World it seem'd agreeable to Ministerial obligation as well as Loyal Reputation to communicate my satisfactions to the World in the view of your R. H. that all might see that nothing else was able to make a Loyal Brittain shrinke from the steps of his Prince but a greater Loyalty to the manifest rights of God and the King and the Truth Which I trust will not be construed Contempt but Constancy nothing being more the duty of every Loyal Servant and a Minister especially than to be as faithful to his Prince and consequently to God and the Nation as Conscience is in every breast which will never approve or agree to any disloyal revolt from Heaven and Truth but will chuse rather to be silenc'd for a time than consent and with patient agony refer the matter to God himself Nor are any to be reckon'd straight-way unfortunate as is the manner of some weak and Carnal reasons and Turba Bemi and also the Divinity of some grave Deacons of the belly and present ease and greatness for any wound or inconvenience they may bring upon themselves for such fidelity to the Temporal and Eternal Interests of their Master either from declar'd which is more faire or undeclar'd and invisible Hostilities which is less For such suffer in their manifest duties which is therefore to be presum'd to be their choice by consequence when such need require and their right and best self-preservation if they be right men or Christians for if we are bound to love our Neighbours as our selves at the least so much more our Prince and Countrey above our selves as the hand doth the head And greater and truer love cannot be express'd than by long misery and durance for the Truth like an Anchor under Waves to hold fast the great Soul of one's Prince compos'd of Grace and Mercy and the fear of God by his bowells and compassion stronger than any Cable from running against Eternal Rocks and clashing with his Heavenly Sovereign which is the first and Original disloyalty and insurrection against the Chief whereof the Tumults of Subjects against Secondary Mortal Soveraigns are usually but copies and fatal consequences by man's manifest fault but Gods secret righteous judgement as the fear and subjection of the Creature is observ'd by Divines to be abated and impair'd towards Adam after his fall And no Prince can more deserve such Martyrial fidelity from Servants and Subjects than your R H. not only upon the score of Loyalty and Conscience common to all Princes but of personal and peculiar merit and exemplary frequent fatigues and hazards and lovely deportments on the confines of life and death for the glory of your Country which your R. H. valued above your life and present and hereditary greatness as much as many mean and vulgar spirits do below their petty self-ends and differences And that great fight cannot easily depart from my remembrance of your serene Magnanimity and cheerful unconcernedness on Quarter Deck June 3d. 1665. which betoken'd to my hopes a great distance of dangers from your R. H. even then when Roaring deaths hail'd thick about your R. Person and besprinkled your Buff with the bloud of your ever memorable Companions that fell by you Such contempt of death and the Pomp and Glory of this World for the defence of your King and Country being a lively resemblance of that true Christian Charity which doth the like for Christ and souls and fits the understanding to receive and embrace the truth And I have just cause often to bless God for a kind of Publick reward then of my many Prayers in private for your R. H. which was my chief and sole Armour in your defence that your R. H. should observe and declare it as an Omen of Victory annext to the publick Service and Exhortation performed by me the even before the fight by your R. H. appointment that one of the greatest Ships of the Enemy should take fire in that moment in the fight of both Fleets reported to be one of the member that were particularly bound to destroy you And why should I distrust in God or the power of truth or the success of sincere love and loyalty but that these my prostrate sentiments proved and preferred through much patience before all the offers of this World may not contribute with the Prayers of all good Christians and far greater Abilities and Counsels and the consideration and candor of your R. H. own breast and Princely Loyalty to God and Truth the greatest of all to beget that satisfaction and stability in your R. H. as may kindle more Bon-fires in our Streets than did that your Renowned Victory Quinctius the Roman General proclaiming in the name of the Senate by sound of Trumpet unexpected Liberty to all the Cities of Greece then newly Conquered as the Nation met to begin their Olympick games did so discompose and lick up all their inclinations after their sports with the suddainness of the good tydings that when they could believe it to be true they could think on nothing else And rushing one upon another with excess of joy and thankfulness to kiss his hands and to cast their Crowns and Garlands at his feet went nigh to put him in manifest danger of his life with their Crowd and immoderate Transports that forgot all manâ—rs and distance had not his great strength of body and the Vigour of his years being 33 saith Livy and some content and satisfaction to observe whence their Rudeness sprang served to Rescue him from the danger of too great love Such a Jubile to our Brittain and such a lovely danger to your R. H. as may be gather'd from the General pulse the dismission of some scruples would soon produce which many suspect and fear but I never did nor can before a special declaration being so over-ruled to the contrary by your Princely wisdom and justice for what greater violation of the Law of Nations can there be to the dissolution of all Faith and Truth among men whereon Allegiance to Princes and the peace of the World hang than openly or secretly to oppose or prejudice a Religion professed before it be Renounced or wherein can the Catholick plaister of dispensation to equivocate mend the matter with Generous and sober understandings whereby the soul is licens'd to be damn'd to save the skin Least therefore by any pretence or whisper of Right or colour of Conscience wherein all the fear can lye your R. H. should be mis-led to espouse unnaturally a Forreign and wrong Superiour to the manifest dethroning of our Right Mother-Church of Brittain more Ancient as well as more sound and Orthodox than the other I have leaving all speculative Controversies and hard questions to Scholars and Students throughly handled one Practical point of plain Right and Title or meum and tuum or the Pretences and Immunities of both Churches which will give great light if not a final end to all the rest and which all sorts of
ordinary prudence exactly gratifying the Italian sagacity by such useful Hostilities And contriving on the other hand to cut down all fences and securities of this Church and repeal its penal Laws out of generous Charity and for more free commerce with Ingenuous Roman Catholicks Whereby their numerous and Industrious Emissaries may over-run the Land and disturb and seduce our people with greater safety Where a Protestant may be discern'd at the Elbow of the Jesuite and a Jesuite at the Elbow of the Protestant in every page both contriving to assist one another against a Sun-shine or a Rainy day by betraying this Church for clear it is that the Italian out-wits the Jew in his part and the lurch befalls the English side For though the Protestant Vulgar think their cause well defended yet the more discerning Conclave finds its designs more Effectually promoted by such Arts. How do such deserve to be admir'd and noted for their Wit that can serve two contrary Masters with success and bid fair to be uppermost let what party that will prevail and be rewarded by both as the open Champions of the one and the secret Factors of the other Neither do they yet less deserve to be scorn'd and detested by all wise and true hearted English-men and Protestants for such scandalous wiles and abominable doubling and betraying their Mother Church with a kiss Others of duller studies and Epicurean Inclinations judge no method better than that of Balaam at Baal Peor Numb 24.15 2 Pet. 2.15 Whose stratagem according to the Chaldee Paraphrast was thus laid with Balak That the people of Israel could not be curs'd or weakned but by dividing them from their God That this was to be best effected by bringing the fairest Daughters of Moab into the field instead of an Army to allure them to their Embraces which soon took effect For the People began to commit Whoredom with the Daughters of Moab And the Anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel Till the zeal of Phineas put a stay unto it Numb 25.1 2 8.11 To the like kind of Prophets and Romish suggestions and connivance we owe the present deluge of Debauchery amongst our Gentry and Superiours whereby men are fitted by Spiritual wounds and servitudes for Romish Plaisters and our Church and its guides disgraced and a greater deluge of judgment and destruction is hanging over us unless God grant us Grace timely to repent out of love and commiseration to our selves and Countrey as well as duty to God whom we have so unthankfully provoked And least Kings themselves who can have no ends but God and the publick should bring too great an happiness upon a Nation by taking the charge thereof themselves They suggest the management of the Reins of Government to be difficult and toilsom for Princes to tire their Arms or Brains with and that others may be better trusted with such fatigues and Princes to take their pleasure and if trusted than trusted for good and all by all means for to trust and suspect were disingenious and contradictory whereby the Prince shall be divested and depos'd from most of his Authority and a Juncto of petty Tyrants raised and multiplied to act under the shelter of the Government against its Interest and honour like unskilful Mountebanks that take liberty to kill under the colour of a License Whereas in truth nothing is more easie and plain especially in some Nations than the Rulers work and office For what more easie than to know good from evil which a Child will soon arrive to in difficult and knotty points they have Counsels and Tribunals to assist as Moses had his Exod. 18. And what more Divine than to be an encourager of the one and a Terrour to the other Or can be more their Interest and strength and blessing and Acclamation and praise from God and men Provided that they take a Text or two for their direction as my present Text to do all from the heart as to the Lord For none are able to Act Christ to the full both in the temper of his first and second coming as Princes may by Meekness in the first place towards such as are tractable by Resolution and severity in the next towards such as prove Incorrigible And that other Text Rom. 12.8 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that ruleth let him do it with diligence not consuming his time and thoughts upon mean and and common Recreations much less on scandalous and sinful pleasures but to make his Government his entertainment and pastime For what can be more the sport and health of a Prince than the prosperity of his people And what Musick more delighting in a Generous Eare than the Te Deums of Orphans and Widows and the Oppressed for their rescue and Protection Any Squire or lusty Clown can equal a Prince in skill and content at Hunting of a Fox or Deer But to detect and hunt Wolves in Sheeps cloathing out of the Church or the wild Bore out of Christs Vinyard and Foxes from Publick Tribunals and Sees and noisom Vermin that prey upon their innocent Neighbours out of every corner of the Land This is Game for a Prince wherein no Subject can be his Rival or share or partake in his Delight and Glory And what a glorious happiness doth it ever prove to a Nation when Kings inspect their own Affairs and trust not too far to others and are led by the heart more than by the ear by God more than by Man by Conscience and Christ its rule which can never deceive them than by Man who is a lyar which can and often doth deceive and betray them into manifold unworthiness and inconvenience The Proverb saith the eye of the Master feeds the Horse But it is far more true that the eye of the King will beatifie a Nation According to that of Solomon The King sitting in his Throne of Judgment scattereth away all Iniquity with his eye Prov 20.8 The Sun it self cannot be more useful to the world by its Beams and Influence nor less be spared than a diligent and wakeful Prince to his People for he is more than a Sun being as God and Christ amongst them not in Title only but in Efficacy and Benefit when by Precept and Example he acts all in conjunction with him and subservience to him and Christ is ever where he is and He is ever where Christ is What an eye-sore would this prove but to none other but to Flatterers Hypocrites Pimps Oppressors Atheists Epicures but to Satan and his Pope who envy every Kingdom the Divine and Fatherly care and inspection of its respective Kings and is ever incroaching for a share in every Crown by the pretence of his Chair though he hath no more right or authority to meddle here than the Lord Mayor of DVBLIN to Govern the City of LONDON or our British Church to rule and controll the See of ROME and not so much because junior in the Faith to Us as
