prostituted themselves to lewd embraces those especially that attended at the Temples of Venus to dedicate some part of their gain and present it to the Gods Athanasius has a passage very express to this purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The women of old were wont to sit in the Idol-Temples of Phoenicia and to dedicate the gain which they got by the prostitution of their bodies as a kind of first-fruits to the Deities of the place supposing that by fornication they should pacifie their Goddess and by this means render her favourable and propitious to them Where 't is plain he uses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or fornication in this very sence for that gain or reward of it which they consecrated to their Gods Some such thing Solomon had in his eye when he brings in the Harlot thus courting the young man I have peace-offerings with me this day have I paid my Vows These presents were either made in specie the very mony thus unrighteously gotten or in 〈◊〉 bought with it and offered at the Temple the remainders whereof were taken and sold among the ordinary sacrificial portions This as it holds the nearest correspondence with the rest of the rites here sorbidden so could it not chuse but be a mighty scandal to the Jews it being so particularly prohibited in their Law Thou shalt not bring the hire of an Whore into the house of the Lord thy God for any Vow for it is an abomination to the Lord. 6. THESE prohibitions here laid upon the Gentiles were by the Apostles intended only for a temporary compliance with the Jewish Converts till they could by degrees be brought off from their stiffness and obstinacy and then the reason of the thing ceasing the obligation to it must needs cease and fail Nay we may observe that even while the Apostolical decree lasted in its greatest force and power in those places where there were few or no Jewish Converts the Apostle did not stick to give leave that except in case of scandal any kind of meats even the portions of the Idol 〈◊〉 might be indifferently bought and taken by Christians as well as Heathens These were all which in order to the satisfaction of the Jews and for the present peace of the Church the Apostles thought necessary to require of the Converted Gentiles but that for all the rest they were perfectly free from legal observances obliged only to the commands of Christianity So that the Apostolical decision that was made of this matter was this That besides the temporary observation of those few indifferent rites before mentioned the belief and practice of the Christian Religion was perfectly sufficient to Salvation without Circumcision and the observation of the Mosaick Law This Synodical determination allayed the controversie for a while being joyfully received by the Gentile Christians But alas the Jewish zeal began again to ferment and spread it self they could not with any patience endure to see their beloved Moses deserted and those venerable Institutions trodden down and therefore laboured to keep up their credit and still to assert them as necessary to Salvation Than which nothing created S. Paul greater trouble at every turn being forced to contend against these Judaizing teachers almost in every Church where he came as appears by that great part that they bear in all his Epistles especially that to the Romans and Galatians where this leaven had most diffused it self whom the better to undeceive he discourses at large of the nature and institution the end and design the antiquating and abolishing of that Mosaick Covenant which these men laid so much stress and weight upon 7. HENCE then we pass to the third thing considerable for the clearing of this matter which is to shew that the main passages in S. Paul's Epistles concerning Justification and Salvation have an immediate reference to this controversie But before we enter upon that something must necessarily be premised for the explicating some terms and phrases frequently used by our Apostle in this question these two especially what he means by Law and what by Faith By Law then 't is plain he usually understands the Jewish Law which was a complex body of Laws containing moral ceremonial and judicial precepts each of which had its use and office as a great instrument of duty The Judicial Laws being peculiar Statutes accommodated to the state of the Jew's Commonwealth as all civil constitutions restrained men from the external acts of sin The Ceremonial Laws came somewhat nearer and besides their Typical relation to the Evangelical state by external and symbolical representments signified and exhibited that spiritual impurity from which men were to abstain The Moral Laws founded in the natural notions of mens minds concerning good and evil directly urged men to duty and prohibited their prevarications These three made up the intire Code and Pandects of the Jewish Statutes all which our Apostle comprehends under the general notion of the Law and not the moral Law singly and separately considered in which sence it never appears that the Jews expected justification and salvation by it nay rather that they looked for it meerly from the observance of the ritual and ceremonial Law so that the moral Law is no further considered by him in this question than as it made up a part of the Mosaical constitution of that National and Political Covenant which God made with the Jews at Mount Sinai Hence the Apostle all along in his discourses constantly opposes the Law and the Gospel and the observation of the one to the belief and practice of the other which surely he would not have done had he simply intended the moral Law it being more expresly incorporated into the Gospel than ever it was into the Law of Moses And that the Apostle does thus oppose the Law and Gospel might be made evident from the continued series of his discourses but a few places shall suffice By what Law says the Apostle is boasting excluded by the Law of works i. e. by the Mosaic Law in whose peculiar priviledges and prerogatives the Jews did strangely flatter and pride themselves Nay but by the Law of Faith i. e. by the Gospel or the Evangelical way of God's dealing with us And elsewhere giving an account of this very controversie between the Jewish and Gentile Converts he first opposes their Persons Jews by nature and sinners of the Gentiles and then infers that a man is not justified by the works of the Law by those legal observances whereby the Jews expected to be justified but by the faith of Christ by a hearty belief of and 〈◊〉 with that way which Christ has introduced for by the works of the Law by legal obedience no flesh neither Jew nor Gentile shall now be justified Fain would I learn whether you received the spirit by the works of the Law or by the hearing of Faith that is whether you became partakers of the miraculous powers of the
and perfection whereof he designed should be brought in by Christ. And how admirably did God herein condescend to the temper and humor of that people for being of a more rough and childish disposition apt to be taken with gaudy and sensible objects by the external and pompous institutions of the Ceremonial Dispensation he prepared them for better things as children are brought on by things accommodate to their weak capacities The Church was then an heir under age and was to be trained up in such a way as agreed best with its Infant-temper till it came to be of a more ripe manly age able to digest Evangelical mysteries and then the cover and the veil was taken off and things made to appear in their own form and shape 7. HENCE in the next place appears our happiness above them that we are redeemed from those many severe and burdensom impositions wherewith they were clogg'd and are now obliged only to a more easie and reasonable service That the Law was a very grievous and 〈◊〉 Dispensation is evident to any that considers how much it consisted of carnal ordinances costly duties chargeable sacrifices and innumerable little Rites and Ceremonies Under that state they were bound to undergo yea even new-born Infants the bloudy and painful 〈◊〉 of Circumcision to abstain from many sorts of food useful and pleasant to man's life to keep multitudes of solemn and stated times new Moons and Ceremonial Sabbaths to take long and tedious journeys to Jerusalem to offer their sacrifices at the Temple to observe daily washings and purifications to use infinite care and caution in every place for if by chance they did but touch an unclean thing besides their present confinement it put them to the expences of a sacrifice with hundreds more troublesome and costly observances required of them A cruel bondage heavy burdens and grievous to be born under the weight whereof good men did then groan and earnestly breath after the time of reformation the very Apostles complained that it was a yoke upon their necks which neither their Fathers nor they were able to bear But this yoke is taken off from our shoulders and the way open into the liberties of the children of God The Law bore a heavy hand over them as children in their minority we are got from under the rod and lash of its tutorage and Pedagogie and are no more subject to the severity of its commands to the exact punctilio's and numerousness of its impositions Our Lord has removed that low and troublesome Religion and has brought in a more manly and rational way of worship more suitable to the perfections of God and more accommodate to the reason and understandings of men A Religion incomparably the wisest and the best that ever took place in the World God did not settle the Religion of the Jews and their way of worship because good and excellent in it self but for its suitableness to the temper of that people Happy we whom the Gospel has freed from those intolerable observances to which they were obliged and has taught us to serve God in a better way more 〈◊〉 and acceptable more humane and natural and in which we are helped forwards by greater aids of Divine assistence than were afforded under that Dispensation All which conspire to render our way smooth and plain Take my yoke upon you for my yoke is easie and my burden is light 8. THIRDLY the Dispensation of the Gospel is founded upon more noble and excellent promises A better Covenant established upon better promises And better promises they are both for the nature and clearness of their revelation They were of a more sublime and excellent nature as being promises of spiritual and eternal things such as immediately concerned the perfection and happiness of mankind grace peace pardon and eternal life The Law strictly considered as a particular Covenant with the Jews at Mount Sinai had no other promises but of temporal blessings plenty and prosperity and the happiness of this life This was all that appeared above-ground and that was expresly held forth in that transaction whatever might otherwise by due inferences and proportions of reason be deduced from it Now this was a great defect in that Dispensation it being by this means considering the nature and disposition of that people and the use they would make of it apt to intangle and debase the minds of men and to arrest their thoughts and desires in the pursuit of more sublime and better things I do not say but that under the Old Testament there were promises of spiritual things and of eternal happiness as appears from 〈◊〉 Psalms and some passages in the Books of the Prophets But then these though they were under the Law yet they were not of the Law that is did not properly belong to it as a legal Covenant God in every age of the Jewish Church raising up some extraordinary persons who preached notions to the people above the common standard of that Dispensation and who spoke things more plainly by how much nearer they approached the times of the Messiah But under the Christian Oeconomy the promises are evidently more pure and spiritual not a temporal Canaan external prosperity or pardon of ceremonial uncleanness but remission of sins reconciliation with God and everlasting life are proposed and offered to us Not but that in some measure temporal blessings are promised to us as well as them only with this difference to them earthly blessings were pledges of spiritual to us spiritual blessings are ensurances of temporal so far as the Divine wisdom sees fit for us Nor are they better in themselves than they are clearly discovered and revealed to us Whatever spiritual blessings were proposed under the former state were obscure and dark and very few of the people understood them But to us the veil is taken off and we behold the glory of the Lord with open face especially the things that relate to another World for this is the promise that he hath promised us even Eternal Life Hence our Lord is said to have brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel Which he may be justly said to have done inasmuch as he has given the greatest certainty and the clearest account of that state He hath given us the greatest assurance and certainty of the thing that there is such a state The happiness of the other World was a notion not so firmly agreed upon either amongst Jews or Gentiles Among the Jews it was peremptorily denied by the Sadducees a considerable Sect in that Church which we can hardly suppose they would have done had it been clearly propounded in the Law of Moses And among the Heathens the most sober and considering persons did at some times at least doubt of it witness that confession of Socrates himself the wisest and best man that ever was in the Heathen World who when he came to plead his cause before his Judges and
the same reasonable Propositions into other Nations and he therefore multiplied them to a great necessity of a dispersion that they might serve the ends of God and of the natural Law by their ambulatory life and their numerous disseminations And this was it which S. Paul 〈◊〉 The Law was added because of transgression meaning that because men did transgress the natural God brought Moses's Law into the world to be as a strand to the inundation of Impiety And thus the world stood till the fulness of time was come for so we are taught by the Apostle The Law was added because of transgression but the date of this was to expire at a certain period it was added to serve but till the seed should come to whom the Promise was made 23. For because Moses's Law was but an imperfect explication of the natural there being divers parts of the three Laws of Nature not at all explicated by that Covenant not the religion of Prayers not the reasonableness of Temperance and Sobriety in Opinion and Diet and in the more noble instances of Humanity and doing benefit it was so short that as S. Paul says The Law could not make the comers thereunto perfect and which was most of all considerable it was confined to a Nation and the other parts of mankind had made so little use of the Records of that Nation that all the world was placed in darkness and sate in the 〈◊〉 of death Therefore it was that in great mercy God sent his Son a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of the people Israel to instruct those and consummate these that the imperfection of the one and the mere darkness of the other might be illustrated by the Sun of Righteousness And this was by restoring the Light of Nature which they by evil Customs and 〈◊〉 Principles and evil Laws had obscured by restoring Man to the liberty of his spirit by freeing him from the slavery of Sin under which they were so lost and oppressed that all their discourses and conclusions some of their moral Philosophy and all their habitual practices were but servants of sin and made to cooperate to that end not which God intended as perfective of humane nature but which the Devil and vicious persons superinduced to serve little ends and irregular and to destroy the greater 24. For certain it is Christianity is nothing else but the most perfect design that ever was to make a man be happy in his whole capacity and as the Law was to the Jews so was Philosophy to the Gentiles a Schoolmaster to bring them to Christ to teach them the rudiments of Happiness and the first and lowest things of Reason that when Christ was come all mankind might become perfect that is be made regular in their Appetites wise in their Understandings assisted in their Duties directed to and instructed in their great Ends. And this is that which the Apostle calls being perfect men in Christ Jesus perfect in all the intendments of nature and in all the designs of God And this was brought to pass by discovering and restoring and improving the Law of Nature and by turning it all into Religion 25. For the natural Law being a sufficient and a proportionate instrument and means to bring a man to the End designed in his creation and this Law being eternal and unalterable for it ought to be as lasting and as unchangeable as the nature it self so long as it was capable of a Law it was not imaginable that the body of any Law should make a new Morality new rules and general proportions either of Justice or Religion or Temperance or Felicity the essential parts of all these consisting in natural proportions and means toward the consummation of man's last End which was first intended and is always the same It is as if there were a new truth in an essential and a necessary Proposition For although the instances may vary there can be no new Justice no new Temperance no new relations proper and natural relations and intercourses between God and us but what always were in Praises and Prayers in adoration and honour and in the symbolical expressions of God's glory and our needs 26. Hence it comes that that which is the most obvious and notorious appellative of the Law of Nature that it is a Law written in our hearts was also recounted as one of the glories and excellencies of Christianity Plutarch saying that Kings ought to be governed by Laws explains himself that this Law must be a word not written in Books and Tables but dwelling in the Mind a living rule the 〈◊〉 guide of their manners and monitors of their life And this was the same which S. Paul expresses to be the guide of the Gentiles that is of all men naturally The Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature the things contained in the Law which shews the work of the Law written in their hearts And that we may see it was the Law of Nature that returned in the Sanctions of Christianity God declares that in the constitution of this Law he would take no other course than at first that is he would write them in the hearts of men indeed with a new style with a quill taken from the wings of the holy Dove the Spirit of God was to be the great Engraver and the Scribe of the New Covenant but the Hearts of men should be the Tables For this is the Covenant that I will make with them after those days saith the Lord I will put my laws into their hearts and into their minds will I write them And their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more That is I will provide a means to expiate all the iniquities of man and restore him to the condition of his first creation putting him into the same order towards Felicity which I first designed to him and that also by the same instruments Now I consider that the Spirit of God took very great care that all the Records of the Law of Jesus should be carefully kept and transmitted to posterity in Books and Sermons which being an act of providence and mercy was a provision lest they should be lost or mistaken as they were formerly when God writ some of them in Tables of stone for the use of the sons of Israel and all of them in the first Tables of Nature with the 〈◊〉 of Creation as now he did in the new creature by the singer of the Spirit But then writing them in the Tables of our minds besides the other can mean nothing but placing them there where they were before and from whence we blotted them by the mixtures of impure principles and discourses But I descend to particular and more minute considerations 27. The Laws of Nature either are bands of Religion Justice or Sobriety Now I consider concerning Religion that when-ever God hath made any particular Precepts to a Family as to Abraham's or
Man if they pass through an even and an indifferent life towards the issues of an ordinary and necessary course they are little and within command but if they pass upon an end or aim of difficulty or ambition they duplicate and grow to a 〈◊〉 and we have seen the even and temperate lives of indifferent persons continue in many degrees of Innocence but the Temptation of busie designs is too great even for the best of dispositions 7. But these Temptations are crasse and material and soon discernible it will require some greater observation to arm against such as are more spiritual and immaterial For he hath Apples to cousen Children and Gold for Men the Kingdoms of the World for the Ambition of Princes and the Vanities of the World for the Intemperate he hath Discourses and fair-spoken Principles to abuse the pretenders to Reason and he hath common Prejudices for the more vulgar understandings Amongst these I chuse to consider such as are by way of Principle or Proposition 8. The first great Principle of Temptation I shall note is a general mistake which excuses very many of our crimes upon pretence of Infirmity calling all those sins to which by natural disposition we are inclined though by carelesness and evil customs they are heightned to a habit by the name of Sins of infirmity to which men suppose they have reason and title to pretend If when they have committed a crime their Conscience checks them and they are troubled and during the interval and abatement of the heats of desire resolve against it and commit it readily at the next opportunity then they cry out against the weakness of their Nature and think as long as this body of death is about them it must be thus and that this condition may stand with the state of Grace And then the Sins shall return periodically like the revolutions of a Quartan Ague well and ill for ever till Death surprizes the mistaker This is a Patron of sins and makes the Temptation prevalent by an authentick instrument and they pretend the words of S. Paul For the good that I would that I do not but the evil that I would not that I do For there is a law in my members 〈◊〉 against the law of my mind bringing me into captivity to the law of Sin And thus the 〈◊〉 of Sin is mistaken for a state of Grace and the imperfections of the Law are miscalled the affections and necessities of Nature that they might seem to be incurable and the persons apt for an excuse therefore because for Nature there is no absolute cure But that these words of S. Paul may not become a 〈◊〉 of death and instruments of a temptation to us it is observable that the Apostle by a siction of person as is usual with him speaks of himself not as in the state of Regeneration under the Gospel but under the 〈◊〉 obscurities insufficiencies and imperfections of the Law which indeed he there contends to have been a Rule good and holy apt to remonstrate our misery because by its prohibitions and limits given to natural desires it made actions before indifferent now to be sins it added many curses to the breakers of it and by an 〈◊〉 of contrariety it made us more desirous of what was now unlawful but it was a Covenant in which our Nature was restrained but not helped it was provoked but not sweetly assisted our Understandings were instructed but our Wills not sanctified and there were no suppletories of Repentance every greater sin was like the fall of an Angel irreparable by any mystery or express recorded or enjoyned Now of a man under this Govenant he describes the condition to be such that he understands his Duty but by the infirmities of Nature he is certain to fall and by the helps of the Law not strengthened against it nor restored after it and therefore he calls himself under that notion a miserable man sold under sin not doing according to the rules of the Law or the dictates of his Reason but by the unaltered misery of his Nature certain to prevaricate But the person described here is not S. Paul is not any justified person not so much as a Christian but one who is under a state of direct opposition to the state of Grace as will manifestly appear if we observe the antithesis from S. Paul's own characters For the Man here named is such as in whom sin wrought all concupiscence in whom sin lived and slew him so that he was dead in trespasses and sins and although he did delight in the Law after his inwardman that is his understanding had intellectual complacencies and satisfactions which afterwards he calls serving the Law of God with his mind that is in the first dispositions and preparations of his spirit yet he could act nothing for the law in his members did inslave him and brought him into captivity to the law of sin so that this person was full of actual and effective lusts he was a slave to sin and dead in trespasses But the state of a regenerate person is such as to have 〈◊〉 the flesh with the affections and lusts in whom sin did not reign not only in the mind but even also not in the mortal body over whom sin had no dominion in whom the old man was crucified and the body of sin was destroyed and sin not at all served And to make the antithesis yet clearer in the very beginning of the next Chapter the Apostle saith that the spirit of life in Christ Jesus had made him free from the law of sin and death under which law he complained immediately before he was sold and killed to shew the person was not the same in these so different and contradictory representments No man in the state of Grace can say The evil that I would not that I do if by evil he means any evil that is habitual or in its own nature deadly 9. So that now let no man pretend an inevitable necessity to sin for if ever it comes to a custom or to a great violation though but in a single act it is a condition of Carnality not of spiritual life and those are not the infirmities of Nature but the weaknesses of Grace that make us sin so frequently which the Apostle truly affirms to the same purpose The flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other so that ye cannot or that ye do not do the things that ye would This disability proceeds from the strength of the flesh and weakness of the spirit For he adds But if ye be led by the Spirit ye are not under the Law saying plainly that the state of such a combate and disability of doing good is a state of a man under the Law or in the flesh which he accounts all one but every man that is sanctified
