deceived and God needeth not your Lye for him or against your self in any thing And if you judge amisse of your self God is so Holy and Just that you never need fear that He will confirm or execute your wrong Judgement And if you judge rightly of your self you are not so miserable as you conceive your self but as you do that which is one of the Highest and Hardest Acts possible which is to judge ones self rightly so you have one of the Greatest Bbessings which God giveth to the Sons of men or to his own Son which is a right understanding of a right Judgement which was the Great Argument used by the greatest and best man that ever lived to prove that he was of God and had His Spirit and a Will also moulded into His Holy Will for else he saith he could not Judge Righteous Judgement And who ever doth this of himself and his own sins is in a special manner partaker of the Holy Ghost whose proper work is to convince us rightly of sin Righteousnesse and Judgement and who ever judgeth himself rightly shall not be judged of God Here he stopt and sweetly bowed and turned aside a little but returned soon again looking as cheerful as he could well force himself It being not very easie so to clear up his eyes and face but that it might be seen though he hid it that he had wept Which also pierced his Guest both to see the Fathers affection and his own misery Who was still so unhappy as he some way expressed to be a burthen to himself and all he conversed with supposing he had grieved or displeased him by some of his expressions But when the Good Father perceived those thoughts with a most sweet tender and melting look he replyed No my Dear Brother no you do not burthen me at all or in any thing displease me But as my general duty bids or helps me in some measure to mourn with every one that mourneth and to weep with every one that weepeth So my particular respect and affection now forceth me if at least it can be force upon a Fathers tender bowels to yearn over his son or a brother over his own dearly beloved brother Yet there is somewhat in You that maketh me melt in Joy rather then sorrow tho it may be unutterable for I cannot expresse it I saw you were my Neighbour at the first as a Man and so I found my self obliged This is Little and low both to Love and Honour you for that Image of God I ought to acknowledge in you and the great Law of Love that commands Brotherly kindenesse bids us adde Love also yea and to strangers also for the same chapter that bids us Love our Neighbour as our self bids us Love a stranger also as we love our selves And among divers reasons why we should love strangers it is sometimes added Because God loveth strangers Yea and we are bid to entertain them so As if they were or might be Angels seeing some had unawares so entertained Angels But now I see somewhat more in you not onely a Man and my Neighbour but a Christian also and my Dear and pretious Brother whom the Angels do attend and love and honour as a lively Image of their great Lord and Master Jesus Christ. And how is it that the Brother of my Lord thus cometh to visit me And you are so far from having committed that great sin against the Holy Ghost which you so much fear that you are still under the most gracious workings of that Holy Spirit Whose great work is to convince the world even the world and not onely the Apostles or Disciples but the World of Sin Righteousnesse and Judgement which is also promised to the World even to the World and is fulfilled in you who are thus under the convincing spirit of Promise And it will also comfort you for the same spirit that convinceth is also the Comforter and where it wounds it heals and when it hath convinced both of Sin Judgement and Righteousness which is there promised it will also comfort It being the promise or indeed the property and nature yea and heart of God to heal and quicken whom he wounds and kills which from Moses Song runs all along through the Psalms and Prophets Who tell us If he wound he will heal Yea though he kill for two dayes He wil revive and quicken on the Third For he will turn again and have compassion on us because he delighteth in mercy though he cause grief for a while and yet not willingly or from his heart afflicteth the children of men which is his Strange work But Mercy is his Child his Son and comes as naturally from him as a child from any father For he is the Father of Mercy yea of a multitude of mani-fold Mercies which are also One with the heart of Christ for He is the onely begotten of the Father and yet His Father is also the Father of Mercies so that Christ and Mercies lay together in one womb and indeed are the same for how else is Christ the Onely begotten of the Father And you are under the tender mercies of Christ even that Christ who is Mercy it self and this holy Spirit of Promise will certainly be your Comforter being already I see your Remembrancer to bring to mind his words one of his proper Works having also convinced you of Righteousnesse enough in him Everlasting Righteousnesse to satisfie God and sanctifie you And I hear you not onely acknowledge him to be the Son of God and sent of God to be the Saviour of the World but also you are convinced of sin because you have not believed on him the great promise of that Comforter and are made most truly and highly to value defire long and pray for him and To him which you could not but by the gracious workings of that Holy Spirit of promise whose great work was and still is to set up Christ as he set up his Father Which Character given by Christ of his own spirit is repeated also by the Apostles And St. John gives it as the Touch-stone whereby we should try the spirits saying Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus is come in the flesh is of God and again he that confesses that Jesus is the Son of God dwelleth in God and God in him and again whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God and again He that is born of God sinneth not that sin or worketh not sin which is a common phrase in the Language of the Law of Moses and other places of Scripture Doeth not sin So but that the seed of God still remaineth in him as the sap of an Oake or Teile when it casteth its leaves as the Prophet Isaiah in that most remarkable Chap. cited in the six first books of the New Testament For the Jews rejection and return again as an emblem of the whole Worlds Restoring or Resurrection it being plain in the
by him to a journey when he meets with great storms and danger of death by shipwrack or otherwise For the Lord met Moses in the Inn and sought to slay him in his way to Aegypt though he sent him thither on so great an errand Noah brought rest to the World through the Floud and many tossings in great Waters And we might have lost some of the sweetest portions of the Gospel but for such storms by Sea In one of them Christ is in the Ship but asleep and they wake him crying Carest thou not that we perish And he soon took care and rebuked the winds though blaming their unbelief and fear with amazement which is Peters phrase to the Daughters of our good Mother Sara and he might learn it from our Saviour in their storms and fears with such amazement which is a phrase used several times in the Gospel But doth God take care of bodies Will he not be more careful of our souls and pity them more If we would cry and wake him also when he seems asleep about or in us and among us and say to him Master carest thou not that our souls perish Even those precious and Immortal souls which thou seemest to value above the whole World saying What shall a man give in exchange for his soul It is said Our blood shall be precious in thy eyes and shall not our Souls be more precious O we of little faith At another time Our Saviour did not onely send away his Disciples but constrained them to go in a ship when they might have gone another way But they would have sent away the poor people supperlesse from him and when he had supped them He sends away his Hard Disciples to be tossed in the Sea while he blessed the poor people In the fourth watch of the night he shews himself God is nearer us in a storm then we believe or Expect and he saw them tossed some pretty while it seems but would not help them or appear till the last watch and then they are more afraid and cryed out supposing it to be an evil spirit So easily may we mistake the kindnesse of God and think him to be the Devil to devour us even then when he comes in goodnesse to save us But he first rebuketh their fears and saith It is I be not afraid And when Peter would venture out beyond his strength and ready to sink cryed Save me I perish He is moved with compassion and immediately stretcheth out his hand and catcheth him the very phrase used to the Hebrews He caught not the nature of Angels but he caught the seed of Abraham He suddenly reached out his hand and caught as we snatch a thing perishing in fire or water So he caught Peter As he would do us also if in our fears and sinking we would so cry out to Him Help Lord I perish How quickly did he bring him into the Ship and it with them all safe in a calme to their wished Haven O that men would praise the Lord for his goodnesse and wonderful kindnesse to the sons of men as the Psalmist repeats it several times in the 107. Psalm Such goodnesse and wonderful kindnesse did the Lord shew to Paul also in that stormy voyage to Rome wherein yet he did not onely preserve Him safe but all his fellow passengers also as he told him in a night vision saying Fear not Paul thou must be brought to Cesar and lo God hath given thee all them which sail with thee And when he came to Rome he expounded and testified the Kingdom of God perswading them of Jesus both out of the Law of Moses and out of the Prophets And for two years dwelt in an hired house receiving All that came to him Preaching the Kingdom of God and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence As we read in the Acts. That he also taught them to pray to Jesus Christ is plain enough from the stresse he putteth on it in his Epistle to those very Romanes in the tenth chapter Where to believing with the heart he joyns also confession with the mouth and explaineth it by praying to him For it is written Whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord shall