the evil upon his house Wherein we shall be occasioned to enquire how the first of these may stand with Gods holiness the second with his Truth the third with his Iustice And first of Ahabs humiliation Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me This Ahab was King of Israel that is King over those ten Tribes which revolted from Rehoboam the Son of Salomon and clave to Ieroboam the son of Nebat Search the whole sacred story in the Books of Kings and Chronicles and unless we will be so very charitable as notwithstanding many strong presumptions of his Hypocrisie to exempt Iehu the son of Nimshi and that is but one of twenty we shall not find in the whole List and Catalogue of the Kings of Israel one good one that clave unto the Lord with an upright heart Twenty Kings of Israel and not one or but one good and yet than this Ahab of the twenty scarce one worse It is said in the sixteenth Chapter of this Book that Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him at verse 30. and at verse 33. that He did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the Kings of Israel that were before him and at verse 25. of this Chapter that There was none like unto Ahab which did sell himself to work wickednesse in the sight of the Lord. An Oppressour he was and a Murderer and an Idolater and a Persecuter of that holy Truth which God had plentifully revealed by his Prophets and powerfully confirmed by Miracles and mercifully declared by many gracious deliverances even to him in such manner as that he could not but know it to be the Truth and therefore an Hypocrite and in all likelyhood an obstinate sinner against the holy Ghost and a Cast-away This is Ahab this the man But what is his carriage what doth he he humbleth himself before the Lord. Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me The manner and occasion of his humbling is set down a little before at V. 27. And it came to passe when Ahab heard those words the words of Eliah the Prophet dealing plainly and roundly with him for his hatefull Oppression and Murther That he rent his cloathes and put sackcloth upon his flesh and fasted and lay in sackcloth and went softly And that is the humbling here spoken and allowed of and for which God here promiseth that he will not bring the evill in his dayes Lay all this together the man and his ill conditions and his present carriage with the occasion and successe of it and it offereth three notable things to our consideration See first how far an Hypocrite a Cast-away may go in the outward performance of holy duties and particularly in the practice of Repentance here is Ahab humbled such a man and yet so penitent See again secondly how deep Gods word though in the mouth but of weak instruments when he is pleased to give strength unto it pierceth into the consciences of obstinate sinners and bringeth the proudest of them upon their knees in despight of their hearts here is Ahab quelled by Eliah such a great one by such a weak one See yet again thirdly how prone God is to mercy and how ready to apprehend any advantage as it were and occasion to shew compassion here is Ahab humbled and his judgement adjourned such a real substantial favour and yet upon such an empty shadow of Repentance Of these three at this time in their order and of the first first An Hypocrite may go very farre in the outward performances of holy duties For the right conceiving of which assertion Note first that I speak not now of the common graces of Illumination and Edification and good dexterity for the practising of some particular Calling which gifts with sundry other like are oftentimes found even in such apparently wicked and prophane men as have not so much as the form much lesse the power of Godlinesse but I speak even of those Graces which de tota specie if they be true and sincere are the undoubted blessed fruits of Gods holy renewing Spirit of sanctification such as are Repentance Faith Hope Ioy Humility Patience Temperance Meeknesse Zeal Reformation c. in such as these Hypocrites may go very farr as to the outward semblance and performance Note secondly that I speak not of the inward power and reality of these graces for Cast-aways and Hypocrites not having union with God by a lively faith in his Son nor communion with him by the effectual working of his Spirit have no part nor fellowship in these things which are proper to the chosen and called of God and peculiar to those that are his peculiar people but I speak only of the outward performances and exercises of such actions as may seem to flow from such spiritual graces habitually rooted in the heart when as yet they may spring also and when they are found in unregenerate men do so spring from Nature perhaps moralized or otherwise restrained but yet unrenewed by saving and sanctifying grace Note thirdly that when I say an Hypocrite may go very farre in such outward performances by the Hypocrite is meant not only the grosse or formal Hypocrite but every natural and unregenerate man including also the Elect of God before their effectual calling and conversion as also Reprobates and Cast-awayes for the whole time of their lives all of which may have such fair semblances of the forenamed Graces and of other like them as not only others who are to judge the best by the Law of Charity but themselves also through the wretched deceitfulnesse of their own wicked and corrupt hearts may mistake for those very graces they resemble The Parable of the seed sown in the stony ground may serve for a full both declaration and proof hereof which seed is said to have sprouted forth immediately Springing up forthwith after it was sown but yet never came to good but speedily withered away because for want of deepnesse of earth it had not moysture enough to feed it to any perfection of growth and ripenesse And that branch of the Parable our blessed Saviour himself in his exposition applieth to such hearers as When they hear the Word immediately receive it with gladnesse and who so forward as they to repent and believe and reform their lives but yet all that forwardnesse cometh to nothing they endure but for a short time Because they have no root in themselves but want the sap and moysture of Grace to give life and lasting to those beginnings and imperfect offers and essayes of goodnesse they made shew of Here are good affections to see to unto the good word of God they receive it with joy it worketh not only upon their judgements but it seemeth also to rejoice yea after a sort to ravish their hearts