one of St. Pauls Disciples one of his own bloud and extraction being the Son of Claudia Ruffina f Martial Fpigr lib. 11. Ep. 53. lib. 4. Ep. 13. a Brittish Lady admired by f Martial Fpigr lib. 11. Ep. 53. lib. 4. Ep. 13. Roman Writers for her Accomplishments not short of any then in Rome or Athens e Usher cap. 3. p. 31. seq the Wife of Pudens and Mother of Linus in whose house at Rome Baronius saith g Anno Christi 44. the Tradition goes St. Peter had his abode in Converted afterwards into a Temple but which is more certain and generally agreed on by their Writers and ours and the exceptions of one e Usher cap. 3. p. 31. seq Dissenter sufficiently answered by the most Learned Vsher they both were the same persons who are mention'd e Usher cap. 3. p. 31. seq in St. Paul's 2 Epistle to another Timothy 4.21 Pudens and Linus and Claudia greet thee and all the Brethren Who after acquaintance with St. Paul in all Probability was more instrumental to conveigh and promote more and more the Gospel into her Countrey than before pieces of Roman Wit as she was wont as is rightly inferred by the Polite and Reverend Author of Antiquitates Ecclesiasticae who yet is more industrious than need in the derivation and Roman forming of both her names Claudia from Claudius Caesar and Ruffina from Pudens Rufus a Roman Knight her Husband when her own h Hist Britt l. 2. c. 2. Brittish name might easily and without such streining be formed after the Latine Mode common with it to other Tongues to make some alterations in Forreign names which they are to pronounce in their own who being Young and newly Married with Pudens Martialls Patron stil'd Sanctus by the Poet in his Epithalamium for his Modesty and Vertue might well be the Mother of a Son that might be fit for time as well as mutual affection to Baptize our Brittish King coming over to be a Christian and probably by his means and influence for K. Lucius or Lhês lived not at that distance of time but that this might be well Effected in Anno 156. saith Geoffry h Hist Britt l. 2. c. 2. of Monmouth and sooner say Ninius and P. Jovius as before Withall there was but his Father King Coillus and Marius or Meirig his Grandfather between Lucius and Aruiragus mention'd in Roman Writers who was Contemporary with Joseph of Arimathaea and g Gwladys Ruffydh or Gryffith whence Ruffinus Ruffina Griffin The old Brittains retain'd their Maiden surnames though Married and do still amonst the communalty and pronounâ—e u as y and melt away g. bountiful to him at Glastonbury say our Histories and Lucius might be called Arviragus or Apviragus for his name in Brittish form was Lhês Coel ap Meirig i Usher p 18 And were it true that Lucius of a King became a Preacher before his end and Converted to the Faith Bavaria k Usher p 31. and Switzerland as several Authors report out of the Annals of those places as our English k Ubbo Emmius Reâ— Frisicarum Willibrord and Suidbert and Wilfrid did Holland and Frizland and Boniface or Winfrid did the Thurmgi Suevi Franci l Munster Cosm l. 3. p. 323. doth it follow they must owe an Eternal Subjection to the Church of Brittain upon that score Or did the Ancient Brittains ever pretend to a Supremacy or Jurisdiction over Ireland upon the pretence of its Conversion by their St. Patrick as is the way at Rome to insist Or were it lawful for them and in their own power to pav us or another that should upon such a score expect it such their subjection and obedience against their due Loyalty and Allegiance to their own Soveraign whose right it is but though we pretend to no rule over them nor expect any more but their love and kindness which is mutually due we may justly take it ill and unkind at their hands that they chuse rather to be guided in their Faith by Forreign Deceivers to their Misery than continue their Communion with their Ancient Christian Friends and Brethren Branach to their great felicity in Soul and Body and the happy peace of both Nations Where Christian Religion is wholly imployed and adapted to compass Worldly ends and Temporal Superiority its dignity is embased and its nature really chang'd into another kind or species and ought not by consequence to be call'd Religion For the end is better than the means and the Master than the Servant and the Building than the Scaffold And this present World Satans Kingdom is more excellent than such a Church which is wholly designed and dedicated to serve and gain it with all the end gives name and being and definition unto the means as a sum of Money imployed to relieve the poor is Charity to pay Debts Justice to Bribe an Evidence Perjury to hire an Assasinate Murder or a Building made to dwell in is a House to Grind Corn a Mill to keep off Enemies a Fort to serve God in a Church to buy and sell in a Shop and by consequence that Religion that hath Earthly Rule and advantage for its chief end and professes Earth thereby to be better than Heaven and Gospel good for nothing more than to fill Coffers cannot be call'd Christian or true Catholick Religion for the chief aime of such is the World to come but rather an Antichristian trade or craft which sets Conscience and Truth and Sacraments all at sale to make sure of this And so much may suffice touching the second point to shew that Rome is no Mother Church to Brittain neither by Conception or Education for she was neither conceived in her womb nor nourished on her breast but was a Virgin of full Age when her pretended Mother was but in her Swadling Clouts and Cradle SECTION VII The Description of the Old Brittish Church in its Doctrine Discipline and Goverment and Traditions when Augustine the Monk made his Impression here IN the third place to come to Augustine the Monkes Impression upon our Brittish Church we are to examine whether being free born she forfeited that liberty by any foul Heresie or Schisme Or the Church of Rome at that time merited Superiority over her by being a more Excellent and purer Church Or by any Act of redemption or unrequitable Courtesie which swallows liberty hath won or oblig'd it in justice and equity to be subject to her Or wherein her Title to this Supremacy lay in its first advance and setting out before any pretence or colour from prescription or possession The Face therefore and Physiognomy of both Churches at that time is to be viewed and examined in its lines and features which of the two for Doctrine and Discipline and Traditions was most Catholick and Apostolick and Primitive and Merited supposing their years and standing equal to Rule and give Law to the other Where it is to be premised
effectual appearance and existence of the Truth and reality of this high mercy and its Obligations in our minds and perswasions for what is not known or own'd and received in the soul is as was said before with all men of no account as to them no more than if it had never been and we move and Act in our souls and in the conceptions and models thereof as our souls in God or Idols for we walk not in the Streets and stairs without us but in the Streets and stayers within our brain and count for let the last be mistaken or out of order men shall stumble and stagger though the first be never so true and right And to the Resuâ—â—ection Rom. 4.25 or Ascention into Heaven above 〈◊〉 as to the livery and seisin of this blessed State into which Christ enter'd for us in our Name and Naâ—â—â—â— drawing all hearts after him to Heaven by this 〈◊〉 and obligation as to a new center Wherebâ— the Sâ—â—â—â— of the Christian Church to use the 〈◊〉 of the World or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Country-Ship of every Christian is laid and fix'd in Heaven with Christ our of himself and this Transitory World And the nature of our fall in Adam understood by the cure and reparation to have been our departure far from God and Paradice into flesh and self and death for out of Christ in the fallen State the natural man is neither dead to this World in his Cross nor exalted to Heaven in his Resurrection nor United by love and the holy spirit to his person nor dead to himself but stands upon his own Leggs and Power against all opposition upon his own righteousness and Impeccability against Divine Justice upon his own strength and Grace against Infernal Powers and the deceits of the Flesh and the World upon the love of himself as the spring and end of all his Actions and designs above the love of God being his own 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in enmity with God by setting up Rebelliously himself Instead being miserably beside himself because so totally in for and to himself man's bliss and rest being not immanent but transitive not in himself but in God his Centre for of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory for ever Rom. 11.36 And the return of the soul to God by love in the extinction of all enmity on either hand is wrought alone by Christ our Mediator satisfying Gods Justice by his death for us when we were Enemies and swallowing all our lives and hearts into himself by the obligation infinitely surpassing all comprehension or requital And we are not lost but perfected by this our Transmigation into Christ by love and gratitude lost indeed to our selves and to this World but found in Christ in Heaven each part being the health and perfection of the soul For so the Apostle understood this mystery None of us liveth to himself and none dyeth to himself for whether we live we live unto the Lord and whether we dye we dye unto the Lord whether we live therefore or dye we are the Lords For to this end Christ both dyed and â—ose and reviv'd that he might be Lord both of the Dead and Living Rom. 14.7 8 9. And in another place The love of Christ constraineth us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath our beings wrap'd up together with him because we thus Judge that if one dyed for all than were all dead And that he dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him which dyed for them and rose again we are to follow him in his Resurrection by our Conversation in Heaven and affections set on things above and in his death by mortification and self-denyal as dead men by construction and entendment to all things here below for the Laws and fictions of reason well supported are as much to guide and conclude us as outward reality the Mathematicks the most certain of Sciences have no other foundation The Church bids farewell to the present World as if it were already dead and buried and lives by its Faith and love in Heaven as if it were already ascended thither and its life hid with Christ in God Col. 3.3 or as we said Christ and Heaven descend to abide in every Christian that thus ascends by his holy Spirit and the consequence of this union for they never are in Heaven with him without his being on Earth in them Withall Christ is never backward at Redamation to prevent the delinquiums and deadly fits of his sincere lovers for want of being re-loved and those Eli Eli Lamma Sabacthani's which himself felt and underwent for us out of Love The Aire is not more at watch and readiness to break in at the place a Vessel is flowing out to prevent a Vacuum than Christ by holy inspirations to replenish that heart that expires after him in zeal and love and by that to prevent its dissolution Yea Vessels though never so full will not and cannot flow without such vent nor the Aire step through for relief but where the Vessel is in a posture and inclination to run out But Divine Inspirations far out do and super-repair human expirations yea sometimes shoot out by their force the all that is within even life it self into Martyrdom and repair it with a stronger life in the midst of death According to the Aphorisms or Paradoxes of Christ himself the first Author of this Divine Art of loving and mutual dying and living in one another He that findeth his life shall loose it and he that looseth his life for my sake shall find it Mat. 10.39 And the reason assign'd why Christians are able to count death and Tribulations as nothing yea to Glory in them is Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given us Rom. 5.5 Because love delights and glories to prove it self by tryals especially when rais'd and elevated by a divine life and mixture And if crosses become easie and glorious and acceptable to Christians by this mystery of spending how much more will their prosperities and favours He that can rest on Thornes may much more on Downe There are many and familiar Instances in the World of these mutual transmigrations between lovers and Benefactors as well as between Christ and Christians Vendidit libertatem qui beneficium accepit Obligations exhale mens liberties and a courtesie from the Heart of the Giver steals away the heart of the Receiver But what Grace or obligation can be compar'd to Christs Grace to men The Servant upon the score of a little Salary in his want ceases to be his own man and becomes swallowed in reason into the person of his Master and who more deservedly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lord and Master of all men than our for ever blessed Redeemer Right love in Matrimony and Friendship is mutually
