shall haue a resemblance and conuenience the faithfull saith Christ shall be a Matth. 22. as the Angels of God in heauen and the cursed are cast b Matth. 25. into euerlasting fire prepared for the diuell and his angels But in this life except we will waxe mad we must make no equiualence betwixt their estates and ours So that from the diuels condition to mans in this life there is no consequent more then the imitation and communion of his wickednesse in the reprobate whose children they are because they fulfill his desires and an expectation and feare of his punishment Otherwise as the earth is neither heauen nor hell no more is mans life on earth matchable with the ioyes of the good or paines of the bad Angels which haue the place of their abode determined and assigned them in heauen or in hell saue when they are sent or loosed by God to attend the execution of his will And yet if the place of hell had no greater nor other paines then the diuels alwayes carrie with them and in them why should they so much feare to be a Luc. 8. v. 31. sent into the deepe or b Iudae epla v. 6. be reserued vnto the iugdement of the great day and c Peter 2. ca. 2. kept vnto damnation feare they without cause or are they kept and reserued to no more nor worse paines then already they feele That is no reseruation where there is nothing but a continuation of the very same that was besore It is certaine therefore howsoeuer you presume the contrarie that the place of hell hath greater paines euen for the diuels then they feele any heere on earth or before the last day and howsoeuer their inward confusion and desperation doe horribly persue them in all places since their fall yet a more fearefull torment abideth them in hell and especially when the last iudgement commeth which is the set time that shall torment them by addicting and fastning them to eternall and intolerable fire Yet the sorrowes of hell are in the world By such logicke you may prooue the paines of hell to be in heauen and the ioyes of heauen to be in hell and so make a full confusion of all things which well becommeth your newe found faith For the Scriptures beare witnesse that Satan not only c Luc. 10. fell from heauen but made his d Reuel 12. battell or rebellion in heauen and after his fall e Iob 1. stoode among the children of God and euen with f 1. King 22. the host of heauen g Reuel 12. There was a battaile in heauen saith Iohn Michael and his Angels fought against the Dragon and the Dragon fought and his Angels But they preuailed not neither was their place found any more in heauen And the great Dragon called the diuell was cast into the earth Therefore reioyce ye heauens and ye that dwell in them Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea for the diuell is come downe vnto you with great wrath knowing that his time is short h 1. King 22. I saw the Lord sit on his throne saith Michaiah the Prophet and all the host of heauen stoode about him on his right hand and on his left hand Then there came foorth a lying spirit and stoode before the Lord of whom the booke of Iob testifieth that i Iob 1. v. 6. when the children of God came and stoode before the Lord Satan came also among them Certaine it is that Satan and his angels sinned euen in heauen and were cast out of heauen after their defection from God carrying alwayes with them and within them the losse of their originall brightnesse and the chaines of inward and fearefull darknesse whereby they find themselues reiected from Gods sauour despoyled of their former light and glory and reserued for the iudgement of the great day at which they tremble as well as at the place of their perpetuall imprisonment where their torments are and shal be increased though
they be neuer freed from that horrible confusion in which they lie And therefore they scare the place prouided for them and besought Christ neither k Luc. 8. to send them into the deepe and bottomlesse pit nor to l Matth. 8. torment them besore their time Neither was there onely transgression reprobation and confusion in the place of heauen where the Angels sinned and whence they were cast but of the blessed Angels S. Iohn saith that one of them m Reuel 20. came downe from heauen hauing the key of the bottomlesse pit and a great chaine in his hand who tooke the Dragon which is the diuell and bound him and cast him into the bottomlesse pit and shut him vp and sealed vpon him And were it doubtfull of Angels how they could retaine the measure of their brightnesse and blessednesse in the place of hell yet heare we Dauid confesse of God himselfe and of his spirit If I ascend to heauen thou art there if I get downe to hell thou art there So that the very fountaine of all holinesse and happinesse is in heauen earth and hell and yet the states of these three places are not confounded because the perfection of all goodnesse is present in euery of them The goodnesse and glory of God is not so fastned vnto places that either Paradise or heauen did priuilege men or Angels from sinne as heauen did not the diuels nor hell it selfe can hinder the happinesse of the blessed Angels when they are sent with power from God to execute his pleasure And yet this doth not confound the distinction of places or states in heauen or hell but that heauen is now the place where the brightnesse of Gods glory is reuealed to his Saints besides their internall and continuall vision of God which maketh them most happie and neuer leaueth them whethersoeuer they goe And therefore the Angels that sinned were cast thence that they should not defile the place of Gods presence with their wickednesse and hell is likewise the prepared mansion for the diuels where vengeance from God is powred on them and greater shall be when after iudgement they shall be closed in perpetuall prison though till that day some of them be suffered to beare rule in the aire and to worke in the children of disobedience for the triall of the saints and farder setting forth os Gods most glorious wisedome power and rightcousnesse n Defenc. pag. 119. li. â—…7 Lastly the true ioyes of heauen may be out of the locall heauen as when the glorious Angels haue bene and tarried some while here on earth with men Yet did they neuer for a moment want the toyes and glory of heauen From Angels endued with inward and heauenly light power holinesse and happinesse and by grace euerlastingly confirmed therein no argument can be drawen to our weake sinfull and variable condition neither doe we dispute of Gods power what he can doe but of his will and ordinance whereby he hath appointed heauen to be his seat that is the place where his glory is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and eternall and perfect blessednesse bestowed on all the inhabitants thereof be they men or Angels And though the Angels whethersoeuer they goe or whatsoeuer they doe retaine the cleere sight of God and the perfection of their 〈◊〉 all happinesse yet that is no proofe that we liuing here in mortall and miserable flesh can haue that on earth which they haue For example take some parts or consequents of that heauenly ioy and blisse which the Angels being heere on earth keep immutable and you shall soone see how grossely you erre in communicating their glory to men yet dwelling in houses of clay The Angels of God 〈◊〉 here on earth can neither erre sinne nor die they can feele no necessity infirmity nor miserie they need not eat sleepe nor rest they are indued with light that cannot be obscured with holinesse that cannot be defiled with ioy that cannot be diminished with power that cannot be resisted by men or Diuels Can these things be attributed to mortall men here on earth without open and palpable heresie Wherefore it is an erroneous and presumptuous inference that o Defenc pa. 120. 〈◊〉 2. If Angels may enioy heauen really being in the world that men heere liuing may doe the like p Defenc. pag. 120. 3. It is possible for Gods goodnesse to communicate some reall foretasie thereof vnto some blessed men also A taste of glory which neither continueth nor satisfieth can not be called heauen which is the perfect and perpetuall fulnesse of all kinde of blisse and want of all kinde of miserie S. Peter teacheth vs that God q 1. Pet. 1. begetieth vs into a liuely hope to an inheritance incorruptible vndefiled and vnchangeable reserued in the heauens for vs who are by the power of God kept by faith vnto saluation readie to le shewed in the last time If the taste of glory which you talke of be not immortall immutable vndefiled with any defect or miserie it may not be called heauen nor be sayd to be the inheritance reserued for vs in heauen And therefore though some blessed men haue had a sight of some glory which you call a taste thereof as Moses Esay Steuen and others yet that doth not proue them to haue beene really in the ioyes of heauen How osten is it written of the Israelites that they saw the glory of the Lord and yet they were ouerthrowen in the wildernesse r Exodus 24. ver 16. 〈◊〉 17. The glory of the Lord saith Moses abode vpon mount Sinai and the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the top of the mountaine in the eies of the children of Israel So when Aaron offered his first offering for his Priesthood and blessed the people t Leu t. 9. v. 23 The glorie of the Lord appeared to all the people of whom God saith u Numb 14. vers 22. All these men which haue seene my glory my miracles which I did in Egypt and in the wildernesse and haue tempted me these ten times certainly they shall not see the land whereof I sware to their Fathers When Salomon had builded and consecrated the temple with praier and sacrifice x 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The glory of the Lord 〈◊〉 house so that the Priests could not enter into the house of the Lord because the glory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lord had filled the Lords house And when all the children of Israel saw the fire and the glory of the Lord come downe vpon the house they bowed themselues with their faces to the earth vpon the pauement and worshipped and praised the Lord. I trust the King the Priests and the People were not all in the ioies of heauen and yet they all with their eies saw the glory of God there presented before them and such as were religious and obedient saw it to their exceeding ioy y Defenc. pag. 120. li. 5. That God doth
man compassed with sinne is able to see He saw posteriora Dei the backe parts of God for so God sayd vnto him y Exo. 33. v. 22 I will couer thee with mine hand whiles I passe by z 23. After I will take away mine hand and thou shalt see mine hinder parts but my face shalt thou not see Whereupon S. Austen sayth very aduisedly a August de Symbolo aâ—… Catethâ—…menos li 〈◊〉 ca. 3. Ipsa sunt illa posteriora Dei Christus Dei Those hinder parts of God were the Christ of God Which exposition Christ confirmeth when he sayth b Iohn 8. Your Father Abraham reioyced to see my day and he saw it and was glad Other shewes of Gods glorie some others had as Elias in the Caue the People in the Wildernesse Salomon in his Temple and Iohn Baptist in Iordan when he saw the Holy Ghost descend like a Doue and abide on Christ but none of those was the sight of Gods face which no mortall man can see and liue And that is the true and essentiall ioy of heauâ—…n to which all other degrees of perfection and happinesse are consequent c August dâ—… ciuitate Dei li. 16. â—…a 9. Videns Deum quod erit in sine praemium omnium sanctorum The sight of God sayth Austen shall in the end be the reward of all his saints Which doctrine he learned from S. Paul and S. Iohn the Apostles of Christ and they from their Master d 1. Cor. 13. Then we shall see him face to face and then shall I know sayth S. Paul euen as I am knowen When Christ shall appeare sayth S. Iohn e 1. Iohn 3. we shall be like to him for we shall see him as he is And so our Sauiour f Iohn 14. I will loue him that loueth me and shew mine owne selfe vnto him g Defenâ—… 〈◊〉 120. li. 15. Secondly it is true the Apostle sayth that here we walke by faith and liue by hope yet some rare exceptions do not ouerthrow this generall course The Scriptures are true with you saue where you list to make exceptions of your doctrine as not conteined in them nor agreeing with them No man in this life Christ Iesus only excepted had euer any such vision of God or possession and fruition of his heauenly kingdome that he did not walke by faith and liue by hope Paul was h 2. Cor. 12. taken vp into the third heauen and heard words not lawfull or not possible for man to vtter Did he then cease to walke by faith who after and alwayes prosessed of himselfe i 1 Cor. 13. Now I know in part but then I shall know as I am knowen And including himselfe with the rest k 2. Coâ—… 5. We walke by faith not by sight And â—…xactly speaking of himselfe l Galat. â—… That I now liue in the flâ—…sh I liue by the fâ—…ith of the Sonne of God m Phil. 3. that I may know him and the vertue of his resurrection and fellowship of his afflictions not as though I had alreadie attained to it but I endeuour my selfe to that which is before and follow hard towards the marke for the price of the high calling of God in Iesus Christ. If you dare defend that Paul in Paradise did see God face to face then may you say that at that time he walked not by faith but by sight but if that be a plaine errour then Paul as yet attained not the sight of Gods face nor the crowne of righteousnesse layed vp for him which should be giuen him by the iust Iudge at that day and consequently neither faith nor hope ceased in Paul notwithstanding his being in the third heauen The like I say of S. Iohn who n Reuâ—…l 4. saw a dore open in heauen and was willed to come vp thither and of all the Saints that either talked with God or had any manifest reuelation of his glory whiles here they liued The transfiguring of Christ in the mount was to him not only a ioyfull hope but a reall taste of his very heaueâ—…ly ioyes That transfiguration of Christ whether it were for himselfe or for the confirmation of his Disciples the Scriptures doe not precisely determine When a voice came from heauen to Christ in the audience of all the people Christ answered This voice came not because of me but for your sakes S. Peter who was one of those Disciples that saw him transfigured writeth thus of it o 2. Pet. 1. We followed not deceiuable fables but with our eyes we saw his Maiestie for he receiued of God the Father honour and glory when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory This is my beloued Sonne in whom I am well pleased This voice which was greater glory than his transfiguration came in respect of them to confirme them in their faith and obedience to the Sonne of God then incarnate and yet to assure their eyes by sight as well as their â—…ares by that voice he was transfigured before them but this transfiguration did not frâ—…e Christ from feare sorrow shame violence and death which followed and therefore this was not heauen to him nor all the glory prepared for him but an outward shew thereof to establish rather his Disciples then himselfe For his soule within him had here on earth greater glorie continually then a transitorie change of his body as namely the personall vnion with God which no creature man nor Angell in earth or heauen had or hath besides him the fulnesse of Gods spirit resting on him by which he knew all the counsell and will of God and all the secrets of mens hearts power ouer all flesh and command ouer all creatures which neither Saint nor Angell in heauen hath In the glory of his body Moses and Steuen did here on earth in part communicate with him P 2. Cor. 3. Moses face did shine when he knew it not The children of Israel could not behold the face of Moses for the glorie of his countenance which so glittered that the children of Israel were afrayd to come neere him he forced to put a vaile vpon his face when they spake with him and yet Moses q Exod. 34. ver 29. wist not that the skin of his face shone bright And likewise r Acts 6. all that sate in the councell where Steuen was conuented condemned looking stedfastly on him saw his face as the face of an Angell that is bright and glorious though Steuen knew it not no more than Moses for ought that the Scripture noteth of him saue that in the end Steuen s Acts 7. looking stedfastly into heauen saw the glory of God and Iesus standing at the right hand of God But the inward and continuall glorie of Christes soule heere on earth was proper to him no man nor angell matching him therein How come you then to attribute heauen vnto Christ for the
if it were possible that houre might passe from him Then he came and found them sleeping and said to Peter Couldest not thou watch one houre Watch ye and pray that ye enter not into temptation What signes or words are here of astonishment continuing astonishment stoppeth speech and motion as well as sense y Rhetoricorum ad Herâ—…nnium li. 4. Omnes stupidi timore obmutuerunt They all amazed with feare were mute sayth the heathen Oratour And so the Poet z Plautus in Epidiâ—…o Quid stas stupida quid taces Thou amazed thing why flandest thou still why art thou tongue-tied Yea Galen himselfe giueth euident testimonie that men amazed with feare neither speake nor doe any thing but stand still with their eyes open a Galenus in Aphorismos Hippocratis li. 7. apho 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Amazednesse is when men neither speake nor do any thing but abide silent with their eyes open like to men astonished with feare So that if Christ were astonished with feare or amazed he could neither haue done nor sayd any of those things which the Gospell reporteth he did and sayd and therefore vnlesse you can alter the rules of nature as you doe of Scripture Christ was in no such astonishment as you dreame of neither did his memory faile him in speaking those words for then how could he not haue rememâ—…red that they were spoken amisse and needed correction as you conceiue them Your selfe acknowledge that he might be It helpeth not you I sayd if we should so interpret the word which S. Marke vseth that Christ began to be afrayd or somewhat astonished for if b In verbo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to admire some sudden or strange sight as Phanorinus auoucheth then might our Sauiour approching Gods presence now sitting in iudgement to redeeme the world easily finde cause both of admiration and feare and yet be free and farre from suffering your hell paines And where you say my words are vtterly vntrue that c Defenc. pag. 123. li. 13. many things might astonish our Sauior for the time besides such paines they are truer than any thing you haue yet spoken or will speake of his astonishment For whether we respect the sight of his eyes or the apprehension of his minde he might either way beholde many things woorthie of that feare or astonishment which the Scripture describeth in him d Zanâ—…hius de Incar Christi li. 2. quaest 11. Thesi 2 de scientia Christi pa. 302. If with the eyes of his bodie cleered with diuine light Christ being in earth sayth Zanchius could see the things in heauen and being in heauen doth see what he will in earth as he saw and heard Steuen saying Lord Iesu receiue my spirit he saw and spake to Paul persuing him in his Church how much more can and could the soule of Christ see particular things in the word which is his Godhead So that either the eyes of Christ or the minde of Christ might beholde or consider the glory of Gods iudgement whereof he spake when he sayd e Iohn 12. Now euen at hand is the iudgement of this world or the greatnesse of mans sinne or power of Gods wrath or the vengeance deserued from which he was to ransome man and for which he was to satisfie God all these things might in more likelihood in some sort astonish the humane soule of Christ than the paines of the damned presently then inflicted on him with Gods immediate hand as you imagine but are no way able to proue saue by your owne conceit And therefore your second obseruation that these infinite incomprehensible and incomparable paines which you meane astonished is but the froth of your fansie for you shall neuer be able to iustifie any such thing by the text or historie of the Euangelists f Defenc pâ—…g 123. li. 20. Thirdly adde heereunto that which you rightly grant that it is true a mighty feare may so affect a man for the time that it shall hinder the senses from recouering themselues and stoppe the faculties from informing one another Likewise afterward astonishment draweth the mind so wholy to thinke on some speciall thing aboue our reach that during the time we turne not our selues to any other cogitation You take this to be true that I said and so do I but this vtterly subuerted your former position which now you recant that g Treat pa. 53. li. 32. Christ could not but be astonished forgetfull and all confounded in his whole humanity botâ—… in all the powers of his soule and senses of his body If Christ according to your desperate doctrine were all consounded in his whole humanity were not his vnderstanding and memory confouÌ„ded aswel as other parts of his humane nature If he were all confounded in all powers of his soule and senses of his body as your wicked error imagineth are not vnderstanding and memory powers of the soule and did not I charge you iustly and truely with casting Christ into an infernall confusion for the time since in hell it selfe they can be no more but all confounded in their whole manhoods both in all the powers of their soules and senses of their body Tell what confusion in hell is or can be more then all in all and I will yeeld I did you wrong If you cannot then bethinke your selfe how lewdly and loosely you aduentured all to confound Christ in all the powers of his soule and senses of his body in which case whether you leaue sense memory or vnderstanding vnconfounded in Chist I leaue to the censure of the discreet Reader h Defenc. pag. 124. li. 1. I say as you say he now on the suddaine might turne neither sense nor memory to any other obiect and so not thinke on any thing els but onlie on this terrible and mighty sorow and feare Your helpers haue aduised you to recall that forgetfulnesse and all confusion in all the powers of Christs soule senses of his body which before you sounded out with such waine loades of wordes as was maruailous and now you be come to say as I say that there was no confusion in the powers of Christs soule nor in the senses of his body but an intentiâ—…e cogitation on some fearefull or sorowfull thing which for the time so detained the powers of the soule as on a matter most importing and nearest touching the state of himselfe either in soule or in body that he did conuert them to no other obiect If you say thus with me then must you say farder with me that as soone as Christ beganne to vse speach or conuert his cogitation to praier this astonishment was eased and howsoeuer feare was not altogether dispelled yet he could no longer be said to be amazed or to seeke what to doe For praier to God without the mind intending and attending it is sinne which might not be in Christ and
to Gods will yes neuerthelesse as touching the desire it selfe and his particular present inclination compared to Gods particular determination herein If Christes prayer in the garden were heard as the Apostle saith it was then is it euident it was no way repugnant to the will of God for God doth not vse to grant petitions made contrarie to his will And then we must so interprete the sense of Christs praier that it might take effect in his sufferings as I thinke it did And though we should suppose it tooke not effect yet since he himselfe did so condition his desire of nature that he subiected it to the will of God which way can you proue it contrary to Gods knowen will Christs particular present inclination compared to Gods particular determination herein you say was contrary to it I denie that vtterly For Christs particular and present inclination of mans nature to dislike paine and death was Gods generall ordinance in all men and Gods speciall will in the manhood of Christ at that instant and Christes determination was the same with Gods since he submitted the one to the other and resolued as we find in his praier with obedience willingly to vndergoe that shamefull and painfull death which Gods iustice purposed for the sinnes of men Yea God hath not only ordained that the Crosse should be greeuous vnto vs as it was to the manhood of Christ but he misliketh when it is otherwise that is if we despise his correction because it is made tolerable by his fatherly goodnesse respecting our weakenesse a Ierem. 5. Thou hast striken them but they haue not sorowed saith the Prophet meaning they despised the hand of God because it was tempered with mercy and plagued them not vnto destruction Then is it Gods will that affliction should grieue vs and he hath not only so created vs but it is his purpose when he smiteth to haue vs feele it and to haue vs mourne vnder the Crosse but yet without distrust of his goodnesse or dislike of his counsell though it pinch vs neuer so neere in the sense of our nature What contrariety then to Gods will had Christs inclination of nature shunning death and the sharpenesse thereof so farre as was possible and did stand with Gods pleasure since his resolution was the same with Gods will most obediently to suffer it though it seemed neuer so sharp to his flesh which was Gods will it should as for Balaams bad desire I leaue it to you to comment thereon at your leasure his wicked auarice secretly seeking after gaine though pretending Gods name ought not in Christes case to be so much as mentioned b Defenc. pag. 125. li. 2. When we perfectly know and remember Gods certaine will euery light affection and sodaine wishing to the contrary howsoeuer conditionally is no lesse then manifest sin â—…inst God Is it sinne in Martyrs that their flesh by sense of nature endureth not quietly the rage of fire without feare and griefe or is it rather a godly conflict betwixt the â—…eadinesse of the spirit and the weakenesse of the flesh to feele the one and to follow the other in regard of duty to God and his blessed will which hath prouided not pleasure but paine to make triall of patience In desires and delights the sense of the flesh is to be declined least it bait the minde and wax vnruly but in feare and paine Gods sacred will is that the flesh should be flesh and not senselesse nor carelesse that the spirit may be prooued and the c 1. Pet. 1. triall of our faith in affliction being much more pretioâ—… then gold may be found to the praise of God It is therefore no sinne c 1. Pet. 1. for a season if need require to be in heauinesse through manifold tentations Neither did Christ tell his Disciples that they should not weepe lament nor sorow in their miseries since nothing could befall them without the direct and expresse will of God with whom the d Matth. 10. haires of their heads are numbred But he promisâ—…th their e Iohn 16. sorow shal be turned to ioy Wherefore Christs present and particular inclination in nature to dislike the bitternesse of paine and death was not contrary to Gods disposition but answeareable to it so long as in obedience he alwaies referred himselfe to the will of God and his petition being conditionall so farre as might stand with Gods good will was no way touched with any shew of sinne much lesse in plaine wordes repugnant to Gods knowen will though our Sauiour were in perfect remembrance as the Scripture declareth he was and aduisedly considered and regarded the will of God in euery part of his praier f Defenc. pag. 126. li. 11. The very nature of all conditionall desires is such that it includeth euermore a possibility at least of being contrary to his will whom we desire This generall obseruation of yours is not true and though it were it maketh nothing to this purpose The Saints haue often prayed in full persuasion of faith yet with a condition not as doubting but as humbling themselues in his presence before whom or of whom they spake When God had sayd to Iacob g Genes 28. Loe I am with thee and will keepe thee whither soeuer thou goest and will bring thee againe into this land Iacob vowed saying if God will be with me and will keepe me in the iourney which I goe so that I come againe into my fathers house in safetie then shall the Lord be my God Shall we say because God addeth a conditionall to his vow that either he doubted of Gods promise made vnto him that verie night or that it was possible to be contrarie to Gods will I trust not So Moses confessed to God h Exod. 33. See thou hast said vnto me I know thee by name and thou hast also found fauour in my sight Now therefore I pray thee if I haue found fauour in thy sight shew me now thy way that I may know thee Was Moses vnfaithfull to the mouth of God because he maketh that a condition which God vttered as an affirmatiue or was there any possibilitie of the contrarie to that which God had once pronounced Likewise the Apostles vnder conditions expresse most certaine assertions as Paul i 2. Thesâ—… 1. If it be a iust thing with God to recompense trouble to them which trouble you and to you which are troubled rest with vs when the Lord Iesus shâ—…ll shew himselfe from heauen Meaning there can be no doubt but it is iust though he made it conditionall But we need not this rule for the praiers of Christ in the garden Christ knew it was possible for Gods power to saue him from death and yet to make him the Sauiour of the world but as Gods counsell decreed and reuealed now stood he knew it was not possible the whole cup should passe from him but that he must drinke thereof
God and chiefly Christs soule when it descended to hell not only to be brought thence but euen there by gods hand assisting to destroy the strength of Satans kingdome and to triumph ouer all the powers and Principalities of darkenesse If those wordes did alwaies import a present possession and fruition of heauenly glorie then could Dauid with no truth haue spoken them of himselfe so long before his death when as yet no part of Gods promises to him touching his kingdome were perfourmed But the soules of the faithfull are alwaies in the hand of God whiles heere they are protected by him and after this life receaued in rest though they come not as yet to be inuested with the fulnesse of heauenly glory Yea the words properly pertaining to our Sauiours person and condition after death ` Thou wilt not leaue or forsake my soule in hell doe shew that Christs soule was then in Gods hands and compassed round with the power and glory of God when hell and Satan trembled at his presence and were both vanquished and spoiled by him Your adding that this sentence may be fitly applied to Christ prooueth nothing For though I haue no doubt but Christs soule was with farre greater honour and fauour ioy and blisse receaued into the hands of God to whom it was committed then the soules of all his Saints yet that doth not prooue his present entraunce after death into the glory of heauen and continuance in the same except you will say that at his resurrection and till his Ascension his soule was out of his Fathers hands because during that time it was on earth and not in heauen which were a strange position in diuinity The soules of the righteous were in the hands of God long before Christs comming as the wise man witnesseth and yet were they not in the glory of heauen but in Abrahams bosome as our Sauiour teacheth And so the wise man expoundeth himselfe adding No torment shall touch them they are in peace and in the time of their visitation they shall shine reseruing them to a time appointed when glory shal be reuealed on them though in the meane whiles their spirits were kept in rest and ioy vnder the mighty hand of God The Thieues being in Paradise with Christ the same day that he died concludeth no such thing as you conceaue For first no words there or els where euince that Christ spake this of his humane nature Saint Austen resolueth The sense is much easier and freer from all ambiguities if Christ be vnderstood to haue said this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise not of his manhood but of his godhead And in his 111. Tractate vpoÌ„ Iohn vpholding the same exposition addeth He that said to the thiefe painfully hanging yet healthfully confessing this dâ—…y shalt thou be with me in Paradise according to his manhood had his soule that daâ—…e in hâ—…ll his flesh 〈◊〉 the graue but according to his godhead vndoubtedlie he was in Paradise Titus Bishop of Bostra in Arabia somewhat elder then Austen sheweth how these words may be verified of either of Christs natures How was this promise of our Lord made to the thiefe this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise performed Christ takâ—…n dâ—…wne from the crosse was in hell according to his soule and neuerthelesse by the power of his diuinity brought the Thiefe into Paradise Happily he first caried the beleeuing Thiefe to Paradise before he descended to hell Damascen is of Austens mind The same Christ is adored in heauen as God together with the Father and with the holy Ghost and he as man lay in the Sepulchre with his body and abode in hell with his soule and gaue entrance to the thiefe into Paradise his diuinity which cannot be comprehended in any place euery where accompanying him And so is Euthymius How said Christ this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise because as God who filleth all places he was euery where at one instant in the sepulchre in hell and in Paradise and in heauen But admit the words to be ment of Christs humane soule what reason call you this Christs soule was in Paradise that very day that he died ergo neither that day nor any day els before his resurrection his soul did or could descend to hell You must amend these reasons before any man will yeeld you to haue reason or sense Christ might that very day that he went to Paradise subdue and subiect all power in hell vnto himsâ—…lfe he might doe it the next day he might doe it the third day when he rose from the dead the time is not the thing we striue for which we must leaue to God but the reall and actuall performance of the Apostles words He spoiled powers and principalities and made an open shew of them triumphing ouer them in himselfe which in other words Peter expressed when he said Christs soule was not left or forsaken in hell but God raised him â—…p loosing the sorowes of death or hell that euery knee of things vnder earth should â—…ow vnto him as well as of things in heauen and earth and that euerie tongue euen of the damned and Diuels for there are none other vnder earth should confesse either willingly or constrainedly Iesus Christ to be Lord vnto the glory of God the Father This conquest ouer hell and Satan being acknowledged whereby all power in heauen and earth and consequently in hell conteined in the earth was yeelded vnto Christs manhood after his death and before or at his resurrection we shall not need to be curious about the time and manner thereof The compilers of the centuries at Magdeburge doe well admonish Descendisse Christum in infernum articulus sidei est verum quanam ratione ibi omnia sunt gesta non est expresse traditum That Christ descended to hell is an article of the faith but in what sort all things there were donne is not expressely deliuered Happilie it is enough for vs to hâ—…ld the generall and a more exact declaration of this mysterie wee shall heare in another life The eternall and generall ordinance of God is shewed Luc. 16. to be such that none can goe out of heauen downe to hell nor come from hell vp to heauen You boldly presume after your maner that Abrahams bosome was heauen of which many learned men do make great doubt For if the soules of the righteous were in heauen before Christes death and biâ—…th then were they equall vnto the elect Angels before the resurrection which Christ saith shall be when they are the children of the resurrection and so not before And how were the wordes of our Sauiour true which he spake in his life time No man ascendeth vp to heauen but he that descended from heauen the Sonne of man which is in heauen If all the Saints deceased were in heauen or how had