prepare the way to the coming of our Blessed Lord he preached Repentance and baptized all that professed they did repent He taught the Jews to live good lives and baptized with the Baptism of a Prophet such as was not unusually done by extraordinary and holy persons in the change or renewing of Discipline or Religion Whether 〈◊〉 's Baptism was from heaven or os men Christ asked the Pharisees That it was from heaven the people therefore believed because he was a Prophet and a holy person but it implies also that such Baptisms are sometimes from men that is used by 〈◊〉 of an eminent Religion or extraordinary fame for the gathering of Disciples and admitting Proselytes and the Disciples of Christ did so too even before Christ had instituted the Sacrament for the Christian Church the Disciples that came to Christ were baptized by his Apostles 10. And now we are come to the gates of Baptism All these till John were but Types and preparatory Baptisms and John's Baptism was but the prologue to the Baptism of Christ. The Jewish Baptisms admitted Proselytes to Moses and to the Law of Ceremonies John's Baptism called them to 〈◊〉 in the Messias now appearing and to repent of their sins to enter into the Kingdom which was now at 〈◊〉 and preached that Repentance which should be for the 〈◊〉 os 〈◊〉 His Baptism remitted no sins but preached and consigned Repentance which in the belief of the 〈◊〉 whom he pointed to should pardon sins But because he was taken from his Office before the work was completed the Disciples of Christ 〈◊〉 it They went forth preaching the same Sermon of Repentance and the approach of the Kingdom and baptized or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Disciples as John did only they as it is probable baptized in the Name of Jesus which it is not so likely John did And this very thing might be the cause of the different forms of Baptism recorded in the Acts of baptizing in the Name of 〈◊〉 and at other times In the 〈◊〉 of the Father Son and 〈◊〉 Ghost the sormer being the manner of doing it in pursuance of the design of John's Baptism and the latter the form of Institution by Christ for the whole Christian Church appointed after his Resurrection the Disciples at first using promiscuously what was used by the same Authority though with some difference of Mystery 11. The Holy Jesus having found his way ready prepared by the Preaching of 〈◊〉 and by his Baptism and the 〈◊〉 manner of adopting Proselytes and Disciples into the Religion a way chalked out for him to initiate Disciples into his Religion took what was so prepared and changed it into a perpetual Sacrament He kept the Ceremony that they who were led only by outward things might be the better called in and easier enticed into the Religion when they entred by a Ceremony which their Nation always used in the like cases and therefore without change of the outward act he put into it a new spirit and gave it a new grace and a proper efficacy he sublimed it to higher ends and adorned it with Stars of Heaven he made it to signific greater Mysteries to convey greater Blessings to consign the bigger Promises to cleanse deeper than the skin and to carry Proselytes farther than the gates of the Institution For so he was pleased to do in the other Sacrament he took the Ceremony which he found ready in the Custom of the Jews where the Major-domo after the Paschal Supper gave Bread and Wine to every person of his family he changed nothing of it without but transferred the Rite to greater Mysteries and put his own Spirit to their Sign and it became a Sacrament Evangelical It was so also in the matter of Excommunication where the Jewish practice was made to pass into Christian discipline without violence and noise old things became new while he fulfilled the Law making it up in full measures of the Spirit 12. By these steps Baptism passed on to a Divine Evangelical institution which we find to be consigned by three Evangelists Go ye therefore and teach all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost It was one of the last Commandments the Holy Jesus gave upon the earth when he taught his Apostles the things which concerned his Kingdom For he that believes and is baptized shall be saved but 〈◊〉 a man be born of Water and the Holy Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven agreeable to the decretory words of God by Abraham in the Circumcision to which Baptism does succeed in the consignation of the same Covenant and the same Spiritual Promises The uncircumcised child whose flesh is not circumcised that soul shall be cut off from his people he hath broken my Covenant The Manichees Selencas Hermias and their followers people of a day's abode and small interest but of malicious doctrine taught Baptism not to be necessary not to be used upon this ground because they supposed that it was proper to John to baptize with water and reserved for Christ as his peculiar to baptize with the Holy Ghost and with fire Indeed Christ baptized none otherwise he sent his Spirit upon the Church in Pentecost and baptized them with fire the Spirit appearing like a flame but he appointed his Apostles to baptize with water and they did so and their successors after them every-where and for ever not expounding but obeying the preceptive words of their Lord which were almost the last that he spake upon earth And I cannot think it needful to prove this to be necessary by any more Arguments for the words are so plain that they need no exposition and yet if they had been obscure the universal practice of the Apostles and the Church for ever is a sufficient declaration of the Commandment No Tradition is more universal no not of Scripture it self no words are plainer no not the Ten Commandments and if any suspicion can be superinduced by any jealous or less discerning person it will need no other refutation but to turn his eyes to those lights by which himself fees Scripture to be the Word of God and the Commandments to be the declaration of his Will 13. But that which will be of greatest concernment in this affair is to consider the great benefits are conveyed to us in this Sacrament for this will highly conclude that the Precept was 〈◊〉 ever which God so seconds with his grace and mighty blessings and the susception of it necessary because we cannot be without those excellent things which are the Graces of the Sacrament 14. First The first fruit is That in Baptism we are admitted to the Kingdom of Christ presented unto him consigned with his Sacrament enter into his Militia give up our Understandings and our choice to the obedience of Christ and in all senses that we can become his Disciples witnessing a good
called them he also justified and whom he justified them he also glorified this also declares the regular event or at least the order of things and the design of God but not the actual verification of it to all persons These sayings concerning Baptism in the like manner are to be so understood that they cannot exclude all persons from the 〈◊〉 that have not all those real effects of the Sacrament at all times which some men have at some times and all men must have at some time or other viz. when the Sacrament obtains its last intention But he that shall argue from hence That Children are not rightly baptized because they cannot in a spiritual sence put on Christ concludes nothing unless these Propositions did signifie universally and at all times and in every person and in every manner which can no more pretend to truth than that all Christians are God's Elect and all that are baptized are Saints and all that are called are justified and all that are once justified shall be saved finally These things declare only the event of things and their order and the usual effect and the proper design in their proper season in their limited proportions 10. Eighthly A Negative Argument for matters of fact in Scripture cannot conclude a Law or a necessary or a regular event And therefore supposing that it be not intimated that the Apostles did baptize Insants it follows not that they did not and if they did not it does not follow that they might not or that the Church may not For it is unreasonable to argue The Scripture speaks nothing of the Baptism of the Holy Virgin Mother therefore she was not baptized The words and deeds of Christ are infinite which are not recorded and of the Acts of the Apostles we may suppose the same in their proportion and therefore what they did not is no rule to us unless they did it not because they were forbidden So that it can be no good Argument to say The Apostles are not read to have baptized Infants therefore Infants are not to be baptized but thus We do not find that Infants are excluded from the common Sacraments and Ceremonies of Christian institution therefore we may not presume to exclude them For although the Negative of a Fact is no good Argument yet the Negative of a Law is a very good one We may not say The Apostles did not therefore we may not but thus They were not forbidden to do it there is no Law against it therefore it may be done No man's deeds can prejudicate a Divine Law expressed in general terms much less can it be prejudiced by those things that were not done That which is wanting cannot be numbred cannot be effectual therefore Baptize all Nations must signifie all that it can signifie all that are reckoned in the Capitations and accounts of a Nation Now since all contradiction to this Question depends wholly upon these two Grounds the Negative Argument in matter of Fact and the Pretences that Faith and Repentance are required to Baptism since the first is wholly nothing and infirm upon an infinite account and the second may conclude that Infants can no more be saved than be baptized because Faith is more necessary to Salvation than to Baptism it being said He that believeth not shall be damned and it is not said He that believeth not shall be excluded from Baptism it follows that the Doctrine of those that resuse to baptize their Infants is upon both its legs weak and broken and insufficient 11. Upon the supposition of these Grounds the Baptism of Infants according to the perpetual practice of the Church of God will stand firm and unshaken upon its own Base For as the Eunuch said to Philip What hinders them to be baptized If they can receive benefit by it it is infallibly certain that it belongs to them also to receive it and to their Parents to procure it for nothing can deprive us of so great a Grace but an Unworthiness or a Disability They are not disabled to receive it if they need it and if it does them good and they have neither done good nor evil and theresore they have not sorseited their right to it This theresore shall be the first great Argument or Combination of inducements Infants receive many benefits by the 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 and theresore in charity and in duty we are to bring them to Baptism 12. First The first Effect of Baptism is That in it we are admitted to the Kingdom of Christ offered and presented unto him In which certainly there is the same act of Worship to God and the same blessing to the Children of Christians as there was in presenting the first-born among the Jews For our Children can be God's own portion as well as theirs And as they presented the first-born to God and so acknowledged that God might have taken his life in Sacrifice as well as the Sacrifice of the Lamb or the Oblation of a Beast yet when the right was consessed God gave him back again and took a Lamb in exchange or a pair of Doves so are our Children presented to God as forseit and God might take the forfeiture and not admit the Babe to the Promises of Grace but when the Presentation of the Child and our acknowledgment is made to God God takes the Lamb of the World in exchange and he hath paid our forfeiture and the Children are holy unto the Lord. And what hinders here Cannot a Cripple receive an alms at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple unless he go thither himself or cannot a Gift be presented to God by the hands of the owners and the Gift become holy and pleasing to God without its own consent The Parents have a portion of the possession Children are blessings and God's gifts and the Father's greatest wealth and therefore are to be given again to him In other things we give something to God of all that he gives us all we do not because our needs force us to retain the greater part and the less sanctifies the whole but our Children must all be returned to God for we may love them and so may God too and they are the better our own by being made holy in their Presentation Whatsoever is given to God is holy every thing in its proportion and capacity a Lamb is holy when it becomes a Sacrifice and a Table is holy when it becomes an Altar and an House is holy when it becomes a Church and a Man is holy when he is consecrated to be a Priest and so is every one that is dedicated to Religion these are holy persons the others are holy Things And Infants are between both they have the Sanctification that belongs to them the Holiness that can be of a reasonable nature offer'd and destin'd to God's service but not in that degree that is in an understanding chusing person Certain it is that Infants may be given to God and if they may
be they must be for it is not here as in Goods where we are permitted to use all or some and give what portion we please out of them but we cannot do our duty towards our Children unless we give them wholly to God and offer them to his service and to his grace The first does honour to God the second does charity to the Children The effects and real advantages will appear in the sequel In the mean time this Argument extends thus sar That Children may be presented to God acceptably in order to his service And it was highly preceptive when our Blessed Saviour commanded that we should 〈◊〉 little children to come to him and when they came they carried away a Blessing along with them He was desirous they should partake of his Merits he is not willing neither is it his Father's will that any of these little ones should perish And therefore he died for them and loved and blessed them and so he will now if they be brought to him and presented as Candidates of the Religion and of the Resurrection Christ hath a Blessing for our Children but let them come to him that is be presented at the doors of the Church to the Sacrament of Adoption and Initiation for I know no other way for them to come 13. Secondly Children may be adopted into the Covenant of the Gospel that is made partakers of the Communion of Saints which is the second Effect of Baptism parts of the Church members of Christ's Mystical body and put into the order of eternal life Now concerning this it is certain the Church clearly hath power to do her offices in order to it The faithful can pray for all men they can do their piety to some persons with more regard and greater earnestness they can admit whom they please in their proper dispositions to a participation of all their holy Prayers and Communions and Preachings and Exhortations and if all this be a blessing and all this be the actions of our own Charity who can hinder the Church of God from admitting Infants to the communion of all their pious offices which can do them benefit in their present capacity How this does necessarily infer Baptism I shall afterwards discourse But for the present I enumerate That the blessings of Baptism are communicable to them they may be admitted into a fellowship of all the Prayers and Priviledges of the Church and the Communion of Saints in blessings and prayers and holy offices But that which is of greatest perswasion and convincing efficacy in this particular is That the Children of the Church are as capable of the same Covenant as the children of the Jews But it was the same Covenant that Circumcision did consign a spiritual Covenant under a veil and now it is the same spiritual Covenant without the veil which is evident to him that considers it thus 14. The words of the Covenant are these I am the Almighty God walk before me and be thou perfect I will multiply thee exceedingly Thou shalt be a Father of many Nations Thy name shall not be Abram but Abraham Nations and Kings shall be out of thee I will be a God unto thee and unto thy seed after thee and I will give all the Land of Canaan to thy seed and All the Males shall be circumcised and it shall be a token of the Covenant between me and thee and He that is not circumcised shall be cut off from his people The Covenant which was on 〈◊〉 's part was To walk before God and to be perfect on God's part To bless him with a numerous issue and them with the Land of Canaan and the sign was Circumcision the token of the Covenant Now in all this here was no duty to which the posterity was obliged nor any blessing which 〈◊〉 could perceive or feel because neither he nor his posterity did enjoy the Promise for many hundred years after the Covenant and therefore as there was a duty for the posterity which is not here expressed so there was a blessing for Abraham which was concealed under the leaves of a temporal Promise and which we shall better understand from them whom the Spirit of God hath taught the mysteriousness of this transaction The argument indeed and the observation is wholly S. Paul's Abraham and the Patriarchs died in faith not having received the Promises viz. of a possession in Canaan They saw the Promises afar off they embraced them and looked through the Cloud and the temporal veil this was not it they might have returned to Canaan if that had been the object of their desires and the design of the Promise but they desired and did seek a Country but it was a better and that a heavenly This was the object of their desire and the end of their seach and the reward of their Faith and the secret of their Promise And therefore Circumcision was a seal of the righteousness of Faith which he had before his Circumcision before the making this Covenant and therefore it must principally relate to an effect and a blessing greater than was afterwards expressed in the temporal Promise which effect was forgiveness of sins a not imputing to us our infirmities Justification by Faith accounting that for righteousness and these effects or graces were promised to Abraham not only for his posterity after the flesh but his children after the spirit even to all that shall believe and walk in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham which he walked in being yet uncircumcised 15. This was no other but the Covenant of the Gospel though afterwards otherwise consigned for so the Apostle expresly affirms that Abraham was the father of Circumcision viz. by virtue of this Covenant not only to them that are circumcised but to all that believe for this promise was not through the Law of Works or of Circumcision but of Faith And therefore as S. Paul observes God promised that Abraham should be a father not of that Nation only but of many Nations and the heir of the world that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through Faith And if ye be Christ's then ye are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the Promise Since then the Covenant of the Gospel is the Covenant of Faith and not of Works and the Promises are spiritual not secular and Abraham the father of the faithful Gentiles as well as the circumcised Jews and the heir of the world not by himself but by his seed or the Son of Man our Lord Jesus it follows that the Promises which Circumcision did seal were the same Promises which are consigned in Baptism the Covenant is the same only that God's people are not impal'd in 〈◊〉 and the veil is taken away and the Temporal is passed into Spiritual and the result will be this That to