l. 28. d of p. 599. l. 35. r. may Col. 3.23 Whatsoever you do do it from the Heart as unto the Lord and not unto men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the Soul THe difference between the Soul and the Body which is the foundation of all Religion and Honesty and Honour is not so plainly demonstrable from Natural marks and arguments wherein the resemblance of Organs and Animal operations in man and beast puts a meer Naturalist often to a stand as from Moral effects and experiments and signatures undenyable For men's Actions good and bad like the Men themselves consist of two Essential parts Body and Soul or the outside of the Action which men regard answering to the Body or Carcass and the inside or the intent and manner which God respects answering to the Heart and Soul which is all in all to assigne a few instances received throughout mankind without controll It is the mind and kindness of the giver which is as the Soul of the guift and not the bulk and quantity which is but as the Body that gives price and valuation to presents with God and God-like men And a Dinner of Herbs or Bread and Water where there is love and a cheerful countenance as a signe of hearty welcom which is the life and Soul of entertainment digests better than the most Sumptuous Magnificent Feast that is where these are wanting If a life be destroyed yet if the will and intention that is the heart appear to have no manner of hand at all therein there is a non est factum in the Case it 's neither Murder nor Slaughter but Chance Lucretia though Villanously Ravished in her Body stands Chast and undefiled in Story because she fully proved after her Roman way her mind to have been pure and unconsenting It was done against my will is a plea of Natural Logick in tender Age and Riper for their indemnity in any fault committed unawares â—â—ir promises and Professions that proceed not from the heart none value but as wind or as God doth the worship or repentance of a Hypocrite that hath a relapse and falsehood in his heart The Roman General knew not how to be angry with the transported Greeks that went nigh to press him to death with their excessive joy and thankfulness at his unexpected Publication of their liberty at the Olympick Games the verity of their heartiness drown'd the danger of their outward rudeness Whereby as by a tast it is apparent that the want and absence of the Soul or heart render all our actions not only pale and ghastly and ill favour'd but also null and void and dead and that the least touch and tincture communicated from the Soul unto them gives them a new and admirable life and beauty How great then must the loveliness and beauty of the Soul itself be if the image of the Sun shines so bright in a Pail of water How glorious is the Sun it self in full body in his own orb and firmament Upon this account so great a stress is laid upon the heart in all mens Actions by all wise and holy men by Solomon My Son give me thy heart Prov. 23.26 By our Blessed Saviour from the heart proceed all evil thoughts and works and all good by the contrary Mat. 15.19 By St. Paul in my Text Whatsoever you do do it from the Heart c. without which all Religious worship would be Insignificant and Cadaverous and dead as without brotherly love from the heart amonâ—â—t brethren your solemn Festivals would be but jejune Pageantry but a Feast of Artificial Napkins or painted Pastboard or that wooden treat of the Poet Et tot á sonat ulmea Caena saburrâ 2. The Text is a rule and lesson given to Servants But doth God take care of Servants only Doth it not as well belong to Masters also yea it doth as much belong to Masters Col. 4.1 For if the Servant is bound to eye the Authority and fear of Christ in his Master is not the Master bound by Counter-part in Equity to appear in the mercy and tenderness of Christ towards such an awful and conscientious Servant Or is there or can there be any better regulation of Master and Servant than when Christ is made a Rule for both And wherein lies the main-stay and support of all the Societies and Communities of the World more than in the right Regulation of Master and Servant Superiour and Inferiour For Communities ever stand or fall decay or flourish as Servants and Subjects Masters and Governours neglect or discharge each their several parts and duties For in all our service and subjection we have two Lords and Masters before us our 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 22. those our visible Lords and Masters whom we outwardly and subordinatly serve in our Mortal bodies with a condition and reservation ever that they interfere not in their Commands with God Acts 4.19 And our Invisible and supreme Lord and Master whom we absolutely and unconditionally serve and obey with our immortall Souls and Spirits which know no Superiour but God alone or Christ the Lord in my text who because he hath right to the entire service of the heart and soul according to our Apostle in this text is therefore truly God And seeing we are to do all from the heart and soul or else nothing in reason is by us ever done And the heart or the soul knows none over it but only God the Apostle therefore takes Christians off from serving Earthly and perishing Lords Masters to serve our only ever-living Master in Heaven from the heart of whom Masters on Earth to Christians are as Signs and Symbols changing eye-service for fear into heart-service for Conscience v. 22. Our Earthly drudgery to men into Heavenly worship towards God fear of blows into fear of Hell temporal liberty and salary into everlasting bliss and Glory knowing saith he v. 24. That of the Lord you shall receive the reward of the Inheritance for ye serve the Lord Christ Ye serve the Lord Christ and you are to serve your Masters and Governours over you in the flesh nevertheless yea the more because they are now to you vested with Christ By the Christian Hypothesis Earthly Masters and Governours are as I may say Sacramentally chang'd and consecrated into Christ yet continue the same Masters and Governours nevertheless un-transubstantiated un-removed from their beings and stations to make room for Christ So that a Quaker may with a safe conscience yeâ— ought in conscience to express Reverence from his heart as to Christ in the first place so to his Superiour in the next yea to Christ himself in the persons of his Superiours at once And as the Blessed Sacrament is Holy Bread to our sense while yet Christ himself to our Faith so the Christian Servant or Subject serves an Earthly Prince or Master in the flesh but serves the Lord Christ himself in his heart and Faith the outside of the service
Boethius l. 9. p. 171. That because they deserted the Religion of their Fathers and violated the Worship of their Gods perinde atque Brittannis atque Scotis se hostem futurum that he would be their enemy no less than to the Brittains and the Scots And lost his life at last in his Holy War against the East-Angles having lost an eye before in Scotland and a great Army at Bangor where he was also wounded breathing out his impious Soul like Julian only better for his constancy but not inferiour for his Heathenish Cruelty Deorum Religionis Protector Christiani Nominis Hostis ut vixi morior m Ibid. p. 172. I dye as I lived the Protector of the Religion of the Gods and the enemy of Christ and all his Christians who therefore was a very fit and useful Instrument for Monk Augustine to comply with for the destruction of the true Christian Religion here in Brittain that opposed the Roman and to plant his Popery instead and accordingly made use off If therefore the English were not all converted in their Hearts under Arthur and Aurelius because of the force It may well be presumed from the contrary reason that the Heart it self did not hold out against the Divine power of the same Ministry acting in its external weakness and exinanition God by his great Providence having us'd all means both harsh and easie to soften and chafe the hard and stubborn hearts of the English to receive his Gospel and shap'd and cast the Brittish Nation for their use and the use of all Germany through them into the mould as it were of Christs first and second coming to work and make impression upon them if it were possible either of the two wayes With this difference that here Humility came after Power to to win by Intreaty what it could not compass by command and force as there Power will come after Humility to bruise with irresistable destruction what it could not prevail upon by Grace and love And when all would not do delivered them over to Popery as it were to Satan or Antichrist to be chain'd in spiritual slavery and darkness with many other Nations for about a thousand years And then visited them again in mercy with the comfortable light and Glorious Liberty of the Reformation handed also to them by their Kings when they came to be of Brittish race to try their love to truth once more before his last stroke and Eternal destruction of the Impenitent and Incorrigible But nothing of the former passages though the truth thereof hath left sufficient markes and effects behind it in Saxon Laws and Homilies extant quite dissonant to Popery in several principles as shall hereafter be mention'd how remarkable soever occurrs in Bede's Popish History not a word of n Munster Cosm p. 552. Offa the Son of Ethelfred preaching the Gospel to the Germans beyond the Rhine Anno 603. and building Offenburg and Schuttern as Munster Notes nor o Ibid. p. 580. St. Columbanus our Irish Monk of whom the same Munster saith Certò Constat We have certain knowledge of his propagating the Gospel far and wide through Germany the passages being within the time and business of his History and for the Honour of this Land only tending too much to discover that the Gospel was preached by the Brittains to the Saxons in the houses of their Fiercest Kings which Right to that Nation was against Bede's Theme and humour to acknowledge But Ethelfred and Oswald being both Princes of his Countrey and Climate he is Civil to them and endeavours to do Right to both respectively in Magnifying the Vertues of King Oswald which are undenyable to Superstition And Palliating and lessening the wickedness of Ethelfred which was as notorious to Indignity seldom doing the least Right to the Brittains the enemies of his Nation and of his Catholick Faith as he openly stiles them lib. 5. c. ult Saving sometimes out of unavoidable necessity and for other ends and Interests as where he is to commend the way and Religion of the Scots and Irish for whom he had greater kindness The Brittish Faith whence the other deriv'd and stifly kept to is inevitably extoll'd by consequence Or when he mention'd the good work of Augustine in repairing Canterbury Church whither Queen Bertha resorted he had like to have betrayed and discovered to a sagacious smell how all then stood How much the Christian Brittish Religion was received and flourished in Kent before the coming of Augustine So the West Saxon Kingdom shall be all in darkness p Bede lib. 3. c. 7. Paganissimi when Birinus comes to convert it but when Aldhelmus is to do exploits in bringing them over to the Roman Easter it shall be very q Idem lib. 5. c. 19. full again of Brittish Christians whom he is to reduce and such is his Conversion of all Mercia by Diuma and but two or three more and the like of the other Heptarchies yet no Ecclesiastical Writer is now more Classic and Authentick than Bede nor any passage of Church Antiquity to be well credited without his attestation so beneficial was his Partiality to the Roman-church to his Reputation and Authority in the World Therefore the other mixt Conversion of the English and full completion or confirmation of the former by Brittish Ministy and Doctrine but not all Brittish persons shall be clear'd out of Bede their own Author against our Romanists and irrefragably evinc'd by cross examination of his History whereby it will appear that the English under God owe their Conversion to the Brittains and others and not to Rome And that Augustine came hither to no better end than to destroy the true Religion like a messenger of Antichrist or at least miserably to corrupt it with adulterate mixtures and Superstitions And the positive proofs out of Bede of the Gospel being preached and planted among the English upon mixt account and especially Northward where the English did most abound and the Brittains were least intermixt amongst them are not so much Proofs and undenyable Instances as Divine Miracles and over-ruling Providences and the manifest Finger of God calling not only for Assent but Astonishment and Admiration That not only Augustin's plantation at York and Kent should be totally extirpated as it were by Divine Retaliation by the same means and method himself contrived and set on foot to destroy our Brittish Church But the Sons of Edelfred swho was Augustine's Executioner to Massacre the Brittish Clergy are made by Gods controlling power the chief Patrons and Propagators of the Brittish Faith over most part of England and Oswald the best of them who for his own virtues was no doubt rewarded with rest and Glory permitted by Gods severity and hatred of his Fathers Murders at Bangor to be slain and mangled and quarter'd by his enemies in view well nigh and sight of that very place And the Brittains by excess of wrong and cruelties from their enemies