he the preeminence in all things if all the Patriarks and Prophets were there before him againe the words of Abraham reach no farder then vnto men they restraine not Angels from descending and ascending and much lesse the sonne of God If none without exception could goe fro heauen to hel as you would construe Abrahams speach how fell the Diuell and his Angels from heauen to hell how did Saint Iohn see an Angel come downe from heauen hauing the key of the bottomlesse pitte binding shutting vp Satan in that pitte if Angels may passe from the one place to the other how much more might Christ who is the Lord head of Angels and hath the keies of hell and death But since the Scriptures anouch Christes soule was not left in hell there are plainer and exprâ—…sser words for the being of his soule in hell then in Abrahams bosome so if there be no returne thence no not for Christ himselfe then by your lame and lewd collection you condemne Christs soule to perpetuall prison in hell And how commeth it to pasâ—…e by your diuinity that Abraham must receaue Christs soule into his bosome who was the Redeemer and Sauiour of Abraham is your skill so great that you forget Christ to be the sonne of God and so meeter to receaue Abrahams soule into his protection then to be receaued of Abraham but what will you not say and suppose to continue the credit of your conceits in the eies of the simple though no wise man vnlesse wedded to your deuices will any thing be mooued with these weake suggestions As touching Austens diuers opinion and yours see before page 29 and your page 360. Could you find any diuersity worth the marking between Austens opinion and mine touching Christs words on the crosse to the thiâ—…fe your modesty would serue you to make the most of it but if I repeat diuers opinions of learned writers and leaue the Reader to his Christian liberty which he best liketh what offence take you at that except it be that I follow not your trade which is to despise all the world besides your selfe Indeed in your 29 Page you say I reiect Austens exposition of Christes words to the Thiefe this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise which Austen vnderstandeth of the thiefes soule and Christs diuine presence in Paradise but you keepe your wont to tell taâ—…es for trueth and to wast words when you want good matter For I doe not reiect Austens exposition but only adde as now I doe since there is no Scripture to fasten Christs soule to hell for the whole time of his death Christs soule might after death at diuers times be in Paradise and in hell Wherein I leaue the Reader to his discretion which of those two expositions he will embrace Neither did I in this anouch more then Austen himselfe els where is content to yeeld For reasoning against Felicianus the Arrian he saith Seddicet aliquis deitatis hanc non animae Christi credimus vocem But some will say we beleeue this to day shalt thou be with me in Paradise was the voice of Christs deity and not of his soule To which part then of the thiefe doe we take this promise was made this day saith Christ to the thiefe shalt thou be with me in Paradise whose body the common death had inclosed vntill the resurrection to come It was then the soule of the thiefe to which Christ promised and performed this Whereupon he concludeth Si igitur mortuo corpore ad Paradisum anima mox vocatur quemquamne adhuc tam impium credimus qui dicere audeat quoniam anima seruatoris nostritriduo illo corporeae mortis apud inferos custodiae mancipetur If then the body of the thiefe dying his soule were presently called to Paradise shall we thinke any man so wicked as to dare say that the soule of our Sauiour during the three dayes that his bodie lay dead was held in the custodie of hell So that though S. Austen acknowledge the other sense of Christes diuine presence in Paradise to be multo expeditior ab ijs omnibus ambiguitatibus liber farre the easier and freer from all obiections yet he doth not endure that any man should so fasten the soule of Christ to hell for the time of his death that Christ might not thence depart and be in Paradise when pleased him as well as the Thiefe but must stay in hell as if he were kept in custodie How you will doe to maintaine that Christ went indeed to them but presently left them that he might goe to hell I know not In this I doubt you walke without your guide If I did vse any such wordes that Christ must presently post from heauen to hell as if he were like to be benighted afore he came thither you might busie your braines with lacke of time and want of guides but if Angels present themselues heere from heauen in a moment and time almost insensible what should hinder the soule of Christ endued with greater power and might then any Angel to goe at what time and with what speed he would to doe that which the Scriptures testifie he did If then the Prophets and Apostles beare witnesse that his soule was in hell and there not left but ascending vpward ledde captiuitie caâ—…tiue and spoiled powers and principalities why play you the iade in iesting at an Article of the Christian faith as if the way were long and tedious betweene Paradise and hell so that Christ must haue some time and helpe to dispatch so great a iourney The Apostle teacheth that the resurrection of the dead shall be in a moment and in the twinckling of an eie If so generall and strange a worke as to haue all their soules out of Paradise and hell ioyned to their bodies and their persons aliue caught vp to the iudgement seate of Christ in the aire shall be wrought in all the sonnes of men elect and reprobate at an instant what incredible thing is this except to an infidell that he which made heauen and earth with a word should in as short time as he saw cause shew his humane soule to the powers of darknesse in the midst of their kingdome and take all strength and rule from them and lead them captiue at his pleasure And therefore neuer calculate so curiously the distance or passage from Paradise to hell if these things were not marueilous in mans eies they were not meet workes for the Sonne of God but examine soberly whether the Scripture auouch any such presence of Christes soule in hell and conquest ouer hell And if that appeare teach men to leaue the rest to the mightie hand of God which brought the soule of his Sonne thither in what time and maner he thought good and might best make for his glory I adde that which is cleere and certaine yea that which your selfe rightly beleeueth and professeth with
and specially the nether most Sheol to be below in the deepe of the earth to be opposite to heauen to be the place of punishment for the wicked after their deaths warrant in the sacred Scriptures to vphold these assertions For though Sheol extend to any place vnder earth that by Gods ordinance requireth or receaueth the bodies or soules of the dead in that respect to the godly it can be no more then the graue the losse of all things in this life consequent to the graue in that sense we must interprete Sheol when it is applied to the bodies or persons of the Saints whose soules are in rest and blisse with God not vnder the earth where Sheol is yet the ful force of that word wheÌ„ it is threatned to any or affirmed of the wicked noteth the pit of destructioÌ„ for their soules aswel as of corruption for their bodies the consequents of either the nethermost Sheol expressely designeth the place of torment appointed for sinners that die out of Gods fauour receaue the iust reward of their vnrighteousnesse The way of life saith Salomon is aboue to him that knoweth to decline from Sheol that is below Where first it is euident that as heauen is aboue in which is true and eternall life so Sheol which is the pit of death for bodie and soule is below vs which must needes be in the earth vnder vs. This partition of celestiall terrestriall and infernall persons and places the Apostle warranteth by this authoritie when he saith Euery knee of things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in heauen on the earth and vnder the earth should and shall bow at the name of Iesus And since the whole world is by the word of God in the creation conseruation and alteration thereof sufficiently deuided into heauen and earth the place of hell must of necessitie be either out of the whole world created by God and so no where or in heauen which is an impious absurditie and monstrous contrarieâ—…e or else it must be within the compasse of the earth and not being vpon the earth where men liue it must needes be vnder the earth whither the wicked descend when they die This distribution also Saint Iohn ratifieth when he saith None in heauen nor on earth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor vnder the earth was able to open the booke Wherefore the booke of Iob to expresse the infinitenesse of Gods perfection and wisedome vseth these foure comparisons The heauens are high what canst thou doe there It is deeper then Sheol how canst thou know it the measure thereof is longer then the earth and broder then the sea Where if we bee not wilfully blâ—…nd wee cannot choose but see that Sheol is not onely deepe but the deepest place in the world euen as heauen is the highest To compare the wisedome of God with the graue which is sixe foote deepe or not so much were most ridiculous since we commonly digge to that depth and deeper vpon diuers occasions And therefore Sheol is the deepest place in the earth to which no man liuing euer pearced to make report of the deepenesse of it Moses confirmeth the same when he saith sire shall burne to the lower Sheol and shall eate through the earth and inflame the foundations of the hils As the situation of Sheol is below vnder the earth that is in the bottome of the earth so is it a place threatned to the soules not onely to the bodies of the wicked though at length it shall receaue both Dauid putting a difference betwixt himselfe and the wicked saith Like sheepe shall they be laid in Sheol but God will redâ—…eme my soule from the hand of Sheol Dauid neuer drempt that his soule should bee in the graue nor that the soules of the wicked should there be laid much lesse that his bodie should be freed from the graue more then the bodies of such as knew no God at all Sheol then here as in sundry other parts of Scripture signifieth somewhat from which the godly shal be saued and whereto the wicked shal be euerlastingly adiudged But that is not the graue which is common to all men good and bad It was therefore the Sheol of soules from which Dauid hoped to be deliuered and which the wicked shall not auoyd And so are his very words The Lord will deliuer my soule from the power of Sheol Againe the full reward of wickednesse is not the graue whereto the godly come as well as the godlesse But Sheol is threatned in the Scriptures as the full and finall wages of all impietie neither is there any other note or name sor hell except metaphoricall throughout the Old Testament Wherefore when Dauid saith sinners shall be turned to Sheol and all nations that forget God he doth not threaten them with that which is generall to all Gods children but with that which is peculiar to all Gods enemies which must needes be hell and not the graue And so much Caluine himselfe who otherwise ouermuch vrgeth the right sense of Sheol to be the graue confesleth to be the true meaning of this place The Hebrew word Sheôlah to Sheol which was ambiguous I doubted not to translate by the name of hell For though it displease me not that others translate it the graue yet it is certaine that somewhat heere is noted by the Prophet besides the common death Otherwise he should say nothing of the wicked that should not indifferently agree to all the faithfull Obserue this rule which indeed is true that when the Scriptures threaten the wicked with Sheol they meane not the graue which is common to all the godly but that Sheol which is appointed for the wicked from which the faithfull shall be freed and you may spare all your figures and phrases wherewith you loade both your selfe and your Reader in this place to no purpose For there is a Sheol as Salomon noteth that shall swallow men aliue and whole which cannot be the graue where there lyeth but one part of man and that after his death And since the Scripture in exact tearmes maketh a lower Sheol which cannot be but in comparison of an higher with what face can you elude the lower Sheol to be nothing but the graue whereas one and the same thing cannot bee by any meanes both lower and higher in respect of it selfe And therefore howsoeuer you could shuffle with the name of Sheol without addition against both learning and trueth yet to auouch the lower Sheol to be onely the graue is onely a point of your accustomed impudencie which regardeth neither reason nor sense so long as you may ourface all with your priuate and witlesse fansie Come now to the place of Esaie the fourteenth where you so premâ—…rily pronounce that whatsoeuer others thinke the circumstances doe conuince the graue onely is there ment and see your owne follie if pride haue not so closed your eyes
appellantur Inferi ex eo quod nihil suaue habeant resonâ—…re perhibetur it sheweth his mistaking more yea the very ground of all his mistaking as I thinke Though Austens skill in the Greeke tongue was not so great that he could readily reade and vnderstand the writings of the Grecians as himselfe confesseth yet wanting that he kept himselfe to the best and most approoued translation of the Latine and gat so much knowledge at length that he could compare the originall Greeke with the translation and see the difference betwixt them as is euident in many places of his works The deriuation which you so much depraue was made by many Grecians as well as by Saint Austen and therefore he may the better be excused in ioyning with them Eustathius the learned expounder of Homer saith that many deriued Hades without contraction and did not subscribe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vnder the first letter as you haue it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but affirme hades to be deriued from hêdo by a kind of antiphrasis because no man delighteth or reioiceth therein so Hesychius the great Grammarian witnesseth that Ades in the Greeke tongue doth signifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vnsweete or vnpleasant and Hades hath his h of aspiration from the Atticke and not from the common Greeke tongue as Eustathius noteth So that there is no cause why you should so much reuell at Saint Austens ignorance in the Greeke tongue as you doe he followed whom he liked and yet notwithstanding he wanted the perfection of the Grecke tongue hee goeth righter to the nature and force of Inferâ—… and Hades then you and your paâ—…ners with your glut of Greeke For Austen saith two things of Inferi which you would faine impugne if you could tell how the one is Inferi eo quod infra sunt Latine appellantur Inferi are in Latine so called because they are below The other Sicut secundum corpus inferiora sunt omnia grauiora ita secundum spiritum inferiora sunt omnia tristiora As all bodily thinges the lower their naturall place the waightier they are so all spirituall thinges the lower the griâ—…uouser they are You against all reason and learning contradict both these for you say that heauen is infernus which by force of the word must needes be below and you bring death which is a most grieuous thing into heauen though it be the highest place and state that men can or shall haue Besides you sticke not to alter your authors Irenaeus Tertullian and Ambrose whom you bring for your pretence and where they talke of an innisible place or prison you turne their wordes to an inuisible state common to good and bad Irenaeus in that place saith nothing of Hades Ambrose saith the heathen were of opinion that soules loosed from their bodies went to aides a place not seene which the Latines call infernus Tertullian saith Carcerem illum quod Euangelium demonstrat inferos intelligimus That prison which the Gospell mentioneth we vnderstand to be inferi What is this to heauen or paradise or to the state of blessed soules departed this life Hades signifieth sometimes darknesse or a place of darknesse not that the state of all the dead generally was thought to be in darknesse but because death tooke them out of this cheerefull worldes light and couered them as it were with darknesse and obliuion from the worlds sight and knowledge You would faine shift off the description of Hades made by Greeke Fathers which by no meanes can agree to heauen or paradise but your shifts are all of one sort that is deuoid of learning trueth and sense The Greeke writers of all ages that were Christians acknowledge Hades to be full of fearefull and eternall darknesse As Nazianzene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ comming to the house of Hades all full of mist and darknesse And Chrysostome The Lord descending into the darke mist of Hades Eustathius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hades is a darke place vnder earth Nicetas Choniates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The darke and dreadfull tabâ—…nacles of Hades Nicephorus Gregoras 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We walked in grosse darkenesse as they say of those that destend to Hades Phauorinus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hades is a placâ—… voide of light and full of eternall darkenesse These and the like testimonies when you cannot auoid you answer that the soules of the godly are taken out of this cheerefull worlds light and couered as it were with darkenesse and obliuion from the worlds sight and knowledgâ—… as if this world were cheerefull light and the light of heauen must for your pleasure be counted darknesse or the sight of Christ and his Saints might be called as it were obliuion that we should take more ioy and comfort in the faces of mortall men then of the Lord Iesus This conceit would well become him that had no heauen but this world otherwise to change the natures and names of earthly and heauenly things vpside downe and to diâ—…grace eternall blisse with the notâ—… of darknesse and obliuion preferring temporall ease or honor before it as cheerefull light this is fit for a Pagan but not for a Christian. I come from the auncients to the later learned writers that we may not neglect their iudgement in this qâ—…stion who were obserued before yet because you let them go without saluting them they shall be noted once more that I may presse you with them As you haue handled the auncients so doe you the later writers you doe not or will not vnderstand them but keepe on your peruerting of these as you did of the other I could easily haue saluted them if leasure had then serued to me to discusse all your vntoward assertions and allegations which because it did not you will once more presse me with them Well then let vs heare them Bucere saith the Scripture no where speaketh or hades of infernum but as being common as well to the blessed as to the damned When you alleage but little you should alleage it right not adde what pleaseth you to other mens words In this place which you bring out of Bucere he maketh no mention of hades at all that is your interlacing by Infernus he meaneth the gâ—…aue which is common to good bad His own words are Quid hîc sit ad infernum descendere aliud quam recondi corpus sub terra What is heere descending to infernus but the body to be couered vnder earth The reason whereof he giueth Sheôl enim pro quo in Scripturis nâ—…s fere infernus legimus sepulchrâ—… significat Sheol for which in the Scriptures we read almost euery where infernus signifieth the graue And so he there interpreteth himselfe Sanctos qui in inferno erant id est dormiebant corpore in puluere terrae The Saints which were in infernus that is which slept with
recenseri insernum siue gehennam mortem peccatum legem In the meane while thou must see our enemies heere numbred in order hell or gehenna death sinne and the law Christ hath gotten the victory ouer all these and the fruit of that victory redoundeth to vs. Bullinger The Apostle declareth that the victory ouer sinne death and hell is gotten by the might and merits not of the saints but of Christ to whom the saints must yeeld all glory praise and thanks And this explanation hath very excellent degrees First â—… hell to wit the excrlasting punishment whereby the dead are condemned to the second death the second is sinne which is the force of death and hell For by sinne came death The third is the law the strength of sinne The law being then taken away the force of sinne decaieth sinne being abolished the power of death ceaseth death being disarmed hell is ouerthrowen Hyperius If death shall then haue no more rule it followeth that neither hell shall preuaile against the godly For this must be vnderstood of them since the wicked shall not be deliuered from the power of hell In these words ô death where is thy sting ô hell where is thy victory either God as conquerer or the saints as giuing the praise of the conquest to God in a sort reproch death and hell with the losse of their power and strength And very aptly is death put first and then hell For men die before they be cast into hell in which the wicked tast the second or eternall death Moe might be brought but with wise men there can be no question that the Saints at the last day being then fully freed from all their enemies may giue thanks to God for the victory purchased by Christ against them all hell and Satan not excepted Also we are to note that the Apostle heere plainely alludeth to that of Hoseah O Sheol o kingdome of death I wil be thy destruction not ô hell The Prophet speaketh this to comfort Israel in their captiuity against their continuall destruction and raizings out of this world You will soone brest other men that will beard the Apostle in this matter so boldly as you doe Indeed you and some others thinke it a glory to take part with the Iewes contradicting all that the Euangelists Apostles alleage out of the law and the Prophets touching Christ and his kingdome and you vouchsafe to yeeld to the holy Ghost speaking in them no more skill or vnderstanding of the old Testament but to allude to it and as it were to play with it when the true literall sense of most places as you thinke is farre from that which they intend But this Iudaizing whiles you would seeme more then others to smatch of a little Hebrew I for my part detest and professe to the world I take that euery where to be the true and direct meaning of Moses and the Prophets which Christ and his Apostles collect from their words And therefore Ierom saith of this very place as I say of all others That which the Apostle referreth to the resurrection of the Lord nos aliter interpretari nec possumui nec audemus we neither can nor dare interprete otherwise Yea so well learned you are in the circumstances of the Prophets speach that you pronounce The Prophet speaketh this to comfort Israel in their captiuity shewing that now the Lord would stay his iudgment that way and death should now destroy them no more Whereas Israel was then in no captiuity as appeareth by the 16 verse of the same chapter Samaria shal be desolute And God had no meaning to tell the people he would now stay his hand and they should be destroied no more because in the two next verses he threatneth They should be spoiled dried and desolate they should fall by the sword their infants should be dashed in pieces and their women with child should be ripâ—… Wherefore except you will haue the holy Ghost to speake contradictions as your manner is you must acknowledge that amidst the fearefull troubles destructions and desolations then and afore denounced by the Prophet against the whole kingdome of Israel God doth comfort his elect amongst them that whatsoeuer became of their bodies in this affliction approching he had his time when he would vtterly destroy the power of all their enemies not onely freeing them by death from tyrants and persecutors but sauing them from death and hell by his annointed Messias who should be a death to death and a destruction to hell And as this was the greatest comfort and onely hope that Gods children in their miseries could expect or desire so the Apostle keepeth right the Prophets meaning and sheweth the time when all this shal be performed that is when all teares shal be wiped from the eies of Gods elect and all their enemies sinne death and hell troden vnder their feete In this comfort and promise as hell was the chiefest enemy so of all others that must be conteined within the limits of Gods assurance and their deliuerance In vaine are all other promises of grace whiles that enemy standeth vnuanquished And therefore as we most needed so God most promised and Christ most performed the destruction of hell aboue and afore the death of the body which you so much talke of and from which you giue to the reprobate a resurrection as well as to the godly which is but a cold comfort to him that duely considereth it Next we come to the Reuelation First I haue the keyes of Hades that is of destruction or of the kingdome of death and of death Or we may take them as two words for oâ—… and the same thing That is both of them for death What shew of reason haue you to bring in here Christs power ouer the damned soules in hell because there is mention else where of the key of hell therefore the key of Hades here is the same What colour of reason is there in this Euen so much as you can not resist For if it be certaine which the Scripture confirmeth that Christ hath the keyes of both that is as well of hell as of death and gate them both by submitting himselfe to death And Hades in the new Testament is taken for hell as hitherto we haue seene and euen with Saint Iohn the writer of this Reuelation it is a different thing from death what can Hades be here but hell That Christ by his obedience vnto death had all power in heauen and earth and hell giuen him the Apostle is very plaine Christ became obedient to the death euen the death of the Crosse. Wherefore or for which cause God highly exalted him and gaue him a Name aboue euery name that at the name of Iesus euery knee of those in heauen on earth and vnder the earth should bow and euery tongue confesse that Iesus is the Lord. As he himselfe also witnessed when he said
no doubt can be made saue of Austen onely because he sometimes repeateth the Creede without that clause which yet he confesseth to be a maine point of the Christian faith That in all places they did varie from this forme though you pretend the names of Ignatius Irenaeus Iustine Tertullian Origen c. yet they prooue no such thing These Fathers do often as learned discoursers enlarge the parts of the Creed somtimes as short comprisers of it they contract the summe thereof into fewer wordes but yet the most and most famous churches had from the beginning a briefe collection of the Christian faith deliuered to the simple people to be learned and said by heart before they could be baptized Of this doe many learned and auncient Fathers beare witnesse Duodecim Apostolorum Symbolo sides sancta concepta est In the Creed of the twelue Apostles saith Ambrose is the holy faith conceaued or comprised So Leo Catholici Symbolibreuis perfecta confessio dâ—…odecim Apostolorum totidem est signata sententijs The short and perfect confession of the Catholike Creed is sealâ—…d vp with twelue sentences of the twelue Apostles So Ierom. In the Creed of our faith and hope which being deliuered from the Apostles is not written in paper and â—…ke but in the tables of mens hearts after the confession of the Trinitie and vnitie of the Church all the mysteries of Christian Religion are closed vp with the resurrection of the â—…lesh Isidore saith the Apostles readie to depart one from another Normam prius sibi futurae praedicationis in commune constituunt appoint first in common a summe of that they would preach least sâ—…uered in diâ—…ers places they â—…ould propose any diuers or dissonant thing to those whom they brought to the â—…ith of Christ. Rabanus Maâ—…rus de Institutione clericorum li. 2. ca. 56. hath the very same wordes Neither could Tertullian whose name you vse haue truely said r Regâ—… fidei vn a omnino est sola immobilis irreformabilis there is but one rule of faith and only that immooueable and vnchangeable vnlesse there had beene some forme of faith receaued in the Church which no man might alter or change For how could he saie there is but ONE RVLE if euery Church had a seuerall rule Or how was it immooueable or irreformable if there were no certaine wordes or parts but euerie man might alter at his will Tertullian therefore doth not repeat the words of the Creed which he varieth in euerie place where he citeth it but he pointeth to the chiefe parts thereof no where keeping the same words but in substance the same matter Against Praxeas the heretike he saith Hanc regulam ab initio Euangelij decurrisse This rule of faith hath had continuance from the beginning of the Gospell Against heretikes in generall he saith Haec regula à Christo probabitur instituta This rule shall be prooued to haue beeâ—…e appointed by Christ. And yet in these two places he keepeth not the same wordes but the same heades and as it were the same principles of faith As likewise both these differ in wordes from that rule which he cited before being omnino vna euerie where one and by no meanes alterable Irenaeus saith The Church throughout the whole world euen to the endes of the earth receaâ—…ed from the Apostles and their Disciples that faith which be beleâ—…eth in one God the Father almightie maker of heauen earth c and in Iesus Christ the Sonne of God incarnate for our saluation and in the holie spirit which preached by the Prophets the dispensation and comming of God and the birth of Christ our Lord by the Virgine his pâ—…ssion resurrection and ascension with his flesh into heauen and his comming from heauen in the glory of his Father to recapitulate all to raise vp all flesh and to giue iust iudgement in all Thâ—… faith the Church dispâ—…rsed through the world hauing receaued faithfully keepeth and constantly teacheth and deliuereth these things as it were with one mouth For though there be different languages in the worlde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Yet the summe aud effect of the tradition or faith deliuered is one and the same Neither doe the Churches in Germany otherwise beleeue or otherwise teach nor those in Spaine nor those in Fraunce nor those in the East nor those in Egypt nor those in Africke nor those in the middest of the world So that all the churches in the world had one and the same tradition and rule of faith and though the wordes in some places did differ yet in sense they agreed and the chiefer the churches were the more was their care to preserue this Creed not written as Ierom and others confesse but deliuered and receaued by hart euen from the Apostles and their Disciples And since the Church of Rome then one of the most famous Churches in the world kept this Creede comprised in twelue sentences according to the number of the twelue Apostles as Leo testifieth not long after Ruâ—…ines time and Ambrose said the same in effect euen in Ruâ—…ines time and other Churches likewise both East and West had retained the same from their first foundation as Irenaeus witnesseth It can not be but the Creede which we haue at this day was the verie same which the primitiue churches had and kept and these auncient Fathers that alleage the authoritie thereof bring not euerie where the exact wordes but the chiefe parts and grounds thereof as appeareth by Tertullian who saith The Rule or Creed is one and vnchangeable notwithstanding he bringeth three seueral variations therof in wordes For the clause of Christs descent to hell I haue said before it was retained in many places though it wanted in the church of Rome and some other churches of the East and no doubt the Church of Rome and the rest conceaued no lesâ—…e by Christes resurrection from the dead but that he rose conquerer of death and hell as the prophet foretold he should in saying O death I will be thy death ô hell I will bee thy destruction as Christ professed he did when he said I haue the keies of death and hell and as the great and generall Councels of Ephesus Chalcedon and Constantinople did expound that Article of the Creed Christ rose the third day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hauing â—…irst spoiled hell And vpon this resolution of these generall Councels and not as you dreame vpon the opinion of Limbus preuailing the Churches that wanted that Article which others had receaued it into their Creed as contained there before in force and effect but now they concurred in one consent of faith and wordes which before they did not Our third reason is if there be no certaine benefit to the godly by Christs going to hell then doubtlesse he went not thither But there is no certaine benefit to the godly by Christs going to hell Therefore