repairs not my estate the first makes it in me to be unjust the latter declares me malicious and revengeful If I demand an eye for an eye his eye extinguished will not enlighten mine and therefore to prosecute him to such purposes is to resist or render evil with evil directly against Christ's Sermon But if the postulation of sentence be in order only to restore my self we find it permitted by S. Paul who when for the 〈◊〉 sake he forbad going to Law before unbelievers and for the danger and temptation's sake and the latent irregularity which is certainly appendent to ordinary Litigations he is angry indefinitely with them that go to Law yet he adviseth that Christian Arbitrators be appointed for decision of emergent Questions And therefore when the Supreme Authority hath appointed and regularly established an Arbitrator the permission is the same S. Paul is angry that among Christians there should be Suits but it is therefore he is chiefly angry because Christians do wrong they who should rather suffer wrong yet that they should do it and defraud their brother which in some sence enforces Suits that 's it he highly blames But when injustice is done and a man is in a considerable degree defrauded then it is permitted to him to repeat his own before Christian Arbitrators whether chosen by private consent or publick authority for that circumstance makes no essential alteration in the Question but then this must be done with as much simplicity and unmingled design as is possible without any desire of rendring evil to the person of the offender without arts of heightning the charge without prolongation devices and arts of vexation without anger and animosities and then although accidentally there is some appendent charge to the offending person that is not accounted upon the stock of Revenge because it was not designed and is not desired and is cared for to prevent it as much as may be and therefore offer was made of private and unchargeable Arbitrators and this being refused the charge and accidental evil if it be less than the loss of my sufferance and injury must be reckoned to the necessities of affairs and put upon the stock of his injustice and will not affix a guilt upon the actor I say this is true when the actor hath used all means to accord it without charge and when he is refused manages it with as little as he can and when it is nothing of his desire but something of his trouble that he cannot have his own without the lesser accidental evil to the offender and that the question is great and weighty in his proportion then a Suit of Law is of it self lawful But then let it be remembred how many ways afterwards it may become unlawful and I have no more to add in this Article but the saying of the son of Sirach He that loves danger shall perish in it And certainly he had need be an Angel that manages a Suit innocently and he that hath so excellent a spirit as with innocence to run through the 〈◊〉 temptations of a Law-suit in all probability hath so much holiness as to suffer the injury and so much prudence as to avoid the danger and therefore nothing but a very great defalcation or ruine of a man's estate will from the beginning to the end justifie such a controversie When the man is put to it so that he cannot do some other duty without venturing in this then the grace of God is sufficient for him but he that enters lightly shall walk dangerously and a thousand to one but he will fall foully It is utterly a fault among you said S. Paul because ye go to Law one with another It is not always a crime but ever a fault and an irregularity a recession from Christian perfection and an entertaining of a danger which though we escape through yet it was a fault to have entred into it when we might have avoided it And even then when it is lawful for us it is not expedient For so the Apostle summs up his reprehension concerning Christians going to Law We must rather take wrong rather suffer our selves to be defrauded and when we cannot bear the burthen of the loss then indeed we are permitted to appeal to Christian Judges but then there are so many cautions to be observed that it may be the remedy is worse than the disease I only observe this one thing that S. Paul permits it only in the instance of defraudation or matter of interest such as are defending of Widows and Orphans and Churches which in estimation of Law are by way of fiction reckoned to be in pupillage and minority add also repeating our own interests when our necessities or the support of our family and relatives requires it for all these are cases of Charity or duty respectively But besides the matter of defraudation we find no instance expressed nor any equality and parallel of reason to permit Christians in any case to go to Law because in other things the sentence is but vindictive and cannot repair us and therefore demanding Justice is a rendring evil in the proper matter of Revenge Concerning which I know no 〈◊〉 but in an action of Scandal and ill report But because an innocent and an holy life will force light out of darkness and Humility and Patience and waiting upon God will bring glory out of shame I suppose he who goes to Law to regain his credit attempts the cure by incompetent remedies if the accusation be publick the Law will call him to an account and then he is upon his defence and must acquit himself with meekness and sincerity but this allows not him to be the actor for then it is rather a design of Revenge than a proper deletery of his disgrace and purgative of the 〈◊〉 For if the accusation can be proved it was no calumny if it be not proved the person is not always innocent and to have been accused leaves something foul in his reputation and therefore he that by Law makes it more publick propagates his own disgrace and sends his shame farther than his innocence and the crime will go whither his absolution shall not arrive 10. If it be yet farther questioned whether it be lawful to pray for a Revenge or a Punishment upon the offender I reckon them all one he that prays for punishment of him that did him personal injury cannot easily be supposed to separate the Punishment from his own Revenge I answer that although God be the avenger of all our wrongs yet it were fit for us to have the affections of brethren not the designs and purposes of a Judge but leave them to him to whom they are proper When in the bitterness of soul an oppressed person curses sadly and prays for vengeance the calamity of the man and the violence of his enemy hasten a curse and ascertain it But whatever excuses the greatness of the Oppression may
and therefore less likely to deceive for which reason it is said that he shall deceive if it were possible the very elect that is therefore not possible because that by which he insinuates himself to others is by the elect the Church and chosen of God understood to be his sign and mark of discovery and a warning And therefore as the Prophecies of Jesus were an infinite verification of his Miracles so also this Prophecy of Christ concerning Antichrist disgraces the reputation and faith of the Miracles he shall act The old Prophets foretold of the Messias and of his Miracles of power and mercy to prepare for his reception and entertainment Christ alone and his Apostles from him foretold of Antichrist and that he should come in all Miracles of deception and lying that is with true or false Miracles to perswade a lie and this was to prejudice his being accepted according to the Law of Moses So that as all that spake of Christ bade us believe him for the Miracles so all that foretold of Antichrist bade us disbelieve him the rather for his and the reason of both is the same because the mighty and surer word of Prophecy as S. Peter calls it being the greatest testimony in the world of a Divine principle gives authority or reprobates with the same power They who are the predestinate of God and they that are the praesciti the foreknown and marked people must needs stand or fall to the Divine sentence and such must this be acknowledged for no enemy of the Cross not the Devil himself ever foretold such a contingency or so rare so personal so voluntary so unnatural an event as this of the great Antichrist 12. And thus the Holy Jesus having shewed forth the treasures of his Father's Wisdom in Revelations and holy Precepts and upon the stock of his Father's greatness having dispended and demonstrated great power in Miracles and these being instanced in acts of Mercy he mingled the glories of Heaven to transmit them to earth to raise us up to the participations of Heaven he was pleased by healing the bodies of infirm persons to invite their spirits to his Discipline and by his power to convey healing and by that mercy to lead us into the treasures of revelation that both Bodies and Souls our Wills and Understandings by Divine instruments might be brought to Divine perfections in the participations of a Divine nature It was a miraculous mercy that God should look upon us in our bloud and a miraculous condescension that his Son should take our nature and even this favour we could not believe without many Miracles and so contrary was our condition to all possibilities of happiness that if Salvation had not marched to us all the way in Miracle we had perished in the ruines of a sad eternity And now it would be but reasonable that since God for our sakes hath rescinded so many laws of natural establishment we also for his and for our own would be content to do violence to those natural inclinations which are also criminal when they derive into action Every man living in the state of Grace is a perpetual Miracle and his Passions are made reasonable as his Reason is turned to Faith and his Soul to Spirit and his Body to a Temple and Earth to Heaven and less than this will not dispose us to such glories which being the portion of Saints and Angels and the nearest communications with God are infinitely above what we see or hear or understand The PRAYER O Eternal Jesu who didst receive great power that by it thou mightest convey thy Father's mercies to us impotent and wretched people give me grace to believe that heavenly Doctrine which thou didst ratifie with arguments from above that I may fully assent to all those mysterious Truths which integrate that Doctrine and Discipline in which the obligations of my duty and the hopes of my felicity are deposited And to all those glorious verifications of thy Goodness and thy Power add also this Miracle that I who am stained with Leprosie of sin may be cleansed and my eyes may be opened that I may see the wondrous things of thy Law and raise thou me up from the death of sin to the life of righteousness that I may for ever walk in the land of the living abhorring the works of death and darkness that as I am by thy miraculous mercy partaker of the first so also I may be accounted worthy of the second Resurrection and as by Faith Hope Charity and Obedience I receive the fruit of thy Miracles in this life so in the other I may partake of thy Glories which is a mercy above all Miracles Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me clean Lord I believe help mine unbelief and grant that no 〈◊〉 or incapacity of mine may hinder the wonderful operations of thy Grace but let it be thy first Miracle to turn my water into wine my barrenness into fruitfulness my aversations from thee into unions and intimate adhesions to thy infinity which is the fountain of mercy and power Grant this for thy mercie 's sake and for the honour of those glorious Attributes in which thou hast revealed thy self and thy Father's excellencies to the world O Holy and Eternal Jesu Amen The End of the Second Part. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 THE HISTORY OF THE Life and Death OF THE HOLY JESUS BEGINNING At the Second Year of his PREACHING until his ASCENSION WITH CONSIDERATIONS and DISCOURSES upon the several parts of the Story And PRAYERS fitted to the several MYSTERIES THE THIRD PART Seneca apud Lactant. lib. 6. c. 17. Hic est ille homo qui sive toto corpore tormenta patienda sunt sive flamma ore recipienda est sive extendenda per patibulum manus non quaerit quid patiatur sed quà m bene LONDON Printed by R. Norton for R. Royston 1675 TO The Right Honourable and Vertuous Lady The LADY FRANCES Countess of CARBERY MADAM SInce the Divine Providence hath been pleased to bind up the great breaches of my little fortune by your Charity and Nobleness of a religious tenderness I account it an excellent circumstance and handsomeness of condition that I have the fortune of S. Athanasius to have my Persecution relieved and comforted by an Honourable and Excellent Lady and I have nothing to return for this honour done to me but to do as the poor Paralyticks and infirm people in the Gospel did when our Blessed Saviour cured them they went and told it to all the Countrey and made the Vicinage full of the report as themselves were of health and joy And although I know the modesty of your person and Religion had rather do favours than own them yet give me leave to draw aside the curtain and retirement of your Charity for I had rather your vertue should blush than my unthankfulness make me ashamed Madam I intended by this Address not onely to return you spirituals for
loves a Soul unless he loves its safety and he cares not to have his child safe that throws him into the fire Hither are to be reduced all false Doctrines aptly productive of evil life the Doctrines are scandalous and the men guilty if they understand the consequents of their own propositions or if they think it probable that persons will be led by such Doctrines into evil perswasions though themselves believe them not to be necessary products of their Opinions yetthe very publishing such Opinions which of themselves not being necessary or otherwise very profitable are apt to be understood by weak persons at least to ill ends is against Charity and the duty we owe to our Brother's Soul 10. Sixthly It is not necessary for ever to abstain from things indifferent to prevent the offending of a Brother but only till I have taken away that rock against which some did stumble or have done my endeavour to remove it In Questions of Religion it is lawful to use primitive and ancient words at which men have been weakned and seem to stumble when the objection is cleared and the ill consequents and suspicion disavowed and it may be of good use charity and edification to speak the language of the purest Ages although that some words were used also in the impurest Ages and descended along upon changing and declining Articles when it is rightly explicated in what sence the best men did innocently use them and the same sence is now protested But in this case it concerns prudence to see that the benefit be greater than the danger And the same also is to be said concerning all the actions and parts of Christian liberty For if after I have removed the unevenness and objection of the accident that is if when I have explained my disrelish to the crime which might possibly be gathered up and taken into practice by my misunderstood example still any man will stumble and fall it is a resolution to fall a love of danger a peevishness of spirit a voluntary misunderstanding it is not a misery in the man more than it is his own fault and when ever the cause of any sin becomes criminal to the man that sins it is certain that if the other who was made the occasion did disavow and protest against the crime the man that sins is the only guilty person both in the effect and cause too for the other could do no more but use a moral and prudent industry to prevent a being mis-interpreted and if he were tied to more he must quit his interest for ever in a perpetual scruple and it is like taking away all Laws to prevent Disobedience and making all even to secure the world against the effects of Pride or Stubbornness I add to this that since actions indifferent in their own natures are not productive of effects and actions criminal it is merely by accident that men are abused into a sin that is by weakness by misconceit by something that either discovers malice or indiscretion which because the act it self does not of it self if the man does not voluntarily or by intention the sin dwells no-where but with the man that entertains it the man is no longer weak than he is mistaken and he is not mistaken or abused into the sin by example of any man who hath rightly stated his own question and divorced the suspicion of the sin from his action whatsoever comes after this is not weakness of understanding but strength of passion and he that is always learning and never comes to the knowledge of the truth is something besides a silly man Men cannot be always babes in Christ without their own fault they are no longer Christ's little 〈◊〉 than they are inculpably ignorant For it is but a mantle cast over pride and frowardness to think our selves able to teach others and yet pretend Offence and Scandal to scorn to be instructed and yet complain that we are offended and led into sin for want of knowledge of our Duty He that understands his Duty is not a person capable of Scandal by things indifferent And it is certain that no man can say concerning himself that he is scandalized at another that is that he is led into sin by mistake and weakness for if himself knows it the mistake is gone well may the Guides of their Souls complain concerning such persons that their sin is procured by offending persons or actions but he that complains concerning himself to the same purpose pretends ignorance for other ends and contradicts himself by his complaint and knowledge of his error The boy was prettily peevish who when his Father bid him pronounce Thalassius told him he could not pronounce Thalassius at the same time speaking the word just so impotent weak and undiscerning a person is that who would forbid me to do an indifferent action upon pretence that it makes him ignorantly sin for his saying so confutes his Ignorance and argues him of a worse folly it is like asking my neighbour whether such an action be done against my own will 11. Seventhly When an action is apt to be mistaken to contrary purposes it concerns the prudence and charity of a Christian to use such compliance as best cooperates to God's glory and hath in it the less danger The Apostles gave an instance in the matter of Circumcision in which they walked warily and with variety of design that they might invite the Gentiles to the easie yoke of Christianity and yet not deter the Jew by a disrespect of the Law of Moses And therefore S. Paul circumcised Timothy because he was among the Jews and descended from a Jewish parent and in the instance gave sentence in compliance with the Jewish perswasion because Timothy might well be accounted for a Jew by birth unto them the Rites of Moses were for a while permitted But when Titus was brought upon the scene of a mixt assembly and was no Jew but a Greek to whom Paul had taught they ought not to be circumcised although some Jews watched what he would do yet he plainly refused to circumcise him chusing rather to leave the Jews angry than the Gentiles scandalized or led into an opinion that Circumcision was necessary or that he had taught them otherwise out of collateral ends or that now he did so But when a case of Christian liberty happened to S. Peter he was not so prudent in his choice but at the coming of certain Jews from Jerusalem withdrew himself from the society of the Gentiles not considering that it was worse if the Gentiles who were invited to Christianity by the sweetness of its liberty and compliance should fall back when they that taught them the excellency of Christian liberty durst not stand to it than if those Jews were displeased at Christianity for admitting Gentiles into its communion after they had been instructed that God had broken down the partition-wall and made them one sheepfold It was of greater
he did and the expresses of his power saying He saved others himself he cannot save others saying Let him come down from the Cross if he be the King of the Jews and we will believe in him and others according as their Malice was determined by phancy and occasion added weight and scorn to his pains and of the two Malefactors that were crucified with him one reviled him saying If thou be the CHRIST save thy self and us And thus far the Devil prevailed undoing himself in riddle provoking men to do despite to Christ and to heighten his Passion out of hatred to him and yet doing and promoting that which was the ruine of all his own Kingdom and potent mischiefs like the Jew who in indignation against Mercury threw stones at his Image and yet was by his Superiour judged idolatrous that being the manner of doing honour to the Idol among the Gentiles But then Christ who had upon the Cross prayed for his enemies and was heard of God in all that he desired felt now the beginnings of success For the other Thief whom the present pains and circumstances of Jesus's Passion had softned and made believing reproved his fellow for not fearing God confessed that this death happened to them deservedly but to Jesus causelesly and then prayed to Jesus Lord remember me when thou comest into thy Kingdom Which combination of pious acts and miraculous Conversion Jesus entertained with a speedy promise of a very great felicity promising that upon that very day he should be with him in Paradise 33. Now there were standing by the Cross the Mother of Jesus and her Sister and Mary Magdalen and John And Jesus being upon his Death-bed although he had no temporal estate to bestow yet he would make provision for his Mother who being a Widow and now childless was likely to be exposed to necessity and want and therefore he did arrogate John the beloved Disciple into Marie's kindred making him to be her adopted Son and her to be his Mother by fiction of Law Woman behold thy son and Man behold thy Mother And from that time forward John took her home to his own house which he had near mount Sion after he had sold his inheritance in Galilee to the High Priest 34. While these things were doing the whole frame of Nature seemed to be dissolved and out of order while their LORD and Creator suffered For the Sun was so darkened that the Stars appeared and the Eclipse was prodigious in the manner as well as in degree because the Moon was not then in Conjunction but full and it was noted by Phlegon the freed man of the Emperor Hadrian by Lucian out of the Acts of the Gauls and Dionysius while he was yet a Heathen excellent Scholars all great Historians and Philosophers who also noted the day of the week and hour of the day agreeing with the circumstances of the Cross. For the Sun hid his head from beholding such a prodigy of sin and sadness and provided a veil for the nakedness of Jesus that the women might be present and himself die with modesty 35. The Eclipse and the Passion began at the sixth hour and endured till the ninth about which time Jesus being tormented with the unsufferable load of his Father's wrath due for our sins and wearied with pains and heaviness cried out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me and as it is thought repeated the whole two and twentieth Psalm which is an admirable Narrative of the Passion full of Prayer and sadness and description of his pains at first and of Eucharist and joy and prophecy at the last But these first words which it is certain and recorded that he spake were in a language of it self or else by reason of distance not understood for they thought he had called for Elias to take him down from the Cross. Then Jesus being in the agonies of a high Fever said I thirst And one ran and filled a spunge with vinegar wrapping it with hyssop and put it on a reed that he might drink The Vinegar and the Spunge were in Executions of condemned persons set to stop the too violent issues of bloud and to prolong the death but were exhibited to him in scorn mingled with gall to make the mixture more horrid and ungentle But Jesus tasted it only and refused the draught And now knowing that the Prophecies were fulfilled his Father's wrath appeased and his torments satisfactory he said It is finished and crying with a loud voice Father into thy hands I commend my spirit he bowed his head and yielded up his spirit into the hands of God and died hastning to his Father's glories Thus did this glorious Sun set in a sad and clouded West running speedily to shine in the other world 36. Then was the veil of the Temple which separated the secret Mosaick Rites from the eyes of the people rent in the midst from the top to the bottom and the Angels Presidents of the Temple called to each other to depart from their seats and so great an Earthquake happened that the rocks did rend the mountains trembled the graves opened and the bodies of dead persons arose walking from their coemeteries to the Holy City and appeared unto many and so great apprehensions and amazements happened to them all that stood by that they departed smiting their breasts with sorrow and fear and the Centurion that ministred at the execution said Certainly this was the Son of God and he became a Disciple renouncing his military imployment and died a Martyr 37. But because the next day was the Jews Sabbath and a Paschal Festival besides the Jews hastened that the bodies should be taken from the Cross and therefore sent to 〈◊〉 to hasten their death by breaking their legs that before Sun-set they might be taken away according to the Commandment and be buried The souldiers therefore came and brake the legs of the two Thieves but espying and wondring that Jesus was already dead they brake not his legs for the Scripture foretold that a bone of him should not be broken but a souldier with his lance pierced his side and immediately there streamed out two rivulets of Water and Bloud But the Holy Virgin-Mother whose Soul during this whole passion was pierced with a sword and sharper sorrows though she was supported by the comforts of Faith and those holy Predictions of his Resurrection and future glories which Mary had laid up in store against this great day of expence now that she saw her Holy Son had suffered all that our necessities and their malice could require or inflict caused certain ministers with whom she joyned to take her dead Son from the Cross whose Body when she once got free from the nails she kissed and embraced with entertainments of the nearest vicinity that could be expressed by a person that was holy and sad and a Mother weeping for her dead Son 38. But she was highly