be saved For the same Lord over All is Rich unto All that call upon him But how shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed And the first Epistle to the Corinthians is directed to the Church of God at Corinth to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be Saints with All that in every place call upon the Name of Jesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours And concludes thus The Salutation of me Paul with my own hand If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ let him be Anathema Maranatha The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you my love be with you all in Christ Jesus Amen Which belongeth to every one that in any place calleth on Jesus Christ. And to All us there is but one God the Father of whom are all things and we in him and one Lord Jesus Christ by whom are All things and we by him as he speaketh in the same Epistle And the second Epistle concludeth with the Grace of Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father and the Communion of the Holy Ghost be with you All. As that Epistle so all his Epistles generally begin with Grace and Peace and some add Mercy also from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ who as the Epistle to the Galathians addeth gave Himself for our sins that he might deliver us from this present evil World according to the will of God and our Father and I marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the Grace of Christ. And concludes that Epistle From henceforth let no man trouble me for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus Brethren the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit Amen And to the Ephesians among many other remarkable passages of Jesus Christ he prayes that Christ may dwell in their hearts by Faith that ye being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge that ye may be filled with all the fulnesse of God Namely by him in whom All fulnesse dwelleth Yea all the fulness of the Godhead And therefore He that desireth Him and prayeth to Him prayeth to the whole fulnesse of the Godhead and desireth it And in the same Epistle He that descended is now ascended far above all Heavens that he might fill All things and gave gifts c. for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come in the unity of the Faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the
that I say nothing of David in the 50. Psalm and Ezekiel the Son of Man and so a special Type of Christ the Son of Man is bid to make his people Know their sins and the Transgressions and Iniquities of their Fathers Which are forgiven when Seen and acknowledged bemoaned and repented as God promiseth he will bring them unto For it is not as some read it If they shall confess c. But 't is an absolute Promise in Leviticus and Deuteronomy and so cited also by Nehemiah or Daniel and Ezekiel that he would bring them to confess and that they should confess their own Iniquities and their Fathers also and be ashamed for them That which also followeth in the second Command is very sweet and far from shewing God to be an Angry Wrathful God as Satan would fain represent him As at first in Paradice some of his very first spawn cast on our great Mother and continued ever since till Christ shall break his head and destroy his malice with his works was This That God was an Envious God the Root of all evil and hard thoughts of God Who even in Judging and in Chastening and in all his worst visitations There Threatned where yet he spake his heart and seems to speak his worst will still remember Mercy Even in Judgment and in visiting most as a Jealous God he will remember Mercy And will but correct in measure and will not contend for ever lest the Spirit fail which he hath made But will visit only to the third or fourth Generation even in those that Hate him Which yet we All do and could not but do Till he Turn us by manifesting Love to us Love which he still beareth in his heart and it is there Rivetted so fast that he can as soon Un-god himself I would speak with Reverence as he can cast out Love from his Heart or act to his poor creatures without Love Nay give me leave to tell you he loved Adam Better more or with a Better Love or more Godlike after his Fall than before Nay it may be Now much better since his long sorrows and sufferings than before in Paradice Nay I had almost said with a better Love than he loved Christ himself before his Fall or Sufferings For he tels us it is a Little Love to love our like our Friend one lovely fair and beautiful kind and thankful still to us for all our love A very smal and poor and little Love which sinners shew and Hypocrites and All to All their like But that God might encrease his Love to Adam or might shew a Better Love than he could manifest be it spoken with Reverence while Man was Like him Holy Wise and Just Truly Fair and Beautiful in All he let him fall into the dirt and dust of death Into the Pox or worse disease that might deform him wholly so that he might commend his love indeed to such as hated him and were unworthy ugly more deformed then poor Job when botched all and naked most forlorn and miserable in his own and others thoughts and left in the hand of Sathan at his will But onely save his Life or Soul as God expresseth it Not onely for a Type of somewhat yet to come unto All that will wait with Job and expect the Lords End but it may be representing Adam also as accused and tempted by Sathan and at length left in his hands till God could shew his love was not onely skin deep as we say but everlasting Nay encreasing more and more as it could make or find an Object for that pity and compassion and that gracious Mercy which could not appear but still had been unseen abroad from God or hid within him had not his Wisdom contrived an Object for it which was Misery and guilt which was not till Sin came in and so he let him fall and shut him up under sin and guilt that he migh shew him Mercy which he could not do before And as before his fall God did not absolutely tye himself to Punish him So After the fall he did not execute That upon him which he might have done but devised devices as the Wise Woman of Tekoa said to David that his poor Banished might not perish And yet still preserved his own Honour and Majesty Truth and Justice too with such a kind of Love and Tender pity merciful compassion which could not appear abroad or possibly be shewn till sin or guilt or shame or fear or sorrow grief or pain or some such misery or other made an Object capable of pity mercy or compassion I shall yet a little more insist on these Particulars shew I hope they very well agree and no way contradict the Words and Mind of God even in the Law or harshest part of all the Scriptures First I premise God loved him and could not but love him very intirely if he loved himself while he was in his own Image And having so loved him and being so Immutable in his Heart Love and Nature he loved him to the End And I do not yet clearly see how any Promise can Oblige God to a more Constant Love of Man restored to that Image Then his own Nature and Heart moved him to love Adam In that Image Now if his Heart be not so truly Tender Gratious and Perfectly Good and immutable also in his most Genuine and Natural Love but that it could really change towards Adam in his own Image yea and that also before his fall or any demerit what ever as to decree his everlasting ruine or at least to leave him to it so foreseeing that he would so fall and rise no more in himself and his Posterity How can any man be sure and rest upon his Word or Promise that he will not leave him when he is renewed again into that Image Seeing it may be still doubted whether any man living can fully know Gods heart and mind by his words or expressions except there be some way else to know it and to rest and trust in it then his words can expresse or import Or unlesse a man may also be taught to believe his Word is Better Truer and more Certain Fixed and Obliging also then his very Heart and Nature is Which as some Teach or Believe was Such even then when it loved most or as much as it could love its self or its own Image that it yet hated and forsook and left to I know not what Irrecoverable misery his own Image and his dearly beloved in his own person or at least his posterity even his very next Son and Sons Sons to all Generations yea to all Eternity for the far greatest part of his Posterity May we not therefore believe and say that with a true constant and Eternal Love of Delight and Complacence from all Eternity to all Eternity God loved himself and his own Image where ever it was And nothing else but kimself and his own Image with that kind of
then he will dispence with loving our Neighbour yea but shewing pitty to his Oxe or Ass fallen into a pit And as if God would measure all our Love to himself by our loving our poor Neighbour St. John saith Let a man never talk of loving God whom he never saw if he do not love his Brother whom he hath seen and if he do but see him in want and shut up his bowels though his wants be not wept or worded out but only Seen How doth the love of God dwell in such a man as we found also in Esay when thou Seest the naked that thou cover him Which hath sometimes been very sweet to me when I had no words or tears to expresse my miseries to Christ or was sensible enough of any of my wants Yet I have often spoken to him from that place and others in the Psalmes or Job or Lamentations Crying See my affliction though I do not see it or am afflicted for it as I should or would Yet do thou See my miseries Even when I see them not and let thy tender eye affect thy tender heart for the Love of God dwelleth in thee Do not therefore shut up thy bowels when thou seest my want though I do not see it or am not affected with it Give me Eye salve that I may see And thou hast promised an holy Spirit to Convince the world of sinne Righteousnesse and Judgement Withhold not Good whilst it is in the God of thy hand to do it Why then wilt thou send me away saying Come again to morrow when it is in the power of thy hand to do me good For thou hast All power in Heaven and Earth Thou art the Wisdome of God and the Power of God And a Brother is born for a day of Adversity And there may be also the greatest