vs. In this sense all that the Scripture intendeth by wrath in God is most proper and naturall to God namely his holinesse abhorring sinne his iustice proportioning punishment to it and his power performing whatsoeuer his will and councell decreeth for the repressing or reuenging of sinne For which respect Zanchius a very moderate and considerate writer of our time and one whom amongst others the Discourser iudgeth no way inferior to the best of the Auncients setteth downe this for one of his Resolutions which he calleth a Thesis Ira eo sensu quo scripturae dant illam deo veré proprié ei attribuitur Anger in that sense in which the Scriptures giue it to God is truely and properly ascribed vnto him And his resolutions ensuing vpon the former are not onely that God is angry he meaneth truely and properly as his first Thesis affirmeth with all sinners as well elect as reprobate but that maior grauior est ira dei aduersus homines etiam electos propter peccata quam existimari possit ab ipsis hominibus The anger of God against his elect for sinne is greater and greeuouser then they can conceiue A second signification of proper may be that this wrath which the Scriptures attribute to God is proper to him and common to no creature els Men and deuils haue wrath but that is tumultuous or vitious and hath no communion with Gods wrath which is righteous and holy The Saints and Angels in heauen no doubt detest all iniquitie but they are no fit discerners esteemers nor rewarders of sinne The secrets of the heart they know not whose vncleannesse is open onely to the eies of God The waight of sinne they cannot truely balance he onely that is offended and cannot be deceiued rightly knoweth how farre euery sinne should displease and what euery sinne deserueth As they cannot fully ponder offences no more can they iustly proportion punishment to the demerits of euery sinner and least of all ordaine and arme meanes temporally to afflict or eternally to reuenge the bodies and soules of transgressors he onely that is all-wise all-holy all-iust and allmightie can throughly discerne perfectly dislike euenly reward and powerfully represse sinne by repentance or vengeance as seemeth best to him and therefote he onely is the righteous Iudge of the world and capable of that wrath which is proper to God A third meaning of Gods proper wrath may be this that as euery thing most rightly deserueth his name when it hath in 〈◊〉 permixtion of the contrary to alter his nature so Gods proper wrath may be that which is wholy and onely wrath without any temper of mercie or loue to diminish the heate and hight of wrath That is most properly light that hath no darkenesse trueth that hath no falshood good that hath no euill in it And since Gods iustice against the wicked admitteth neither loue to their persons nor mercie to their miseries that is also Gods proper wrath which is fully and wholy wrath without any fauour or pitie towards them that are the vessels of wrath appointed to destruction Of their damnation S. Iohn writeth The smoke of their torment shall ascend for euer and they shal haue no rest day nor night Wherby it is euident their iudgement shall be mercilesse their worme neuer dying and the fire neuer quenching And how can it be otherwise since they are both haters and hated of God Iacob haue I loued saith God and Esau haue I hated Thou hatest saith Dauid to God all those that worke wickednesse Yea the wrath of God saith Paul is reuealed from heauen against all vngodlinesse and vnrighteousnesse of men For as they regarded not to know God so God deliuered them vp into a reprobate minde to doe vnseemely things Neither is there any greater wrath in this life then for men to be left to the lustes of their owne hearts that they may be full of all vnrighteousnesse wickednesse maliciousnesse haters of God inuenters of euill voyde of all loue fidelitie and mercie and here receiue in themselues a meete reward of their errour to prepare them for eternall vengeance with diuels in the world to come This wrath of God against the wicked hath in it neither loue nor mercie but is wholy wrath proportioned to their desires which are sinnefull and their deserts which are hatefull before God and so they feele the iust and full recompence of their affected ignorance and wilfull disobedience Of this wrath the elect doe not taste they are freed from it in Christ their Redeemer and Sauiour by whose spirit their mindes are lightned and renued and their hearts perswaded to the obedience of faith and by whose death they are wholy deliuered from the wrath to come Of the two former they often taste specially when they neglect continuall and serious repentance to which free remission of sinnes is offered in the blood of Christ Iesus or when through the rebellion of the flesh against the spirit they are caried backe to the desires of their former corruption In which cases the Lord with sundry and sore afflictions letteth them sharpely feele what it is to prouoke the holinesse or abuse the goodnesse of so gracious a Father and neuer leaueth scourging them till they see and acknowledge their vnrulinesse and lament and leaue their vncleannesse taking hope and hold through faith of his mercies promised them in Christ Iesus If it can not be truely sayd of the elect that in this third sense which you vrge they taste of Gods proper wrath because of the loue which God beareth and sheweth them in Christ his sonne how much lesse may it be auouched of Christ himselfe that he suffered all Gods proper wrath on whom nothing was layed for our sinnes but with so great loue fauour and honour considering the cause which he vndertooke that God in each and all Christs sufferings declared him to be the best pleasing sacrifice and most sufficient recompense for sinne that heauen could yeeld or God would haue For whether wee looke to the choise of the person to the measure of his chastisement or to the reward of his labour wee shall see the exceeding and admirable loue and fauour of God towards him albeit the iustice of God kindled against our sinnes did not quit him from all paine yea that very chastisement by which he yeelded and learned obedience did not onely witnesse but also increase Gods loue towards him And where you Sir Discourser cast your eyes onely vpon Gods seuere and implacable iustice against sinne when you speake of Christes sufferings to serue your owne turne and to tole in hell-paines with some pretence of piety all the godly may perceiue and must confesse that God in satisfaction for sinne had greater regard of his holinesse despised by mans disobedience and of his glorie defaced by Satans triumph for our fall than of the rigor of his iustice prouoked by contempt of his commandement For
of it The end and vse of parables which are allegoricall similitudes ouâ—… Sauiour confessed when his disciples asked him Why speakest thou to them in parables Who answered because it is giuen to you to know the secrets of the kingdome of heauen but to them it is not giuen To them that are without all things are done in parables that seeing they may see and not discerne and hearing they may heare and not vnderstand Then serue parables and allegories which are both one to hide the meaning of the speaker and to darken the vnderstanding of the hearer But the Iudgement of Christ hath cleane contrarie purposes and must haue plaine and proper speech that the whole world may heare it with their eares vnderstand it with their hearts and see it executed with their eyes For how should allegories or metaphores be executed by Gods Angels who shall be the ministers in that iudgement or how shall all the elect concurre with Christ in iudgement if he vse metaphores and allegories knowen onely to himselfe It is euident therefore the generall and finall sentence by which the wicked shall be adiudged to euerlasting fire must haue in it no figures nor allegories but onely plaine and proper speech which must be heard and vnderstood of all good and bad and be presently put in execution by the ministers that attend that Iudgement A third is that where parables by reason of their darknesse must be expounded before they can be conceiued when Christ doth declare the meaning of them his exposition of necessitie must be in plaine and proper words lest a darke and doubtfull exposition breed a further confusion in the mindes of the hearers than the parable it selfe The parable of the good seed sowed by the owner of the ground and of tares sowed by the enemie as also of the haruest and reapers when the Disciples of Christ prayed him to declare vnto them he expounded it in these words The sower of the good seed is the sonne of man the field is the world the good seed are the children of the kingdome the tares are the children of the wicked the enemie that soweth them is the diuell the haruest is the end of the world and the Reapers be the Angels As then the tares are gathered and burned in the fire so shall it be in the end of the world The Sonne of man shall send forth his Angels and they shall gather out of his kingdome all offences and the workers of iniquitie and shall cast them into a furnace of fire there shal be wailing and gnashing of teeth And vpon occasion of the parable of the draw-net cast into the sea and gathering all kinds of men and after seuering the good from the bad our Sauiour repeating the same exposition in the same words So shall it be in the end of the world the angels shall go forth and seuer the bad from among the iust and shall cast them into a fornace of fire sayd to his Disciples Vnderstand ye all these things and they sayd to him Yea Lord. The parable they vnderstood not but this they vnderstood The fire therefore into which the wicked shall be cast is no parabolicall but a plaine and proper speech Againe Christ expoundeth the parable by it it is therefore no allegorie but a true and proper speech by which Christ opened the obscuritie of the parable and his Disciples presently conceiued his meaning by the proprietie and perspicuitie of his words Then that the Angels of God in the end of the world shall seuer the wicked and cast them into a furnace of fire is an euident plaine and proper speech easie to be vnderstood of euerie Christian by the verie hearing of the words vttered without recourse to you Sir Deuiser to helpe allegorize them or to bring in stead of them the immediat soules suffering which you still auouch but neuer take the paines to proue or vse the meanes to vnfold Fourthly your new conceit hath no coherence with the sense or words of the Holy ghost but either he must correct his speech wheresoeuer he mentioneth the fire of hell or you must recall your fansie who suppose an inward paine in the soule from the immediat hand of God to be hell fire For if that which you call hell fire be only within the soules of the wicked how can they DEPART GO or BE CAST INTO HELL FIRE which by your imagination is cast into them not they into it And therefore when our Sauiour so often affirmeth that the wicked shall be cast into hell fire and iudicially willeth them to depart from him into euerlasting fire you must set him to schoole and teach him to speake righter and according to your opinion to say that hell fire shal be cast into them But if these be fooleries most vnfit for any Christian man to controll the sonne of God in his speech and to condemne him of open and childish ignorance as not knowing the difference betwixt an externall and internall fire then learne to reuerence the veritie and grauitie of the word of God and to confesse that he which seeth and setleth all things in heauen earth and hell cannot so forget himselfe as to mistake the one for the other For if the fire be a violent externall and locall agent into which the wicked shal be cast then are the words of our Sauiour and of the Prophets and Apostles most proper and pertinent to the matter but if that fire which shall torment the damned be nothing but an internall paine rising within the soule by the immediat hand of God then are all the speeches of the Holy ghost expressing their punishment wide from the sense and dissonant from the truth of that which you suppose they would deliuer Dauid describing the vengeance that God at the last will execute on the wicked sayth Vpon the wicked God will raine snares fire and brimstone This raining vpon them sheweth that the meanes and matter of their torment shall be without them and not an anguish onely rising within them as you imagine of hell fire The diuell that deceiued them was cast sayth S. Iohn into a lake of fire and brimstone and whosoeuer was not found written in the booke of life was cast into the lake of fire The Holy ghost by your direction must haue sayd the lake of fire was cast into the diuell and into euery one that was not found written in the booke of life It is better sayth our Sauiour to enter into life maimed than hauing two hands to goe into hell into the fire that neuer shall be quenched Our Sauiour by your doctrine is not well aduised so to speake when he should haue sayd It is better to enter into life maymed than hell fire to goe into you And when Christ foretelleth that the Angels shall seuer the badde and cast them into a furnace of fire he committeth two great ouersights by your new Diuinity the first
firy worme not dying nor destroying the bodie but breaking forth of the bodie with vnceasing anguish Howbeit because S. Austen leaueth it indifferent for euery man to refer the WORME properly to the bodie or figuratiuely to the minde as he liketh best so that by no meanes he thinke the bodies in hell shall not be touched with the paine of fire I left it likewise free for euery man to make his choise and saw no need of farther answer Touching brimstone you may iest at S. Iohn if you list who saith of the wicked they shall be tormented in fire and brimstone before the holy Angels and before the Lambe and likewise of the diuell that he was cast into a lake of fire and brimstone or if you please you may oppose God himselfe and aske whether materiall brimstone were mixed with the fire which hee rained from heauen on Sodom and Gomorre and why hee powred them both on the heads of those wicked ones as if fire alone were not sufficient to destroy them who are set forth for an ensample by suffering the vengeance of eternall fire But howsoeuer you presume to alter or new frame the iudgements of God after your fansies when I reade that God hath rained brimstone and fire out of heauen on Sodom and the cities adioyning and will raine fire and brimstone vpon the wicked as Dauid testifieth I dare not allegorize either of them because I reuerence the word of God which is his will and by no meanes distrust his power For if God will haue brimstone mixed with hell fire to make it burne not onely the darker and sharper but also the lothsommer and so to grieue the sight smell and taste of the wicked which haue heere surfeited with so many vaine pleasures what haue you or any man liuing to say against it yea rather why teach you not men to tremble at the terror of Gods iudgements who can and will so fully punish all the powers and parts of bodie and soule with one and the same fire in hell Your obiection of true chaines and much wood I called sleeuelesse in deed I should haue called it witlesse for but you no man that would seeme wise euer did account it worth the obiecting or answering Who knoweth not that the names of artificiall things applied to Gods iudgement or gouernement must not import with him as they doe with vs things made or prouided with mens handes but the woonderfull works and powerfull acts of God tending to the same end for which these artificiall things do serue with vs As when we read in the Scriptures of Gods sword cup bow booke sootestoole furnace and such like Is any man so foolish as to aske after the Cutler Goldsmith Flâ—…tcher Stationer Carpenter Mason that made those things for God and not rather to looke to the vse of these things amongst men and thence to collect the marueilous and manifest effects of Gods power iustice counsell and prouidence determining and perfourming in this world and the next what pleaseth him against men and Angels The chaines wherewith the deuils are bound Peter calleth the chaines of darkenesse not of mettall which man can frame and they note the ineuitable subiection and immutable condition of deuils plunged in outwarde and inward darkenesse malediction and horror whereby they are now kept vnto damnation without any power to resist or decline the iudgement which shall be pronounced on them That God hath a Smith to make Iron chaines to bind the deuill or a fueller to cut and fetch wood for hell fire lest it should faile these were such meriments to be concluded out of Scripture that if you find no vanitie nor absurditie in them against the trueth and glorie of God you may take the Legend or the Alcoran into your Creede without any scruple of conscience but if these things be more then sottish then deserue your obiections a worse name then I gaue them The Scriptures you say shew no more any true fire in hell then true chaines and much wood To suppose those things to be needefull for hell which are prepared by the hands of men is a very wicked and wilfull impietie For so should hell fire quickly cease which Christ hath said shall be euerlasting And that the Scriptures prooue no more the trueth of fire there then they doe of wood is an open and arrogant vntruth For first all the Fathers of Christs Church and the soberest Diuines of our time are condemned by this insolent assertion as ignorant and absurd teachers who confesse the trueth of hell fire to be established by the Scriptures which of wood they do not Secondly the words of Christ and his Apostles are chalenged to be false For they in plaine speech affirme fire to be in hell which of wood they doe not Thirdly the reason whereupon the Defenders obiection is grounded ouerthroweth all religion in this life and all reward in the life to come For this is and must be the pillar whereto his obiection leaneth The Scripture nameth fire and so it nameth wood and therefore it sheweth the trueth of the one no more then it doth of the other but if the wood be figuratiue so must the fire be Applie this reason to the Church of Christ on earth or to the kingdome of heauen or to Christ himselfe and see whether it will not vtterly subuert them all and make all Gods promises and graces here and in heauen to be allegoricall and not literally true Of Christ God saith Behold I will lay in Sion a stone a tried stone a precious corner stone And of himselfe Christ saith I am the true Vine Were it not braue blasphemie to say the Scriptures shewe Christ to be no more a true God then a true Stone or a true Vine because they affirme of him all three To his Church God saith I will lay thy foundation with Saphires and will make thy windowes of Emeraudes and thy gates shining stones All thy children shall bee taught of God and much peace shall be to thy children in righteousnesse shalt thou be established Shall we say that wisedome peace and righteousnesse here promised to the Church are figuratiue because Emeraudes and Saphires mentioned in the very same place must be figuratiuely taken Christ saith to his disciples I appoint you a kingdome as my Father hath appointed to mee that you may eate and drinke at my table in my kingdome Are all the rewards of the faithfull in the kingdome of heauen allegoricall because this most apparantly is so Proude and false therefore is that surly resolution of yours Sir Discourser who auouch the Scriptures shewe no more true fire in hell then much wood because the Prophet in one place nameth them both and if your obiections be no better let the Christian reader iudge whether there be any cause you should so earnestly call for an answere But let vs view the place whence you
their torments are those mercilesse Angels woe to the guiltie when the innocent shal be rewarded with honour and they with shame The innocent shal goe to Paradise the nocent into fire vnquenchable The sight of God shal cherish the innocent the sight of fire shal torment the wicked If the fire of hell be visible it must needs be an externall and true fire for internall and spirituall paines are inuisible And therefore the Church of Christ hath alwayes confessed the fire of hell to be an externall and violent force of true fire tormenting the wicked and condemned as an error in Origen the conceit of an inward and spirituall fire in stead of hell fire which this Defender is so much in loue withall Ierom directing Auitus what he should beware in the reading of Origens bookcs sayth Scias detestanda tibi in cis esse quà m plurima iuxta sermonem Domini inter scorpiones colubros incedendum This know that there are very many things in them to be detested by thee and as God speaketh Thou must walke amongst Scorpions and Serpents Where repeating diuers errours of Origen hee layeth this downe for one of those that must be detested Ignes quoque Gehennae tormenta quae scriptura sancta peccatoribus comminatur non ponit in supplicijs sed in conscientia peccatorum quando Dei virtute potentia omnis memoria delictorum ante oculos nostros ponitur ac praeteritas voluptates mens intuens conscientiae punitur ardore poenitudinis stimulis confoditur The fire of hell also and the torments which the sacred Scripture threatneth vnto sinners Origen PLACETH NOT AMONGST externall PVNISHMENTS BVT VVITHIN THE CONSCIENCE of sinners when as by the vertue and power of God the remembrance of all our sinnes is set before our eyes and the minde beholding her pleasures past is punished with the fire of conscience and pierced with the stings of griefe and repentance This error Ierom more plainly expresseth and sharply taxeth in his larger Commentaries vpon the Epistle to the Ephesians whose words to preuent all cauils I thinke best to set downe in Latine as they lie though they be large for that they giue light to the former testimonie Quia sunt plerique qui dicunt non futura pro peccatis esse supplicia nec extrinsecus adhibenda tormenta sed ipsum peccatum conscientiam delicti esse pro poena dum vermis in corde non moritur in animo ignis accenditur in similitudinem febris quae non torquet extrinsecus aegrotantem sed corpus ipsa corripiens punit sine cruciatuum forinsecus adhibitione has it aque persuasiones decipulas fraudulentas verba inania appellauit vacua quae videntur blandiri peccantibus sed magis eos ferunt ad aeterna supplicia Because there are many which say that there shall be no externall punishments for sinne nor TORMENTS OVTVVARDLY INFLICTED but that sinne it selfe and the conscience thereof is punishment whiles the worme doth not die in the heart and a fire is kindled in the soule after the fashion of a feuer which doth not outwardly torment the sicke but possessing the bodie veâ—…th â—…t without any forrâ—…gne inflicting of paine these perswasions and deceitfull deuices the Apostle calleth void and emptie words which seeme to flatter sinners but indeed hasten them to eternall punishment Hell fire by this resolution is a punishment OVTVVARDLY inflicted on the damned and not an inward fire or paine kindled in the minde and possessing the soule or bodie as an ague doth which is an inward grieuance but no externall violence and the contrarie conceit of your spirituall fire in the minde to be hell fire is heere condemned in Origen as a deceitfull and detestable error hastning men to eternall torments The same confession stil continued in the Church of Christ Gregory Quos flamma Gehennae deuor at à visione veri luminis coecat vt for is eos dolor combustionis cruciet intus poena caecitatis obscuret quatenus qui authori suo corde corpore deliquerunt simul corde corpore pâ—…iantur Whom the flame of hell deuoureth it blindeth from sceing the true light that paine of burning may outwardly torment them and punishment of blindnesse inwardly obscure them that as they sinned against their maker with heart and body so they may be punished both in soule and body Isidore Duplex damnatorum poena est in Gehenna quorum mentem vrit tristitia corpus flamma There is a double punishment of the damned in hell whose minds burne with sorow and their bodies with flame by a iust rcward that as they debated with their mindes what they might performe with their bodies so they should be punished both in soule and bodie Bede By the worme Christ noteth the rottennesse as by fire the burning of hell or cls the worme signifieth the ouer-late repentance of sinne which shall neuer cease to bite the conscience of the damned in their torments vt ignis sit poena extrinsecus sâ—…iens vermis dolor interiâ—…s accusans that the fire of hell should be a torment OVTVVARDLY raging and the worme a griefe inwardly accusing Bernard Timor coâ—…turbabit te cùm terra aperietur cor am te iurues caedes in stagnum sulfuris ardent is foetentis Ignis exteriùs carnem tuam comburet vermis interiùs conscientiam corrodet Feare shall amaze thee when the earth shall open before thee and thou fall and light in the lake of brimstone burning and stâ—…king Fire shall OVTVVARDLY BVRNE thy flesh and a worme shall inwardly gnaw thy conscience So Tertullian before them Gehenna est ignis arcani subterraneus ad poenam the saurus Hell is a treasure of secret fire kept vnder the earth to punish withall And Iustine the Martyr The diuels shall suffer punishment and vengeance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inclosed in euerlasting fire Arnobius likewise The Gentiles are admonished by the books of their best learned men and verses of their Poets of that firie flood and infernall lake of flames often compassing the place which being prepared for eternall torments they deliuered as knowen both by the demonstration of diuels and by the oracles of the Prophets As the flashes of lightning touch mens bodies but consume them not and as the fires of Aetna and Vesuuius and of other places of the earth doe burne and not spend so that flame appointed to punish the wicked is not fed with the decayes of those that burne but nourished with parching their bodies that waste not And Prosper To heare and reade these things and to beleeue they shall come to passe to thinke how great an euill it is to be excluded from the ioy of beholding God to be banished from heauen and cast into euerlasting fire with the diuell and his angels to see no light in that fire but to feele that it burneth to suffer the
sense and case that I do Peruse the labours of that learned Father Bishop Iewel and see how often in his Replie to Harding and his Defence of the Apologie he calleth the testimonies of the ancient Fathers and Councels Authorities We rest sayth he vpon the Scriptures of God vpon the Authoritie of the ancient Doctours and Councels And againe to reckon vp the authorities of ANTIQVITIE it would be infinite The halfe communion by the authoritie of Gelasuis may well be called open sacriledge In the conclusion of the same booke I grant you haue alledged authorities sundrie and many such as I knew long before Verely I neuer denied but you were able to bring vs the names and shadowes of m◅ny Fathers You haue defended the open abomination of your stewes by the name and AVTHORITIE of S. Augustine You haue sought vp a companie of new petite Doctors Authors void of Authoritie full of vanities In the conclusion of his defence of the Apologie my Authorities of Doctors and Councels as you haue vsed them are few enough What meant you in fauour of open Stewes to shew vs the name and AVTHORITIE of S. Augustine Peter Martyr against Smithes bookes of the singlenesse of Priests sayeth In iudging of things obscure we must haue two waies or meanes to direct vs one i◅ward which is the Spirit the other outward which is the word of God Tum si ad haec patrum etiam authoritas accesserit valebit plurimum to these if the authoritie of Fathers be ioyned it is of great force So Chemnitius in his examination of the Tridentine Councell Quod de patrum authoritate sentimus etiam ab ipsis Patribus didicimus That which we hold touching the authoritie of the Fathers we learned of the Fathers themselues Where also he teacheth you this Rule worth the noting for your new found Redemption and the rest of your nouelties Sentimus etiam nullum dogma in ecclesia no◅m cum t◅ta antiquitate pugnans recipiendum We also confesse that no point of Doctrine which is new to the Church and repugnant to all antiquitie is to be receiued If the Fathers themselues will better please you I want not their example for the vse of that word which so much offendeth you Ierome in his Epistle to Damasus in very earnest manner maketh this petition Vt ◅ihi epistolis tuis siue tacendarum siue dicendarū hypostase◅n detur authoritas That AVTHORITIF may be giuen me saith he by your letters to vse or refuse the word hypostases Vincentius in his book against heresies mooueth this question Here some perchaunce will aske where as the Canon of the Scripture is perfect and abundantly sufficient in it selfe for all things quid opus est vt ei ecclesiasticae intelligentiae iungatur authoritas what neede is there that the authoritie of the ecclesiasticall interpretation should be ioyned with it The effect of his answere which is good for you to obserue that claime such libertie for your selfe to expound the Scriptures at your pleasure is this least euery man should wrest the Scriptures to his fansie and sucke thence not the truth but the patronage of his error Saint Augustine that is euery where carefull to yeeld the Scriptures their due reuerence yet giueth the word Authoritie to the decrees of Councels and writings of godly Fathers before his time Speaking of generall Councels he saith Quorum est in ecclesia saluberrima authoritas Whose authoritie is most wholsome in the Church And alleaging the testimonies of Irenaeus Cyprian Hilarius Ambrose Gregorie Chrysostome Basil and others against Iulian the Pelagian he concludeth Hoc probauimus Catholicorum authoritate sanctorum this haue we prooued by the authoritie of Godly Catholike men vt vestra fragilis quasi argutula nouitas sola authoritate conteratur illorum that your weake and sleigh noueltie might be ouerwhelmed with their onely authoritie For your contumacie is first to be repressed by their authoritie With these testimonies and so great authoritie of holy men thou must either by Gods mercy be healed or else thou must accuse the egregious and holy Doctors of the Catholike truth against which miserable madnes I must so answere that their faith may be defended against thee euen as the Gospell it selfe is defended against the wicked and professed enimies of Christ. If then this word seeme insolent to you which is so frequent with the best Diuines of former and latter times let your Reader iudge whether it be ignorance or insolence in you to stumble at so plaine a word as if the religious and auncient Fathers and lights of Christs Church were not worthy with you to be counted learned Authors nor their testimonies to be named Authorities fit to guide and lead others to the knowledge of the truth I trust no aduised Christian will challenge more authoritie to the Fathers then was giuen by those of Beraea to the Apostle nor deny indeede to any priuate man much lesse to a Minister to iudge and discerne in themselues not onely the words of men but euen of the sense and meaning of the Scripture by the Scripture it selfe which thing the Beraeans did and are commended by the holy Ghost for it I trust you claime no power to iudge of the Scriptures you may discerne the truth there written but with necessitie to beleeue not with libertie to iudge And if by your freedome you fasten on falsehood it is no excuse for you but a condemnation vnto you Saint Austen speaking of the bookes of the Prophets and Apostles saith quos omnino indicare non audeamus which we may not dare at all to iudge And where you say the Ber◅ans are commended by the holy Ghost for not beleeuing that Paul spake touching Religion till they had examined by the Scriptures and seene whether the truth were so as he vttered You speake not one◅y vnwisely and vntruely but if you would haue Christians to follow that course you shew intolerable pride against the word of God for the Beraeans were commended when as yet they neither beleeued in Christ nor acknowledged Pauls Apostleship for their readinesse to heare and care to search whether Paul spake trueth or no. This if you now assume to your selfe ouer Pauls words or writings you incurre the crime of flat impietie Pauls words to vs that beleeue without further search or other credit are of equall authoritie with the rest of the Scriptures and not to beleeue him till we examine and see the trueth of his doctrine is meere infidelitie Behold I paul say vnto you must suffice all Christians and if an Angel from heauen preach otherwise than he preached we must hold him accursed For our comfort that beleeue and to perswade them which as yet beleeue not we may search and see the consent betwixt the Prophets and Apostles yea the sonne of God sent men to the writings of Moses and the
the hole that you would faine hide your selfe in To that intent which I set downe my reasons drawen from the Iewish sacrifices and Christians sacraments did and doe still stand effectuall For the olde sacrifices must figure and the new Sacraments must seale whatsoeuer death in Christ was the full and perfect ransome of our sinnes But they foreshew and confirme the bodily death of Christ onely they neither shew not signifie the death of the soule nor the death of the damned Therefore the bodily death of Christ onely is the full and perfect ransome of our sinnes the death of the soule and the death of the damned as they serued nothing to our Redemption so were they not suffered in the soule of Christ. Two cauils you offer against the first part of this reason touching the sacrifices of the fathers before and vnder the law One that they figured not the whole sacrifice as neither Christes Deitie his soule nor his resurrection the next that all the sacrifices of the Iewes did not signifie his bodily death because the Scape goate which was a sinne offering was not slaine Of trifling you talke much this is more then trifling it is plaine shifting Christes deitie could be no part of that sacrifice which suffered for sinne the diuine Maiestie can not suffer either paine or sorrow To what ende then come you in with Christes Godhead when you talke of his suffering for sinne His soule you say was not figured by those sacrifices The suffering death in his soule was indeed no way figured by them but that the mediatour should haue an humane soule to bee separated from his body by death before hee could make purgation of our sinnes that was more then figured by those sacrifices For since not the blood of beasts but of man and euen of the Sonne of God made man was by Gods promise to be shed for our sinnes It is euident that from life to death he could not come but by seuering his soule from his body And consequently he must haue a soule being a man which must be powred out vnto death before he could die euen as the powers of life in bloody sacrifices were parted from their flesh before they could be offered as sacrifices vnto God But I charge you vntruely when I say you expound your whole and absolute Redemption to be of all the fruites and causes of our Redemption you haue no such word nor meaning as fruites Your words are our whole and absolute Redemption and those I say containe the whole course of our saluation euen vnto the last step which is our glorification as I haue formerly prooued by Christes owne speech Againe if the resurrection of Christ which is your owne instance bee a part of that propitiatorie sacrifice because it was a necessarie consequent then all the benefites that Christ obtained for vs or bestowed on vs must be comprised in that his oblation for sinne For they are all necessarie consequents and effects of our Redemption and depend on these two branches his death to free vs from sinne and his resurrection to raise vs into a new and heauenly life now for euer He was deliuered to death for our sinnes and rose againe for our iustification From these two heads the Scriptures deriue not onely forgiuenes of sinnes but newnesse of life on earth and happinesse of life in heauen Yet you did not call them fruits Effects you called them and what is a ioyfull effect such as was Christs resurrection but a fruit and that as well in Christ as in vs When the Prophet saith of Christ he shall see the trauaile of his soule and be satisfied what meaneth he but the fruits and effects of Christs labour when for his obedience to death God highly exalted him and gaue him a name aboue euery name that euery knee should bow vnto him what is this but a fruite and reward of his humiliation first in his owne person then proportionably in all that be his Many of the Iewes sacrifices yea most of them did represent and signifie Christs bodily sufferings onely yet not all Therefore you may well deny mine assumption as you did before and affirme that certaine Iewish Sacrifices set forth the sufferings euen of the soule of Christ and not of his body only Did I any where say that all the Iewish sacrifices were bloudy or that all of them did represent Christs death and blood shedding Could I be ignorant that the Iewes had oblations made onely by fier as of flower wine and incense and also offerings of the first fruits and other things dedicated or presented to the Lord for the vse of his tabernacle and Temple Doth not the Apostle say Euery high Priest is ordayned for men to offer GIFTES and SACRIFICES for sinne Where gifts shew that things without life were offered as well as liuing beasts and birds which were slaine As then there was no cause nor neede I should so I neuer vsed the word ALL in that case vnlesse I added liuing or BLOODY Sacrifices For they by their life lost and blood shed figured the death of Christ Iesus But this ALL is your adding to my wordes that you may take occasion to pike some quarrell at them But you may well deny my assumption that no sacrifices of the Iewes did figure the sufferings of Christs soule I assumed no such thing neither did I meddle with the sufferings of Christs soule vnlesse they were the death of the soule or the paines of hell which the Scripture calleth the second death and I the death of the damned because none besides the damned die that second death but you plainly giue me the slip and conuey your selfe from speaking of the death of the soule or of the death of the damned which are the things in Question to the sufferings of the soule in generall of which I make no Question And though your meaning be vnder the sufferings of the soule to comprise the tormenting of Christs soule by the immediate hand of God with the selfe same paines which the damned do feele in hell Yet such is your cariage that euery where you suppresse your maine intent and make a faire shew with the sufferings of Christs soule as if you ment no more but that Christs soule must needs haue some sufferings proper to it selfe which you confesse I sundry times teach and yet you make your Reader beleeue I euer impugne You shall doe well to awake out of this slumber and call to minde that there are no sufferings of Christs soule now in question but the DEATH of the SOVLE or of the DAMNED which you dare not openly auouch and therefore you plaster them ouer with smoother termes of the sufferings of the soule to hide your secret mysteries till you meete with itching eares that will listen more to fansies then to faith Another peece of skill you shew in this place to ease your selfe of all proofe and thinke it enough if
