diligent Execution of his Apostleship Feed my Sheep And the Method which our Lord here prescribes to Peter must be observed also by us in advancing the Kingdom of God When thou art converted says he strengthen thy Brethren We must first set up the Kingdom of God in our own hearts before we attempt to erect it in others As he is unfit to be a Teacher that is not first well instructed himself So he is not fit to be a Reformer that is not first reform'd himself for his Evil Manners will certainly defeat his Sermon and instead of making others righteous by his preaching he will render himself ridiculous 'T is a Noble Undertaking to bring others to the fear of God but 't is an indispensable Duty to serve God our selves says S t James He that converteth a Sinner from the Error of his ways shall save a Soul from death that 's an Heroick Action and shall hide a multitude of Sins that 's a necessary Concern Self-reformation is the most Effectual Step we can make to promote God's Glory 't is such a Giantly Step as I may say as reaches from the Setting out of the Course to the End of it 't is like the first Step of the Sun above the Horizon which darts Rays to the furthest Circumference of it and fills the whole Hemisphere with Light and Vigour which these Words of our Lord seem to allude to Let your Light so shine before men that they may see your good Works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven Nothing so illustrates the Gospel nothing so powerfully converts Sinners and brings them to glorifie God as the Holy Lives of the Faithful But I urge not this to exclude other Endeavours to propagate Righteousness but to shew the great Force and Prevalence that Righteousness has to produce Righteousness I proceed to the Objects of our Love which are two God and our Neighbour 1. God Saint John speaks as if there were some difficulty in this Part of our Duty Our loving God says he He that loveth not his Brother whom he hath seen how can he love God whom he hath not seen Implying though the Ear be Janua Scientiae the Gate of Knowledge the Eye is Janua Amoris the Gate of Love and that to excite this Passion 't is requisite some Visible Beauty be display'd But we may say to this Though we do not see God yet we may love him by what we see and hear of him nay with good reason we may be the more enamour'd on him because his Perfections transcend not only our mortal Senses but even all humane Conception and thus we may fall in love as Blind Men often passionately do by report and hear-say But more particularly there are three Motives why we should love God comprehended in the very Object The Lord thy God 1. Because he is God For that 's the Name of the highest Excellence and Perfection and they are only Glorious and Illustrious things that stir Love and Admiration in us we run not out to gaze upon Common Persons but upon those that are famous for Greatness Learning Beauty Prowess and the like Now there is nothing Rare or Admirable of any kind but 't is in God in its Fullness and Perfection and for this reason Epicurus though he believed no Providence or that Men received any Good or Evil from the Gods yet he adored them and sacrificed to them merely because they were Glorious Beings Had we no other Cause to love God but for the Stupendous Perfections that are in him it were sufficient But we have greater reason to love him from the Second Motive Because we have the Honour of Relation to him he is The Lord Our God The Psalmist thought it a high Obligation to praise him because he was created by him I will praise thee because I am fearfully and wonderfully made But we have not only the Obligation upon us of Creation and Conversation which is a kind of continual Creation in common with all Creatures to love God but other Extraordinary and Distinguishing Favours viz. his calling us to the Knowledge of the Faith and the Blessed Consequences attending it and this ought to tune our Harps yet higher and to be the Subject of many Hymns and Psalms more But then Thirdly Our greatest Motive of all to love him is Because he Redeem'd us after we were lost restor'd us when by our Sins we were in a manner uncreated again when we had defac'd the Image of God in us our Innocence and Righteousness forfeited all our Felicity and were become the Bond-slaves of Satan then he rescued us from Eternal Damnation and made us again the Children of God So that as he is Deus or God to all Mankind to Christians he is also over and above Dominus a Lord i. e. a Redeemer and Saviour There is nothing so much obliges as Love and Benefits Celsus the Physician speaking of Philtres or Love-potions says Amor est naturale Philtrum Love is a Natural Love-potion and more powerful than those that are compounded of Drugs and by Incantations The most stupid of Creatures the dull Oxe and Ass the wildest and fiercest the Lion and Tyger are brought to love by good Usage though they know not the Nature of a Man they know if they receive Meat at his hands and be well treated by him and will love him and be obsequious to him And men were more insensible than the Brutes if when they have received of the Riches of God's Bounty and Goodness they refuse to love him because they have not seen his Person and cannot comprehend his Essence And God Isai. 1.3 complains of this stupid Insensibility in Israel The Oxe says he knoweth his Owner and the Ass his Master's Crib but Israel doth not know my people do not consider We love God as S t John says because he loved us first he began with us and our Love to him is at best a Gratitude or Retaliation if therefore the innumerable and inestimable Benefits of God work no return of Love in us to him we deserve not only to have our Names rased out of the Number of Men but to be allowed no place among the better natur'd Beasts but to be rang'd with Devils who are the only Enemies of God for his Goodness and Haters of him for that which is Excellent and Amiable in him The next thing I am to shew is In what Measure or Degree we are to love God The Words of the Commandment are Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy Soul with all thy heart and with all thy mind On which three Expressions Commentators have many Observations and Criticisms but more nice than profitable for as Saint John says of the three that bear witness on Earth the Spirit the Water and the Bloud these three are one so I may say of these three Expressions in the Commandment however diversify'd that in importance they are but One and may be summ'd up
for their Children for being kind Husbands they have provided for their Wives for being bountiful Masters they have preferr'd their Servants But yet all this is but to do Good or Charity Oeconomically or within our own Doors not Oecumenically or Universally all this is still but the Love of a Man's Self for he is hardly yet gone out of Himself that is not gone beyond his Family and Relations This measure of Love as our Lord observes is found among Infidels They love those that love them but we are to be like our Father which is in Heaven who sends his Rain upon the Vnjust as well as the Just we are to love Aliens and Enemies as well as Friends The Love that is express'd to Relations may be the Pin or Hook on which some Single Precept hangs but not which supports the Stress of the Whole Law and the Prophets that Honour or Dignity belongs only to these two The Love of God Above our selves And the Love of all men As our selves Which brings me to my Second General Part The Dignity of these two Commandments by reason of the Dependence of the whole Law and Prophets on them The Twenty First Sermon MATTH xxii 46 On these two Commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets THESE two Commandments The Love of God And the Love of our Neighbour sustain the Entire Structure or Frame of the Book of God as the two Pillars Boaz and Jachin bore up the stupendous Fabrick of Solomon's Temple Or rather to keep to our Lord's Comparison they are as two mighty Hooks Hinges or Pins on which all the Law and the Prophets hang. For the better Explanation of which I shall do these three things I. Shew how it is to be understood That all the Law and the Prophets hang on these two Commandments The Love of God And the Love of our Neighbour II. I shall shew the Excellence of Love by way of Essay so far as to make it appear worthy of the Honour ascribed to it of sustaining all the Law and the Prophets III. I shall add as a Corollary how we may attain this Excellent and important Grace Love on which all the Law and the Prophets hang. I. How it is to be understood That all the Law and the Prophets hang on these two Commandments The Love of God And of our Neighbour The Law and the Prophets i. e. the Text and the Gloss or Comment whatsoever the Law has concisely commanded or implyed only and the Prophets more largely expounded and dilated on were but to plant this one Duty this One Master Principle in the hearts of men Love In every Law there are two Parts the Matter enjoin'd and the Rewards and Punishments annex'd by way of Sanction for the better Observation of it For a bare Injunction not animated and fortified with the Promise of Good things to the Keepers of it and Threats of Evil to the Infringers will find but cold Observation among men Who as the Psalmist speaks are little better than horse and mule that must be held with bitt and bridle of Penalties lest they fall upon you The Office of the Prophets was to be Custodes Legis the Guardians and Conservators of the Law they were not to add to the Law though they were inspired by God as Moses was but to interpret press and inculcate the Duties of it to revive in mens thoughts the Promises and Threats and thus they were a kind of Mound or Fence to the Law to keep off Transgressions The Jews had a Sort of Criticks who with great preciseness observed the Number of the Letters in each Book of Moses how they were written together with the Various Readings and these were call'd the Masorites because they were as the Word imports a Hedge to the Law But with much better right the Greater and Lesser Prophets may deserve this Name And upon this account it is that these two the Law and the Prophets or Moses and the Prophets are still quoted by our Lord together who says not The Law and the Interpretation of the Scribes or the Law and the Determination of the Priests though in lesser Matters the People were also to harken to them but the Law and the Prophets which were both of equal Divine Production and carried on the Same Design the one by commanding and the other by preaching and inculcating the Will of God and Duty of Men. Now whatsoever the one of these enjoins and the other enforces our Lord says Hang all upon these two Pins The Love of God and the Love of our Neighbour And though the Word Love is not often found in the Law and the Books of the Prophets though they are not as I may say so much Canticles as the Sermons of Christ and the Writings of his Apostles in some of which there is scarce a Verse but it is even verbally repeated and ingeminated yet the Duties which the Prophets urge and press are all Acts of Love to God and Charity to our Neighbour and whatsoever else they seem most to intend and employ their Pens about the propagation of Piety and Charity may be seen latent in the Scheme and Contexture of their Discourse and he that reads the one shall be unawares engaged and intangled in the other But then it may be ask'd here Seeing all the Law and the Prophets hang on this One Law of Love what need was there of so many Specifications of the Several Duties contain'd in both Tables as Thou shalt not kill Thou shalt not commit Adultery Thou shalt not Steal c. For this Single Word Love comprehending them all in effect so many Tautologies might have been spared To this we may say Men are so crafty and subtil to evade the Duties imposed on them or pretend Ignorance for their Disobedience that 't was not sufficient to set down in Generals the Obligations that lay on them but it was necessary by Express Prohibitions and Particular Instances to convince them when they offended against the Divine Precepts And for this reason the Law is fain often to descend to many trivial Specifications to work a lively and sensible Impression of the Justice or Injustice of every Fact in their minds As for Example Thou shalt not reap the Corners of thy Field nor glean thy Vineyard Thou shalt not suffer the Hire of the Labourer to remain with thee till the morning Thou shalt not take his Garment to Pledge his Bed nor his Working-tools nor his upper Milstone and the like Sure'y to an Ingenious Heart disposed to Humanity this particularizing would have been needless I say to a Good and Friendly Nature these things are of easie Deduction from the bare Word Love that all the rest might have been spar'd we say Verbum Sapienti a Word to the Wise is sufficient but 't is much truer Verbum Amanti a single Word to a true Lover is abundantly sufficient to make him recollect the rest of his Beloveds mind But I say Men