vouchsafed us his holy word to instruct us what we are to believe and to do either as Men or as Christians We are now furnished with as perfect absolute and sufficient a Rule both of Faith and Manners as our condition in this life is capable of And it is our duty accordingly to resign our selves wholy to be guided by that Word yet making use of our Reason withall in subordination and with submission thereunto as a perfect Rule both of Faith and Life This being clearly so and the Scripture by consent of both parties acknowledged to be the perfect Rule of what we are to believe as well as of what we are to do I earnestly desire our Brethren to consider what should hinder a Christian man from doing any thing that by the meer use of his Reason alone he may rightly judge to be lawful and expedient though it be not commanded or exampled in the Scriptures so as it be not contrary thereunto more then from believing any thing that by the like use of his Reason alone he may rightly judge to be true or credible though the same be not revealed or contained in the Scripture nor is contrary thereunto I do without scruple believe a Mathematical or Philosophical truth or a probable historical relation when I read it or hear it and I believe an honest man upon his word in what he affirmeth or promiseth though none of all these things be contained in the Scripture and thus to believe was never yet by any man that I know of thought derogatory to the sufficiency of Scripture as it is a perfect Rule of Faith Why I may not in like manner wear such or such a garment use such or such a gesture or do any other indifferent thing not forbidden in Scripture as occasions shall require without scruple or why thus to do should be thought derogatory to the sufficiency of scripture as it is a perfect Rule of Manners I confess I have not the wit to understand Since there seemeth to be the like reason of both let them either condemne both or acquit both or else inform us better by shewing us a clear and satisfactory reason of difference between the one and the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the main hinge upon which the whole dispute turneth and whereunto all other differences are but appendages The true belief and right understanding of this great Article concerning the Scriptures sufficiency being to my apprehension the most proper Characteristical note of the right English Protestant as he standeth in the middle between and distinguished from the Papist on the one hand and the sometimes styled Puritan on the other I know not how he can be a Papist that truly believeth it or he a Puritan that rightly understandeth it § XXII Having thus answered the several Objections aforesaid wherewith it may be some that stand freer from prejudice then their fellows will be satisfied if any shall yet aske me why I plead still so hard for Ceremonies now they are laid down and so no use either of them or of any discourse concerning them I have this to say First I saw my selfe somewhat concerned to prevent if I could the mis-censuring of these Sermons in sundry of which the Questions that concern Ceremonies are either purposely handled or occasionally touched upon which could not be done without vindicating the Ceremonies themselves as the subject matter thereof Secondly hereby they that were active in throwing them down may be brought to take a little more into their consideration then possibly they have yet done upon what grounds they were thereunto moved and how sound those grounds were that if it shall appear they were then in an Error and they consider withall what disorder confusion and libertinisme hath ensued upon that change they may be sensible of it and amend But Thirdly whatsoever become of the Ceremonies which are mutable things the two Doctrines insisted on concerning them the one touching the Power that Governors have to enjoyn them the other touching the Duty that lyeth upon Inferiours to observe them when they are enjoyned being Truths are therefore alwayes the same and change not It is no absurdity even at mid-winter when there is never a flower upon the bough to say yet Rosa est flos Lastly a time may come when either the same Ceremonies may be restored or others substituted in their rooms and then there may be use again of such reasons and answers as have been pleaded in their defense For I doubt not but those that shall from time to time have the power to order Ecclesiastical affairs if disorders or inconveniencies shall continue to grow after the rate and proportion they have done for some years past will see a necessity of reducing things into some better degree of Decency and Vniformity then now they are Which it is not imaginable how it should be done without some Constitutions to be made concerning Indifferent things to be used in the publick worship and some care had withall to see the Constitutions obeyed Otherwise the greatest part of the Nation will be exposed to the very great danger without the extraordinary mercy of God preventing of quite losing their Religion Look but upon many of our Gentry what they are already grown to from what they were within the compasse of a few years and then Ex pede Herculem by that guess what a few years more may do Do we not see some and those not a few that have strong natural parts but little sence of Religion turned little better then professed Atheists And othersome nor those a few that have good affections but weak and unsetled judgments or which is still but the same weakness an over-weening opinion of their own understandings either quite turned or upon the point of turning Papists These be sad things God knoweth and we all know not visibly imputable to any thing so much as to those distractions confusions and uncertainties that in point of Religion have broken in upon us since the late changes that have happened among us in Church-affairs What it will grow to in the end God onely knoweth I can but guesse § XXIII The Reverend Arch-Bishop Whitgift and the learned Hooker men of great judgment and famous in their times did long since foresee and accordingly declared their fear that if ever Puritanism should prevail among us it would soon draw in Anabaptism after it At this Cartwright and other the advocates for the Disciplinarian interest in those dayes seemed to take great offence as if those fears were rather pretended to derive an odium upon them then that there was otherwise any just cause for the same protesting ever their utter dislike of Anabaptism and how free they were from the least thought of introducing it But this was onely their own mistake or rather Jealousie For those godly men were neither so unadvised nor so uncharitable as to become Judges of other mens thoughts or intentions
of that service which we know to be due to God See secondly how we have dealt even with God himself It is the masters part to command not to serve yet have we against all reason and good order done our endevour to make him who is our Master become our slave Himself complaineth of it by his Prophet I have not caused thee to serve with an offering and wearied thee with incense but thou hast made me to serve with thy sins and wearied me with thine iniquities Esay 43. Now what can be imagined more preposterous and unequal then for a servant to make his master do him service and himself the while resolve to do his master none See thirdly what Christ hath done for us though he were the Eternal Son of the Eternal God no way inferiour to the Father no way bound to us yet out of his free love to us and for our good he took upon him the form of a servant and was among us as one that ministreth That love of his should in all equity and thankfulnesse yet further binde us to answer his so great love by making our selves servants unto him who thus made himself a servant for us Thus both in point of right and equity the service of God is a just service It is secondly the most necessary service Necessary first because we are servi-nati of a servile condition born to serve We have not the liberty to chuse whether we will serve or no all the liberty we have