in his name to plant the Faith to govern and superintend the Church at present and by their wise and prudent settlement of affairs to provide for the future exigencies of the Church III. The next thing then to be considered is the nature of their Office and under this enquiry we shall make these following remarks First it is not to be doubted but that our Lord in founding this Office had some respect to the state of things in the Jewish Church I mean not only in general that there should be superiour and subordinate Officers as there were superiour and inferiour Orders under the Mosaic dispensation but that herein he had an eye to some usage and custom common among them Now amongst the Jews as all Messengers were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Apostles so were they wont to dispatch some with peculiar letters of authority and Commission whereby they acted as Proxies and Deputies of those that sent them thence their Proverb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every man's Apostle is as himself that is whatever he does is look'd upon to be as firm and valid as if the person himself had done it Thus when Saul was sent by the Sanhedrim to Damascus to apprehend the Jewish converts he was furnished with letters from the High Priest enabling him to act as his Commissary in that matter Indeed Epiphanius tells us of a sort of persons called Apostles who were Assessors and Counsellors to the Jewish Patriarch constantly attending upon him to advise him in matters pertaining to the Law and sent by him as he intimates sometimes to inspect and reform the manners of the Priests and Jewish Clergy and the irregularities of Country-Synagogues with commission to gather the Tenths and First-fruits due in all the Provinces under his jurisdiction Such Apostles we find mention'd both by Julian the Emperor in an Epistle to the Jews and in a Law of the Emperor Honorius imploy'd by the Patriarch to gather once a year the Aurum Coronarium or Crown-Gold a Tribute annually paid by them to the Roman Emperors But these Apostles could not under that notion be extant in our Saviour's time though sure we are there was then something like it Philo the Jew more than once mentioning the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the sacred messengers annually sent to collect the holy treasure paid by way of First-fruits and to carry it to the Temple at Jerusalem However our Lord in conformity to the general custom of those times of appointing Apostles or Messengers as their Proxies and Deputies to act in their names call'd and denominated those Apostles whom he peculiarly chose to represent his person to communicate his mind and will to the World and to act as Embassadors or Commissioners in his room and stead IV. Secondly We observe that the persons thus deputed by our Saviour were not left uncertain but reduced to a fixed definite number confin'd to the just number of Twelve he ordained twelve that they should be with him A number that seems to carry something of mystery and peculiar design in it as appears in that the Apostles were so careful upon the fall of Judas immediately to supply it The Fathers are very wide and different in their conjectures about the reason of it S. Augustine thinks our Lord herein had respect to the four quarters of the World which were to be called by the preaching of the Gospel which being multiplied by three to denote the Trinity in whose name they were to be called make Twelve Tertullian will have them typified by the twelve fountains in Elim the Apostles being sent out to water and refresh the dry thirsty World with the knowledge of the truth by the twelve precious stones in Aaron's breast-plate to illuminate the Church the garment which Christ our great High Priest has put on by the twelve stones which Joshua chose out of Jordan to lay up within the Ark of the Testament respecting the firmness and solidity of the Apostles Faith their being chosen by the true Jesus or Joshua at their Baptism in Jordan and their being admitted in the inner Sanctuary of his Covenant By others we are told that it was shadowed out by the twelve Spies taken out of every Tribe and sent to discover the Land of Promise or by the twelve gates of the City in Ezekiel's vision or by the twelve Bells appendant to Aaron's garment their sound going out into all the World and their words unto the ends of the Earth But it were endless and to very little purpose to reckon up all the conjectures of this nature there being scarce any one number of Twelve mentioned in the Scripture which is not by some of the Ancients adapted and applied to this of the Twelve Apostles wherein an ordinary fancy might easily enough pick out a mystery That which seems to put in the most rational plea is that our Lord pitched upon this number in conformity either to the twelve Patriarchs as founders of the twelve Tribes of Israel or to the twelve 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or chief heads as standing Rulers of those Tribes among the Jews as we shall afterwards possibly more particularly remark Thirdly these Apostles were immediately called and sent by Christ himself elected out of the body of his Disciples and followers and receiv'd their Commission from his own mouth Indeed Matthias was not one of the first election being taken in upon Judas his Apostasie after our Lord's Ascension into Heaven But besides that he had been one of the seventy Disciples called and sent out by our Saviour that extraordinary declaration of the Divine will and pleasure that appeared in determining his election was in a manner equivalent to the first election As for S. Paul he was not one of the Twelve taken in as a supernumerary Apostle but yet an Apostle as well as they and that not of men neither by man but by Jesus Christ as he pleads his own cause against the insinuations of those Impostors who traduced him as an Apostle only at the second hand whereas he was immediately call'd by Christ as well as they and in a more extraordinary manner they were called by him while he was yet in his state of meanness and humiliation he when Christ was now advanced upon the Throne and appeared to him encircled with those glorious emanations of brightness and majesty which he was not able to endure V. Fourthly The main work and imployment of these Apostles was to preach the Gospel to establish Christianity and to govern the Church that was to be founded as Christ's immediate Deputies and Vicegerents they were to instruct men in the doctrines of the Gospel to disciple the World and to baptize and initiate men into the Faith of Christ to constitute and ordain Guides and Ministers of Religion persons peculiarly set apart for holy ministrations to censure and punish obstinate and contumacious offenders to compose and over-rule
the Opinions of Men about him were various and different that some took him for John the Baptist lately risen from the dead between whose Doctrine Discipline and way of life in the main there was so great a Correspondence That others thought he was Elias probably judging so from the gravity of his Person freedom of his Preaching the fame and reputation of his Miracles especially since the Scriptures assured them he was not dead but taken up into Heaven and had so expresly foretold that he should return back again That others look'd upon him as the Prophet Jeremiah alive again of whose return the Jewes had great expectations in so much that some of them thought the Soul of Jeremias was re-inspired into 〈◊〉 Or if not thus at least that he was one of the more eminent of the ancient Prophets or that the Souls of some of these Persons had been breathed into him The Doctrine of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Transmigration of Souls first broached and propagated by Pythagoras being at this time current amongst the Jews and owned by the Pharisees as one of their prime Notions and Principles 2. THIS Account not 〈◊〉 our Lord comes closer and nearer to them tells them It was no wonder if the common People were divided into these wild thoughts concerning him but since they had been always with him had been hearers of his Sermons and Spectators of his Miracles he enquired what they themselves thought of him Peter ever forward to return an Answer and therefore by the Fathers frequently stiled The Mouth of the Apostles told him in the name of the rest That he was the Messiah The Son of the living God promised of old in the Law and the Prophets heartily desired and looked for by all good men anointed and set apart by God to be the King Priest and Prophet of his People To this excellent and comprehensive confession of Peter's Our Lord returns this great Eulogie and Commendation Blessed art thou Simon Bar Jonah Flesh and Blood hath not revealed it unto thee but my Father which is in Heaven That is this Faith which thou hast now confessed is not humane contrived by Man's wit or built upon his testimony but upon those Notions and Principles which I was sent by God to reveal to the World and those mighty and solemn attestations which he has given from Heaven to the truth both of my Person and my Doctrine And because thou hast so freely made this Confession therefore I also say unto thee that thou art Peter and upon this Rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it That is that as thy Name signifies a Stone or Rock such shalt thou thy self be firm solid and immoveable in building of the Church which shall be so orderly erected by thy care and diligence and so firmly founded upon that faith which thou hast now confessed that all the assaults and attempts which the powers of Hell can make against it shall not be able to overturn it Moreover I will give unto thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven That is thou shalt have that spiritual authority and power within the Church whereby as with Keys thou shalt be able to shut and lock out obstinate and impenitent sinners and upon their repentance to unlock the door and take them in again And what thou shalt thus regularly do shall be own'd in the Court above and ratified by God in Heaven 3. UPON these several passages the Champions of the Church of Rome mainly build the unlimited Supremacy and Infallibility of the Bishops of that See with how much truth and how little reason it is not my present purpose to discuss It may suffice here to remark that though this place does very much tend to exalt the honour of Saint Peter yet is there nothing herein personal and peculiar to him alone as distinct from and preserred above the rest of the Apostles Does he here make confession of Christ's being the Son of God Yet besides that herein he spake but the sence of all the rest this was no more than what others had said as well as he yea besore he was so much as call'd to be a Disciple Thus Nathanael at his first coming to Christ expresly told him Rabbi thou art the Son of God Thou art the King of Israel Does our Lord here stile him a Rock All the Apostles are elsewhere equally called Foundations yea said to be the Twelve Foundations upon which the Wall of the new Jerusalem that is the Evangelical Church is 〈◊〉 and sometimes others of them besides Peter are called Pillars as they have relation to the Church already built Does Christ here promise the Keys to Peter that is Power of Governing and of exercising Church-censures and of absolving penitent sinners The very same is elsewhere promised to all the Apostles and almost in the very same termes and words If thine offending Brother prove obstinate tell it unto the Church but if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as an Heathen and a Publican Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven And elsewhere when ready to leave the World he tells them As my Father hath sent me even so send I you whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained By all which it is evident that our Lord did not here give any personal prerogative to S. Peter as Universal Pastor and Head of the Christian Church much less to those who were to be his Successors in the See of Rome But that as he made this Confession in the name of the rest of the Apostles so what was here promised unto him was equally intended unto all Nor did the more considering and judicious part of the Fathers however giving a mighty reverence to S. Peter ever understand it in any other sence Sure I am that Origen tells us that every true Christian that makes this confession with the same Spirit and Integrity which S. Peter did shall have the same blessing and commendation from Christ conferr'd upon him 4. THE Holy Jesus knowing the time of his Passion to draw on began to prepare the minds of his Apostles against that fatal Hour telling them what hard and bitter things he should suffer at Jerusalem what affronts and indignities he must undergo and be at last put to death with all the arts of torture and disgrace by the Decree of the Jewish Sanhedrim Peter whom our Lord had infinitely incouraged and indeared to him by the great things which he had lately said concerning him so that his spirits were now afloat and his
passions ready to over-run the banks not able to endure a thought that so much evil should befall his Master broke out into an over-confident and unseasonable interruption of him He took him and began to rebuke him saying Be it far from thee Lord this shall not be unto thee Besides his great kindness and affection to his Master the minds of the Apostles were not yet throughly purged from the hopes and expectations of a glorious reign of the Messiah so that Peter could not but look upon these sufferings as unbecoming and inconsistent with the state and dignity of the Son of God And therefore thought good to advise his Lord to take care of himself and while there was time to prevent and avoid them This our Lord who valued the redemption os Mankind infinitely before his own ease and safety resented at so high a rate that he returned upon him with this tart and stinging reproof Get thee behind me Satan The very same treatment which he once gave to the Devil himself when he made that insolent proposal to him To fall down and worship him though in Satan it was the result of pure malice and hatred in Peter only an error of love and great regard However our Lord could not but look upon it as mischievous and diabolical counsel prompted and promoted by the great Adversary of Mankind A way therefore says Christ with thy hellish and pernicious counsel Thou art an offence unto me in seeking to oppose and undermine that great design for which I purposely came down from 〈◊〉 In this thou savourest not the things of God but those that be of men in suggesting to me those little shifts and arts of safety and self-preservation which humane prudence and the love of mens own selves are wont to dictate to them By which though we may learn Peter's mighty kindness to our Saviour yet that herein he did not take his measures right A plain evidence that his infallibility had not yet taken place 5. About a week after this our Saviour being to receive a Type and Specimen of his future 〈◊〉 took with him his three more intimate Apostles Peter and the two sons of Zebedee and went up into a very high mountain which the Ancients generally conceive to have been Mount Thabor a round and very high mountain situate in the plains of Galilce And now was even literally fulfilled what the Psalmist had spoken Tabor and Hermon shall rejoyce in thy Name for what greater joy and triumph than to be peculiarly chosen to be the holy Mount whereon our Lord in so eminent a manner received from God the Father honour and glory and made such magnificent displays of his Divine power and Majesty For while they were here earnestly imployed in Prayer as seldom did our Lord enter upon any eminent action but he first made his address to Heaven he was suddenly transformed into another manner of appearance such a lustre and radiancy darted from his face that the Sun it self shines not brighter at Noon-day such beams of light reflected from his garments as out-did the light it self that was round about them so exceeding pure and white that the Snow might blush to compare with it nor could the Fullers art purifie any thing into half that whiteness an evident and sensible representation of the glory of that state wherein the just shall walk in white and shine as the Sun in the Kingdom of the Father During this Heavenly scene there appeared Moses and Elias who as the Jews say shall come together clothed with all the brightness and majesty of a glorified state familiarly conversing with him and discoursing of the death and sufferings which he was shortly to undergo and his departure into Heaven Behold here together the three greatest persons that ever were the Ministers of Heaven Moses under God the Instituter and promulgator of the Law Elias the great reformer of it when under its deepest degeneracy and corruption and the blessed Jesus the Son of God who came to take away what was weak and imperfect and to introduce a more manly and rational institution and to communicate the last Revelation which God would make of his mind to the World Peter and the two Apostles that were with him were in the mean time fallen asleep heavy through want of natural rest it being probably night when this was done or else over-powred with these extraordinary appearances which the frailty and weakness of their present state could not bear were fallen into a Trance But now awaking were strangely surprised to behold our Lord surrounded with so much glory and those two great persons conversing with him knowing who they were probably by some particular marks and signatures that were upon them or else by immediate revelation or from the discourse which passed betwixt Christ and them or possibly from some communication which they themselves might have with them While these Heavenly guests were about to depart Peter in a great rapture and ecstasie of mind addressed himself to our Saviour telling him how infinitely they were pleased and delighted with their being there and to that purpose desiring his leave that they might erect three Tabernacles one for him one for Moses and one for Elias While he was thus saying a bright cloud suddenly over-shadowed and wrapt them up out of which came a voice This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him which when the Apostles heard and saw the cloud coming over them they were seised with a great consternation and fell upon their faces to the ground whom our Lord gently touched bade them arise and disband their fears whereupon looking up they saw none but their Master the rest having vanished and disappeared In memory of these great transactions Bede tells us that in pursuance of S. Peter's petition about the three Tabernacles there were afterwards three Churches built upon the top of this Mountain which in after times were had in great veneration which might possibly give some foundation to 〈◊〉 report which one makes that in his time there were shew'd the ruines of those three Tabernacles which were built according to S. Peter's desire 6. After this our Lord and his Apostle's having travelled through Galilce the gatherers of the Tribute-money came to Peter and asked him whether his Master was not obliged to pay the Tribute which God under the Mosaick Law commanded to be yearly paid by every Jew above Twenty years old to the use of the Temple which so continued to the times of Vespatian under whom the Temple being destroyed it was by him transferred to the use of the Capitol at Rome being to the value of half a Shekel or Fifteen pence of our money To this question of theirs Peter positively answers yes knowing his Master would never be backward either to give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's or to God the things that are God's Peter going into the house