Indignities of a Humane Life His Sufferings indeed were antecedent to his Exaltation but his Exaltation was not the End or Reason of his Sufferings God highly exalted him and gave him a Name above every Name that at the Name of Jesus every Knee should bow of things in Heaven and things in Earth and things under the Earth but this was the Result or Event of the Merit of his Humiliation not the Design of it And the Joy which as the Apostle says was set before him and made him endure the Cross and despise the Shame was a Contemplation of the Redemption and Recovery of Lost Man and of the Glory redounding to God by his Atchievement more than of his own Glory There are but two Sorts of Creatures in the Whole Lump of the Creation for whom the Excision of the Messiah could possibly be namely Angels and Men but the Scripture excludes the first He took not upon him the Nature of Angels but took upon him the Seed of Abraham and the Ancients interpret That the Nature that was not assum'd was not ransom'd The State of the Angels Good and Bad immediately after the Fall of those that kept not their Station was made Immutable and they are Happy or Accursed without Change For Men therefore alone the Benefit was and it being said for Men indefinitely it must be understood of all the Race of Mankind the Men of all Nations and of all Times quocunque sub axe how remote or in what Clime soever quocunque sub scelere how remote from Righteousness or under what Sins soever all that Believe all that Repent are of the Number of those for whom Christ was cut off as S t John says He is the Propitiation for our Sins and not for ours only but for the Sins of the Whole World None are so much cut off from Goodness but Christ was cut off to bring them to Righteousness and Salvation And now to draw to a Conclusion What does this Universal this Wonderful Love of Christ preach to us Who when he was not capable as God to dye for us as our Condition required espoused our Nature first that he might espouse our Miseries after and that he might bring us to perfect Felicity was content to be made perfect by Sufferings as the Apostle speaks As I said before an affected weeping and sorrowing in remembrance of Christ's Passion was but an Insignificant Return for his Sufferings So I may say here an Empty Admiration of his Love will be as Vain as Ungrateful and as unacceptable an Acknowledgment of his Goodness The Return he expects for his Unspeakable Love is that we according to our Measures and proportions should shew the like Love to our Brethren And this is the Consequence S t John draws from the Love of Christ If Christ so loved us we ought to love one another But what Kind of Love is it which is requir'd of us For the Love commonly practis'd in the World is but a Confederation for Lust and Pleasure or an Association like that of Merchants for Interest and Profit Moralists observe three Kinds of Love in regard of the Ends of them Love for Pleasure sake Love for Profit and Love for Vertues sake Now the last only of these bears any Resemblance to the Love of Christ which we are to imitate and which is more perfectly described by the Pen of S t Paul To be first a Benevolence or Well-willing to others as to our Selves not excluding our very Enemies a Candid and favourable Interpretation of all Mens Actions a Meek Conceit of our selves and a Lowliness towards others ready to forgive Injuries and to overcome Evil with Good c. which Love the Apostle prefers even before Martyrdom Secondly a Mutual Compassion and being affected as our Brethren are a sorrowing with them that sorrow and a rejoycing with them that rejoyce as the Apostle says like Members of the same Body suffering all if one suffers and if one be honoured all rejoycing Thirdly a Beneficence or Liberal Contribution to those that need exprest in these Words But to do Good and to Contribute forget not And this Love it seems the Church was so happy in in S t Paul's days that he thought it superfluous to recommend it among other Duties to the Thessalonians But as touching Brotherly Love says he ye need not that I should write unto you But had the Apostle liv'd in these days he would have thought it necessary not only to say Love one another love Strangers love your Enemies but love your Friends love your Selves For we see Men destroy their Souls for the love of their Bodies and their Bodies again for the love of their Lusts. And if any in these days should pretend to love merely for Vertue and Goodness sake to have a Kindness to those that gave them an Opportunity to exercise their Charity even as unto those that did them a Good Turn they would be hiss'd at as Hypocrites and if they should love their Enemies and return Good for Evil they would be lookt on as base and degenerate despicable and ridiculous persons But had not Christ been so ridiculous as to do Good to them that hated him so degenerate as to lay down both his Life and Glory for his Enemies none that now shall be admitted into the Kingdom of Heaven should ever have come there And he that gave his Soul unto Death for our sakes looks that we should not only be Believers but Martyrs for his Sake if Occasion requires that we should be ready to be cut off for Him that was cut off for us that is be content to lay down our Lives for the Truth or the Salvation of our Brethren To God the Father Son and Holy Ghost be ascribed all Honour Glory c. Amen The Fifth Sermon ZECHARY xiii 6 And one shall say unto him What are these Wounds in thy hands Then shall he answer Those with which I was wounded in the house of my Friends THere is nothing esteemed more barbarous than to violate the Laws of Hospitality to outrage a Stranger-Guest The sense of Mankind in this Particular may be seen by the fatal Revenge taken for the abuse of the Levite's Concubine which occasioned the destruction well near of a whole Tribe in Israel But then the Violation of an Ambassadour and of such an one as comes to offer Peace and Alliance not only to break the Laws of Hospitality but of Nations to Evil-Entreat a Sacrosanct Person and to return Hostility for Friendship and Amity what can be found sufficient to make an Atonement for such Inhumanity How beautiful are the feet of them that bring glad Tydings of Good things And how deformed and detestable on the other side must the Ingratitude of those be that are injurious to such Messengers 'T is no wonder if such Barbarity creates irreconcileable Feuds inter mortales inimicitias immortales between mortal men immortal Enmities Yet the Prophet Zechary foretells that such
constantly terms them for no man can will a Wrong Action that is not Ignorant and Mistaken and whether the Mistake lye in the thing Chosen or in the Principle by which 't is chosen it matters not if it be still a Mistake and the grosser the Errour is the more pitiable still it is and if we can pardon Fools and Mad Folks Children and Sick persons and cannot likewise commiserate the Sick in Sin the Mad and Foolish in Wickedness we are as blind in our Anger as they are in their Actions How will that man stand before the Severe Tribunal of God who weighs every Grain and Scruple in his Brothers Trespasses against him who shews the exactest and highest Rigour of Justice in his Revenges and perhaps was never just in any other passage of his Life how will he be able to excuse his non-payment of the vast Arrears he is indebted to God who has exacted the utmost Farthing of his Brother Beloved we make our Condition in the World to come according to our Charitableness or Uncharitableness in this God will love us or hate us judge us or justifie us enlarge his Mercy or shut it up to us as we do these things to others if we be difficult in remitting our Brothers Faults he will be difficult in remitting ours if we forgive only small Offences he will not pardon our Great if we forgive only in part we shall not be absolv'd in the whole He shall have Judgment without Mercy as S t James says that shew'd no Mercy Let no man therefore seek an Excuse or be glad when he has found a Distinction to take him off from pardoning his Brother for what profit is there in that Wrath which does but treasure up Wrath against the Day of Wrath The Fourth Council of Carthage forbad that the Oblations of Contentious Persons should be received into the Treasury of the Church for the same reason that the High Priest refus'd to put the money return'd by Judas into the Treasury of the Temple because it was the Price of Bloud So this the Council Obligationes dissidentium Fratrum neque in Sacrario neque in Gazophylacio Episcopi recipiant As there is no place in the Church of God for Uncharitableness so we may be sure there 's as little in the Kingdom of Heaven I have not time to set forth all the Instances of Christ's Love but there is One which I must not omit and 't is that which differences and distinguishes Spiritual Love from Worldly and Carnal above all others and that is Christ's performing all he did merely for their Sakes for whom he did it Carnal Love or Dotage on outward Beauty can in a measure imitate the former things we have mentioned love first before it be beloved love without Merit in the Person affected digest all their Peevishness and Affronts and hang on still and leave no means unattempted to bring their Mind about but then they do this not for their sakes but their own to attain the Fruition of what they have so much desired But Alas what End what Design could the Creator of all things have on his own Creatures What Advantage could he receive by them As Christ therefore lov'd us not for his own Good but ours as it was our Salvation our re-estating in Immortality that he intended and not his own so in our Love to our Brethren we must not have an Eye to any Sordid Profit of our own we must not chaffer Kindness huckster as I may say friendly Offices Charity requires the mind of a Prince not of a Merchant and we must make a difference between Christianity and Factoring As I have loved you so love one another If it be here objected That the most Spiritual and Divine Love was never so abstracted as to be without all Intuition of Reward and that our Lord himself for the joy that was set before him endur'd the Cross and despised the Shame It will be enough to say in answer That as in a Kingdom or Commonwealth they are accounted Disinterested Persons and without all Designs who pursue only the Publick Interest and Honourable Designs So in the Kingdom of the Gospel those are counted to love without all Design who have no base and bye Design who love God and their Neighbour for Heavens sake are interpreted to love them purely for their Own sakes And let this suffice to be said of the Habit or Grace of Love enjoined by the Apostle I proceed next to speak of the Degree of it Have Fervent Charity The Word in the Original for Fervent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies as well the Continuation of Time as the Vehemence and Intenseness of the Quality the Constancy that should be in our Love as well as the Ardour I shall therefore handle it according to both Senses 1. In regard of the Time or Constancy of this Quality our Charity must not be Fantastick interrupted and uncertain there must not be several Weathers in our Affections they must not change like the Winds but move like the Heavens in one constant Circumvolution shedding and dispensing their favourable Influences For he that loves not always when he does love loves out of Humour not Vertue and we may account all the good Offices he does only the Fits and Starts of some momentany Passion and not the Actions of a settled and radicated Habit. Again this Vertue must not be taken up only at the Alarm of a Danger or Sickness at the approach of a Holy Season or by way of Preparation to the Communion for they are far from fulfilling the Law of Charity that lay down their Grudges and Quarrels to their Brethren out of some Affright or Design but as soon as these are over reassume them again imitating the Serpent that casts up her Poyson when she goes into the Water and as soon as she comes on dry Land licks it up again God accepts not those kind of Truces where Battel ceases but the hatred does not where the Weapons rest but the Affections still rage Though Charity ought to flourish more eminently at holy Seasons yet it must live and be exercised all the whole Year Our Saviour's Example will direct us here in the Continuation of our Love as formerly it did for the Manner of it of whom we read That having loved his own which were in the World he lov'd them unto the End 2. In regard of its Degree our Charity must be Vehement and Intense it must confess its Part in its Ardour the Holy Ghost which is call'd the Spirit of Love and has appeared oftener to the World in Fire than under any other Form Good will without Fervency is but the Endeavour of an imperfect Elementary Charity That we may know therefore the Just Degree and certain Temper that is required in our Love the best means will be to bring it to the Test and Tryal of the Rule which is given us to measure it by which is Thou shalt love thy