confidence in their Cut-throate-fathers and are call'd to severe and sharp account for the errours of their teachers and their own yet most clear and undeniable it is that the People have a good zeal in General for the true God and Religion yea are more sincerely stedfast in their errours amidst poverty and torture and double Tithes and payments and death it self than many knowing Protestants are for the true Religion which they shrink from and change upon any appearance of advantage or disadvantage as often as the Moon he that is sincere and earnest in a false Religion aims at the true in the General and in his conscience But he that lives contrary or slights the Religion which himself professes and believes to be true declares himself of no Religion or understanding for contradiction added to Atheism is the Outlary of all reason and honour The Irish therefore are the more to be regarded and tender'd by us under their Ignorance and spiritual disorder because curable and not to be neglected for what wrong or temporal mischief soever they have done to us or themselves in the time of their blindness and seduction lest we be justly guilty of the unjust calumny against the Ancient Brittains towards the Saxons but we are to be zealous of their Reformation whether we be English or Brittains if English we are their debters their Learned and Pious Ancestors have done the like and more for many of ours whom they taught the first Gospel when they lay in Heathenish Ignorance and the shadow of death And much more if we are Ancient Brittains for our Ancestors taught theirs and love descends and it belongs to a Husbandman to be more careful of his plantation than to a stranger therefore we are bound to intreat and beseech them especially their Learned and sincere Clergy that love the Salvation of their charge more than absolute Dominion over them and their remaining afflicted Gentry and Nobility in the name of God and the bowels of Christ and that we may the better prevail even upon our knees before them that they will be merciful to their land and to their own souls and Posterity and as they have of late to some trouble own'd our Soveraign in Temporals that they would also own Christ in Spirituals instead of the Pope and holy Scriptures instead of lyes and Bulls and Legends and conscience more than deceitful guides and Popery will have its end in Ireland and the Ignorance and misery of that poor Nation in soul and body and Estates together with it as we hope and trust They are as able to overthrow the pretended Infallibility of the Pope in the latter and grosser errour as they have done effectually in the first And they 'l meet their old Religion which St. Patrick taught in the Protestant Church of Ireland and England Protestant truth and Irish sincerity will make excellent Christianity The Learned and Pious Dr. Sall is worthy of everlasting honour amongst all good Christians for his great and leading example in this point amidst great discouragements And as for some other of their guides who are like to be most cross and averse against this Petition of truth and love who if they are not fowly belyed delight in the Impliciâ— saith of their Female charge as well as their Male the chastity of the soul and body from God and purity being the chief sacrifice and triumph that Satan and his Ministers delight in we are not so desirous of their company or Communion till by better reformation they assure us of their belief of any God which we doubt not in the least of the rest of their seduc'd Brethren And by this second Instance appears the difference between the Religion of the Irish under its first Plantation by the Brittains and it s after Cultivation by the Romanists by the one they became the Glory of Western Christendom for Christian life and Learning by the other the reproach and scorn of the World and Pitty of all good men for their Ignorance and wildness And the English from the time of King Ina and the Brittains while under their Power till the Reformation were well nigh as much beholding to Rome for their like improvement in knowledge And Rome hath accomplish'd most of her Conquests over Churches and Souls by this mist of Ignorance to set off mistakes and cheats Adimit rebus nox atra colorem darkness destroys differences a Serpent shall be taken for a Rope a Pool for a Meadow a Statue for a living man an enemy for a Friend a King for a Subject in the dark And so the first currant mistake by the help of this politick Ignorance that hath advanc'd and supported the Empire and credit of that Church to this day is that they make their Proselytes believe that their Church is the same with Jerusalem wich is above descended down to Rome the Mother of us all the Church of the living God out of whose Pale or Bosome there is no Salvation to be expected For so all degrees and Converts to that Church by the Bull or Test of Pius quartus must profess and swear the Holy Catholick Church in Heaven and Earth mention'd in Creeds to be their particular Roman Church which begets it great Authority and veneration from those which can believe this to be true and heretofore brought great resort and Treasure and Honour to that City several Kings and Princes leaving their Crowns and Kingdoms to end their dayes at Rome as it were in Heaven or Abraham's bosom So Bede saith of a Bede lib. 4. c. 5. Oswi that he was grown so perfect a Catholick that had not his Disease prevented he resolved to go to Rome to leave his Bones there to be sure of Heaven Which the Monkish corrupter of the Brittish History directly affirms of Cadwaladr last King of the Brittains the absurdity of which dream and forgery tending to exalt the Honour of Rome and the abuse of our Saints and worthies most evidently appears by comparing Bede and Geoffrey of Monmouth together For he with all others allows Cadwaladr to be the Son of Cedwalla or Cadwalhan King Edwins Chrony and Antagonist born the same day and brought up b Hist Britt l. 12 c. 1. in the Court of Northwales to years of manhood together That Edwin recovering Northumberland by the defeat and death of Edelfred after long exile and falling out with Cadwalhan who would not allow him to wear a Crown beyond Humber but at peril of his head and then siding with the Roman faction conquer'd Wales and drove out Cadwalhan beyond the Seas holding the Countrey in subjection for 17 years but was overthrown at last and kill'd by Cadwalhan in the year 633. being the 47 year of his Age c Bede l. 2. c. 20. saith Bede as Cadwalhan was of the same Age by consequence and Cadwaladr his Son born and in being about this time or else according to Bede he never could be born For according to
Church above any other 1. It s Addiction and delight in fictions and pious frauds and officious lies and equivocations and mental Reservations and Stolid Insipid Legends and Infamous unconscionable forgeries and falfifying of the Living and the dead both persons and Records and Histories Fathers Councils Saints Apostles Angels Virgin Mary and Christ himself as well when there is no need of such Arts as when there is out of meer delight in this ugly sin as it were to keep their hands in whereby few Ecclesiastical Authors saving the Bibles have escaped their forgeries and their Histories where they are worth the reading are scarce to be believed but where they speak against them and their Interest now a lye is a slight or repugnancy to the heart and to God present in it or to Ciceroe's Divine mind and by consequence never without a kind of perjury in its train But when the heart is with Christ Christ is with that heart by consequence and he that speaks with and from his heart never lies for Christ speaks through him by fiction and he in whom Christ speaks cannot lye for Christ is Truth and Truth is only that which God saith or approves And God can neither lie himself nor approve it in any others where lyes are in common request and vogue it 's a sign God and the heart are departed and the Dialect of Satan who is a lyar becomes the Language of that Country The Innundation of Legends and Fables that over-spreads the service and Religion and Profession of that Church manifestly proves that its banks are broken that there is little or nothing of the heart or Christ or Conscience left amongst them as the sole and proper walls and fences against all untruth and falshood for regard to the heart alone will keep out lyes as in Generous Heathens and all persons of true honour and honesty much more to the heart and Christ as with all true Christians there is an Antipathy and inconsistency between every Ly and Christ and the heart and Conscience and Honour Where lying and Legending and dissimulation before God and man are easily dispensed with as no where more than at Rome there Christ and the heart are but cashier'd Soveraigns and stand for Ciphers And in what Church or Profession soever Christ goes off the stage Antichrist soon comes on the Father and Patron of Lyes who primarily and originally sure is Satan Revel 2.9 c. 13.4 or the great Dragon and old Serpent in Paradice the first Anti-god that destroyed mankind with a Lie seducing them from their Allegiance to God and substituting his own will to be observ'd instead by interpretation from Gods Authority against his mind Whereof the Science and Mystery is retain'd and profess'd in the Academy of Rome but the common practice and lying Dialect of his Kingdom is to be met in other Apostatical places and Ages co-dispers'd with the Church like Tares among Wheat to destroy and choak it And though the Jewish Turkish and Popish Apostacy use different Dialects the Hebrew the Arabick and the Latine yet they understand one another and exactly agree in their common Mother Tongue of vain lying For our Popish Legends and Alcharon Dreams and Talmudical Dotages wherein differ they but in the Garb and Masquerade of different Languages being all three a breed of the same womb and the Genuine off-spring of the Father of Lyes strongly retaining as bred in the bone the humour and special faculty of vending their own Errours for Gods Truths whose Interpreters they pretend each to be but the Pope and Mahomet more especially 2ly The Unchristian Cruelties of that Church proves it to be an unconscionable Church without a heart and nearly Allyed to Antichrist For by the Heart and Conscience we carry all other men about us in our breasts and our Souls are the Armory and Magazines of Modells and Suppositions by which ouâ— Inward Actions are first form'd and conceived whereof our Outward are but Copies and Counterparts And no man can wrong another outwardly without wronging him in himself to the wounding of his own Conscience in the first place The hurt in both is to himself in the one to the life and quick in the inward guilt in the other in the outward effigie to his own flesh By our unconfin'd Souls whereby one man is all mankind by fiction we are naturally fram'd and dispos'd to compassion and justice and doing as we would be done by As by our confin'd bodies on the other hand or the existence of no more but our bodily life and concerns in the conceptions of the Soul which is our narrowest being and measure of self-preservation we become mean and solitary Individuals and prompted thereby to the sole care and defence of our skin and property and often betrayed to insatiable deceitful appetites after Luxury which more tire and disappoint than satisfie the immense desires of the Soul aiming at the beatifical enjoyment of its God in every lust and pleasure it blindly stumbles upon The whole Creation being not a sufficient meal and the narrow brittle Vessel of the body not large and tight enough to contain and digest its vast draughts and ingestions but in a bounded love or Mortification rather of its Carnal self and unbounded Charity and preference of God and Countrey and mankind iâ— finds a Divine and honourable repast to its full â—atietie and true content yea our Souls were made to be not only receptacles and Synods of mankind but the Temples of God and Christ and all Christians And where the Heart is given Christ Christ a Eph. 3.17 1 Cor. 6.20 in MS. Alexandr in his Law and Nature resides and acts in that heart As such a heart also by its inspir'd Commands and dispositions rules its own body and members whereby every Christian carrying Christ about him by his Faith or Christian supposition is partaker of his Divine Nature and become an inspir'd Actor of his Saviours Vertues meek and merciful to enemies as Christ himself was and kind and tender hearted b Jac. 3. â—7 and peaceable and gentle and easie to be entreated as he hopes to find Christ to himself from an assurance from and in himself of his Infinite and unbounded goodness A right Catholick Christian is angry aâ— Hereticks and transgressors with the same zeal and dislike as Christ is who delights not in their death and ruine but their repentance and return yea he had rather dye for them than be the death of any of them though his enemies Mercy therefore and mildness and compassion from the heart to erroneous fellow-Christians is a great demonstration of true Catholick Christianity where ever it occurres or shines as merciless hostilities and zealous killing and burning all Dissenters of the contrary and of the Eclipse of the heart and Conscience and Christ by consequence in such a Church or Christian Whereby the Protestant Spirit is justified to the World to be right Christian and that in