is to chuse our master as Ioshua said to the people Chuse you whom you will serve Since then there lieth upon us a necessity of serving it should be our wisdome to make a vertue of that necessity by making choice of a good master with his resolution there I and my house will serve the Lord. It is necessary secondly for our safety and security lest if we withdraw our service from him we perish justly in our rebellion according to that in the Prophet The nation and kingdome that will not serve thee shall perish It is necessary thirdly by our own voluntary act when we bound our selves by solemn vow and promise in the face of the open congregation at our Baptism to continue Christs faithful souldiers and servants unto our lives end Now the word is gone out of our lips we may not alter it nor after we have made a vow enquire what we have to do Thus the service of God is a necessary service It is thirdly which at the first hearing may seem a Paradox yet will appear upon farther consideration to be a most certain truth of all other the most easie service in regard both of the certainty of the employment and of the help we have towards the performance of it He that serveth many Masters or even but one if he be a fickle man he never knoweth the end of his work what he doth now anon he must undo and so Sisyphus-like he is ever doing and yet hath never done No man can serve two masters not serve them so as to please both scarse so as to please either And that is every mans case that is a slave to sin Tot Domini quot vitia Every lust calleth for his attendance yea and many times contrary lusts at once as when Ambition biddeth let flye and Covetousness cryeth as fast Hold whereby the poor man is infinitely distracted between a loathness to deny either and the impossibility of gratifying both Saint Paul therefore speaking of the state of the Saints before conversion expresseth it thus Tit. 3. We our selves also were sometimes foolish disobedient deceived serving divers lusts and pleasures and that diversity breedeth distraction But the servant of God is at a good certainty and knoweth before-hand both what his work must be and what his wages must be As is the Master himself so are his Commandements Yesterday and to day the same and for ever without variableness or so much as shadow of turning Brethren I write no new commandement unto you but the old commandement which ye had from the beginning 1 Ioh. 2. It is some ease to know certainly what we must do but much more to be assured of sufficient help for the doing of it If we were left to our selves for the doing of his will so as the yoak lay all upon our necks and the whole burden upon our shoulders our necks though their sinews were of iron would break under the yoak and our shoulders though their plates had the strength of brass would crack under the burden But our comfort is that as Saint Austin sometimes prayed da Domine quod jubes jube quod vis so he that setteth us on work strengtheneth us to do the work I can do all things through him that strengtheneth me Phil. 4. Nay rather himself doth the work in us Yet not I but the grace of God in me 1 Cor. 15. The Son of God putteth his neck in the yoak with us whereby it becometh his yoak as well as ours and that maketh it so easie to us and he putteth the shoulder under the burden with us whereby it becometh his burden as well as ours and that maketh it so light to us Take my yoak upon you for my yoak is easie and my burden light Iuvat idem qui jubet What he commandeth us to do he helpeth us to do and thence it is that his Commandements are not grievous Thus the service of God is an easie service It is fourthly the most honourable service Caeteris paribus he goeth for the better man that serveth the better Master And if men of good rank and birth think it an honour for them and a thing worthy their ambition to be the Kings servants because he is the best and greatest Master upon earth how much more then is it an honourable thing and to be desired with our utmost ambitions to be the servants of God who is Optimus Maximus and that without either flattery or limitation the best and greatest Master and in comparison of whom the best and greatest Kings are but as worms and grashoppers It is a great glory to follow the Lord saith the son of Sirac Sirac 23. And the more truly any man serveth him the more still will it be for his own honour For them that honour me I will honour saith God 1 Sam. 2. and Christ Ioh. 12. If any man serve me him will my Father honour Thus the service of God is an honourable service It is lastly and fifthly the most profitable service We are indeed unprofitable servants to him but sure we have a very profitable service under him They that speak against the Lord with stout words saying It is vain to serve God and what profit is it that we have kept his Ordinances Mal. 3. or as it is in Iob 21. What is the
him His damnation is just We have the very case almost in terminis laid down and thus resolved in 2 Pet. 3. In which are some things hard to be understood observe the condition of the things hard to be understood which they that are unlearned and unstable observe also the condition of the persons unlearned and unstable wrest as they do also the other Scriptures to their own destruction Where we have the matter of great difficulty hard to be understood the persons of small sufficiency unlearned and unstable and yet if men even of that weakness wrest and pervert truths though of that hardnesse they do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to their own destruction saith Saint Peter there to their own just damnation saith S. Paul in my Text. This from the Censure in the first sense Take it in the other sense with reference to this ungodly resolution Let us do evil that good may come it teacheth us that no pretension of doing it in ordine ad Deum for Gods glory to a good end or any other colour whatsoever can excuse those that presume to do evil but that still the evil they do is damnable and it is but just with GOD to render damnation to them for it Whose damnation is just And thus understood it openeth us a way to the consideration of that main Principle whereof I spake and whereon by your patience I desire to spend the remainder of my time namely this We must not for any good do any evil For the farther opening and better understanding whereof since the rule is of infinite use in the whole practice of our lives that we may the better know when and where and how far to apply it aright for the direction of our Consciences and Actions we must of necessity unfold the extent of this word evil and consider the several kinds and degrees of it distinctly and apart We must not do evil that good may come First evil is of two sorts The evil of fault and the evil of punishment Malum delicti and Malum supplicii as Tertullian calleth them or as the more received terms are Malum Culpae and Malum Poenae The evil we commit against God and the evil God inflicteth upon us The evil we do unjustly but yet willingly and the evil we suffer unwillingly but yet justly In a word the evil of sin and the evil of pain Touching evils of pain if the Case be put when two such evils are propounded and both cannot be avoided whether we may not make choice of the one to avoid the other The resolution is common