portion of happiness they expected besides that they hated Christianity because so expresly asserting the Resurrection being vexed to hear this Doctrine vented amongst the People intimated to the Magistrate that this Concourse might probably tend to an Uproar and Insurrection Whereupon they came with the Captain of the Temple Commander of the Tower of 〈◊〉 which stood close by on the North side of the Temple wherein was a Roman Garrison to prevent or suppress especially at Festival times Popular Tumults and Uproars who seized on the Apostles and put them into Prison The next Day they were convented before the Jewish Sanhedrim and being asked by what Power and Authority they had done this Peter resolutely answered That as to the Cure done to this impotent Person Be it known to them and all the Jews that it was perfectly wrought in the Name of that Jesus of Nazareth whom they themselves had crucified and God had raised from the dead and whom though they had thrown him by as waste and rubbish yet God had made head of the corner and that there was no other way wherein they or others could expect salvation but by this crucified Saviour Great was the boldness of the Apostles admired by the Sanhedrim it self in this matter especially if we consider that this probably was the very Court that had so lately sentenced and condemned their Master and being fleshed in such sanguinary proceedings had no other way but to go on and justifie one cruelty with another that the Apostles did not say these things in corners and behind the curtain but to their very faces and that in the open Court of Judicature and before all the People That the Apostles had not been used to plead in such publick places nor had been polished with the Arts of education but were ignorant unlearned men known not to be versed in the study of the Jewish Law 7. THE Council which all this while had beheld them with a kind of wonder and now remembred that they had been the companions and attendants of the late crucisied Jesus commanded them to withdraw and debated amongst themselves what they should do with them The Miracle they could not deny the fact being so plain and evident and therefore resolved strictly to charge them that they should Preach no more in the Name of Jesus Being called in again they acquainted them with the Resolution of the Council to which Peter and John replyed That they could by no means yield obedience to it appealing to themselves whether it was not more sit that they should obey God rather than them And that they could not but testifie what they had seen and heard Nor did they in this answer make any undue reflection upon the power of the Magistrates and the obedience due to them it being a ruled 〈◊〉 by the first dictates of reason and the common vote and suffrage of Mankind that Parents and Governours are not to be obeyed when their commands interfere with the obligations under which we stand to a superiour power All authority is originally derived from God and our duty to him may not be superseded by the Laws of any Authority deriving from him and even Socrates himself in a parallel instance when perswaded to leave off his excellent way of institution and instructing youth and to comply with the humour of his Athenian Judges to save his life returned this answer that indeed he loved and honoured the Athenians but yet resolved to obey God rather than them An answer almost the same both in substance and words with that which was here given by our Apostles In all other cases where the Laws of the Magistrate did not interfere with the commands of Christ none more loyal more compliant than they As indeed no Religion in the World ever secured the interests of Civil authority like the Religion of the Gospel It positively charges every soul of what rank or condition soever to be subject to the higher powers as a Divine ordinance and institution and that not for wrath only but for conscience sake it puts men in mind to be subject to Principalities and Powers and to obey Magistrates to submit to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake both to the King as supreme and unto Governours as unto them that are sent by him for so it the will of God So far is it from allowing us to violate their persons that it suffers us not boldly to censure their actions to revile the gods despise 〈◊〉 and speak evil of Dignities or to vilifie and injure them so much as by a dishonourable thought commanding us when we cannot obey to suffer the most rigorous penalties imposed upon us with calmness and to possess our souls in patience Thus when these two Apostles were shortly after again summoned before the Council commanded no more to Preach the Christian Doctrine and to be scourged for what they had done already though they could not obey the one they chearfully submitted to the other without any peevish or tart reflections but went away rejoycing But what the carriage of Christians was in this matter in the first and best ages of the Gospel we have in another place sufficiently discovered to the World We may not withhold our obedience till the Magistrate invades God's Throne and countermands his authority and may then appeal to the sence of Mankind whether it be not most reasonable that Gods authority should first take place as the Apostles here appealed to their very Judges themselves Nor do we find that the Sanhedrim did except against the Plea At least whatever they thought yet not daring to punish them for fear of the People they only threatned them and let them go vvho thereupon presently return'd to the rest of the Apostles and Believers 8. The Church exceedingly multiplied by these means And that so great a Company most whereof were poor might be maintained they generally sold their Estates and brought the Money to the Apostles to be by them deposited in one common Treasury and thence distributed according to the several exigencies of the Church which gave occasion to this dreadful Instance Ananias and his Wife Saphira having taken upon them the profession of the Gospel according to the free and generous spirit of those times had consecrated and devoted their Estate to the honour of God and the necessities of the Church And accordingly sold their Possessions and turned them into Money But as they were willing to gain the reputation of charitable Persons so were they loth wholly to cast themselves upon the Divine providence by letting go all at once and therefore privately with-held part of what they had devoted and bringing the rest laid it at the Apostles feet hoping herein they might deceive the Apostles though immediately guided by the Spirit of God But Peter at his first coming in treated Ananias with these sharp inquiries Why he would suffer Satan to fill his heart with so big a
on to preach confidently and securely for that he himself would stand by him and preserve him 2. ABOUT this time as is most probable he wrote his first Epistle to the Thessalonians Silas and Timothy being lately returned from thence and having done the message for which he had sent them thither The main design of the Epistle is to confirm them in the belief of the Christian Religion and that they would persevere in it notwithstanding all the afflictions and persecutions which he had told them would ensue upon their profession of the Gospel and to instruct them in the main duties of a Christian and Religious life While the Apostle was thus imployed the malice of the Jews was no less at work against him and universally combining together they brought him before Gallio the Proconsul of the Province elder Brother to the famous Seneca Before him they accused the Apostle as an Innovator in Religion that sought to introduce a new way of worship contrary to what was established by the Jewish Law and permitted by the Roman Powers The Apostle was ready to have pleaded his own cause but the Proconsul told them that had it been a matter of right or wrong that had faln under the cognizance of the Civil Judicature it had been very fit and reasonable that he should have heard and determined the case but since the controversie was only concerning the punctilio's and niceties of their Religion it was very improper for him to be a Judge in such matters And when they still clamoured about it he threw out their Indictment and commanded his officers to drive them out of Court Whereupon some of the Towns men seised upon Sosthenes one of the Rulers of the Jewish Consistory a man active and busie in this Insurrection and beat him even before the Court of Judicature the Proconsul not at all concerning himself about it A year and an half S. Paul continued in this place and before his departure thence wrote his second Epistle to the Thessalonians to supply the want of his coming to them which in his former he had resolved on and for which in a manner he had engaged his promise In this therefore he endeavours again to confirm their minds in the truth of the Gospel and that they would not be shaken with those troubles which the wicked unbelieving Jews would not cease to create them a lost and undone race of men and whom the Divine vengeance was ready finally to overtake And because some passages in his 〈◊〉 Letter relating to this destruction had been mis-understood as if this day of the Lord were just then at hand he rectifies those mistakes and shews what must precede our Lord's coming unto Judgment 3. S. 〈◊〉 having thus fully planted and cultivated the Church at Corinth resolved now for Syria And taking along with him Aquila and Priscilla at Cenchrea the Port and Harbour of Corinth Aquila for of him it is certainly to be understood shaved his head in performance of a Nazarite-Vow he had formerly made the time whereof was now run out In his passage into Syria he came to Ephesus where he preached a while in the Synagogue of the Jews And though desired to stay with them yet having resolved to be at Jerusalem at the Passeover probably that he might have the fitter opportunity to meet his friends and preach the Gospel to those vast numbers that usually 〈◊〉 to that great solemnity he promised that in his return he would come again to them Sailing thence he landed at Caesarca and thence went up to Jerusalem where having visited the Church and kept the Feast he went down to Antioch Here having staid some time he traversed the Countries of Galatia and Phrygia confirming as he went the new-converted Christians and so came to 〈◊〉 where finding certain Christian Disciples he enquired of them whether since their conversion they had received the miraculous gifts and powers of the Holy Ghost They told him that the Doctrine which they had received had nothing in it of that nature nor had they ever heard that any such extraordinary Spirit had of late been bestowed upon the Church Hereupon he further enquired unto what they had been baptized the Christian Baptism being administred in the name of the Holy Ghost They answered they had received no more than John's Baptism which though it 〈◊〉 them to repentance yet did explicitly speak nothing of the Holy Ghost or its gists and powers To this the Apostle replied That though John's Baptism did openly oblige to nothing but Repentance yet that it did implicitly acknowledge the whole Doctrine concerning Christ and the Holy Ghost Whereto they assenting were solemnly initiated by Christian Baptism and the Apostle laying his hands upon them they immediately received the Holy Ghost in the gift of Tongues Prophecy and other miraculous powers conferred upon them 4. AFTER this he 〈◊〉 into the Jewish Synagogues where for the first three months he contended and disputed with the Jews endeavouring with great earnestness and resolution to convince them of the truth of those things that concerned the Christian Religion But when instead of success he met with nothing but refractoriness and infidelity he left the Synagogue and taking those with him whom he had converted instructed them and others that resorted to him in the School of one Tyrannus a place where Scholars were wont to be educated and instructed In this manner he continued for two years together In which time the Jews and Proselytes of the whole 〈◊〉 Asia had opportunity of having the Gospel preached to them And because Miracles are the clearest evidence of a Divine commission and the most immediate Credentials of Heaven those which do nearliest affect our senses and consequently have the strongest influence upon our minds therefore God was pleased to ratifie the doctrine which S. Paul delivered by great and miraculous operations and those of somewhat a more peculiar and extraordinary nature Insomuch that he did not only heal those that came to him but if Napkins or Handkerchiefs were but touched by him and applied unto the sick their diseases immediately vanished and the Daemons and evil Spirits departed out of those that were possessed by them 5. EPHESUS above all other places in the World was noted of old for the study of Magick and all secret and hidden Arts whence the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so often spoken of by the Ancients which were certain obscure and mystical Spells and Charms by which they endeavoured to heal Diseases and drive away evil Spirits and do things beyond the reach and apprehensions of common people Besides other professors of this black Art there were at this time at Ephesus certain Jews who dealt in the arts of 〈◊〉 and Incantation a craft and mystery which Josephus affirms to have been derived from Solomon who he tells us did not only find it out but composed forms of Exorcism and Inchantment whereby to cure diseases and expel
Four Thousand debauched and profligate wretches The Apostle replied that he was a Jew of Tarsus a Free-man of a rich and honourable City and therefore begg'd of him that he might have leave to speak to the People Which the Captain readily granted and standing near the Door of the Castle and making signs that they would hold their peace he began to address himself to them in the Hebrew Language which when they heard they became a little more calm and quiet while he discoursed to them to this effect 7. HE gave them an account of himself from his Birth of his education in his youth of the mighty zeal which he had for the Rites and Customes of their Religion and with what a passionate earnestness he persecuted and put to death all the Christians that he met with whereof the High Priest and the Sanhedrim could be sufficient witnesses He next gave them an intire and punctual relation of the way and manner of his conversion and how that he had received an immediate command from God himself to depart Jerusalem and preach unto the Gentiles At this word the patience of the Jews could hold no longer but they unanimously cried out to have him put to death it not being fit that such a Villain should live upon the Earth And the more to express their fury they threw off their Clothes and cast dust into the Air as if they immediately designed to stone him To avoid which the Captain of the Guard commanded him to be brought within the Castle and that he should be examined by whipping till he confessed the reason of so much rage against him While the Lictor was binding him in order to it he asked the Centurion that stood by whether they could justifie the scourging a Citizen of Rome and that before any sentence legally passed upon him This the Centurion presently intimated to the Governor of the Castle bidding him have a care what he did for the Prisoner was a Roman Whereat the Governor himself came and asked him whether he was a free Denizon of Rome and being told that he was he replied that it was a great priviledge a priviledge which he himself had purchased at a considerable rate To whom S. Paul answered that it was his Birth right and the priviledge of the place where he was born and bred Hereupon they gave over their design of whipping him the Commander himself being a little startled that he had bound and chained a Denizon of Rome 8. THE next Day the Governor commanded his Chains to be knock'd off and that he might throughly satisfie himself in the matter commanded the Sanhedrim to meet and brought down Paul before them where being set before the Council he told them that in all passages of his life he had been careful to act according to the severest rules and conscience of his duty Men and Brethren I have lived in all good conscience before God untill this day Behold here the great security of a good man and what invisible supports innocency affords under the greatest danger With how generous a confidence does vertue and honesty guard the breast of a good man as indeed nothing else can lay a firm basis and foundation for satisfaction and tranquillity when any misery or calamity does overtake us Religion and a good conscience beget peace and a Heaven in the Man's bosome beyond the power of the little accidents of this World to ruffle and discompose Whence Seneca compares the mind of a wise and a good man to the state of the upper Region which is always serene and calm The High-Priest Ananias being offended at the holy and ingenuous freedom of our Apostle as if by asserting his own innocency he had reproached the justice of their Tribunal commanded those that stood next him to strike him in the Face whereto the Apostle tartly replied That GOD would smite him Hypocrite as he was who under a pretence of doing Justice had illegally commanded him to be punished before the Law condemned him for a Malefactor Whereupon they that stood by asked him how he durst thus affront so sacred and venerable a Person as Gods High Priest He calmly returned That he did not know or own Ananias to be an High Priest of God's appointment However being a Person in Authority it was not lawful to revile him God himself having commanded that no man should speak evil of the Ruler of the People The Apostle who as he never laid aside the innocency of the Dove so knew how when occasion was to make use of the wisdom of the Serpent perceiving the Council to consist partly of Sadduces and partly of Pharisees openly told them that he was a Pharisee and the Son of a Pharisee and that the main thing he was questioned for was his belief of a future Resurrection This quickly divided the Council the Pharisees being zealous Patrons of that Article and the Sadducees as stifly denying that there is either Angel that is of a spiritual and immortal nature really subsisting of it self for otherwise they cannot be supposed to have utterly denied all sorts of Angels seeing they own'd the Pentateuch wherein there is frequent mention of them or Spirit or that humane Souls do exist in a separate state and consequently that there is no Resurrection Presently the Doctors of the Law who were Pharisees stood up to acquit him affirming he had done nothing amiss that it was possible he had received some intimation from Heaven by an Angel or the revelation of the H. Spirit and if so then in opposing his Doctrine they might fight against God himself 9. GREAT were the dissentions in the Council about this matter in so much that the Governor fearing S. Paul would be torn in pieces commanded the Souldiers to take him from the Bar and return him back into the Castle That night to comfort him after all his frights and fears God was pleased to appear to him in a vision incouraging him to constancy and resolution assuring him that as he had born witness to his cause at Jerusalem so in despite of all his enemies he should live to bear his testimony even at Rome it self The next Morning the Jews who could as well cease to be as to be mischievous and malicious finding that these dilatory proceedings were not like to do the work resolved upon a quicker dispatch To which end above Forty of them entred into a wicked confederacy which they ratified by Oath and Execration never to eat or drink till they had killed him and having acquainted the Sanhedrim with their design they intreated them to importune the Governor that he might again the next day be brought down before them under pretence of a more strict trial of his case and that they themselves would lye in ambush by the way and not fail to dispatch him But that Divine providence that peculiarly superintends the safety of good men disappoints the devices of the crafty
The design was discovered to S. Paul by a Nephew of his and by him imparted to the Governor who immediately commanded two Parties of Foot and Horse to be ready by Nine of the Clock that Night and provision to be made for S. Paul's carriage to Foelix the Roman Governor of that Province To whom also he wrote signifying whom he had sent how the Jews had used him and that his enemies also should appear before him to manage the charge and accusation Accordingly he was by Night conducted to Antipatris and afterwards to Caesarea where the Letters being delivered to Foelix the Apostle was presented to him and finding that he belonged to the Province of Cilicia he told him that as soon as his Accusers were arrived he should have an hearing commanding him in the mean time to be secured in the place called Herod's Hall SECT VI. Of S. Paul from his first Trial before Foelix till his coming to Rome S. Paul impleaded before Foelix by Tertullus the Jewish Advocate His charge of Sedition Heresie and Prophanation of the Temple S. Paul's reply to the several parts of the charge His second Hearing before Foelix and Drusilla His smart and impartial Reasonings Foelix his great injustice and oppression His Luxury and Intemperance Bribery and Covetousness S. Paul's Arraignment before Festus Foelix his Successor at Caesarea His Appeal to Caesar. The nature and manner of those Appeals He is again brought before Festus and Agrippa His vindication of himself and the goodness of his cause His being acquitted by his Judges of any Capital crime His Voyage to Rome The trouble and danger of it Their Shipwrack and being cast upon the Island Melita Their courteous entertainment by the Barbarians and their different censure of S. Paul The civil usage of the Governour and his Conversion to Christianity S. Paul met and conducted by Christians to Rome 1. NOT many days after down comes Ananias the High Priest with some others of the Sanhedrim to Caesarea accompanied with Tertullus their Advocate who in a short but neat speech set off with all the flattering and insinuating arts of Eloquence began to implead our Apostle charging him with Sedition Heresie and the Prophanation of the Temple That they would have saved him the trouble of this Hearing by judging him according to their own Law had not Lysias the Commander violently taken him from them and sent both him and them down thither To all which the Jews that were with him gave in their Vote and Testimony S. Paul having leave from Foelix to defend himself and having told him how much he was satisfied that he was to plead before one who for so many years had been Governour of that Nation distinctly answered to the several parts of the Charge 2. AND first for Sedition he point-blank denied it affirming that they found him behaving himself quietly and peaceably in the Temple not so much as disputing there nor stirring up the people either in the Synagogues or any other place of the City And though this was plausibly pretended by them yet were they never able to make it good As for the charge of Heresie that he was a ringleader of the Sect of the Nazarenes he ingenuously acknowledged that after the way which they counted Heresie so he worshipped God the same way in substance wherein all the Patriarchs of the Jewish Nation had worshipped God before him taking nothing into his Creed but what the Authentick writings of the Jems themselves did own and justifie That he firmly believed what the better part of themselves were ready to grant another Life and a future Resurrection In the hope and expectation whereof he was careful to live unblameable and conscientiously to do his duty both to God and men As for the third part of the Charge his Prophaning of the Temple he shews how little foundation there was for it that the design of his coming to Jerusalem was to bring charitable contributions to his distressed Brethren that he was indeed in the Temple but not as some Asiatick Jews falsely suggested either with tumult or with multitude but only purifying himself according to the rites and customs of the Mosaick Law And that if any would affirm the contrary they should come now into open Court and make it good Nay that he appealed to those of the Sanhedrim that were there present whether he had not been acquitted by their own great Council at Jerusalem where nothing of moment had been laid to his charge except by them of the Sadducean party who quarrelled with him only for asserting the Doctrine of the Resurrection Foelix having thus heard both parties argue refused to make any final determination in the case till he had more fully advised about it and spoken with Lysias Commander of the Garrison who was best able to give an account of the Sedition and the Tumult commanding in the mean time that S. Paul should be under guard but yet in so free a custody that none of his friends should be hindred from visiting him or performing any office of kindness and friendship to him 3. IT was not long after this before his Wife Drusilla a Jewess Daughter of the elder Herod and whom Tacitus I fear by a mistake for his former Wife Drusilla Daughter to Juba King of Mauritania makes Niece to Anthony and Cleopatra came to him to Caesarea Who being present he sent for S. Paul to appear before them and gave him leave to discourse concerning the doctrine of Christianity In his discourse he took occasion particularly to insist upon the great obligation which the Laws of Christ lay upon men to Justice and Righteousness toward one another to Sobriety and Chastity both towards themselves and others withall urging that severe and impartial account that must be given in the Judgment of the other World wherein men shall be arraigned for all the actions of their past life and be eternally punished or rewarded according to their works A discourse wisely adapted by the Apostle to Foelix his state and temper But corrosives are very uneasie to a guilty mind Men naturally hate that which brings their sins to their remembrance and sharpens the sting of a violated conscience The Prince was so netled with the Apostles reasonings that he fell a trembling and caused the Apostle to break off abruptly telling him he would hear the rest at some other season And good reason there was that Foelix his conscience should be sensibly alarmed with these reflexions being a man notoriously infamous for rapine and violence Tacitus tells us of him that he made his will the Law of his Government practising all manner of cruelty and injustice And then for incontinency he was given over to luxury and debauchery for the compassing whereof he serupled not to violate all Laws both of God and Man Whereof this very Wife Drusilla was a famous instance For being married by her Brother to Azis King of the Emisenes Foelix who had heard