It covers all Sins I answer That Charity nor no other Vertue in a high and Heroick Degree are Single but Complicated Vertues and whoever shall consider what S t Paul says of Charity throughout the thirteenth Chapter of the First to the Corinthians and again Rom. 13.8 He that loveth another hath fulfilled the Law will confess 't is not a Single Vertue but that whoever has Charity in an Eminent Degree must also have Faith Justice Liberality Patience Humility Self-denial even a whole Conjugation or Constellation of Christian Graces And that where this Vertue is entertain'd there all Quarrels and Dissentions secret Malice and open Injuries both the greater Outrages and more petty Vexations and Molestations so much complained of in humane Society are utterly interdicted and banisht Where Charity has its abode indifferent actions are not put upon the Tenter and men made guilty by Censures when their Lives are Innocent Calamities and Misfortunes are not reckoned among Crimes and the Miserable judged void of Goodness because they are void of Success Brutish and voluptuous Affections are not call'd Vertues Lust the greatest Enemy to Charity stampt with the Specious Title of Love Men are not seen to visit their Lawyer oftener than their Neighbour to seek his Ruine and undoing whom 't is their Duty to protect to keep him upon a perpetual Guard and Alarm whose Security should be as precious to them as their own giving him cause to complain That he rather borders on the Den of a Dragon or some savage Beast than on the Habitation of his Christian Brother Men disturb not for every Nothing the Quiet of their own Families making their Houses resemble the Habitation the Poets describe of Aeolus places of continual Storms and Tempests Look not upon the Peace and Safety of their Country with a more malignant and malevolent Aspect than a fatal Comet hatch not worse Mischiefs in their black Cabals than are brooded in the poysonous Womb of the Air when the Contagion of a Plague is fermenting in it Men rend not the Church in pieces to patch up their Beggarly Fortunes or to cover their more beggarly Endowment knowing the Perverseness of men is such that a mean Harangue will lead them sooner into Sedition than the most powerful Oratory will be able to retain them in their Duty and Obedience and that their Voices which sound so loud and shrill in the Cause of Schism and Rebellion would be hoarse and flat in the Defence of Loyalty and Conformity Against these and infinite Disorders more Charity is the best Catholicon the best General Antidote can be prescribed Which as the Apostle says seeks not its own things but the things of another And if we entertain this Vertue it will not only remove those Mischiefs which are already on foot but prevent those that are springing up it will defend us not by the Power of Arms but by turning Wars into Peace Ill-Will into Love Enemies into Brethren by making the World one Common Family and of one Common Interest by making God our Common Father and Heaven our Common Aim and Ambition to the attaining the highest Honours and Dignities in which Kingdom 't is not Envy and Strife the crossing and frustrating Mens Endeavours but the furthering and assisting them that conduces To God the Father Son and Holy Ghost be ascribed all Honour Glory c. The Twentieth Sermon MATTH xxii 46 On these two Commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets THE Law being a large Body consisting of many weighty Precepts upon several distinct accounts as that of the Sabbath for the remembrance of the Creation of the World and the Redemption out of Egypt that of Tythes for the maintenance of the Sanctuary and the Priests that of Sacrifices for the purging away transgressions that of Circumcision for the sealing of the Covenant and which for its better remembrance was rigorously carved into the very Flesh of the Covenanters c. the Jewish Doctors more curious to compare the Excellence of their Precepts than solicitous to obey them to make them contest their Priority with one another than to reform and regulate their Lives by them made it a Question of the highest concern Which Commandment had the Preheminence of all the rest And our Lord in those days opening as 't were a School of Divine Knowledge and professing a Solution of all Difficulties in the Revealed Will of God to men a Pharisee either to shew his Skill in the Law or to try our Lord's to inform himself or to have whereat to cavil put to him this so controverted Point among those of his own Sect Quaenam est suprema Lex among the many Great Commandments which is the Queen or Supreme Commandment the Law as one may say that gives Law to all beside Our Lord whose custom it was not to answer directly to the impertinence of the Asker but to take occasion from his malice mistake or the like to make known some important Truth satisfies not the folly of the enquiry Which Law had the Precedence to the prejudice of the rest but declares That the End and Design of all God's Laws is Piety and Charity the love of God and the love of our Neighbour brings these two Duties which lay overwhelmed and neglected under the Rubbish of vain Traditions over-seen like Saul in the Stuff and Lumber not only into Competition with the Commandments more highly prized by them but as the tallest and most Illustrious anointed them with the Royal Oil and set the Crown upon their heads The Love of God and of our Neighbour are not distinct formal Laws but the Drift and Scope of the Whole Law duae Cardines Tabularum the Hinges on which the two Tables and all the preaching of the Prophets hang and turn and without which they would fall to the ground i. e. have nothing of Vertue or Moment in them But our Lord having styled them two Commandments has made them so by his authority and as such I shall observe in them these two General Parts I. The Substance of them Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all thy soul and with all thy mind And thy Neighbour as thy self And II. The high Dignity of them by reason of the Dependance of the Whole Law and Prophets on them On these two Commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets In the First of these two General Parts the Substance of these two Commandments I shall observe more particularly these three things 1. The Duty enjoin'd which is the same in both Commandments Love 2. The Objects of this Duty God and our Neighbour 3. The Measure or Degree in which the Love to each Object is commanded viz. God to be lov'd with All the heart And our Neighbour as our self I begin first with the Duty enjoin'd which is the same in both Commandments Love To love a Person as Aristotle defines is to wish him well and to procure things Good and
so well known that I shall not need to insist longer on it The Measure of the Love we are to shew him requires more Explanation We are to love him as our self And the Rule is so Excellent that I may say of it That if the like Freedom had been allow'd to Men to chuse a Standard of their Love to those of their own Kind as was allowed Isai. 7.11 to Ahaz to ask a Sign Ask thee a Sign either in the Depth or in the Height above i. e. in the whole Circuit of Heaven and Earth they could not have found a more apt and congruous than that which is here prescribed them The Love of their own selves Which I shall shew in four Regards or Respects 1. In regard of the Universality of it 't is a great Universality where there is no Exception S t Paul says of our Love to Our Selves No man ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it God implanted this Love in every man by Nature and that with singular Wisdom and Goodness that his Creatures loving themselves might conserve themselves in their Being and we see when this Love in any afterwards fails through Miseries which befal them and that they find no Amability in themselves they ordinarily make themselves away God therefore made choice of this Passion implanted in all men in general for Self-Preservation for the Preservation of our Neighbour that as our Love never fails to our Selves so it should never be wanting to others 2. In regard that this Rule is ever ready and at hand as present and officious as he in the Gospel that said to our Lord Master I will follow thee wheresoever thou goest Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy self is a Sociable and Concomitant Rule that is never absent an inherent Direction that prompts us from within when any Opportunity of doing Good is offered us Or we may liken it to the Foot of the Compass that stands fixt at home and guides and carries on the other that romes and circuits about so this quiescent resident Love we bear our Selves ought to be the Guide of that Love we extend or carry out to others 3. In regard that this Rule takes from us all Excuse of Ignorance in performing the Duties of Charity Men are often Churlish to one another too apt to say How must I love my Neighbour What must I do to him to be said to love him Nescio quid sit Amor as the Young Novice is made to speak I know not what this Enjoined Love is No why the Pattern of it is within thy self how dost thou love thine own Person dost thou not clothe it when 't is naked feed it when 't is hungry cure it when 't is hurt consult for it when 't is in Trouble or Danger c. Do the same for thy Neighbour There is no need here to turn over Books or to ask how the Learned have determin'd but to ask thy self what thou wouldst do to thy self in the like Cases What desirest thou Not What readest thou What God says of mens knowing his Laws under the Gospel I will put my Law into their Inward Parts and write them in their Hearts and they shall teach no more every man his Neighbour saying Know the Lord for all shall know me may be affirmed of the Rule that is given us for the Love of our Neighbour It needs not be learned or copied out from any other for the Original of the Duty is a multiply'd Original in the Breasts of all Mankind 4. In regard of the Truth and Sincerity of the Rule No man loves himself with a False or Counterfeit Love but is truly Dear to himself will not hurt will not deceive himself David in the 22 th Psalm calls his Soul or Life his Darling Deliver my Soul says he from the Sword my Darling from the power of the dog How tender is David to David how David careth for himself Why every man does this as well as he and lo here is the Rule of our Love to other Men With the same Fidelity with the same Sincerity with the Same Tenderness we treat Our Selves we ought to treat our Other-Selves our Neighbours What David calls in this place his Darling is styl'd in the