different Liquor unto others in Synods and Conventicles to make them turbulent and frantick and to worry their Rulers and destroy their Kings several have been so weary and tyred what with the noyse and scandal on the one hand what with the Narcotick steam and Operation on the other that they are ready to slumber and sleep at Noon-day and like sick men can find no rest but by changing their Religion as they do their Beds a deadly Symptom in both and to Rome they will go where they may sleep to purpose while their eyes are resign'd to their guides and their trust to man instead of God and never waken till the Trumpet and last Judgement to their Eternal wo. If it were to return to Rome Heathen in its glory and to change their Bibles for Tully or Seneca rather than for Lyes and Legends men might have some excuse for their intoxicated love of slavery which all free Spirits abhor and especially Spiritual slavery which is so contrary to the soul the freest of beings For there we should meet with Caesar and Cicero and Virgil and many other Heroes of several endowments we should light if not upon Christ yet upon the other part of my Text the Heart and Soul in that perfection and improvement by knowledge and virtue and valour as fully answer'd the Poets Character which compriz'd the utmost that men could do or Pen describe Imperium terris animos aequavit Olimpo they match'd the Gods with their parts and over-match'd the World with their Prowess And where the heart is well preserv'd and enlightened Christ is never far off even as Antichrist is never nigh but where the heart is first darkned and resign'd For the Sun of Righteousness was rising to the World about this time that Rome was so clear'd and enobl'd in heart and Spirit and mens souls were so awakned and sitted with Liberty and honour to receive his Truths The Roman Empire being raised and imployed in St. John Baptist's work as it were to prepare the way of the Lord and to train mens souls to value truth in the General above sordid self-love and to clense the eye in part to behold its lustre For as the Sun were of little use to people that had no eyes or were blinded with cataracts and scales so also is the Sun of righteousness to blind and servile and seal'd understandings and Christ to any heart that is muffled with Idols or enslaved to another Supremacy But in Popery neither Christ nor the Heart can well be met with both are so engrossed and devourâ—d by his Vicaâ— it is highest Honour there not to be true to Honour or Conscience which passes for a dangerous private Spirit against their Church and to quit on 's self of his soul and Heart and Judgement is the method to be a right Roman Catholick and Christ and the soul like correlates ever stand and fall together where the one departs the other seldom stays behind Which is the reason that Popish Rome in its highest manhood and perfection had little to shew of either for when it arrived to its highest pitch and all Crowns were Subject to its Mitre all Laws to its Canons where was its glory compar'd to the other Rome but in a Herd of Monkish-Blockheads to be set against the others Divine Classick Authors Bede Geoffrey Comestor or the Golden Legend against Livy and Tacitus and Plutarch c. Epistolae obscurorum virorum against those of Cicero or Seneca And who against Virgil and Juvenal and Horace Poetry was so Ingenious and true to human nature in whose exaltation it ever chirps as down in the mouth in its fall also that where the Heart was excluded it turn'd Protestant and never shewed more its head What they had left to boast of were men without souls Arguments without sence Sermons without Scriptures or Fathers Authors without the stile and dialect of men cloysterd Epicures fat and trading Monks Cardinals without Christian Lives and Popes without Faith or Religion In a word Christianity without a soul or Saviour the Image of Religion to mans eye without the life and truth thereof to God's The Pope and the Virgin Mary instead of Christ and blind Obedience instead of the heart that no time or Age since the Floud or Fall can be parallel'd to that of Popery in its full reign and adâ—ption for a total degeneracy of human and Christian nature in point of Morality and Grace and Learning and Knowledge and Pen. It were better to have our sight and Judgement and but Stars to guide us than to have a blind heart with such a Sun and Gospel It were more eligible to be Cicero â—s Servitour than a King of such Christian Cattel And this was the state of Popery in his highest culmination and plenitude of growth and Lustre And which it is still at to recover for Popery is not to be heeded by its present pretences but its known ends and humour when it hath attain'd its ends which of all things hates nothing more than eyes and private Judgement and light which Inseparablâ— accompany the heart for thieves are best at thâ—iâ— work in the dead of night and Kings are best gullâ—d of their Soveraignties and Subjects of their Câ—yn and Liberty by Ignorance and a scale or Ointment to blind their eyes and all are better cramped and confessed when they are asleep For to appeal to any mans sence or Conscience or observation is there any thing more experimentally manifest to the World in every Age than that the chief design of Popery as to its Leaders is to promote and compass secular ends and Grandeur and Wordly power upon what hazard soever to souls or disgrace to Christ and his Religion and that Mammon is as Catholickly servâ—d at Rome as God and that its main design is to have the Crowns of Kings and Purses of Subjects in its power and the Consciences of both in order thereunto Quae regio in terris c. What Territory or Kingdom can be nam'd in Europe whose Scepter it hath not made Feudatary and Tributary to St. Peters Chair by its Faith-craft as the Ancient Romans did more nobly and Lyon-like by their Arms and Manhood what hide of good land without the fence of mortmain had escap'd the Plow of mortified Monks what Chimney was in all the Kingdom without a Peter-pence what is more confessed and gloried in by our Modern Popes in their stamps and meddals wherein St. Peter is represented lifting up an old Woman from the ground with this motto Roma resurgens a fair and lucky Comment under their own Hand and Seal upon Rev. 13.12 And he exerciseth all the Power of the Beast before him and causeth the Earth and them that dwel therein to worship the first Beast whose deadly wounds was heal'd whereby is prov'd as by their own confession the Succession of Rome-Papal to Rome-Imperial it being the sence of the Ancient Fathers as before that the Empire which
constantly present in his heart and mind As he is ever the vainest that hath him least This presence of Christ in the Soul being its chief life and sobriety or preservation of the mind as the Greek imports and begetting that syberwid wherein the Brittish Ethicks did and doth consist And our Laws which are the wisdom of the Nation Endite none but Rebells against God who for not setting his fear alwayes before their eyes become injurious to their Brethren The great Apostle of the Gentiles comprizes the Disease of the Heathen world in one like word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 1.28 their averseness to eye God ever in their minds and the health of the Christian World to be in this when the Grace of our Lord Jesus was alwayes with them which was ever his last wish and prayer And the Cure of the Antichristian to be herein for when he had forwarn'd of the Pest that was to overspread the Christian Church in future Ages for their want of love to the Truth 2 Thess 2.9 10 11 12. he there names the best Amulet and Antidote against it again and again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cap. 3.16.18 The Lord of Peace give you peace The Lord be with you all The Grace of our Lord Jesus be with you all Amen For they alone should escheat to Antichrist who cast off Christ and Christ them and those fall into the pit of the one whore and the other that in the Proverbs and the other in the Revelation who are abhorr'd of the Lord Prov. 22.14 And so much shall suffice by way of Exhortation to all Loyal Christians true to Christ their King and Countrey to adhere to our own good Mother-Church of Brittain in opposition to the pretences and inveiglements of the Modern Roman whom we leave as we found as Epaminondas is said to leave a sleeping Centinel whom he run through without a heart and Soul and Life through their taking man and not Christ who is the truth and the life for the Lord and Soveraign of their hearts and judgment SECTION XVII Where the place of the undoubted true Church is out of whose Pale there is no Salvation And how to be of the Church in Heaven while we are on Earth THe Brittish Church of England is a good and a true Church and so are many others but before men the Church of Christ that is in Heaven by true Faith is the true Church before God and the heart And certain Salvation is annext to the Church of Hearts and Faith For according to St. Paul every true Christian who is a Mystical Jew or Israelite is to be tryed by this Rule For he is not a Jew saith he which is one outwardly neither is that Circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the Heart in the Spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God Rom. 2.28 29. An unblamable outward profession constitutes us Sons of this or that Church before men but the sincerity of the heart to God sets us in the true Church before God for as he were not a right Son of this Church that should only observe Rubricks and Ceremonies and Consormity and neglect Temperance and Charity and Truth and Honesty which are greater so where both these are outwardly observ'd and kept as the Laws of God and the Customes of the place are the measures of all wise and sober men yet not from sincere love and obedience in the heart to Christ but for impunity from human Laws or vain-glory or some other secret end and purpose of the mind it is that end we thereby serve and not the Lord and by our out-side and the charitable estimation of men who are deceiveable we may be true Sons of the Church of England but our Inside or our souls which truly are our selves will be found out of the Church of Christ in Gods account who Judges by the heart and cannot be deceived And this Church of Christ is in Heaven where Christ is at Gods right hand and men become of it by saith and the sincerity of the heart which alone can reach it while in the body they remain on Earth This is the true Catholick Church whose Silver Rome borrows to cover its Brass with out of whose pale there can be no Salvation nor Condemnation ever to any that are found within it Rom. 8.1 There is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus If a man were Excommunicated by Rome and England and be of this Church he were safe being Christianus in occulto as St. Augustine stiles such a one in his Book de verá Religione cap. 6. and miss of Salvation though in the bosom of both Churches if he be not in his heart of this A Christian who is inwardly by his heart in Heaven with Christ Christ and Heaven are present to his heart by Consequence and such a one is as it were Christ Incarnate as every one who is out of Christ in his heart and wedded to other ends or Idols is a Devil incarnate more or less And this new Celestial person which he puts on becomes the standard of his Interest and the Rule of his deportment whatsoever he doth agreable to Christ thus in him is his honour and newself-preservation and peace and whatsoever unbecoming the contrary For Cicero would allow that the person we sustain by nature or by calling and by Grace by Consequence becomes the Rule and measure of men's duties and obligations so that there is a vast and an infinite difference between one in Christ and out of Christ between a Christian and no Christian as much as between Heaven and Earth Flesh and the Spirit God and a Creature And St. Paul reduces the whole to this point They only that are in Christ can be Justified and Sanctified and Saved and no other and their Natures are chang'd and exalted by this conjunction and consequently all their Actions and affections which answer to the nature they arise from as the fruit to the tree And they that are out of Christ are out of all hopes and possibility of Justification or Sanctification or Salvation and the old man or Nature continues in them and the mortal inclinations and deeds thereof by Consequence And this change of mens state in respect of dignity as well as safety to be freed from wrath and made as second Sons to God is not from any human merit or power but only from the Infinite and free grace of Christ By whom we have access by Faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in hope of the Glory of God Rom. 5.2 Our Justification and happiness by this new state is attributed by the Scriptures to Christ and to Faith and to his Resurrection to Christ without us as to the Purchaser and Founder and Finisher To Faith within us as to the Counterpart Instrument of our acceptance and the