â—ffering where there is but little sorrow yea and the greatest sorrow where the least Expâ—ession either in tears or words A piercing look with an eye fixed on Christ in a promise as one able to help and made for it and why then do we doubt of his Will may be a better Prayer than a great many words or tears They are little Griefs that speak or are spoken Great ones are stupid or at least silent So also are Praises They may be best when they attend God in Silence As the Jews also teach us on those passages of the Psalms My soul is silent before thee and Praise waiteth on thee in silence for so it is And Silence is commanded us all not only in those places which bid our words be Few as Solomon and our Saviour also But when God ariseth and doth manifest himself out of his Temple or in his Holy place as his Presence Chamber we are especially commanded to be Silent before him as we read in the last words both of the second of Habakkuk and the second of Zechary And there is not only an Evil but a Good Day also when All prudent men will hold their Peace as we read in another Prophet But it is yet sweter than many words or any can express to consider that if Christ did neither love Us nor Himself nor his Father as he surely doth Yet his very Duty to Him and that Law which bids him Love the Lord his God with all his heart and soul and minde bâ—ddeth him do it also With all his Might And so also to propagate his love to All he can by all means he may Yea and to work while it is Day and to do whatever is in his hand to do with all his might least the night cometh on him also and there be no more working or Councel in the place whether we are all going Is it indeed enough for Him in himself and his own person to have no other God or other wayes of worship than are Right and set by God and not to bear his Name in vain who yet beareth it more upon him both in words and Actions than all men living Except he also propagate this Love of God his waies of worship and his Name his True Name which is his Nature all he can or may and he may quicken whom he will with all his Might to all his Children Servants Neighbours Subjects and Relations under him and in his Povver and they are All. May I indeed suffer any Servant or any other though I may bear vvith children vvhile they are children and vvith Naturals or Ideots alas vve are All so to Him all our lives May I suffer any man within my power or Family to worship a false God or the True God in a False manner or to take his Name in vain while I can help it Is He not Lord of All the Family both in Heaven and Earth Are we not All in his hand and under his power who hath All Power in Heaven Earth and hath All things delivered to him of his Father Can we wonder now why he so often promiseth to manifest the Name of God that All may know it from the greatest to the least Yea and his Enemies also It being so usuall in Ezekiel and other Prophets to close up all his Threatnings with this You shall all know me or I will bring you to Know my Name Which is also the great end of the Psalmists sharp and bitter prayers against All the enemies of God which we find mustered up together in the 83. Psalm That they may seek thy Name O Lord and that they may know that Thou whose name is Jehovah art the most high God over all the Earth which was also the great end of that great work on Nebuchadnezar And the same Psalms tell us also that when men come or are brought to Know the name of God they will trust in it And there also Christ often promiseth He will declare his Name to his Brethren and as if they were too few to the great Congregation also And how great that Congregation is or shall be I cannot tell When also he came to dye he acknowledgeth this for the great work he had to do in the World I have finished thy work I have manifested thy Name unto the men thou gavest me out of the world And as if this were not yet enough towards the end of that prayer he prayeth for More this being the Covenant Ask of me and I will give thee All Nations and Peoples and persons even the utmost ends of the Earth and those also afarr off in the Seas And is his heart so narrow that he will not Ask when he might have us All and all things for asking Ask then heartily that thou maist receive seek us All heartily and thou shalt find us All Knock heartily at the door of our hearts and by virtue of the promise and Covenant of God they shall be opened to thee Neither pray I for these alone which thou hast yet given me shallâ—at â—at any tâ—me hereafter beleeve on me through their word That they All may be
not that Watches and Catches also might come from the Hebrew Chatsa Which in This sence is akin to their Kaets to Watch or wake out of sleep which is also applied to God himself the Great Watchman of Israel And what if the Watchers singing Holy Holy Holy at every Watch might allude to the Three Hours in Each of them as well as to the 3 Persons in the Blessed Trinity Though some ancient Copies square the 3 also and make it 9 times Holy Holy Holy c. And seeing All things Here below were but shadows of somwhat above and shewed also in the Mount Why may not That Half Hours Rest or-silence in Heaven of which we read in the Revelation be As the Sabbath to Half Hours There being 7 Halves in 3 and an Half As we found before a Sabbath both in Rest and Turning in every 7 Hours and Daies and Months and Years also Or it may be the Cardinal Watches were distinguished by their Songs as the Temple Waits or Trumpets as David may allude by Rising at Midnight to sing Praises c. As the Others by Rest or silence Which we see cleer enough in 2 of them at the Morning and Evening Incense while the People stood without Praying in silence till the Priest came out and blessed them As we read in That of the Baptists Father strucken Silent also And in all the Jews upon Those places we touched before in the Psalms and Prophets The Lord is in his Holy Place Let all the Earth be Silent and the Lord is Risen Let All flesh keep Silence before him And I charge you that you awake not my Love till He please And as Every seventh Day was Holy from the first Creation As we see by divers things in the Flood and many Scriptures So was Every seventh Honr as we saw before distinct or Holy from the Six before it bringing in some Great change of Midnight or Morning or Noon or Evening whence All Time did first begin And from That First beginning of Time there were Three Daies and an half or 4 Evenings and Three Mornings before the Sun and Moon were seen in the Firmament Which they were not till the fourth Day of Creation as we read in the first of Genesis So That for the whole 3 Daies and an half before That fourth Day those 2 Witnesses of Heaven lay Dead as it were or Asleep in their Causes as the Schools use to speak And at the End of Those 3 Daies and an Half there was a voyce saying Come up hither and Be you placed in Heaven As my 2 Faithful Witnesses So long as These Heavens and This Earth shall Endure And when These are to pass away and be renewed Then also 2 other Witnesses that correspond to These shall lie as Dead or asleep 3 daies and an half As These did at first till a voyce place Them also in Heaven Crying Come up Hither And Then shall be such a spiritual Earthquake As at first a Temporal that made the Rivers break out and the Hills rise up or Valleys sink down of which we read in the 104 Psalm and other Scriptures We cannot wonder that Daniels 3 Times and an Half should bid us look to That or Those set in Heaven to make Times and Seasons or Moeds also And in Hours That Number may Expresse the Duration of an Eclipse As in the Gospels we read of Darknesse from the sixth Hour to the ninth and Then it passed off by Degrees with divers Cries of which again And in Dayes besides the three First before the Sun it may be the Proper Time of the Moons Hiding under the Beams of the Sun as Hours might be under his Body and so long the Sun may be Hidden by Eclipse Or the Moon rather And three Weeks and an Half make up the Time of Distance or Absence of Moon from the Suns Rayes Or her Liberty till she come under Them again and so draw nigh to a Change And it may be added that Three Weeks and an half bring us quite through 24 dayes as the 24 hours of each day to the very morning of the 25th which may be considerable for other things besides the square root of 666. And in Years Our Daniel speaketh of causing the Daily Sacrifice and Minha to Cease in the midst of a Week Which is generally taken for three years and an half that is half a week of years in which onr Saviour preached publiquely and Then by his Own Great offering of Himself Once made put an End in right to All other Sacrifice and Offerings Though they were in Fact continued till the Temple was also beaten down about 40 years after our Saviours Death And That very War Endured just Three Years and an Half But three Moeds and an Half in Daniel may speak Months as well as Hours or Dayes or Weeks or Yeares Though in All and Each of them there may be some Correspondence as we touched before And when the Lights an Hebrew word from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were made at sirst they were for Dayes and Years and Moeds which are therefore properly Neither Dayes nor Years but distinct from Both. And as Dayes and Years in Scripture are generally ascribed to the Sun So are Moeds to the Moon As he appointed the Moon for Moeds and the Sun knoweth his Bowing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or his going Down in that Great Comment on the whole Creation if rightly translated which we Cited but now the 104. Psalm And the very next verse hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Iob and Solomon for Goats as alluding also to the Solemn Goat-offering at every Olam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Hiding of the Moon which so made the Moeds How also Mans Seasons or Moeds are made by the Moon in Him as in Heaven we may see by comparing the third and twelfth Chapters of Ecclesiastes with other places of Solomon and David speaking of his Months and Hidden Times or Allamim or Allamuth As Paul also speaketh of our Life Hidden with Christ in God of which we read in Other places besides many verses of the 89 Psalm as in Hebrew And if we should render the Hebrew Moad or Mognadh by Monach as in Almonack we might easily shew their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be made of N. C. As the figure may hint and more the Number 70 being made of 50 and 20. the number of their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 begins a word or syllable the English sound it much by Cn. Gn or Kn. But when it ends by nc nk or ng And if we consider Three Months in Generall They are to the Year as Three Hours to the Day or Night a Watch or Season as we call it of Winter Summer Spring or Autumn Which are All it seems Some how in every Day also As the very words of God to Noah may seem to intimate saying not only that there should be
