Christian such a State I say as the Resurrection from Death Then it is worth our pains to try our selves whether we be in that state or no. We have seen many Easter-Mornings God be praised but if the Sun of Righteousness hath not yet risen upon us with healing in his Wings all those solemnizations of the Resurrection of Christs Body from the grave is but Death and Darkness unto us is no Health no Light nor Life It was the manner of Primitive Christians to salute one another with this Salutation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord is risen If we could this Easter-Sunday and every Lords-day make such Salutations as this in the very Spiritual Truth The Lord is risen That is is risen from Death in our Souls and we by him become enlivened to all Righteousness O what Mutual Rejoycing and true Spiritual Triumph would there be in the Church of God! Verily Beloved if you partake not of the Mysteries of Christianity in the Spirit and Truth of them as well as in the History and Ceremony your Profession is but vain you are still in your Sins and dismal Sentence of Damnation remaineth still upon you DISCOURSE XVI Appendix to DISCOURSE XIII 1 PET. 1. 22 23. Seeing ye have purified your Souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren See that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever I Have already insisted upon the Doctrines or Truths which are as so many enforcements to the great Duty in the Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That which may be observed out of this Precept is a fourfold Doctrine 1. That we are to love one another 2. That we are to love one another out of a pure Heart 3. That we are to love one another fervently 4. That we are to love one another universally and continually The First of these I have done with I come now to Doct. II. That we are to love one another out of a pure Heart This Purity may be set out in these three Constitutives or at least Consecutives of Love viz. Complacentia Benevolentia Beneficentia 1. The Purity of Complacency consists in this that we love and like that of a man that is the adequate object of honest Love and that is Divine Beauty which is not in the Body but in the Soul adorn'd with all Moral and Divine Vertues He that loves not according to this in a man he loves after the same manner he may love an horse a dog or any beast that is fitted for the satisfying of his natural or extravagant humours For if there be no ground of right Friendship but Vertue then is there no Love in vain and leud men but after the manner of Brutes that is eating together as Sheep and Kine in one pasture or sporting together like young Greyhounds at their going out into the fields or better natur'd Spaniels or such like fond Animals I but the gaudes of Phansie and queint toyes of Wit or at least the subtilty thereof Art and accomplishment of the Intellectual parts these all of them put together at least may make up an object of Complacency and friendly delight Verily as much as a well proportioned Body clear Complexion a vigorous Eye gentle Deportment c. which are so far from that living object of Pure Love that by the same Law we may join Friendship with a well wrought Statue or some more curious Picture Complacency in any person saving for Vertues sake is as far removed from pure and Divine Love as the affections of Xerxes Glauca the Youth of Athens and that others of Sparta who loved trees statues rams geese c. were distant from Natural Vid. AElian lib. 1. cap. 39. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And as ridiculous and absurd will their Love prove in respect of that more pure and holy affection that can take Complacency in the person of men that have but the outward accomplishment of parts and abilities or outward artifice or natural well-favouredness their Souls being dead to Vertue and Righteousness For beside that these are as helpless to the best things as a dumb statue or a dead picture they are also very dangerous for either hindering the first shooting out of divine worth in the Soul of man or for corrupting and destroying what already is grown up of Vertue and Goodness For so it is with man that so soon as he is capable of Vertue he must either have it or the contrary Mans Nature is no barren Soil it brings forth or good grain or stinking weeds And where once corruption has taken hold it is even worse than a Gangrene it catches hold on the companion and is the very pest of the Souls of men But if the Love and Complacency of those be not pure that can love notwithstanding the foulness of their friends what pollution is there in theirs that can love for foulness it self viz. whose society pleaseth one another for some bad quality as for being a vain Gamester Swearer for their Lasciviousness or that delicious condiment of Friendship good Fellowship which some loving Souls are so taken with When as it s nothing but the similitude of their evil manners or equality of their enlarged bellies do thus joyn their affections Fellow-wine-bottles of the same size or Ale-tap-urinals c. And as this Impurity in Love is Bestial so there is also that is Devilish as when men like one another the better for being alike imbittered against this or the other party Such complyance as this is but like the twining together of Snakes and venomous Serpents in one bed A Paradox That that which is the most ugly of all the affections viz. embittering Malice and Hatred should make men so amiable one to another Thus Hags and Imps love one another And there is a knot of Friendship that is as Fond at least as this is Devilish viz. endearment from Identity of opinion Fellow-Thomist Fellow-Scotist c. And when it riseth no higher than Scholastick siding or Philosophical altercations it is not much worse than fondness or childishness But when this unskillful affection interweaves it self with matters of Religion and toucheth upon the Attributes actions or designs of the highest God where men are very loth to be deceiv'd though no where more subject to err Fondness is then too mild a term for that which is boil'd up to Fury and Fanaticalness For here men of the same Sect are not content with the pleasure and good-will they exhibit one to another but they grow to that heat as to scorch all gainsayers as well as warm themselves at these misguided flames God forbid that I should go about to slack any mans affection in the pursuit and profession of Divine Truth such as is plainly contained in the Scripture or evidenced by palpable experience in his heart But that which is but
neck and wept and Benjamin wept upon his neck Moreover he kissed all his brethren and wept upon them Gen. 45. 14. 15. And thus in Acts 20. 37 38. They all wept sore and fell on Pauls neck and kissed him Sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake that they should see his face no more But no Story in all the New Testament at least is of that sadness and solemnity as the preparation to the raising up of dead Lazarus Women Men nay God himself as in the flesh all melted together into one Sorrow Iesus wept Nor is this so much a torture as a pleasure to the Mind sweetly melting in kindly motion and gentle ruth for any mishap that befalls her tender care and charge the several parts of the Creation of God This is so far from being a blemish to the condition of Holy and Divine men that it is even a member and branch of that condition that makes them Holy and Divine which is their abiding in Love i. e. in God whence we become Dei-formes Now the due and safe measure of those degrees of fervency in our Mutual Love is The love of our own selves Thou shall love thy Neighbour as thy self and none is coldly affected to himself And that which is to limit our Love to our selves is to bound our Affection to our Neighbour and that is Discretion and Iustice. For if we may not do any thing unjustly in our own behalf nor Reason nor Scripture can warrant us to adventure on any unjust enterprise in the behalf of our Neighbour Now let us see what this plain and familiar measure will amount to which indeed is little less than what was intimated before For though we love our Neighbour no better than we love our selves and that within the bounds of Justice and sound Reason yet we loving our selves so much and so affectionately as we do it must follow that all that Joy Grief Pleasure Displeasure Hope Fear Care Labour Valour and whatever else we can bestow upon our selves in our own behalfes that when occasion requires we confer it all upon our Neighbour This will enable us to profess with S. Paul 2 Cor. 11. 29. Who is weak and I am not weak What is offended and I burn not And to make good his Precept Rom. 12. 15. Rejoyce with them that rejoyce and weep with them that weep To bear others burdens to wax pale with other mens fears to grow lean with their cares It will harness us with Courage as it did Abraham for Lot It will make a man though not desire yet not care to dye for his Brother For its plain his Affection being equal to both he must be indifferent whether shall taste of that bitter Cup. Object If we love every one equally with our selves then must we love all men equally Which is thus demonstrated for the Love whereby one loves every man being each of them equal to that one Love whereby one loves himself they must be all equal to one another from the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Euclid Sol. I Answer That our Love of Complacency is not equally to be distributed to all What then shall our Love of Benevolence Shall I bear as much good-will and therefore do as much good and owe as much service to Thersites as Achilles Shimei as David Nabal as Abigail Verily no. But as God loves himself best not because it is himself but because there is nothing better than himself so we certainly are to love all things according to the several degrees of participation of the Excellencies of the Divine Nature As they that contribute to one common stock though by unequal contributions suppose some one contributing a third part another a seventh part a third a tenth though they partake of the gains but according to this proportion the distribution is said to be just and equal there being indeed a similitude or equality of proportion tho' the shares of gains that every Adventurer has are not equal for it were unequal that they should be so So though the shares and portions of our Love to others be not equal nor ought so to be yet the proportions of our Love may and ought to be equal and that is if our Love flow out according to the several degrees of Divine Excellency in every Person And thus its true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. of Geometrical Equality Object But you will still urge my Love to my self being one single term of Quantity to which my Love to every one is to be equal proves plainly that all these Loves are Arithmetically equal one with another as 2 and 2 are equal to one another Sol. To dispatch all in a Word When we are pointed to the love of our selves as a right measure of our love to our Neighbour it must be understood thus That we are to love our Neighbour of this or that Rank and Qualification in such sort as we would love our selves if we were in that Rank and Qualification and do the same to our Neighbour of this condition that we should expect from others if we were of that condition as suppose a Prince a Noble a Wise man an Honest sincere man a man of unparallell'd Accomplishments In these cases what Love and Respect we would look for if we were such though we be not such yet are we bound to give it to those that are such And thus it will come about that we are obliged to love some better than our selves viz. such as have more Divine Accomplishments in them Thus in 2 Sam. 18. 3. The People said to David Thou art worth ten thousand of us And this obligement to love some better than our selves arises from that general Rule of all That we are bound to love every one according to the proportion of Divine worth in them Whence it must also follow That we are to love othersome less than our selves if we do palpably and infallibly discover in our selves more Divine Accomplishments and more excellent Endowments than in others AND thus we come to the last Doctrine viz. Doct. IV. That we are to love one another universally and continually Vniversally So also 2. Pet. 1. 7. where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is universal Love And so 1. Thess. 3. 12. The Lord make you to increase and abound in love one towards another and towards all men And Chap. 5. 15. See that none render evil for evil unto any man but ever follow that which is good both among your selves and to all men We might add Testimonies out of Heathen Philosophers whose Examples may shame us who without any niceness place them many Stories below our selves Socrates had so little gall against the Judges his mortal Enemies who were no better to him than to tell him He should dye for it if they caught him Philosophizing and had so great Affection to the good of all that he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Meditations of M. Antoninus are full