Christ is first freely given in the Ordinance of c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Hom. 11. in cap. 3. Philipp of Baptism wherein we die to the flesh and this World and rise again to Heaven with Christ and is nourished and cherish'd in us according to that beginning Every being that God founds being accompanied with im-bred Law and Instincts for its self-preservation And this new Creatures self-preservation is performed in a new and different method not in but out of it self It preserves it self in another that is in Christ and his members and another that is Christ in his Spirit in it self To preserve it self in it self which is the use and wisdom of this World that is to perish is Antipathy and suffocation to the Christian Church that is to be saved Therefore the principal Diet and aliment of this new Creature whereby its fed and kept alive is Gods holy word and Eucharist whereby these mutual Immeations or Christ in us and we in Christ is best supported and preserved The Air it lives and breaths in is fervent prayer whereby it dwells out of it self in God by Divine exstasie and God in it by Divine Condescention and supply The Robe it wears is Humility the love and preference of another before it self being its warmth and chief content and Ornament Its Language is sincerity before God and man which it's chiefest Oratory and Eloquence The path it always treads and walks in is the Spirit and not the Flesh every step in the one which ends in self and this World being its death and suffocation as in the other which ends in God and that to come its life and liberty All the parts of Christian Religion both of example and copy are performed by a Counter-change of self which on our parts can only be done by the heart for no other way can we go out of and quit our selves The sum of Christian mystery is compriz'd in that Of God in Christ reconciling the World to himself 2 Cor. 5.16 The Original is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 making an exchange between Christ and our human Nature the nature of Reconciliation being to be one within another as the falling out of Friends to be both apart and in themselves whereby our sins were Construed to be His. Esa 35.5 2 Cor. 5.16 And his righteousness transferr'd and consign'd to us 2 Cor. 1.30 Such an Instance of stupendious Grace and Love as no heart that once observ'd the least glance thereof by serious faith and consideration could continue to be its own ever afterwards but its nature was chang'd and its Centre alter'd thereupon and it strove to mount towards him in utmost gratitude to answer his descent towards it by Infinite compassion And finding it self over-match'd at love it turns towards his weak and poor members and Christ is ready to lay his Majesty aside and to try it there and to accept its alms and forgiveness in formâ pauperis to be requited by him in formâ dei yea to exalt our charity towards our Brethren into the rate and likeness of his Redemption Be kind and merciful to one another forgiving one another your Trespasses which with St. Chrysostom is the greatest of Alms even as God in Christ hath forgiven you Ephes 4.32 The Characteristical distinguishing duty of a Christian is to imitate Christ in his love and that we love others not as but mutually above our selves which is a lesson not to be met in Tullies Office a Lactantius lib. 5. For so Christ loved us for had he loved us only equally or next to himself he had spar'd himself and we had perish'd for ever by that measure We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please our selves but to please every one his Neighbour for his good to Edification For even Christ pleased not himself Rom. 15.1 2 3. And this chief point of Christianity is the greatest Article in the Brittish Faith and tradition among all sorts High and Low Rich and Poor that are right Brittish Christians not degeneâ—ating from the Principles of their Progenitors as â—umbers are found to be to this day comprizing all Practical Religion and Irreligion towards Neighbours in Syberwid and Ansyberwid as before and more was before our unnatural Waâ—â— and ilâ— examples and more yet perhaps before the mixtures of the Nations in Henry the 7th Hereby several momentous questions in Christianity both speculative and practical may be easily resolv'd 1. Whether Christian obedience or a good life be conditional to the Grace of the Gospel For answer Essentially consequent it is but conditional it can hardly be stil'd with any propriety It s Essential to the being of a Christian to be Holy Just and Sober and un-selfish else he receives the Grace of God in vain to his greater account and guilt than if he had ever been an Heathen and without God A vitious unjust unconscionable Christian is an Inconsistency or a contradiction as much as a Valiant Coward a chast Adulterer an honest Cut-throat a Loyal Rebel a Trayterous Saint a Christian Fiend Satan in Christs shape or Christ in Satan's disposition which is monstrous Blasphemy to imagine yet the daily Blasphemy of all Christians that live unanswerably to their high Grace and Calling But conditional it ought not to be call'd for several reasons 1. Because conditional is repugnant and destructive of Grace in its Nature and end what 's conditional is not Grace what 's Grace is not conditional especially the Grace of Christ which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 super-abounds all comparison and merit or contract Rom. 5.21 The design of Grace is to win the heart and to swallow our beings to become one with Christ but the nature of condition which is Covenant supposes two and them distinct and to continue so asunder and so to undertake and perform each their part 2. Hereby suppositions will be implyed that are contrary to sound Doctrine for if Grace were conditional in such manner that condition was ever concurrent and Indenting and coevous with it and neither set out without the other nor could Grace be exerted without the condition were the same time perform'd either really or by fiction through belief and acceptation which is equivalent Now it 's manifest we did not love God but he first loved us when we were Enemies Rom. 8.10 and gave himself for us that we might not perish but live besides such contemporary contract on mans part to indent with and answer Grace on God's part supposes an Ability in human nature before Grace to undertake for it self to walk worthy of the Grace it shall receive and is as absurd and incongruous as it were to Imagine that God before he would enter upon man's Creation required the the dust of the Earth whereof he was to be made to enter into Articles and promise that it should walk answerable to reason after it were made into man and received Gods breath into it
therein or of a mixt sort between both on the frontiers between the flesh and spirit an unpeaceable station subject by turnes to the inroads and prevalence of both being mortal enemies to one another The Truth also is to be considered either absolutely in it self or in its due and suitable application to these several capacities and tempers Of which distinctions we find Christ himself to be a great approver who would not have his little ones offended Mat. 18.6 Nor his Pearles cast before Swine Mat. 7.6 Nor his bread given to Dogs nor denyed to Children c. 15.26 And no Rule was more exactly observ'd by his Apostles especially St. Paul wherein he is most carefully noted by St. Cbrysostom wherein lyes also the excellency of those Commentaries Now he argues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reasoning after the manner of men or human reason Rom. 3.5 assigning the cause to be their Infirmity Rom. 6.19 as who would hardly believe any further than they were convinc'd by reason At other times when he hath to do with more perfect Christians more strongly establish'd in the faith He warnes and minds them of a higher rule to walâ—â— by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Col. 2.8 according to Christ in his death and exaltation to the right hand of God Col. 3.1 2 3. and not according to the weak and beggarly Elements of this transitory World or the Philosophy of human model and Tradition which differs from the wisdom that is in Christ as Earth from Heaven or Death from life Here he speaks to his Auditors as to Babes or Carnal men And I Brethren could not speak to you as unto Spiritual but to you as unto Carnal even as to Babes in Christ I have fed you with milk and not with meat for hitherto you are not able to bear neither yet now are you able In another place saith he Strong meat belongeth to them that are of full Age or of perfection Therefore leaving the principles of the Doctrine of Christ let us go on to perfection Heb. 5. ult 6.1 c. Therefore the primitive Church divided her Disciples into several formes and degrees Catechumens and Believers c. some higher than others who were to be differently instructed with weaker or stronger aliment according to their several tempers and capacities At Athens St. Paul reasons with Philosophers from the light of nature at Ephesus and Philippi from the Creed and the Cross and the Resurrection St. Chrysostom in his great Christian Auditory uses an Apology for quoting Heathen Testimony before them where the matter seem'd to require it upon the like account Aristotle conceived young men by reason of their heady passions to be unfit Auditors of his Ethicks Which Considerations being premised and proved This Controversy may be decided in three Conclusions 1. Grace is to be affirmed to be free and unconditional and not to depend upon human merit and performance which it infinitely surpasses as well in point of time as of love undeserved and that Divinity which degenerates into a meer Moral Philosophy is to be suspected as unsound and far short of their Orthodoxy who assert and maintain the free love and Grace of God in Christ The principles of the one going no higher than immanent and Carnal self-preservation which the old man and Heathenism could reach the other to transitive and Divine proper to Christians or the new-man in Christ 2. That Christian edification which is to be heeded next after absolute Truth is most with them who attemper their Doctrines to the several maturities of their hearers Being all things to all men that they may gain some convincing natural men with natural light and those that are Spiritual with the demonstration of the Spirit and Truth For the glorious light of free grace which drinks up the pure soul in gratitude and redamation is too strong a lustre for weak and Carnal eyes enough to blind them into security and libertinism the soil being not fully fitted for this Heauenly seed such are better manur'd and prepar'd by rational culture to become right men in the first place to the end they may become right Christians in the next and their false health and confidence to be cast down with the discovery of their natural Disease and danger that their Cure and their Physitian may be rightly valued by them the servile spirit of bondage is best tamâ—d by a suitable terrour and Discipline The Husbands of the Amazons conquer'd their servants who had married their Wives in their absence when they brought their whips into the field against them who proved too hard before for their Masters at Weapons of War Divinity in the form of Philosophy may edifie Heathens that are in the form of Christians but Christians that are sincere and able to know Christ's voice from anothers are scandaliz'd and troubled at nothing more than at the change of of their Gospel and the return of Heathenism which is then intended when the milk is maintain'd to be strong meat and what served for edification to some is raised to be an absolute Law of Truth for all and grace to give place to morality Which is manifest Palagianism or Heathenism reviv'd which the Church hath been so careful to condemn though Pelagius himself perhaps intended his Principles no further than to the edification and conviction of corrupt and carnal Christians who walked short of the light of Nature as some Pious and great Diâ—ines have in other times and not for an Vniversal standing Truth throughout the Church of Christ which had been absolute Heresie As in a-like instance though eyes and ears be attributed to God by his own word for the sake of our weak capacities to infer from thence that God is really Corporeal as other mortals be were to run by such mistake into the Blasphemous Heresie of the Anthropomorphites 3. That in our Christian Congregation which consist of mixt tempers some perfect Christians some but Babes in Christ some meer Heathens in the shape of Christians A right Minister of God may and ought to be stor'd with varieties with Milk and Strong Meat Divinity and Philosophy in his Sermons according to mens several needs Nor are the defenders of free Grace and the truth to reproach him streight for an Arminian or Pelagian or our Conditionalists or Moralists for a Puritan as long as he obtrudes not his expedients of Edification as Articles of Faith as long as he keeps himself within St. Paul's distinction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that I delivered as a Philosopher for some mens satisfaction but not as a Christian for a General rule of Evangelical Truth to all resolving to take nothing for such against the Scripture or his Creed or his Church The third Question is more Practical and to the point What sets the soul within the Church of Christ in Heaven out of which none can be ever saved nor in it ever lost A Roman Catholick if asked will say To be
