of mine hands in the midst of him that is such as are begotten to him through the power of mine inward Kingdom they shall sanctifie my name and shall sanctifie the holy one of Jacob and shall fear the God of Israel that is shall walk righteously and obediently according to their calling They also that erred in spirit that is such as were not yet thus inwardly guided but were led by multitude of litteral precepts shall come to understond that is to know this right way of sanctifying me and they that murmured that is such as were made stubborn by relyance upon their own interpretations of legality shall learn Doctrine that is shall learn the doctrine of obedeince a fit lesson for murmurers As this Office of Teaching or Instruction is to be understood here set down as in the first place proper to Christ who was anointed to preach good tydings so because this could be but in small measure done and supplyed by himself at least amongst the Gentiles in the glory of whose Church it is to be understood that of the Jews was prophesied it is therefore to be supposed that Christian Princes are to be his chief deputies in this office of instruction also For as they under him Shall build the old wasts and raise up the former desolations of the Jewish Church by this advancement of Christs kingdome amongst the Gentiles so These strangers shall stand and feed the Churches flock and the sons of the Aliens shall be her plowmen and vine-dressers all which are the Gospel expressions for Christs Shepherds or Pastors Nor can it appear otherwise then reasonable and necessary that those that are to be in the seat of judgement under Christ should have in chief the power and office to teach and instruct as well as to censure and reform Which although not fit to be personally practised by Kings in that sence of preaching as now understood especially having under them persons in holy orders to that purpose separately ordained yet is that general Office of instruction to be esteemed so properly their right as that for the matter and measure thereof it is alwayes subordinately to be executed by others For as they are to be the keepers of both tables so upon extraordinary and exorbitant occasions they may also no doubt as Gods Ministers entrusted in chief with the advancement of his glory and service publikely and personally also perform that Office under the Gospel much more rightfully then good Josiah under the Law Who to his great commendations had formerly done the like In the ears of the Priests and Prophets and all the people both small and great and yet was the custody and interpretation of the Law much more appropriate to the Priesthood then than now Nay indeed this Office must both be in the same person and in the first place setled also or else I see not how they should have power or ability to reprove in such things where they had no power or right to constitute and ordaine And therefore we may observe that the first Mission of power which our Saviour gave was under the notion of this Office of Preachers or Evangelists and by vertue thereof and obedience thereunto did the Apostles at first claim obedience from their Churches in other things as shall more fully appear anon But to return so much of the prophesie as concerns the Church her encrease and prosperity is to be interpreted as not made good fully in Christ himself nor in some time after that is whilst the Church was so under persecution that those deputies of Christ in the seat of judgement had not power and honor enough to preserve the members from shame or fear But it is to be compleated unto the residue or latter time of the Church when God shall more eminently appear like a Crown and diadem in being the spirit of judgement and strength to them that have the crown and diadem That is when Christ as King shall raign in righteousness and his deputies of Princes shall rule in judgement then shall a man the Prince in Christs seat be for a hiding place from the winde of divers doctrines wherewith they were formerly tossed and a cover from the tempest that is of persecution he shall be as rivers of waters in a dry place That is from the spirit of truth now met in the seat of mercy and judgement he shall cause instructions to flow forth as waters in a dry land and by means of strength to him that is to turn the battle to the gate he shall be as the shaddow of a great rock even for strength and defence to the Church formerly wearied with persecution And so the Prophet goes on to shew how the eyes and ears of them that yet see and hearken to his instructions shall be reclaimed from their former rashness and come to understand knowledge By this word man set down in this second verse in the singular number saying A man shall be c. we may gather first that there should be but one at once in each Church that should supply the place of a rock and spirit of judgement although in respect of the whole number of Christs deputies in the Catholike Church they were to be Princes in the plural number under him the Churches universal head and King of Kings And then again this person being set down under the notion of a man will denote unto us that it could not be meant of Christ himself neither But this as before said shall chiefly come to pass after the former Palaces