Margin his Only-One unicam meam Men are allow'd in a sense of Propriety to esteem their Own Souls their own Lives their own Interests to be their Only Ones yet in a sense of Charity they are obliged to make this Onlyness or Singularity become Plural and so to look upon themselves as their Only-Selves as to reckon all Men else their Multiply'd and Several-Selves Since this Commandment was given Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy self all men are made in a manner One Man again as at the first Creation and I can no more count my self and my Neighbour to be two in regard of Charity than I can separate my self from my self seclude him from my Love than I can seclude my self from it I shall make but one General Reflection on all that has been said for Application and conclude my first General Part. Although these two Precepts Of loving our Neighbour As our selves and God Above our selves are founded in Nature re-inforc'd and bound straiter on us by express Commandments press'd further in the Gospel and declar'd to be the Summ and General Design of the whole Law yet there is one Rival one Opposite Vicious Principle which is able to with-hold us from paying Obedience to them I say One because whatever with-holds us beside may be reduc'd to this One and that is our Over-much Love of our selves Saint Paul 2 Tim. 3. reckoning many Vices which are causes of perillous Times brings them all out of the Belly of this Monster makes them all the Daughters and Spawn of Self-Love says he This know also That in the last days perillous times shall come for men shall be Lovers of themselves covetous boasters proud blasphemers without natural affection c. All the cursed Genealogy of Ungodliness and Uncharitableness draw their Extraction from this Stock The Immoderate Love of Our Selves From hence it is that we think it more reasonable to satisfie our vainest Desires and to gratifie our most Sinful Affections than to relieve the most weighty and pressing Distresses of our Brethren from hence it is that we set more by our own Opinions and Estimation than by the Truth it self or God's Glory by our Ambition or Revenge than by the Peace and Tranquillity of the Land The Rule that Divines give men when they seek Justification from God viz. That they go out of themselves and look upon nothing in themselves with a very small change will direct us in the Duty of Love that is commanded us We must go out of our Selves and look less upon what concerns our Selves if we will love God and our Neighbour as we ought to do Some men are praised and perhaps not undeservedly for being good Fathers they have laid up
for the Flame of Divine Love as well as for that of Carnal and if men excite not their Love to God by the Contemplation of his Sublime Perfections and Goodness their Love will be no better than the dead Carcase of a Passion than the cold Picture of a Flame And if any say A high and abstracted Contemplation of the Nature Properties and Attributes of the Deity is only fit for Philosophers who have Learning and Subtilty to penetrate into them but they come not within the comprehension of Common Men though otherwise Godly I answer Neither need they be solicitous in this matter there are other Motives to stir men up to the Love of God no less Excellent and subjected to the meanest Capacity viz. those which are taken from his Love to us first his manifold and never-to-be-enough-acknowledged Benefits both Spiritual and Temporal especially Spiritual which he has bestowed upon us through Christ Jesus the Son of his Love as the Remission of our Sins the Gift of Grace the Adoption of us to be his Children the Promise of the Kingdom of Heaven c. For when all is done there is no greater Procurer of Love or Motive to it than to be prevented with the Acts of Love Says David Praise the Lord O my Soul and all that is within me praise his holy Name who forgiveth all thy Sin and healeth all thy Infirmities who saveth thy Life from Destruction and crowneth thee with Mercy and Loving-kindness If men would weigh and consider the accursed and dreadful Condition into which the Guilt of Sin had brought them that the Wages of it is Eternal Damnation they would also be sensible how inestimable a Benefit the Remission of Sin and the Gifts of Grace and Glory are And as there can be no greater Motive to winde up mens Affections to God to the highest Pitch than this Exceeding great Love of God to them so there will need no other Instead therefore of heaping up many Motives I shall leave this one to your Meditations and proceed to shew what Inducements we have To Love our Neighbour And now the whole Hour would not suffice me to give a particular account of them some drawn from Mankinds being all at first of one Stock and Kindred others again from the Renewing this Relation between them by their being made Brethren through Grace in Christ and the adopted Children of one Father in Heaven from mens needing one anothers mutual help even the Greatest and Happiest as well as the Poorest and Meanest and the like But all these Inducements however weighty I shall wave at present not having time to insist on them and restrain my self to the one Motive express'd in my Text Because the Love of our Neighbour is one of the two Hooks or Hinges on which all the Law and the Prophets hang has the Honour to support at least one of the Tables of the Commandments one half of the Conditions God requires of men to make them Partakers of his Promises of the Blessings of this Life and of the Glory of that to come And though I said it has the Honour or Dignity to support but One of the two Tables yet there is that inseparable Connexion between the two Tables that he that breaks the one inevitably breaks the other Whosoever says S t James shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one Point he is guilty of all 'T is not possible to offend against the Law and not against the Law-giver 't is not possible to transgress against the Second Table and not to violate the First to hate our Brother and to love God And the School-men on this account make but one Theological Vertue of our Love to God and our Love to our Neighbour and S t John reckons Uncharitable men among Unbelievers the Hater of his Brother and an Infidel to be the same says he If a man says I love God and hate his Brother he is a Lyar and again he is in darkness i. e. without Faith or the Knowledge of God Our Lord also Matth. 25. pronounces That whatsoever Love is shew'd to his Brethren is shew'd to him Inasmuch says he as you have done it unto one of the least of these my Brethren ye have done it unto me and again what is denied to them is denied to him Inasmuch as you did it not to one of the least of these you did it not to me The true Love of God carries with it as a necessary Consequence the Love of our Brother and 't is but a cheap Piece of Hypocrisie and a niggardly Lye to pretend to love God who is above any Material Expressions of our Love and to harden our hearts to our Brethren who stand in need of such things and whom God has appointed and deputed to be the Receivers of such Tribute in his behalf And thus as all the Law and the Prophets hang on these two Commandments The Love of God And the Love of our Neighbour So these two again depend on one another The Summ of all that has been said is this Love is the End of the Commandment all the Numerous Precepts contain'd in the Law point only at this One grand Duty and are but particular Instances and Exemplifications of it Many things in the Law consist more in a Shew of Goodness than of true Goodness and are rather the Way to Righteousness than Righteousness it self all the Typical Ceremonial Ordinances were but ad populum phalerae as 't is said Pomps and Ornaments either to amuse the rude People or to be Helps to their weak Understanding to bring them to the Knowledge of better things while therefore they observed these they learned to be Religious but when they lov'd God and their Neighbour they were Religious Etiam stante Hierosolyma Jerusalem even standing and the Law of the Sabbath being in force the Strict Rest of it yielded to the Works of it and our Lord tells us Matth. 12. None broke and prophan'd the Sabbath more than the Priests toiling in killing and sleying the Beasts for Sacrifice and were yet blameless And upon another occasion of breaking the Sabbath says he I will have Mercy and not Sacrifice i. e. when both cannot be performed he prefers the Works of Mercy or Charity to a Brother before the Outward Duties to God himself And the learned among the Jews perceived that even while they did perform the Outward Works enjoined them by the Law that they were not principally intended in the Law nay that in respect of the Works of Love that they were cancell'd even when they stood most in force that which is said of our Lord 's particular Obedience Psal. 40. Burnt-Offerings and Sacrifices thou wouldest not but a Body hast thou prepared me then said I Lo I come to do thy Will O God! may be said in like manner of the Obedience that is required of all Men that there is a noluisti thou wouldst not have implyed in all Commands concerning them
judged for their Sins and shall not those to whom he has revealed his Laws and his Righteousness on whom he has heaped his Blessings be judged more severely He that knoweth his Masters Will says our Lord and doth it not shall be beaten with many Stripes As the Heathen therefore were chastised for their Offences Israel was utterly ruined and Un-nationed And this was not only God's proceeding under the Law but 't is the same still under the Gospel For he has Known or favoured Believers in Christ not only above the Gentiles but even above the Jews themselves and if Judah be trod down and the Temple destroyed for the Sins and Ingratitude of that People the seven Churches in Asia lye under a Sadder Desolation at this Day for their Disobedience to Christ Travellers being scarce able to discern so much as the Places where they stood These Examples of God's Wrath both on Single Persons and whole Nations teach us this Lesson That 't is never so dangerous to offend against God as when he has been Gracious to us his former Benefits being so far from priviledging any to transgress that he is sure to punish those most he has done most for But 't is not enough to shew the quod sit the Truth of the Proposition that it is so I proceed in the next place to shew the cur sit the Reason Equity and Merit of it why it should be so The Reason why it should be so This Position That God punishes with heavier Judgments those whom he has chosen to fix his Favours on if they offend against him than others seems to have something in it contrary to the Nature and Disposition of Men who are apt to delight in the Persons on whom they have placed their Benefits to love the Creatures of their Advancing no less than those of their Begetting So S t Augustine affirms the like Disposition is found in God who speaking of his Rewards to Men says Coronat opera sua non merita nostra God crowns his own Gifts and Graces not any Merit he finds in us and Moses makes it a Plea for his Mercy to Israel that he would not destroy them after he had done them so much Good alledging his former Bounty as a Motive for his Pardon and Forgiveness In satisfaction to this I answer We must consider in God's Benefits to men not only his Love but the Purpose of his Love he confers his Gifts upon us with a Design to make us more holy Persons and for the Favours he bestows he looks for a Return of Obedience and Righteousness on our part and where he fails of this Return he does not only cease to give but hates in a manner his Gifts and destroys them for the Parties sake on whom they were bestowed Says S t Paul Ephes. 