deuice to the doctrine of our saluation than what is euidently reuealed and directly witnessed in the Scriptures Whether it be of Christ sayth Austen or of any other thing what soeuer touching the faith I say not if we who are no way comparable to him that so spake but that which followeth if an Angell from heauen teach you BESIDES that which you haue receiued in the Scriptures of the Law and the Gospell holde him accursed It is a manifest fall from the faith sayth Basil either to abrogate any thing that is written or to bring in any thing that is not written For when once we beleeue the Gospel sayth Tertullian this we first beleeue that there is nothing besides which we ought to beleeue So that the meere bloud and single bodie of Christ are but sleights of yours with vnknowen phrases to draw your Reader from asking or eying your proofes for the death of Christes soule and the paines of the damned to be suffered by him before wee could be redeemed The Scriptures are maine and manifest for that which I beleeue and teach and which the whole Church of Christ before mee taught and beleeued these fifteene hundred yeeres afore your conceit of hell paines in the soule of Christ was either hatcht or heard of The sufferings of the soule and the wrath of God which things you now catch holde on to make some introduction to your secret and priuate fansies are too generall to inferre either the death of the soule or the paines of the damned except to the rest of your absurdities you will adde these that the soule neuer suffereth but it dieth the death of spirits and that Gods anger in this life hath none other effects but damnation Here you vrge a reason against vs if then our soules be not redeemed by the blood of Christ our bodies haue no benefite of Redemption from death You hunt so headily after aduantages of words by some ambiguitie in them that you neither remember what the Scriptures teach nor what your selfe defend nor when I vse a word in the same sense that the Apostle doth It is not my deuise but the Apostles doing to take REDEMPTION of the body for the incorruption of the same We sigh in our selues saith Paul wayting for the Redemption of our body And againe you are sealed by the holy spirit of God vnto the day of Redemption When that day shall be our Sauiour telleth vs in these words When the powers of heauen shall be shaken and you see the sonne of man come in a cloud with power and great glory then lift vp your heads for your Redemption draweth neere In all which places Redemption is taken for none of those mercies or graces which are bestowed on Gods children in this life but for that glorie and immortalitie which shall be reueiled on them when Christ shall come to iudge the world and namely the Redemption of the body for that incorruption wherewith our vile bodies shall bee changed and made like to his glorious body Take then the Redemption of the body for the incorruption of the same as the Apostle plainely doth and I did and see what absurditie or obscuritie there is in my reason which you so much wrangle with and wonder at as though it passed all vnderstanding The Redemption which we haue in this life by the bloud of Christ must needes bee either of body or of soule we haue no more parts to be redeemed by Christ. But the Redemption of our bodies we haue not in this world we must waite for it till this corruptible put on incorruption The Redemption therefore which we haue in this life or shal haue before the last day is the Redemption of our soules And so the words of Peter You were Redeemed with the precious bloud of Christ and of the Saints in heauen saying to the Lambe Thou hast redeemed vs to God by thy bloud pertaine expresly to the Redemption of their soules because their bodies then did and yet do lie in corruption What so strange monsters or marueiles doeth your Logicall head finde in this reason that you should make such wonderizations at it and protestations against it Is it not open and easie to all that be meanely witted or soberly minded But you haue three things to note in my words which you alleage 1. The Proposition is vaine and Illogicall hauing no consequence in it at all It is a speciall point of Art memoratiue in you to note three things and vtterly to forget two of them For in this whole Section you doe not so much as mention any second or third thing to bee noted in those words which you cite The first and al which you note is that my proposition is vaine Illogicall and vncoherent Your idle and vntheologicall head hath ouer busied it selfe with many mad multiplications and what ifs vpon this proposition and yet you come nothing neere the sense or coherence of it The Proposition hath two parts whereof the second is either an illation out of the Apostles words vpon the first being a supposition of yours if we limit it to the time of this life or if wee speake without restraint of time as you doe it is a necessarie consequent to the former being the condition and cause of the latter That our soules are not redeemed by the bloud of Christ but by his soule is a resolution of yours wherewith you giue a fresh on-set in the next Section as the Reader shall there perceiue though here in shew you somwhat relent after your inconstant maner That being a position of yours I added by the Apostles warrant that our bodies haue not their Redemption in this life but must stay for it till the day of Redemption or generall resurrection And so the reason standeth If our soules be not here redeemed by the bloud of Christ which is your Assertion our bodies by the Apostles doctrine haue no Redemption in this life But this That wee should presently haue no Redemption in body or soule by the bloud of Christ is quite m contrarie to the words of Peter who sayth Yee are redeemed by the bloud of Christ not yee shall be and of the soules in heauen that say to Christ thou hast redeemed vs by thy bloud when their bodies were rotten in the earth Since therefore either body or soule must haue Redemption in this life and the body as Paul assureth vs hath not Redemption in this life Ergo the Redemption which we haue in this life by the bloud of Christ must bee referred to our soules and our bodies must expect the generall day of Redemption in the end of the world before they shall haue it If the sober and wise Reader vnderstand not this reason or can dislike the sequence of it I am content he shall condemne it as darke and obscure but if it be open to all mens eyes saue yours then is your
bodie and imparteth it vnto both that neither scape vnpunished If the Soules operations were so necessarily tied to the faculties and instruments of the body as you doe auouch I greatly doubt how the Soules immortalitie will be defended against the effect of your assertion I giue the body no essentiall cooperation with the Soule in vnderstanding and will I giue it a prouocation impression subiection and execution in euill which argueth a communion with the Soule in sinne though vnderstanding and will bee the proper actions of the Soule Now if the soule so long as shee is ioyned with her body communicate her sinfull operations to the body is that any proofe shee can not bee seuered from the body Children in their cradles haue no knowledge of good and euill Shall they therefore remaine children for euer in minde and not discerne either their happinesse in heauen or their wretchednesse in hell What here they want because the soule is coupled with the body shall there be supplied when the soule is parted from the body Here the soule seeth with the eyes heareth with the eares and speaketh with the tongue but after this life our Sauiour teacheth vs that the Soule shall see heare and speake after an other maner as spirits doe though shee want eyes eares and tongue Here the soule can not mooue from place to place but with her body when shee is seuered shee shall be caried to Paradise or hell without her body Here the passions of the Soule desire ioy feare and sorrow are common to both parts of man hereafter they shal be proper to the soule so long as shee abideth vncoupled to the body Here foolishnesse madnesse forgetfulnesse sicknesse wearinesse do hinder the operations of the soule there shall bee no such thing Here the soule sinneth repenteth and beleeueth there is no place nor power to commit new sinnes nor to repent the olde S. Austen sayth thereof Istis voluntas illis facultas non poterit esse vlla peccandi The Saued can haue no will the Damned no power to sinne So that the condition of the Soule seuered from the body much differeth from the state of the soule ioyned with the body and though shee communicate her actions good and bad in this life to her body yet in the next shee shall vse her vnderstanding and will and feele her affections and passions without her body Surely it bringeth in the heresie of Pope Iohn the two and twentieth and of certaine Anabaptists that the Soule hath no being till shee resume her body at the last day Your ignorance is no argument to bring the soule a sleepe till shee resume her body Shee hath no seueral being from her body in this life for that Man consisteth of soule and body vnited and ioyned together Shall shee therefore not bee seuered or haue no being when shee is seuered Are you a Diuine and doe not know that God hath so framed the Soule that shee may be vnited to the body and also seuered from the bodie without losse of her essentiall powers which yet during this life are seated in the body and in some sort assisted by the body The very faculties of sense and motion which are permixed with the body and can not be exercised but in the body retaine their roote and force still in the Soule when their operation ceaseth for want of the body To gather knowledge and declare consent the Soule heere vseth the spirits and parts of the body yet after this life her vnderstanding and will shall not onely persist the same which they were but be exceedingly encreased and confirmed For now we see through a glasse darkely but then face to face Now we know in part but then shall we know euen as we are knowen Yea loue and ioy which here are discerned by the motion of the heart and alteration of the spirits shall there bee most perfect and neuer fall away So that your doubt of Pope Iohns heresie to be consequent to my position is a drowsie slumber of your distempered braine it hath no coherence with any conclusions or assertions of mine Hence is it that you say Gods iustice punisheth the soule onely by the body that is not till the resurrection You can hatch errours foule enough and fast enough if you may be suffered to adde and alter what pleaseth you in other mens words Betweene the professions of Arians Christians there was but a diphthongs difference 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Atheists holding there is NO God swarue but one sillable from the truth What heresie then may you not come by adding ONLY to my words which I precisely did decline and made a manifest exception against it lest any should suspect it Giue me the like libertie in your words and I will find you holes in euery leafe to harbor the grossest heresies that euer were heard of in Turke or Pagan But Sir this is the diuels occupation plainely to peruert the words that otherwise containe nothing in them but the trueth That the iustice of God both temporally and eternally punisheth the soule by the bodie which are my words is a notorious and manifest trueth for he punisheth temporally in this world and eternally in the world to come after that sort so that no man is so doltish as to doubt thereof That God neuer punisheth otherwise in this life nor the next but ONLY so this is your exorbitant imagination it is no conclusion depending on my words much lesse any part expressed in them In trueth thus you must needs affirme and holde you can not auoid it if you will hold your maine question In trueth your Mastership is mis-sighted I do not see nor you do not shew how any such thing is consequent to my question The absurditie with which you would intangle me that els God did not properly punish Christ for our sins is weaker than a spiders webbe The proper punishment of sinne without respect to persons is spirituall temporall and eternall death which Christ could not suffer The full satisfaction and punishment of our sinnes in Christes person was the death of his bodie suffered on the crosse with those paines preceding and accompanying it which are described in the Scriptures And this is so euident and easie that besides such conceited Sirs as you are few do or need doubt it If I grant this point of heathen Philosophie that the Soule taketh occasion to thinke all things which she thinketh vniuersally from the Body and bodily obiects yet it followeth not that she taketh occasion to mis-thinke from thence also Doe you call that heathen Philosophie which is so plainely perceaued by nature so fully confirmed by Scripture and so vniuersally confessed on all sides that the very Heathen could not gainesay it Tell vs I pray you if you haue lately lighted on any new way how Man may come to knowledge but either from sense or by reuelation
Our Sauiour knew no more waies when he said to Peter Flesh and blood hath not reuealed it vnto thee but my Father which is in Heauen Where men that are teachers or learners are called flesh and blood because without the Body the Soule learneth nothing in this life but what is reuealed vnto it by the spirit of God Saint Iohn knew as few That saith he which we haue seene and heard declare we vnto you that you also may haue fellowship with vs. This a man would thinke were plaine enough that all knowledge must be either naturally infused in vs as it was in Angels or collected of vs by sense and experience or reuealed to vs from God For if we be borne voide of all knowledge as the Scripture expresly testifieth we know not at first our right hand from our left then must we get it by meanes And meanes to come by the knowledge of particular and externall things what can you assigne besides the sense If therefore the Heathen saw this and you see it not you prooue your selfe to haue lesse vnderstanding then the Heathen The Soule indeede by the power of vnderstanding and reason wherewith she is endued of God doth in continuance obserue discerne and compare the agreements and contrarieties of things as also their causes and consequents and what of her selfe she can not perceaue she learneth with more ease of others who are longer and better acquainted therewith and whose phantasiue spirits are thinner and quicker to pearce into the depth of things The differences then and defects of mens wits doe cleerele witnesse that not onely the instruments of sense but the Imaginatiue spirits must concurre to attaine and encrease knowledge in this life vnlesse God inspire the Hart aboue nature which he doth when and where pleaseth him These may be the meanes of thinking and yet not the causes or occasions of mis-thinking The naturall meanes of thinking must still be the meanes of well and ill thinking they varie not howsoeuer the minde varie in her resolutions What or how manie may be the causes or occasions of ill thoughts maketh nothing to this question it sufficeth for my purpose to make the bodie liable to the punishment of euery sinne that the parts powers or spirits of the Body haue any communion with the suggesting admitting or performing of ech sinne For in all sinne not onely the Doers but the leaders directors aduisers helpers consenters allowers and reioycers are in their degree partners with the principall Yea all the instruments are iustly detested where the crime is worthily condemned But whence ill thinking commeth can you tell A man may thinke and speake of all the errors and heresies in the world and yet not sinne It is the liking and embracing of them that maketh the offence and not thinking or reasoning of them The will then causeth thoughts to be good or euill the vnderstanding doth not Now the will must haue somewhat to lead it which is either the show of truth or the loue of some other thing which doth preiudice the truth There is no truth but in the word of God which we must either heare or read before we can apprehend If we stop our eares against the word of God shall not that wilfull deafenesse of ours turne to the deserued destruction of Body and Soule If we open our eares but not our harts to the voice of God doth not the loue of some earthly good or feare of some temporall harme close our harts against the truth Both which as well loue as feare come from the bodily senses and affections and make their manifest impression on the hart leading the will to consent to their law For where all ill thoughts are against veritie charitie or temperance men are ledde from the truth by commoditie glory soueraigntie or credulitie as Austen obserueth whereto if we put ease enuie and luxurie we see the causes of all ill thoughts which haue no place in the Soule apart from the Body The proper prouocations and pleasures of sinne are often times not outward at all but the mâ—…ere peruersitie and malignitie of our euill mind is vsually the very cause of ill thoughts and ill determinations You would say some what if you could tell how Doth any thing properly prouoke it selfe Doth the fire prouoke it selfe to burne or the Sunne prouoke him selfe to shine Lamenesse maketh a creeple to halt it prouoketh him not And so doth pitch defile the hands and not prouoke them to fowlenesse The next and necessarie causes of things are called efficients and not provocations So that will you nill you prouocations are externall either to the person or to the part that is the principall or speciall Agent The Apostle teacheth you how to vse the word properly when he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 prouoking one an other The very composition of the word proueth as much 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or prouocare is first to call or vrge a man to any thing before he him selfe be willing Then the naturall and inward corruption of the minde is no prouocation but the cause efâ—…cient of ill thoughts and if there be any prouocations they must be externall to the part or partie prouoked And did you know the principles of learning or grounds of nature you would soone perceaue that as well the will of man as his desire is led with respect of somewhat that is good or at least seemeth good which prouoketh and draweth both sense and will to performe her actions Now though the desire Antecedent and delight consequent be inward and inherent yet the good things which we affect and would attaine are then externall when we pursue them and when we vse them or enioy them they are but conioyned with vs in possession or opinion which contenteth both Body and Soule As you do not vnderstand what PROVOCATION meaneth so do you lesse perccaue what PLEASVRE is You mingle Soule and sense head and heeles together to make some shew of opposition but in the end you bewray your presumptuous ignorance and daube it ouer with your wonted words of PROPER MEERE which are as much to this purpose as salt to make sugar The PROPER prouocations and pleasures of sinne are often times you say not outward at all I vsed not the word outward but sayd the soule tooke from the bodie all PROVOCATIONS and PLEASVRES of sinne brought to effect and committed all ACTS of sinne by her bodie you neither marke the restraint which I made in the beginning of that section of all sinnes brought to effect neither see the words following in the same sentence which expresse as much the acts of sinne committed but rouing quite from the matter you â—…arle at my words without iudgement or memorie For as you fumble about prouocations so do you about pleasure which you would make to be meerely spirituall But notwithstanding your toying with termes that is properly PLEASVRE which the soule
sorow necessarie in the sacrifice for sinne of his sanctitie with godly sorrow which was despised with our iniquitie the mitigating of his anger with humble and earnest praier which was prouoked with our contempts were they not three different effects euen in Christ himselfe and so might stirre vp three religious affections of feare sorrow and prayer Why then should they be confounded in Christ whose humane nature might yeeld all three to God as well in respect of pietie to God and of charitie to men as in regard of his office for the satisfaction of our sinnes for he might not approch the presence of God as a Priest with our person and cause who were sinnefull though he were innocent and holy to make intercession and sacrifice for our sinnes but he must giue God his due glorie haue compassion on our miserie and mediate for our safetie As therefore I see no cause to exclude these affections and actions from the satisfaction for sin so I see greater reason to include them in the sacrifice for sin except we make Christ a Priest onely by his SVFFERINGS leaue him neither any honor of OFFERING nor right of PRAYING for vs in the purgation of our sins which were a strange kind of Priesthood no way answerable to the Leuiticall in that wherin the apostle compareth them For in the Law the Priest was to present the sacrifice to God and to pray for the trespasser which if you thinke needlesse in the true sacrifice that should propitiate the sinnes of the world you must correct the Apostle that maketh the Law a figure of the Gospell though the person of the Priest and the price of the sacrifice farre excell all that was vnder the Law b Defenc. pag. 99. li. 20. Furthermore you knit in within this foure other seuer all causes of Christes agonie as you recken them pa. 27. First his taking of our infirmities in his flesh to cure them Secondly his breaking the knot betwixt bodily death and hell which none but hee was able to doe Thirdly Gods anger which might be executed on his bodie but was mitigated by him Fourthly the desire he had to continue the feeling and enioying of Gods presence with his bodie As there is no one thing in the Scriptures that receiueth and hath more diuers opinions of it than Christes agonie in the Garden so I proposed as many as had any coherence with trueth and left the Reader to make his choise which he liked best Howbeit I did not pag. 27. recken foure seuerall causes of Christes agonie as you mistake but of the c Serm. pag. 27. li. 23. feare which Christ had and shewed of his bodily death His agony had other parts and affections besides feare and astonishment as sorow zeale submissiue and intentiue prayer and a bloudie sweat the obiects and ends whereof might be as different as the things themselues For example Christes feare in the Garden might haue many respects and causes as well as his sorow He might feare the glory of God now sitting in iudgement to receiue recompense for the sinnes of his elect For as Christ himselfe who best knew it confirmeth it by saying d Iohn 12. Christes manhood might feare the glorie of Gods iudgement Now at hand is the iudgement of this world now shall the Prince of this world be cast on t so wee must not thinke so mightie and weightie matters as the iudgement of the world and the casting out of Satan the accuser of his brethren and the admitting the Redeemer to present himselfe here on earth for our cause to the face of God in iudgement were decreed and setled by God without some reuelation of his glorie and maiestie meet for those persons and purposes For this is a rule which may euery where be obserued in the Scriptures that when God is described as a Iudge he is sayd to sit in a Throne and all the host of heauen to stand before him to resemble the glory of his iudgement as we finde in Daniel 7. vers 9 10. Esa. 6. vers 1 2. 1. Kings 22. vers 19. Wherefore Dauid sayth e Psal. 9. v. 7. The Lord hath prepared his throne for iudgement This Michaiah and Esay the Prophets say they SAW which whether it were by sight as Steuen f Act. 7 v. 55. looked stedfastly into heauen and with his eyes saw the glory of God and Iesus standing at the right hand of God or in spirit as Ezechiel waking and g Ezech. 8. sitting in his house with the Elders of Iudah before him was by a diuine vision brought to Ierusalem to see all the abominations there committed I dare not determine Christ himselfe sayth I saw Satan fall downe from heauen like lightning Which way soeuer Gods glory in iudgement was reuealed vnto Christ and beheld of Christ in the Garden it was able for the time of his humilitie to impresse a religious feare and trembling into his humane nature since Christ came now by iudgement to haue the burden of our sinnes taken from vs and layed vpon him that he might make satisfaction for them Another thing that Christ might iustly and yet religiously feare in the Garden offering now to ransome man from the wrath of God was the POWER of Gods wrath Hâ—… might feare 〈◊〉 pâ—…wer of Goâ—…s wrath 〈◊〉 our sinne whiâ—…h hâ—… was to â—…eare which is fully infinite and so farre exceedeth the strength and reach of mans nature that our earthly infirmitie to which Christ submitted himselfe for our sakes can not comprehend the greatnesse thereof nor thinke on the power thereof without feare and trembling h Psal. 90. v. 11 Who knoweth saith Dauid to God the power of thy wrath for according to thy feare that is as thou art feared so is thine anger Contempt and carelessenesse kindle and increase the wrath of God against vs feare and submission asswage it And when I name feare I meane not a dreadfull distrust of Gods purpose towards vs which is desperation but a perswasion and confession of his power ouer vs whereby we feare to displease him and tremble before him withall submission when we haue displeased him This feare Christ teacheth his disciples when he saith I will shew you Luc. 12. whom you shall feare feare him which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell yeâ—… I say feare him not meaning they should firmely beleeue God would euerlastingly condemne them but that thinking on his power preuailing here and in hell they should beware to prouoke him and with all humilitie prostrate themselues before him when they had offended him to preuent his anger Christ you will say needed not thus to feare since he was no sinner For himselfe he needed not because he was innocent and obedient in all thinges to the vttermost but since he was at this time now to beare the burthen of our sinnes in his body and to haue the chasticement of our peace laid
the one after the other that S. Iohn confirmeth it with his owne i vers 35. sight lest so strange a thing should not be beleeued k Defenc. pag. 106. li. 35. Though it be against the common course of our nature for any paines or feare to sweate bloud yet the diuine power with and through paines and feares might wring out of his body that trickling bloudy sweate As it is plaine that it did by the wordes next before in the text an Angell came to giue him some comfort Your head was troubled about some waighty worke when one sentence wrang from you such contrarieties and falsities But the l Pag. 105. li. 38. Page before you tooke speciall exception against me if I did not thinke that Christ was vrged to his bloudy sweate for thereof you speake in that place by violence of paines or feare procuring it in him NATVRALLY here you say it is against the common course of our nature for any paines or feare to sweat bloud Could it be naturally procured in Christ and yet against the common course of our nature againe if it be against the common course of our nature for any paines or feare to sweate bloud by what reason or authority doe you conclude hell paines out of Christes bloudy sweate for if no paines or feare can by the course of our nature procure a bloudy sweate how know you that Christ did sweate bloud for paines or for feare for hell paines you will say he might Not by any course of our nature For then all his members which at one time or other feele the like which Christ felt should sweate bloud as Christ did But that I trust is sensiblely false The diuine power might wring it out of his body So it may raise Children to Abraham out of stones Doth that inferre that men are made of stones and might not the diuine power wring this sweate for that is your phrase out of Christes bodie as well without hell paines as with them is it hard for God to make a man sweat bloud without the paines of the damned It is plaine that it did by the words next before in the text Doth the text name hell paines or the feare of hell what will you not aduenture that thus presume to outface the Scriptures the text nameth many thinges before and you like your crafts-master will make your choise though the Scripture doe not expresse what was the cause thereof The words next before the text are an Angell came to giue him comfort Then comfort belike cast him into this bloudy sweate if the wordes next before declare the cause thereof which were very strange that a man by comfort should be cast into a bloudy sweate Why may not I rather say that the vision of an Angell put him rather into this sweate then the comfort which was brought him since Daniel was m Dan. 8. v. 27. stroken sicke and astonished with a vision as diuers others of Gods saints haue beene yet I thinke neither of these to be the cause of that sweate but as I say in my Sermons it might be voluntary either for signification as Austen Prosper Bede and Bernard do thinke or for sanctification and consecration of his person and sacrifice answeareable to the manner of the legall oblation prefiguring this as the trueth or for vehement contention of spirit in praier which indeed is the next thing mentioned before his sweate and shewed his desire and zeale to be more then humane for the Redeeming and reconciling of man to God by the shedding of his bloud n Defenc. pag. 106. li. 27. You conclude that Christes agony demonstrating Christs Priesthood must not rise from the terror of his owne death and yet a little before you openly confesse and graunt that his agony did rise from the feare of his death The effect of Christes Priest-hood performed in the garden must in no wise concerne himselfe For he was not a Priest to make intercession or to offer sacrifice for himselfe but for vs. And therefore his praiers then vttered in his agonie with strong cries and teares if they pertained to his Priesthood they were made for vs and not for himselfe and declared his voluntarie profering and presenting his body and bloud to Gods pleasure to be the sacrifice for mans Redemption and his feruent supplications to haue it accepted as the full Ransome for his elect that the accuser and supplanter of his Church might be remooued from Gods presence and wholy subiected vnder Christes feete Now if this desire and offer for vs must not only be voluntarie but inflamed with wonderfull vehemencie then would not Christ sweat bloud for any terror of his owne death but for his infinite feruency to preuaile and obtaine his petition for vs. You permix Christes feare and his feruent zeale together and call the whole action his agonie though it containe both feare conceaued at first when he approched Gods presence in iudgement for sinne and comfort receaued at last by message brought from Heauen and out of this confusion you collect what you list and say what you please to no purpose That Christ might haue a naturall feare of death I then said and yet see no cause to recall it but that I said Christ did sweate bloud for feare of his bodily death this is one of your painted faces with which you would outface the trueth Howbeit this persisting in your ignorant folly without remembring or regarding what is said on the other side argueth ridiculous negligence or malitious diligence of which because I haue already spoken I will say no more o Defenc. pag. 106. li. 33. Why should Hilarie deny that Christes bloudy sweat came of infirmity or Austen that Christes feare and perturbation was of infirmity Because they had learned iudgments and sober considerations in these matters which you want They beheld Christes power which no force of hell or Satan could impeach but where and when himselfe would permit They saw the innocencie and integrity of Christes humane nature which could not be tossed nor troubled with inward affections but when and how farre he was content to admit them They knew the infinite loue of God to his son for whose sake we were all beloued and adopted and that the father was so farre from tormenting the soule of his sonne with his immediate hand that p Iohn 17. he gaue him power ouer all flesh and q Iohn 13. gaue all things into his hands euen before his death and against the time of his agony in the garden Wherefore as the r Iohn 14. Prince of this world had nought in him and for that cause neither sinne nor corruption were found in him and s Iohn 10. no man tooke his soule from him but he laid it downe of himselfe so neither necessity nor infirmitie of our nature could oppresse or possesse him but he must first giue place to it by his will and guide it by