of the Jewish Church shall be forsaken and by means of the spirit from on high to be powered on the Gentile Church judgement shall dwell in the wilderness that is in the Gentile Church formerly a wilderness and righteousness remain in the fruitful field meaning the now flourishing Gentile Church And the work of righteousness shall be peace and the effects of righteousness shall be quietness and assurance for ever That is by means of righteousness looking down from heaven and so causing righteousness and judgement to kiss each other The Church shall dwell in a peaceable habitation and in sure dwellings and in quiet resting places that is the Church by the means of this blessed protection of kingship shall be no more in danger of persecution as before These blessings of peace and prosperity to come to the Church by means of Gods judgement and righteousness given to the King and the Kings son that is Christ and his sons of oile David under the type of himself and Solomon at large setteth down in the 72 Psalm Where it being set down to last so long as the Moon shall endure we may know how to interpret Isaiahs prediction of quietness and assurance for ever and so be confirmed that these promises import temporal happiness to acrew to us by a temporal Saviour All which prophesies were to be fullfilled after
these things was despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief and we hid as it were our faces from him and we esteemed him not performing onely in himself as after followeth the work of Jesuship and so healing his Church by his wounds and stripes And therefore as we are to interpret those many promises of prosperity made to the Church in general under a Jewish figure to be accomplished in the prosperity of the Christian Church so must also many of those other Promises made of the Churches Kings in the name of David and Solomon be interpreted of Christian Kings Else we shall not know how to make good those sure mercies of David those many Prophesies that his kingdom should be established for ever in his seed and that his mercy should not depart from him as it did from Saul who was taken away from before him The same again repeated 1 Chron. 17.13 promising that as his Temple should be built by Solomon who was a Type of Christian Kings as David was of Christ so God says I will not take my mercy from him as I took it from him that was before thee but I will settle him in mine house and in my kingdom for ever and his Throne shall be estaalished for ever And David himself did so understand it also and therefore said Now O Lord let the thing that thou hast spoken concernig thy servant and concerning his house be established for ever and do as thou hast said And so he proceeds with a reason for establishment of that Government Let it even be established that thy name may be magnified for ever saying the Lord of hosts is the God of Israel even a God to Israel and let the house of thy servant be established before thee And in the next verse he intimates the manner how it should be For thou O Lord God hast told thy servant that thou wilt build him a house that is supply it by adopted Children for so the word wilt build must import beyond Solomon already born Therefore understanding and interpreting the conditonal promises made to Solomon and David to extend and have been fulfilled in their own personal loyns according to Nature and these by default on their part to be cut off and understanding again that succession of perpetuity and the glorious Promises of the Church to be made good in Solomons typified sons the Christian Monarchs these seeming contradictions may be easily reconciled as having been both made good And it is observable by the way that the expressions used verse the 14. shew that the kingdom of God here is the Kings as before shewed in the Petition Thy Kingdom come and that again the Kingship of Kings is Gods for so the words run I will settle him in mine house and my Kingdom for ever and his Throne shall be established for evermore to the end that Gods will may be done in earth as it is in Heaven But since for the far greater part of the time past we cannot find as aforesaid these Promises fulfilled to the natural or direct seed of Solomon or David in the kingdoms of Israel or Judah we cannot without great partiality and prejudice but conceive that they must typically be accomplished in Christian Kings in like manner as we are to understand that the many Promises of Judah and Israel and the Jewish Church and Temples happiness and perpetuity are to be made good in the Christian Church answerable to that prophetical description of the Christian Church under the Jewish figure made by David himself viz. For there are set Thrones of Iudgement the Thrones of the house of David Where the names of Thrones being twice set in the plural number must signifie succession of Kingship which coming to Christ as naturally Davids son and to Kings as Christs adopted sons it follows that the opposers of them do oppose Christ and so are Antichrists And without the like interpretation and taking in the adopted Christian Kings as with Christ typified in Solomon Psal. 72 it will be hard to be understood how many of those Prophesies of prosperity and outward greatness here and in other