1.3 God has blessed us with all Spiritual Blessings in Christ and why that we should be holy and without blame before him in love But then if this Design be defeated and made void and we are not holy and without blame before him in love we may assure our selves that all his purposed Bounty is also made void and that is hated which is loved thought fit to be destroyed that was intended to be built and the rather because it was not found fit to be built There are three things which are observed to provoke Anger and Indignation in the most Patient First An affront to a Mans Person all vilifying and despising as Aristotle the best Describer of Passions says being a just Cause of Choler Secondly The Loss of a Mans Labour as when a Professor of some Curious Art arrives to great Perfection in it and reaps no Advantage by it is Excellent but yet notwithstanding Poor and Neglected ravishes all for Example with his Musick or Poetry and wants Bread this will make him hate his Muse and break his Strings reek his Revenge upon the Instrument of his Profession because he cannot reach his unfortunate Profession it self Thirdly The Loss of a Mans Love and Good-Will exasperates him more than all the rest and turns his Kindness into Fury Neglect of Worth and Personal Contempt though they be deeply resented yet they touch not so to the Quick as the Contempt of Affection for indeed the Contempt of Affection includes in it both the Contempt of the Worth and of the Person and he that despises a mans Love despises all that he has and all that he is But what then must the Provocation be when all these Causes concur as they do when either a Nation or a Single Person returns God Disobedience after he has shewed them his Extraordinary Mercies and Favours For First His Person is affronted Regard is not had to the Great God of Heaven and Earth condescending to do Good to his own Sinful Creatures and the Greater the Person is the Greater is the Contempt and consequently the Greater Anger and Evil Effects of it Revenge and Punishment may be expected Says S t Paul Of how much Sorer Punishment suppose you shall he be thought worthy who has trod under foot the Son of God viz. than he that has only trod Moses under his feet Secondly God loses his Labour on such Persons and that enrages him yet more he likens Israel to a Vineyard on which he had bestow'd great Cost and Husbandry fenced and gathered out the Stones and planted it with a Choice Vine but after all when he lookt for Grapes behold it brought forth Wild Grapes Grapes which instead of delighting the Taste set the Teeth on Edge What does he do therefore upon so unexpected a Frustration and disappointment of his Hopes Why as a Person much Incensed shews many times a Wild and Frantick Behaviour so God puts on a seeming Transport and Fury breaks out into a Tragical Song to vent his Indignation I will sing says he a Song of my Beloved touching my Vineyard in which he utters both his Displeasure and his purposed Revenge The Issue of God's Labour lost upon a People can be no less than the Perdition or Loss of those People First He complains but after that lest he should seem to be Master'd or Mock'd by his own Creatures he sends Destruction and Desolation on them Thirdly His Love and Kindness is despised which provokes his Anger above all the rest When God has shew'd Singular Goodness and Mercy to a Nation eminently delivered them or otherwise Blessed and prospered them and they return him nothing but contempt and Neglect disregard his Laws and violate his Commandments esteem his Worship a Burden and his Service a Slavery reflect upon their late Infelicities and Deliverances as the Common Vicissitudes of the World or only as False or more Wary and Masterly Steps made by themselves in Points of Policy Thus like Israel sacrificing to their own Net and burning Incense to their Drag Or as another Prophet representeth them ascribing all the Good things they received from God to the Idols of Canaan to Baal and
Structure of the Body or other Graces of a fair and amiable Person which is the Child only of an abused Fancy begot through Weakness and nurs'd up by fond Conversation Musick Feasts Comedies and other the like Genial Sports and busie Idlenesses of the times and produces no better Effects than Folly dissolute Manners Jealousie discontent Madness c. This Frenzy has obtain'd too much in being the glorified Theme of Poets and Romance-Writers who advance it above all other Concerns of Man's Life whether Secular or Sacred and while they make it the admired Subject of many Fables and the ambitious Pursuit and highest Ornament of their counterfeit Heroes the gilded Poyson is often swallow'd by the more Sober and Vertuous Our Apostle is so far from recommending or in the least degree countenancing of this Dotage that ver 3. he ranks it among the detestable practices of the Heathen and such things as Christians ought to be asham'd of For this Sensual Love in those days was not only an Immorality or Vice but a prime Branch of Idolatry from hence flew all the Cupids from hence came the Temples dedicated to Venus the Divinity of Beauty and the Deities of Women And happy it were if we could say These were not Idols still in the World for if as S t Jerome says every reigning Lust is an Idol set up in our hearts Sensual Love is no inferior Deity Quotcunque habemus Vitia says the Father quotcunque peccata tot recentes habemus Deos iratus sum ira mihi Deus est vidi Mulierem concupivi Libido mihi Deus est as many Vices we have as many Sins so many Gods we have I am angry Anger is a God to me I see a Woman and lust my Lust again's a God to me And the Reason of this is plain Because none of these things can be in us but they must be before God in us for if they can come after God they can agree with and be reconcil'd to God which is impossible and then being before or above him can we say less of them than that they are Gods in us 'T is not the Temple or the Image that constitutes the Idolatry but the Shrine the Idol has in our hearts the Adoration and Sacrifice paid to it by our Affections Neither does God require of us a higher Acknowledgment than to love him with all our Heart and with all our Mind The Love therefore recommended here by the Apostle cannot be any thing that is an Enemy to God to Man or to our Selves Charity or Love carries something Pious and Beneficial in its very Name and if these things be not in the Nature of it 't is a Spurious or Bastard Love To come then to the Love recommended by the Apostle we define it to be A Divine Vertue or Supernatural Grace inspired into us by God's Holy Spirit a Quality which resides in himself and which is subject to no perturbation an Image of it we see in the pious Love of Parents and Children the religious Amity between Brethren Friends and Neighbours and the Perfection of it in our Saviour his Apostles Martyrs and other Christian Heroes that follow'd his Example An Affection it is but a Severe and Sober one a Fire that warms the hearts of men but a pure and sanctify'd one lifted far above the Softnesses and Wantonnesses of the other Carnal heat and not kindled by the Deception of the Outward Senses or flaming from the Fewel of a bright Beauty but a reflected Beam of our Love to God descending downwards and glancing on our Brethren from a Sense of God's Goodness to us and in obedience to that Commandment of his that enjoins us to pay to men as his Proxies and Substitutes on Earth the Tolls and Tributes due unto himself So that 't is not This or That Person that this Love makes court to but to Mankind its Addresses are as Universal as the Image of God in the World no more regard is had by it of the Handsome than the Deformed of the Young than the Aged or if more be had of the one than the other 't is of the Party most to be compassioned the Object of this Love is Want or Misery in any kind and whoever it can help is its Amata or Beloved And as the Object of this Love is no less General than the Distresses of Humane Nature so its Expressions towards them are as many and various as there are Ways of doing Good and being Beneficial in any kind For Charity is not only a Largess of Money or a Dole of Bread a feeding of the hungry and a cloathing the naked c. but a parting with our Passions for the sake of our Brethren a condescending to their Weakness a complying with their Temper and tolerating their Infirmities 'T is again a relieving them with Good Counsel a Donative of Seasonable Admonition and Reproof a shewing of Severity when need requires as well as Mercy an Exacting of Punishment as well as a remitting of it for Charity is not that which is always grateful and always pleasing but which is ever salutary and ever beneficial The Wanton Love we condemned is a constant Floud of Sweetness which flows smoothly into the Ocean of Destruction a smiling Evil that knows nothing harsh or disagreeable till it turns all to Harshness and Disagreeableness But Godly Love is often bitter in the first Taste and sweet in the after Relish a rugged Mercy and an Austere Kindness a Good transferr'd with Frowns and Severe Discipline and such are the Corrections of Servants and Children the Correptions of Friends the Excommunications of the Church and the exterminating Sentences of the Law the Rod and the Stocks the Hurdle and the Axe being as instrumental unto Charity as Money Food Raiment and the like Open Rebuke says Solomon is better than secret Love and I may say Open Rebuke has in it much secret Love And to think the Remissness of Laws charitable and the Execution of them cruel is a Shortness of Reasoning which becomes only Women and Children who pity the present Sufferings of the Criminal but see not the future Good purchased by it The timely cutting off of a Notorious Malefactor has rescued a Nation from Destruction Phineas stood up and pray'd and the Plague ceas'd his seasonable Execution of two Eminent Offenders preserved the lives of many thousands of the people and holy Writ calls not his Fact Slaughter but styles it by the milder Name of Prayer because it invoked God's Mercy and propitiated his Wrath. If Pity may bind the hands of Justice and Charity protect Violence and Outrage not only one Wolf will worry a whole Flock but the Flock or Body of People will in time become Wolves and Tygers for Religion only perswades men to be Just and Righteous it does not constrain them to be so indeed it promises Rewards to Well-doers and threatens Judgment to Evil-doers but they are Rewards to come and Judgments at a
great distance and the Sinner has leave to execute his Wickedness so that the Terrours of Religion work only upon the Good and Faithful while the Worst and most of men despise them But even the boldest and most daring in their Impiety who count Heaven and Hell only the Parables of Scripture and the Fictions of Preachers will boggle in the Cariere of their Sins at the remembrance of a severe Judge and an unrelenting Humane Law and consider whether they can escape if they commit them and will not run on madly to transgress when they see nothing is to be had but Vengeance the Attempt and their Miscarriage their Sin and their certain Death Thus we see Severity is not contrary to the Rules of Charity the Sword in the hand of Justice less instrumental to mens Good than the Scales that the fear of Punishment is a kind of Grace and Principle of Obedience in the Hearts of Wicked men which restrains them from Vice even when it wins them not to the Part of Vertue But then though Severity and Punishment are Noble and necessary Branches of Charity they are not the Natural and Genuine they relate to it but as the Prophet Isaiah says they do to God They are his Works his strange Works his Acts his strange Acts. The Works which Charity delights most in are those that are mild and gentle which not only produce Good but which in themselves are Good which shew Mercy by the Ways of Mercy and are no less beneficial in their Progress than their End And these are the Operations of Charity which our Apostle chiefly recommends here to us and that we may not erre in so Divine a Grace or come short in so important a Duty our best way will be to set before us the Perfectest Exemplar of it that ever was our Lord and Saviour and himself commands us John 15.12 to do this As I have lov'd you says he so love one another thus making his Love to us the Rule or Pattern of our Affection to those of our own Kind And the first Instance of Christ's Love which I shall propose for Imitation is this That as he lov'd us Before we lov'd him lov'd us without any Merit or Invitation on our part lov'd us when we could not love him when we were wholly benumm'd and dead to all heavenly Affections So likewise that we love one