DISCOURSES ON Several Texts OF SCRIPTURE BY The late Pious and Learned HENRY MORE D. D. LONDON Printed by I. R. and are to be Sold by Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons against the Royal Exchange in Cornhil 1692. THE PREFACE I Shall not bespeak the acceptance of these Papers by any large Encomium either of them or of the Author This would detain the Reader too long from the Benefit of them and indeed to little or no purpose For the Discourses will sufficiently speak for themselves without the artifice of any Commendatory Preface And as for the Author His Name is so well known and deservedly admired in the World upon the account of the many Elaborate Treatises which he Published in his Life-time that these his Posthumous Pieces may find a welcome Entertainment without any other Invitation The business therefore of this Preface is only to acquaint the Reader with some things which concern this Edition and this I shall do very briefly in the following Particulars 1. The First and chief thing which the Reader is to be acquainted with is the Authenticness of these Writings they being all of them Printed by the Authors own Copies except Discourse XII th and XIII th which were with some of the other transcribed from the Originals in the Authors Life-time by one whose Faithfulness and Exactness is evident in the rest and is not in the least to be doubted of in these 2. The next thing which I should tell the Reader is by whom these Papers were committed to my care and management in order to make them Publick But I am forbidden to name him and therefore I shall be silent as to this particular 3. But here it may not be unfit to tell the Reader in general That I have bestowed upon them all the care and pains which the shortness of time determined for the preparing of them for the Press would admit of And this is sufficient to satisfie any ingenuous Person Whereas to speak of all the toil and difficulties which I met with therein would be too tedious an exercise of the Readers Patience and piece of Vanity as burdensome to my self as to others 4. And Lastly As for any Defects therein or for the Errors which have escaped the Press they are such as neither the Authors Name will suffer by reason of them nor the Papers be less acceptable to a Candid and well-disposed Reader Thus much I thought fit to advertise the Reader of here concerning this Edition As for the Discourses themselves I shall leave it wholly to Him to observe the Stile and Matter of them Only this I would suggest That they are such as were prepared for no mean Auditory some of them being University-Sermons and the rest College-Exercises I will conclude this Preface with a short Prayer Which I wish the Reader may as seriously and devoutly put up as the Pious Author did before one of the following Discourses O Lord our God the Fountain of Light and the Well-spring of all holy Wisdom and Knowledge without whose aid our search after thee and thy ways is but tedious error and dangerous wandering from thee Assist us mercifully in our endeavours after thee Open our eyes that we may see the wonders of thy Law Sanctifie our hearts unto obedience that we may unfeignedly love thee and worthily magnifie the holy Name through Iesus Christ our Lord. Amen London Nov. 1. 1692. John Worthington THE TEXTS OF THE Following Discourses DISCOURSE I. 1 PET. II. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. p. 1. DISCOURSE II. PSAL. LXXXIV 7. They go from strength to strength every one of them appeareth before God in Sion p. 31 DISCOURSE III. MAT. VI. 22 23. The light of the Body is the Eye if therefore thine Eye be single thy whole Body shall be full of light But if thine Eye be evil thy whole Body shall be full of darkness If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness p. 60. DISCOURSE IV. PROV I. 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom p. 85. DISCOURSE V. JOHN IV. 31 32 33 34. In the mean time his disciples prayed him saying Master eat But he said unto them I have meat to eat that you know not of Therefore said the disciples one to another Hath any man brought him ought to eat Iesus saith unto them My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work p. 119. DISCOURSE VI. JAM I. 22. Be ye Doers of the Word and not Hearers only deceiving your own selves p. 151. DISCOURSE VII PROV XV. 15. All the dayes of the afflicted are evil but a good conscience is a continual feast p. 191. DISCOURSE VIII PSAL. XVII 15. As for me I will behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness p. 221. DISCOURSE IX ROM VIII 17. And if children then heirs heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ if so be that we suffer with him that we may be also glorified with him p. 251. DISCOURSE X. JAM I. 27. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world p. 282. DISCOURSE XI HEB. XIII 16. To do good and communicate forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased p. 314. DISCOURSE XII GAL. VI. 14 15 16. But God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Iesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world For in Christ Iesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature And as many as walk according to this rule peace be on them and mercy and upon the Israel of God p. 369. DISCOURSE XIII 1 PET. I. 22 23. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever p. 394. DISCOURSE XIV PSAL. CVI. 28. They joined themselves also unto Baal-Peor and ate the sacrifices of the dead p. 419. DISCOURSE XV. COL III. 1. If ye then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God p. 435. Appendix to Discourse XIII p. 458. IMPRIMATUR Lambhith Nov. 2. 1692. Ra. Barker R mo in Christo Patri ac D no D no Johanni Archiepiscopo Cant. a Sacris Dom. DISCOURSES ON Several Texts OF SCRIPTURE DISCOURSE I. 1 PET. II. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. THE Text is an Exhortation to abstinence from the Lusts of the Flesh Which Duty the Apostle endeavours to fix upon the Spirits of
enjoyments it is very unworthy and unbecoming so noble a Being as the Soul not to abstain from Fleshly Lusts not to be so much master of the Natural Desires of the Flesh as not to be enslaved to them or transported by them either to seek them or sue after them with over-much eagerness whether Riches Honours the Pleasures of the Flesh or whatever gratifications of the Animal Life or to embrace them with over much transportedness when they are offer'd unto us Epictetus expresses how we ought to be minded toward these things excellently well by a Similitude taken from a Feast or Banquet If a Dish come to thee that thou likest take part thereof with Modesty and Temperance Is it to be removed from thee detain it not Is it not yet come at thee stretch not thine Appetite out to it before its approach If thou shalt be thus affected toward all the things of this World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if when they are offered thee thou yet refuse them thou shalt not only be a worthy Guest but even a Fellow-Prince amongst the Gods And truly if we would but duly consider the Original of our Souls from what Fountain and Archetypon they are derived and of what an excellent nature they are and how little they are intended for this Terrestrial condition methinks it should be no hard task to fulfil this Precept of the Stoick or rather that of S. Iohn in his General Epistle Love not the world neither the things of the world If any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him For all that is in the world the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life is not of the Father but of the world Wherefore our Original being so peculiarly Divine we are bound if we bear a due respect to that to gather up our Affections from sinking towards the vain and transitory things of this World and look upon our selves as very little concerned in them Christian Souls especially who by reason of their new birth are of a noble and divine extraction indeed and therefore upon a double account ought not so to undervalue themselves as to adhere to the fading pleasures and gratifications of this mortal Life If in vertue of this new birth ye be risen with Christ into the sense of the Divine Life and into a true and lively Faith seek those things which are above where Christ fitteth on the right hand of God Set your affections on things above not on things on the earth For what is there that this Earthly Life affords which we do not enjoy but as Tenants in common with the very Brutes Eating Drinking Sleeping hunting after a prey or pursuing a project for the satisfaction of our Carnal Desires begetting or bringing up our young applauses caresses the pleasure of dominion or revenge and the like These set up but on one level with the Beasts of the field and do not at all reach the excellency of our proper Nature But yet this is the guise of this Land of our Pilgrimage thus to be clad in the manners and habits of our fellow-Animals of the Earth as well as Strangers put on Turbants in the Turkish Empire But who would put on an odd habit in a strange Country but merely out of necessity Could he strut and please himself in it and be curious and sollicitous about a thing that he has no conceit or opinion of For us to make provision for the Flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof as the Apostle speaks is as fond as if some Slave should be very curious to provide himself of Chains and Fetters or other badges of his Slavery or a Fool should be very careful that his Coat have all the peculiar laces or tassels of a Fools-Coat And all this Worldly Pomp and Enjoyments are no better nor bear no more agreeable proportion to the Nobleness of the Soul than a Fools-Coat to the Body of a Grave and Wise Man Nay I think that Grave and Wise Philosopher Plotinus took his own Body to be such a Coat and therefore was loath to be painted in it and so leave a durable disgrace of himself behind him But suppose these Worldly things were not altogether so vile and contemptible yet our stay is here so short that to us they cannot be valuable For as both S. Peter and Plato have told us this Life is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of Pilgrimage here upon Earth and we are but passing through it into our own Country How fond a thing therefore would it be to love any thing of the World or to addict our Affections to it when we must so suddenly leave it As fond as if one should be inveigled with the love of his Inn or any thing there when as he must leave it the next morning Wherefore being thus in a strange Land which we are to pass through not to make any abode in let not our minds be fixt or glued to any thing from which our Persons are so suddenly to remove And because we are Strangers in the Land let us take heed how we tamper with any bewitching Objects lest that which looks fair may prove no safe food but either a present or more lingring poyson and we may find the mischief of it at our return into the other State It is S. Iudes Character of some in the antient Christian Feasts of Charity that they fed themselves without Fear as if they had made that perverse sense of our Saviours Saying That which enters into the man cannot defile him by either quantity or quality But we are environed with so much ignorance and inexperience in this strange Land that we ought carefully to stand upon our guard and take heed how over-greedily or over-heartily we close with any tempting delight remembring that there may lye hid the most dangerous poyson in the greatest sweetness Let us therefore trust no strange Objects in this strange Land but keep close to what is nearest akin to us that is to our true Manhood which is the sense of true Honour and Vertue the Fear and Love of God and whatever Graces descend from that Fountain of Light and Giver of every good and perfect gift But the gifts of this World are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which few can receive without parting with that which is infinitely better a pure Mind and a peaceable Conscience and the assured hopes of Eternal Happiness hereafter And thus much for the Apostles first Argumentation to perswade us to abstain from Fleshly Lusts fetch'd from the Dignity of the Soul 2. We come to the Second which is The Enmity and Hostility of these Lusts against the Soul the law of the members warring against the law of the mind and endeavouring to lead us captive into the bondage of sin This Hostility is exercised 1. In treacherous Circumventions 2. In violent Assaults And 3. in the spoil and pillage of the Soul upon Victory 1.