Prophesies given to Christ can personally be made good in him considering that mean condition Christ himself lived in amongst us where he was so far from expressing or exercising any thing like the Throne or judgement of a King or Kings son that he had not whereon to lay his head But there can be no more better Commentator of the meaning of these Promises then David himself who in his last words cleerly explains to us that they were prophetick to those Thrones which should be established under the Types of him and Solomon by Christ and Christian Kings in the Christian Church and not by him and his direct natural seed in the Jewish Church For there we shall finde him confessing that he was but the Prophet of these things that should after come to pass and not the present object otherwise then in type the spirit of the Lord spake by me and his word was in my tongue Afterwards we shall finde that that perfection of the Ruler he speaks of belongs to his typified son Christ and not to himself because it speaks of a perfection and an extent of Dominion which he in his own person was not capable of He that ruleth over men or is appointed Ruler over mankinde which David nor his natural race as Kings of the Jews could not claim to be must be just ruling in the fear of God And he shall be as the light of the morning when the sun ariseth even a morning without clouds as the tender grass springing out of the earth by cleer shining after rain All which are expressions of excellence which David could not personally essume and therefore he adds although my house be not so with God yet he hath made me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my salvatin and all my desire although he make it not to grow That is although neither I nor my present more natural house do thus grow yet it is my comfort that it shall be accompplished in my typifyed son Christ and the Christian Kings after him In him from whom all Crowns are derived and in whom all Justice is originally inherent is this Prophesie in the first place to be fulfilled And then by vertue of that Unction which those other Christi shall have from him all the world over they also shall be enabled in their several jurisdictions to rule over men in the fear of God and by vertue of their derived power be as the light of the morning even as a morning without clouds when the Sun ariseth or after this Son of Righteousness is arisen and be as the tender grass springing out of the earth by cleer shineing after rain that is that cleer shining light of Justice from
him imparted shall in them spring up like tender grass in their earthly administrations And then he foretels the state of Antichristianism to follow and that under the Jewish notion of insubjection and Rebellion viz. Sons of Belial or men without yoak but the sons of Belial shall be all of them as thorns thrust away because they cannot be taken with hands That is because they cannot be kept under by Laws but as Thornes have been troublesom to others and been ready to raise civil flames of dissention therefore as Thornes they shall be burnt or thrust away But the man that shall touch them must be fenced with Iron and the staffe of a spear That is as he that will meddle with cutting down of Thorns must have his person defended against their pricking as it were with Iron and also must have a staffe or fork to manage them with and not his bare hands so prudence must direct Christian Princes to have in readiness Davids Chelethites and Pelethites and the assistance of their Militia typified under Iron and a spear and then they shall be utterly burnt with fire in the same place that is these Thornes of rebellion shall be consumed That Christ and the Christian Kings were in these Promises meant appears yet more fully by that Promise which God makes of the prosperity of his people at the same time which could not have likelihood of accomplishment in the Jews Moreover I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will place them that they may dwell in a place of their own and move no more neither shall the Children of wickedness afflict them any more as before time Which Promise was not made good to the Israelites whom the Assyrian and other Nations did so many times afflict and whom the Romans did utterly subdue and remove but was made good after the time of Christian Kingship in that this Christian Church was ever more glorious and strong then to be oppressed by her enemies And so David himself farther instructs us acknowledging these things spoken of his house for a great while to come In this fore-recited Prophesie and those whereto it alludes it is farther observable that as it is the first that speaks particularly and largely of the perpetuity and glory of the Church so doth it also of the kingship that should be therein coupling them so together as to make it apparent that as the glory of a Church and Nation doth arise by Gods vouchsafeing to own them and by having a place amongst them so this owning them and this place is still accompanyed with the Promise of kingship nay made subsequent thereunto For so we finde that while Moses is directing the people to go with their hard controversies or appeals from the ordinary Judges unto the Iudge that shall be in those days meaning that