patience whereby we might be assured that he felt his afflictions on the Crosse with quicker sense and greater paines then we are able with any patience to endure And is this all that now you would say that Christ found no ioy in his paines what Cow-keeper doth not know that paine is paine and not ioy but was Christes paine such that it excluded his soule from the remembrance or sense of all Gods graces so richly powred on him and promises so faithfully made vnto him you were best come in with your mooueable fittes of astonishment and tell vs that in one and the same sentence when Christ said My God my God he was in full and perfect assurance and assistance of Gods fauour whom els he could not call his God if he felt no comfort in him that is the God of all comfort and when he pronounced the next syllable why he presently fell into a sudden pangue where he was forsaken and left all comfortlesse and alone according to your deuices And if any man be so wise to let you lead him through such thornes as to graunt in Christ on the Crosse sometimes hope of glorie and sometimes feare of confusion sometimes comfort and suddainly distrust of his saluation sometimes Gods fauour and full assistance as in affliction and by and by the second death and the paines of the damned he may dally with faith and infidelity with heauen and hell with Christ and Beliall as you doe But if it were not possible for Christ crucified being the wisdome and power of God to be tossed and tumbled with such contrarie blasts then hath the forsaking which he complained of an other manner of sense then you imagine And whatsoeuer meaning you ascribe vnto it you may not with a word that admitteth diuers interpretations impugne the plaine and open wordes and deeds of our Sauiour in which is no question As when the high Priest asked him e Mar. 14. art thou Christ the sonne of the blessed Iesus said I am and ye shall see the sonne of man sit at the right hand of power and come in the cloudes of heauen And when the Theefe that was crucified with him said vnto him f Luc. 22. Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdome he answeared Verily I say vnto thee to day shalt thou be with me in Paradise As also breathing out his soule he said g Ibidem Father into thine hands I commend my spirit If to be the sonne of God and to sit at Gods right hand in glory if to dispose of Paradise at his pleasure and to commit his spirit into his Fathers hands be no signes nor proofes of comfort and ioy then let your exposition beare some shew but if these be more then arguments of most excellent honour and glory not onely reserued for him and confirmed vnto him but assumed and professed by him euen when he was condemned and crucified who that had any care of trueth or respect to reason would auouche that Christs h Defenc. pag. 108. li 9. godhead gaue him for that season of his passion no sense nor feeling of comfort and ioy neither in spirit soule nor body i Defenc. pag. 108. li. 16. This was that extreame humiliation and exinâ—…nition of nature wherein God spared not his sonne and wherein Christ spared not himselfe If you may sit iudge not only ouer Prophets and Apostles but ouer Christ himselfe you will soone appoint him to suffer what pleaseth you but when you come to make proofe thereof you betray the violence of your spirits that must haue all thinges giue way to your wills and the weakenesse of your iudgements that discerne not humility from infidelity nor religious patience from hellish astonishment k Philip. 2. Exinanition and humiliation the Apostle nameth in Christ but either voluntary and either in comparison of his diuine glory and maiesty wherein being equall with his father he tooke on him the forme of a seruant and Christ emptied himselfe of glory not of gracâ—… humbled himselfe becomming obedient to the death of the crosse The Apostle neither saith nor meaneth that Christ emptied himselfe of all grace or comfort in his whole humane nature but laid aside the vse and shew of his diuine power and honour whiles for loue to vs he performed the worke of our redemption in the shape of a seruant and became obedient vnto the death of the crosse which was painefull and shamefull but not astonished with the paines of the damned nor subiected to the second death This is your yarne which you would faine weaue into the Apostles words but truth and falshood haue no fellowship no more haue your dreames and the Apostles doctrine As much it maketh for you that God spared not his owne sonne but gaue him for vs all whence you may as well conclude that God adiudged his sonne to euerlasting destruction and damnation for that were indeed not to spare him as that he inflicted on him the true paines of hell least he should seeme to spare him The Apostles wordes expound themselues God spared not his sonne but gaue him for vs This giuing him into the hands of sinners for our sakes was Gods not sparing him otherwise that God spared him in nothing which either his power was able to impose or our sinnes did deserue this is doctrine for him that meaneth to be an Apostata from all faith and trueth to set the father at as great enmity with his sonne as our sinnes did deserue or could prouoke The higth of Christs not sparing himselfe was as the Apostle teacheth his obedience vnto the death of the Crosse if you will haue Christs obedience stretch to the second death of the damned you must get you some new Scriptures these that are already written witnesse no such thing How beâ—…t you will lacke no Scripture For rather then you will acknowledge your want in that behalfe you will make euery Chapter throughout the Bible to speake of your dreames For euen * 〈◊〉 pag. 〈◊〉 heere you quote Deutero 10 17 and Luc 16 17 in the first of which places the Scripture saith l Deut. 10. 17. The Lord your God is God of Gods and Lord of Lords a great God mightie and terrible which accepteth no persons nor taketh rewards What is this to Christes sufferings or to the paines of the damned was it after noone or after midnight when you quoted these places you knew not why nor wherefore So play you with Luc 16 17. where it is said m Luc. 16. 17. It is more easie that heauen and earth should passe away then that one tittle of the Law should fall Will you hence inferre which is the thing that you should prooue ergo Christ was forsaken of all outward and inward comfort and ioy besides you no man hath the grace to make such faire and cleare demonstrations of your doctrine n Defenc pag. 108. li. 21. This forsaking or
his owne most free and fore-determined will would he then so mournefully grieue and complaine thereat It hath no reason nor likelihood in it You runne your selfe out of breath and quite besides the way You shall not need to perswade me that Christ was resolued and willing to die I perfectly beleeue it and easily confesse it but how as he himselfe declared the spirit was willing the flesh was weake The minde of Christ apprehended and persued all these things which you mention but that excludeth not the naturall dislike which Gods will is all men should haue of death This imperfection of mans nature since it pleased Christ to taste as well as the rest of our infirmities and affections you may by no respects nor rewards make the weakenesse of Christes flesh to which he submitted himselfe the Weaknesse appered in Christs flesh but willingnesse in his spirit same or equall with the willingnesse of his spirit which had and shewed the abundance of all grace Wherefore I maintaine both in Christ a voluntarie sense of the weaknesse of our flesh and an heauenly strength of the inward man which expressed but ouerballanced the naturall desire of the outward man in Christ. And still you harpe on that one string which is vtterly out of tune that he would not do it So extreamly and So mournefully This extremitie is only your fansie for I say Christ did it meekely obediently and faithfully assuring himselfe that his Father who all this while had tried his patience would at his prayer not onely end his paine but make heauen and earth to witnesse what account God made of him though for a season he left him in their hands to be made a sacrifice for our sinnes u Defenc. pag. 111. li. 15. Lazarus when he was returned from the ioyes of heauen to take againe his rotten carcase yet he grieued not at it nor ought he so to haue done When you sincke in reasons you ascend to reuelations Who tolde you that the soule of Lazarus was in the ioyes of heauen when Christ raised his bodie from the graue Christ placeth the soule of the other Lazarus that died at the rich mans doore in Abrahams bosome to be comforted and doe you take vpon you to place this Lazarus that was brother to Marie and Martha in the very ioyes of heauen Where was his soule those foure dayes you will aske It is not for you to aske nor for me to answere The things after this life and out of this world it is not lawfull for me or you farder to enquire then the Scripture reuealeth That such as are raised from the dead should be able by experience to report the ioies of heauen or the paines of hell or the secrets of Gods kingdome is a thing not permitted by God as we find by Abrahams answeare to the rich man praying that Lazarus might be sent to his fathers house God hath places and Angels enough to keepe the soules of such as he meaneth shal be returned to this life though it be neither in hell nor in heauen From hell no man is released and from heauen no man is dismissed that hath once seene God face to face When x 1. Cor. 13. that which is perfect is come then that which is in part shall be abolished sayth the Apostle And will you aduenture to abolish perfection after it is come and to bring men backe to this mortall life that haue seene God in the fulnesse of his glory whom no man liuing can see depriuing them of that vision perfection and brightnesse which the ioyes of heauen haue in them It is an enterprise meet for such an encounterer as you are Paul liuing was taken vp into y 2. Cor. 〈◊〉 the third heauen euen into Paradise where he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he might not vtter Was Paul then in the ioyes of heauen I trow not For he sayth Lest I should be exalted out of measure through the abundance of reuelations there was giuen vnto me a sting in the flesh euen the messenger of Satan to â—…uffit me If the abundance of reuelation would so exalt Paul when he was but taken vp into Paradise that he needed the messenger of Satan to humble him how would the ioyes of heauen and cleercnesse of Gods face beheld in his glory exalt men that should afterward liue againe in this wretched world And therefore this is like the rest euen a bolde assertion of things vnknowen whereas God wanteth no meanes nor places extraordinarie to detaine the soules of such as shall in his counsell returne to this life without knowing the secrets or possessing the ioyes of heauen z Defenc. pag. 111. li. 22. If your Fathers proue any thing towards your meaning it is this because that he complained of his bodily dying Howbeit they say not that he thus complained only and meerely The Defender 〈◊〉 the Fathers proue my meaning for that Neither do I thinke will you plainly holde this NEITHER DO VVE DENIE THE OTHER If the Fathers meaning be which you now consesse that Christ on the crosse complained because of his bodily dying then proue they as much as I produced them sor and your admitting this exposition of theirs sheweth that all this while you idlely sought to subuert their assertion with your strong allegation as you supposed to no purpose since now you denie it not And where you pretend they say not ONLY and meerely for that you come too late with your exception For since Christ made no complaint on the crosse but this My God my God why hast thou forsaken me if in that he complained because of his bodily dying as you do not denie then all proofe for your hell paines out of those words is quite excluded aswell by their opinion as by your owne confession And your making Christs complaint on the crosse to be a Pa. 111. li. 22 improbable yea vnlawfull conuinceth you by your owne mouth that within the compasse of fiue lines you are contrary to your selfe and charge Christ with vnlawfull mourning which amounteth to as much as sinfull As for mine opinion what respects Christ might haue in that complaint of his I haue before deliuered so that your so grieuing and so mourning only and meerely for that is but a sillie refuge when you can not otherwise resist the trueth b Defenc. pag. 111. li. 32. 28. These Fathers had no purpose here to exclude the suffering of Christes soule but only to denie that his Godhead suffered They stroue here with heretikes whose controuersies were farre from our question Indeed the heretikes against whom they wrote tooke great holde of these places on which you build your hell paines and because they were Heretikes alwayes vrged the same places whiâ—…h the Desender doth somewhat darke and doubtfull they stumbled many weake Christians with them euen as you doe Their purpose I know was to proue Christ no God in nature because he feared and sorowed in
110. li. 28. exceeding generall and constant ioy and had as Dauid foreprophesied of him i 34. constant and continuall ioy in God was there no feeling of all this triumph and ioy so exceeding constant and continuall May a man be so franticke as to confesse that Christ felt all this and yet to say he had no comfortable feeling This may be called the death of the soule To him that calleth light darknesse good euill faith feare ioy discomfort this may seeme death which by all the rules of the sacred Scriptures is called the life of the soule heere on earth but by no man that vnderstandeth or careth what he sayth can this be called or defended to be the death of the soule k Defenc. pag. 113. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As it is life to the soule to feele and to enioy the glory of God Psal 16. 21. so it is death to feele the want and absence thereof vtterly Hauing abused the Fathers at your pleasure you offer now the like if not worse to the Scriptures The sixteenth Psalme vers 11 not 21 as you quote it sheweth vs that there is a way to life reuealed here on earth but the fulnesse of ioy is in Gods presence when we shall behold his face as the Angels doe in heauen The way to life is grace wherewith Christ was replenished from his mothers wombe and in greater measure then all his members For he had the fullnesse thereof in this life where the perfectest men haue but a measure thereof and we l Iohn 1. all haue receaued of his fulnesse The plenty of pleasure which is at Gods right hand is euerlasting glory both of soule and body into which Christ entred after his Resurrection How doth this prooue that Christs soule was dead during the time of his Paâ—…sion if a man would seeke out a place to confirme the contrarie he cannot light on a better For these words pertaining directly to Christ on the crosse conclude that euen in the midst of his sufferings m Psal 16. v. 11 the waies of life were made knowen to him by God and that after his rising againe God would Replenish him with the ioy of his countenance which was euerlasting glory in the heauens The one he possessed the other was promised more then which the soule of man cannot enioy in this life Now except this be your rage rather then your reason that all mens soules are dead till they come to behold God face to face in the heauens I see not what you can hence collect touching the death of Christs soule The contrarie may be soundly concluded out of this place For the wayes of life were made knowen to him here on earth and by him to all men liuing since he prosessed himselfe to be the n Iohn 14. Way and the Truth and the Life and the promises of God to him as farre exceeded all honour and glory reserued for men as it was possible for the head to excell his members o Defenc pag. 113 li. 1â—… This heauenly life Christ tasted a while in his transsiguration this death he felt besides his bodily death on the Crosse. If Christ neuer tasted an heauenly life but in his transfiguration then all the time of his conuersing heere on earth he felt your hellish death and not in his passion only but what madnesse is this to affirme either of Christ or of his members that their soules are dead till they come to behold Gods face in the glory of his Kingdome If these be your best proofes for the death of Christs soule 〈◊〉 heed you be not estrâ—…nged from the life of God through the ignorant wilfullnesse or your heart that thus confound heauen and earth life and death to maintaine your fansies against both Fathers and Scriptures But of the death of Christs soule we shall haue better occasion afterward to speake when we come to handle it at large where I will by Gods grace let the Reader see how resolutely and absolutely the Fathers ioyning with the Scriptures repell the death of Christs soule as a pestilent point of false doctrine vnlesse we take it as a figuratiue kind of speach which is nothing to the principles of our faith nor to the true price of our Redemption since we must not conuert the truth of Christ to figures and phrases p Defenc pag. 11. li 〈◊〉 Your fourth exposition for any thing I see may be granted for it seemeth to be the same in effect that we hold If the fourth exposition be granted then two of your chiefe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the 〈◊〉 grounds on which you raise your hell paines suffered in the soule of Christ vtterly sincke For then Christ spake these words of his members not of his owne person and it was no such dolefull and vncomfortable mourning and 〈◊〉 his owne soule as you suppose but a praier full of power fauour and grace whereby the sonne of God auerted from vs the separation that was betwixt God vs and made peace in heauen and earth reconciling man to God that before was forsaken of him q Pag. 113 li. 2â—… Was it remooued from vs then surely it was laid on some body els Now that must needes be vpon himselfe You fall to rouing in steed of reasoning Euerlasting death and hell fire it selfe were remooued from vs. On whom then were they laid Desperation confusion reiection were likewise remooued from vs. Were they therefore laid on Christ 〈◊〉 of sinne and corruption in the graue shal be likewise remooued from vs. Were these also laid on Christes person or did he suffer the very same that we should keepe such reasons for your hellish mysteries they haue no force in true religion nor I think with any sober or well aduised reasoner The punishments of this life imposed on all mankind Christ suffered for vs and by them freed vs from euerlasting damnation and destruction which were the due wages of our sinnes He therefore paied a price for vs which was the shedding of his bloud vnto death on the Crosse and by that ransomed vs from the captiuitie and miserie that otherwise were appointed for sinne r Defenc. pag. 113. li. 30. Where you obiect Athanasius that he could not be forsaken of his Father who was alwaies in his Father it is meerely wrested Athanasius speaketh against Arius also that Christs deity could not be for saken of his Father and so was not inferiour to his Father What talke you of wresting that neuer yet conceaued any Fathers words rightly no more then you doe that of Athanasius which I brought You catch at a piece and runne your way as though you were cleerely acquited but returne to the text and looke on the rest with shame enough Who was he that spake those words Why hast thou forsaken me I trust he was the sonne of God though now incarnate who before his incarnation was equall with his father in the forme of God Els Peter was
indeed reueale some reall tast of his heauenly ioies to his children euen in this life I haue already shewed but am not answeared You slide from some blessed men to all the children of God to whom you affirme God doth reueale indeed some reall tast of his heauenly ioies euen in this life What you meane by a reall tast we must learne from your owne mouth by such doubtfull phrases which you may after wrangle about you vse to deliuer your doctrine If you meane ioy in the holy Ghost whiles by hope we expect the promises of God at his determined time that indeed is common to all the children of God in their measure but that teacheth a maine difference betwixt the things heere enioined and reserued for vs in heauen and quite crosseth the new heauen which you would establish For we learne by the Scriptures that our z Coloss. 3. Life is hid in Christ and when Christ who is our life shall appeare then shall we also appeare with him in glory a 1 Iohn 3. Now we are the sonnes of God but yet it doth not appeare what we shal be and we know that when he shall appeare we shal be like him for we shall see him as he is Our knowledge loue and ioy of God and in God beginne heere by the preaching of the Gospell and the working of his spirit but the Scripture neuer calleth those the ioies of ueauen though they shall there continue yet so augmented and accompanied with heauenly brightnesse and glory that they shall not be the same they were For as our naturall vnderstanding and sense and corporall life and flesh shall not be abolished in heauen but abide and be glorified and yet no man is so senselesse as to thinke or say the glory of our creation is the glory of our resurrection so our knowledge loue and ioy which heere are weake and wanting all perfection as being mixed with ignorance and error lust and vnlawfull desires feare and griefe and often obscured and almost ouerwhelmed with infirmity iniquity and misery no wise man will defend to be the ioies of Gods heauenly kingdome where is no want nor defect of any good nor feare nor doubt of any euill inward or outward but as God shall then be all in all so shall we be filled with the sight and fruition of God our loue and ioy increasing according to our knowledge which then shal be the manifest vision of God face to face who is the vnceasing and vnsearchable fountaine of all goodnesse and blessednesse The b Treatis pa. 80 proofe on which you stand as yet not answered is a place of the Apostle to the Corinths applied by many men to the preaching of the Gospel then it maketh nothing for your purpose but if it be referred to the ioyes of heauen as you would haue it it maketh quite against you For c 1. Cor. 2. eye hath not seene saith the Apostle neither eare hath heard neither hath mans heart conceaued the things which God hath prepared for them that loue him If those be the ioyes of heauen which the Apostle there meaneth then is it euident that men are not capable of them whiles they are compassed with sinne and infirmitie but God hath reserued them in the heauens for vs when we shall come to his presence though in the meane time d 1. 2. he hath reuealed to vs by his spirit that such things are kept in store for vs which then shall appeare that is be apparently and perfectly bestowed on vs and we euerlastingly inuested with them The Reuelation which the Apostle here speaketh of is the reuelation of knowledge whereby these things are promised and assured vnto vs not the reuelation of glory whereby we shall see that which we now hope for and enioy that which we now expect This doctrine howsoeuer you would delude it with your reall tasts is plainely deliuered in the Scriptures When Moses besought God to shew him his glory God answered e Exod. 33. ver 20. Thou CANST NOT SEE my face and liue for there shall no man see mee and liue Where God doth not meane that men shall not see him in heauen when they come to be f Matth. 22. as the Angels of God who g Mat. 18. v. 10. alwayes behold the face of God in heauen his owne sonne hath sayd h Matt 5. blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God and his Apostle likewise i 2. Cor. 13. Now we see through a glasse darkely then shall we see face to face But he meaneth that no man liuing in this mortall flesh can see his face Otherwise it is the cleere resolution of the Scriptures that we k 1. Iohn 3. shall see him as he is that is not by faith as now we doe nor by some created shew of his glory as Moses Elias Esai and other the Prophets and Patriarkes did see him for the confirmation of their callings or consolation of their miseries but as the Apostle speaketh face to face Vpon these words of S. Iohn we shall see him as he is S. Austen learnedly and truely sayth l August in 〈◊〉 Iohan. Tract 101. Ista visio non est huius vitae sed futurae non temporalis sed aeterna Hunc totius laboris sui fructum Ecclesia nunc parturit desiderando tunc paritura cernendo This vision of God as he is is not in this life but in the life to come not temporall but eternall This fruite of her whole labour the Church now trauelleth with by desiring it but then shall attaine by beholding it Now if the sight of God himselfe face to face that is of his substance and glory in plaine full and perfect manner and measure be the same with the darke and enigmaticall beholding his graces and promises by the glasse of faith then haue you some reason to say the ioyes of heauen may be had in this life but if in the manner measure obiects and effects of our sight of God in this life and the next there be so great difference then you deceiue both your selfe and your Reader to affirme we haue the ioyes of heauen heere in this life when not onely our sinne our ignorance our miserie mutabilitie and mortalitie but euen our faith and hope do clearely prooue that we haue not that which we desire nor as yet enioy that which we expect and beleeue wee shall haue m August epist. 112. Non corda munda suae substantiae contemplatione fraudauit cum haec magna summa merces Deum colentibus diligentibus promittatur dicente ipso Domino quando corporalibus oculis visibiliter apparebat inuisibilem se contuenaū mundis cordibus promittebat qui diligit me diligitur a Patre meo ego diligam eum ostendā meipsum illi God hath not defrauded cleane harts of the sight of his substance since that is promised to those which serue
and loue God as the great and chiefe reward the Lord saying when he appeared visible to the eyes of their bodies promised himselfe inuisible to be seene of cleane hearts he that loueth me shal be loued of my Father and I will loue him and will shew mine owne selfe vnto him n Defenc. pag. 120 li. 7. The transfiguration of Christ on the mount declareth that some reall part of heauenly glory may be heere on earth which you your selfe somewhere confesse cleane against your selfe You would needes tell vs in you Treatise that heauen was some foretaste of the infinite ioy prepared for the godly which you attempted to prooue by the Apostles words common to all the children of God and thereupon concluded thus you o pa. 80. li. 23. see that as there is heauen in this life in some measure euen so there may be hell I replied that if you p Conclu pag. 337. 〈◊〉 34. affirmed of heauen as you did of hell that the VERY SAME IOYES which are in heauen or EQVALL with them are heere sometimes found in vs liuing on earth it was a wicked error flatly repugning to the trueth of Gods promises and to the very nature of our Christian faith and hope We reasoned not of Christs manhoode which q Colos. 1. in all things had the preeminence aboue and afore all the sonnes of God but OF THE CODLY whom you expressely named and of whom I accordingly replied and to whom those words of the Apostle cited by you for proofe of your purpose doe precisely pertaine For of Christ they are most false that his eye neuer saw nor his eare neuer heard nor his hart neuer conceiued the things which God hath prepared for them that loue him Now when you should prooue that mortall men and no more then men though the members of Christ liuing heere on the earth haue THE VERY SAME IOYES which are in heauen or EQVALL with them you run to Christes transfiguration on the mountaine and by that you would inferre that there was heauen euen in this life in some measure But first where can you shew that Christes transfiguration on the mountaine is called heauen in the Scriptures Next what deriuation can you make from Christs power knowledge and glory to ours heere on earth Christs soule had many parts and degrees of heauenly perfection in this life which ours haue not he was free from sinne and error which abound in vs he was full of trueth and grace which want in vs saue what we receiue from his fulnesse he was the way the light and the life that leadeth lightneth and quickeneth euery man comming into the world yea the crosse of Christ was the wisdome and power of God These and many other maine differences the Scriptures expresse betwixt Christ and vs so that from his perfection and preeminence to our weakenesse wickednesse and wretchednesse in this world no comparison can be made nor any consequent but that beleeuing in him louing him and obeying his commandements as we are heere regenerate and renewed by his spirit so we shal be conformed to his image to raigne with him in the next life if we suffer with him in this life Christs transfiguration then is not called heauen in any Scripture neither had it the perfection or condition of heauen since heauen is not a transitory taste of mutable ioy or glory but a full and euerlasting possession of all power honour and blisse communicable from God and proportionable to the receauer But if Christ had the reall fruition of heauen in his flesh heere on earth how much more in his soule which was alwaies full of trueth and grace light and life and hauing so reall a tast as you speake of and so immeasurable a fulnesse of life and grace as the Scriptures speake I greatly maruaile how you come really to place hell and heauen in one soule together and specially in the soule of Christ on which you inflict the very substance of hell paines when yet the abundance and continuance of heauenly ioy could not want in him As for my somewhere confessing cleane against my selfe that Christ transfigured in the mount tasted of that heauenly glory prepared for him I see not how that crosseth any thing auouched by me in the 337. and 338. page by you noted You shall do well when you challenge contrarieties not to let the report rest on your crackt credit but produce the words that your Reader may be iudge of both You are sharp enough to catch hold of any thing if there were any cause I called indeed Christs transfiguration on the mount a taste of that heauenly ioy prepared for him I called it not heauen A taste of things neither abideth nor sufficeth which heauen fully doth therefore it is rather a contradiction then a confession of your conceit For if you thinke that Christs heauenly glory may be defectiue or mutable as his transfiguration was you broch a wicked and impious error Christs transfiguration did not exempt him from feare sorrow shame and death following which if you imagine of his glorification in heauen it is a right hellish impiety And whatsoeuer we affirme of Christ touching his preeminence aboue all the children of men as that he was free from sinne and full of grace and had the perfect knowledge of Gods trueth and will aboue men and Angels I hope you will not deriue it to his members heere liuing in the flesh least you leaue no ground of Christian religion vnshaken r Defenc. pag. 120. li. 10. Onely this you haue to obiect touching men that faith and hope is the euidence of things not seene neither are our greatest ioyes the same nor equall to them which we shall possesse in the next world I haue also to obiect that it is not lawfull for you nor for any man liuing to determine of Gods kingdome without his warrant nor to auouch that to be heauen which the Scriptures doe not Take heed it is no pastime to play with heauen and hell as you do without better aslurance than you haue Know you not what that learned Father sayth s Tertullianus de praescrip aduersus haereticos Nobis nihil ex nostro arbitrio indulgere licet It is not lawfull for vs that be Christians to deuise any thing of our owne heads But t Cyril de fide ad Reginas li 2. it is necessarie for vs as Cyril sayth to follow the diuine Scriptures and in nothing to depart from their praescription u Defenc pag. 120 li. 14. I answere our reasons before do proue more than only hope in the faithfull sometimes And I replie that none of your reasons do any way proue the ioyes of heauen Gods answere to Moses must stoppe your mouth and the presumption of all such as you are x Exod. 33. Thou canst not see my face for there shall no man see me and liue Moses saw as much as in this mortall life any
momentarie transfiguration of his bodie and to neglect and ouerskippe the constant and continuall ioy and glory of his soule which far better deserued the name of heauen than the change of his bodie t Defenc. pag. ◅21 li. 2. We grant the ioyes of heauen here are nothing equall to those hereafter only we say the very same in nature may be and are by the effectuall working of Gods gratious spirit in his elect reuealed in some measure and sometime euen in this world Neither is this as your charity speaketh any lewd or wicked error My charity serueth me and my duty bindeth me to tell you that if you of your owne head without the word of God will make an heauen or defend that to be heauen which is imperfect mutable and often defiled not with misery and death only but with weakenesse and wickednesse also you maintaine an euident and pestilent error The graces of God are heauenly aswell because they are giuen from heauen and direct to heauen as also they assure men of heauen but the measure of grace or ioy which we haue heere on earth is not the heauen which we are willed to beleeue and expect where our reward is and where an incorruptible vndefiled and immutable inheritance is reserued for vs and whence we looke for our Sauiour Your distinction that our ioy is the very same in nature though not in measure which is in heauen is not only false but a void and idle refuge For the ioy of heauen The name of Nature in the graces of God and ioyes of heauen is a vaine distinction is the plaine vision of Gods face which bringeth with it a present perfect perpetuall and plenary possession of all light power loue holinesse and happinesse deriueable f◅m God which in this weake fraile sinnefull and wretched life no man hath nor can haue And therefore though there be the knowledge loue and ioy of God both in this life and in the next yet the differences are so many and so great that no man of any reason or vnderstanding will make the one to be the other for some agreements in some points whereas in the whole there is not only a substantiall difference betwixt them which is the sight of Gods face but so many parts effects and consequēts in the one which are not in the other that it is more then folly to make the one by pretence of nature to be the same with the other All ioy in nature is the same if by nature we meane the generall definition therof for ioy is the impression or inward sense of good present or instant yea hope is in nature all one with ioy since in hope there is ioy as in feare there is paine and in hope we reioice yet no considerate diuine will confound hope and ioy together because they differ but in time much lesse make the ioies in this life which are defectiue mutable and permixed with our infirmity misery and iniquity the very same in nature with the ioies of heauen which are abundant constant and sincere in all parts and effects of brightnesse mightfulnesse righteousnesse and blessednesse which men can possibly comprehend when they come to the presence of God The sight of God by his creatures by his iudgments by his word and by himselfe is the same in the generall nature of knowledge yet are there as great differences betwixt them as betwixt darkenesse and light The Apostle saith u Rom. 1. The inuisible thinges of God that is his eternall power and godhead are seene by the creation of the world considered in his workes and that which may be knowen of God is manifest in them Shall we then say the heathen haue the very same knowledge of God by his workes which the Angels in heauen haue by the sight of himselfe the Diuels know him also by his workes by his word and his iudgements x Ionas 2. Thou beleeuest saith Iames That there is one God thou doest well The Diuels also beleeue◅t and tremble Yea they know Christ to be the sonne of God y Luc. 4. I know who thou art said the Diuell to Christ euen the holy one of God Shall we then thinke that the Diuels faith is the very same in nature with our Christian faith of many castawaies which fall away from the grace of God and receaue it in vaine the Apostle saith z Heb. 6. They were once lightened and tasted of the heauenly gift and were made partakers of the holy Ghost and tasted of the good word of God and of the powers of the world to come Shall we auouch these reprobates were in heauen in this life because they had once the very same graces in nature which the elect haue If our knowledge doe differ in this life and the next Our loue and ioy do follow our knowledge then doth our ioy likewise differ From our knowledge of God riseth our loue of God and our ioy in God For we can neither haue loue nor ioy of that which we know not but as our knowledge increaseth so doth our loue and ioy And therefore when we see God infallibly as he is then shall we loue him vnfainedly as we ought and reioice in him vnspeakeably euen as much as we are capable of not by the strength of our nature but by the working of his power Till then as our knowledge is darke and in part so our loue is weake and our ioy is faint but then shall these very thinges not only rise to an higher degree and be of another nature but be replenished with all parts of light power and blisse without which we may defend nothing to be heauen indeed howsoeuer wee may vse figuratiue speaches to comfort or encourage the godly As then worke and wages labour and rest sowing and reaping running and obtaining striuing and crowning abroade and at home doe differ euen in nature so faith and sight hope and haning promising and performing that is our state in earth and heauen doth likewise differ though it be one and the same thing which is now promised beleeued and hoped for and which hereafter shal be receaued attained and enioyed a Defenc. pag. 121. li. 7. Now then if more then hope only euen heauenly ioies may be on earth surely it followeth that likewise more then feare euen hellish paines themselues may be in men on earth also If the ioies of heauen be not only constant in nature but perfect in measure and consist in the sight of Gods face which no man shall see and liue then certainly the ioies of heauen are not in this life imparted to any mortall and sinnefull man And though that might be which yet God expressely denieth shal be yet the other is no con◅quent that the paines of the damned may be likewise in this weake and fainting flesh because ioy is an affection that preserueth this life and paine if it be violent and aboue our strength presently seuereth the soule