Paul in this present Epistle if so we may happily wind our selves out of this dangerous maze or labyrinth Whereas then he seems to nullifie or vilifie at least the Law in the advancing of that Righteousness that is by Faith Let us see what this Righteousness that is of Faith and what that of the Law is Chap. 2. 19. For I through the law am dead to the law that I might live unto God Ver. 20. I am crucified with Christ Nevertheless I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me I through the law am dead to the law What a riddle is this that the Law should deprive it self of its Disciples And yet it doth so For it is a Schoolmaster to Christ or rather an Usher Which when it hath well tutour'd us and castigated us removes us up higher to be made in Christ perfect who is the perfection of the Law But the Law it self makes nothing perfect And this is the reason that Righteousness is not of the Law And to this purpose speaks the Apostle in this very Epistle Chap. 3. Ver. 21. Is the law then against the promises of God God forbid For if there had been a law given which could have given life verily righteousness should have been by the law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Law that could enliven and enquicken us But that is beyond the power of the Law That 's the Title and Prerogative of Christ who is the way the truth and the life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am the resurrection and the life He that believeth in me though he were dead yet shall he live Iohn 11. 25. This therefore is the Righteousness of Faith or Belief far above the Righteousness of the Law or killing Letter Now when this Faith is come we are no longer under that Poedagog of Punie-boys the Low-master But are all the Children of God by Faith in Jesus Christ. And none are the Children of God but those that are led by the Spirit of God as the Apostle witnesseth in his Epistle to the Romans And those that have the Spirit of God what fruits they bring forth is amply set out by the Apostle in this to the Galatians Chap. 5. ver 22 23. But the fruit of the Spirit is love joy peace long-suffering gentleness goodness faith meekness temperance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Against such there is no Law For indeed there is no need of it they being a Law unto themselves So we see how those that are in Christ are not under the Law because their Obedience or that living Law in their Hearts are above it They do really and truly fulfil it through the Spirit that is by Faith For that Spirit is the begetter of Love and Love is the fulfilling of the Law For all the law is fulfilled in one word even in this Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self But if ye bite and devour one another take heed that ye be not consumed one of another This I say then Walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh For 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 do the things that ye would But if ye be led by the spirit ye are not under the law Ver. 14 15 16 17 18. Observe that If you be led by the Spirit For against such there is no Law as was said before Which implies if thou art not led by the Spirit thou art liable to the Curse of the Law to Death Hell and Damnation For so also speaks the Apostle when he hath reckoned up the works of the flesh ver 21. But here methinks I see some filching away an excuse for their own hypocrisie out of some of the foregoing words at the 6th Verse of that 5th Chapter The flesh and the spirit are contrary so that you cannot do that you would I but withal this is true too That if we will that which we do amiss we are then under the Curse of the Law For we are not then led by the Spirit of God but are servants of Sin and Satan We are not then in Christ no more than our bodies at Athens or Carthage but our phansies roving thither For they that are Christ have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts Ver. 24. So we see plainly Beloved that the Righteousness that is of Faith is not a mere Chimaera or phansie but a more excellent Righteousness than that of the Law For the Law is no quickening Spirit but a dead Letter But Christ is the resurrection and the life And he is God our Righteousness mighty to save and can with ease destroy the powers of Death Darkness and the Devil out of the Soul of man But we must have the patience to endure the work wrought in us by him I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me And if we will still cloak and cover our foul corrupt Hearts with forged conceits of Hypocrisies own making and excuse our selves from being good to one another or to our selves because God in Christ is so good to us Hear what the Apostle speaks in the last Chapter of this Epistle for it is now time to draw nearer to my Text Ver. 7 8. Be not deceived God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption But he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting The aim therefore of the Apostle is not to extenuate or discountenance real Vertue and Righteousness but to point us to it and tell us where it may be had Not in Days and Years not in New Moons or Festivals not in Circumcision nor in the dead Letter of the Law But in Christ and the Spirit of God in the renewed Image of God in the New Birth in the New life in the second Adam from Heaven in the New Creature in that stumbling block to all Flesh and Blood in the Cross of Christ. But God forbid that I should glory save in the cross c. THE Text contains briefly the Summ of the whole Discourse we may cast it into these Three parts 1. The Apostles Resolution He will not glory in any thing save in the cross of Christ whereby the man of Sin in his very Soul is crucified and made dead that the Life of Christ may abide in him 2. The Reason of his Resolution Because when a man hath given his name to Christ neither circumcision nor uncircumcision nor any of the Ceremonial Laws is any thing but a new creature 3. His Benediction or well-wishing to all that walk after the rule i. e. according to the new man that is fram'd in Righteousness and true Holiness the true Israel of God Peace be on them But I will rather fall upon the words themselves And in my passage point out such Observations as shall arise most
God The righteous Nation in whom there is no guile As our Saviour saith of Nathanael Behold a true Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile And thus the Psalmist Surely God is good unto Israel even to such as are of an upright heart God continue his Goodness to them and encrease it sevenfold And encrease them in number above the Sands of the Sea and the Stars of Heaven that none may be able to count the dust of Jacob or to number the fourth part of Israel That the Heathen may be swallowed up of them and that the very memorial of wickedness may perish from off the Earth To the King of Saints the Holy one of Israel who inhabits Immortality and the Light inaccessible to the only Wise and All-powerful God be ascribed as is most due all Honour c. DISCOURSE XIII 1 PET. i. 22 23. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever THE Text is an Exhortation to Christian Love The Duty is enforced from a double Argument 1. From the end of our Sanctification in those words Seeing ye have purified your Souls in obeying the Truth through the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unto or for unfeigned brotherly love And this ushers in the Precept or Duty Love one another with a pure heart fervently 2. The other Argument follows of no less force than the former which is drawn from the condition of our new Birth Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever THE several Truths or Doctrines contained in the First Argument are these viz. Doctrine I. That the Christian mans Soul is Purified Purified 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word synonymous to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both imply a purging or cleansing from filth They are both used together Iames 4. 8. in one signification But yet there is a more special sense belonging to them both they both signifie a Sacred and Ceremonial kind of cleansing and purification and after appropriation to God as Titus 2. 14. where the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with allusion to the Consecration of the Levites Numb 8. and their washing of their Cloths and sprinkling the Water of Purification is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that the purifying of the Soul in the Text implies cleansing and appropriation But the Objects are not here express'd yet very safely supposed we cannot miss of them if we would For from what should the Soul be purified but from its filth What is the filth of the Soul but Sin To whom should the Soul thus purg'd be appropriated or consecrated To it self It is not purg'd if not purg'd from it self To the Creature It is the height of Impiety palpable Idolatry To Sin It is not Sense To what then but to God its Creator and Redeemer who gave himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he might purifie unto himself a peculiar people Tit. 2. 14. Thus is purified the Christians Soul which is true not only in that narrower sense of taking the Soul but also as it includes the Body or the Beast as the Platonists call it even the very Passions and more fiery motions which those Philosophers resemble to Horses drawing the Chariot of the Soul these also shall be Sanctified So that upon the reins of the Horses if I may speak with Zechary there is inscrib'd Holiness to the Lord. But certainly more properly and chiefly this Purification belongs to the Soul her self and from thence will sink through all the powers and faculties of the Body taking hold of them wielding them and ruling them at its own pleasure or at least not suffering it self to be over-ruled by them Now this purifying of a Christian implies that he was unholy and foul before And not only the whole man but also whole mankind is in this sinful state till wash'd and purified Rom. 3. 12. 1 Ioh. 1. 8 9 10. where we have both these points confirm'd 1. That we all have sinned and stand obnoxious before God 2. That by the worth and merit of Christ and the effectual working of the Divine Spirit we have forgiveness and that God doth cleanse us from all unrighteousness And this is the true Christian Mystery If we be Christians we must be as certainly purified as its certain we were once impure Doct. II. That the Christians Soul is purified in obeying the Truth Here meets us the unwelcome visage of Obedience but with its face turn'd upon a safe object the Truth Where we may note that it is not any Obedience that purifies but the Obedience to the Truth A man may toil like a Mill-horse in a circuir of Ceremonies and outward performances and yet but take his walk with the wicked unless the Truth be obey'd Again it is such a Truth as Obedience belongs to not an high aery speculative Truth not a Truth only to be believed but to be put in practice for we cannot be said properly to obey speculative Truth because the Soul there has no power to resist or disobey For the Devil himself would glady embrace and assent to all pure and inoffensive speculation that doth not touch his own interest and present condition and so would all his and Natures children the most wicked men that are And that the Devil is cast into a fit of trembling at this grand speculative Maxime There is a God is because his quick memory doth presently recollect that he is Just and that himself stands obnoxious to his Justice here is his interest toucht The Truth therefore here meant is not so much those general speculations of the Infinite Power and Wisdom of God the Incomprehensible Trinity c. which both good and bad men do easily spend their time in and promiscuously believe and yet sit securely upon their lees their hearts being untoucht unbroken unstir'd But the Truths which we are said most properly to obey are the Practical Truths such as Matth. 5. Chap. 16. 24. Chap. 11. ult Chap. 7. 13. c. The Purification of a Christian is in obedience to such Truths and Christ admits none for his that be disobedient workers of iniquity Matth. 7. 23. Doct. III. That the purified and obedient Soul is thus purged and obedient through the Spirit This is he of whom Malachi 3. 2 3. But who may abide the day of his coming and who shall stand when he appeareth for he is like a refiners fire and like fullers sope And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver and he shall purifie the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness We having then so powerful a Purifier what hinders but the Christian