future Government of kings which immediately follows in the same chapter he appoints them to go up unto the place which the Lord their God should choose Shewing to us that when God would have his Church most eminent by having a chief and eminent place amongst them he will also have one most eminent Officer to be his servant in establishment thereof who may also more gloriously represent him therein All which as it appears in the examples of David and Solomon so doth the words of Solomon cleerly manifest it shewing That God chose no City out of all Israel to build an house for his name before he chose David to be over his people And therefore because the good intention of Davids heart to build Gods house could not be performed by him God promiseth to raise up to him a son that should come forth of his loyns and that he should build this house to his Name Which son of his we cannot think otherwise of then as having his kingdom purposely made glorious and established for the encrease of Gods glory by this work And therefore it was not a work which God required to be done by any of the former Iudges but the height and glory belonging to each Church and Nation is to be accomplished under the most glorious instrument And by having this future regard to things we may finde those Gospel promises of restitution or reward which could not in kinde be made good to the Primitive persecuted Church and the oppressed Christians therein to be made good to the Catholike Church and the generality of Christians under the protection of Christian Kings since Namely that in comparison of those former losses the Church hath since been rewarded both in respect of increase of possession and degree of continuance with an hundred fold now in this time of houses and brethren and sisters and mothers and children and lands c. Whereupon we may make the whole issue and interpretation of this forementioned Promise to be that Christ typified in David is represented as desirous out of his zeal to Gods house to be as active and forward as he can for advancing of Gods own glory and also for the promotion of his Churches happiness represented under the figure of the Jewish Temple But because he in regard of those Victories he was to make over sin and death was in his own person disabled to perform it even as David was for the wars which were about him on every side until the Lord had put them under the soles of his feet therefore is he by God the Father Promised in the person of David When thy days shall be fulfilled and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers that is when thou shalt have accomplished the days of thy flesh and by being seated at the right hand of thy Father shalt have thy foes made thy footstool then shall God make good the word he had spoken concerning him and his house to establish it for ever That is in accomplishing the glory of the Church under his adopted sons the Christian Emperors and Monarchs as the glory of the Jewish Church and Temple was setled under Solomon and not under David By which words for ever we are also to understand Christian kingship to be promised to last till the worlds end notwithstanding all opposition as we may finde them typified under Solomon the Kings son in the seventy second Psalm where the flourishing estate and increase of the Church is foretold to continue to the glory of Christs name by reason of these that held their Crowns of him His Name shall endure for ever his Name shall be continued as long as the Sun and men shall be blessed in him all Nations shall call him blessed That is each Christian Monarch from him anointed shall be as a Son to continue his Fathers Name for ever meaning so long as the Sun and Moon shall endure For if this Psalm had intended the setting forth of the continuance of Christs own Name as the second person in the Trinity and not in relation to his
hath he not put them in such a condition as they could not do otherwise To which purpose as Iob in the fortunes of this world so we for tryal of our faith are suffered to have tares and false lights sowed amongst us by that wicked one that we from thence escaping might arise more glorious in the praise of the goodness and power of that God to whose glory and service we directed it and to the greater condemnation of him that in so great a light fell away Nor yet can there be any ground taken from thence for any such impious conjecture as that God proposed these lights and truths to his Church as in mockery and with direct intention of rendring them ineffectual through obscurity and not as truly and sincerely therein purposing their benefit and salvation For we may confidently affirm that the discovery of the errors and inconveniencies of Atheism Antichristianism Uncharitableness Disobedience c. are in nature and many places of Scripture so plainly delivered and the contrary truths and duties so evidently exprest and asserted that it were not possible for any man whom licentiousness hath not prejudiced and pre-possessed with the spirit of Infidelity Rebellion Malice Stubornness or the like to be ignorant thereof upon any reasonable inquiry But if the corruption of our depraved nature helped on with the malice of that wicked one most forward to sow his tares in the field of the Church