and good from the old Maxime E malis minimum we may incur the lesse to prevent the greater evil As we may deliver our purse to a Thief rather than fight upon unequal terms to save it and in a tempest cast our wares into the Sea to lighten the ship that it wreck not and indure the lancing and searching of an old sore to keep it from festering and spreading And this Principle in my Text is not a rule for that Case that being propounded concerning evils of pain whereas my Text is intended onely of the evils of sin We are herehence resolved that we are not to do any evil that good may come of it for all which yet we may suffer some evil that good may come of it Although to note that by the way the common answer è malis minimum even in the evils of pain is to be understood as most other practical conclusions are not as simply and universally but as commonly and ordinarily true For as one saith well perhaps there are Cases wherein two evils of Pain being at once propounded it may not be safe for us to be our own carvers But I must let passe the Questions concerning the evils of Pain as impertinencies The evils of sin are of two sorts Some are evil formally simply and per se such as are directly against the scope and purpose of some of Gods Commandements as Atheism against the first Idolatry against the second and so against the rest Blasphemy Profanenesse Disloyalty Cruelty Adultery Injustice Calumny Avarice and the like all which are evil in their own nature and can never positis quibuscunque circumstantiis be done well Othersome are evil onely respectively and by accident but otherwise in their own nature indifferent and such as may be and are done sometimes well sometimes ill To know the nature of which things the better since they are of singular use for the resolution of many Cases of Conscience we must yet more distinctly inquire into the different kinds or rather degrees of indifferent things and into the different means whereby things otherwise in nature indifferent become accidentally evil for their use Indifferent things are either equally or unequally such We may call them for distinctions sake and I think it not altogether unfitly indifferentia ad utrumlibet and indifferentia ad unum Indifferentia ad utrumlibet or equally indifferent things are such as barely considered are arbitrary either way and hang in aequilibrio between good and evil without turning the Scale either one way or other as not having any notable inclination or propension unto either rather than other as to drink fasting to walk into the fields or to lift up ones hand unto his head c. Now concerning such things as these if any man should be so scrupulous as to make a matter of conscience of them and should desire to be resolved in point of Conscience whether they were good or evil as namely whether he should do well or ill to walk abroad into the fields a mile or two with his friend the thing it self is so equally indifferent that it were resolution enough to leave it in medio and to answer him there were neither good nor hurt in it the Action of walking barely considered being not considerably either morally good or morally evil I say morally for in matter of health or civility or otherwise it may be good or evil but not morally and spiritually and in matter of conscience And I say withall barely considered for there may be circumstances which may make it accidentally evil As to walk abroad in the fields when a man should be at Divine service in the Church is by accident morally evil through the circumstance of Time as on the contrary not to walk if we have promised to meet a friend at such a time and in such a place who standeth in need of our present help is by accident morally evil through the obligation of that former promise But yet still these and other circumstances set aside barely to walk or barely not to walk and the like are Indifferentia ad utrumlibet things in their own nature and that equally indifferent Things unequally indifferent are such as though they be neither universally good nor absolutely evil yet even barely considered sway more or less rather the one way than
for the reasons already shewn to let it passe as a collection impertinent and that I suppose is the worst that can be made of it There is a second acception of the word Faith put either for the whole systeme of that truth which God hath been pleased to reveale to his Church in the Scriptures of the old and new Testament or some part thereof or else 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the assent of the mind thereunto In which signification some conceiving the words of this Text to be meant do hence inferre a false and dangerous conclusion which yet they would obtrude upon the Christian Church as an undoubted principle of truth that men are bound for every particular action they do to have direction and warrant from the written word of God or else they sinne in the doing of it For say they faith must be grounded upon the word of God Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God Rom. 10. Where there is no Word then there can be no Faith and then by the Apostles doctrine that which is done without the Word to warrant it must needs be sin for whatsoever is not of faith is sin This is their opinion and thus they would inferre it I know not any piece of counterfeit doctrine that hath passed so currently in the world with so little suspicion of falshood and so little open contradiction as this hath done One chief cause whereof I conjecture to be for that it seemeth to make very much for the honour and perfection of Gods sacred Law the fulnesse and sufficiency whereof none in the Christian Church but Papists or Atheists will deny In which respect the very questioning of it now will perhaps seem a strange novelty to many and occasion their miscensures But as God himself so the Holy Word of God is so full of all requisite perfection that it needeth not to begge honour from an untruth Will you speak wickedly for God or talk deceitfully for him I hold it very needfull therefore both for the vindicating of my Text from a common abuse and for the arming of all my brethren as well of the Clergy as Laity against a common and plausible errour that neither they teach it nor these receive it briefly and clearly to shew that the aforesaid opinion in such sort as some have proposed it and many have understood it for it is capable of a good interpretation wherein it may be allowed first is utterly devoid of truth and secondly draweth after it many dangerous consequents and evil effects and Thirdly hath no good warrant from my present Text. The Opinion is that to do any thing at all without direction from the Scripture is unlawfull and sinfull Which if they would understand onely of the substantials of Gods worship and of the exercises of spirituall and supernaturall graces the assertion were true and sound but as they extend it to all the actions of common life whatsoever whether naturall or civil even so farre as to the taking up of a straw so it is altogether false and indefensible I marvell what warrant they that so teach have from the Scripture for that very doctrine or where they are commanded so to believe or teach One of their chiefest refuges is the Text we now have in hand but I shall anon drive them from this shelter The