to this purpose Vid. lib. 5. and lib. 6. And this Philosopher attempts by many wayes and Arguments to keep us in this so pleasant temper of Spirit to all men good and bad friends and foes viz. 1. A settled perswasion that all those things which the Stoicks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are so indeed not truly good or bad in themselves there being nothing truly good but what is in our own power such are the voluntary motions of our Mind or Soul Thus he And indeed a very little observation will make this good to us That an eager and sharp desire of outward things Riches Honour and Corporeal Pleasure whose maintenance is from the outward Creature that this is the main if not only Cause of all Dissention amongst the Sons of men So that I think Envy it self is not moved at the Vertuous Accomplishments of any but merely at the effects thereof viz. the Admiration and Glory they get amongst the People Therefore the best way to be friends with all the World is not to desire the things of this World but to reckon them as nothing to the purpose and so shall we assuredly provoke very few against us and be provoked by none 2. Consider Socrates's Maxime 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Christ said Father forgive them they know not what they do This is true in injuries done to our selves but the Stoick would drive it to an universality 3. That thou thy self transgressest in many things c. 4. Mans Life is but for a moment of time 5. Consider how many things may and do often follow upon such fits of Anger and Grief far more grievous in themselves than those things we are grieved for and angry 6. The Meekness is a thing unconquerable if it be true and natural 7. It is a mad mans part to look there should be no wicked men in the World because it is impossible c. Thus he But observe that in all these attempts for a continued Meekness and Benignity towards all men whatsoever the ease and quiet of the Philosophers Mind is rather aimed at than any thing else And that it is not so much an Vniversal Love to all men as an universal fencing of himself against the provocations of all whatsoever may at any time chance to assault and shake that firmness and stillness of Temper he proposes to himself being loth to be so obnoxious to any man that it should be in his power to plough up in uneven furrows the settled Planities of his smoothed mind Object But here it will be Objected That unless we endeavour after and at some time reach that Stoical state of the Mind it will be impossible to hold out perpetually in that mild and even tenour of Love to all men For some men are so habitually evil that nothing is tolerable much less lovely in them So that when we light on such some other Affection will be drawn out And for those of the better sort They are sometimes so unlike themselves that it cannot be that the same Affection should be continued to them How then is it That we are to love continually Sol. To this I answer three wayes First We are to love all men i. e. all manner of men of what Religion Sect or Nation soever so be that God has manifested his Graces in them any way And then that this Love should continue as long as the deserts of them that are loved And this takes away all partiality in Love Or Secondly We are to love all men and alwayes amore Benevolentiae though not Complacentiae And thus all particularity or peculiarity will be taken away or swallowed up All men whatsoever being objects capable of this Love We may wish those to be good that are notoriously evil and endeavour too to make them so which are real fruits of Love Or we may pitty them that they are not so already it being so great a Misery for them to be otherwise which is a Symptome of Love if not a genuine Notion thereof nay the very Act of Love only under another modification Which minds me of a Third way of Answer which I cannot so well make out without giving first some settled Notion or Definition of the Nature of Love The general Description whereof let be this Love is an Affection or Passion of the Mind conversant about Divine Beauty and Perfection introducible into the Souls or Persons of the Sons of men And I say Conversant about Divine Perfection and Beauty communicable to the Sons of men to distinguish it from what Love soever else For that Love that ariseth from Interest is but such as a man would bear to his Saddle-horse that carries him safely and easily And that Pitty we bear to calamitous men in Sickness Death or great distress without reference to what we have mention'd in our definition is but the same we may be haply moved with toward a dying beast or a bemoaning and whining dog That Love therefore that like the Vestal Fire is never to go out but alwayes to burn and shine in our hearts is the motion of our Mind one way or other taken up about the Divine Beauty communicable to man And thus I have at large as if I should define Colour in general described the Nature of Love But as Colour is not at all but in its several kinds and distinctions viz. either White or Red or Yellow or Green c. or some other particular kind So this Love is not any Passion at all indeed nothing at all but in its several kinds such as are Hope Fear Ioy Anger Sorrow c. For the very root or matter of all these is Love yea of Hatred it self if we look to the bottom of this Mystery As the Wax takes all shapes and yet is Wax still at the bottom The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 still is Wax So the Soul transported in so many several Passions of Ioy Fear Hope Sorrow Anger and the like has for its general ground-work of all this Love which if it were taken away those various superstructures would suddenly fall For he that loves nothing how can he fear any thing or hope or joy or hate any thing For how can he hate when there is nothing to injure or cross him in what he loves he loving nothing Or yet to make a more fit representation Love is that to the Soul that the Light is to the Sun For Light being simple in it self and uniform is yet the Basis or ground of much variety in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Nature Light being in it self one according as it lights on various surfaces of things returns modifyed into this or that colour If it fall upon Grass it becomes green if upon the Piony-flower red on the Marigold yellow from the Swans back it is reflected white and so according to the variety of the surfaces of Bodies which occur there is a change of light into some particular
See how they go about to vilifie the Meat rather than any way suspect the foulness and weakness of their own ill Stomachs But as all are not to stretch out their hand to every dish and intemperately and unseemlyly to seize upon that which is not meant for them Seek not out the things that are too hard for thee saith Siracides neither search the things rashly that are too mighty for thee But that which God hath commanded think upon that with reverence c. Ecclesiasticus 3. I say as we are modestly to decline that which we are not as yet fitted for receiving So no man hath excuse from receiving some or other of the variety of meats that He hath prepared who feedeth with his goodness every living thing Old men and babes young men and children they all are sustained by the Word according to every ones necessity and capability Or else how could the young ones increase Or they of full age subsist Both which is the Will of God That which Theophrastus hath in his First Book of his History of Plants belongs indifferently to all kind of Generation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nature is not content with the bestowing of a being upon things but works them up to the perfection of that being As an little Plants that in time grow to their just bulk blooming and bearing Fruit plentifully And it is said of our Saviour that he shall grow up like a plant And our Saviour saith of the Kingdom of Heaven that it is like the growth of the mustard-seed tree Now as this new Life is called a Plant for its vegetation so is it also termed a Child for its tender sense and simplicity of meaning That therefore that hath knowledge and sense having also an appetite to nourishment and that a nourishment proper to sustain its own Nature and the Word being the proper nourishment of those spiritual new-born babes then if there be no such desire in us to this Word it 's a sign there is no such Principle of life in us or if there be that it is sick or the Stomach past by over-much fasting But if this Life by not giving it its due nutriment either for measure or quality come to be extinguished we prove our selves it's an horrible thing to think of it no better than Murderers of the Innocent and Just one For Murder is not the cutting and slashing of the Visible Body but the extinguishing of Life And thus we have seen in brief That for the raising of our Souls from Death for the begetting of the Holy Life and for the conservation and increase of the same we ought to be Hearers of the Word II. WE pass on now to that other Doctrine proposed That we ought not only to be Hearers but Doers also of the Word That awing sense of God which is impressed if not upon all yet at least upon most mens Souls together with a Natural desire of security and tranquillity of mind and every pleasing good That experience and acknowledgment of our own imbecillity and insufficiency walking in the fear of darkness and knowing not as the Apostle speaks whither we go doth easily induce even our Natural and Fleshly minds out of love to our selves to lay hold upon somewhat which we conceive stronger than our selves And this we call God and that outward erected form of Religion in all Churches as Hearing and saying of Prayers and giving Attention to the Word we call Gods Worship And a Worship it is surely too too easie and so fit for the vafrous and subdolous Spirit of the Natural man to play its wily pranks in that it being well instructed by the sly and subtle counsels of that Old Serpent the Devil and Satan it turns those good constitutions which should have been introductions to further Holiness into a strong fort or castle of false satisfaction of Conscience and most pernicious diabolical delusion whiles we take our selves to be distinguished from the wicked reprobate brood by outward performances of Ear-labour and Lip-labour without the practice of that which is taught us out of Moses or Christ plainly according to the Pharisees in our Saviours time whom the Holy Baptist sharply rebukes for such kind of imaginations Bring forth fruit worthy amendment of life saith he And think not to say within your selves we have Abraham to our father For I say unto you that God is able even of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham Surely it is out of the want of that feeling Knowledge of that which is so acceptable to God and a fond over-estimation of our own poor naked and contemptible Souls or a conceit that God would want persons if we Christians be excluded to make up the number of the Inheritors of Heaven that makes us think that such superficial performances will make us allowable before God But nothing is acceptable to him but a simple humble and unfeigned obedient Spirit Nothing glorious in his eyes but his own Life the Soul inacted and quickened by Christ. All flesh is grass and all the glory thereof as the flower of the field The grass withereth the flower fadeth but the word of our God endureth for ever This is the Word and Eternal Life on whom whosoever doth believe and by true Faith in his strength is Regenerate into shall obtain Everlasting Life otherwise he abideth in the Sentence of Death and the Wrath of God is upon him 'T is true there be notable Preheminences and Priviledges given even to the Natural Fleshly Adam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Hermes The whole World subsists for Mans sake But this Prerogative howsoever hath its condition which follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The World for Man but Man for God And how for God To wit that his Life may be in us that his Christ may be in us Not so many verbal points of Christianity not so many notions of Divinity not so many moon-shine imaginations from the Word heard or read in Books in our Hearts in the Visible World in Heaven in Earth in Men. Christ is not dead and unprofitable phansie but the vigorous ebullition of Life Which Life if it be not in us then are we not partakers of that we were destinate to for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man was made for a Tabernacle for God he 's Materials for his Holy Temple But if we will not be living stones as the Apostle speaks we shall have the same doom that unprofitable trees or timber They are fit for nothing but to be hewn in pieces and cast into the fire This is the end of that frustraneous brood of the Sons of Belial the off-spring of unprofitableness that fall short of the end they were intended to by their own disobedient perversness The best of them fare no better Man being in honour hath no understanding but is like to the beasts that perish I but we learned Scholasticks have Vnderstanding enough or at least as much as any As much as we have
and in the mean time abstain from no manner of pleasure in anger impotent in good fortune insolent in adversity impatient remember the Name of God and in the mean while be held with all manner of Passions overcome no kind of perturbation Vertue arrived at its due pitch with true Wisdom and Prudence shews God unto us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But without true Vertue the naming of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but a name a word a sound an eccho nothing See how the Heathen Philosopher triumphs over those unworthy Christians whose Religion was but Opinion and their Life the depth of filth and corruption Or see rather how moderately and civilly he carries himself toward them that in their Controversies are ready to eat up and devour one another 2. But I will endeavour to convince them with the Apostles own Argument viz. That they that hear and do not deceive their own selves There be many testimonies of Scripture that will witness this deceit Gal. 6. 7 8. Be not deceived God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting So S. Iohn Little children be not deceived he that doth righteousness he is righteous even as he is righteous He that commits sin is of the Devil for the Devil sinneth from the beginning 1 Cor. 6. Be not deceived neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor wantons nor defilers of themselves with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor railers nor extortioners shall inherit the Kingdom of God How frequent are the Apostles in inculcating this so plain a Truth That righteousness of life is that which leads to God and his Eternal Kingdom Surely those Holy Watchmen of Israel did see the time would come that the delusions of the Devil would so strongly possess the heads and hearts of men that they would be fast glewed in hypocritical holiness to some outward form of Religion as the formal Hearing of the Word and such like that they might with a more quiet false Conscience omit the greater things of the Law as Justice Temperance Charity Humility and the whole quire of Holy Vertues The other they ought to do but by no means to leave these undone But now I will endeavour to shevv how this simple sort of Souls are befooled Galat. 