of her incomparable beauty by the help of Simon the Magician a Jew of Cyprus ravished her from her Husbands bed and in defiance of all law and right kept her for his own Wife To these qualities he had added bribery and covetousness and therefore frequently sent for S. Paul to discourse with him expecting that he should have given him a considerable summ for his release and the rather probably because he had heard that S. Paul had lately brought up great summs of money to Jerusalem But finding no offers made either by the Apostle or his friends he kept him prisoner for two years together so long as himself continued Procurator of that Nation when being displaced by Nero he left S. Paul still in prison on purpose to 〈◊〉 the Jews and engage them to speak better of him after his departure from them 4. TO him succeeded Portius Festus in the Procuratorship of the Province at whose first coming to Jerusalem the High-Priest and Sanhedrim presently began to prefer to him an Indictment against S. Paul desiring that in order to his Trial he might be sent for up from Caesarea designing under this pretence that some Assassinates should lie in the way to murder him Festus told them that he himself was going shortly for Caesarea and that if they had any thing against S. Paul they should come down thither and accuse him Accordingly being come to Caesarea and sitting in open Judicature the Jews began to renew the Charge which they had heretofore brought against S. Paul Of all which he cleared himself they not being able to make any proof against him However Festus being willing to oblige the Jews in the entrance upon his Government asked him whether he would go up and be tried before him at Jerusalem The Apostle well understanding the consequences of that proposal told him that he was a Roman and therefore ought to be judged by their Laws that he stood now at Caesar's own Judgment-seat as indeed what was done by the Emperor's Procurator in any Province the Law reckoned as done by the Emperor himself and though he should submit to the Jewish Tribunal yet he himself saw that they had nothing which they could prove against him that if he had done any thing which really deserved capital punishment he was willing to undergo it but if not he ought not to be delivered over to his enemies who were before-hand resolved to take away his life However as the safest course he solemnly made his appeal to the Roman Emperor who should judge between them Whereupon Festus advising with the Jewish Sanhedrim received his appeal and told him he should go to Caesar. This way of appealing was frequent amongst the Romans introduced to defend and secure the lives and fortunes of the populacy from the unjust incroachments and over-rigorous severities of the Magistrates whereby it was lawful in cases of oppression to appeal to the people for redress and rescue a thing more than once and again setled by the Sanction of the Valerian Laws These appeals were wont to be made in writing by Appellatory Libels given in wherein was contained an account of the Appellant the person against whom and from whose Sentence he did appeal But where the case was done in open Court it was enough for the Criminal verbally to declare that he did appeal In great and weighty cases appeals were made to the Prince himself and that not only at Rome but in the Provinces of the Empire all Proconsuls and Governours of Provinces being strictly forbidden to execute scourge bind or put any badge of servility upon a Citizen or any that had the priviledge of a Citizen of Rome who had made his appeal or any ways to hinder him from going thither to obtain justice at the hands of the Emperor who had as much regard to the liberty of his Subjects says the Law it self as they could have of their good will and obedience to him And this was exactly S. Paul's case who knowing that he should have no fair and equitable dealing at the hands of the Governour when once he came to be swayed by the Jews his sworn and inveterate enemies appealed from him to the Emperor the reason why Festus durst not deny his demand it being a priviledge so often so plainly setled and confirmed by the Roman Laws 5. SOME time after King Agrippa who succeeded Herod in the Tetrarchate of 〈◊〉 and his Sister Bernice came to Caesarea to make a visit to the new-come Governour To him Festus gave an account of S. Paul and the great stir and trouble that had been made about him and how for his safety and vindication he had immediately appealed to Caesar. Agrippa was very desirous to see and hear him and accordingly the next day the King and his Sister accompanied with Festus the Governour and other persons of quality came into the Court with a pompous and magnificent retinue where the prisoner was brought forth before him Festus having acquainted the King and the Assembly how much he had been solicited by the Jews both at Caesarea and Jorusalem concerning the prisoner at the Bar that as a notorious Malefactor he might be put to death but that having found him guilty of no capital crime and the prisoner himself having appealed to Caesar he was resolved to send him to Rome but yet was willing to have his case again discussed before Agrippa that so he might be furnished with some material instructions to send along with him since it was very absurd to send a prisoner without signifying what crimes were charged upon him 6. HEREUPON Agrippa told the Apostle he had liberty to make his own defence To whom after silence made he particularly addressed his speech he tells him in the first place what a happiness he had that he was to plead before one so exactly versed in all the rites and customs the questions and the controversies of the Jewish Law that the Jews themselves knew what had been the course and manner of his life how he had been educated under the Institutions of the Pharisces the strictest Sect of the whole Jewish Religion and had been particularly disquieted and arraigned for what had been the constant belief of all their Fathers what was sufficiently credible in it self and plainly enough revealed in the Scripture the Resurrection of the dead He next gave him an account with what a bitter and implacable zeal he had formerly persecuted Christianity told him the whole story and method of his conversion and that in compliance with a particular Vision from Heaven he had preached repentance and reformation of life first to the Jews and then after to the Gentiles That it was for no other things than these that the Jews apprehended him in the Temple and designed to murder him but being rescued and upheld by a Divine power he continued in this testimony to this day asserting nothing but what was perfectly agreeable to Moses
West he taught righteousness to the whole World and went to the utmost bounds of the West Which makes me the more wonder at the confidence of one otherwise a Man of great parts and learning who so peremptorily denies that ever our Apostle preached in the West meerly because there are no Monuments left in Primitive Antiquity of any particular Churches there founded by him As if all the particular passages of his life done at so vast a distance must needs have been recorded or those records have come down to us when it is so notoriously known that almost all the Writings and Monuments of those first Ages of Christianity are long since perished or as if we were not sufficiently assured of the thing in general though not of what particularly he did there Probable it is that he went into Spain a thing which himself tells us he had formerly once and again resolved on Certain it is that the Ancients do generally assert it without seeming in the least to doubt of it Theodoret and others tell us that he preached not only in Spain but that he went to other Nations and brought the Gospel into the Isles of the Sea by which he undoubtedly means Britain and therefore elsewhere reckons the Gauls and Britains among the Nations which the Apostles and particularly the Tent-maker perswaded to embrace the Law of Christ. Nor is he the only Man that has said it others having given in their testimony and suffrage in this case 8. TO what other parts of the World S. Paul preached the Gospel we find no certain foot-steps in Antiquity nor any further mention of him till his return to Rome which probably was about the Eighth or Ninth Year of Nero's Reign Here he met with Peter and was together with him thrown into Prison no doubt in the general Persecution raised against the Christians under the pretence that they had fir'd the City Besides the general we may reasonably suppose there were particular causes of his Imprisonment Some of the Ancients make him engaged with Peter in procuring the fall of Simon Magus and that that derived the Emperor's fury and rage upon him S. Chrysostome gives us this account that having converted one of Nero's Concubines a Woman of whom he was infinitely fond and reduced her to a life of great strictness and chastity so that now she wholly refused to comply with his wanton and impure embraces the Emperor stormed hereat calling the Apostle a Villain and Impostor a wretched perverter and debaucher of others giving order that he should be cast into Prison and when he still persisted to perswade the Lady to continue her chast and pious resolutions commanding him to be put to death 9. HOW long he remained in Prison is not certainly known at last his Execution was resolved on what his preparatory treatment was whether scourged as Malefactors were wont to be in order to their death we find not As a Roman Citizen by the Valerian and the Porcian Law he was exempted from it Though by the Law of the XII Tables notorious Malefactors condemned by the Centuriate Assemblies were first to be scourged and then put to death and Baronius tells us that in the Church of S. Mary beyond the Bridge in Rome the Pillars are yet extant to which both Peter and Paul are said to have been bound and scourged As he was led to Execution he is said to have converted three of the Souldiers that were sent to conduct and guard him who within few days after by the Emperours command became Martyrs for the Faith Being come to the place which was the Aquae Salviae three Miles from Rome after some solemn preparation he chearfully gave his Neck to the fatal stroke As a Roman he might not be put upon the Cross too infamous a Death for any but the worst of Slaves and Malefactors and therefore was beheaded accounted a more noble kind of Death among the Romans fit for Persons of better Quality and more ingenuous Education And from this Instrument of his Execution the custom no doubt first arose that in all Pictures and Images of this Apostle he is constantly represented with a Sword in his right hand Tradition reports justified herein by the suffrage of many of the Fathers that when he was beheaded a Liquor more like Milk than Blood flowed from his Veins and spirted upon the Clothes of his Executioner and had I list or leisure for such things I might entertain the Reader with the little glosses that are made upon it S. Chrysostom adds that it became a means of converting his Executioner and many more to the Faith and that the Apostle suffered in the sixty eighth Year of his Age. Some question there is whether he suffered at the same time with Peter many of the Ancients positively affirm that both suffered on the same Day and Year but others though allowing the same Day tell us that S. Paul suffered not till the Year after nay some interpose the distance of several Years A Manuscript writer of the Lives and Travels of Peter and Paul brought amongst other venerable Monuments of Antiquity out of Greece will have Paul to have suffered no less than five Years after Peter which he justifies by the authority of no less than Justin Martyr and Irenaeus But what credit is to be given to this nameless Author I see not and therefore lay no weight upon it nor think it fit to be put into the balance with the testimonies of the Ancients Certainly if he suffered not at the very same time with Peter it could not be long after not above a Year at most The best is which of them soever started first they both came at last to the same end of the race to those Palms and Crowns which are reserved for all good Men in Heaven but most eminently for the Martyrs of the Christian Faith 10. HE was buried in the Via Ostiensis about two Miles from Rome over whose Grave about the Year CCCXVIII Constantine the Great at the instance of Pope Sylvester built a stately Church within a Farme which Lucina a noble Christian Matron of Rome had long before setled upon that Church He adorned it with an hundred of the best Marble columns and beautified it with the most exquisit workmanship the many rich gifts and endowments which he bestowed upon it being particularly set down in the Life of Sylvester This Church as too narrow and little for the honour of so great an Apostle 〈◊〉 or rather Theodosius the Emperor the one but finishing what the other began by a Rescript directed to Sallustius Praefect of the City caused to be taken down and a larger and more noble Church to be built in the room of it Further beautified as appears from an ancient Inscription by Placidia the Empress at the perswasion of Leo Bishop of Rome What other additions of Wealth Honour or stateliness it has
besides this Simon and his followers made the gate yet wider maintaining an universal licence to sin that men were free to do whatever they had a mind to that to press the observance of good works was a bondage inconsistent with the liberty of the Gospel that so men did but believe in him and his dear Helen they had no reason to regard Law or Prophets but might do what they pleased they should be saved by his grace and not according to good works Irenaeus adds what a man would easily have inferred had he never been told it that they lived in all lust and filthiness as indeed whoever will take the pains to peruse the account that is given of them will find that they wallowed in the most horrible and unheard of bestialities These persons S. Paul does as particularly describe as if he had named them having once and again with tears warned the Philippians of them that they were enemies of the Cross of Christ whose end is destruction whose God is their belly and whose glory is in their shame who mind earthly things And elsewhere to the same effect that they would mark them that caused divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which they had learned and avoid them for they that were such served not our Lord Jesus Christ but their own belly by good words and fair speeches deceiving the hearts of the simple This I doubt not he had in his eye when he gave those Caveats to the Ephesians that fornication and all uncleanness and inordinate desires should not be once named amongst them as became Saints nor filthiness nor unclean talking being assured by the Christian doctrine that no whoremonger nor unclean person c. could be saved that therefore they should let no man deceive them with vain words these being the very things for which the wrath of God came upon the children of disobedience and accordingly it concerned them not to be partakers with them Plainly intimating that this impure Gnostick-crue whose doctrines and practices he does here no less truly than lively represent had begun by crafty and insinuative arts to screw it self into the Church of Ephesus cheating the people with subtil and flattering insinuations probably perswading them that these things were but indifferent and a part of that Christian liberty wherein the Gospel had instated them By these and such like principles and practices many whereof might be reckoned up they corrupted the Faith of Christians distracted the peace of the Church stained and defiled the honour and purity of the best Religion in the World 4. BUT the greatest and most famous Controversie that of all others in those times exercised the Christian Church was concerning the obligation that Christians were under to observe the Law of Moses as necessary to their Justification and Salvation Which because a matter of so much importance and which takes up so great a part of S. Paul's Epistles and the clearing whereof will reflect a great light upon them we shall consider more at large In order whereunto three things especially are to be enquired after the true 〈◊〉 of the Controversie what the Apostles determined in this matter and what respect the most material passages in S. Paul's Epistles about Justification and Salvation bear to this Controversie First we shall enquire into the true state and nature of the Controversie and for this we are to know that when Christianity was published to the World it mainly prevailed among the Jews they being generally the first Converts to the Faith But having been brought up in a mighty reverence and veneration for the Mosaick Institutions and looking upon that Oeconomy as immediately contrived by God himself delivered by Angels setled by their great Master Moses received with the most solemn and sensible 〈◊〉 of Divine power and majesty ratified by miracles and entertained by all their forefathers as the peculiar prerogative of that Nation for so many Ages and Generations they could not easily be brought off from it or behold the Gospel but with an evil eye as an enemy that came to supplant and undermine this ancient and excellent Institution Nay those of them that were prevailed upon by the convictive power and evidence of the Gospel to embrace the Christian Religion yet could not get over the prejudice of education but must still continue their observance of those legal rites and customs wherein they had been brought up And not content with this they began magisterially to impose them upon others even all the Gentile Converts as that without which they could never be accepted by God in this or rewarded by him in another World This controversie was first started at Antioch a place not more remarkable for its own greatness than the vast numbers of Jews that dwelt there enjoying great immunities granted them by the Kings of Syria For after that Antiochus Epiphanes had destroyed 〈◊〉 and laid waste the Temple the Jews generally flocked hither where they were courteously entertained by his successors the spoils of the Temple restored to them for the enriching and adorning of their Synagogue and they made equally with the Greeks free-men of that City By which means their numbers encreased daily partly by the resort of others from Judaea partly by a numerous conversion of Proselytes whom they gained over to their Religion Accordingly Christianity at its first setting out found a very successful entertainment in this place And hither it was that some of the Jewish Converts being come down from Jerusalem taught the Christians that unless they observed Circumcision and the whole Law of Moses they could not be saved Paul and Barnabas then at Antioch observing the ill influence that this had upon the minds of men disturbing many at present and causing the Apostasie of some afterwards began vigorously to oppose this growing error but not able to conjure down this Spirit that had been raised up they were dispatched by the Church at Antioch to consult the Apostles and Governours at Jerusalem about this matter Whither being come they found the quarrel espoused among others by some Converts of the Sect of the Pharisees of all others the most zealous assertors of the Mosaick rites stifly maintaining that besides the Gospel or the Christian Religion it was necessary for all Converts whether Jews or Gentiles to keep to Circumcision and the Law of Moses So that the state of the controversie between the Orthodox and these JudaiZing Christians was plainly this Whether Circumcision and the observation of the Mosaick Law or only the belief and practice of Christianity be necessary to Salvation The latter part of the question was maintained by the Apostles the former asserted by the Judaizing Zelots making the Law of Moses equally necessary with the Law of Christ and no doubt pretending that whatever these men might preach at Antioch yet the Apostles were of another mind whose sentence and resolution it was therefore thought necessary should be