all his Disciples to feare him euen God y Luc. 12. who after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell Shall we thence inferre by your diuinitie that God will cast all the faithfull into hell because he hath power so to doe which they must feare z Philip. 2 Finish your saluation with feare and trembling saith the Apostle Shall we therefore neuer be saued because we must alwayes tremble and feare vnder the mightie hand of God Vnder the same hand of God migh Christ feare and tremble not doubting of his saluation nor distrusting his Fathers loue but knowing that the hand of God was Almightie and able to impose farre greater paine on his bodie then his humane flesh was able to beare It is therefore due to Gods power from all the faithfull and was likewise from Christes manhoode for men to be afrayd of the strength of Gods hand when he ariseth to punish sinne though when and how he will doe it we may not or cannot determine And if we should graunt that Christs flesh euen thus feared the power of Gods hand that was able to keepe him from death and to inflict what paine pleased him you are no whit the nearer to your new found hell or to your second death of Christs soule which you labour to deriue from these words of the Apostle to the Hebrewes But to let the reader see how rashly rudely you conclude what you list out of the Apostles words without any sure ground The word which all this while you haue taken to import a coufused and perplexed feare in Christ hath no such signification in the Greeke tongue and in this place of the Apostle by the iudgement of the ancient and best learned interpreters of all ages that are not infected with this new fansie is taken for reuerence or a religious feare of God Of which signification there can be no question with any man that is meanely learned And albeit some fauouring your fansie haue sough farre and neere for examples where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 might signifie a painefull and amazing feare yet find they none neither in prophane nor sacred writers but only a carefull feare to decline euill or a religious feare honoring God to be the true force of that word How prophane men vse the word with that I haue elsewhere sayd this may suffice Diogenes Laertius deliuering the decrees and opinions of the best philosophers saith of them they affirme a 〈◊〉 de 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that 〈◊〉 carefulnesse is contrary to feare as being an honest and reasonable declination of euill 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that a wise man is neâ—…er amazed with feare but wary to decline euill Saint Ierom confesseth as much among Christians b 〈◊〉 li 3 〈◊〉 5. â—…pist â—…d 〈◊〉 He that feareth hath paiâ—…e and is not perfect According to which signification of feare seruants haue the spirit of bondage in feare There is another kind of feare named by the Philosophers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and with vs it may be called 〈◊〉 though this doe not fully match the force of the word The Prophet Dauid knew tâ—…e 〈◊〉 of the perfect when he said nothing wanteth to them that feare the Lord. Of Simeon that tooke Christ in his armes when he was brought to the Temple by his mother Saint Luke saith he was a iust man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and one that religiously feared God So of those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. that buried Steuen the Martyr he saith d 〈◊〉 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 certaine mâ—…n Fâ—…ARING GOD caried Steuen to bee buried And in the twelfth of this Epistle the same Apostle vseth the very word which he applied before to Christ for the common duetie of all the godly e Hebr. 12. Let vs haue grace by which we may serue and please God with reuerence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a religious feare Which is M. f 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in 12. ca. epistolâ—… ad Hebreos Bezaes owne interpretation of that place howsoeuer he swarue from it in the formâ—…r words of the same Epistle Neither doth the Syriack translation any thing helpe him since the word dechalta which in the fift Chapter is affirmed of Christ in the 12. Chapter of the same Epistle and indiuers other places of the new Testament is by the same translator referred to al Christians as expressing a generall duty belonging to God And therfore there is no need why any man should translate the one otherwise then he doth the other specially the whole Greeke and Latin Church concurring in one and the same signification and exposition of the word which is a better precedent to follow then any one mans translation And where some others would take aduantage of the Greeke preposition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifiâ—…th for as well as from signifying alwayes from and not for it is an euident ouersight in them abusing their skill to maintaine their will more then trueth enforceth For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the new Testament and with the Septuagint noteth vsually as well for as from In the 14. of Saint Matthewes Gospell when the disciples saw Christ walking on the waters at the fourth watch of the night and approching the ship wherein they were they cryed g Matth. 14. vers 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for feare The souldiers likewise that kept the Sepulchre when they saw the Angell that rolled away the stone and sate on it they were h Matth. 28. vers 〈◊〉 astonished 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for feare and became as dead men Zacheus by reason of his low stature could not see Iesus i Luc. 19. v. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the multitude or presse that was about him The Apostles that cast theiâ—… net into the sea at Christs commandement could not draw it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the number k Ioh 21. v. 6. of fishes that were in the net Paul reporting the maner of his conuersion how he was stroken to the ground with a great light that suddenly shined on him from heauen sayth When I could not see l Acts 22. ver 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the glory of that light I was led by the hand to Damascus The Sâ—…ptuagint in many places vse the same proposition in the same sense Israels eyes were dimme m Gen. 48. v. 14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for age My bones sayth Iob are drie n Iob. 30. v. 30 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for heat You shall crie o Esa. 65. v. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for griefe of heart and houle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for affliction of spirit sayth Esay of the Iewes reiected Where the Septuagint doe make 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equiualent to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with an accusatiâ—…e which noteth the cause of any thing Infinite are the examples that might be brought out
ascend aboue the higth of the clouds and I wil be like the most high * The last or highest heauen the Scripture nameth the Seat throne or habitation of God which is not only holy as whereinto no vncleane thing shall enter but is aboue all other heauens and often called the heauen of heauens In this is the presence of Gods throne that is a perpetuall and plaine reuelation of his diuine glory and maiesty which the elect Angels alwaies behold And heere is not only the fulnesse of ioy as in the presence of God but the stability security and satiety of euerlasting life and blisse to men and Angels without any defect doubt or danger of failing or decreasing In this they want nothing and besides this they desire nothing since in him who is all in all they find all things worthy loue delight and ioy Looke downe from heauen saith Esay to God and behold from the dwelling place of thine holinesse and glory And Ieremie The Lord shall crie from aboue and giue out his voice from his holy habitation Behold the heauens and the heauens of heauens containe thee not saith Salomon Praise the Lord from the heauens saith the Psalmist praise him in the highest Praise him all his Angels praise him all his armies Praise him heauens of heauens To this place when Christ ascended with his body the Apostle saith of him that he was made higher then the heauens and ascended aboue all the heauens and sitteth â—…t the right hand of maiesty in the high places Now two we call both not all but of three we first vse this word â—…ll And the Greeke tongue hath a speciall number for two which is the duall the plurall is applied to moe Besides Moses saith in the beginning before the light or firmament were created God made eth hashamaiâ—…m the heauens and the earth where by the name of heauen the best interpreters vnderstand the place appointed for the habitation of Angels and the reuelation of Gods glory Now the word hashamaiâ—…m in Hebrew being not the singular number must haue diuers maâ—…s in it as well as the aire and 〈◊〉 haue diuers regions and sphaeres to make the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 agree to either of them So that when Christ is said to haue ascended aâ—… the heauens nature reason and Grammar besides Scripture seeme to teach vs that he ascended aboue that part of the third heauen where the Apostle noteth Paradise to be And consequently if the soules of the righteous deceased be in Paradise they are not as yet in the highest heauens where Christ sitteth in the glory of God his Father in whose house are many mansions and whether they shal be admitted at the last day when Christ shall come againe to take them vnto himselfe and to haue them for euer with him in the possession and communion of his kingdome and glory that they may be like the Angels To this difference of place and glorie before and after the day of iudgement the Scriptures incline as well as the Fathers if I mistake them not which I referre to the iudgement of the wise and learned S. Iohn saw the soules of the Martyrs Vnder the altar where they were willed to rest vntill the number of their fellow seruants were fulfilled But when crownes of glorie are giuen them as in the last day they shall stand in the presence of the throne of God and before the Lambe and he that sitteth on the throne will dwell among them Henceforth saith Paul is laied vp for me the crowne of righteousnesse which the Lord the iust iudge shall giue me at that day and not to me only but vnto all that loue his appearing Blessed be God saith Peter who hath be gotten vs again vnto â—… liuely hope to an inheritance immortall vndâ—…filed which fadeth not away reserued in heauen for you which is prepared to be shewed in the last time Now are we the Sonnes of God saith Iohn but yet it doth not appeere what we shall be we know that when he shall appecre we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is that is aswell the glorie of his Godhead as of his manhood Then as Paul saith to all the faithfull Your life is hidde with Christ in God When Christ which is our life shall appeare then shall ye also appeare with him in glory And he shal say Come ye blessed of my Father receaue the kingdome prepared for you from the foundation of the world and not retaine the kingdome already possessed by you It were easie out of new writers to shew the same Master Calâ—…m shall suâ—…ce for al who vseth not ouersoone to concurie with the fathers when they diuert from the Scriptures The soules of the saints after death are in peace saith he because they are escaped from the power of the enemy But when heauenly Ierusalem shal be aduanced to her glory and the true Salomon Christ the king of peace shall sitte aloft in his iudgement seat then shall the true Israelites raigne with their KING This they may easily perceiue by the Scriptures whosoeuer haue learned to giue eare to God and heare his voice This also haue they deliuered to vs by hand who haue sparingly and reuerently handled the mysteries of God For Tertullian saith why should we not admit Abrahams bosome to be called a temporall receptacle of the soules of the faithfull And Chrysostom Vnderstand what and how great a thing it is for Abraham to sitte and for the Apostle Paul to expect vntill he be perfected that then they may receaue their reward For vntill we come the Father hath foretold theÌ„ he wil not giue them their reward Art thou grieued because thou shalt not yet receaue it what should Aâ—… doe who ouercame so long since and yet sitteth without his crowne what Noe and the rest of those times for behold they expected thee and expect others after thee They preuented vs in their conflicts but they shall not preuent vs in their crownes because there is onetime appointed to crowne all together Augustine in many places describeth secret receptacles in which the soules of the godly are kept vntill they receaue their crowne and glory Bernard in two homilies made at the feast of all Saints where he handleth this question of purpose teacheth that the soules of the Saints departed from their bodies do stand as yet in the outward courts of the Lord being admitted to rest but not to glory Into that most blessed â—…ouse saith he they shall not enter neither without vs nor without their bodies Those that place soules in some part of heauen so they giue them not the glory of the resurrection to be shewed on them at the time of the resurrection and not before they differ nothing from the former opinion And in his institutions Since the Scripture euery where biddeth vs depend
vnto hell that we should not abide in hell Ruffinus Eousque ille miserando descendit vsquequo tu peccando deiectâ—…s es Christ descended of mercie to the very place whither thou wast deiected by sinne Fulgentius It remained to the full effect of our redemption that the man which God tooke vnto him without sin should descend euen thither whither man separated from God fell by desert of sin that is to hell where the soule of a sinner vseth to be tormented and to the graue where the flesh of a sinner vseth to be corrupted yet so that neither Christs flesh might rot in the graue nor his soule be â—…ormented with the sorrowes of hâ—…ll Cyrill The powers Principalities and rulers of the world which the Apostle numbreth none other could conquere and carie into the desart of hell but only he who said be of good hope I haue ouercome the world Therefore it was necessary that our Lord Sauiour should not only be borne a man amongst men but also descend to hell that he might carie into the wildernesse of hell the goate that was to be led away and returning thence this worke perfourmed might ascend to his father Caesarius Arelatensis Aeterna nox inferorum Christo descendente resplenduit attonitae mentis obstupuere Tortores The euerlasting darkenesse of hell was made bright with Christs descending thither the tormentors inwardly stroken were amazed Prudentius Tartarum benignus intrat fracta cedit Ianua fertur horruisse mundus noctis aeternae chaos Christ mildely entred hell breaking open the gates the world shooke at the opening of Chaos of euerlasting darkenesse Arator Infernum Dominus cum destructurus adiret Sol ruit in Tenebras arua tremunt concussa locis saxa crepant tartara moesta gemunt quia vincula cunta quiescunt Mors ibi quid faceret quo vitae portitor ibat When the Lord went to hell to destroy it the Sunne was darkned the earth shooke the rockes claue in sunder Hell mourned to see her bands loosed But what could death doe there whither the bringer of life came Petrus Chrysologus Mortem suscepisse vicisse intrasse inferos redijsse venisse in iura Tartari Tartari iura soluisse non est fragilit as sed potestas To suffer death and to conquere it to goe to hell and to returne to come within the lawes of the dungeon of hell â—…nd to dissolue the lawes therof is not weakenesse but power And thus he maketh Christ to speake after his resurrection to his Disciples Ego ex mortuis sum vinus ex infernis sum supernâ—…s Ego sum quem mors fugit inferna tremuerunt Tartarus Deum confessus est I am aliue from the dead and come vp from those below I am he whom death fled from hell trembled at and the dungeon of hell confessed to be God Maximus This day of Christes resurrection which the Lord hath made penetrat omnia vniuersa continet coelum terram Tartarumque complectitur pearceth all places conteineth all compriseth heauen earth and the dungeon of hell For that Christ the true day lightned heauen earth and the deepe of hell the Scripture witnesseth There should be no end of alleaging if I should cite all that speake to this purpose These be auncient and sufficient to prooue this refuter a fabler in affirming that the Fathers with one voice auouch Christ went no whither but where his faithfull and holy seruants were whom the Fathers did not thinke to be in the torments of hell nor in the place of the damned and to shew that I teach none other sense of the Creed then all these Fathers and infinit others did before me Neither can they be shifted off as this Trifler vseth to decline them who name Hades that they ment the world of soules which might be as well in heauen or paradise as in hell since they speake of Christes descent after death to that place where there was euerlasting darknesse and amazednesse of diuels bondage and punishment of sinners deliuerance from destruction an happie and mightie conquest ouer enemies with such like circumstances which by no meanes can agree either to Paradise or heauen or to any other place but onely to hell where these things are found and no where else And if new writers may be regarded I could bring as many or moe of them of great learning and good iudgement confessing and allowing this exposition of the Creede which I follow that Christ descended into Hell to destroy Satans power and force ouer his and to free them all from comming thither as concurrent and consonant with the sacred Scriptures and namely refelling your fansie that Christ went no whither but where his faithfull and holy seruants were The very Catechisme which you would seeme so much to respect as if it were the publicke and authorised doctrine of this Realme maketh it needfull to beleeue that as Christs body was laid in the bowels of the earth so his soule separated from his body descended ad inferos to the places or spirits below that is to hell and with all the force and efficacie of his death so pearced vnto the dead atque inferos adeo ipsos and euen to the spirits in hell that the soules of the vnfaithfull perceaued the condemnation of their infidelity to be most sharp and iust ipseque inferorum princeps Satan and Satan himselfe the Prince of hell saw all the power of his tyrannie and of darcknesse to be weakned broken and destroied and contrariwise the dead who whiles they liued beleeued in Christ vnderstood the worke of their redemption to be performed and felt the fruite and force thereof with a most sweet and certaine comfort The Catechisme treating of Christs descent to hell mentioned in the Creed deliuereth this to be the sense thereof that Christes soule separated from his body descendit ad inferos descended vnto hell And least we should doubt what he meaneth by inferi he putteth inferos as a degree lower farder then the dead in saying Penetrauit ad mortuos atque inferos adeo ipsos Christ pearced vnto the dead and which more is euen to hell it selfe and maketh Satan to be Princeps inferorum the Prince of hell Who is no chiefe ruler either in heauen or Paradise but onlie in hell Againe he resolueth that together with the soule of Christ came the power force of Christs death as well to the faithfull which were saued by him as to the rest iustly condemned for their vnbeliefe and that the Diuell himselfe saw all the power of darckenesse afflicted and oppressed by Christ. More then this I do not teach so much the catechisme auoucheth to be part of the Christian faith and the meaning of that article in the Creed Christ descended into hell Peter Martyr likewise in the confession of his faith and exposâ—…tion of the Creed sayth As touching Christes soule as soone as it
Then notwithstanding your exception not worth a straw these are two maine grounds of the Christian faith that Christ dying descended to the decpe and rising ascended to heauen and hee that but doubteth in his heart of either of these by the apostles verdict emptieth and reuerseth Christs death and resurrection And did not this latter question who can descend to the deepe pertaine directly vnto Christ who onely of all men that euer were descended to the deepe of Hell and returned againe with safetie and glory we might not onely iustly doubt whoeâ—…er besides Christ descended to the deepe of the earth but our faith teacheth vs plainely â—…o denâ—…e that euer man Christ cxcepted did descend to the deepe supposing now that to signifie hell as you doe and yet doth not our faith frustrate the death of Christ but therein rather commend it and exalt it that neuer man was able to doe as he did that is dying and descending to subiect hell vnder his power and to deliuer all his from thence So that if the deepe heere doe signifie hell then is heere a plaine resolution of the Apostle that Christ dying descended to hell Now least you should take any pride in your peâ—…ting answere not worth a tagge of of a blew point the Reader shall see that all interpreters old and new and euen those on whom you would seeme most to relie haue with one consent comprised the person of Christ in these two questions and yeelded the Apostles answcre to be very extrauagant which God forbid vnlesse Christ were comprised as well in the questions as in the answeres Oecumenius The Apostle referreth these things to Christ. That is wauer not neither say in thy mind how did Christ descend from heauen or did Christ being dead rise from the deepe that is from the lowest places cast all such thoughts out of thy mind Theophylact. Stagger not saith the apostle neither doubtingly cast this in thy mind how Christ descended from heauen or how after death he rose from the deepe id est ex abditissimo profundissimo loco that is from the deepest and most hidden place Erasmus Who shall ascend to heauen that being spoken of the Law Paul interpreteth and applieth to Christ. For that is saith he to draw Christ from heauen Or who shall descend into the deepe that is who will beleeue the things that are spoken of hell except he see them this is sayth Paul to draw Christ backe from the dead as though he did not descend to hell or they desired that in their sight he would againe descend to hell Peter Martyr thus setteth the Apostles questions Who shall ascend to heauen to see whether God bee reconciled to vs by Christ or who shall descend downe into the deepe to see euerlasting death weakned and abolished by him that is by Christ Bucere The Apostle acknowledgeth in this question the deniall of Christ and that he draweth Christ downe from heauen which admitteth this doubt It is euident that the deepe is taken pro inferis for hell and in this sense the Apostle seemeth to haue vsed this word the deepe for hee addeth that is to bring Christ backe from the dead to wit to account his descent to hell to be void and his victorie ouer death and Gehenna Hyperiâ—…s Say not who shall descend into the deepe thou art eased of this trouble by Christs resurrection from the dead and from hell Gualtere Who shall descend to the deepe to see whether death be disarmed hell gates broken open the Diuels kingdome subuerted and we truely redeemed from all these doâ—… not they denie death to haue beene conquered by the merit and resurrection of Christ and therefore would haue him againe to die and to returne to hell to doe that once more which he hath alreadie performed Piscator The heart of him that beleeueth doth not descend by his thoughts to the deepe to trie whether victorie be obtained against eternall death For if he doubt of this he must also doubt whether Christ were dead ad inferos descender it and descended to hell Beza Because the law proposed heauen but vnder an impossible condition and threatned the deepe that is destruction for the offence to which we are all subiect whosoeuer cleaueth to the righteousnesse of the law of force is compelled to crie out who shall ascend to heauen or descena into the deepe to take me hence and lead me thither But contrariwise faith suggesteth that Christ is he which ascended to heauen to carrie vs thâ—…ther with him and descended into the depth of death to abolish him that had power of death Take which of these expositions you will it is euident in euery one of them that by the Christian faith both these impossible actions as man thinketh of ascending to heauen and descending to the deepe were performed for vs in the person of Christ and therefore now to doubt of either is to weaken eneruate the power of Christ who most perfectly hath accomplished both to saue vs from one and bring vs to the other And heere also by the deepe those whom you would seeme to follow vnderstand destruction and eternall death as all the rest doe from which Christ hath freed vs by descending and destroying them for vs. This I say the dead heere importeth the generall condition and state of all the dead as it is opposed to the state of the liuing Yea it is not vnlikely that the former word Abyssâ—… the deepe is vsed also heere by the Apostle to signifie not hell but euen this condition and state of death which is a gulfe bottomlesse neuer satisfied and vnrecouerable like as Sheôl in Hebrew doth likewise properly signifie You shew your selfe by your saying to haue little care what you say that not onely you crosse all Expositors without exception but euen the Scriptures themselues without any respect of trueth or touch of conscience For where the Apostle proposeth this last point Who shall descend to the deepe and returne againe as possible onely to Christ and to none else by your vntidie tale that the deepe heere signifieth the generall condition of the dead opposed to the liuing you make the apostle a weake reasoner or rather a plaine lyer For could Paul at this time be ignorant that Elias and Elizeus raised some from the generall condition of the dead that Christ restored three from death Peter did the like for Tabitha Is there not plaine testimonie giuen in the Scriptures that through faith the women receaued their dead raised to life If this were not onely possible but so vsuall as the Scriptures declare how could Paul make this actioÌ„ of descending to the deepe possible but only to Christ wherefore I say you must be better aduised or else you shew yourselfe in an open and impudent falshood to ruffle and reuell with the holy Ghost testifying that many haue gone to the condition
conceits with rounder words then to any learned or sober writer I would willingly giue That the graue then by which death is meant hath in it or bringeth with it a lacke or losse of all earthly things and that common to good and bad this as it is not denied so is it no special signification of Sheol as you out of your new found notes obserue but the generall consequent of Sheol or the graue in all men iust or wicked as also corruption returning to dust is from whence they were taken To the wicked that wedde their soules to these earthly vanities and neglect God his promises the Prophets often threaten Sheol that is the place and state where all these thinges shal want or perish to them but with the sheol of their bodies which is the graue is ioyned the sheol of their souls which is hell though they not regarding or not beleeuing the later are most often threatned with the former which they euery day saw before their eies so was likeâ—…st to moue them most To the godly the remembrance of Shâ—…ol was somtimes grieuous either because it was ioyned with an vntimely death to theÌ„selues or with the dishonour of Gods name or with the danger of his Church or signification of his dislike of their liues and courses which circumstances haue often troubled the Saints at the sight or foreshew of death These things you stampe and straine with your distempered and vnlearned fansies and then you produce a meere priuation which you call a destruction of the whole man in Sheol Now what if Iob called the graue an house appointed for euery man liuing or said the graue must be an habitation to him as well as to others doth he meane that the whole man bodie and soule shall dwell in the graue or â—…ome to corruption as is presently added I shal say to corruption thou art my Father to the worme Thou art my mother my sister Are you so good a Carpenter that with a meere priuation you can make an habitation and to furnish your house bring soules from heauen or the whole man to dwell with corruption and wormes A seely reason like the rest you interpose That seeing Iob speaketh of Shâ—…ol as his continuall habitation to the worldes end it can not be went onely of the graue for his bodie which endured but a very short time and had no being at all after it was turned to verie earth and wormes Much lesse may it be ment of his soule that turneth neither to earth nor wormes and least of all of his whole person since in the whole euery part is coÌ„tained if it be true of neither part how can it be verified of the whole but such is your folly that with your idle fansies you call the maine grounds of Christian faith in question and offer doubt how God can raise his Saints out of their graues when as their bodies being long before turned to earth and ashes haue no being at all Sir if you speake in earnest these be wicked quarrels and shew that you woulde faine shake heauen and earth to vphold your new found Sheol Otherwise all the godly know that God hath their ashes in sight before him and will not mistake one earth for another though their dust were scattered ouer all the world And so long as he that will raise them by his mightie power hath in so certaine number and measure the whole and euery the least dust that came of their bodies they lie in their graues till the time of resurrection and their maker will not misse an haire of their head nor a mote of their ashes which if it be strange to you dispute against him that created heauen and earth of nothing and not against me that beleeue the resurrection of mens bodies and flesh many thousand yeeres after they be turned to dust and as you wickedly surmise haue no being at all after they are turned to earth and wormes In greatest reason this is that which Iacob meaneth when he saith he will goe downe mourning to his Sonne in Sheol His body he thought was deuoured and digested in the belâ—…es of wilde beasts Therefore he will goe to the soule of his sonne in sheól to enioy the society of his deere Soâ—…e It is no maruell you be so stiffe-necked in rules of Discipline when you â—…e thus â—…ad-headed in points of doctrine I pray you Sir where did Iacob thinâ—… that â—…osephs soule was after death or that his owne should be in hell in Abrahams bosoâ—… or in some place lately deuised by your selfe to containe iust mens soules Or are soules by your Diuinitie without all place that the father might enioy the socieâ—…e of his deare sonnes soule and yet in no place you may doe well to declare vs these doubts for I assure you vnlesse you plead dottage these discourses will amount to plaine impietie In hell there is no great enioying one of an other I trow In heauen you meane it not for then you must confesse heauen to be Sheól which you say you neuer thought In the graue I hope soules doe not lodge then must you find vs a place whither Iacob would descend to enioy the society of his deere sonnes soule Will you call it a meere priuation and destruction which are the graffes that you haue newly planted you must first tell vs what ioy there is in priuation and destruction Next whether this priuation and destruction be any where and so in some place or no where and so a right creature of yours as being a priuation of all witte and trueth Thirdly if Iosephs soule were neither in ioy nor rest what comfort Iacob could take to finde his deere sonnes soule in such a plight And lastly whether the Patrâ—…arks had no promises of rest and receit with God after this life but that they were to seeke for the soules of their parents and children in your priuatiue Sheol which is neither hell heauen nor Abrahams bosome For if it be one of these then is it not onely positiue but also locall that is somewhere and hath a state and condition agreeable to the mercies of God and the desire of the Saints But why persue I your follies so farre as if they were not peeuish pangues of your vnsetled braines Iacobs words without your iests are plaine enough to ech good Christian in saying he would goe mourning to sheâ—…l that is to his graue assuring himselfe after death to haue his soule receaued into that place of rest into which he did not doubt but the soule of his innocent childe was formerly admitted by the goodnesse of his God And if any man like Rabbi Selomoes exposition that êl in this place may signifie ouer or for as it often doth then Iacobs wordes are more easie that he will descend to Sheol mourning for his sonne Howbeit Iacob knew well enough that Iosephs bodie though deuourâ—…d and digested in the