6. If any man seem to himself that he is somewhat when he is nothing he deceiveth himself in his imagination Now these empty Hearers of the Word that they think themselves to be somewhat is plain from hence else would they seek something better but being that they set up their rest in this outward performance it 's a sign that they seem to themselves not to have got nothing But that they are as surely nothing as it is sure they take themselves to be something is easily proved out of 1 Cor. 13. Though I speak with the tongue of men and angels and have not charity I am as sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal And although I had the gift of prophesie and knew all secrets and all knowledge yea if I had all faith so that I could remove mountains and had not love I were nothing Now that they that are but idle Hearers of the Word have not Charity and so consequently are nothing will be proved out of the effects of Charity Love suffereth long They are impatient Love is bountiful They are griping and covetous Love envieth not They are choaked with malice Love is not puffed up They are swoln with deceitful imagination Love disdaineth not They regard not the humble It seeketh not its own They are not contented with their own It is not provoked to anger They are implacable It thinks no evil They meditate no good It rejoyceth in the truth They are contemners of the Truth It believeth all things They believe no more than serves their own turn It fulfils the Law They only hear the Law The estate of this kind of people is well described by the Prophet Esay The multitude of all nations that fight against the altar shall be as a dream or vision of the night Even all they that make the war against it and strong-holds against it and lay siege unto it And it shall be like as an hungry man dreams and behold he eateth and when he awaketh his Soul is empty Or like as a thirsty man dreameth and lo he is drinking and when he awaketh behold he is faint and his Soul longeth So shall the multitude of nations be that fight against mount Sion That we are to sacrifice our selves that is our wickedness and fleshly life no man I think will deny But so exceeding misery it is and smart to Flesh and Blood to undergo this mortification and to lye broiling in this consuming fire that there needs a steddy strong upholding instrument for this so weighty performance which is all-bearing Patience This holds up the mortified Soul in its extreme burning anguish and therefore is not unlike an Altar that bears the Sacrifice Now they that fight against this real Service of God which is the mortification of our sinful Lusts the sacrificing of our evil Life and against Sion which God calls the Hill of his Holiness Let them dream never so strongly nor phansie never so deeply that such a measure of Righteousness will serve their turn a formal Hearing of the Word and a favourable false Application out of the same all this sweet repast and imaginary trust and perswasion will prove but a vision of the night and a feasting upon phansie in deceivable sleep For these Dreamers instead of purging the Flesh by the sacrifice of fire defile the Flesh with the fire of Lust Great pretenders to Knowledge and therefore sedulous Hearers but no Doers Clouds without water and they you know make a goodly show of whitish shining light though not so thoroughly enlightned as the blew Sky Stars they are but wandering Stars the end of whose staggering period is to set in everlasting blackness of darkness But I go on now to two other Arguments 3. A third Argument is taken from the Dignity of the Word it self Thou hast magnified thy name and thy Word above all things saith the Psalmist Hitherto belongs the Purity of the Word Thy Word is most pure therefore they servant loveth it Psal. 119. And it is Philo's observation upon the manner of the giving of the Law out of Fire and Smoke and Lightening 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Well and befittingly may the Word of God be said to come out of the fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the holy oracles of God are accurately purged and tryed even as gold in the fire So the Psalmist Psalm 12. The words of the Lord are pure words even as silver which from the earth is tryed and purifyed seven times in the fire So great Purity was conceived to be
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Are they animo Dei formi Where the Poet plainly makes the form or image of God consist in Love in Righteousness or Iustice and Courteousnes they being contrary to Injury brutish Fierceness Cruelty and Injustice The Divine Philosopher speaks out more expresly though in fewer words To be like unto God is to be holy just and wise I might multiply words here for the setting forth of the manifold Benefits and Graces that accrue to the Soul of Man from his Conversion to God and Obedience to his Holy Word But nothing more can be said than this Image of Christ doth either express or at least imply Justice Holiness and Prudence comprize all Excellence That generous Magnanimity of mind that bears it self above all the contempt that can follow the practice of that which is Good or abstinence from that which is Evil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pure Temperance Manly and awful-eyed Fortitude Gravity and Modesty gently moving in all peaceful and steady tranquillity and a God-like Vnderstanding watering with showers of Light this flourishing Paradise of Piety and Vertue This and whatsoever else we can conceive that Good is is contained in this Divine Image nay more than we can conceive before we be transformed into that likeness The Wisdom of him that is regenerate into this image and conformity with God dives into the depth of Darkness unties the knots of that Old Serpents train breaks off the bonds of Death and Hell pierceth like Lightning into the inwardness of things stands before the Throne of Immortal Glory That Holiness winds it self from all corruption of the Flesh flyes above the bewitching attraction of the Body looks upon God in unspotted purity That Iustice gives every thing it s own That which is Caesars to Caesar and that which is Gods to God But nothing to it self seeketh nothing for it self exulteth not in it self But gives all to God seeks all for God rejoyceth alwayes in God Thou art worthy O Lord to receive honour and glory and power for thou hast created all things and for thy wills sake they are and have been created Rev. 4. Thus be they nothing in their own eyes as indeed they are nothing but in profound Humility and Gratitude which is the most exquisite act of Iustice give all to the Eternal and Everlasting Majesty This is that lovely beautiful and most desirable Image of Christ the Son of the Father Who hath part here is an Inheritor of Eternity But he that by false and lazy imagination and phansie remains in the Devils deformed Nature his doom is everlasting Death and unspeakable Misery AND thus much for the Reasons Why we should be Doers of the Word I will only speak a word or two of the Proposition that is left and so end this Text. The Proposition is this III. That we are not to deceive our selves Errare falli decipi c. To err or be deceived saith Tully turpe est And that methinks should be a sufficient Argument to avoid it But to deceive ones self is a double fault He that deceives himself is both Fool and Knave as we say both the gull and the cheater the deceived and the deceiver Though to say the truth he that is deceived by another was first deceived by himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The same defective Principles that expose a man to be deceived of another exposeth him as well to be deceived of himself No man is discovered to be a fool by another but he was so in himself first And who made him so then But how can this be That man should be so wise as to circumvent himself and so foolish as to be circumvented by himself Certainly it implies more Natures than one in a Man The Platonists reckon up three in general there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. There is Vnderstanding that lamp of Heavenly Truths or Intellectual illumination 2. There is the Soul in the middle where Will and Reasoning is situated 3. In the last place there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Life which resides in the Body and is but a shadow of the Soul the darkened Cave of evil delusions falshood and deceit a den of all Serpentine Natures false Spectrums Magical Allurements thick Mists benumming Vapours execrable Whisperings vain Terrour false Delight bewitching Apparitions fair flitting Phantasms deceivable Suggestions besotting Attractions Here 's that damn'd cell where those three grand Impostors and Conspirators against the Soul plot their fraudulent mischiefs the Flesh the World the Devil Or rather here is a World of Devils in this Life of the Flesh where the Prince of Darkness rules Well hath Zoroastre described this place He calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a World whose light is the blackness of darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A World whose bottom is the depth of unfaithfulness It 's foundation is laid in Hell a Hell whose fense is pitchy clouds and thick darkness whose treasure is corruption inhabitants vanity and shadowes wisdom senslesness prudence precipitancy simplicity of heart inextricable labyrinths of deceit and hypocrisie constancy or steddiness a vertiginous circuit of glowing phrensie and gross madness He that here doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which those wise Oracles forbid He that looks down indangers his sight indangers being carryed away with this rapid course and hurrying flux of tumultuous motions It 's enough to turn his Brain to change his Understanding to bereave him of his right Senses Here 's the fountain of ignorance and well-spring of all evil deceits So long as the Soul leans toward this and its loving and liking is toward this shadow of falshood it carries its deceiver about with it self and no deceit there is without but it is from this first or in vertue of this That which the Platonists call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Scripture calls Spirit Soul and Flesh. This Flesh is that whorish Woman that Solomon speaks of so oft and describes her subtil carriage But all her fair speaking is but false allurement and her flattering utter destruction For a whore is a deep ditch and a strange woman a narrow pit saith the Wise Man Nay the high way to the very pit of Hell Her house are the wayes of hell whose descent is into the chambers of death Prov. 7. Now the Soul of man betwixt these two the Spirit and the Flesh Heaven and Hell God and the Devil is so placed that accordingly as it inclines or cleaves to so is its Wisdom and Life If it continually struggle to work it self upward toward God God will put out his merciful arm to draw it out of those Infernal Waters If it cleave unto the Flesh and its deceivable Lusts the warmth of wickedness will attract it down lower and lower till Satan hath insnared it in all his nests and hath chained it in his own chains So that being made an absolute Vassal of
in us And Israel is called the inheritance of God Wherefore God in a kind of Gratitude as I may so say will provide us an Inheritance sith that we as he himself testifieth are an Inheritance to him Now if any man be desirous to know what an Inheritance this is that God hath prepared It is no less than a Kingdom And how great an esteem is put upon an Earthly Kingdom is very well known to you all Which if it be so desirable how much more desirable is the Kingdom of Heaven that nor time nor tumult can ever demolish This Kingdom of Heaven of God or Christ is the Inheritance of the Sons of God with Christ. But if any one rest unsatisfied yet and would further know what the Kingdom of God is Let him listen to S. Paul Rom. 14. 17. The kingdom of God is not meat nor drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost But this will seem even nothing to him that hath not the Spirit of Righteousness Peace and Joy Wherefore saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 2. 7. c. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory Which none of the princes of this world knew for had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory But as it is written Eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither have entred into the heart of man the things that God hath prepared for them that love him But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit For the Spirit searcheth all things even the deep things of God For what man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of a man that is in him Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit that is of God that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God In a word therefore Beloved the Inheritance of the Children of God is the Spirit of God and all that it doth discover as the Sun is the lot and the inheritance of the Natural Eye and all visibles laid open by it in Nature And can any thing be wanting to them that are sharers in that Inheritance If I may call them sharers where every one is full possessour of the whole as the Sun is alike wholly in every eye Can our Souls be larger than the Life of God Or our Understanding not filled and satisfied by his all-knowing Spirit Can our Will wax restless or anxious where the Understanding finds out and feels the greatest good that any thing is capable of where the pure and undefiled Affection baths her silver plumes in eternal love and delight What is the Soul more than infinite that it should desire any Inheritance greater than God But it were now more seasonable to make some Vse to our selves from this Doctrine so infinitely plain or infinitely inexplainable First Who cannot hence condemn all Avarice Drunkenness Fleshly Lust Voluptuousness the bartering away this Glorious Inheritance of the Everlasting Kingdom of God for the Muck of this World choak'd with the Cares of this World undermining our Neighbours by false and treacherous practices over-reaching them in bargainings and cheating indeed our selves of Eternal LIfe by our own couzenages Instead of being filled with the Spirit to be full of base liquor drowning our Reason and Conscience and laying our selves open to the despight of the Devil and the shame of the World Chaffering away for a light momentany fit of Pleasure or some seducing wanton Lust the Inheritance of the good Spirit of God the sweet and comfortable Fellowship of the Holy Ghost the Joyes of Heaven the full Contentments and unspeakable Delights of that hidden Paradise that Garden of all sweetness and deliciousness Secondly The consideration of this future excellent state and glorious royal condition may afford much comfort to men of low degree and meaner fortune What though our Means be small our Calling base and dishonourable before men This time vvill certainly over and that quickly Though I be poor here a Servant and Bond-slave a Beggar Yet hereafter I shall be rich free noble a Prince a King an Emperour Then shall I be Lord not of a larger spot of Ground consisting of Dirt and Gravel and vvithering Grass and perishing Trees the sight of vvhich every nights sleep takes from me but of the boundless Heavens the everlasting Beauty of God vvhere vvith never-vvaking Eyes I shall alvvayes behold his excellent Glory This I say may comfort the poorer sort they being as capable if not more capable of this precious Inheritance than Lords and Princes of the Earth than Kings and Caesars than Dukes and Emperours Gal. 3. 