seemed Thus. Divine Sophia Though I spraul in Clay Yet Thou art neer ally'd and for a Day Of Wo Made of Woman Reach out thy skirt Bow down thine Hemm For It can Heal my Heart Vouchsafe to know me and to let me know Thee When thou hast thy Blackest Mask and though My guilt present thee Frowning Let me see The Frowns I fear are Love that Vaileth thee Made under That most Royal Law of Love That bids thee Love us Heere as Those above Thy Neighbour As thy self And who is He The Stranger Any Man in Misery 'T is Little Love to Love our Like or Friend And Less to Love one Lovely Fair and Kinde All Sinners may do This and Hypocrites Thy Law is Love thine Enemy that fights And Hates Reviles and Offers All Despites Yet if he Want Or if his Ass but stray Thou saist Relieve him Lead him to his way Nor may we stay for Tears But Misery Must melt our Eyes and Heart to Sympathy How dwelleth Else the Love of God I am That Behemoth That Beast that stray's That Ishmael Wild Asses Colt that bray's For want of Fodder Thou art sent to Seek and Help and Save All Lost and Needy That No Helper have To Comfort All that Mourn To Sacrifice For every One that Errs or is Unwise And to Redeem their Soul Their Precious Soul From All Deceit and Violence Thou hast Received Gifts Then Freely Give It makes thee Blessed more then to Receive And Thou hast Gifts for Rebbels And Thy Breast By Flowing alwayes Out is more increast And every little Drop that falleth over Is so Precious that it can recover Any fainting swooning Heart and can stretch out My Narrow Soul As All the Heavens about Thou art gone Over All that Thou mightst fill All Things with Good Then do his Holy Will That sent thee with Eternal Love to Dwell In us to Conquer Wrath and Death and Hell As David Saul To Break the Serpents Head And All his Works and Power To raise the Dead And make All new Which Thou hast also Promised Upon thy â—rone and Lifted up to Draw All Men To Thee Then Do it As Thy Law Requires of All. My Son Give me thy Heart Do Heartily And Do not Act a Part. Nor offer with an Evil Eye lest All Abhorr Thy Dainties Do To All men As thou wouldst be Done unto Or if thou Hate Us Love thy Fathers Name With All thy Might and Propagate his Fame And Manifest his Love As Thou hast said 'T was written in Thy Heart and seen and Read Of All that Reade Thy Words But do the same Do it again 't is sweet Declare his Name In us We shall believe Thou wilt not cease Till Thou hast brought Us All to Rest in Peace Thy Children and thy Servants Hand-maids Child The Strangers in Thy Gates and Cattle wild Must Rest the Rest of God and Sabbath keep Then see our Woful Miseries and Weep With All that Weep And let thy Bowels yearn To Pitty and thy Patience make us Learn It s perfect Work And when we Most thee Grieve O Then Most sweetly Teach us to Believe And know Thy Heart is Love And when we Hear Thy Loudest Thunders and do feel or fear Thy smartest Lightnings Make us sweetly Bow And silently adore and pay the Vow We made thee in our Youth or fears And Pray And Praise for what and whom we ought or May While in us Praying Thou dost say the same Our Heavenly Father Hallowed be thy Name Thy Kingdome Come and let Thy Will be Done On Earth As it is in Thy Heavenly Throne Give us this Day the Bread we need to Live And As We Debtors So do Us Forgive Into Temptation Lead us not But Free Us from The Evil Evil One. For unto Thee Belongeth Kingdom Power and Majesty Through All Eternity Eternity THE Translator also being a Stranger would bespeak his pardon if in any thing his Language shall not suit the Reader or the Subject which yet he hopeth may be the more excusable because he durst not hide some particulars of this following discourse which it may be some after ages may improve or at least excuse the Authors well meaning in describing some of the many things he met in so strange a way So much speaking the goodnesse and bounty of God the great Giver with the Liberal hand upbraiding none nor accepting Persons but in all Nations devising how to keep his Banished from perishing as the woman of Tekoa spake to David and still accepting and rewarding those that fear and diligently seek him hoping in his goodnesse through Jesus Christ the onely way of pleasing him to whom be given as of right belongeth Kingdom Power and Glory through all ages for ever more Amen Touching the Author it may be we should not ask or enquire his Name Nation or Quality seeing himself so Silent in it and it may be as unlawful to pry into others secrets especially of their mind and spirit as to unseal a Letter break open an house or discover that which is committed to ones greatest Trust. Yet by some passages he seemeth to intimate his Parents Christian and Religious who bred him tenderly and yet strictly in the best way they could both in Learning and Religion which seemed to have taken a deeper impression in his tender years then he well retained afterwards in the croud of this World and worldly employments both in War and Peace with many Civil Relations In all which he found himself so much entangled beyond his expectation or desire that for some years together it seems he wrestled with something within him that oft moved him to a more retired life which yet seemed to flie from him the more he pursued it About the height or greatest heat of the late Plague in Naples having lost his Father with other near and dear Relations he became so disconsolate that in a sad forlorn manner he wandred a while rather then Travelled all alone till among other places coming at length too neer the great City of Rome in that contagious season when he hoped for some little rest he fell into great danger of Death among some strict searches for suspected Persons from infected places But by great mercy escaping that danger also he was yet it seems so followed by the al-seeing eye that he was scarce got out of sight of Civita Vechia or some other place about that City whence he might escape by Sea But in a terrible storme and Tempest he was also seized and arrested with many privie Seals on his Conscience in most unutterable pangs of fear Terror and amazed Horror with a most heavie weight of guilt from all his former course of life which then lay gnawing on him with a grim vizage of death that King of fears staring and gaping on him with its open jaws ready to devour him This grew up to that height at length the storm still lasting and encreasing that there needed no other Processe or
here in dust or thick clay And yet his Wisdom and the Best in him being now united to Flesh will not must not say to the Foot I have no need of Thee yea must not disdain to say to this Worm Thou art my Brother or my Sister and Corruption is my Mother or my neer kindred And while others talk of Doing the Law and performing it to others I am mainly bent to see and hope believe and pray that Christ will Do it and perform it unto me and so by working in me teach me and help me also so to Act to others in some measure As he doth to me What is the Law which hath so long kept us in awe As if it had or could disanul the free Grace of God and Covenant thereof which was made with our Fathers and with us in them also so many hundred years before the Law rose up As also the Goodness and Pities of God were from everlasting to everlasting and so much longer and stronger than his wrath which we use to call his Justice which is not in him but as a stranger coming cross his way or calling on him and at most was but of yester day when some poor creature had sinned Is not the Law the very mind and Heart of God even That God which is Light and Love and perfect goodness Is it not summed up by Christ himself into Love All the Law nothing but Love Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy mind and heart and might and the other is like unto this Like unto This For Man also is like unto God and thou must Love yea and honor Man too But Like as thou dost God Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thy self But how can I possibly Love God or my Neighbor before God Love me yea and some way manifest his Love to me Can I first give unto God or lend him that it may be paid again Is it Probable or Possible that I say not noble generous or Ingenuous for my God to ask and expect my Heart and Hearts Love to him before he had given his Heart and Hearts Love to me What shall we say then Having loved Man once he loved him still being his own in his own Image which he yet owns still in him after the Fast and after the Flood too Thou shalt not shed Mans blood for in the Image of God He is created Nay St. Paul is so bold as to call man not only the Image of God but also his Glory the Image and Glory of God And yet he speaks of Man as Man and of every man saying also that Christ is the Head of every man and that Man is the Image and Glory of God And Wisdom which is Christ plainly saith His delights were not only with Man but with the Sons of men or Man-kind And there were no Sons of men till after the Fall and when man had sinned And Gods Philanthropy or Love to Man-kind so much spoken of by St. Paul and others in the New Testament is also observed by Moses himself who beginning to bless the twelve Tribes of Israel plainly saith God loveth the Peoples also for the word is Plural and may take in all the Gentile Nations also in the Earth yea he carries them all in his bosom as the word he there useth may import Though he have also some especial to them that sit at his Feet and receive the Law at his Mouth which he there giveth for a sure Character of Gods especial Love even his Giving and their Receiving of his Law the Good and Royal Law