another expect not Obligations and Invitations from our Brethren to quicken our Charity towards them but rather delight to begin and be before-hand in our Expressions of Kindness and to have it seen that they come from our selves A natural Spring flows of its own Impulse unbid unprovoked and makes its Way through all Oppositions if it meets a hollow in its Course it fills it up if a light Obstacle it bears it away with its Stream if a great one it swells and passes over it at least pours out still its free Source till it finds or makes a Passage And thus our Charity must take its Rise and flow from its self shew it depends on nought beside that it cannot be obstructed by the want of any Qualifications or yet by any Disobligations of our Brethren Atticus the charitable Bishop of Constantinople when he sent Money to relieve the Poor in the City of Nice commanded that no enquiry should be made in the Distribution of it of what Sect in Religion the Poor were but what their Wants were He that confers his Benefits upon Consideration only of mens agreeing with him in Opinion of their Merit Neighbourhood former Obligations or the like may be just prudent or Grateful but he cannot be said to be Charitable for this is a free unbiass'd disinterested Vertue and if it regards ought in the Good it does beside the Opportunity and Power it has to do it it changes its Nature becomes another thing and assumes a New Name Let no man therefore think he has absolved the Duty of Charity if he be Kind only where his Honour is courted and comply'd with ready to entertain Friendship when he is sought to to be reconcil'd when full Amends is made him But if he will shew this Grace he must first break the Ice and lead the way to Concord Kindness and Beneficence And none think this so hard a Saying as those who would hugely stomach and disdain in case their Neighbour should precede or take place of them upon any Meeting or Encounter as if it were Disparagement to them to sit lower than another at the Table and not to be below him in Vertue to go after him at a Door and not to come behind him in all Goodness If we cannot part with our Passions and Evil Affections for the sake of our Brethren as well as our Money for go our Pride and Animosities as well as our Goods we are Charitable but in part Merciful but in a Case and possibly the Vertue may not be only Imperfect and lame in us but we may be wholly destitute of it for S t Paul says We may bestow all our Goods to feed the Poor give our Bodies to be burnt and yet not have the Grace of Charity Because these things may be done out of Ostentation and not only so but without any Profit or Benefit For put the Case our Brother be not low in Fortune but weak of Undestanding not indigent of outward things but of Instruction and Advice stands in need to be born with not to be reliev'd what Good will our Money do him in these his Infirmities It were as seasonable to apply it to a broken Arm or fester'd Wound to give it to one starving in a Desart where no Food is to be bought If we will be Charitable we must compassionate our Brothers Necessities of what Nature soever they be supply his Wants not gratifie our own Temper The second Instance of Christ's Love which I recommend to our Imitation is this That as he lov'd us not only first and before we lov'd him but lov'd us when we were Enemies to him when we were not only Strangers but Rebels to Heaven when we exercised all the acts of hatred and hostility against it So that we love one another and not think the Obliging and Good Natur'd only worthy of our Kindness but the Discourteous and Injurious Some men are contentious with their Neighbours outrageous to their Children tyrannical to their Inferiors insupportable to their Equals irreconcileable to their Enemies implacable upon every Colour of a Wrong But the Charitable on the other side can Excuse and pardon the most design'd and study'd Injuries see something to commiserate and pity even in mens Injustice can look upon their Malice as their Mistake or Misfortune pray for their Enemies as our Lord did in the very Article of the Death which they have brought upon them Father forgive them for they know not what they do And if we consider rightly Sinners are Ignorant and Mistaken in what they do Fools as the Scripture
Neighbour as thy Self And this Commandment makes our Love to our own Selves the Pattern or Standard of that which we ought to bear to other Men Not that we are obliged to love other men every way Equal to our selves that is not the meaning of the Rule it implies not an Equality but a Similitude not a Parity but a Resemblance of it in Truth and Reality Our Love must be as Sincere and Cordial to our Brethren as to our Selves we must heat our Affections in the same Forge have the like Zeal the like Promptness to snatch all Occasions to advance their temporal and spiritual Good as we would to advance our own but yet still other mens Concerns ought to be but our second Care before we preach to others before we labour for their Salvation we must take heed with S t Paul that we our selves be not Cast-aways I shall not need in these days in which Self-Love so much abounds and Christian Love so little to give Cautions against Supererogating and overflowing Charity but though little will need to be said against any Excess in this Grace yet much may be behoof-ful to prevent the Mistakes of it For many think that for Friendship-sake they are obliged to engage in all manner of Wickedness to drink Drunk and fight Duels to spend the main of their Life in Gaming and other dissolute Courses nay to enter into treasonable Practices against their Prince and Country And there are those again that will debauch as highly in matters of Religion out of their Kindness to a Sect dip their hands in Bloud and put a Nation into a Flame and Combustion for their Love to an ill-taken up Opinion and a Party they have long adhered to renounce the Church and Truth which in effect is God himself chuse rather to live and dye in Disobedience and a damnable Schism than seem to be inconstant and to carry their Flocks along with them in the way of Perdition than undeceive and grieve them with an Unwelcome though Necessary Truth Such as these are not tender of their Brethrens Peace but guilty of their Destruction and set not so high a Price on their Contentment as a cheap on their own Consciences 't is not possible to be Wicked and Charitable to love men and sooth them in their Sins What S t Paul says of the false Teachers among the Galatians is true of these They zealously affect you but not well yea they would exclude you that you might affect them i. e. they had rather their Congregations should miss of Salvation than they lose the Interest they have in them There may be some Extraordinary Cases in which we ought to prefer our Neighbours Good before our own as their greater Good before our lesser their Spiritual before our Temporal c. But the Rule holds in General I am not to destroy my self out of Courtesie I am not to contract Guilt to preserve another Innocent I must love my Neighbour As my self not Above not Before my self But this Doctrine seems to be oppos'd by the Practice of the two greatest Guides of the Jewish and Christian Church Moses and S t Paul The one Exod 32.31 when the Israelites had so heinously transgress'd in the Golden Calf interceded for them in this manner This people have sinn'd a great Sin they have made them Gods of Gold yet now if thou wilt forgive their Sin if not blot me I pray thee out of the Book which thou hast written And the other Rom. 9.7 out of his heat of Zeal for the Salvation of the same Seed of Abraham utters these words I could wish my self Accursed from Christ for my Brethren And both these seem to prefer not only the Temporal but Spiritual Good of others before their own insomuch as to salve their Excess of Charity some have thought nothing less sufficient than to say There are many things done in Scripture by Persons acted by an Extraordinary and Heroick Spirit which are not to be brought into Practice by us who are mov'd by lower Degrees of the Spirit and though we may admire them we must not imitate them Others again on the other side have as much depress'd the transcendent Charity of these Great Persons by parallelling what they did with like Usages and Customs common among the Jews For first they resemble Moses's Intercession for the people to a friendly Complement or Expression of Good-Will familiarly used by those of the Circumcision and possibly first taken up in imitation of Moses's intercession May I be thy Propitiation or Expiation my Brother i. e. may I undergo the Penalty of the Law in thy Stead to rescue thee from the Divine Displeasure bear thy temporal Punishment And after the like manner they parallel S t Paul's words I could wish my self Accursed from Christ to a like Passage found in Ignatius who was an Auditor of the Apostles Let the Punishment of the Devil come upon me only let me obtain Christ. Where the Punishment of the Devil cannot possibly import the Eternal Torments of Hell for from thence there is no Redemption or returning to enjoy Christ and therefore it must point at Excommunication to the giving up to Satan and the Punishments he had power to inflict on the Excommunicated so frequently mentioned in Scripture but I shall need to give only one instance of Deliver such an one unto Satan for the Destruction of the Flesh that the Spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus 1 Cor. 5.5 But there seems here to be no need of these Extraordinary Salvo's these however ingenious and learned Accommodations For put the Case we should take the Words of Moses in the strictest literal Sense they can bear and we must take them so if we will take them as God's Answer shews he took them Whosoever has sinn'd against me says he him will I blot out of my Book what would be the Danger or Inconvenience What did his Intercession import more than may be thus fairly paraphrased Lord let me prevail with thee to revoke thy Sentence of totally destroying this People thou hast done such wonderful things for or involve me in their Destruction which is easier for me to bear than to survive so great a Calamity and to hear the Heathen insult and blaspheme thy Name on this Occasion But Moses's words relate to an Eternal blotting out Not necessarily no nor probably for whatever knowledge he might have of another Life the less 't is to be supposed that he should be willing to undergo an Eternal Death to save the People only from a Temporal And as fair an account may be given of S t Paul's words who does not say I do but I could wish my self accursed from Christ for my Brethren So that his words are not an anathematizing or devoting himself but only a Meditation as if he had said I could in my Imagination be contented upon the Condition or Contemplation of an Event so much to God's Glory
