again by St. James chap. 5.12 Above all things my Brethren swear not c. least ye fall into condemnation Swear not as for the former reasons so also for the surer avoiding perjury a great and dangerous sin a sin not only as other sins inheriting but also mocking Gods vengeance § 268 Having said this of the reverence we ought to bear towards God and also all his creatures in matter of Oaths and of the simplicity and innocency and moderation that ought to be of our words in all our Conversation and the prudent art of avoiding perjury by not swearing at all he proceeds to some other precepts regarding our carriage to our neighbour that was also much misinterpreted by the Pharisees and transgressed in Common practice That herein whereas it hath bin said formerly Exod. 21.24 Deut. 19.19 21. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth they should not take any such revenge or call for justice and satisfaction for the injuries or losses done to them but if they would be perfect remit and pardon them and to any evil done them make no resistance at least in smaller wrongs and damages a cuff on the ear losing a coat going a mile or two bearing opprobrious words c. or where the publick good was not concerned or their own absolute necessities That if any one should smite them on the one cheek they should out of the amity they bear him and love to peace rather turn the other than make a quarrel and strike again And the same behaviour here seems to be commended by our Lord in words which is in actions that in opprobrious language discourses disputes we should not make to them any replyes where these probably effectless and which may rather offend than edify expressed in this Sermon in his warning us not to cast our precious things before those who for them will only be more enraged against and sooner fall upon us and a lesson himself so eminently practised before his passion Propter te sustinui opprobrium Psal 68.7 And Like a Lamb dumb before his shearer So if one takes away their cloak they should give him their coat also Act. 8.32 forc't to go a mile in another employments go with them twain So any taking away by violence their goods not require them again of him at least when they can any way spare them rather than break friendship or make a quarrel for any of these things or go to law That also they should freely lend to every one not only friends or kindred that would borrow tho he not able to repay it and give to him that asked supposed necessitous though he never able to repay it Deut. 24.12 § 269 All these Lessons I say our Lord proposed though not as in all cases a Christians duty yet as a Christians greater perfection and this way far more beneficial to us than practising the Contrary though the Contrary may be done without any guilt whilst thus we preserve a firm peace and tranquillity in our mind by a little suffering when resistance and contention hardly can be without some degree of hatred toward our brother and desire of revenge Again thus many times we gain over our brother Mat. 18.15 and convert him to us and receive voluntarily from him by such our condescention that amends which we could not by contending at least we are recompensed abundantly by God for what we have with such an holy intention suffered from them Lastly all these are Heroical practises of Humility and do shew a true contempt of these temporal things not thought worthy our strife and a desire in us of sufferings in Conformity to our Lord and therefore such things by a right eye are looked upon as favours to be embraced when ever offered § 270 In the same matter also our Lord presseth further that they should not only patiently and without any revindication suffer evil from men but also inwardly love those who did it to them and again out of this Love do all good to those from whom they received such evil That indeed it had bin said among them formerly that they should love their Neighbour and hate their enemy See Luk. 10.29 the Lawyer harping upon it who to justify himself in this point asked who was his Neighbour and our Lord to instruct him herein instanced in one professed enemy shewing mercy on another a Samaritan on a Jew And perhaps the Pharisees and people were induced to such a perswasion from Gods commanding them to cut off the Nations who were by him sentenced to such a destruction that the severity thereof might be a warning to themselves if in like manner offending But herein the Israelites indeed were only Executioners of Divine justice and express Commands and without doubt ought to have done this thing with all pitty and without any hate toward these miserables or any men whatever or any other of Gods creatures who are all to be loved for his sake And the law plainly taught and the Saints under it practised the contrary to this Pharisaical corruption See Exod. 23.4 Job 31.29 Psal 7.4 35.14 Prov. 24 17.-25.21 quoted by S. Paul Rom. 12. If thine enemy hunger give him bread doubtless in the first place to gain our enemy to us as Mat. 18.15 though if not gained the issue would be heaping more wrath upon him but this contrary to our intention Our Lord therefore informs them that their enemies also without any distinction were to be reckoned amongst their Neighbours and so they were also to love them as themselves do good to those that hated them bless those that cursed which thing was punctually practised afterwards by these his disciples Being reviled we bless being defamed we intreat being persecuted we suffer it and resist not 1 Cor. 4.12 13. and that they should pray for those that despitefully use and persecute them as our Lord did on the Cross and St. Stephen in his lapidation For that if they loved only the lovers of them did good gave or lent mony to those returning to them again the like favours what extraordinary thanks or reward could they expect from God for this usual amongst the worst of men Publicans and Heathens but for doing this to others where nature so much relucts their reward should be great and they truely the children of the most high and much resembling him herein who every day makes his Sun to rise upon and his raine to descend for the unjust and his enemies and is kind unto the unthankful and evil and is the great reconciler of and peace-maker in the world and of peace-makers he said before that they shall specially be called his children § 271 Lastly for these matters he gave them this general rule that all things not that others should do but that they would that others should do to them that they should do to others For this was the summ of what the laws enjoyned as to our Neighbour Further to enforce