of Love And God so loved the World even the World that he gave his Son for the world not to condemn the World but to save it for God even the Father himself is Love and hath sent forth his Son in Love and hath also promised his Spirit to convince the world even the World of Sin and to powr it out on all flesh that All may see the Glory of God Yea every eye may see his Salvation And hath therefore given his Law to the World even to the worst of men as St. Paul argues to Timothy that by it he may convince them and draw them to Christ. Having so shut them all up in unbelief and conclude them All under sin and breach of the Law that he might have Mercy on them Which indeed and properly speaking could not be shewed till there was an Object for it and there was no Misery which is the Object of Mercy till Sin was in the world And doth not This very Law this Holy perfect Royal Law of Love express and speak this Heart and Love of God to every man that it speaketh to and that is the worst of men living Doth it not say Thou shalt love me because I love thee Doth it not begin to every Man to whom it speaks and say I am the Lord thy God even Thy Lord and Thy God! and Therefore Thou shalt have No other God because I am Thy God And therefore thou shalt not bow to Images but Worship me only because I only am the Lord Thy God And therefore thou shalt honor my Name and not abuse my Love or take my Name or Goodness in vain or turn it into Wantonness because I am the Lord thy God And wilt thou not both love and honor That is Reverence that great and Reverend Name The Lordthy God Not a Terrible Name but a Reverend Name and therefore to be loved and greatly honored or Reverenced as God bids us Reverence his Sanctuary and a Woman must Reverence her Husband and the time is coming that we shall not call our God Baali that is My Lord or hard Master But Ishi my Husband And yet we shall then most Love and Reverence him with Godly Sonly Fear and Reverence And because this Name of the Lord my God is so great and holy and reverend Therefore I am bid to reverence it and hallow it even as the first Petition of our Lords Prayer teacheth us to pray and by no means to take it in vain For they that name it must depart from Iniquity And although the words added of not holding him guiltlesse that takes his Holy Name in vain ought still to keep me in great aufull Reverence yet they ought not to make me have any hard thoughts of God as if he were an Hard Master which our Saviour shewed as the Root of all miscarriage And those words may seem to speak a selfish person and so hard to please and so unexorable when displeased that do little suit the sweet and Gracious Heart of God which is Pure and Peaceful hardly provoked and Gentle easie to be entreated Slow to anger and without fury which rest onely in the bosome of Fools Delighting in Mercy and abounding in Goodnesse The Father of Mercies pardoning Iniquity Transgression and Sin And when he is provoked to visit and chasten yet he doth it Gently and Slowly and by degrees not at once
more than That I will not be your God or I will not shew you mercy Or Thou shalt Die and thou shalt not Live as it was said to Hezekiah and yet he did not Die but Live Or that to Samuel or Jeremiah Thou shalt not Pray for This man or This people Which yet it may be made them Pray More than they did before and so perhaps was One good means to recover them that else might have been so irrecoverable And so This very saying of Christ if he had so said I will not Pray for the world might have been a great means to save the World and to recover them by convincing them of their forlorn and desperate estate For This may be one great End of the heaviest Threatnings in the Scripture not only to shut men under fear and guilt that so they may be fitter Objects of Pity and Mercy but to Convince them also that they may be in a way for mercy It being the great Art of the Holy Ghost to work along with the Word sutable to the Subject and Object it hath to work upon And in a sharp Threatning it is as Vinegar or burnt Allum or some Corrasive to putrid flesh that must be taken off And How will a poor Soul Tremble under This That Christ who is Love it self should once say I will not Pray for you As every one is ready to apply it to himself while under the Convincing Work of the Spirit which is promised to Convince the world also of sin and Righteousness But he doth not say I Will not Pray for the world but only I Do not Just perhaps as in the Chapter before he said to his own Disciples I do not say I will pray for you for the Father himself loveth you And in That day you shall ask me Nothing And hitherto you have asked Nothing Which are Negatives comparative not absolute And why not This also I do not pray only or mainly and chiefly for the world but for Those thou hast given me out of the world And it may be Christ finds enough upon him as a Man and so only he Prayes to mind his Elect and care for Them Though God and He also as God Loveth the world also and the Peoples in distinction from Israel as Moses expresseth it Yea and He was given also for the world and sent to bear away the sins of the world and not to condemn but save the world and to be a Propitiation for the sins of the world As we read with many such passages in This very Apostle who records This Prayer And if we take the words asstrictly as we may being only in the Present Tence I do not yet Pray for the world We know not how soon he yet might pray for the world also Though he Now did not Seeing in this very Prayer towards the end he prayed for others Many others then he Now Prayed for at the beginning of it And I know not but the VVorld might Then come in also if I should grant it did not Now. Epecially seeing One great End of all he asked for his Disciples also and for all others was that the World may come to know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved me And in the beginning of this very Prayer Christ sheweth that it is Eternal Life to know God and Him whom God had sent And by this he proved that his Disciples knew the Name of God and kept his Word because they now believed that God sent him and knew surely that he was come out from God And yet in the latter end of this Prayer he beggeth so and so for His and all that should believe that the whol World also might come to know that God had sent him and had loved them as he loved him Which may be added to That we noted in the chap. before VVhen the Comforter shall come to You he shall Convince the VVorld also of sin and of Righteousness And yet as himself and St. Paul also said the World as the World and the Carnal man as Carnal did not receive conceive or understand the Spirit or the things thereof So in a safe sence also we may say Christ did not Then Pray for the World that As the World they might be saved or be Happy while they remained Such But that they might be changed and called out of the World and so Turned from Darkness to Light from the Power of Satan unto God and then might also receive an Inheritance among them that are sanctified through Faith in Christ. Which was the sum of This Prayer it may be and the great Commission given by our Lord himself when he sent Paul to the Gentiles and made him a Minister and Witness or Martyr also to the whole World And He gives us This Sum of the Gospel he was to preach That God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself and Not imputing their sins And the Mystery of Godliness God manifest in the Flesh and believed on by the VVorld And if any take the VVorld here for the Systeme of Elements and not for Men of the World I may say Christ also might mean only the Worldly Systeme which he prayed not for but for all men of the world and in the world But St. Paul in several places saith and that also in the Spirit or person of Christ whom we found before as Ezekiel the strong God and yet the Son of Man to be the great Watcher and Warner for every man and as Ezekiel bid to order a Sacrifice for every one that erreth and is simple he was Warning every man and Teaching every man in all Wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus And he bids us Love All men and prayes they might Love All men even as He loved them Yea and we are bid to Honour All men For Man is the Image and Glory of God And directly against the sence which some suppose in Christs words I pray not for the World but for These St. Paul exhorts first of all That Prayers Intercessions Supplications yea and giving of Thanks also be made for All men Which he saith is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour Who Will directly Will have All men All men to be saved and to come unto the knowledg of the Truth For there is One God and One Mediator between God and Men All Man-kind the Man Christ Jesus who gave himself a Ransom for All for he is the Propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole World to be testified or witnessed or manifest in due season or its proper seasons For it is plural in the Original expressing divers several and proper seasons for the manifestation of That Truth to the World Of which we may speak again in Times and Seasons And yet also in a True and safe sence we may say Christ loveth not the World as the World nor