immediately known 5. WE are then next to consider what determination the Apostostolick Synod at Jerusalem made of this matter For a Council of the Apostles and Rulers being immediately convened and the question by Paul and Barnabas brought before them the case was canvassed and debated on all hands and at last it was resolved upon by their unanimous sentence and suffrage that the Gentile Converts were under no obligation to the Jewish Law that God had abundantly declared his acceptance of them though strangers to the Mosaical Oeconomy that they were sufficiently secured of their happiness and salvation by the grace of the Gospel wherein they might be justified and saved without Circumcision or legal Ceremonies a yoke from which Christ had now set us free But because the Apostles did not think it prudent in these circumstances too much to stir the exasperated humour of the Jews lest by straining the string too high at first they should endanger their revolting from the Faith theresore they thought of some indulgence in the case S. James then Bishop of Jerusalem and probably President of the Council propounding this expedient that for the present the Gentile Converts should so far only comply with the humour of the Jews as to abstain from meats offered to Idols from bloud from things strangled and from fornication Let us a little more distinctly survey the ingredients of this imposition Meats offered to Idols or as S. James in his discourse stiles them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the pollutions of Idols the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly denoting the meats that were polluted by being consecrated to the Idol Thus we read of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the LXX render it polluted bread upon God's Altar i. e. such probably as had been before offered to Idols So that these meats offered to the Idols were parts of those Sacrifices which the Heathens offered to their Gods of the remaining portions whereof they usually made a Feast in the Idol-Temple inviting their friends thither and sometimes their Christian friends to come along with them This God had particularly forbidden the Jews by the Law of Moses Thou shalt worship no other God lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land and go a whoring after their Gods and do sacrifice unto their Gods and one call thee and thou eat of his sacrifice And the not observing this prohibition cost the Jews dear when invited by the Moabites to the Sacrifices of their Gods they did eat with them and bowed down to their Gods Sometimes these remaining portions were sold for common use in the Shambles and bought by Christians Both which gave great offence to the zealous Jews who looked upon it as a participation in the Idolatries of the Heathen Of both which our Apostle discourses elsewhere at large pressing Christians to abstain from Idolatry both as to the Idol-feasts and the remainders of 〈◊〉 Sacrifice From the former as more immediately unlawful from the latter the Sacrificial meats sold in the Shambles as giving offence to weak and undiscerning Christians For though in it self an Idol was nothing in the world and consequently no honour could be done it by eating what was offered to it yet was it more prudent and reasonable to abstain partly because flesh-meats have no peculiar excellency in them to commend us to God partly because all men were not alike instructed in the knowledge of their liberty their minds easily puzled and their consciences intangled the Gentiles by this means hardned in their idolatrous practises weak brethren offended besides though these things were in their own nature indifferent and in a mans own power to do or to let alone yet was it not convenient to make our liberty a snare to others and to venture upon what was lawful when it was plainly unedifying and inexpedient From blood This God forbad of old and that some time before the giving of the Law by Moses that they should not eat the flesh with the bloud which was the life thereof The mystery of which prohibition was to instruct men in the duties of mercy and tenderness even to brute beasts but as appears from what sollows after primarily designed by God as a solemn fence and bar against murther and the effusion of humane bloud A Law afterwards renewed upon the Jews and inserted into the body of the Mosaick precepts From things strangled that is that they should abstain from eating of those Beasts that died without letting bloud where the bloud 〈◊〉 not throughly drained from them a prohibition grounded upon the reason of the former and indeed was greatly abominable to the Jews being so expresly sorbidden in their Law But it was not more offensive to the Jews than acceptable to the Gentiles who were wont with great art and care to strangle living Creatures that they might stew or dress them with their bloud in them as a point of curious and exquisite delicacy This and the foregoing prohibition abstinence from bloud died not with the Apostles nor were buried with other Jewish rites but were inviolably observed for several Ages in the Christian Church as we have elsewhere observed from the Writers of those times Lastly From Fornication This was a thing commonly practised in the Heathen World who generally beheld simple Fornication as no sin and that it was lawful for persons not engaged in wedlock to make use of women that exposed themselves A custom justly offensive to the Jews and therefore to cure two evils at once the Apostles here solemnly declare against it Not that they thought it a thing indifferent as the rest of the prohibited rites were 〈◊〉 it is forbidden by the natural Law as contrary to that chastness and modesty that order and comeliness which God has planted in the minds of men but they joyned it in the same Class with them because the Gentiles looked upon it as a thing lawful and indifferent It had been expresly forbidden by the Mosaick Law There shall be no Whore of the daughters of Israel and because the Heathens had generally thrown down this fence and bar set by the Law of nature it was here again repaired by the first planters of Christianity as by S. Paul elsewhere Ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus for this is the will of God even your Sanctification that you should abstain from fornication That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour not in the lust of concupiscence even as the Gentiles which know not God Though after all I must confess my self inclinable to imbrace 〈◊〉 his ingenious conjecture that by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fornication we are here to understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the harlots hire or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the offering which those persons were wont to make For among the Gentiles nothing was more usual than for the common women that
Holy Ghost while you continued under the legal dispensation or since you embraced the Gospel and the faith of Christ and speaking afterwards of the state of the Jews 〈◊〉 the revelation of the Gospel says he before saith came we were kept under the Law i. e. before the Gospel came we were kept under the Discipline of the legal Oeconomy shut up unto the faith reserved for the discovery of the Evangelical dispensation which should afterwards in its due time be revealed to the World This in the following Chapter he discourses more at large Tell me ye that desire to be under the Law i. e. Ye Jews that so fondly dote upon the legal state Do ye not hear the Law i. e. Understand what your own Law does so clearly intimate and then goes on to unriddle what was wrapt up in the famous Allegory of Abraham's two Sons by his two Wives The one Ishmael born of Hagar the Bond-woman who denoted the Jewish Covenant made at Mount Sinai which according to the representation of her condition was a servile state The other Isaac born of Sarah the Free-woman was the Son of the promise denoting Jerusalem that is above and is free the mother of us all i. e. The state and covenant of the Gospel whereby all Christians as the spiritual children of Abraham are set free from the bondage of the Mosaic dispensation By all which it is evident that by Law and the works of the Law in this controversie the Apostle understands the Law of Moses and that obedience which the legal dispensation required at their hands 8. WE are secondly to enquire what the Apostle means by Faith and he commonly uses it two ways 1. More generally for the Gospel or that Evangelical way of justification and salvation which Christ has brought in in opposition to Circumcision and the observation of those Rites by which the Jews expected to be justified and this is plain from the preceding opposition where Faith as denoting the Gospel is frequently opposed to the Law of Moses 2. Faith is taken more particularly for a practical belief or such an assent to the Evangelical revelation as produces a sincere obedience to the Laws of it and indeed as concerned in this matter is usually taken not for this or that single vertue but for the intire condition of the New Covenant as comprehending all that duty that it requires of us than which nothing can be more plain and evident In Christ Jesus i. e. under the Gospel neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor Uncircumcision 't is all one to Justification whether a Man be circumcised or no What then but Faith which worketh by love which afterwards he explains thus In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature a renewed and divine temper of mind and a new course and state of life And lest all this 〈◊〉 not be thought plain enough he elsewhere tells us that circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing but the keeping the Commandments of God From which places there needs no skill to infer that that Faith whereby we are justified contains in it a new disposition and state both of heart and life and an observation of the Laws of Christ in which respect the Apostle does in the very same Verse expound believing by obeying of the Gospel Such he assures us was that very Faith by which Abraham was justified who against all probabilities of reason believed in God's promise he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief but was strong c. that is he so firmly believed what God had promised that he gave him the glory of his truth and faithfulness his infinite power and ability to do all things And how did he that by acting suitably in a way of intire resignation and sincere obedience to the divine will and pleasure so the Apostle elsewhere more expresly by Faith he obeyed and went out not knowing whither he went This Faith he tells us was imputed to Abraham for righteousness that is God by vertue of the New Covenant made in Christ was graciously pleased to look upon this obedience though in it self imperfect as that for which he accounted him and would deal with him as a just and a righteous Man And upon this account we find Abraham's faith opposed to a perfect and unsinning obedience for thus the Apostle tells us that Abraham was justified by faith in opposition to his being justified by such an absolute and compleat obedience as might have enabled him to challenge the reward by the strict Laws of Justice whereas now his being pardoned and accepted by God in the way of a mean and imperfect obedience it could not claim impunity much less a reward but must be intirely owing to the Divine grace and favour 9. HAVING thus cleared our way by restoring these words to their genuine and native sence we come to shew how the Apostle in his discourses does all along refer to the Original controversie between the Jewish and Gentile-Converts whether Justification was by the observation of the Mosaic Law or by the belief and practice of the Gospel and this will appear if we consider the persons that he has to deal with the way and manner of his arguing and that there was then no other controversie on foot to which these passages could refer The Persons whom he had to deal with were chiefly of two sorts pure Jews and Jewish Converts Pure Jews were those that kept themselves wholly to the Legal Oeconomy and expected to be justified and saved in no other way than the observation of the Law of Moses Indeed they laid a more peculiar stress upon Circumcision because this having been added as the Seal of that Covenant which God made with Abraham and the discriminating badge whereby they were to be distinguished from all other Nations they looked upon it as having a special efficacy in it to recommend them to the divine acceptance Accordingly we find in their Writings that they make this the main Basis and Foundation of their hope and confidence towards God For they tell us that the Precept of Circumcision is greater than all the rest and equivalent to the whole Law that the reason why God hears the Prayers of the Israelites but not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Gentiles or Christians is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the vertue and merit of Circumcision yea that so great is the power and efficacy of the Law of Circumcision that no man that is circumcised shall go to Hell Nay according to the idle and 〈◊〉 humour of these Men they fetch down Abraham from the Seat of the Blessed and place him as Porter at the Gates of Hell upon no other errand than to keep circumcised Persons from entring into that miserable place However nothing is more evident than that Circumcision was the Fort and Sanctuary wherein they ordinarily placed their security
and accordingly we find S. Paul frequently disputing against circumcision as virtually comprizing in their notion the keeping of the whole Jewish Law Besides to these literal impositions of the Law of Moses the Pharisees had added many vain Traditions and several superstitious usages of their own contrivance in the observance whereof the People plac'd not a little confidence as to that righteousness upon which they hoped to stand clear with Heaven Against all these our Apostle argues and sometimes by arguments peculiar to them alone Jewish Converts were those who having embraced the Christian Religion did yet out of a veneration to their ancient Rites make the observance of them equally necessary with the belief and practice of Christianity both to themselves and others These last were the Persons who as they first started the controversie so were those against whom the Apostle mainly opposed himself endeavouring to dismount their pretences and to beat down their Opinions level with the ground 10. THIS will yet further appear from the way and manner of the Apostles arguing which plainly respects this controversie and will be best seen in some particular instances of his reasonings And first he argues that this way of justification urged by Jews and Jewish Converts was inconsistent with the goodness of God and his universal kindness to Mankind being so narrow and limited that it excluded the far greatest part of the World Thus in the three first Chapters of his Epistle to the Romans having proved at large that the whole World both Jew and Gentile were under a state of guilt and consequently liable to the divine sentence and condemnation he comes next to enquire by what means they may be delivered from this state of vengeance and shews that it could not be by legal observances but that now there was a way of righteousness or justification declared by Christ in the Gospel intimated also in the Old Testament extending to all both Jews and Gentiles whereby God with respect to the satisfaction and expiation of Christ is ready freely to pardon and justifie all penitent believers That therefore there was a way revealed in the Gospel whereby a man might be justified without being beholden to the rites of the Jewish Law otherwise it would argue that God had very little care of the greatest part of men Is he God of the Jews only is he not also of the Gentiles Yes of the Gentiles also Seeing it is one God which shall 〈◊〉 the Circumcision by Faith and the uncircumcision through Faith Jew and Gentile in the same Evangelical way The force of which argument lies in this That that cannot be necessary to our Justification which excludes the greatest part of mankind from all possibility of being justified and this justification by the Mosaick Law plainly does a thing by no means consistent with God's universal love and kindness to his Creatures Hence the Apostle magnifies the grace of the Gospel that it has broken down the partition-wall and made way for all Nations to come in that now there is neither Greek nor Jew Circumcision nor uncircumcision Barbarian nor 〈◊〉 no difference in this respect but all one in Christ Jesus all equally admitted to terms of pardon and justification in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh righteousness being accepted with him 11. SECONDLY He argues that this Jewish way of Justification could not be indispensably necessary in that it had not been the constant way whereby good men in all Ages had been justified and accepted with Heaven This he eminently proves from the instance of Abraham whom the Scripture sets forth as the Father of the faithful and the great Exemplar of that way wherein all his spiritual seed all true Believers were to be justified Now of him 't is evident that he was justified and accepted with God upon his practical belief of God's power and promise before ever Circumcision and much more before the rest of the Mosaick Institution was in being Cometh this blessedness then upon the Circumcision only or upon the uncircumcision also For we say that Faith was reckoned unto Abraham for righteousness How was it then reckoned when he was in Circumcision or in uncircumcision Not in Circumcision but in uncircumcision And he received the sign of Circumcision a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had being yet uncircumcised c. The meaning whereof is plainly this That pardon of sin cannot be entailed upon the way of the Mosaick Law it being evident that Abraham was justified and approved of God before he was Circumcised which was only added as a seal of the Covenant between God and him and a testimony of that acceptance with God which he had obtained before And this way of God's dealing with Abraham and in him with all his spiritual children the legal Institution could not make void it being impossible that that dispensation which came so long after should disannul the Covenant which God had made with Abraham and his spiritual seed CCCCXXX years before Upon this account as the Apostle observes the Scripture sets forth Abraham as the great type and pattern of Justification as the Father of all them that believe though they be not Circumcised that righteousness might be imputed to them also and the father of Circumcision to them who are not of the Circumcision only but also walk in the steps of the Faith of our Father Abraham which he had being yet uncircumcised They therefore that are of Faith the same are the children of Abraham And the Scripture foreseeing that God would justifie the Heathen through Faith preached before the Gospel this Evangelical way of justifying unto Abraham saying In thee shall all Nations be blessed So then they which be of Faith who believe and obey as Abraham did shall be blessed pardoned and saved with faithful Abraham It might further be demonstrated that this has ever been God's method of dealing with mankind our Apostle in the eleventh Chapter to the Hebrews proving all along by particular instances that it was by such a Faith as this without any relation to the Law of Moses that good men were justified and accepted with God in all Ages of the World 12. THIRDLY He argues against this Jewish way of Justification from the deficiency and imperfection of the Mosaick Oeconomy not able to justifie and save sinners 〈◊〉 as not able to assist those that were under it with sufficient aids to perform what it required of them This the Law could not do for that it was weak through the flesh till God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful 〈◊〉 to enable us that the righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit And indeed could the Law have given life verily righteousness should have been by the Law But alas the Scripture having concluded all mankind Jew and Gentile under sin and consequently incapable of being
man in such circumstances with the least pretence of reason lay claim to merit or boast of his own archievements Hence the Apostle magnifies the Evangelical method of Justification above that of 〈◊〉 Law that it wholly excludes all proud 〈◊〉 upon our selves Where is 〈◊〉 then it is excluded By what Law of works Nay but by the Law of Faith The Mosaical Oeconomy fostered men up in proud and high thoughts of themselves they looked upon themselves as a peculiar people honoured above all other Nations of the World the seed of Abraham invested with mighty priviledges c. whereas the Gospel proceeding upon other principles takes away all foundations of pride by acknowledging our acceptance with God and the power whereby we are enabled to make good the terms and conditions of it to be the mere result of the Divine grace and mercy and that the whole scheme of our Salvation as it was the contrivance of the Divine wisdom so is the purchase of the merit and satisfaction of our crucified Saviour Nor is Faith it self less than other graces an act of Evangelical obedience and if separated from them is of no moment or value in the accounts of Heaven Though I have all Faith and have no Charity I am nothing All Faith be it of what kind soever To this may be added that no tolerable account can be given why that which is on all hands granted to be the condition of our Salvation such is Evangelical obedience should not be the condition of our Justification And at the great day Christians shall be acquitted or condemned according as in this World they have fulfilled or neglected the conditions of the Gospel The decretory sentence of absolution that shall then be passed upon good men shall be nothing but a publick and solemn declaration of that private sentence of Justification that was passed upon them in this World so that upon the same terms that they are justified now they shall be justified and acquitted then and upon the same terms that they shall then be judged and acquitted they are justified now viz. an hearty belief and a sincere obedience to the Gospel From all which I hope 't is evident that when S. Paul denies men to be justified by the works of the Law by works he either means works done before conversion and by the strength of mens natural powers such as enabled them to pride and boast themselves or which mostwhat includes the other the works of the Mosaick Law And indeed though the controversies on foot in those times did not plainly determine his reasonings that way yet the considerations which we have now suggested sufficiently shew that they could not be meant in any other sence 16. CONSECT II. That the doctrines of S. Paul and S. James about Justification are fairly consistent with each other For seeing S. Paul's design in excluding works from Justification was only to deny the works of the Jewish Law or those that were wrought by our own strength and in asserting that in opposition to such works we are justified by Faith he meant no more than that either we are justified in an Evangelical way or more particularly by Faith intended a practical belief including Evangelical obedience And seeing on the other hand S. James in affirming that we are justified by works and not by Faith only by works means no more than Evangelical obedience in opposition to a naked and an empty Faith these two are so far from quarrelling that they mutually embrace each other and both in the main pursue the same design And indeed if any disagreement seem between them 't is most reasonable that S. Paul should be expounded by S. James not only because his propositions are so express and positive and not justly liable to ambiguity but because he wrote some competent time after the other and consequently as he perfectly understood his meaning so he was capable to countermine those ill principles which some men had built upon S. Paul's assertions For 't is evident from several passages in S. Paul's Epistles that even then many began to mistake his doctrine and from his assertions about Justification by Faith and not by works to infer propositions that might serve the purposes of a bad life They slanderously reported him to say that we might do evil that good might come that we might continue in sin that the grace of the Gospel might the more abound They thought that so long as they did but believe the Gospel in the naked notion and speculation of it it was enough to recommend them to the favour of God and to serve all the purposes of Justification and Salvation however they shaped and steered their lives Against these men 't is beyond all question plain that S. James levels his Epistle to batter down the growing doctrines of Libertinism and Prophaneness to shew the insufficiency of a naked Faith and an empty profession of Religion that 't is not enough to recommend us to the Divine acceptance and to justifie us in the sight of Heaven barely to believe the Gospel unless we really obey and practise it that a Faith destitute of this Evangelical obedience is fruitless and unprofitable to Salvation that 't is by these works that Faith must appear to be vital and sincere that not only Rahab but Abraham the Father of the faithful was justified not by a bare belief of God's promise but an 〈◊〉 obedience to God's command in the ready offer of his Son whereby it appears that his Faith and Obedience did cooperate and conspire together to render him capable of God's favour and approbation and that herein the Scripture was fulfilled which saith That Abraham believed God and it was imputed to him for righteousness whence by the way nothing can be clearer than that both these Apostles intend the same thing by Faith in the case of Abraham's Justification and its being imputed to him for 〈◊〉 viz. a practical belief and obedience to the commands of God that it follows hence that Faith is not of it self sufficient to justifie and make us acceptable to God unless a proportionable Obedience be joyned with it without which Faith serves no more to these ends and purposes than a Body destitute of the Soul to animate and enliven it is capable to exercise the functions and offices of the natural life His meaning in short being nothing else than that good works or Evangelical obedience is according to the Divine appointment the condition of the Gospel-Covenant without which 't is in vain for any to hope for that pardon which Christ hath purchased and the favour of God which is necessary to Eternal Life The End of S. Paul's Life THE LIFE OF S. ANDREW St. ANDREW He was fastened to a Cross since distinguished by his name by y e Proconsul at Patrae a City of Achaia from which he preached severall dayes to y e Spectators S. Hierom. Baron Nov 29. St. Andrew's Crucifixion Matth. 23.