26 c. For you are all the children of God by faith in Christ Iesus For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Iew nor Greek there is neither bond nor free there is neither male nor female For ye are all one in Christ Iesus And if ye be Christs then are you Abrahams seed and heirs according to promise But Thirdly and Lastly Is it so indeed that there is prepared for men of all conditions of Life such a rich Inheritance Let then all men of what condition soever examine themselves and try what assurance they find in themselves in their own Souls of this future Happiness What then is the Sign That brings me to my Second Doctrine viz. II. That the heirs of the Kingdom must suffer So saith the Text Heirs of God and joynt-heirs with Christ if so be that we suffer with him that we may be also glorified with him Which Truth is manifest out of sundry places of Scripture I will name only two Acts 14. 22. We must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God And Coloss. 1. 10 11 12. That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God Strengthened with all might according to his glorious power unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness Giving thanks unto the Father which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light What Shall we think Beloved to obtain Heaven at a more easie rate than we purchase any Temporal Honour or Estate Multa tulit fecitque puer Those that are designed for some special piece of Earthly Preferment sweat and toil for it even from their very Childhood by industrious Education But we think to have Heaven for an old song as they say or for a lazily repeated Pater Noster for a word for an imagination for a phansie a thought an empty faith for nothing Who in the name of God told us so My Text contradicts it And Scripture will not contradict my Text because my Text is Scripture No verily It confirms it Be not deceived God is
point of Religion exerciz'd all the time God himself bears witness against them Ezekiel 33. They speak every one to his brother saying Come I pray you and hear what is the word that cometh from the Lord. They come unto thee and sit before thee as my people and they hear thy words but they will not do them with their mouth they shew much love but their heart goeth after covetousness And lo thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice and can play well on an instrument for they hear thy words but they do them not And Reading of the Scripture privately is so like the publick Preaching of it that I need not take any new pains to refute the vanity of it if it be not accompanied with due obedience We may fetch that up to Divinity which Epictetus hath both wittily and gravely of Moral Theorems The Sheep tell not their keeper how much Fodder or Grass they eat but shew that they feed sufficiently by their Milk and Wooll Let us not therefore Beloved do as vain Limners they say have done drawn Venus and the Virgin Mary according to the feature of some Face they themselves love best Let us not I say picture out Religion to our own liking and then be in love with an Idol of our own making but love and like that which the Apostle has so plainly pourtray'd to us That whose description consists in visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction and keeping our selves unspotted of the world Which in two words is this Charity and Purity Of these two consists that true Religion acceptable to God For I conceive visiting the Fatherless and Widows in their affliction excludes not other good deeds from this definition but by a Synecdoche is put for the whole office of Charity 1. The First branch is Charity I will not curiously and artificially set out the bounds of this Vertue It will be enough to intimate that it is not confin'd to the relief of the Body only as he is not only Fatherless that wants his Natural Parent but he much more that has not God for his Father through the seed of the new birth Nor she alone a Widow that has lost her Natural Husband but every Soul is a Widow that is estranged and divorced from her God whose sins have made a separation betwixt her and her Maker Thy Maker is thy Husband Esa. 11. 54. He is so indeed to those that are not faithless and play the Harlot for of such saith the Lord She is not my Wife neither am I her Husband Hosea 2. 2. He therefore that can reconcile a Soul unto God doth not only relieve the Fatherless and Widow but procures an Husband and Father for them and wholly rids them out of their distressful estate These outward transient actions tending to the spiritual or temporal good of our Neighbour are fit testimonies of our sincere Religion before men but for every mans private satisfaction concerning himself there be divers inward and immanent motions of the Soul which will abundantly help on this confirmation I will reckon them up out of the mouth of the Apostle 1 Cor. 13. Where I will not balk those that be at ad extra too they being all very well worth our taking notice of Charity suffereth long and is kind Charity envieth not Charity vaunteth not it self is not puffed up Doth not behave it self unseemly seeketh not her own is not easily provoked thinketh no evil rejoyceth not in iniquity but rejoyceth in the truth Beareth all things believeth all things hopeth all things endureth all things 2. I pass on now to the Second branch Purity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to keep himself unspotted from the World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word signifies properly such kind of spots as are in Clothes by spilling some liquid or oyly thing on them An hard task certainly to be Religious at this height Is it to be thought possible that we should wear this Garment of Mortality every day nay every hour and moment for thirty forty fifty sixty years together and soil it by no mischange or miscarriage either of careless Youth violent Manhood or palsied Old Age To pass through the hurry and tumult of this World and never be crouded into the dirt nor be spattered by them that post by us But verily this is not the meaning of the Apostle or of his description of Religion that no man is Religious but he that is absolutely spotless But he sets before us an Idea or Paradigme of true Religion that men having their eyes upon it may know how much or rather how little of Religion they have attained to By how much nearer conformable to this pattern by so much more Religious by how much further off by so much the less Religious He that is not so much as within the sight of it has not so much as seen the least glimpse or glance of Godliness but may be without any wrong to him writ down Atheist Let every man herein examine himself and ask his own Conscience how unspotted he has kept himself from the World And here as hard a difficulty represents it self if not harder than before To keep himself unspotted from the World Is it not pure Irreligiousness to think so Impossible to be so Who can keep himself pure I answer it may be a mistake in the Idiom of the Tongue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is no more than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be kept unspotted from the World Hithpael for Niphai as there is elsewhere Niphal for Hithpael Acts 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Beza Or to keep himself unspotted from the World is to be understood so far forth as is in our power which in truth is very little Here therefore steps in the power of Christ that strong Arm of God for our Salvation the stay and trust of all Nations and the hope of the ends of the Earth For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Iesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us that walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Rom. 8. We walk though it be in the power of that Spirit of Life in Christ as our Body moves by vertue of our Natural Spirit But whether this act of purification or keeping our selves pure be so from God that it is not in any wise from us I leave to them to dispute that are more at leasure That it must be in us if there be any Religion in us is all that the Text affords me and 't is enough for the tryal of our Religion Pure Religion is to keep our selves unspotted from the World What to keep our selves
a want and find our selves able to make a supply He that informs the Ignorant doth as it were lead the Blind He that comforts the distressed Conscience gives a Cordial to the sick He that appeaseth Pride and Anger asswageth a dangerous swelling He that casts out the envious Devil out of a man cures a rotting Consumption He that out of friendly monition and information amendeth another mans outward Manners and Behaviour clotheth him as it were with a seemly garment and comely ornament He that begets in a man the love of Vertue and true Piety restores him to Life These things ought to be done but the other in no wise left undone For he that is liberal in good words and a nigard in his works he doth but verba dare deceive both himself and others Now to whom and what we are to give I have briefly intimated 3. It remains that I speak of the manner which consists especially in these three things 1. In the quantity of the gift 2. In the universality of the persons to whom we are to give 3. In the inward affection or qualification of the mind of the giver 1. For the quantity of the gift 2 Cor. 9. I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren to come before unto you and to finish your benevolence appointed before that it might be ready as of benevolence and not of sparing Remembering this that he which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly and he that soweth liberally shall reap also liberally Now that those that are of a lower fortune be not discouraged or disheartened from giving Alms because they may conceive that their estate is such that their act of communicating must needs be deficient in this first requisite They are to understand that this quantity of their Alms consists not in an absolute bigness or largeness but is in relation to their states and abilities See what a testimony our Saviour gives of the poor Widow who cast in but her two Mites into the treasury among those great largisses of the rich men He called to him his Disciples and said unto them Verily I say unto you that this poor widow hath cast more in than all they that have cast into the treasury For they all did cast in of their superfluity but she of her poverty did cast in all that she had even all her living Two Mites was not more than all those rich men cast in but was more to her or in respect of her poor fortune than that which those rich ones gave was to them and the abundance of their Estates From whence that is plain which I said before that the quantity of our Alms doth not consist in an absolute bigness but in a respect to our abilities AElian in his First Book of his Various History tells us how the Persians when the King goes his Progress are all to offer Gifts to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every one according to his ability And that one Sinetas when King Artaxerxes was not far off from his Cottage what with the fear of the Law and what with the shame that he should not be found as forward as any in expression of his Loyalty and good Will toward the King having notwithstanding nothing at all at that time to offer or present to his Majesty The poor man was ill troubled in his mind and in this perplexity the King approaching nearer he runs to the River Cyras hard by with all speed kneels him down gets up Water in the hollow of his Hands comes to the King and salutes him after this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O King Artaxerxes Reign for ever I now O King what I am able after what manner I am able offer this Present unto you that so far as lies in me you may not pass by me without the acknowledgment of my Duty and Allegiance The King was very well pleased with the Gift and commanded the Water to be received into a Golden Phial Surely the Charitable man serves as reasonable a Master and one as graciously disposed Our Saviour Christ hath promised his favourable acceptance even of but a cup of cold Water Whosoever shall give one of these little ones to drink a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple Verily I say unto you he shall not lose his reward Matth. 10. And to make the application of the story more fit He that offers a cup of cold Water to these little ones offers it to no less than a King and no less a King than the King of Heaven and Earth Matth. 25. 34. c. where these doers of good and free communicators receive their doom of that great Judge and mighty Prince Christ Jesus Come ye blessed of my Father saith he inherit you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world For I was an hungred and ye gave me meat I thirsted and ye gave me drink I was naked and ye clothed me I was sick and ye visited me I was in prison and ye came unto me Then shall the righteous answer him saying Lord when saw we thee an hungred and fed thee or a thirst and gave thee drink or when saw we thee a stranger and lodged thee or naked and clothed thee or when saw we thee sick or in prison and came unto thee And the King shall answer and say unto them Verily I say unto you inasmuch as you have done it unto the least of these my brethren you have done it unto me He therefore that offers a cup of cold water to these offers it to this King who hath promised a gracious acceptance of it and a sure reward Wherefore we are not to be discouraged from these works of Charity though our means be small For if we give a little of a little that little is great in the eyes of God who knoweth how to prize the works of his Saints If there be a willing mind it is accepted according to that a man hath and not according to that a man hath not saith the Apostle 2 Cor. 8. So that we see none excluded from this First requisite in communicating of good For though one man cannot give so much as another yet one man may be as liberal as another which is if he give as much for his Estate as the other doth for his Which consideration as it may animate the Low-estated man in his Beneficency So it may make them of higher fortunes bring their Liberality to the right measure and consider that he hath not done a super-eminent act of Charity above others because his Alms was bigger than others of lower degree He that gives one shilling out of twenty is as truly liberal as he that gives one hundred pound out of two thousand This I speak that the Poor man depretiate not his slenderer bounty nor the Rich overprize his larger liberality but that all may walk in all Meekness Humility and Holy Charity before God and before men 2. But I pass on