Patriarkes and Prophets partakers of him selfe habes regionem inferûm subterrane am credere thou must beleeue the place or region of inferi to be vnder the earth If you draw these words to your world of the dead then are the soules of the iust neither in heauen nor in Paradise but vnder the earth euen in the heart or midst thereof and there shall remaine vntill the resurrection for so Tertullian resolueth of his inferi Which yet is farder most cleerely to be seene Lazarus apud inferos in sinu Abrahae refrigerium consecutus Lazarus in the world of the dead enioieth comfort in Abrahams bosome contrariewise the rich man is in the torments of fire both of them there receauing their diuers rewards How cleere is this that he maketh hades and inferos euen in Luke also to be nothing but the common state and world of the dead It is farre cleerer that you neuer read Tertullian with indifferent care to trie the trueth of his meaning and words but only to abuse the Reader with a seelie shew not of his writings but of your wrestings For there can be no directer speach to prooue that inferi are neither heauen nor Paradise but places vnder the earth and in the midst thereof where bad and good excepting onely Martyrs are kept in rest or paine till the generall day of iudgement then is found in these bookes of Tertullian from which you would gather your world of the dead For euen in the fiue and fiftie Chapter of his booke De Anima whence you first beganne to weaue your world of the dead he positiuely auoucheth Nulli patet caelum terra adhuc salua ne dixerim clausa Heauen is opened to no man so long as the earth is continued that I say not closed ouer them Together with the end of the world shall the kingdome of heauen be opened And touching Paradise he admitteth no soules to be there but onely Martyrs And therefore to this obiection But thou wilt say the dead are in Paradise whether the Patriarkes and Prophets that rose with our Lord passed euen then ab Inferis from the places below he answereth How then was the region of Paradise which is vnder the Altar reuealed to Iohn in the spirit to haue none other soules in it besides Martyrs how did Perpetua the most valiant Martyr the day before her suffering when Paradise was reuealed to her see there onely her fellow martyrs but because the glittering sâ—…ord that keepeth the gate of Paradise yeeldeth to none saue to such as die in Christ that is as Martyrs for Christ Tota Paradisi clauis tuus sanguis est The only key to open Paradise is thine owne bloud shed in Martyrdome So that in as plaine words as Tertullian vseth any Inferi are neither heauen nor Paradise but Regio subterranea a place or Region vnder earth and in the heart of the earth where some soules are in rest as he thinketh and some in torments which if you can turne to your generall and priuatiue Hades you shall worke wonders That other position of his constituimus omnem animam apud Inferos sequestrari in diem Domini we resolue that euery soule is kept in Inferi till the day of the Lord or of iudgement as it is priuate to himselfe and sauoring of Montanisme so it is different from the rest of the Fathers who confesse not onely Martyrs as he doth but all good Christians after this life to bee receiued into Paradise This error if you be disposed you may mainetaine with Tertullian but you shall neuer thence establish your world of soules which you seeke for Whereupon the learned Iunius noteth thus Inferos Latini Patres vt Graeci Haden pro omni loco aut statu mortuorum dixerunt promiscué The Latine Fathers vse Inferi as the Greeke doe Hades for euery place and state of the dead indifferently That Iunius was very learned I doe not denie but that learned men may be partiall and many times addicted to their priuate collections and opihions I would God we had not so much experience as wee haue If Iunius meane that Hades or Inferi were taken for euery place and state of the dead vnder the earth before Christes comming Iunius wordes are very true that many of the Fathers tooke Hades Inferi for the place of al the dead which they thought to be vnder the earth before Christs comming but that they called heauen or Paradise which are places for the Saints deceased in Christ by the name of Inferi or that they tooke Inferi for the state of the blessed soules since Christes resurrection this I say neither Iunius was nor any man liuing is able to prooue And for Tertullians meaning his wordes are so plaine that neither Iunius nor whosoeuer might or may ouerrule them I repeated them before the effect is this Inferi saith he are beleeued of vs to be a vastitie in the depth of the earth and an hidde profunditie in the bowels thereof for we reade that Christ was the three dayes of his death in the heart of the earth that is in the inward and middlemost receit thereof couered in the earth and hollowed or compassed on euery side with the earth and seated vpon the lower gulfes If these words be not plaine enough he addeth Habes Regionem Inferûm subterraneam credere thou must beleeue the Region of Inferi to be vnder the earth I shall not need many wordes to shew that Iunius obseruation out of Tertullian is not true except you adde euery place and state of the dead vnder the earth thereby to exclude the place and state of the blessed in heauen and in Paradise I leaue it to the Iudgement of any man that hath learning or vnderstanding whether these words of Tertullian do not define and describe a certaine place vnder the earth and within the earth in which he thought the soules of all men Patriarkes and Prophets not exempted were before Christes comming and should bee till the resurrection saue such as rose with Christ or suffered Martyrdome for Christ for that is his exception afterward as I haue shewed the good in rest the badde in punishment To that end he saith Omnes ergo animae penes inferos inquis Velis ac nolis supplicia iam ILLIC REFRIGERIA habes pauperem diuitem Cur enim non putes animam puniri foueri in Inferis interim sub expectatione vtriusque iudicij All soules then you suppose are in Inferi Will you â—…ill you you haue THERE alreadie both punishment and comfort the poore man and the rich For why should you not thinke the soule to bee punished and cherished in Inferis in the places below meane while vnder an expectation of either iudgement These wordes you can alleage and neglecting how plainly Tertullian hath taught besore that Inferi are places in the heart of the earth and a region vnder the earth you wilfully change condition
the Gentiles neuer vsed that word which the heathen at that time did not vnderstand but where occasion so required they retained the word hades and applied it to the place of torment and to the ruler thereof which things were not strange to the Gentiles Since then the Euangelist and Apostles neuer ment to confirme or continue the erroneous fansies of the Pagans and yet vsed their words it is euident they vnderstood so much by these wordes as was not repugnant to the Christian faith Now hades with the Pagans was a place vnder the earth where the wicked after this life were punished This was agreeable to the trueth and for that cause the Apostles retained that sense and force of the word That the soules of the iust were also kept vnder the earth in rest and ease this was the error of the heathen though both Iewes and Christians lighted afterwardes on that fansie This the Apostles doe not ratifie in vsing the word hades for that it was not consonant to the grounds of true religion from which they neuer ment to depart by vsing any wordes accustomed among the heathen And as the Gentiles before they beleeued vsed hades for the chiefe ruler of those Infernall places so doth Saint Iohn not refuse to attribute that name to the diuell in his Reuelation And so without your conceits or discourses we haue shortly and plainely the cause and course why and how the Canonicall writers concurred with the Grecians in vsing the word hades and yet corrected their error Howbeit I thinke the Apostles had chiefe respect to the Septuagint who translating the Hebrew into Greeke then rife in many learned mens handes and expressing there the sense of Sheôl vsed Hades for the death of the bodie in the graue and for the death of the soule in hell after whose example the sacred writers of the new Testament speaking of the wicked or ioyning death with hades note what hades is besides the death of the bodie which they intend by Thanatos And therefore though Hades in the old Testament import the places of death for bodie and soule I meane the graue and hell yet throughout the new Testament that word being alwayes opposed to heauen applied to the wicked or connexed with other wordes that signifie the death of the bodie it must of force be taken for the power and place that killeth the soules of all men approching it except onely Christs to whom all powers and principalities in heauen and earth and hell were and are submitted and subiected Hitherto wee haue tried the nature and vse of Hades and haue found it to bee not properly hell as you auouch no not when it is applied to soules of men deceased And therefore also that it cannot be so vnderstood in Acts 2.27 where it is applied to Christs soule after he was dead which yet is the onely place you haue to pretend Hitherto you haue prated what pleased you and proued nothing and notwithstanding your vaine euasions meere priuations inuincible conditions and plaine visible contradictions Hades is found by the full consent of Christian and heathen writers to bee a place vnder the earth and in darkenesse where the soules of the dead adiudged to that place were and are detained vnder the Dominion of the Diuell though the Pagans in their wandering from their trueth imagined him to be a God and dreampt of earthly pleasures there to comfort their deiected spirits against the terror of death And since Christs soule was not left in hades after death as appeareth Acts 2.31 what haue you or any man liuing to say why Christs descent to Hades that is as the Gospell expoundeth this word to the place of torment of which it was impossible for him to be held or to bee therewith touched should not bee iustly grounded on this place wee may simply take hades for the inuisible state or place of the deceased If for the place then for heauen where you say Christes soule was after death And would Christ so greatly reioice that his soule should not be left in heauen Otherwise we may take it simply for deaths force and power supplying also the same wordes eis ton topon or tên chôran hadou in that place where the power and strength of death preuaileth and holdeth the deceased soules from their bodies You haue so many senses that you haue neuer a good First you tooke hades for a state or place and then you supplied it as indeed you must with topon or choran a place or region And so your sense went round like a wheele Thou wilt not leaue my soule in the place of place or state which is not seene that is not in heauen Now you renew your strength to take better hold and saie Thou wilt not leaue my soule to the place of deaths power Where we must note that heauen for there was Christes soule as you grant is by you appointed to be the place of deaths power and so you haue brought vs the strength and power of death and darknesse preuailing in heauen and euen on Christes soule This is the world of the dead implying nothing else but an estate opposite to our visible state in this world Are the places or states of heauen and hell nothing but an opposition to our visible estate in this world There are bodies both in heauen and in hell by the consent of the best Diuines new and old How then is their state opposite to our visible state Moses and Elias were seene talking with Christ in the mount What place will you appoint for them since they were visible And if the world of the dead be nothing else but an estate opposite to our visible estate then Christ after his resurrection relapsed often to hades to the world of the dead for he was inuisible to all men as long as he staied on earth but when and where he was pleased to shew himselfe And if that be true which you your selfe doe say that l in very deed hades hath properly but a priuatiue sense and not any thing positiue in it then your additions of place and region be repugnant to the nature of hades except you can bring vs a place and region of meere priuations in which is nothing positiue and consequently your varieties and expositions of hades be meere illusions and haue nothing in them but lies and mockeries For hades is a place below in the earth and darke by condition as wherein nothing is seene as both Christians and Pagans affirme Hades therefore is no mecre priuation If the soule of Christ then after death were in hades it was not at the same time in heauen for heauen is opposite throughout the Scriptures to hades and your owne common and inuisible place of both is a priuate and palpable errour of your owne Last of all we may take Hades heere by a prosopopaea conceauing it to be as it were some person of vnresistable power taking away
to heauen as Dauid likewise foretold of him and there sitteth at the right hand of God vntill all his enemies in the rest of his members be made his footstoole and thence hath he shed forth this which you now see and heare euen the promise of the holy Ghost receaued of the Father for all his Know ye therefore for a suertie that God hath made him both Lord ouer all in heauen earth and hell and Christ euen the annointed Sauiour of all his elect Against this illation neither all the miscreants in earth nor all the Diuels in hell can open their mouths Where first we may see that Peter resteth more on the manner and power of Christs resurrection then simply on this that his soule was reunited to his body from which by death it was seuered Secondly he bringeth the words of Dauid to shew that either part of the Messias submitted to death for the time was to returne againe to life with greater glory the flesh free from all corruption the soule superiour to all destruction Thirdly that these things neither were nor could be verified in Dauid since Dauid saw corruption as his sepulchre prooued remaining to that day and Dauid was not as then ascended to heauen much lesse made Lord ouer all his enemies Heere is no such prerogatiue mentioned If this were common to Christ with Dauid and others of the faithfull how could Peter hence conclude that this was not spoken of Dauid but onely of the Messias Againe if this were no prerogatiue what need was there that Dauid should be a Prophet by speciall reuelation to know this much and that which Dauid knew was not onely this that Christ should rise to life againe but the words are that God would raise vp Christ after death to set him on his throne that is to giue him an euerlasting kingdome euen all power in heauen and earth subiecting all his enemies vnder his feet So that simply to rise from death was no prerogatiue nor proper to Christ but to rise Lord ouer all death and hell not excepted this was peculiar to Christ and not common to him with Dauid and therefore must needes be a speciall priuiledge to the manhood of Christ which is expressed chiefly in these words Thou wilt not forsake my soule in hades but bring me thence conquerer of all mine enemies You adde no flesh dead was euer free from corruption but onely Christes what then ergo his soule was in hell Why winch you where no man toucheth you doth any man say Christes soule was in hell because his flesh saw no corruption or rather that Dauids wordes are as plaine and peculiar to Christ in the one that Christes soule was not forsaken in hell as in the other that God would not suffer his flesh to see corruption and both being affirmed of Christ by way of speciall prerogatiue why should not both be likewise performed in Christ were not some being dead raised to life againe before their flesh putrified The promise of God to Christ that his flesh should not see corruption doth not onely assure a speedie resurrection but an impossibilitie that any corruption could preuaile against his flesh since the returne of his flesh to dust to which all others are iudged would bee the dissolution of his person for the time which by no meanes might befall him his Godhead being vnited vnto flesh and not vnto dust In these words therefore of Dauid the soule and bodie of Christ were appointed to be superiour to all contrarie powers that is the soule to hell the flesh to the graue and from both was Christ to rise as subduer of both that he might sit on his heauenly Throne as Lord ouer all not by promise onely as before but by proofe also as appeared in his resurrection And yet so many dayes as Christ did lyeth no man in his graue without some taint of corruption which in Christ was vtterly none It is a strange absurditie still to abuse your Reader calling this word hell which indeede is nothing but death in effect Againe to presume that we take it for Paradise or heauen or hell when wee referre it alwayes to the generall state of the dead and no farder immediately Then when you expound the wordes of the Creede Christ descended to hades your meaning is nothing in effect but that Christ died which was before deliuered in plained and shorter wordes and so your exposition is an idle and obscure repetition Againe hades in the new Testament is neuer taken for the death of the bodie since it is annexed to bodily death as a consequent after it and so your acception of it is repugnant to the trueth of the Scriptures And where you will at no time haue Hades taken for Paradise Heauen or Hell as here you pretend when you thereby note the place of soules deceased meane you they are neither in Heauen Paradise nor Hell are you not a wise man to talke so much of an inuisible place and when you come to the point you will haue it no place at all but you referre it alwayes to the generall state of the dead and no farder immediately An inuisible place you referre immediately to no place and thus when you will be frantike or foolish words shall loose their proper and plaine signification and containe no more then pleaseth you Shew vs a place where soules deceased are besides Paradise Heauen and Hell and wee will graunt you may exclude these three by some pretence when you spake of the place of hades but if you cannot then topos aides a place vnseene which you haue so much bowled at will be a place in spite of your heart and that immediately and consequently will bee Paradise Heauen or Hell whatsoeuer you presume or dreame to the contrarie Christ had another inestimable cause to reioyce that he was raised to life againe namely that he might fulfill his whole worke for our saluation which before his resurrection and ascension he could not accomplish When I told you that Christ after death was to conquere Hell and to free vs thence you would needes defend that Christ on the Crosse perfited our redemption and wrought our saluation and now you say which I take to bee the truer though you meane not to bee constant therein that before his resurrection and ascension hee could not accomplish the worke of our saluation The text saith God raised him vp loosing the sorrowes of death because it was impossible for him to be holden fast of it Will you conclude from hence ergo there were present sorrowes in the place where Christ was there is no strength in this reason There is more strength in it then either you will acknowledge or can answere The sorrowes of bodily death are all dissolued by the separating of the soule from the bodie Then after death there are no sorrowes of bodily death But God raised vp Christ loosing the sorrowes of
may doe well to leaue this outfacing Scriptures and Fathers it may seeme a shift for a time but it will end with your shame By the whole text it is euident Peter had no reason nor purpose to speake to the Iewes of Christes soule being in hell If you may be iudge Peter shall say nothing but what hitteth your hand right It is more then plain by the whole purport of Peters speech that he ment to prooue Christ to be raised vp as Lord of all his enemies and Sauiour of all that obey him To rise simply from death was not sufficient to shew the eternitie and soueraigntie of Christs kingdome but he must be raised as the only Lord that should sit on Dauids throne and haue all things in heauen earth and hell subiected vnto him From our enemies if hee could not deliuer vs he could be no Sauiour of ours he must therefore tread them all vnder his feete when he rose from death before we could hope to be freed from them by his force And to this end Peter expresly maketh mention that God scattered the sorrowes of death and hell before him when he raised him vp that all the faithfull might be assured as Christ conquered and destroied the diuell in his owne person when he rose from the graue so he could and would doe the like for all his members by freeing them from the power of Hades and conforming them to his death and resurrection This God had promised to his people by his Prophet saying I will redeeme them from the hand of hell I will deliuer them from death O death I will be thy death O hell I will be thy destruction Repentance is hid from mine eies This Dauid foretold the Messias should performe in that his soule should not be forsaken that is left destitute of power or honour no not in hell Of this deliuerance from their enemies and from the handes of all that hated them spake the Prophets that were from the beginning of the worlde This was the oath that God sware to Abraham that they being deliuered out of the handes of their enimies should serue him without feare of sinne death or hell This the Iewes beleeued and expected in the Messias and therefore neither were they I meane the elect among them so ignorant vnbeleeuing and stubborne as you pretend three thousand being conuerted with this one Sermon neither was this so strange and vncouth a thing as you imagine being so often promised and prophesied vnto them Neither did Peter intend onely Christes resurrection as you suppose his chiefe scope being to shew them the strength and height of Christs heauenly kingdome And where you flourish that this was not subiect to sense and without all example of the like in the whole law and namely no figure foreshewing any such thing these be obiections meeter for perfidious Iewes then for those that would seeme to be beleeuers How many points of faith are not subiect to sense Christes sitting at the right hande of God in glorie will you not beleeue because it is not subiect to sense and without an example of the like and no figure foreshadowing any such matter Of Christes ascending to heauen and his returne to iudge the quicke and the dead haue you any examples or figures in the whole law and yet it is no such hard matter to proportion our deliuerance from hell and Satan to the bondage of Israell in Egypt and the ouerwhelming of Pharoh and all his host in the bottom of the redde sea The like might be said of Sampsons death who being weake and bound slew all his enemies of Dauid and Goliah of Daniell in the Lyons denne without harme of Ionas lying in the Whales bellie and such like which though in all things they match not Christs conquest ouer Satan and the destruction of him and his kingdome as no figures can do yet are they resemblances of that which you so much dissemble Howbeit as I said of Christes birth buriall descending to Hades rising ascending sitting in heauen and comming to iudge the law did not yeeld any expresse and visible figures as it did of his death and sacrifice We haue seene that Hades hath no such meaning in the Acts which yet is the only place whereon you build This were sufficient to end this argument but yet it shall be good to trie whether any where hades properly signifieth hell Verily it doth so signifie no where at all in the Scriptures Yet I graunt it is and ought to be translated hell in two places Matth. 16. v. 18. Luk. 16. v. 23. not that the word it selfe doth necessarily signifie hell but because the circumstances heere doe require that meaning as the fittest and best for these particular purposes We haue seene you beate your braines about Hades to make it any thing rather then tha tindeed it is both by the generall opinion of all Pagan Poets and by the constant assertion of all the Greeke Fathers We haue also seene you turne winde your selfe you know not whither sometimes to haue it the place for soules departed this world sometimes the state of such soules sometimes the power of death and sometimes the priuation of this life and so to crosse and controle your owne conceits that you could not tell where to set foote without falling Now as he that is blinde maketh no difference betwixt day and night no more doth your wilfull yet witlesse imagination perceaue any distance betwixt trueth and falshood And hauing held your owne so well that no shifting or shuffling can make you ashamed you will now proceed to a farder triall of other texts of Scriptures to see whether you can outface them with your fansies and figures as you haue done them that be already ouerpast I make no doubt but if you may sit sole Iudge in your owne cause you will quickly pronounce for your selfe but if you must prooue as well as pronounce you will make as many errors in your proceedings as there be holes in a sieue Howbeit you grant that in two places of the new Testament Hades is and ought to be translated hell not for that the word of it self doth so necessarily signifie but because the circumstances require that meaning Which is as much as if you said there are two places in the new Testament where hades is must be taken for hel neither can you with all your sleights shifts auoid the same the circumstances of the text so euidently demonstrate the Euangelists tooke hades for hell This by your leaue is some preiudice to your cause and a bridle to your boldnesse that the holy Ghost doth twice in the Gospels by your owne confession vse hades for hell and why he doth not vse it in that sense in other places there is no impediment but your proud will and waste wordes Saint Luke is so cleere as no exception can be taken to it that Hades is the
thou know it Shall it suiâ—…ce in this place to say the cloudes are high the starres are higher all which we see with our eyes and can obserue their course or must we cast our thoughts on the highest heauen wherein we neither see nor know any thing but what God reuealeth by his word and which is the chiefest place of his perfection So Dauid Whither shall I flie from thy presence If I ascend into heauen thou art there if â—… get downe to Sheol below thou art there also If I take the wings of the morning and dâ—…d in the furdâ—…ct parts of the Sea there thy right hand shall hold me Ascending to the highest descending to the lowest and going to the fardest we passe through all places If God be then in the highest in the lowest and in the midst whither can we flee from him who is euery where all places being here contained the highest heauens are not omitted The Prophet Amos hath the like both purpose and partition where God assureth Israel they cannot decline his hand whither soeuer they could or would goe whether to heauen on high to Sheol below to the bredth of the mountaines or to the depth of the Sea If out of his diuision you exclude hell or heauen as places whither Gods hand can not reach doe you not with your impertinent Sophistrie broch vs a manifest heresie wherefore Shammaijm here is any or euery part of heauen euen as the earth is diuided by bredth and depth into the hils the Seas and Sheol vnderneath which is here conuinced to be in the earth because God saith though they digge into Sheol teaching vs that the lowest Sheol is in the earth which onely can be digged and not either in water or aire which can not be digged As for the 14 of Esay from which Christ deriued his threatning to Capernaum as resembling the pride and deseruing the punishment of the king of Babel the words there are so direct for Shammaijm to be the highest heauen euen the place of Gods throne that you thought best to skippe it ouer with a false translation and not to trouble your selfe any farder The pride of the King of Babylon is there thus expressed Thou saidst in thine heart I will ascend to heauen and will exalt my Throne aboue the starres of God I will ascend aboue the higth of the clouds and wil be like the most highest But thou shall be drawen downe to Sheol euen to the sides or lowest parts of the pit Shammaijm comprising three regions at least the clouds the starres the place of Gods throne the king of Babylon in his proud ambition said he would ascend aboue the higth of the clouds aboue the starres of God and would exalt his throne like to the most highest I hope Shammaijm here to which the king of Babylon would ascend was neither the clouds nor the starres they both are by name excluded and consequently not the skies as you fasly translate the Prophets words but it was the resemblance of Gods throne and the place of his glory to which that proud tyrant aspired Neither ment he there to be one of Gods Saints as you would childishly chalenge your opponent but what place of glory others get at Gods hands by obedience and humility he would in his arrogant heart assume vnto himselfe with rebellion and emulation of Gods greatnesse euen as Adam and Eue neuer ment to be Saints when they accepted the Diuels offer ye shal be as Gods but desired no longer to be subiect to God and sought to get a similitude if not an equality with God So did the King of Babel affect to be like the most highest though he were fardest from it of all others For the Prophet doth not in these words expresse what the king of Babylon was indeed but what his arrogant spirit conceaued in thinking there was no God greater then himselfe This monstrous pride of his being the higth of all impiety and blasphemie what reward in your conscience was it worthy to haue a plaine no being any longer amongst the liuing which you say Daniel affirmeth of the Messias or a iudgement proportionable to his wickednesse that is to be cast downe to the bottom of hell for exalting himselfe to the top of heauen Your spinning of cobwebbes about an inglorious destruction is no way sufficient for this offence except you meane destruction of body and soule in hell with the sight and shame of his folly and so if you ioine the vtter and eternall destruction of his person and his pride you agnise Sheol to be hell as I doe and haue not the witte to see that when a man is taken hence to that terrible and intolerable vengeance all worldlie things first faile him and the remembrance of his forme plenty and glory augmenteth the griefe of his present penurie and misery Els how auoide you contradiction as well to the trueth as to your selfe in your two signification of Sheol Sheol opposed to Shammaijm you say signifieth not hell the place of torments but aâ—… vast and deepe guise onely or pit in the earth the bottome where of we know not If you deriue this vast and deepe gulfe in the earth from the warrant of holy Scripture I must aske you first how many of these gulses the scripture admitteth to be in the earth next what vse there is of them The Scripture mentioneth the lower Sheol indeed so called in respect of the higher which is the graue common to the bodies of good and bad Other Sheols in the earth the Scripture knoweth none Now for whom is this lower gulfe in the earth prouided for men or for oxen and sheepe which you were placing there euen now by warrant pretended from Moses and the Psalmist but that you fouly mistooke the words of both When God openeth the earth to swallow vp men and all that belongeth to them as he did to the rebels in the wildernesse he hath roome enough in the earth to couer and close that which doth not descend to Sheol without your vast and deepe gulfe If you confesse this vast and deepe gulfe in the earth to serue for wicked men after death then come you neerer to the Scriptures but as neere to hell For Dauid saying vnto God Thou hast deliuered my soule from the lower Sheol declareth the lower Sheol to be a receptacle for the soules of such as God doth not shew mercy vnto SalomoÌ„ saith of such as haunted harlots Her guests are in the depth of Sheól Moses telleth you The sire of Gods wrath burneth to the lower Sheól In the lower Sheol then are the soules of the wicked and fire there burning for them If your vast and deepe gulfe in the earth be all one with this we know the place to be hell and the vse thereof the punishment of the wicked If it differ from this you must tell vs by the word of God wherefore it
after his resurrection all power in heauen and earth that is in all places and ouer all things created is giuen vnto me Since then without question Christ had the keyes as well of death and hell as of heauen and so that sense of his words is most true let vs see which of our expositions hath best reason When Iohn for feare fell as dead at Christs feete would Christ to comfort Iohn in that plight say no more but that he himselfe was once dead and now aliue and had power to die no more as you expound Christs words how could this strengthen or restore Iohn that was euen dead for feare or did Christ rather encourage Iohn not to feare without cause seeing he himselfe not onely was risen from the dead but had all power ouer death and hell that is the keyes of both to dispose of ech mans life and Soule at his pleasure when therefore Christ that had all power of life and death Saluation and damnation laid his right hand on Iohn to protect him and bad him not feare but write the things which he saw had not Iohn iust cause to cast away all feare and cheerefully to obey the voice of him that was so able and ready to rescue him from all feare and danger whatsoeuer Christs power ouer death you will say was enough to preserue Iohns life and therefore mention of the key of hell was superfluous Iohn was to see and write the things that were and after should be in heauen earth and hell as is euident in his Reuelations yea the opening and shutting of the bottomelesse pit the chaining of Satan there the comming of the Locusts and the beast from thence and the lake of fire and brimstone euerlastingly burning there and who should be throwen into it were to be reuealed vnto him Lest therefore the sight of these things should amaze Iohn or the reporting of them should want credit with vs Christ did professe which is most true that he had the keyes that is all power euen ouer these secret and fearefull places so that Iohn should neither shrinke at the vision nor we distrust the Relation of them And though my reason of mentioning here the keyes of hell be such as you shall neuer counteruaile yet doe I not runne proudly and peremptorily as you doe in mine owne conceits I haue the iudgement of the best Interpreters old and new that haue intermedled with the opening of these reuelations Andreas Arch Bishop of the same Caesaria that Saint Basil was and within 600. yeeres after Christ though you skornfully reiect him as you doe that venerable writer Bede expounding these words of Christ I haue the keyes of death and of Hades saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is of the death of the Body and of the Soule Primasius expoundeth them thus I haue the keyes of death and hell idest Diaboli totius corporis eius that is ouer the diuell and all his body or societie The exposition of the Apocalyps extant in Saint Austens works thus I haue the keyes of death and Hell because he that beleeueth and is baptised is deliuered from death and from hell Haymo thus By the name of the keyes is shewed Christs eternall power by death the diuell is vnderstood by whose enuy death came into the world And by hell his members that shall come to the torments of hell Lyra. I haue the keyes of death and of hell that is power to deliuer thence the iust which Christ did in his Resurrection and to inclose there the wicked which he shall chiefly doe in the last iudgement Of our new writers Bullingere Christ then hath the keyes of death and hell because whom he will he deliuereth from the perpetuall damnation of death and whom he will he suffereth iustly to remaine in that perill of damnation Christ hath the supreme gouernment of the house or kingdome of God to quicken whom he will and to draw them from hell and damnation and whom he will damne with his iust iudgement to destroy For he hath most full power ouer death and hell He conquered and disabled both as it is Osee. 13. and 1. Corinth 15. Aretius He that resembled the Sonne of Man in the Apocalyps said I haue the keyes of hell and death hoc est in damnatos damnandos damnatorum loca that is ouer those that are damned or shall be damned and ouer the places of the damned Chytreus Christ deliuereth his Church from the captiuitie of death and hell casteth the wicked into the Dungeon of hell and of eternall death For he hath the keyes that is most full power ouer death and hell Sebastian Meyer whom Marlorate followeth I haue the keyes of death and hell that is power to pardon sinnes which being abolished both death and hell are depriued of their strength Osiander I haue the keyes of death and hell that is it is in my hand to kill and quicken to damne and sauc These men had both learning and reason to say as they did neither will any pick them ouer the pearch as you doe Andreas Caesariensis and Bede but he that hath neither Againe one sitteth on a pale horse whose name was death and Hades destruction the world of the dead or the kingdome of death followed after him This in no wise can be hell because the Text addeth power was giuen them to slay with the sword and with famine and with death and with wild beasts Hell slayeth none in that sort these are not the weapons of hell You lacke three Gennets to set your three poppets on horsebacke If by these three destruction the world of the dead the kingdome of death you meane in effect nothing but death as you vse to expound your selfe that is expressed before and Saint Iohn saith Hades followed after him Doth any thing follow after it selfe Againe will you bring your world of the dead that is all the Soules in heauen and hell to ride on horse-backe and that in the shew and shape of one person you would make good dumb shewes you haue such pretie fansies to make death goe first alone and his kingdome to come after him But though you play with Saint Iohns visions you haue no warrant to mistake Saint Iohns words and to muster your owne errors vnder his colours Saint Iohn doth not say that power was giuen to death and Hades to kill with the sword with famine and with death as you dreame but Saint Iohn hauing represented the sword or warre by the red horse verse 4. and famine by the blacke horse verse 5. and all sorts of diseases and pestilences by the pale horse verse 8. he saith power was giuen to them that is to the riders on these three horses to kill the fourth of the earth with warre hunger and sicknesse And because these three come not one after another but when God is greatly prouoked with