Agreeable to him for his own sake And this Rule of Love to Men may teach us what Love we ought to pay to God for we ought to wish Well to God and to procure things Good and Agreeable to him And if any ask Wherein we can do this to God I need look no further for an Answer than the second Petition in the Lord's Prayer Thy Kingdom come thy Will be done in Earth as 't is in Heaven It consists in the Execution of God's Will and the Extension of his Glory For all other things besides these are nothing to God as the Psalmist says My goods are nothing unto thee The Riches of this World and the most precious things in its account are contemptible in his Sight but these two which I have named he esteems and in some measure wants and desires possesses not perfectly and absolutely as he would All his Creatures do not acknowledge him honour him worship him delight in his Dominion pay a ready cheerful Obedience to his Commands as the Angels in Heaven do notwithstanding that they are reasonable honourable beneficial have more of Profit than of the Yoke in them But so it is there is another God of this World that blinds most men and leads them away captive with divers Lusts and they chuse rather to be Vassals and Drudges to this Usurper and Tyrant than to be Nobles and Princes even adopted Children to the King of Heaven and Earth And with good reason holy Men in every Age have pray'd for God's Kingdom i. e. the Encrease of Righteousness and of the Number of the Faithful for God is yet in a manner like those Princes which are outed of part of their Dominions and deny'd the Obedience of whole Nations of their People and his Loyal Subjects can no way shew their affection so much to him as by espousing his Interest abetting his Title employing their best Endeavours to reduce the Rebellious to Allegiance by wishing with the Psalmist That Kings and all People young men and maidens old men and children would praise and glorifie his holy Name 'T is the business of Great Ministers of State to understand the Strength and weakness of Foreign Princes the Commodities and Defects of their Countries that they make the most advantageous Alliances for their own Masters and they are held the best Politicians that do this best But if both those of the highest Condition and also of the lowest and meanest even all People would set to their Power to serve the Great Monarch of Heaven and Earth they would find no Policy comparable to this that the promoting of his Designs would be the most certain way of promoting their own whether publick or private they would find that they would thrive like Jacob that all things would prosper under their hands like Joseph that they would return with constant Victory like David and heap up Gold and Silver like Solomon Numa though a Heathen rely'd so confidently on this Policy that when he was told on a time That the Enemy was drawing up against him he answer'd And I am praying against them And when 't was said They were charging he reply'd and he was Sacrificing assuring himself the Gods would not neglect his Safety while he was solicitous for their Worship But you will say Is it needful that we should wish for the Encrease of God's Kingdom does he want the help of his Creatures No. Is he not Omnipotent and can bring to pass whatever seems good to him Yes Who has resisted his Will As the Question is ask'd None and yet it may be as truly said Who is there that has not resisted his Will What was spoken of Israel may be affirmed of all Mankind that they are a rebellious and gain-saying People God 't is true is Omnipotent and his Power never fails he brought the World out of nothing by his Word and by his bare Word can reduce it again to nothing if he had pleas'd he could have created a Generation of Men that should have served him regularly and constantly fatally and necessarily as the Fire burns and the Sun and the Moon move in their Courses But this is not the Service that God wants and which we are to pray for in his behalf 't is the Free and Voluntary not the Constrain'd Service of his Rational Creatures that Men would obey him out of Love and Choice as his Dominion is gracious that they would desire it as it is beneficial and honourable that they would delight in it Compell'd Righteousness is no Righteousness 't is in Obedience as in Charity he that gives grudgingly and of necessity does not give but is tax'd and he that obeys of Compulsion is a Slave and not a Votary 'T is reported of the famous Painter Apelles that when he had finish'd any rare Piece his custom was latere post tabulam to hide himself behind it that he might hear what Passengers said of it and that he car'd for no Approbation but what came in this free way After the like manner God exposes to the View and Consideration of Men his Works of Power and of Wisdom of Mercy and of Goodness and then delights latere post tabulam to conceal himself in his inaccessible Glory and to observe what free and unextorted Returns of Honour and Love they will bring him in all forc'd or feign'd Superstitious and Hypocritical Acknowledgments being odious to him And now after all that has been said in strict speaking God stands no more in need of our Obedience and Worship than he does of our Riches as 't is said Acts 17.24 He dwelleth not in Temples made by hands neither is he worshipp'd by mens hands The meaning of his being outed of part of his Kingdom and denied his full Dominion in truth signifies no more But that he has not yet extended the Salvation of Men to the Bounds his Goodness designed But to proceed We said Love did not only Wish but Procure things good and acceptable to the Person belov'd and we ought not only to wish the Execution of God's Will and the Extension of his Glory but to set-to our hands to Effect what we pray for as it is not sufficient in Point of Charity to give good Words only to the Poor to say Be thou warm be thou fill'd God assist thee and the like when we can supply what they want our selves so 't is not sufficient in our Love to God to say only Thy Kingdom come thy Will be done in Earth as it is in Heaven but we must zealously and industriously do his Will and endeavour all we can to promote his Kingdom Says our Lord to S t Peter Simon Peter lovest thou me Lord reply'd he thou knowest that I love thee And yet notwithstanding that he knew the Sincerity of his heart he ask'd him the same Question three times Why to grieve Peter or that he delighted in the repetition of the Profession of his Love No but to excite him to a more
in this single term omnibus viribus with all thy Strength Instead therefore of amuzing my Auditory with fruitless Niceties it will be more worthy the while to take notice In the first place That when God commands us to love him with all our Strength or Power he commands us no more than what we are able to perform and not as some will have it what is above our Ability posse autem hominem quantum potest nemo sanus negabit for that a man can do as much as he can none that is in his wits will deny and we are enjoined here To love God With All our Strength and not Above it Secondly It may be worth the while to note on the other side The ambitious Folly and Vanity of the Church of Rome who more to exalt her own false Reputation than the Truth boasts of such performances of her Saints as are above the measures of Humane Nature For Example their living in Desarts after the manner of Elias and John the Baptist and using such wonderful Austerities as have not only mortify'd their Carnal Affections but so Spiritualiz'd their very Bodies that they have been seen to the astonishment of the Beholders raised and suspended in the Air many Foot above Earth as if it were as easie a thing to work Miracles as to write a Legend or tell Lies to bring God to câ—â—ply with the Follies of Men as for them to conceive or fansie foolish things as if again it were as easie to live a Miraculous Life as to assume the Name of Heremite or to live in a Wood the last indeed they do in an apish Imitation of Elias and John the Baptist which is all that is true in this Piece of Pageantry they being ridiculously fed by the neighbouring Towns All that I shall say to this Affectation of Divine Performances shall be something like that which the Elder Pliny said to the Younger racking his Invention for an Oration he was to make Visne melius dicere quà m potes Will you speak better than you can So will you shew your selves Diviner Persons than you are When you are but Men would you act like Angels Have you perform'd all that is enjoined you in the Gospel Are the Commandments of God indeed so mean and trifling that they are not worthy to amuse your Greater Abilities The Example of Christ's patience meekness self-denial c. such narrow Scenes to shew your Spacious Vertue in that you aspire to his Supernatural Performances He trod no other way to Heaven than those which honest men ordinarily tread in and though none was ever so abstracted from the Love of the World as he yet none was more conversant in it none abhorr'd Sin equal to him and none yet was more familiar with Sinners But to leave these men to their Dreams as in Humane Love we may love ardently and yet be wise so in Divine Love we may love Exaltedly and yet not Extravagantly and affectedly we may love God above our selves and the whole World and yet not above Sobriety To direct us in the way of this Duty by so many perverted we need only observe two things which are express'd both in the Letter of the Commandment namely That we love God with the Heart And with All the Heart First With the Heart i. e. unfeignedly and without Hypocrisie Hypocritical Love is odious even to Men we endure not to have Professions made to us when there is no real Affection to be embraced and caressed when the Heart is far distant from the Outward Behaviour much less does God suffer such Juggling but as S t Augustine says Sim 〈…〉 Sanctitas est duplex iniquitas counterfeit Sanctity 〈◊〉 God's account is a double Provocation and he more detests the feigned Saint than the Open Sinner denounces more Judgments in Scripture against those that mock him in this manner than against those that defie him Secondly We are to love God with All the Heart which implies two things All in Quantity or Extension and All in Quality or Intention 1. With all the Heart in Quantity or Extension is as much as with the Intire Heart not excluding all Inferior Loves but all Competitor or Rival Loves with our Love of God and so debarrs not only Idolatry but all Inordinate Love whatsoever to any Creature which is a kind of Idolatry No man can serve two Masters nor no man can love two Opposite Objects Divers he may but not Contrary and Opposite but as he loves the one he must hate or dissemble with the other 2. To love God with all the Heart in Quality or Intention implies Fervency and excludes Coldness and Indifferency Slack Lukewarm Love is neither active nor durable productive of Service nor constant in the Day of Tryal Demas hath forsaken me says S t Paul having loved this present World and no wonder for 't is not possible for him that loves this present World to suffer Persecution for the Gospel Such as Demas love God as Flatterers love those in Power who are officious to them in Prosperity but are sure to leave them in Adversity As 't was observed that none were so forward to break down Sejanus's Statues and to lay their hand on the Hang-man's Rope that dragg'd him to Execution as those that had saluted him loudest that morning and were readiest to have proclaim'd him Emperor had his Treason succeeded Let this suffice to be said of our Love to God I proceed to the Love of our Neighbour In which as in the former there are two things to be observed The Object of our Love Our Neighbour And the Measure of our Love to him We must love him as our self I. The Object of our Love Our Neighbour The Jews before our Lord interpreted to them who was their Neighbour understood not this Commandment they allow'd none this Title but those that were of their Nation or at least Proselytes to their Religion to all beside that they were directly Inhumane they would not shew a Heathen a waste running Water to save him from perishing by thirst or so much as direct him in the right Way But our Lord in the Parable of the Samaritan taught them who they were to esteem their Neighbour that 't was not only those of the same Kindred or Religion but those of the same Kind or Nature as 't is said in the Parable Quidam homo a Certain man fell among Thieves no mention is made of what Country or Religion he was Tros Tyriusve nullo discrimine habentur in Point of Charity no Difference is to be made between Jew and Gentile Native and Stranger Charity or Divine Love knows no Partiality but where there is an Object of Misery there is also an Object of Mercy if there be Distress on the one Side and Power to relieve on the other all Circumstances are fitted to shew our Love and in Christ's account there are two Neighbours met The Object of our Love or who is our Neighbour is