Eternal Spiritual Riches he will endue us with hereafter 3. The Third Motive is taken from the persons to whom we are to communicate The rich and the poor meet together and the Lord enlightens both their eyes Prov. 29. No difference between the greatest Prince and the poorest Beggar but the goods of Fortune or rather of Providence For they come not to us by chance but by the good will of God who hath made out of his Wisdom some Poor and some Rich that we may have occasion to exercise the acts of Mercy and tender Compassion to our Brethren who live by the same Air vvalk in the light of the same Sun vvere created by the same God are to be saved by the same Christ. There is one Body and one Spirit even as you are called in one hope of your calling One Lord one Faith one Baptism One God and Father of all which is above all and through all and in you all Eph. 4. What One Body and one Member despise and disregard another One Spirit and not sympathize one vvith another One Hope and not help one another One Lord and not one fellovv-servant acknovvledge another One Father and Brethren not relieve one another One God above all over-seeing us all in all our actions vvho though he be so high yet beholdeth things here belovv upon earth and vve poor earthly vvorms overlook one another One God in us all and no goodness in us all God vvho is Love it self pierce through us all and yet not those lovely shafts of holy Charity vvound any of our hearts God forbid If vve abide not in Love God abideth not in us If our hearts be contracted and darkened by frozen rigidness the light of God shineth not through us If our poor contemptible Neighbour be so far under us that vve disdain to stretch forth our armes to help him vve forget God above us If vve love not as Brethren God is not our Father If vve be asham'd of our Fellovv-servants the Lord is not our Master If vve be cold in mutual affection our Faith is dead and Hypocrisie is our Religion If vve have no sympathy or fellovv-feeling the Spirit vve boast of is but vanity or empty air If vve favour not one another as Members of the same Body vve are not Members of the same Body but disunited Dust vvhich the Wind blovves to and fro upon the face of the Earth and the Angel of God scatters it Community is but a name vvhere there is no communication of good Vnity but a deceivable phansie vvhere there is no real Mercy He that will endanger the Soul of his Brother by with-holding the sustenance of his Body which out of Brotherly affection he is to administer to him surely that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Brotherly Love which the Apostle calls for dwelleth not in him The very shame of Poverty will force a man to do or suffer any thing How much more will pinching hunger scorching thirst benumming cold Necessity hath no Law or at least necessitous persons are easily drawn to think so Give me not poverty saith the Wise Man Prov. 30. 8 9. lest I be poor and steal and take the name of my God in vain A good man is merciful to his beast and shall not we be so good as to have compassion upon men The miserable and penurious condition of the Poor man would afford me great store or plenty of Arguments to plead his cause but I will only name them Hunger thirst nakedness rags filth deformity pensiveness sickness torture contempt sighs tears groans fear despair disconsolateness assaults of the Devil hard-heartedness of the World dejectedness of his spirit weak and vain looks loss of limbs blindness and deafness I cannot name them all Poverty is attended with such a numerous regiment of defects and infirmities that they may win the most strong and stony heart to compassionate their miseries But because we are fallen into these ill latter times in which the Apostle hath foretold that the love of many or rather of most if not almost of all shall wax cold Mercy and Pity are not passions easily to be stirred up out of the representation of our Neighbours misery and ill plight These are poor contemptible vertues befitting the weak womanish sect A strong vigorous faith I would to God it were so or if you will a deep conceited phansie that we are Gods Children though we be not merciful as our Heavenly Father is merciful is altogether in request and fashion amongst us Christians So this conceit makes us abound with Love toward God as vve think But when all comes to all it will prove but false and adulterate Love It will not abide that touchstone If you love me keep my commandements Or that of S. Iohns Epistle Chap. 3. Whosoever hath this worlds good and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his compassion from him how dwelleth the love of God in him 4. But if we do love God so much and our Neighbour so little yet we may not evade or escape this duty of doing good for all that For say that all our time is to be spent in the duties of the First Table all our Piety to be shewed in performances toward God If I shew that these acts of Mercy and Bounty be acts of the First Table too I hope we will not shew our selves so ungrateful and impious as to decline this manner of Worship which he requires at our hands Now that acts of Mercy are duties of the First Table I need go no farther for proof than my Text which tells us that doing good and communicating is a sacrifice And Sacrificing you know is a duty of the First Table even the immediate service of God How fitly the Apostle hath framed his Argument for convincing of mens corrupt Consciences and discovering that mysterious hidden wickedness that lurks in our hypocritical hearts a strong perswasion that we are Gods though there be little of the inward power of Godliness in us This holy kind of irreligiousness that is so immerse and lost as it were in a false counterfeit love of God that it quite forgets all respect and duty to our Neighbour That foolish impudent Spirit that would so confidently father it self upon God and perswade him that he is his Child when it s nothing but the deceitful breath of the Devil A handsome slight to travel to Heaven at least charges The service of God that is a strong perswasion that we are one of them that God hath sign'd to be his though there be no other sure argument or sign saving that we do strongly perswade our selves so The hearing of the Word the saying of Prayers and such outward performances or outward deceivable phansies is a Religion so cheap and easie that it asks a man neither cost nor labour But to be crucified with Christ to suffer with him to undergo the deadly dolorous pangs of mortification to sweat drops of Blood and endure
This last is chiefly the Word The other but dead signs or shadows of it differing as much from this as a picture of a man from a living man nay much more as much at least as the shadow of the Garland hanging on a Sign-post and projected on the ground differs from the best Wine in the Inne The Word spoken perisheth with the speaking Vox audita perit The written Word is indeed longer-liv'd but Paper and Ink is not incorruptible and immortal For the heavens shall melt away with a noise and the elements shall melt with fervent heat the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up 2 Pet. 3. 10. The Word of God then is safe no where but in his own bosom cypher'd within himself in his own mind This is his eternal Wisdom and incorruptible Word the only incorruptible Seed Preaching and hearing and reading and discoursing they may be a kind of plowing or harrowing or some such piece of Husbandry But it is an hand out of the Clouds that sets this Seed of everlasting Life in our hearts Those are but some hungry talk of the best dishes or spreading the table This is the real food Those but a note under the Physitians hand This is the very Physick that restores to health Doct. IV. That this Word of God which is the Seed of the Soul is a living and everlasting Word This Word is no other than the inward Word of God which is his first-born Son the everlasting Wisdom of the Father which sat in Counsel with him when he made the World Prov. 8. Iohn 1. This Second Hypostasis is so acknowledged by the Heathen to be everlasting they make it to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first Life That it is a living Word we have an ample testimony Heb. 4. 12 13. For the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joynts and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do Can these Attributes be given to any dead letter or any transient hand Can Words or Writings be so penetrating as to divied asunder the Soul and Spirit c. 'T is true Authors both Divine and Profane give very quick operations to the Words of the Tongue Prov. 25. 15. By long forbearing is a prince perswaded and a soft tongue breaketh the bone Psal. 57. 4. My soul is among lions and I lie even among them that are set on fire even the sons of men whose teeth are spears and arrows and their tongue a sharp sword Psal. 64. 3. Who whet their tongue like a sword and bend their bows to shoot their arrows even bitter words And in Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to speak words that cut to the heart But for this consider that it is not the words that do then so wound the mind as the mind launceth it self and plagues it self by those unruly phantasms she then occasionally creates in her self upon such speeches One man being jear'd at a Comedy bears himself so carelesly and jollily that he walks cross the stage that all the people may take notice that he was the man that was so abused Another so used goes home and hangs himself which is a sure experiment to prove that it is not words but the Souls own thoughts that so wound and scorch her self Words of themselves are but empty shells and husks and can give no greater blow than the shadow of Hercule's Club lifted up in the Sun nor can no more administer comfort than an Ivy-bush can quench our thirst Wherefore it is plain that 't is the Soul her self that creates these joys or disturbances in things Natural or Moral But in real Conversion to God in unfeigned Repentance in the New Birth as the Letter or outward Word is excluded as has been cleared so the Soul her self is excluded as being unable to regenerate her self therefore what is left but God himself by his living Word That 's the immediate cause of Conversion and Regeneration the other but occasions If not there is no supernatural act at all in Conversion and Regeneration Again this Word of God is said to be a discerner of the thoughts c. all which are manifest Properties of Life Compareing therefore this place of the Hebrews with the Text it is plain that there is a living and everlasting Word and that that Word is meant in both these places And if so then it s the same with S. Iohns words In him was life and the life was the light of men THUS much for the Doctrines or Truths which are as so many enforcements to the great Duty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The substance of the Duty is mutual Love which is charged with a double modification viz. of quality 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of quantity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which implies extension and is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or intension and is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Again this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or extension is either in reference to the object or else duration and implies an universal Love and continued But no English word will fully answer to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Therefore our Interpreters have been forc'd to make use but of one of these senses fervently And they have with more judgment pitcht upon the sense of intension than extension because that intension in some measure implies extension but not è contra for that which is ex gr very hot has also a further extended sphear of calefaction and doth last longer hot than that which is at first but more remisly heated as is manifested in heated Irons To make any subtle disquisition of the nature of Love is not much to the purpose Every one knows what it is to love himself how he is affected towards himself Let him but transfer that affection which he is so sensible of in himself to his Neighbour and the Duty is done more substantially and completely than all Scholastical definitions and curious circumscriptions can be able to set it out Be so affected to other men as you would they should be to you or as you are affected to your self This is the Law and the Prophets THE Incitements to this Duty are many But I will confine my self to the Text and cull out some three As 1. From the Seed of the New Birth For what is this Seed but the Son of God by union with whom we also become the Sons of God petty Deities But sith that the Deity it self is nothing else but a sufficient and overflowing Goodness creating all things and sustaining them from no other principle than the Spirit of Goodness though we cannot act as this absolute Deity yet we may will according