within the Pale of the Church of Rome or to be subject to the Pope and to believe as the Church believes will do it and nothing else without it For let a man be never so vitious and Ungodly if he stick close to their Church which is allowed to be consistent provided he have the Absolution of a Priest at the last gasp upon his sorrow and condition or if this be wanting upon his attrition or fear of Hell he shall not miss Eternal Salvation nor ever attain the same if he be a Protestant though never so holy or charitable or Penitent and believing so are such Casuists for their want of love to the truth delivered over to deceive both themselves and others But to wave all parties and to give a plain and clear answer according to the truth or the mind of God in his word which is the same which the soul and Conscience loves to believe and build upon before any human Authority whatsoever This question may be divided into two points or Issues Stricti juris largi 1. What that is that makes one a Member of that Heavenly Church which if he wants he is none 2. What makes him more assuredly of it than many others that yet be in it The first question is best answer'd in St. Paul's Phrase in one word in the sence of that Phrase in three By the first he is of this Salvifical Church who is in Christ he is not of it who is out of Christ Rom. 8 1. Here the issue is short and clear with St. Paul Not to be In or out of the Church of Rome this he never saith but in or out of Christ which he affirms throughout Neither Jew nor Gentile nor Greek nor Barbarian nor Brittain nor Roman nor English or Scot or Irish are nearer or further from Salvation by their Countrey but their conditions Not by their first birth which is Temporal but their second which is Celestial and Catholick and one and the same to all true Christians stilâ—d for this Originally the Brethren Neither Circumcision nor uncircumcision nor the skin Black or White nor a Pall from the body of St. Peter nor the Vest of St. Francis to be buried in nor dispensations Seal'd in Lead more lasting than Wax nor sprinkling nor bathing in Holy Water can avail any thing to save the soul or to purifie the heart but only faith which worketh by love Act. 15.9 Gal. 5.6 Nor the sign of the Cross alone nor the very nails and wood of the Cross it self were they to be seen and touch'd nor any other contact or show or specious title nor the entring in at Porta Caeli at a Jubile nor the Popes Canonization nor the name and title of Roman-Catholick nor the Holy Roman Church like the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord with them in the old Testament Jer. 7.4 or saying Lord Lord with them in the New Math. 7.21 can give entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven but the doing the will of our Father which is in Heaven And did not this old anile faith of Modern Rome which serves to make so many Catholick Sons of their Church serve as much to make them children Universally in understanding also which the Apostle dislikes 1 Cor. 14 20. their practices would have more of their own suspition and less of their Neighbour's Censures What can any mortal excellency that hath visibility and hic nunc or perishing Temporality stamp'd upon it signifie to Christians who are not of this World as Christians but of the World to come by faith And look not at the things which are seen but at the the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are Temporal but the things which are not seen are Eternal It 's true as men we are to prefer and provide for the nearest in flesh unto us before others or else we are worse than Infidels and prefer our Country and our Prince before our own flesh and life or else we fall short of Noble Heathens but as Christians who is to be nearest to us but he that is holiest and likest to God and Christ How unlike Christians therefore are they in their estimates and measures who think any man is a better or worse Christian or more capable or incapable of Salvation for being of this or that place or City or Nation on Earth rather than for having his affection with Christ in Heaven at Gods right hand Col. 1.3 In whom is neither Greek nor Jew Circumcision nor Vncircumcision Barbarian Scythian Bond nor Free but Christ is all and in all Col. 3.11 2 Cor 5.16 Math. 12.50 Act. 10.34 35. But how Antichristian is it to make a contrary measure of Salvation to curse them as Hereticks though they be in Christ that be not of their way and Communion and bless them as Catholicks though out of Christ if they be According to the sence of that Phrase it may be further answer'd in three words 1. To be Christ's and not his own 2. to dye in his death to Earth 3. to live in his life to Heaven 1. To be Christ's and not his own All are yours and ye are Christ's 1 Cor. 3.22 23. and 2 Cor. 5.15 Christ dyed for all that none should live unto themselves No Christian is to live unto himself but unto Christ He is to eat and drink and converse and rise and lye down and labour and rest and study and serve and obey and command and rule and to bring up or provide for children and relieve the poor and poor friends every thing as to Christ as guided by his Law and accountable to his Judicature For he cannot be said to be a Servant to another that minds his own affairs or pleasure altogether and never his Master's but when himself pleases for a spurt or humour Neither is any selfish person a Servant of Christ nor a true salvable Christian by consequence but is one that sets up for himself And is not under Christ's Law and will but his own Neither shall be under his pay but must must expect his reward and Salvation from himself as he lived wholly to and for himself and his Conscience cannot gain-say this Law for such a one never hath Communion with God as all true Christians have but only with himself like a Rebel Mock-god ordering all things in the World for his own ends as God doth all for his own glory and never durst trust God so far as to go out of himself for his sake In himself shall he therefore ever remain and out of Christ forever because he never had the honesty to give God his glory nor the faith to give his heart that is himself to his Redeemer 2. To dye in Christs death to the Pomp and vanity of the World which according to St. Paul's comment is the mystical Christian meaning and fulfilling of the Ancient Circumcision Col. 2.11 12. Phil. 3.3 Gal. 6.14 16. That as amongst the Jews
first Magnitude must give place to the Sun and Moon these Primier Peers must yield precedence to the Royal bloud to the exact and lively Images and descendants of the Son of God who being light of light very God of very God yet left his Glory to express his Charity and for us men and for our Salvation came down from Heaven and made himself to be of no Reputation a man of sorrows and contempt to exalt others from misery to rest and honour such his Genuine off-springs and special Images are they only for no other in this World are dignified to such a singular capacity who most resembling the Eternal Son in the height of their birth and Power and Wealth and Wisdom and Authority and Command and trust in their several Spheres and Neighbourhoods yet delight to transfer their Wealth and Honour from themselves upon others upon their poorer Brethren that are in want and weakness and to copy out the Divine humility of the Incarnation and to quit their glory as Christ did to put on the griefs and wants and the miseries of others to make them happy and ful and become eyes to the blind and feet to the lame and Fathers to Orphans and Husbands to Widows and Champions for the oppressed and Gods on Earth to the Poor and weak And consume the least share of their estate upon themselves much less ignobly upon their Lusts and Luxury but in the return after others have been serv'd receive them again entire and doubled and trebled with the hearts of the refreshed along with them and the Acclamations of their Country and the blessing of their Church and the reward of God in the Establishment of their houses and the Salvation of their souls for both Exinanitions upon the score of charity in the Copy as well as in the Original end in highest Glory to have a name above every name in Heaven or Earth that all hearts and tongues should confess and praise them to the honour of the Lord Jesus whom they so Imitate and the glory of God the Father whom they so please The Heavenly Magnanimity and Serenity of the contented poor is out-done in several features of divine lovelyness by the Exinination of the Rich and liberal not only in the exact likeness to Christ in his humility and Exaltation and the transitive love and preference of others before themselves but in the difficulty of the Victory and conflict it being easier to bear Poverty than Riches as Winter is more healthy of the two than Summer hard Frosts pinch but excessive heats Intoxicate sometimes exhale the strength at all times and more souls miscarry under wealth than under want and our Streets are fuller of the Blasphemies of the Rich than of the Poor These give Divine honour to their bags and put their trust Idolatrously in uncertain Riches and say unto their Gold thou art my confidence others take and receive Divine honour to themselves and the fears of the Poor and the admiration of the sensual and childish upon the score of their wordly power and pomp and glory till an Angel sometimes smite them for example that they be eaten up of Worms Acts 12.23 Others though of private condition think nothing too much to be spent in Luxury and Liveries nothing too little on Alms and Charity to attract mens eyes to see their power which they value above all blessings a fashion more currant in civitate mundi then in civitate Dei more suitable to vain Heathens than sober and Baptiz'd Christians The middle condition excels both extreams in safety but not in honour and reward the Poor for his Patience and the Rich for his sobriety and bounty shall have higher Thrones in the other World with this pre-eminence that the Patient Poor shall have life Eternal hereafter Luke 16.25 the communicative Rich have it delivered to their hands to lay hold off here as the Apostles affirms laying up in store a good foundation for themselves against the time to come that they may lay hold on Eternal life 1 Tim. 6.9 But though none have properly this singular opportunity and Priviledge of resembling their Lord in such a depth of love and height of Glory but those alone to whom it is given to be Great and Rich in this present World who have much wealth and greatness to quit and leave for the relief of the Needy as Christ did great Parts to prostrate great State and Dignity to undervalue for Christ and his poor Members Yet every charitable Christian hath this capacity and Priviledge in the Kingdom of his heart and in the sight of God though not in the Kingdom of the World and in the sight of men for so the Widows mite was her Exinanition and is in proportion of every liberall giver of a narrow Estate and Fortune in our Saviours Book of Rates wherein all mens Actions and Persons are Rated and computed by the heart And the true Church is a Kingdom of hearts where all we do is to be done from the heart as unto the Lord and he is in Heaven whose heart is in Heaven and with Christ at Gods right hand whose heart is there with Christ though he be on Earth in the flesh The Christian begins to be in Heaven in this World wafted beyond all the dangers of Fabulous Purgatory when he begins to converse entirely from his heart with Christ in Heaven for non ubi animat sed ubi amat there all men are where there hearts are their hearts being with Christ the men themselves are by consequence with him wheresoever else they may be in their mortal Bodies Heaven there begins where this Christian conversation begins that leads to Heaven and is already in it as the Ocean in reason many be said to begin not at the Rivers mouth but from the first spring of the River that Travels towards it for means are the beginnings of those ends for which they serve and similar parts thereof And every step from our home in the right way is more or less an entrance into our Journie's end The Christian's first setting forth for Heaven is like the beginning of a small Rivulet which many a time a hot Summer or sharp Winter of temptation wholy dries up and stops but recovering it self again by the Influence and pity of Heaven in Dew and Rain and falling in with other Rivers that speed towards the same Sea either they into it or it into them it grows bigger and stronger by the Communion and drawing towards its latter end and hoping to be disembogued at last into its rest it finds it self repell'd again and again with a kind violence and an useful growth and Sea-like largeness and swelling so that it becomes hard to distinguish where the River ends or where the Sea begins and being rewarded and comforted for these frequent stops and interruptions with Divine foretasts of that finall brackishness into which it is to be in the end dissolv'd and season'd with it