prayeth for the World as such No more than a Man ought to love or cherish his Flesh as such But only in order to change it and make it New And this indeed seems one of the most proper sences of Gods Hating any Which in Hebrew is expressed by a word so neer That which is to Change as if Hating were but in order to a Change which is also very neer the sound of the words that in Hebrew signifie both to Change and to Hate And as Sone comes from their Sana to Hate as we touched before So doth Sin which is Hate or Shun And That which English Saxons whose Language is much Hebrew do call Sin is in Gods Language Hatred For he hateth Nothing but Sin And the Eng Sin is in Heb Hate or Chate or Hhate So that God Hateth Nothing but Sin And no person but as Sinful and so in Order to Changing of him As we see in his own Covenant His First Covenant and so his First Creation and the First born in all Dispensations must give place to a Second which is Better And the Elder must still serve the Younger or give place to it God will still shew himself Better and Better and so will ever to All Eternity And finding fault with his first Expressions or Manifestations he Disanuls and rejects or Hates and reprobates them in order to change them and make them Better VVhich he is still Doing For what he doth once he doth ever And the VVheel still goeth round as we find in the 90. Psalm and Solomon in divers places to be compared with that of our Saviour so often repeated They that are First shall be Last and the last first And behold I make All things New As in the beginning so it shall be ever I may add also That in divers Scriptures we may find Love and Hate to be but relative Terms or comparative God as God Loveth Himself only with an Absolute Love and Hateth nothing but sin with absolute Hatred But among Creatures He Loveth One before another as it cometh neerer to himself and his own Image So he prefers it before another which he hateth in comparison So Leah was Hated that is Less loved than Rachel preferred before Leah who was loved also but below Rachel And in such a sence God speaketh If a man have two Wives the one Loved and the other Hated that is less Loved For else sure God would never countenance any mans Hating his VVife But only as he doth a mans Hating his own flesh in order to change it and prefer somwhat before it And so Christ telleth us that no man can be His Disciple except he Hate his Father Mother Brother Sister Wife and self Whom yet he never should or could Hate if he be His Disciple and be moulded into Love But his meaning is as we find in another Evangelist Except he prefer Christ and so Love Him before All Those Which therefore in Scripture Language are All said to be Hated in comparison of Christ. And why may not Jacob the Younger be Thus Loved that is preferred before Esau who in This sence is Hated and rejected that is set behind his younger Brother But however These may be used or looked upon as Types of the Elect and Reprobate we cannot from Thence determine Final Reprobation as the Schools express it in the person of either Though the Scripture give us very sad Characters of Esau calling him a Profane Person yet I know not that it ever shews him to be Eternally Reprobate That Repentance which is spoken of in the Hebrews being his Fathers and not his own but the changing of his Fathers mind towards him which he could not obtain though he sought it with Tears But yet his Father also Blessed him and though he must serve his younger Brother it was but for a season till he could break his yoak as we shall see anon And This also but as generally in all the Dispensations of God out to the World the Elder as we may commonly see in most or All the Elder Sons named in the Bible or the first must give place to the Second Even the first Covenant it self must be rejected and disanulled and judged Faulty also that is Reprobate in order to a Second Better and more Gracious So it was said The Elder shall serve the Younger And Christ himself came to Serve and to Minister and not to be Ministred unto As it is said Joseph in Prison was Trusted with the Care or Government of all the Prisoners and set to serve them As indeed a Governor is a great Servant to his Servants As it is written Jacob have I Loved is it indeed an Interrogation rather than affirmation But Esau have I hated But How Hated The very next words of the Prophet who is cited by the Apostle shew us that This Hating was some frowning of Gods Face as we may say but not of his Heart and but upon the outward Man or Estate of Esau whom he therefore saith he Hated because he laid his Mountains and his Heritage waste for the Dragons of the Wilderness But may or can any man know or judg of True Real Love or Hatred especially That which is Eternal by All that is without or before him Is there not much worse spoken of Jacob and Israel in that very Prophet than of Esau Doth not the same Malachy say of Israel VVill the Lord regard your persons Even your persons And no wonder then his Soul abhors their Sacrifice Which yet is one of the worst things that Solomon observes of a wicked man But How frequent in the Prophets against Israel And in Jeremy 12. we see How God Forsook and Hated the deerly beloved of his soul. As an Emblem of Christ himself so forsaken Hated cursed and Rejected by God or of all the Elect who once were as Paul to the Fphesians children of VVrath or curse as well or much as Any others And the same Malachy doth not only observe the Jews so neglected and rejected but Cursed also by God himself several times Yea and that the Lord would also curse their very Blessings Yea and had cursed them already One of the heaviest or worst Curses in the Bible And This is for Spiritual Adultery and Judahs marrying the Daughter of a strange god As Gen. 38. Judah leaving his Brethren for it is not good for man to be alone Turned in to a Canaanite who bore Er and Onan so wicked that the Lord slew them Which is also in Malachy though lost by reading it Therefore will the Lord cut off the Master and the Teacher which in Heb is Er and Oneh And the Scripture seems often to allude to Tamar also at the end of that History Mother of All Judahs Posterity As the Church or every Christian waiting for Christ that Shilo or Shela till with child by his Father also leaving his Signet and Bracelets which save her at the fiery Judgment But we translate Tamar the
Precious in his eyes shall be their Bloud and yet more precious their souls which himself said was so exceeding precious as not to be compared with the World must it only be precious in our own eyes and shall it not be so in his also Let us then bowe down to him as the third Captain of 50. did to Elijah saying Let my soul be precious in thine eyes and the soules of thy servants for so the words are in the original And himself summed up all the Law into Love adding also that it was a little love to love a friend or one that was lovely or like us fair and beautifull kind and thankfull even sinners and Hypocrites do so but I say unto you love your enemies and them that hate you pray for them that persecute you revile you blaspheme and offer all despite to you Blesse them that curse you yea blesse and curse not be ever blessing and never cursing In a word Be mercifull as your Heavenly Father is mercifull and then addeth Judge not that you be not judged Which is the more to be marked because himself so often intimates that although the Father hath committed all judgement to him and authority to execute it also as we shewed before yet that he neither came to judge the world nor will judge it or any man it may be in his own person but will commit it to his Children who shall judge the world and Angells also and then the Son of man shall sit on the Throne of his Glory to seperate those that are judged And there also none are condemned but those that justifie themselves for if we could or would Judge our selves we should not be judged Yet even then also we are judged by the Son of man For we must all stand before his judgement seat who yet loved our nation and our nature and was made our Advocate and under the same Law with us The same Law of Love And did any man ever Hate his own flesh though he may chasten it and keep it in subjection Plucking it under the eyes as some render the Apostles phrase Or if he could hate his own flesh will he not love his own Spirit and his owm Image Will not That love seek to propagate it all he may he hath received the Spirit without measure He is infinitely full of that as Elihu speaks which is as New Wine yea as Fire in his bones and heart which as the Spring in the watch is ever clicking and the cause of all the beating in the Arteries and all the Pulses and it must have vent he cannot hold it in So it hath now pleased infinite Wisdome and Goodnesse to screw it selfe into the finite heart of Christ in his humanity so that he cannot hold it in or stifle it if he would as that which is infinite might have done and so swallowed it up as that we might never have seene or felt or any way enjoyed it But infinite is now so riveted into finite that this finite cannot comprehend it or detain it if he would He cannot detain it in unrighteousnesse not so much as he may the wind in his hand or all the great Ocean in his bowels So that if his eye were evil or his heart hard and narrow when he seems so kindly to invite and call and woo us to his dainties which the Scripture yet forbids us once to tast from an evil eye or from one that cryeth eat and drink but his heart is not with us which the soul of God abhors Yet indeed if Christ do but love himself and his own Spirit and his own ease he still will and still must give out freely having received that which is too great and strong for him to hold in and keep down if he would being an infinite Fountain still flowing up and still flowing out with Rivers of living water round about him So it is in all that do but receive some little drops of it from him How much more is it so in himself that hath it without such bounds and limits O how is he straitned t is his own expression till he poure out himself and his Spirit among us It cannot be taken from him against his will and yet it cannot be held in but is as an Ointment or a sweet perfume in ones hand the more it is pressed and heated the more it flows out and sends forth it's sweet Odours And she came behind him saying If I can but touch him or so much as the hemme of his Garment I shall be healed and vertue went out at every touch As the sweet perfume and precious Ointment on the Sacrificers head it drencht his Beard even Aaron's beard which yet was but an Excrement and to be cut off with every Sissors and it ran down through all his Garments and to every hemm and Fringe of them although to be changed and laid off very many times besides every nights rest And the Laver of old in the Tabernacle had no cover how much lesse the great Molten Sea in the Temple which had such a Fountain or Fountains still flowing up in it or into it as the very words in the Hebrew may teach us Have you not seen a tender Mothers breast so full and swel'd for want of sucking that she hath been glad of a strangers Child to draw it when her own could not or would not So and much more is it with the full breast of Jesus Christ which is such an infinite Fountain that the more it gives the more it may And if thou knewst the gift of God and who it is that giveth thou wouldst ask and ask again and never give over asking as we found before in Acksa and divers others till he filleth thee also with the upper and the lower springs Rejoyce yee then and be glad with him all yee that love him rejoyce with him all yee that mourned after him that you may suck and be satisfied with those breasts of Consolation And a drop that runneth over for he hath enough for his Children Servants Strangers Cattle all his Creatures every drop hath power enough to make us hunger and thirst and long for more till it may stretch out our narrow hearts and make them as wide as the very Heavens And he hath received gifts for Rebels also and his own Law was he that received freely mâ—st give freely yea and he said It is a more blessed thing to give then to receive As if he thought himself also and made himself more blessed by giving out freely then by receiving all the fulnesse he hath which would be a burthen to him if he could not did not give out freely as he receiveth And for more clear expressing his own mind and heart and will for doing good according to his Power which is still the measure of goodnesse also He hath not only promised to receive All that come to him and by no means no means to cast them off or out but also to