I trust you dare not endure Perhaps your meere priuations shall be euerlastingly punished in hell the danger is not great for them since nothing can be no where nor feele no paine and so not in hell But after many deuices and aduices you say the power and dominion of death shall be cast into hell That shall vtterly cease at the resurrection when all soules are ioyned to their bodies againe How then shall that which wholy and finally ceaseth be cast into hell You meane it shall bee eternally abolished This is an erection of a new hell and no part of the old Happy were the damned both men and spirits if they might be cast into this new hell of yours that is vtterly and eternally be abolished But these be mockeries in themselues and falsities against the Christian faith That which is cast into the lake of fire shall there euerlastingly burne and not consume but dure in perpetuall torment Shall your dominion of bodily death euerlastingly burne in hell And shall it also feele the force of that fire You must then make Hades a person for besides persons nothing shal be cast into hell fire And if it be a person it must be a diuell or a man except you will find out a place for it amongst your sheepe and cattell that you sent aliue to Hell But such childish and peeuish deuices are not worth the refuting The Reader may see what it is for men to forsake the learned and sound expositions and assertions of auncient Fathers and betake themselues to their fresh and new fansies of which thy cannot tell what to make nor how to speake Though you meane the containing to be put for the contained hell for the diuels of hell as one Andreas and Bede likewise vnderstand it yet neither you nor they it seemeth doe consider that this place assigneth them to hell at the last day who yet then are not in hell But the Diuels are in hell alreadie Therefore the diuels cannot be vnderstood heere by Hades Can a man be so sottish vnlesse hee were besides himselfe as not to find that all this while he refuteth his owne falsifications of Saint Iohns wordes and not any position of mine nor of these two learned writers whom he disdaineth as not considering where the diuels are before the day of iudgement They doe not say the diuels shall then be cast into hell this is your coltish conceit from which you will not depart but into the lake of fire prepared as our Sauiour pronounceth for the diuell and his Angels And how come you now in your heate so hastily to determine where hell is which not long since you called rashnesse in me you told vs ere while The Apostle mentioneth the aire on high as being the place of Diuels Put to this that which heere you say the Diuels are in hell alreadie you meane the place of hell or else you say nothing against Andreas and Bede whom you would confute as not considering where the Diuels are Doe not you then determine that hell is in the aire on high and so not onely condemne your selfe of rashnesse by your owne verdict but gainesay the Scriptures who testifie that the diuels desired Christ not to commaund them into the deepe Yea by this resolution of yours the face of the earth where wee liue is hell since the diuels are heere also and compasse the earth and walke therein So that if we let you alone in steed of one hell you will make vs three the aire the earth the deepe since in all these three it cannot bee denied but the Diuels are And yet for all your tripping so light on the toe the diuels may and shal be at the last day cast into hell that is affixed to the place and torments there from which they shall not stirre as now they doe whiles the iustice of God doth suffer them to vphold and encrease their kingdome here on earth And where you vouch of your hades that it shall at the last day of iudgement be throwen into hell that is eternally be abolished as you conceaue and deriue your Hades that day shall enlarge it more then euer before and so continue it so reuer For all visible creatures in heauen and earth saue men shall after that day haue no more any being at all yea the first heauen and the first earth shall passe away and there shall be no more any sea which will greatly enrich your generall Hades that containeth the destruction of vnreasonable things and the perishing of visible creatures from hence as the proper Etymologie thereof admitteth Nay if the very naturall Etymologie of the word according to Grammar doe properly signifie NOT SEENE ANY MORE IN THIS WORLD as you affirme it doth then all both good and bad be they in heauen or hell shall after the day of iudgement be properly and euerlastingly in Hades For they shall neuer be seene any more in this world whose figure passeth away without returning and giueth place for euer to the world to come And this your Hades which you would cast into hell there to bee for euer abolished shall by the naturall Etymologie and proper signification thereof confessed and vrged by your selfe not only continue in hell and in heauen but comprise them both seeing the Citizens of either shall not be seene any more in this world Lastly heere is shewed the most generall and vniuersall rendring vp of all the dead whatsoeuer to iudgement But hell plainly hath not all the dead Therefore death and Hades doe not heere properly signifie the diuell and Hell When you say heere is shewed the vniuersall rendring vp of all the dead whatsoeuer to iudgement If you meane this of death hades that they rendred vp all the dead that came to iudgement you vouch a manifest vntrueth repugnant to the very wordes of Saint Iohn going next before for thus his wordes stand And the sea gaue vp her dead which were in her and death and Hades deliuered vp the dead which were in them So that all the dead were not rendred to iudgement by death and Hades the Sea had part by Saint Iohns owne speech and therefore death and Hades heere doe not signifie the Dominion of death which reacheth to the sea aswell as to the earth Againe Saint Iohn in the twelfth verse saw the dead both great and small stand before God And in the thirteenth he addeth the Sea also gaue vp her dead and death and hell deliuered vp the dead which were in them Hee saw then some dead stand before God which neither the Sea nor hades deliuered And since Paul telleth vs that the dead in Christ shall rise first and God will bring them which sleepe in Iesus with him to iudgement what hindreth but the dead in the twelfth of Saint Iohn may be the elect and the rest be deliuered vp from the deepe of the Sea and of
ouer to Christ by God and all things subiected vnder his feet because he hâ—…bled himselfe and was obedient to his father vnto death euen the death of the Crosse. Was it then wrath in God without loue that brought Christ to his death or rather vnspeakable loue in God towards his sonne which ouerruled his iustice prouoked by our sinnes and so highly accepted and plentifully rewarded the death of Christ that he made him LORD ouer all things and persons in heauen earth and hell to giue grace and peace mercie and glory to Gods elect by his meanes and merites and to inflict excecation destruction and damnation on the wicked both men and diuels by his iudgement and sentence If it were admirable loue and fauour in God towards Christs humane nature to ioyne mans flesh and spirit into the vnitie and societie of his Sonnes Diuine maiestie what inestimable honor and glory was it to put the whole gouernment of Gods kingdome in heauen and earth into Christs hands which is the reward that God hath allotted to Christs obedience patience shewed on the Altar of the Crosse So that the learned may soone perceiue I worke no deceit nor mistaking to the Reader through the ambiguitie of this word THE VVRATH OF GOD as you pretend but you wandring in the desart of your owne deuises haue fashioned to your selfe a fardle of phrases as Gods proper and improper wrath 〈◊〉 meere iustice and such like and vnder the generalitie and vncertaintie of these words you hide your head and when you are required to make some proofe and shew some parts of Gods wrath out of the Scripture which Christ suffered besides the death of the Crosse and paines thereof you answere to particularize or to specifie the parts of Gods wrath which Christ felt as I will you to doe what madnesse were it in men to attempt and what folly is it in any to require Indeede it would be madnesse in you to attempt it for thereby you should plainly disclose that absurditie and impietie which now is cloaked vnder generall and doubtfull termes but those that be godly will neuer suffer their faith to be framed by your phrases except you shew warrant of Gods word both whence you collect them and what you meane by them neither of which you doe nor can doe with any truth in these points now in question For first by what Scripture proue you that Christ did or must suffer the proper wrath of God or the punishment and vengeance of sinne I following the sense and words of the Scriptures and of Diuines both olde new which make shame sorrow paine and death in this life the effects of Gods wrath punishing sinne in Adam and his of-spring at his fall did by consequent a specie ad genus affirmatiue gather and in that respect confesse that Christ suffering those things on the Crosse suffered the wrath of God and due punishment of sinne in this life but you tell vs now the Scriptures in that point speake most improperly you haue found out that Gods wrath signifieth properly the paines of the damned and those Christ suffered for our sinnes True it is and long since by me auouched that Gods wrath against sinne extendeth to all the paines and punishments of Soule and body as well in hell as on earth and in comparison of the terrible torments of hell fier the paines and punishments of the faithfull in this life may be called and accounted rather the chastisements of a Father then the rigour of a Iudge but since you refuse that sense of Gods wrath which I collected from the Scriptures as very improper take no aduantage of my confession and let Gods wrath stand in your sense either for Gods displeasure against the person offending or for the vengeance of sinne executed on the wicked and damned I aske you now by what authoritie of holy Scripture can you prooue that Christ suffered Gods proper wrath or his wrath at all I recall not my former Resolution which I take to be sober and sound but you reiecting it as improper and deceitfull let vs see how you prooue by the Scriptures that Christ suffered Gods wrath which you so much presume and make the chiefe pillour of all your procedings In your late defence with shame enough you yeeld at last that this word HELL is not literally and expresly applyed to Christs sufferings in the Scriptures you must likewise yeeld by your leaue that this speech the wrath of God is not literally nor expresly affirmed of Christs sufferings in all the Scriptures That he was wounded for our transgressions and torne or trodden vnder feete for our iniquities and we healed by his stripes as also that he was afflicted and oppressed and bare our iniquities and poured out his soule vnto death the Prophet Esay witnesseth that he dranke of the Cup which his Father gaue him the Euangelists mention and the Apostle saith he was deliuered and died for our sinnes according to the Scriptures but none of these expresse or inferre that he suffered the proper wrath of God or full punishment and vengeance of sinne which are the phrases placed for the ground-worke of all your discourse though no way prooued by any shew of Scripture The words vsed generally by the holy Ghost to expresse Christs sufferings besides the former import that he gaue himselfe for vs to be the sacrifice the price and the ransome of our deliuerance All which wordes note no wrath conceiued against him nor vengeance executed on him but rather the exceeding loue and fauour of God towards him as the onely Sacrifice that God would accept the onely price that God did esteeme the onely ransome that God would receaue for the sinne of the world This Sacrifice was his body this price was his bloud this ransome was his death We are sanctified by the offering of the body of Iesus once ‖ made ‖ priceâ—…th â—…th Paule that is yee were redcemed with the precious blood of Christ saith Peter For we haue redemption in him by his blood And he is the mediatour of the new testament through death for the ransome of the transgressions in the former testament So that by the sacrifice of his bodie price of his blood and ransome of his death he hath made a most full recompence satisfaction and redemption for the sinnes of the world and consequently the punishment which he sustained when he bare our sinnes in his body on the tree was the full perfect purgation and propitiation of our sinnes full not in the degrees and parts of condemnation and vengeance due to sinne which the damned doe suffer as you falsely and absurdly insinuate but full in price and force of Redemption and deliuerance from sinne for somuch as Gods holinesse is highly pleased with the obedience Gods glory greatly aduanced by the humilitie and Gods iustice fully satisfied with the
for regiâ—…on and state for place skipping cleane that all this is vnder earth and then you say this is your world of the dead whereof part are in heauen by your owne positions and part in hell But this is too sensible a subuerting of Tertullians words vnfit either for Iunius to beginne or for you to follow If Tertullians words were as true as they be plaine neither side might refuse his opinion Neither was Tertullian alone in this perswasion that all departing this life before Christes death went to places below in the earth Ireneus affirmeth almost as much Ea propter Dominum in ca quae sunt sub terra descendisse euangelizantem illis aduentum suum Therefore the Lord descended to the places vnder the earth to preach or publish euen to them his comming And againe Christ conuersed three dayes where the dead were yea where the soules of the dead were and was in the heart of the earth and stayed till the third day in the lower parts of the earth where I trust you will not defend Heauen or Paradise to be Ierom is more plaine in this point Salomon speaketh thus sayth he because before the comming of Christ omnia ad inferos pariter ducerentur all were caried alike to the places below Wherefore Iacob sayth He shall descend ad inferos to the lower places Et Iob pios impios in inferno queritur retentari And Iob complaineth that the godly and the wicked are detained in inferno in the gulfe below And lest you make what you list of the words Inferi Infernus as Iunius and some other learned men by their leaues haue done you shall heare what Ierom himselfe sayth of them both Inter mortem inferos hoc interest betweene death and inferi this is the difference Death is that whereby the soule is separated from the bodie Infernus locus in quo animae includuntur siue in refrigerio siue in poenis Infernus is the place in which the soules are shut vp either in refreshing or in punishment Now where this place was and how long the soules of the iust stayed there he doth not dissemble We learne by Esay sayth he that Infernus is vnder the earth And that Infernus is in the lower part of the earth the Psalmist witnesseth saying The earth opened and swallowed Dathan and couered the congregation of Abiram For as the heart is in the midst of the liuing creature so Infernus is sayd to be in the midst of the earth And vpon these words of Salomon There is neither thought knowledge nor wisdome in Infernus whither thou goest he sayth Nota vt Samuelem quoque verè in Inferno credas fuisse ante aduentum Christi quamuis sanctos omnes Inferm lege detentos Porro quod sancti post resurrectionem Domini nequaquam teneantur Inferno testatur Apostolus dicens melius est dissolui esse cum Christo. Qui autem cum Christo est vtique non tenetur in Inferno Note that thou mayest beleeue Samuel also was truely in Infernus and that before Christes comming all though saints were detained vnder the law of Infernus But that the saints after the Lords resurrection are no longer in Infernus the Apostle witnesseth saying It is better to be dissolued and to be with Christ. Now he that is with Christ certainly is not held in Infernus I would not repeat so much of this which I do not acknowledge to be vndoubtedly true were it not that you and some otheâ—…s take aduantage of these sayings which yet you reiect as vtterly false to establish hence your new world of soules and that after Christs resurrection directly repugnant to their assertions out of whose words you would seeme to deriue your opinion For you hold that to this hower the soules of the iust are in hades and infernus and so shal be till the resurrection since infernus and hades as you beare men in hand import no more with the Latin and Greek fathers but the condition and state of the dead in generall whether they be in hell or in heauen Well this may be your conceit but no father Greek or Latin euer made mention of any such thing as you would gather out of their words That all mens soules before Christs comming good and bad were in places vnder the earth the good in ease and comfort the rest in paines and torments this some of the fathers both Greek and Latin auouch but that the iust still remaine now after Christs resurrection either in hades or Infernus I find no man that auoucheth any such thing saue only Tertullian The first I must confesse I doe not beleeue neither did Saint Austen before me who learnedly and truely concluded that Abrahams bosome mentioned by our Sauiour in the Gospell could be no part nor member of Infernus or hell since the Scripture saith there is a great and mighty gulfe set betweene them so that the one can haue no accesse to the other and the iust were aboue in comfort whiles the wicked were below in hades a place of torment punished with flames of fire But since the resurrection of Christ no father I still except Tertullian affirmeth the soules of the iust to be in hades or infernus but in Paradise which Tertullian yeelded to none but to Martyrs being himselfe infected with the error of Montanus when he wrote his booke De anima as shall most plainly appeare though you neuer so stifly denie it Howbeit his opinion in that was priuate and different from the rest For Ierom saith Ante Christum Abraham apud Inferos post Christum latro in Paradiso Before Christ Abraham was in places below after Christ the Thiefe was in Paradise Now the thiefe was iustly punished for his offences and so no Martyr And againe The munition to which God exhâ—…rteth the Prisoners of hope we ought to vnderstand none other but the habitation of Paradise to which the Thiefe first entred with the Lord. For this is the Land of the liuing in which the good things of the Lord are prepared for meeke and holy men to which before the comming of our Lord and Sauiour in the flesh neither Abraham nor Isaac nor Iacob nor the Prophets nor other iust men could attaine But euen by Tertullian himselfe it is euident that your collection out of him is vtterly false For he excepteth martyrs out of Inferi and placeth them in Paradise who yet I trust are in the condition of the dead And so by no meanes doe inferi signifie with Tertullian the place or state of good and bad indifferently that are dead but onely such as were or are in places vnder the earth who are properly and truely called inferi in respect of vs and not those that are aboue vs in heauen or Paradise where on euery side we now confesse the Saints are though their bodies lie yet in the dust
vnder earth And because Chrysostome is quoted as one of the Patrons of these pretences I am content to let you see that Chrysostome is abused as well as the rest For howsoeuer Chrysostome be vehement and sometimes figuratiue in his speeches yet shall you not be able to prooue that he euer vseth Hades after Christes death and resurrection for the place of iust mens soules Before that time some of the Greeke Fathers supposing the soules of the iust to be kept vnder the earth you may perchance finde heere and there a sentence where the iust are said to be in Hades but you shall neuer be able to euince that after Christes resurrection Hades is either the common condition or place of soules departed good and bad as you and some others would seeme to obserue out of the Greeke Fathers I speake of no more then I haue read in Greeke but for so much as is extant of theirs and I could get I dare assure the Reader he shall finde my saying to be true As for the Homilie of Chrysostome which you cite it can doe you no great good The Greeke to my knowledge is not Printed and therefore you can conclude nothing for Hades since the Grecians haue and vse many words for Inferi besides Hades Cyril of Ierusalem expressing in Greeke that Article of the Creed descendit ad inferos saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ descended to the places below or vnder the earth to redeeme thence the iust But graunt the worde Hades be vsed in that place of Chrysostome what prooue you more then that Chrysostom was of opinion the soules of the iust before Christes comming were not in heauen or Paradise but in Hades vnder the earth neither shall we need for witnesse thereof to goe any farder then the same Homilie which you produce for your purpose His wordes euen there are these Simulque consider andum quod Abraham apud inferos erat Nondum enim Christus resurrexerat qui illum in Paradisum duceret Antequam Christus moreretur nemo in Paradisum conscenderat nisi Latro. And withall we must consider that Abraham was yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 apud inferos with those that were vnder the earth For Christ was not yet risen who should bring him into Paradise Before Christ died no man ascended to Paradise but the thiefe No man could enter into Paradise which Christ had shut The thiefe was the first that entred with Christ. The crosse of Christ is the key of Paradise the crosse of Christ opened Paradise Abraham is yet vnder the generall condition of death though his soule be in Paradise but Abraham is no longer in Hades where he was before Christs comming by Chrysostoms opinion Hades therefore is neither Paradise nor the generall state of the dead after Christes death and resurrection which cannot be strange to him that with any moderate paines peruseth Chrysostom Nec mors tollere nec infernus potuit hanc animam tenere qua iubente tremens etiam vinctas animas quas tenebat amisit Christo moriente dâ—…tione Tartarus perdidit quos tenebat abiecit infernus ius potestatis antiquae Neither could death take nor â—…nfermis or Hades hold Christs soule at whose coÌ„mandement hel or Hades trembling let go the soules which he held bound Christ dying hell lost out of his dition or custodie whom before it held Infernus or Hades threw of the right of his former power And after his eloquent manner speaking in the person of Christ hee saith amongst other things I should haue left vngratefull men to euerlasting punishment but mercie I confesse preuailed with mee I sent not an Angel but I my selfe came downe for thee I suffered my selfe to bee slaine sic ad istos Inseros veni and so came to these lower places Goe out now you that are bound rise vp yee that are wretched breath your selues yee prisoners Behold I shine on you as light vnwoonted behold I breake all your cordes and chaines Ecce Tarteareas sedes noctemque profundam faetidumque chaos extermino Beholde I abolish to you these infernall seats this darke mist and stincking chaos Here is Chrysostomes hades which I trust is not the generall state nor place of all mens soules vnder Christ specially since Chrysostom in plaine speech sayth Christ abolished and ended all these things to them that were in hell or hades If you stand on the Greeke word as not expressed in Chrysostoms Latine copies out of these Latine translations your Leaders by their leaues gathered their obseruations for these parts of Chrysostom are not yet printed in Greeke and therefore rightly may they berefuted by the same But though it be no small defect that we want as yet the most of Chrysostoms works in Greeke neuerthelesse by part you shall perceiue what he meaneth by the word Hades wheresoeuer it is occurrent in his writings In his homilie of the resurrection which I before cited lying in the New Colledge Librarie in Oxford he hath these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord came on his crosse and payed a death for man who was held of the diuell that he might free him from the bands of hades Where the bands of hades are those wherein man was deteined of the diuell And elsewhere speaking of the crosse of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If the crosse of Christ brake vp the gates of hades and set wide open the arches of heauen and renewed the entrance into Paradise what maruell is it if it ouer came deadly poisons and cruell beasts And so againe God by Christ abolished the curse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and brake in pieces the gates of hades and opened Paradise And shewing a generall consent of all nations in this vse of the word hee sayth The Grecians Barbarians Poets and Philosophers and all sorts of men consent with vs in this though not after the same maner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and say that there are certaine iudgements or punishments in hades Which Theodoret likewise confesseth to betrue These speeches sayth he are sit for Philosophie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to send the soules that haue liued here well to heauen and those that haue followed the contrary downe to hades And of Plato he sayth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In many places he affirmeth tortures in hades And least I should be thought to be lead with a desire to contradict without cause or vpon some conceit to oppose my selfe against such learned men as haue leaned that way supposing hades with the Greek Fathers to import the place and state of good bad after death I am not vnwilling good Christian Reader if it be not tedious or troublesome to thee to set downe part for the whole would make a new volume of that which in reading I haue obserued touching the vse of the word hades with auncient writers that were Christians who vse not
the very Tartarean Chaos or dungeon of hell You know the Apostle mentioneth the Aire and that on high as being the place of diuels Notwithstanding farre be it from me to affirme that hell certainely is not beneath Yet your pretended Scriptures are meerely forced to prooue it Your are lighted iust on Master Broughtons argument whose folly hath filled many sheetes afore and now all his Religion learning and reasons are emptied in the fourth part of one poore printed sheete of the lesser size of paper Onely in this he shewed some witte that he foresaw of such brainesicke stuffe the least would be the best But doe you vnderstand for he is not worthy an answere who can frame himselfe to nothing but to rage and riddles that which the Psalmist saith of the elect Angels God shall giue his Angels charge ouer thee to keepe thee in all thy waies or which the Apostle saith They are all ministring spirits sent foorth for their sakes which shall be heires of Saluation Doth this prooue there are no Angels in heauen I troe not Their office is here to attend and defend the faithfull and yet heauen is the place of their habitation whither they repaire with vnspeakeable celeritie when their speciall seruice is finished So the diuels haue hell appointed for the place of their condemnation and thither they cary and there they torment the wicked as also they are commaunded to the deepe and chained there at Gods becke notwithstanding some of them are by Gods wisedome and patience permitted to wander in the ayre and compasse the earth to tempt the wicked to trie the godly to shew their power vpon the creatures and bewray their malice against the Church of God Wherefore the ayre and earth are the places of their seeing and assaulting vs but hell is their home to be remanded thither vpon any the least occasion when pleaseth God The griefe terror and torment of their inward confusion obscuration malediction and condemnation they alwaies beare about them and within them being no way freed or eased of that wheresoeuer they goe but they are often spared from the place of torment which is the deepe that they feare and shun and yet know they must all thither at last to be terribly and eternally plagued and punished there for all their hatefull impieties and villanies They therefore during the time of our warfare conflict with them gouerne the darkenes of this world and Rule in the Ayre yet not all nor onely there they haue their chiefe their powers and principalities and their kingdome is not diuided against it selfe yet the strength and terror of their kingdome is in hell which they neither doe will nor can forsake how fearefull soeuer the place be to themselues as well for the present paines there as for remembrance it shall be in the ende of the world their perpetuall prison when their torments shall be exceedingly increased and they not suffered to start from thence The Scriptures which I brought you say are meerely forced to prooue Hell to be beneath And why because Sheol in the Scriptures by your conceite doth no where signifie hell that Sheól is a vast and deepe gulfe in the earth the bottome whereof we know not your selfe admit Then if the wicked dead or aliue descend to this vast deepe and vnknowen gulfe in the earth whither go they I pray you to the graue or to hell To goe aliue to the graue were somewhat strange and yet the graue is no deepe nor vnknowen gulfe but to descend aliue or dead to the bottom of the earth were more stranger if hell be not ment by that gulfe in the earth And if no more be ment by descending aliue to Sheol then to fall aliue into a cleft of the earth there to die the terrible iudgement of God executed on Core and his companie for their rebellion in the sight of all Israell is vtterly cluded since to fall into a deepe well or Cole-pit and there to die is as great a punishment as they suffered and is a descending aliue to Sheol as theirs was And where is the fire of Gods wrath inflaming the foundations of the hils and burning to the bottome of Sheol is that also in your gulfe of the earth and not in hell which Moses saith is the lower Sheol And how can dead men whose carkasses either lie on the earth vnburied as the King of Babylon did or are layed in their graues descend to Sheol beneath or to the lower earth if neither of these import hell but a vast and deepe gulfe in the earth whither dead bodies neuer come this for the Situation of Sheol what say you now to the opposition of Sheol to heauen Euery opposition betweene Shammaijm the heauens or skies and Sheol doth not signifie the opposition betweene heauen and hell Shammaijm thus placed signifieth the skies not the very place of Gods heauenly glory in the presence of God which in English we call heauen When Sheol is opposed is opposed in the Scriptures to Shammaijm the ground of the opposition is either the heigth of the one and the depth of the other or the glory and felicitie in the one and destruction and miserie in the other In those three places Iob 11. vers 8. Psal. 139. vers 8. Amos 9. vers 2. the perfection presence and power of God are expressed to be higher then Shammaijm and deeper then Sheol Now doth your religion serue you to restraine any of these three to the skies and the graue and not to make them superior to the highest heauen and deeper then the lowest Sheol Shammaijm you say is the skie as well as the heauen of the blessed Shammaijm is the ayre also where birds flie as well as the skies Doe you therefore thinke it a meete comparison for the presence or power of God to say that if you clime to the top of an high steeple which standeth in the ayre the hand of God can reach you there as though it were enough for the perfection presence and power of God to reach to the skies and you were skant resolued whether you should graunt it to stretch any farder But though you cauill with Hades quarrell not with God His perfection presence and power are infinite aboue the highest heauen and beneath the deepest Sheol yea these comparisons do not match him but leade vs to those places where the most wonderfull workes of God are to which no man liuing can ascend or descend much lesse can we search or attaine to the heigth or depth of him or his perfection presence or power And this is so plainely comprised in those places that none but an irreligious and impious conceiter will doubt thereof Canst thou by searching sinke out God or trace the Alâ—…ghtic to his perfection saith the booke of Iob. the heauens are high where his glory dwelleth what canst thou doe it is deeper then Sheol how canst