other places usually alleaged speak onely either of divine and supernaturall truths to be believed or else of workes of grace or worship to be performed as of necessity unto salvation which is not to the point in issue For it is freely confessed that in things of such nature the Holy Scripture is and so we are to account it a most absolute and sufficient direction Upon which ground we heartily reject all humane traditions devised and intended as supplements to the doctrine of faith contained in the Bible and annexed as Codicils to the holy Testament of Christ for to supply the defects thereof The question is wholly about things in their nature indifferent such as are the use of our food raiment and the like about which the common actions of life are chiefly conversant Whether in the choice and use of such things we may not be sometimes sufficiently guided by the light of reason and the common rules of discretion but that we must be able and are so bound to do or else we sinne for every thing we do in such matters to deduce our warrant from some place or other oâ— Scripture Before the Scriptures were written it pleased GOD by visions and dreames and other like revelations immediately to make known his good pleasure to the Patriarches and Prophets and by them unto the people which kind of Revelations served them to all the same intents and purposes whereto the sacred Scriptures now do us viz. to instruct them what they should believe and do for his better service and the furtherance of their own salvations Now as it were unreasonable for any may to think that they either had or did expect an immediate revelation from God every time they ate or drank or bought or sold or did any other of the common actions of life for the warranting of each of those particular actions to their consciences no lesse unreasonable it is to think that we should now expect the like warrant from the Scriptures for the doing of the like actions Without all doubt the Law of nature and the light of reason was the rule whereby they were guided for the most part in such matters which the wisdome of God would never have left in them or us as a principall relike of his decayed image in us if he had not meant that we should make use of it for the direction of our lives and actions thereby Certainly God never infused any power into any creature whereof he intended not some use Else what shall we say of the Indies and other barbarous nations to whom God never vouchsafed the lively oracles of his written word Must we think that they were left a lawlesse people without any Rule at all whereby to order their actions How then come they to be guilty of transgression for where there is no Law there can be no transgression Or how cometh it about that their consciâ—nces should at any time or in any case either accuse them or excuse them if they had no guide nor rule to walk by But if we must grant they had a Rule and there is no way you see but grant it we must then we must also of necessity grant that there is some other Rule for humane actions besides the written word for that we presupposed these nations to have wanted Which Rule what other could it be then the Law of Nature and of right reason imprinted in their hearts Which is as truly the Law and Word of God as is that which is printed in our Bibles So long as our actions are warranted either by the
serpentis the spawn of the old Serpent children of their father the Devil And they do not shame the store they come of for the works of their Father they readily do That Hellish Aphorisme they so faithfully practise is one of his Principles it was he first instilled it into them Calumniare fortiter aliquid adhaerebit Smite with the tongue and be sure to smite home and then be sure either the grief or the blemish of the stroke will stick by it A Devillish practise hateful both to God and Man And that most justly whether we consider the sin or the injury or the mischief of it the Sin in the Doer the Injury to the Sufferer the Mischief to the Common-wealth Every false report raised in judgement besides that it is a lye and every lye is a sin against the truth slaying the soul of him that maketh it and excluding him from heaven and binding him over unto the second death it is also a pernicious lye and that is the worst sort of lyes and so a sin both against Charity and Iustice. Which who so committeth let him never look to dwell in the Tabernacle of God or to rest upon his holy Mountain GOD having threatned Ps. 50. to take speciall knowledge of this sin though he seem for a time to dissemble it yet at lest to reprove the bold offender to his face Thou satest and spakest against thy brother yea and hast slandered thine own mothers son These things hast thou done and I held my tongue thou thoughtest wickedly that I was even such an one as thy self but I will reprove thee and set before thee the things that thou hast done And as for the Injury done hereby to the grieved party it is incomparable If a man have his house broken or his purse taken from him by the high way or sustain any wrong or losse in his person goods or state otherwise by fraud or violence or casualty he may possibly either by good fortune hear of his own again and recover it or he may have restitution and satisfaction made him by those that wronged him or by his good industry and providence he may live to see that losse repaired and be in as good state as before But he that hath his Name and Credite and Reputation causlesly called into question sustaineth a losse by so much greater then any theft by how much a good name is better than great riches A man may out-weare other injuries or out-live them but a defamed person no acquittall from the Iudge no satisfaction from the Accuser no following endeavours in himself can so restore in integrum but that when the wound is healed he shall yet carry the markes and the scarres of it to his dying day Great also are the mischiefs that hence redound to the common-wealth When no innocency can protect an honest quiet man but every busie base fellow that oweth him a spite shall be able to fetch him into the Courts draw him from the necessary charge of his family and duties of his calling to an unnecessary expence of money and time torture him with endlesse delayes and expose him to the pillage of every hungry Officer It is one of the grievances God had against Jerusalem and as he calleth them abominations for which he threatneth to judge her Ezek. 22. Viri detractores in te In thee are men that carry tales to shed blood Beware then all you whose businesse or lot it is at this Assises or hereafter may be to be Plaintiffs Accusers Informers or any way Parties in any Court of Justice this or other Civil or Ecclesiasticall that you suffer not the guilt of this prohibition to cleave unto your Consciences If you shall hereafter be raisers of false reports the words you have heard this day shall make you inexcusable another You are by what hath been presently spoken disabled everlastingly from pleading any Ignorance either Facti or Iuris as having been instructed both what it is and how great a fault it is to raise a false report Resolve therefore if you be free never to enter into any action or suite wherein you cannot proceed with comfort nor come off without injustice or if already engaged to