to that uncreated Will which is nothing else but pure overspreading Love Again this Seed as hath been shewed which is the Word is a living Seed But where Life is and Understanding or Sense there must needs be Love for it is the flower and sweet of all desire What then can be the desire of the living Word but Love and how can he want desire sith he is Life and what can he so much desire as the good and welfare of Mankind What therefore should that part of Mankind that partake of this Divine Nature desire more than the good of one another and of those also that as yet have not partaked of that Divine Nature For God also loves those or else how could ever any partake of it 2. From the Regeneration of the Soul It is the Holy Ghosts own arguing 1 Ioh. 4. 7. Beloved let us love one another for love is of God and every one that loveth is born of God and loveth God Ver. 16. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us God is love and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him By Righteousness and Unrighteousness by Love and Hatred are the Children of God and the Children of the Devil manifested 1 Iohn 3. 10. In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God neither he that loveth not his brother Ver. 14. We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren he that loveth not his brother abideth in death If Water or Earth be turn'd into Fire we expect it should burn and be hot How shall then a Son of Satan or the Earthly man be turn'd by Regeneration into the Son of God and not love 3. From the end of our Sanctification Love is the very End of it Shall Envy shall Hatred shall Lust Ambition Luxury c. shall all these enormous Desires and Affections be cast out of the Soul by Sanctity and Purity that she may be but a transparent piece of Ice or a spotless fleece of Show Shall she become so pure so pellucid so christalline so devoid of all stains that nothing but still shadows and night may possess that inward diaphanous Purity Thus would she be no better than the nocturnal Air no happier than a statue of Alabaster it would be but a more cleanly sepulchre of a dead starved Soul Nay certainly at this cleansing and preparing is for something well worth that labour The Stoicks themselves that were such severe Sentencers of Passion would retain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stoicism it self brings in upon that deadness and privation of other Passions that divine motion of the Soul which is Love or Goodwill to all Mankind And shall Christianity be but a cold grave to the mortified Soul of man No surely there is a Resurrection to Life Love and the Divinity as well as a Death of the enormous Affections of this Mortal Body Bitter Zeal harsh Censure busie Revenge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are so far from being able to supply the place of Charity that it 's a manifest sign that we are as yet carnal and unsanctified DISCOURSE XIV PSAL. cvi 28. They joined themselves also unto Baal-Peor and are the sacrifices of the dead THIS Psalm is a compendious commemoration of those many slips and falls the Children of Israel had in their Journey to the Land of Canaan As foul and as dangerous as any is this in my Text this business of the Baal-Peor In the handling whereof I will observe this method First I will explain what may seem difficult to understand or ambiguous Secondly I will further confirm out of Scripture the narration in this Particle of Scripture Thirdly and Lastly I will make some Observations or Deductions from the truth of this Text such as will come from it with as much ease as profit I. For the First 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. They joyned themselves For although the word be in Niphal and may seem to signifie either Passively or Neutrally yet as Elias the Grammarian hath observed the Conjugation Niphal sometimes signifies as Hithpael which denotes a reflex act Tota actio ejus est retransitiva quum recipiatur ab ipso agente So he expounds that in 2 Kings 20 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Amasa non est custoditus that is saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Non custodivit se. So Lev. 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Et venditus tibi Vt dicunt sapientes bonae memoriae saith Elias upon this place loquitur hic versus de vendente seipsum necessitate cogente Other Examples this Grammarian brings for the further confirmation of the matter but I will omit them these being sufficient for proof According therefore to this Analogy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be interpreted as our Translators have expounded it They joined themselves also to Baal-Peor To Baal-Peor But what 's that Such an Abomination that I am loth to name it I am almost forced back at the evil sight of it and ill sent And well may be if we believe the Hebrew Writers Peor saith Vatablus testantibus Hebraeis spurcissimum Idolum Madianitarum fuit a denudando nempe nomen habens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 enim aperire denudare significat I will not venture any further in this description The impure Dog hath more modesty than the Worshippers of that Deity For that which they hide by scraping over earth from the sight of men they lay open to the view of their God Yet as filthy Abomination as it is the Iews as Moses the Egytian for example and R. Salomon stick not to assert it as true Origen durst conclude that at least it is idolum turpitudinis though not define what kind of turpitude in his twentieth Homily upon Numbers Cum multae sint turpitudinum species una quaedam ex pluribus turpitudinis species Beelphegor appellatur S. Ierom ventures to parallel it with the Latines Priapus and makes it to be chiefly workshipped of Women Others I could bring in to confirm this of the turpitudo of this Idol But I lift not to dwell so long upon an history so foul It is enough and too much that it be true that all assent to that it was an Idol that Israel joined himself to Those things concerning it that be questionable and uncertain I will let go and will build nothing but upon a sure foundation Let the condition therefore of their transgression be set as low as Venerable Bede hath pitch'd it in his Exposition upon this Text Initiati junt saith he or consecraverunt se vel initiati sunt sacricaverunt Beel qui colebatur in Phegor Belus enim fuit Pater Nini in cujus honorem Filius Idolum fecit quod vocabatur Beel colebatur in regione Phegor cui isti in deserto sacricaverunt And hence we may have some little light to find
the collection of Humane Reason which at the best and containing it self within its own more proper Bounds the representations of Nature is slippery enough and uncertain if it be promoted with urgency of Affection over-proportionated to the weight of Reason and Argument by how much it transgresseth this way by so much largely doth it partake of superstitious Phrenzy and Fanaticalness And that this heat is but mistaken zeal not divine Love of the Truth this one thing may be a shrowd sign That they hate a man commonly more for not being of their Sect than they love him for being a Christian. 2. The Second Branch of Love is Benevolence Which as it is nothing so precious as the former viz. Complacency so we may and should be the more prodigal thereof We may wish well to all men but can delight in none but such as be good The Purity therefore and perfection of Benevolence is that it shoots out before and lasts longer if need be than Complacency may do For God also loved us when there was nothing lovely in us And we are to be like-minded with God who is kindly affected to those who deserve it not And though there be a good rude Honesty in such a disposition that makes a man not able to be at all kindly affected to them that are debauched yet certainly we are obliged to a more high and Divine temper if that which is most perfect and most Divine doth oblige us as certainly it doth Object But then Anger and Hatred and such churlish Passions are useless nay sinful Sol. That follows not For we may wish well to the man though we be angry or hate or grieve at his Vices Nay it s impossible to bear a sincere Good-will to any man that goes out of the way but that he should be angry or grieved at such a mans wicked courses and reprove him Benevolence is so far from excluding Anger and Rebuke that the want of this upon due occasions is an argument of the impureness or counterfeitness of the Affection at least in those men who hold it lawful or are upon any occasions brought into this Passion When a man sees God dishonoured and his Brother endangered by his vain ways Quis est tam ferreus ut teneat se He that can be still and smooth in such matters has some unwarrantable Complacence in his Friend they are not united in the bond of Vertue The Impurity of this part of Love is the well-wishing to others for our own sakes This is called Amor Concupiscentiae in contradiction to Amor Amicitiae as being indeed nothing akin but rather opposite thereunto He that loves a man thus is no more a Friend to him than a Country Farmer is a Friend to his Team of Horses his Cart or Plough I wish that most Polititians were not of this stamp to look upon all the World as the Rustick does upon his Horse Plough Sheep Dog c. as profitable and instrumental The World is so Epidemically corrupt herein that the whole Conversation or dealing of men even of them that would seem something more than ordinarily serious is not much better and more generous than the trade and commerce of Fairs and Markets They make choice of their Friends after the same rate they would seek out a purchase Profit and Pleasure share all the Societies of men betwixt them two He that is not instrumental to either of these ends is overlookt as a thing of no worth so that there is no room but for the skilful flatterer or the able purse And indeed none can love at a better rate that is not born of God who is Love it self and made the World and the whole Creature out of no such self-respects at all but for their Happiness or if for any thing in reference to himself for the delight that should arise to him from their being Happy Nor do I know that they are obliged to any thing but what is conducible to this end whatever unlearned Melancholly or rude Mistake may surmize to the contrary 3. The Third and last considerable in Love is Beneficence And 1. This should spread out as large as our Benevolence Humanity is to be extended so far as Mankind reacheth at least 2. Those who partake most of Vertue and the Divine Image should share the greatest part of our Favour 3. It must be devoid of all self-respects What a shameful thing is it That where that noble and generous title of a Friend is pretended there should be no other Love found at the bottom if the business be unravelled than such as he bears to the meanest utensil he has in his house WE pass on now to the Intension of our Love viz. Doct. III. That we are to love one another fervently And if we did make good the foregoing Precept of loving sincerely we might easily arrive to the doing of it fervently Quis enim celaverit ignem Indeed the most accurately well painted Flame that is gives no heat But true Fire without a miracle will betray it self in burning or warming at least Quest. But you will say We are uncertain of the due measure and degree of this fervency of our Affection Answ. The least degree that we can allow our Brotherly Affection is that it must be fervent Coldness here is Death and Luke-warmness an Abomination a thing to be spued out as being nauseating and distastful to all good men But when we are got to that due warmth and heat that we are really constituted in the Divine Life and Heavenly Love we are in a very good and safe and commendable condition though we have not reached all the degrees thereof for a little fire is as truly fire as a great deal And these degrees of Divine Love are it may be best proposed unto us in several Examples of Saints and Prophets which have gone before us carrying the Glorious Lamps of Divine Love in their hands to light us the way that we might follow them by a godly imitation Such were Abraham Ioseph Moses S. Paul c. This kindly Flame did so inact Abraham that in the very heat of the day at the door of his Tent he waited with as much earnestness for an opportunity to exercise that excellent Vertue of Hospitality as our greedy Inn-keepers at their Sign-posts expect a Traveller Nor does this generous Fire only melt him into all sweet behaviour and kindness unto Strangers but elsewhere we shall find it bravely to raise him to feats of Arms and hardy Enterprizes in behalf of his Captived Friends Gen. 14. And certainly no truer root of Valour and Bravery can be found than Hearty and Compassionate Love to those that be in affliction and oppressed Nor any cause that God is more engaged to prosper Nor does this Principle of holy fervency only express it self in bounty and indignation and just revenge but in Grief also whether mixt with joy or downright sadness Thus Ioseph fell upon his brother Benjamins