who ever was uncircumcised was to be cut off from his people so all among Christians that live to their flesh in luxury and uncleanness in wordly pride and vain-glory and carnal security and give their heart from Christ to his Enemy to sin and Satan and the World contrary to the Christian vow cannot belong to Christ but are spiritually uncircumcised and to be for ever cut off from the hopes and priviledge of a Christian Israelite Some strongly led by their Carnal will which easily believes what it loves think their lusts and their Lord may agree and Salvation and a sinful life stand well together what advantage else hath a Christian by having a Saviour above a Heathen who hath none and is not this an honourable requital then to make Christ who came to destroy the works of the Devil a greater Patron for them than the Devil himself and to fortifie his temptations to sin with Indemnity Such suggestions and delusions are not to be answer'd but abhorr'd Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound God forbid Rom. 6.1 2. or to be seriously warn'd and monish'd with a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Have a care be not deceived neither Fornicators nor Idolators nor Adulterers nor Effeminate nor Abusers of themselves with mankind nor Theeves nor Coveteous nor Drunkards nor Revilers nor Extortioners shall inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6 9 3. To live with Christ in Heaven or to have our affection and Conversation in Heaven from whence we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Phil. 3.20 Col. 3.2 For his affections cannot chuse but be with Christ if his heart be with him but his heart can never be with him till it be seâ—sible of his grace nor be sensible of his 〈…〉 see its danger and deliverance by him and 〈◊〉 he can never see without hearing Gods word and believing his Gospel Clear therefore it is Conscience it self being judge that where there is no pulse of Heavenly life and concomitancy of the heart after Christ in his Exaltation there is no belief and who hath no belief is no Christian He may pass for a Protestant or Catholick for his profession before men but God and his heart will pronounce him to be an Infidel and out of Christ at the last day and here great is the usefulness and service of a wary Conscience and a faithful Pastor to be its Adjutant and guide The second question is who are in Christ with a stronger title and firmer possession than others of their Brethren Or who they be that be no punies but compleat Graduates and of the highest form and degree in the Church of Heaven All men are ambitious of excelling their Brethren either in Riches or Honour or Precedency or Parts or Learning or Activity or Beauty or in their very Clothes And no where is their more scope or encouragement or praise and honour from God and man and Conscience and less danger of wrong or envy than in the honest ambition of being the greatest man with God in Heaven and surer of being saved than many others to be a Christian not in the Positive degree only but also in the superlative according as the Apostle Beseeches and exhorts all by the Lord Jesus that as they have received how they ought to walk and to please God so they would abound more and more 1 Thess 4.1 And Heroes and Worthyes and men taller than others by the Head belonging to the Heavenly Kingdom may be met and found on Earth amongst all Ages and Conditions and Degrees High and Low Young and Old Rich and Poor For Instance he is Princeps Civitatis a Grandee of this Heavenly City who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first mark with the Apostle to qualifie a man to be a Bishop 1 Tim. 3.2 there translated blameless but may well signifie one that is unsurprizeable in his Christian principles and profession and watch by any lust or temptation or worldly Allurement alwayes retaining his Baptismal vow and love and Allegiance and fear of God in his remembrance and esteem and that in all times and places and companies by an uniform healthy victorious sobriety and vigilance over his heart and fancy and senses subject to no Convulsion-fits or Spiritual Epilepsies or scandalous fallings But having Heaven ever present in his eye to the life to cure all weariness and fainting and to out-bid all Worldly and Carnal Allurements Keeping himself altogether with God or as near as may be to Him having no end or design ever in his heart that doth not finally reach his Lord no thought therein that his God doth disallow or take unkind no word in his mouth to be publish'd without His License no bargain or sale without his God to approve and supervise it to be just and keeps no Company but with the living Images of his God for every vertue Is inseparable from Church and Sacraments where he is sure to meet with his God by special promise and appointment And either Reads or Prayes without ceasing at all Intervals of business that he and his God may be ever within hearing of one another which is effected with success while God is ever speaking to him or he to his God Which is an infallible method to be ever with God that is to be in the Church of Heaven while he is on Earth by prefruition He is another great Prince or Peer that bears great sway and rule and hath large and fair Possessions and domaines in this Heavenly Territory that bears a Martyrial breast and a fixt Resolution to come off with Faith and a good Conscience in all his Tryals though not with life Being never touch'd or hurt but where his Interest and adherence to Christ where he computes his self and being wholly to be comes to be shaken and assaulted And feels no heat in flames no rubs in Persecution to prove his love and to make good his March and Progress under his Saviour's Flagg but dants all that stand in his way with his immoveable Innocence and Heavenly unconcernedness And makes all Tyrants and Atheists confess they have not strength and power enough to shock his constancy nor the whole World wrongs and vexations enough to overwhelm his patience and forgivenness For the World with all its terrours and preparations is but a dead Host already subdued and crucified to his hand in the Cross of his General through whom he is more than Conquerour and altogether inseparable from him by that love in his heart Which neither Tribulation nor distress nor Persecution nor Famine nor Nakedness nor Peril nor Sword nor Death nor Life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other Creature can divide from God but maintains his ground though but one against the whole World who may perhaps prevail to seperate his Body from his Soul but never his Soul and Heart from Christ nor from his love or Laws
This Caelestial Champion is hardly to be exceeded oâ— out-done by any but by â— Joseph encountring flames burning not only his flesh but his very Soul and outgoing all other Martyrs that keep the Field by running away from his enemy and his thoughts and from himself into the bosome and protection and fear of God transforming the flattering visage of his lust into deformity and flat Rebellion against Heaven by the glass of consideration or consultation with his Heavenly Interest and gratitude How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God Gen. 39.9 Chastity and purity of Soul and Body being a Divine transcendent vertue in every Age and zone but in the torrid zone of youth lovely and admirable beyond measure where the storm is greatest and the walls weakest there to make good one's post against all the Arts and Fireworks of Satan or his blandishments and deceitful Treaties and Counsels wherein he ever was stronger than in the Field or storm This is such a proof of victorious loyalty and courage and grace and wisdom all in one part as is hardly to be parallell'd or exceeded either in Earth or in Heaven It is doing Gods will on Earth not as but in some manner above what it is done in Heaven by those Glorious beings who are not infested with that war and contagion and clog of flesh and blood that may give greater lustre and merit to there obedience from its difficulties How much is he in Heaven while on Earth who is in a manner more than in Heaven by the Glory of his highly rewardable service and loyalty Yet the conflict of this Heavenly Victor seems as easie as shutting the eye or turning away the face from beholding vanity if compared to the archievements of another great Peer not to be estimated or understood by Carnal judges the contentment and serenity of a Lazarus at Dives his gate pin'd with hunger and thirst macerated with Sores and Boiles and tempted the more to unevenness by the Pride and Inhumanity of Dives more unnatural and merciless and Ansyber than his dogs who came and lick'd his sores A poor man in the eye of this World is like a wither'd plant out of a dry ground he hath no form nor comeliness or desirable beauty in him but is despiz'd and rejected of men and shunn'd by friends and slighted in his Vote and Testimony by the Law which was ordain'd to do right to all men And forsaken as it were by God himself who seems more bountiful to the wicked that Blasphem his name who yet fare deliciously and are fill'd with his hid Treasures while the poor mans portion is short of the Fowls of the Air or the Rich mans Kennel enough to subdue the strongest Spirit and to bring down the stoutest heart to be without heart or life not only by the unsupportable pressure and discouragement but by the endless continuance of such a life-less life without all prospect of relief A condition that Agur prayed against least I be poor and steal and take the name of my God in vain Prov. 30.9 And all the World shunnes like paena damni and finds not that evil in perjury or perfidiousness or the Gallowes or Hell and damnation it self as in a poor and narrow fortune which sets one out of the World while it disables him to be of the fashion in it or to live up to his quality and degree He therefore that can be thankful to his God in poverty as well as plenty and bless him upon a Dunghill no less than on a Throne and though his outward man perish hath his inward man renewed day by day and is rich in Faith though poor in Pence and alive in Heaven while dead on Earth and viewing his condition with the right end of the prospective finds his poverty to be his riches and his misery to be his felicity and himself to be in the midst of Heaven when he was thought out of World for what else is it to be a perfect Christian than to be dead to this World and alive to Christ wherein a poor man hath the advantage above the Rich Carrying his Mortification ever in readiness about him while the Rich are to fetch it far off with labour and cost and much Discipline and difficulty and to strive against pride and intemperance and the snares and temptations of wealth wherewith the poor is seldom troubled but is strong in God who is his trust while Mammon is the strength and trust of the other and is cloth'd with Graces while the other with but Wormes and Clay and hath the feast of a good Conscience to match the other's surfets and the roomes of his understanding clear'd from all Childish conceptions by a manly Faith and looks upon fashions to be but stage appearances and Earthly dignities to be but bubbles and delicious fare but the Dainties of the dead and stately Mansions but as Childrens Turretts rear'd with Cards and this World to that to come to be but as the Earth is to Heaven for quantity and his Heavenly condition not to grow greater by addition or lesser by substraction of the goods of this World to or from it He I say that can thus live in death by his Faith and is hearty and contented amidst wants and honest and true in Rags is that Christian Phenix which the Psalmist conceived was hardly to be met with Who O Lord shall give thee thanks in the Grave or declare thy loving kindness in Destruction Lo the man is found that shall It is the poor that receive their evil things in this World yet praise God continually for his goodness nevertheless and are full of heart though not of present pay in his service and resolve to trust in him though he kill them These that are full of Halelujahs in their pains and wants how fit are they already to be of the Quire of Glory Therefore in the Sermon in the Mount where several of the blessed Citizens and chief Peers in this Heavenly Kingdom are recounted by our Saviour in their several ranks and orders the place of Primier Nobles and chief Probationers of Glory is remarkably assigned to the poor the really poor in Fortune expresly Luc. 6.20.16.25 Blessed be the poor for yours is the Kingdom of Heaven blessed are ye that hunger now for ye shall be filled blessed are ye that weep now for ye shall laugh As well as the poor in Spirit or humble in heart amidst their greatest affluence wherewith they are not puffed as if it were their own but are diligent Stewards thereof under God for their poorer Brethren and Neighbours whose needs with their Compassion entitles them to an equal share The Rich that are humble and liberal the Poor that are thankful and contented act both equally above this World in the Society and view of God in Heaven Which points and discovers one other order in the Heavenly City that are to â—it above them also for these Stars of the