make as good and speedy an end as you can of a bad matter and to desist from farther prosecution Let that golden rule commended by the wisest heathens as a fundamentall Principle of morall and civill Iustice yea and proposed by our blessed Saviour himself as a full abridgement of the Law and Prophets be ever in your eye and ever before your thoughts to measure out all your actions and accusations and proceedings thereby even to do so to other men and no otherwise then as you could be content or in right reason should be content they should do to you and yours if their case were yours Could any of you take it well at your neighbours hand should he seek your life or livelyhood by suggesting against you things which you never had so much as the thought to do or bring you into a peck of troubles by wresting your words and actions wherein you meant nothing but well to a dangerous construction or follow the Law upon you as if he would not leave you worth a groate for every petty trespasse scarce worth half the money or fetch you over the hippe upon a branch of some blind uncouth and pretermitted Statute He that should deal thus with you and yours I know what would be said and thought Griper Knave Villain Divel incarnate all this and much more would be too little for him Well I say no more but this Quod tibi fieri non vis c. Doe as you would be done to There is your generall Rule But for more particular direction if any man desire it since in every evil one good step to soundnesse is to have discovered the right cause thereof I know not what better course to prescribe for the preventing of this sinne of sycophancy and false accusation then for every man carefully to avoid the inducing causes thereof and the occasions of those causes There are God knoweth in this present wicked world to every kind of evil inducements but too too many To this of false accusation therefore it is not unlikely but there may be more yet we may observe that there are four things which are the most ordinary and frequent causes thereof viz. Malice Obsequiousnesse Coverture and Covetousnesse The first is Malice Which in some men if I may be allowed to call them men being indeed rather Monsters is universall They love no body glad when they can do any man any mischief in any matter never at so good quiet as when they are most unquiet It seemeth David met with some such men that were enemies to peace when he spake to them of peace they made themselves ready to battell Take one of these men it is meat and drink
findeth himself hot in his body and fain he would know whether it be Calor praeter naturam or no whether a kindly and naturall heat or else the fore-runner or symptome of some disease There is no better way to come to that knowledge than by these two Notes Universality and Constancy First for Vniversality Physicians say of heat and sweat and such like things Vniversalia salutaria partialia ex morbo If a man be hot in one part and cold in another as if the palms of his hands burn and the soles of his feet be cold then all is not right but if he be of an indifferent equal heat all over that is held a good sign of health Then for Constancy and Lasting if the heat come by fits and starts and paroxysms leaping eftsoones and suddenly out of one extreme into another so as the party one while gloweth as hot as fire another while is chill and cold as ice and keepeth not at any certain stay that is an ill sign too and it is to be feared there is an Ague either bred or in breeding but if he continue at some reasonable certainty and with in a good mediocrity of heat and cold it is thought a good sign of health As men judge of the state of their bodies by the like rule judge thou of the state of thy soul. First for integrity and universality Is thy Repentance thy Obedience thy Zeal thy Hatred of sin other graces in thee Vniversal equally bent upon all good equally set against all evill things it is a good sign of Grace and Sanctification in the heart But if thou repentest of one sin and persistest in another if thou obeyest one commandement and breakest another if thou art zealous in one point and cool in another if thou hatest one vice and lovest another flatter not thy self too much thou hast reason to suspect all is not sound within Then for Continuance and Lasting I deny not but in case of prevailing temptations the godly may have sometimes uncomfortable and fearfull intermissions in the practice of godlinesse which yet make him not altogether Gracelesse as a man may have sometimes little distempers in his body through mis-dyet or otherwise and yet not be heart-sick or greater distempers too sometimes to make him sick and yet be heart-whole But yet if for the most part and in the ordinary constant course of thy life thou hast the practice of repentance and obedience and other fruits of grace in some good comfortable measure it is a good sign of Grace and Sanctification in the heart But if thou hast these things only by fits and starts and sudden moods and art sometimes violently hot upon them other sometimes again and oftner key cold presume not too much upon shewes but suspect thy self still of Hypocrisie and Insincerity and never cease by repentance and prayer and the constant exercise of other good graces to Physick and Dyet thy soul till thou hast by Gods goodness put thy self into some reasonable assurance that thou art the true child of God a sincere believer and not an Hypocrite as Ahab here notwithstanding all this his solemn humiliation was Here is Ahab an Hypocrite and yet humbled before the Lord. But yet now this humiliation such as it was what should work it in him That we find declared at verse 27. And it came to passe that when Ahab heard these words c. There came to him a message from God by the hand of Eliah and that was it that humbled him Alas what was Eliah to Ahab a silly plain Prophet to a mighty King that he durst thus presume to rush boldly and unsent-for into the presence of such a potent Monarch who had no lesse power and withall more colour to take away his life than Naboth's and that when he was in the top of his jollity solacing himself in the new-taken possession of his new-gotten Vineyard and there to his face charge him plainly with and shake him up roundly for and denounce Gods judgements powerfully against his bloudy abominable oppressions We would think a Monarch nusled up in Idolatry and accustomed to bloud and hardened in Sinne and Obstinacy should not have brooked that insolency from such a one as Eliah was but have made his life a ransome for his sawcinesse And yet behold the words of this underling in comparison how they fall like thunder upon the great guilty offender and strike palsie into his knees and trembling into his joynts and tumble him from the height of his jollity and roll him in sack-cloth and ashes and cast him into a strong fit of legal humiliation Seest thou how Ahab is humbled before me And here now cometh in our second Observation even the power of Gods word over the Consciences of obstinate sinners powerfull to Cast down strong holds and every high thought that exalteth it self against God That which in Heb. 4. if I mistake not the true understanding of that place is spoken of the Essential word of God the second Person in the ever-blessed Trinity is also in some analogie true of the revealed word of God the Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles that it is Quick and powerfull and more cutting than any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of the soul and spirit and of the joynts and marrow Is not my word like as a fire saith the Lord and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces Ierem. 