severall times in the Prophets and twice in Jeremy of his own dearest Children whom he saith he will not Cut off or destroy but only chasten visit or Correct in measure but not Hold Guiltless or acquit them wholly The very same Phrase used in the Third Commandement and in the Name of God Proclaimed in Exodus and Numbers 14. And the very same Phrase is used by Job of himself divers times although we may be sure he did not beleeve God had cut him off for ever or would never acquit him or hold him Guiltlesse though he so speak of himself But it is such a phrase as the Prophet Esays Therefore forgive them not which yet is no worse or more then we find commended and commanded also by Solomon to a tender Father who is bid to chasten his Son and not to spaâ—e him or forgive or acquit or Hold him Guiltless For they are much the same Phrases Yet I may ad to make us fear the Goodnesse of God rather then All his Wrath He that taketh the Good Name of God this gracious God in vain or he that so Turneth it into wantonness is the most guilty Person in All the Bible that I know or most in danger not to be quit or held Guiltless as we find hinted in severall places from the third Commandement Except haply we may also say the most Guilty Person in the World whom God will least acquit or hold guiltlesse is Jesus Christ In whom the Curses also are Yea and Amen or fulfilled rather more then the Promises For in These he joynes his Children who are Co-heirs in All the Promises and Purposes of God But in bearing the Threatnings and Curses He is more alone then in All the Promises He treads the Winepress of Gods Wrath alone and of the People there is none with Him He alone can bear it He alone need fear it All the Billows of the Almighty rowled upon Christ and All his Arrows stuck in his Heart and drunk up his Spirit more then All the world besides All else being little weak nothing lighter then vanity Compared with Him that was Gods Fellow and his Match Who thought it no Robbery to be Equall with God who therefore laid his stroaks upon H m who was only able to bear them with our guilt So that in a right sence He is the most guilty Person as Bearing Gods most Holy Name more then All the World besides And bearing all our guilt for bearing at in vain And as the third Commandement hath its not Acquitting So the second hath it's Jealousie and visiting the Fathers sinn upon the Children As if this were most proper to the false or Superstitious wayes of Worshipping the true God rather then to the having other Gods forbidden in the first As if God also were Jealous of none but such as were Marryed to him and had chosen him for their Husband But now wandred out in strange wayes of Worship which provokes his Jealousie and makes him visit more it may be then any other sinnes If it had been an Enemy I could easily bear it O but my Friend and my Familiar in my Bosome as the Lord may speak when his own Spouse dresseth her selfe in an Whorâ—sh Habit as it were inticing Strangers Which the Lord abhorreth more it may be then the grossest Idolatry of those that are Strangers Which is not so grievous as the Provocation of his Sonns and Daughters as Caesar also cryed What and thou my Sonn Brutus or his nerest Relations which perhaps also may be more properly called Haters of God in Hebrew Sone much akin to the Saxon English Name of Sonn rather then Strangers who have not knowledge enough to Love or Hate Him in a proper sence as those that by not walking in the light and love they have received come at length to be so guilty and full of slavish fear that they turn downright Rebbels and such Sonns as God commanded should be brought out to the Judges to be stoned for Rebellion Which is very neer perhaps if not the very sin against the Holy Ghost Or that presumptuous wickednesse which David so prayed against remembring that there was No Sacrifice for presumptuous Sinners but as the Epistle to the Hebrews speaketh A certain fearfull looking for of judgement and fiery indignation to devour the Rebbels As the Jews also had the Cutting off and the Hand of Heaven yea and that also they called the Rebels stroake But of All Images forbidden in the second Commandement as so much moving God to Iealousie Those which are most common and most dangerous as little taken notice of being most Spirituall or most Divelish are the Images we are so prone to make and mould of God by that within us which is therefore rightly called Imagination and the proper forge of Images which yet may reach farther higher and more inward then our sences or that which the Schooles call Imagination Worse much then Images made by hands which we are so long in Moulding and Carving that we blâ—sh to worship That we have sweat so much about and warmed our selves with part of But a deceived Heart makes us eate the very Excrements and ashes of those Images or Image-makers And as the great thing which brought the Flood was the evil Imagination of mans Heart continually So it is the great promise in many places of Scripture that his people should no more walk after the Imagination or the Image making or the Idols of their own foolish Hearts And it is the great Judgement and Punishment of those that when they knew God did not glorifie him as God nor were thankfull that they should become vain in their Imaginations or in Image making and their foolish hearts so darkened as to change the Glory of God into an Image or an Idol of their own fancies the most dangerous Idolatry And thus indeed they change the Image and glory of God in themselves to the Image of a Beast eating grass as Nebuchadnezar and it may be This is some emblem of worshipping the Beast or receiving that character which the Revelation saith All the World should do but those only whose names were written in the Lambs book of Life before the foundation of the World And That Beast or sensual beastly spirit may be more common than is thought And when man was made in the Image of God He was to Rule over all the Beasts or Beastly natures or spirits But now losing the Image of God and of man also he taketh the Image of a Beast and of The Beast so much spoken of in the Revelation But as Love was the foundation of the very Law also springing out of the Heart of God which is Love However it may now gender unto Bondage yet it rose from Love So it speaketh Love to the very worst of men as Saint Paul affirmeth till their Rebellion make them Outlaws and put them out of the Protection of that good Law which is given to them all saying to
Flood was such a Baptism to the Earth also As helped to wash away its Curss and Then God said in his Heart I will no more Or I will not yet add or go on to Curss the Earth for mans sake For or although all the mouldings of his heart be evil continually Which was the great reason brought for the Flood and yet now against it and the Curse or its continuance So gracious was God seeing the Flood also did not change mans heart but still left it as bad as it found it he resolved another Course and that he would Overcome Man with Kindness For it it was not only the Heathen Poet that told us Love would Conquer All Nor the Apostle only that Love covereth a multitude of sins but Solomon expressly saith Love covereth or shall cover as the Original expresseth All Transgressions Which St. Paul also Comments on Love beareth All believeth All hopeth All endureth All. Which was seen before in Davids that is Loves perfect Victory over All his Enemies Yea and Saul also which is the Grave and Hell to which David also alludeth perhaps in That very Psalm Crying the Kables of Hell laid hold of me Kable Seol I shall not digress Here to shew How the Flood it self was a Blessing also to the Earth and a Type of a greater Blessing to come When the skies shall pour down Righteousness and the Earth also shall bring forth Salvation When we shall receive the great showrs and the Latter Rain of the Spirit as we have received the Former little drops and first fruits of it hinted in divers places of Scripture For the whole Earth also must be full of the Knowledg of God as the Waters fill up the Sea and did once cover the Earth yea once and again But the Spirit also moved on the Waters and formed out the Heaven and the Earth so also it shall bring forth a new Heaven and a new Earth in which Righteousness shall dwell And in the Revelation the Earth also holped the woman and drunk up the Flood cast out of the Dragons mouth May it not also be about 1656 from Christs Resurrection or the New Creation as the Flood was so long after the Old Creation And That very Earth which God so cursed even This Cursed Earth must become the Blessed of the Lord. Yea so much his Darling That he resolveth to make it the very Centre of All his Glory and to fill it so with his glorious presence that the very Saints or Angels in Heaven rejoyced in the Revelation that they should come out of Heaven to reign upon the Earth Which is many times also hinted in the Psalms and All the