and most ready to enter the places thus swept and garnished do so commonly keep us from discerning those truths and duties which we are so loath to find and conceive to be such it is not as before noted to be wondred at And to come nearer our own present business by instance if there should have been set down in Scripture such plain Precepts for settling the office and power of Monarchy as should have necessarily and universally driven men to implicite obedience to that Government and none else it would not only have overthrown our liberty and rendred all men equally good and bad as aforesaid but also have endangered the loss of Gods honor the end of mans conservation whilst it thus for peace sake went about to confer it too closely and absolutely on his deputy on whom as in a kind of Idolatry men might else come to fix those express returns of thanks and praise which to God himself were only due as to their fountain and original These lessons intending as well to enjoyn obedience in subjects to whom all places of obedience must be understood as to take off arrogance in Princes and so each one to learn their own parts not that of others And therefore when we shall find Christ so obsure in his description of the Kingdom of God or heaven and of his appearing as to give occasion to some to think the words altogether to imply Gods inward Kingdom or Christs coming to judgement at the last day and not his glorious appearance in his Kingdom the Church it is not much to be admired to be misconstrued and that construction always made use of by such prejudiced minds as are loath to examine how then it should be true that the Apostles themselves should desire to see one of the days of the Son of man and should not see it it being unconceivable how they should not see his second coming to judgement or not be partakers of his glory therein as well as of his inward comforts here Upon which grounds we may also find reason why our Saviour was so close and reserved in all those places where he hath occasion to speak of that power he was to delegate and leave to his Apostles even so that he not only forbears to put their Authority under the plain notion of obedience and doth it under the more familiar terms of hearing or receiving saying He that receiveth or heareth you heareth or receiveth me But also whilst he is giving them this power he doth so intermix it with such other discourses that may seem or are common to others also that the Apostles themselves could not it is like understand the plenitude of their own power until after his Resurrection that he had particularly spoken to them of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God Which things being the proper duties and instructions of the Apostles only was the reason we find him not mentioning the like to any other person And when by reason of this obscurity S. Peter is asking whether themselves or all are spoken to he neither gives answer I nor no but as before noted goes on with the description of the duty of their Offices under the notion of Stewards Which office although it must of consequence draw on eminence and power in Gods houshold the Church yet he delivers the duty thereof in such expressions as might concern others as well as themselves But when there or in other places he is instructing to humility most we are to conceive it done because the Authority of this office is most subject to tempt to pride and oppression And where we find him so frequent in giving admonitions to mutual love and particularly so often giving his Apostles warning for loving one another and so expresly forbidding them to seek to exercise Authority one over another as it cannot be construed as excluding their just authority over such as are under them so this admonition is to be conceived of high import to the peace and good of his whole Church Which might else by the disagreement of these several Heads in their divided jurisdictions one against another draw on perpetual wars by their ambitious seeking to encroach on their frllow Stewards Office and Authority and not resting content with their own Charge Which Gentile imitation or striving to obtain a sole Monarchy in Christs whole Church as formerly the Greeks Romans or others had done in the world hath been as experience tells us not only unsuccesful to the undertakers but always of high mischief to Christendom And therefore if this seasonable admonition of mutual service and love one to another do oftner and more plainly appear to be given to the Apostles then the description of their power there is good and plain reason for so doing We may also find reason from hence why the Apostles themselves were so mysterious and dark in declaring their own great Power in the Church So that S. Paul having been put to it by his stubborn Corinthians doth yet do it as in a mystery for fear of arrogating too much to himself and through his too great eminence in power to prove more obnoxious to the rest of the world and more scandalous to his new Believers Therefore saith he These things brethren I have in a figure transferred to my self and to Apollo for your sakes that ye might learn in us not to think of men above that which is written that no one of you be puffed up for one against another Meaning that as he