being generally of a Churlish Disposition it comes to pass that the Duties both to God and Men which are to be inferr'd from the General Precept of Love are obscure or at least pretended to be so and that they may have no Colour from the Abridging their Whole Duty into one Word Love to say There is no Obligation upon us to do the things required shew us where they are commanded produce the Letter of the Law and the like all the Silva Legum as Justinian calls them the Forest of God's and Mens Laws consisting of such Heaps of Precepts were added whereas otherwise all the Duties would have been seen to hang on this brief Syllable Love This Phrase do hang upon it is a Figurative Expression borrowed from the hanging things upon a Hook or Pin in a Wall which bears the Stress of their Weight We find the same Figure used Isaiah 22.23 God determining to make Eliakim Treasurer over his House to shew the Support he should be by the Influence of his Wisdom and Justice to the Inhabitants of Jerusalem he says I will fasten him as a Nail in a sure place and they shall hang upon him all the Glory of his Father's House all the Vessels from the Vessels of Cups to the Vessels of Flaggons and then it follows In that day says the Lord of hosts shall the Nail that is fastned in a sure place be removed and cut down and the Burden that was upon it shall be cut off But I shall shew more particularly three Ways how all the Commandments hang or depend on the Commandment of Love 1. As the Parts do upon the Whole the Whole contains the Parts and is but the Parts collected into One. And some will have this the only Dependance that is here meant of the other Commandments on that of Love according to S t Paul's interpretation Rom. 13.9 He that loveth another hath fulfilled the whole Law For this Thou shalt not Kill Thou shalt not commit Adultery Thou shalt not Steal c. are briefly comprehended in this saying namely Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy Self And the like may be said of the Duties of the First Table Thou shalt have no other God but the God of Israel Thou shalt worship him no other way than he has prescribed Thou shalt not take his Name in vain Thou shalt not break his Sabbath they are briefly contained in this Thou shalt love the Lord thy God And if Love were deeply rooted in the Hearts of men upon their going about any Act dishonourable to God or unjust to their Neighbour it would pull them back from it for this would be the immediate Question they would ask themselves By what Rule do I do this Will it hold according to the Precept of Love to God and to my Neighbour This particular Fact which I put forth by way of retail does it not vary from the General Rule in which it ought to be comprehended as in its Body 2. The Law and the Prophets may be said to hang or depend upon the Law of Love because it is the Scope or Drift to which all the Commandments in particular tend according to that Saying of S t Paul 1 Tim. 1.5 The End of the Commandment is Charity or Love out of a pure Heart and good Conscience and Faith unfeigned i. e. upon the Ground of the Belief of Remission of our Sins through Christ to love God and our Brethren for so great a Benefit and to express our Love in the Works of a good Conscience 'T is not preaching the Law though never so zealously as those did S t Paul here speaks of or the performing the Outward Acts of the Law as many of the Jews were very scrupulous in the Observation of that makes a Righteous Man according to the Law but he that does according to the Design and Intention of the Law which is Love Ratio Legis est interpres Legis the Purpose of the Law is the best Interpreter of the Law and they that mind not this as S t Paul says Take their Aim amiss and swerve from the End and Intention of the Law discern not the Grace of Love that runs through it as the Warp and the Woof do through a Web of Cloth and wholly sustains the Contexture of it Without Love all that is Excellent all that is Divine in the Law would fall to the Ground as all the Riches and Gallantry of the Veil of the Temple all the Purple and Scarlet would have lain grovelling on the Earth without the Tacks or Hooks on which they hung 3. The Law i. e. all the Vertue Goodness and Righteousness it commands all the Worth and Value of its Duties depend upon Love as the Value of Coin depends upon the Price the Stamp sets upon it or as a thing that is Accessory depends on its Principle take away the Principle and the Accessory is nothing so take away Love and all the Commandments are insignificant and nothing And this Saint Paul shews 1 Cor. 13. That even the most Specious and seemingly Heroick Performances of Christianity it self as a man's giving his Goods to feed the Poor and his Body to be burned c. if they be not accompanied with Charity or Love are all nothing the Dignity of these Works depending so absolutely upon this Grace that in God's Esteem to suffer Injury only out of Love to our Fellow-Christian is more than to suffer Martyrdom not to envy not to be puft up not to despise our Brother is more in his Eyes than to speak with Tongues than to prophesie than to understand all Mysteries And indeed there is more true Religion in this one Benign Good Natur'd Vertue than in the Ostentation and outward Grandeur of all the other But the Excellence of Love and that 't is worthy of the Honour ascribed to it to sustain all the Law and the Prophets is the next thing I am to shew The Excellence of Love c. This I shall make appear by four Reasons 1. For the Natural Universal pleasing Effect Love has upon All and even upon God himself as well as men and other Creatures insomuch as God for his part requires almost nothing else from us Now O Israel what doth the Lord thy God require of thee but to fear the Lord thy God and to love him with all thy heart and with all thy soul Deut. 10.12 To be belov'd is so grateful a thing that men receive delight even in the Affection of Brute Creatures and we see that such as are not qualify'd to deserve any true Love are taken with the Similitude only of it the gross Flatteries of them that counterfeit it Sinners as our Lord tells us love those that love them and S t Paul 1 Thess. 2.15 brands the Jews for their want of Love as with a Crime of so high Nature as deserved to be reckoned with their murdering the Prophets and of Christ himself says he Who have kill'd the Lord
Jesus and their own Prophets and persecuted us and are Contrary to all men 2. Because Love easily forgives Injuries hardly perceives any can never possibly wrong the Party Beloved and the Object or Party Belov'd of Divine Love is all Mankind So that there needs no Admonitions here to suppress Malice or Uncharitable Inclinations for the first Motions of them never arise in the heart to be suppress'd 3. Because Love of all other Vertues of the Soul goes forth of a Mans self and places its Content in the Good it does to another that so hard a Duty to Flesh and Bloud which the Apostle commands 1 Cor. 10.12 Let no man seek his own but every man an Others Wealth is its Choice and Delight No Vertue therefore qualifies us equal to this to perform the Works of Piety Justice and Charity 4. Because of the wonderful Activity of Love in the Soul and enflaming it more than any other Vertue to Great Actions for indeed whatsoever is Vigorously performed is the Effect of Love This Grace is like a Fire in the Heart and makes it restless in what it conceives will be acceptable to the Person beloved it renders it also undaunted in the greatest Difficulties and Dangers and for this reason 't is Faiths chiefest Instrument to conquer the World and the Temptations of it This is the Victory that overcometh the World says S t John even your Faith but then 't is that Faith which as S t Paul speaks worketh by Love 'T is a strange word in the Original which the Apostle uses in that place for working by Love 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which imports as much as being possess'd with Love as a Demoniack is possess'd with an Evil Spirit which kind of Persons are ordinarily indued with an Unusual Strength to do things which naturally they could not do as the Demoniack that met our Lord out of the Tombs whom no Chains of Iron could hold but he brake them asunder Those that are acted by Love are transported after the like manner to perform things above their own and other mens Measures As the Spouse speaks in the Canticles Love is strong as Death i. e. conquers all things and nothing can stand against it 2 Cor. 5.13 S t Paul says again That for the Love of God and the cause of the Gospel and the sake of the Brethren he had done some things that in the Eye of the World appeared Wild and Extravagant But whether we be Beside our Selves says he it is to God or whether we be sober 't is for your Cause for the love of Christ Constraineth us For the Influence therefore Love has upon all other Good Works as well as for its own Good Nature it is that God so highly Esteems it and 't is no wonder that 't is the Favourite of his Graces when as S t John says God himself is Love and though he be no more Love essentially than he is Wisdom Justice Power or any of his other Attributes yet because he exerts and diffuses his Love more among men and is revealed and made known more by it than by another Attribute it is spoken of as his Sole Being And now after so many Excellent things have been said of this Divine Grace namely That 't is the Summ of the Commandments the Soul of all Vertue the Favourite of God and in a Sense God himself certainly it will be worth our best Endeavours to acquire it and how we may do this is the last thing I am to shew How we may acquire or attain Divine Love That we may take the right course to attain this Vertue we must look upon it as upon all other Vertues partly as a Grace of God's bestowing and partly as that which is to be acquired by our own Labour for there is something of Gift and something of Industry in it First We must look upon it as a Grace of God's Donation For what our Lord says of Faith That all men have it not and S t Paul That no man has it of himself but it is the Gift of God may likewise be said of the Love of God and of our Neighbour We have them not of our Selves but they are Heavenly Gifts born of a Divine Seed and we must not conceive that by our own mere Natural Power and humane Will we can acquire them to the Soul and that we have no more to do but to resolve to obtain them and the Possession will follow But we must seek them by devout Addresses from God and expect them from his Bounty they being as I say Graces as well as the Fruits of our Labour As our Church therefore sets before the Epistle of Charity a Collect or Prayer to God for it Send O Lord into our Hearts the most Excellent Gift of Charity without which all our doings are nothing worth c. we must also supplicate for this Grace before we can hope to attain it But then Secondly 't is also an Acquisition of Labour and to be arriv'd to as other Vertues or Habits by Industry There are that have written of the Art of Vnchaste Love and all the Mysteries of it taught men how to accomplish their Wicked Ends which it would have been happier for them if they had been ignorant of And the Art of Godly Love may be also taught Rules and Precepts given to make men Masters of it And the Way in general to raise our Affections to the Love of God is to take the same course which we do when we betray our selves into a humane Passion reflect on what is Excellent and Amiable in God meditate on his Unparallell'd and Glorious Perfections which are sufficient to ravish us from the Desire of all Earthly things The reason that the Love of many waxes cold and their Affection to God as I may say is without Affection without heat and ardour is because they understand not the Beauties of his Essence and the Glorious Operations of his Power Wisdom and Goodness Men profess to be Worshippers of God to be brought up and skill'd in the Knowledge of him and his Religion but generally they are Strangers to him and his ways and what the Psalmist says of the Ungodly That they care not for God neither is God in all their thoughts I fear without Injustice may be affirmed of most men That they care not for God neither is he in all their thoughts and then what wonder is it si ignoti nulla cupido if men have no longing after a Good that they are ignorant of or at least never weigh and consider The Spouse in the Canticles numbers up and runs over in her Thoughts the manifold Graces that are in Christ which made him so amiable in her own and others Eyes before she sigh'd out her Love for him My Beloved says she is white and ruddy the chiefest among ten thousand again Because of the Savour of thy Ointments therefore do the Virgins love thee There must be some Fewel