23. Like a soft fire to dissolve and melt the hearts of relenting sinners and true converts but like a strong hammer to batter and break in pieces the rocky and flinty consciences of obstinate and hardened offenders Examples hereof if you require behold in the stories of the Kings Saul whining when Samuel reproveth him in the books of the Prophets the Ninivites drooping when Ionas threatneth them in the Acts of the Apostles Felix trembling when Paul discourseth before him in the Martyrologies of the Church Tyrants and bloudy Persecutors maskered at the bold confessions of the poor suffering Christians in this Chapter proud Ahab mourning when Eliah telleth him his sin and foretelleth him his punishment Effects which might justly seem strange to us if the Causes were not apparent One Cause and the Principal is in the instrument the Word not from any such strength in it self for so it is but a dead letter but because of Gods Ordinance in it For in his hands are the hearts and the tongues and the eares both of Kings and Prophets and he can easily when he seeth it good put the spirit of zeal and of power into the heart of the poorest Prophet and as easily the spirit of fear and of terrour into the heart of the greatest King He chooseth weak Instruments as here Eliah and yet furnisheth them with power to effect great matters that so the glory might not rest upon the instrument but redound wholly to him
wrong way These would be fairly checkt turned into the right way and guided with a steddy and skilfull hand A third sort and I think the greatest through unsetledness or discontentedness or other untoward humour walk not soberly and uprightly and orderly in their Calling like an unruly Colt that will over hedge and ditch no ground will hold him no fence turn him These would be well fettered and side-hanckled for leaping The first sort are to be taught the Necessity of a Calling the second to be directed for the Choice of their Calling the third to be bounded and limited in the Exercise of their Calling Of which three in their order and of the First first the Necessity of a calling The Scriptures speak of two kinds of Vocations or Callings the one ad Foedus the other ad Munus The usual known terms are the General and the Particular Calling Vocatio ad Foedus or the General Calling is that wherewith God calleth us either outwardly in the ministery of his Word or inwardly by the efficacy of his Spirit or joyntly by both to the faith and obedience of the Gospel and to the embracing of the Covenant of grace and of mercy and salvation by Iesus Christ. Which is therefore termed the General Calling not for that it is of larger extent than the other but because the thing whereunto we are thus called is one and the same and common to all that are called The same duties and the same promises and every way the same conditions Here is no difference in regard of Persons but One Lord one Faith one baptism one body and one spirit even as we are all called in one hope of our Calling That 's the General Calling Vocatio ad Munus Our Particular Calling is that wherewith GOD enableth us and directeth us and putteth us on to some special course and condition of life wherein to employ our selves and to exercise the gifts he hath bestowed upon us to his glory and the benefit of our selves and others And it is therefore termed a Particular Calling not as if it concerned not all in general for we shall prove the contrary anon but because the thing whereunto men are thus called is not one and the same to all but differenced with much variety according to the quality of particular persons Alius sic alius vero sic Every man hath his proper gift of God one man on this manner another on that Here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some called to be Magistrates some Ministers some Merchants some Artificers some one thing some another as to their particular Callings But as to the General Calling there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the common Salvation all called to the same State of being the servants and children of God all called to the performance of the same duties of servants and to the expectation of the same inheritance of children all called to be Christians Of both which Callings the General and Particular there is not I take it any where in Scripture mention made so expresly and together as in this passage of our Apostle especially at the 20 ver Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called Where besides the matter the Apostles elegancy is observable in using the same word in both significations the Noun signifying the Particular and the Verb the General Calling Let every one abide in the same calling wherein he was called bearing sense as if the Apostle had said Let every man abide in the same Particular Calling wherein he stood at the time of his General Calling And the same and no other is the meaning of the words of my Text. Whence it appeareth that the Calling my Text implyeth and wherein every man is here exhorted to abide is to be understood of the Particular and not of the General Calling And of this Particular Calling it is we now intend to speak And that in the more Proper and restrained signification of it as it importeth some setled course of life with reference to business office and imployment accordingly as we say a man is called to be a Minister called to be a Lawyer called to be a Tradesman and the like Although I cannot be ignorant that our Apostle as the stream of his argument caryed him here taketh the word in a much wider extent as including not only such special courses of life as refer to imployment but even all outward personal states and conditions of men whatsoever whether they have such reference or no as we may say a man is called to Marriage or to single life called to riches or poverty and the like But omitting this larger signification we will hold our selves either only or principally to the former and by Calling understand a special setled course of life wherein mainly to employ a mans gifts and time for his own and the common good The Necessity whereof whilst we mention you are to imagine not an absolute and positive but a conditional and suppositive necessity Not as if no man could be without one de facto dayly experience in these dissolute times manifesteth the contrary but because de jure no man should be without one This kind of Calling is indeed necessary for all men But how Not as a necessary thing ratione termini so as the want thereof would be an absolute impossibility but virtute praecepti as a necessary duty the neglect whereof would be a grievous and sinfull enormity He that will doe that which he ought and is in conscience bound to doe must of necessitity live in some calling or other That is it we mean by the Necessity of a Calling And this Necessity we are now to prove And that First from the Obedience we owe to every of Gods Ordinances and the account we must render for every of Gods Gifts Amongst those Ordinances this is one and one of the first that in the sweat of our faces every man of us should eat our bread Gen. 3. The force of which precept let none think to avoid by a quirk that forsooth it was layed upon Adam after his transgression rather as a Curse which he must endure than as a Duty which he should perform For first as some of Gods Curses such is his goodness are promises as well as Curses as is that of the Enmity between the Womans seed and the Serpents so some of Gods Curses such is his Iustice are Precepts as well as Curses as is that of the Womans subjection to the Man This of eating our bread in the sweat of our face is all the three it is a Curse it is a Promise it is a Precept It is as Curse in that God will not suffer the earth to afford us bread without our sweat It is a promise in that God assureth us we shall have bread for our sweat And it is a Precept too in that God enjoyneth us if we will have bread to