34. Behold I send unto you prophets and wisemen and scribes some of them ye shall kill and crucifie some of them shall ye scurge in your synagogues and persecute them from Cyty to City The Sacred History sparing in the Acts of the succeeding Apostles and why S. Andrew's Birth-place Kindred and way of Life John the Baptist's Ministry and Discipline S. Andrew educated under his Institution His coming to Christ and 〈◊〉 to be a Disciple His Election to the Apostolate The Province assigned for his Ministry In what places he chiesly preached His barbarous usage at Sinope His planting Christianity at Byzantium and ordaining Stachys Bishop there His travails in Greece and preaching at Patrae in Achaia His arraignment before the Proconsul and resolute defence of the Christian Religion The Proconsul's displeasure against him whence An account of his Martyrdom His preparatory sufferings and crucifixion On what kind of Cross he suffered The Miracles reported to be done by his Body It s translation to Constantinople The great Encomium given of him by one of the Ancients 1. THE Sacred Story which has hitherto been very large and copious in describing the Acts of the two first Apostles is henceforward very sparing in its accounts giving us only now and then a few oblique and accidental remarques concerning the rest and some of them no further mentioned than the meer recording of their Names For what reasons it pleased the Divine wisdom and providence that no more of their Acts should be consigned to Writing by the Pen-men of the Holy story is to us unknown Probably it might be thought convenient that no more account should be given of the first plantations of Christianity in the World than what concerned Judaea and the Neighbour-countries at least the most eminent places of the Roman Empire that so the truth of the Prophetical Predictions might appear which had foretold that the Law of the Messiah should come forth from Sion and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem Besides that a particular relation of the Acts of so many 〈◊〉 done in so many several Countries might have swell'd the Holy Volumes into too great a bulk and rendred them less serviceable and accommodate to the ordinary use of Christians Among the Apostles that succeed we first take notice of S. Andrew He was born at Bethsaida a City of Galilee standing upon the banks of the Lake of Gennesareth Son to John or Jonas a Fisherman of that Town Brother he was to Simon Peter but whether Elder or Younger the Ancients do not clearly decide though the major part intimate him to have been the younger Brother there being only the single authorlty of Epiphanius on the other side as we have formerly noted He was brought up to his Father's Trade whereat he laboured till our Lord called him from catching Fish to be a Fisher of men for which he was fitted by some preparatory Institutions even before his coming unto Christ. 2. JOHN the Baptist was lately risen in the Jewish Church a Person whom for the efficacy and impartiality of his Doctrine and the extraordinary strictness and austerities of his Life the Jews generally had in great veneration He trained up his Proselytes under the Discipline of Repentance and by urging upon them a severe change and reformation of life prepared them to entertain the Doctrine of the Messiah whose approach he told them was now near at hand representing to them the greatness of his Person and the importance of the design that he was come upon Besides the multitudes that promiscuously flock'd to the Baptists discourses he had according to the manner of the Jewish Masters some peculiar and select Disciples who more constantly attended upon his Lectures and for the most part waited upon his Person In the number of these was our Apostle who was then with him about Jordan when our Saviour who some time since had been baptized came that way upon whose approach the Baptist told them that this was the 〈◊〉 the great Person whom he had so 〈◊〉 spoken of to usher in whose appearing his whole Ministry was but subservient that this was the Lamb of God the true Sacrifice that was to expiate the sins of Mankind Upon this testimony Andrew and another Disciple probably S. John follow our Saviour to the place of his abode Upon which account he is generally by the Fathers and ancient Writers stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the first called Disciple though in a strict sence he was not so for though he was the first of the Disciples that came to Christ yet was he not called till afterwards After some converse with him Andrew goes to acquaint his Brother Simon and both together came to Christ. Long they stayed not with him but returned to their own home and to the exercise of their calling wherein they were imployed when somewhat more than a Year after our Lord passing through Galilee found them 〈◊〉 upon the Sea of Tiberias where he fully satisfied them of the Greatness and Divinity of his Person by the convictive evidence of that miraculous draught of Fishes which they took at his command And now he told them he had other work for them to do that they should no longer deal in Fish but with Men whom they should catch with the efficacy and influence of that Doctrine that he was come to deliver to the World commanding them to follow him as his immediate Disciples and Attendants who accordingly left all and followed him Shortly after S. Andrew together with the rest was called to the Office and Honour of the Apostolate made choice of to be one of those that were to be Christ's immediate Vice-gerents for planting and propagating the Christian Church Little else is particularly recorded of him in the Sacred story being comprehended in the general account of the rest of the Apostles 3. AFTER our Lord's Ascension into Heaven and that the Holy 〈◊〉 had in its miraculous powers been plentifully shed upon the Apostles to fit them for the great errand they were to go upon to root out prophaneness and idolatry and to subdue the World to the Doctrine of the Gospel it is generally affirmed by the Ancients that the Apostles agreed among themselves by lot say some probably not without the special guidance and direction of the Holy Ghost what parts of the World they should severally take In this division S. Andrew had Scythia and the Neighbouring Countries primarily allotted him for his Province First then he travelled through Cappadocia Galatia and Bithynia and instructed them in the Faith of Christ pasling all along the Euxin Sea formerly called Axenus from the barbarous and inhospitable temper of the People thereabouts who were wont to sacrifice strangers and of their skulls to make Cups to drink in in their Feasts and Banquets and so into the solitudes of Scythia An ancient Author though whence deriving his intelligence I know not gives us a more particular
Evangelists about his name the one stiling him by his proper name the other by his relative and paternal title To all this if necessary I might add the consent of Learned men who have given in their suffrages in this matter that it is but the same person under several names But hints of this may suffice These arguments I confess are not so forcible and convictive as to command assent but with all their circumstances considered are suffioient to incline and sway any mans belief The great and indeed only reason brought against it is what S. Augustine objected of old that it is not probable that our Lord would chuse Nathanael a Doctor of the Law to be one of his Apostles as designing to confound the wisdom of the World by the preaching of the Ideot and the unlearned But this is no reason to him that considers that this objection equally lies against S. Philip for whose skill in the Law and Prophets there is as much evidence in the History of the Gospel as for Nathanael's and much stronglier against S. Paul than whom besides his abilities in all humane Learning there were few greater Masters in the Jewish Law 3. THIS difficulty being cleared we proceed to a more particular account of our Apostle By some he is thought to have been a Syrian of a noble extract and to have derived his pedigree from the Ptolomies of Egypt upon no other ground I believe than the more analogy and sound of the name 'T is plain that he as the rest of the Apostles was a Galilean and of Nathanael we know it is particularly said that he was of Gana in Galilee The Scripture takes no notice of his Trade or way of life though some circumstances might seem to intimate that he was a Fisherman which Theoderet affirms of the Apostles in general and another particularly reports of our Apostle At his first coming to Christ supposing him still the same with Nathanael he was conducted by Philip who told him that now they had found the long-look'd for Messiah so oft foretold by Moses and the Prophets Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph And when he objected that the Messiah could not be born at Nazareth Philip bids him come and satisfie himself At his first approach our Lord entertains him with this honourable character that he was an Israelite indeed a man of true simplicity and integrity as indeed his simplicity particularly appears in this that when told of Jesus he did not object against the meanness of his Original the low condition of his Parents the narrowness of their fortunes but only against the place of his birth which could not be Nazareth the Prophets having peremptorily foretold that the Messiah should be born at Bethlehem By this therefore he appeared to be a true Israelite one that waited for redemption in Israel which from the date of the Scripture-predictions he was assured did now draw nigh Surprized he was at our Lord's salutation wondring how he should know him so well at first sight whose face he had never seen before But he was answered that he had seen him while he was yet under the Fig-tree before Philip called him Convinc'd with this instance of our Lord's Divinity he presently made this confession That now he was sure that Jesus was the promised Messiah the Son of God whom he had appointed to be the King and Governour of his Church Our Saviour told him that if upon this inducement he could believe him to be the Messiah he should have far greater arguments to confirm his faith yea that ere long he should behold the Heavens opened to receive him thither and the Angels visibly appearing to wait and attend upon him 4. CONCERNING our Apostles travels up and down the World to propagate the Christian Faith we shall present the Reader with a brief account though we cannot warrant the exact order of them That he went as far as India is owned by all which surely is meant of the hither India or the part of it lying next to Asia Socrates tells us 't was the India bordering upon AEthiopia meaning no doubt the Asian AEthiopia whereof we shall speak in the life of S. Thomas Sophronius calls it the Fortunate India and tells us that here he left behind him S. Matthew's Gospel whereof Ensebius gives a more particular relation That when Pantaenus a man famous for his skill in Philosophy and especially the Institutions of the Stoicks but much more for his hearty affection to Christianity in a devout and zealous imitation of the Apostles was inflamed with a desire to propagate the Christian Religion unto the Eastern Countries he came as far as India it self Here amongst some that yet retained the knowledge of Christ he found S. Matthew's Gospel written in Hebrew left here as the tradition was by S. Bartholomew one of the twelve Apostles when he preached the Gospel to these Nations 5. AFTER his labours in these parts of the World he returned to the more Western and Northern parts of Asia At Hieropolis in Phrygia we find him in company with S. Philip instructing that place in the principles of Christianity and convincing them of the folly of their blind Idolatries Here by the enraged Magistrates he was at the same time with Philip designed for Martyrdom in order whereunto he was fastned upon the Cross with an intent to dispatch him but upon a sudden conviction that the Divine Justice would revenge their death he was taken down again and dismissed Hence probably he went into Lycaonia the people whereof Chrysostom assures us he instructed and trained up in the Christian discipline His last remove was to Albanople in Armenia the Great the same no doubt which Nicephorus calls Urbanople a City of Cilicia a place miserably over-grown with Idolatry from which while he sought to reclaim the people he was by the Governour of the place commanded to be crucified which he chearfully underwent comforting and confirming the Convert Gentiles to the last minute of his life Some add that he was crucified with his head downwards others that he was flead and his skin first taken off which might consist well enough with his Crucifixion excoriation being a punishment in use not only in Egypt but amongst the Persians next neighbours to these Armenians as Ammianus Marcellinus assures us and Plutarch records a particular instance of Mesabates the Persian Eunuch first flead alive and then crucified from whom they might easily borrow this piece of barbarous and inhumane cruelty As for the several stages to which his Body removed after his death first to Daras a City in the borders of Persia then to Liparis one of the AEolian Islands thence to Beneventum in Italy and last of all to Rome they that are fond of those things and have better leisure may enquire Hereticks persecuted his memory after his death no less than Heathens did his person while
A circumstance the more considerable because spoken at the same time when Peter was in Council who produced no such intimation of his Authority Had the Champions of the Church of Rome but such a passage for Peter's judiciary Authority and Power it would no doubt have made a louder noise in the World than Thou art Peter or Feed my sheep 5. HE administred his Province with all possible care and industry omitting no part of a diligent and faithful Guide of Souls strengthning the weak informing the ignorant reducing the erroneous reproving the obstinate and by the constancy of his Preaching conquering the stubbornness of that perverse and refractory Generation that he had to deal with many of the nobler and the better sort being brought over to a compliance with the Christian Faith So careful so successful in his charge that he awakened the spite and malice of his Enemies to conspire his ruine a sort of Men of whom the Apostle has given too true a character that they please not God and are contrary to all men Vexed they were to see that S. Paul by appealing to Caesar had escaped their hands Malice is as greedy and insatiable as Hell it self and therefore now turn their revenge upon S. James which not being able to effect under Festus his Government they more effectually attempted under the Procuratorship of Albinus his Successor Ananus the Younger then High-Priest and of the Sect of the Sadducees 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Josephus speaking of this very passage of all others the most merciless and implacable Justicers resolving to dispatch him before the new Governor could arrive To this end a Council is hastily summoned and the Apostle with some others arraigned and condemned as Violators of the Law But that the thing might be carried in a more plausible and popular way they set the Scribes and Pharisees Crafts-masters in the arts of dissimulation at work to ensnare him who coming to him began by flattering insinuatious to set upon him They tell him that they all had a mighty confidence in him and that the whole Nation as well as they gave him the testimony of a most just man and one that was no respecter of Persons that therefore they desired he would correct the error and false Opinion which the People had of Jesus whom they looked upon as the Messiah and would take this opportunity of the universal confluence to the Paschal solemnity to set them right in their notions about these things and would to that end go up with them to the top of the Temple where he might be seen and heard by all Being advantageously placed upon a Pinnacle or Wing of the Temple they made this address to him Tell us O Justus whom we have all the reason in the World to believe that seeing the People are thus generally led away with the Doctrine of Jesus that was crucified tell us What is this Institution of the crucified Jesus To which the Apostle answered with an audible Voice Why do ye enquire of Jesus the Son of man he sits in Heaven on the right hand of the Majesty on high and will come again in the Clouds of Heaven The People below hearing it glorified the blessed Jesus and openly proclaimed Hosanna to the Son of David The Scribes and Pharisees perceived now that they had over-shot themselves and that instead of reclaiming they had confirmed the People in their Error that there was no way left but presently to dispatch him that by his sad fate others might be warned not to believe him Whereupon suddenly crying out that Justus himself was seduced and become an Impostor they threw him down from the Place where he stood Though bruised he was not killed by the fall but recovered so much strength as to get upon his Knees and Pray to Heaven for them Malice is of too bad a nature either to be pacified with kindness or satisfied with cruelty Jealousie is not more the rage of a Man than Malice is the rage of the Devil the very soul and spirit of the Apostate nature Little portions of revenge do but inflame it and serve to flesh it up into a fiercer violence Vexed that they had not done his work they fall afresh upon the poor remainders of his life and while he was yet at Prayer and that a Rechabite who stood by which says Epiphanius was Symeon his Kinsman and Successor stept in and intreated them to spare him a just and a righteous Man and who was then praying for them they began to load him with a showre of stones till one more mercifully cruel than the rest with a Fullers Club beat out his Brains Thus died this good Man in the XCVI Year of his Age and about XXIV Years after Christ's Ascension into Heaven as Epiphanius tells us being taken away to the great grief and regret of all good Men yea of all sober and just Persons even amongst the Jews themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Josephus himself confesses speaking of this matter He was buried says Gregory Bishop of Tours upon Mount Olivet in a Tomb which he had built for himself and wherein he had buried Zacharias and old Simeon which I am rather inclinable to believe than what Hegesippus reports that he was buried near the Temple in the place of his Martyrdom and that a Monument was there erected for him which remained a long time after For the Jews were not ordinarily wont to bury within the City much less so near the Temple and least of all would they suffer him whom as a Blasphemer and Impostor they had so lately put to death 6. HE was a Man of exemplary and extraordinary Piety and Devotion educated under the strictest Rules and Institutions of Religion a Priest as we may probably guess of the ancient Order of the Rechabites or rather as Epiphanius conjectures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the most ancient order and form of Priesthood when the Sacerdotal Office was the Prerogative of the first-born and such was S. James the Eldest Son of Joseph and thereby sanctified and set apart for it Though whether this way of Priesthood at any time held under the Mosaick dispensation we have no intimations in the holy story But however he came by it upon some such account it must be that he had a priviledge which the Ancicnts say was peculiar to him probably because more frequently made use of by him than by any others to enter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not into the Sancta Sanstorum or most holy of all but the Sanctuary or holy place whither the Priests of the Aaronical Order might come Prayer was his constant business and delight he seemed to live upon it and to trade in nothing but the frequent returns of converse with Heayen and was therefore wont to retire alone into the Temple to pray which he always performed kneeling and with the greatest reverence till by