Prophets to be compared with that most remarkable Discourse of God with Moses on Mount Sinai of the Lands enjoying her Sabboth of Rest in Leviticus And the very Song of Moses which is as the Bass to All following Prophesies concludeth with This He will be gracious to his Land as to his People or he will Cover or Atone or Expiate his Land Yea the very word by which God named the Earth which is one of the few things God Himself named and would not leave to Adams Naming as he did other things is such a word as might be also rendered I will delight or be pleased as if Here he meant to take his pleasure and delight rather than in All the Heavens Which must pass away as a Scroul of Parchment before the fire and They shall be no more being only as a Canopy or Curtains now to hide the Glory of God which must ere long fill the Earth which therefore shall Endure for ever and be never moved though renewed and filled both with Righteousness and Peace And God will come to keep his Sabboth of Rest and will delight on Earth and take his pleasure Here and Here also accept his People as himself seemeth sweetly to allude to the very Name Erets by which he named the Earth in the 40. verse of the 20. chapter of Ezekiel Where also This allusion is more sweet and fuller much in the Original than other Languages can well express Berets sam eretsem And in the 34. of the same Prophet he saith I will make them and the places about my Hill a Blessing I will cause the showr to come in his season there shall be showers of Blessing And the Tree of the field shall yield her fruit and the Earth even the whole Earth shall then yield her Increase Which we also read in the 67. 96 97 98 99. and divers other Psalms and in the second of Hosea and divers other Prophets And this Land of Canaan more Accursed than the whole Earth besides while it was held by those accursed Nations so devoted to destruction came to be the Pleasant Land the Holy Land the place of Gods Delight and Residence on which his Eyes and Heart were fixed All the Year And This also but as the First fruits of the Earth For it must All be Full of the glory of God And All Nations must worship him and All Kingdoms must be His. So it is prayed and promised in many places of Scripture Let All the Earth fear the Lord let all the Inhabitants of the World Reverence him For he looketh on them and fashioneth their hearts alike and his Eyes are on them that fear him and Hope in his Mercy All his Works are done in Truth He loveth Righteousness and Judgment All the Earth is full of his Goodness And the next Psalm is Davids Heart or Christs when driven out from Abimeleck the King my Father or the Father of the King he Changed his Habit c. And among other sweet Expressions That may be One When the Face of God is against the wicked to cut them off from Earth They Cry for so is the Original and the Lord heareth and delivereth them out of all their Trouble And again All the Ends of the World shall remember and Turn unto the Lord. And All Nations and Kindreds shall worship him Yea All Kings shall fall down before him and All Nations shall serve him For he shall deliver the Needy when he Cryeth the Poor also and Him that hath no Helper And again All Nations which thou hast made shall come and Worship before thee O Lord and glorifie thy Name And the reason is in the same Psalm For the Lord is Good and ready to forgive and plenteous in Mercy to all that call upon him O sing unto the Lord a New Song which is cited also in the Revelation Sing unto the Lord All the Earth Fear before him All the Earth Say among the Heathen the Lord Reigneth and the whole World shall be Established that it thall not be moved Let the Heavens rejoyce and let the Earth be glad Let the Sea Dance and Rowl with All the Fulness thereof which hereafter we may understand Let the Field be Joyful and All in it Yea Then shall all the Trees of the Wood rejoyce before the
are by Thee Thou shalt not press him with Usury or be as an Userer to him nor any way Hard for if he Cry unto me I will Hear for I am Gratious and will God Hear when we cry of a man oppressing or pressing us and will he not hear us against the Devil also and our spiritual pressors or Oppressors seeing he Fxecutes Judgement for All that are Oppressed And His Word is as pure silver seven times refined from Earth sweetly applyed to this very thing If thou meet thine Enemies Ox or Ass going astray and in another place This Enemy is called a Brother which may shew us how far that Phrase of Brother or Neighbour reacheth even to an Enemy and One that Hateth us As also Christ sheweth us in his Parable of the good Samaritan and divers other places Where he tells us 't is â—a little Love to love a Friend or one that is like us or friendly to us Thankful and Kinde which even sinners and Hypocrites use to do in Their Love But his Children and Servants and himself also must love Enemies and such as hate backbite blasphem and offer all despite unkind and unthankful and all this that they may be like their Heavenly Father Who with love of delight and complacence loveth only himself and his own Image but with pitty and compassion which may be a better or a kinder kind of love he loveth and is kind and Merciful to his very enemies and those that are unlike him froward and unthankful Yea to their very Ox and Asses also even as the Law here bids in Exodus If thou meet thine Enemies Ox or Asse going astray thou shalt surely bring it back to him again If the see the Asse of him that hateth thee lying under his Burthen Thou shalt surely leave thy businesse or lay aside thy Garments to help him up or help with him Which may be improved much in our addresses to Christ. For we may justly tell him Our poor souls are as the very Asses of his Enemies and those that hate him nay yet worse as the wild Asses Colt as the Scripture expresseth it and that is more unserviceable then the Ox or Asse or other beast of burthen is I am Behemoth with thee as the psalmist expresseth it But though I stray yet Thou hast put thy self under That Law which bids us help a straying Beast and much more when he lies under an heavy Burthen under which he cannot stir much lesse come to Thee as thou callest All that are heavy laden Now sherefore shew thy pitty and compassion to the poor Asse or the poor soul the bruitish Heart of him that is thy Enemy and Hateth Thee And I know one that said He never received a more sweet and kind return from our Saviour then when in great anguish of spirit he bowed unto him crying onely This Now shew thy kindness to thy Poor Enemy the Kindnesse thou hast spoken of to a Poor Enemy which is now at thy foot and mercy whom thou hast taken captive with thy Sword and thy Bow and while I am speaking Thus I think also of That spoken by the Prophet to the King of Israel when he had so many of his Enemies at his Mercy in the midst of his great City Shall I smite them my Father shall I smite them and the Prophet answered No by no means wilt thou smite them thou hast taken captive with thy sword and thy bow give them to eat and drink and let them go and he prepared great provision for them and sent them away so overcome with this Kindnesse that they could hardly be drawn to come any more as Enemies against the King of Israel who was so Merciful a Prince And Mercy doth preserve and establish a Kings Throne more then any thing in the World as Solomon shews and David also in divers places and so it doth and still shall establish Christs Throne also Which is a white Throne even when he cometh to Judgement and Mercy shall still go before him and be the stability of his Throne and Kingdom and blessed be they that hear and know and believe that joyful sound which is sweeter then all the Trumpets or the Bells about the fringe of Aarons Garment Which yet had a better Ornament even that sweet perfume of the Good Oyntment a meek and quiet spirit as Saint Peter expresseth it and the Psalmist compareth it to Love which with God is of great value and it drencht his beard throughout even Aarons Beard which was yet but an Excrement and often to be cut away and ran down through all his Garments even to the seams and fringes also round about And as if God had not yet enough provided for the Poor through all the Laws in Exodus and Leviticus He repeateth and addeth in Deuteronomy Thou shalt not harden thy Heart or shut thy hand from thy Poor brother As if all shutting of hands came from Hardnesse of Heart and that This also was mainly or onely against a poor man But thou shalt open thy hand wide and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need in That which he wanteth Beware there be not a word or thought in thy wicked heart saying the seventh year the year of Release is at hand and thy eye be evil against thy poor brother and thou givest him Nought and he cry unto the Lord against thee and it be Sin unto Thee Thou shalt surely give him which before was lend him but at or near the year of Release it was a gift because to be forgiven then and Thy Heart shall not be grieved when thou givest to him a most sweet Command and Promise because that for This thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in All thy Works and in All that thou puttest thy hand unto VVhich is the great promise to the Reading and Observing of the whole Law so that love and pitty to our poor Neighbour is rewarded as keeping of the whole Law As Daniel also to Nebuchadnezar even when the decree was made against him I councel thee to break off thy sins by justice and by shewing Pity to the poor And when the people asked John the Baptist What shall we do He said nothing but Pity the poor And so our Savior also to the wicked Pharisees Give Alms of all you have and All things shall be clean to you And lest All This might yet be too little or too narrow because it begun with a Poor Brother It concludes as general as well can be expressed Thou shalt open thy hand wide unto thy Brother to thy Poor and thy Needy in the Land Which Phrase is remembred to Christ several times in the Psalms crying Thy Poor and Thy Needy and forget not the Congregation of Thy Poor c. Where it is also Kite as the English sound the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Kite or Knite the Beast or Beasts of thy Poor As alluding to the Oxe or Ass or wild Asses Colt