decree He spake the word and they were made he commanded and they were Created So in all their operations in actu secundo when they do at any time exercise those natural faculties and doe those Offices for which they were created all this is still done by the same powerfull word and decree of God He upholdeth all things by the word of his power As we read of bread so we often read in the Scriptures of the staff of bread God sometimes threatneth he will break the staff of bread What is that Bread indeed is the staff of our strength it is the very stay and prop of our lives if God break this staff and deny us bread we are gone But that is not all bread is our staff but what is the staff of bread Verily the Word of God blessing our bread and commanding it to feed us is the staff of this staff sustaining that vertue in the bread whereby it sustaineth us If God break this staff of bread if he withdraw his blessing from the bread if by his countermaund he inhibit or restrain the vertue of the bread we are as far to seek with bread as without it If sanctified with Gods word of blessing a little pulse and water hard and homely fare shall feed Daniel as fresh and fat and fair as the Kings dainties shall his Companions a cake and a cruse of water shall suffice Eliah nourishment enough to walk in the strength thereof forty daies and nights a few barly loaves and small fishes shall multiply to the satisfying of many thousands eat while they will But if Gods Word and Blessing be wanting the lean Kine may eat up the Fat and be as thin and hollow and ill-liking as before and we may as the Prophet Haggai speaketh eat much and not have enough drink our fills and not be filled This first degree of the Creatures sanctification by the word of God is a common and ordinary blessing upon the Creatures whereof as of the light and dew of Heaven the wicked partake as well as the godly and the thankless as the thankfull But there is a second degree also beyond this which is proper and peculiar to the Godly And that is when God not only by the word of his Power bestoweth a blessing upon the Creature but also causeth the Echo of that word to sound in our hearts by the voyce of his Holy spirit and giveth us a sensible taste of his goodness to us therein filling our hearts not only with that joy and gladness which ariseth from the experience of the effect viz. the refreshing of our natural strength but also joy and gladness more spiritual and sublime than that arising from the contemplation of the prime cause viz. the favour of God towards us in the face of his Son that which David calleth the light of his countenance For as it is the kind welcome at a Friends Table that maketh the chear good rather than the quaintness or variety of the dishes Super omnia vultus Accessere boni so as that a dinner of green herbs with love and kindness is better entertainment than a stalled Oxe with bad looks so the light of Gods favourable countenance shining upon us through these things is it which putteth more true gladness into our hearts than doth the corn and the wine and the oyle themselves or any other outward thing that we do or can partake Now this sanctified and holy and comfortable use of the Creatures ariseth also from the word of Gods decree even as the former degree did but not from the same decree That former issued from the decree of common providence and so belonged unto all as that Providence is common to all But this later degree proceedeth from that special word of Gods decree whereby for the merits of Christ Jesus the second Adam he removeth from the Creature that curse wherin it was wrapped through the sin of the first Adam And in this the wicked have no portion as being out of Christ so as they cannot partake of Gods Creatures with any solid or sound comfort and so the Creatures remain in this degree unsanctified unto them For this reason the Scriptures stile the Faithfull Primogenitos the first born as to whom belongeth a double portion and Haeredes mundi heirs of the world as if none but they had any good right thereunto And S. Paul deriveth our Title to the Creatures from God but by Christ All things are yours and you are Christs and Christ is Gods As if these things were none of theirs who are none of Christs And in the verse before my Text he saith of meats that God hath created them to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth as if those that wanted faith and saving knowledge did but usurp the bread they eat And indeed it is certain the wicked have not right to the Creatures of God in such ample sort as the Godly have A kind of Right they have and we may not deny it them given them by Gods unchangeable ordinance at the Creation which being a branch of that part of Gods Image in man which was of natural and not of supernatural grace might be and was foulely defaced by sin but was not neither could be wholly lost as hath been already in part declared A Right then they have but such a right as reaching barely to the use cannot afford unto the user true comfort or found peace of Conscience in such use of the Creatures For though nothing be in and of it self unclean for Every Creature of God is good yet to them that are unclean ex accidenti every Creature is unclean and polluted because it is not thus sanctified unto them by the Word of God And the very true cause of all this is the impurity of their hearts by reason of unbelief The Holy Ghost expresly assigneth this cause To the pure all things are pure but to them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure but even their mind and Conscience is defiled As a nasty Vessel sowreth all that is put into it so a Conscience not purified by faith casteth pollution upon the best of Gods Creatures But what is all this to the Text may some say or what to the point What is all this to the Duty of Thanksgiving Much every manner of way or else blame Saint Paul of impertinency whose discourse should be incoherent and unjoynted if what I have now last said were beside the Text. For since the sanctification of the Creature to our use dependeth upon the powerfull and good word of God blessing it unto us that duty must needs be necessary to a sanctified use of the Creature without which we can have no fair assurance unto our consciences that that word of blessing is proceeded out of the mouth of God