a spiritual Kingdom and therefore that he was to come in a sutable dress not in pomp and state but in all self-denial and humility § 21 Joseph awaked yeilded a ready and undisputing belief to these things so incredible and new and saith the Scripture presently did as the Angel had bidden him and took the Blessed Virgin to perpetual cohabitation with him and sheltered her Honour And surely this Angel's apparition and that which he said was now enough to deter Joseph from ever approaching this Holy Virgins bed and to make him treat her ever after with that reverence and modesty which her Sacred person required As likewise the near neighbourhood and presence of this holy child must needs inspire his sanctified Soul with the same heavenly love to single life and with the same chastity and purity of thoughts which was in his Spouse and which many married persons tho much inferior to these Saints have bin endowed with since by the power of the same Holy Spirit long cohabiting without touching one another Thus therefore we may imagine these two lived together afterward in our Saviours family enjoying now a Spiritual union much more delicious then any carnal and doing all conjugal duties for the breeding up of their little Infant without tasting any of the fleshly pleasures thereof Meanwhile how many joyes at once ravisht this poor mans heart at his awaking who went to bed loaden with so much greif joyes for the coming of the Messias whom all men had so long expected for the Virgins innocency and honour one so nearly linked to him and loved by him for his being chosen so mean a man amongst all the progeny of David to be Guardian to Her and her Holy child How well he was now rewarded for his discreet proceeding and patience in not seeking presently publick revenge or satisfaction for his suppos'd violated Bed and again how great consolation the Virgin now received for her past affrights secured for ever under the protection of an husband from the obloquies of the wicked I leave you to meditate by your-self whilst I proceed § 22 And now this Blessed couple live securely and peaceably together at Nazareth providing as well as their mean condition to the uttermost was able for the conveniencies and decency if net the state of the approaching birth of this great Prince Abrahams promised seed in whom all Nations should be blessed and Davids Son who should sit on his Throne for ever without any successor And this small town of Nazareth so far remote from the Relations of David seem'd also specially chosen by the Almighty for the more privat birth and education of his Son wherein he might best ly hid and disguised till his manifestation to Israel But meanwhile the Prophecy and that a noted one see Joh. 7.41 strictly required that this Son of David should be born in no other place then Bethleem the Town of David where he also was born And the very name of this Town Viz. the house of Bread as also Ephrata fruitfulness or plenty was also of old ordained with relation to this childs birth there because the world should thence at the appointed time receive this bread of life and God out of it would bring forth him who should feed his people Israel as the Evangelist seems to allude Mat. 2. ◠And at this very place also or close by it see Gen. 35.19 the fair and beloved Rachel's painful birth and that in a journey of a Son who was called her Benoni but Jacobs Benjamin who was Jacobs only Son that was born in the blessed land of Canaan and whom his Father tho so dearly beloved was afterward forced to part with for the redeeming of his Brethren out of their prison in Egypt was promised two thousand years before for a type of the much-suffering travel of the Blessed Virgin which should be in the same place and for a type of this Son which she should there bring forth who was Her Benoni also see Luk. 2.35 but his Fathers Ben-jamin Whom tho he was much dearlier beloved then Jacobs Benjamin yet God his Father not importuned unwillingly gave up but unasked freely offered to suffer far greater hardships then the other Benjamin was exposed to for the redemption of his brethren and for the bringing home of many more sons unto this his Father Whom also after these his sufferings as a Benoni he took and set at his right hand for ever and so made him a Ben-jamin This therefore and no other place was preappointed for the Nativity of this Benjamin the Anti-type of the other And likewise because the eternal wisdom of God would have his Son from and I may say also in the womb to undergo the hardest condition which mortals are subject to and to descend in his exinanition so far below other men as in his honour and Majestie he was above them that in all things even in sufferings as well as in glory he might have the preeminence Therefore he would not indulge the Mother so much rest nor her Son so convenient a birth-place as their poor house at Nazareth But he who had suffered before a long journy forward and backward above one hundred and forty miles into the Mountainous country of Judah must now be carried another near as far to Bethleem before his Birth And this also that we may not think he was remov'd to get honour by his birth-place was but a small and poor Town and saving its relation to David and Christ of no greater account in Judea then Nazareth in Galilee as appears by the Prophet Micah 5.2 And thou Bethleem tho little among the thousands of Judah c. § 23 And to bring this about and that at such a moment of time as might most distress these beloved Servants of his God sendeth not now an Angel to Joseph or Mary to signifie to them to remove thither betimes before the approach of Winter and ere the Mother by her gravidity might be more unfit for travel or for providing for themselves there early a convenient lodging But according to his boundless fore-sight and providence he derives the cause of this removal as far off as Rome That his Son thus early might begin to practice obedience and subjection not only to his good pleasure but to the beck and command of earthly Princes he layes his design in the Vain-glorious Head of an heathen Emperor that he should devise an Edict such as formerly had not bin that all the world the subjects of his now all-peaceful Empire should be enrolled and amongst the rest that the Jews should be enrolled according to their Tribes in the Mother-cities thereof Amongst which Bethleem tho a poor place was the mother City of the Tribe of Judah and of David as Jerusalem was of Benjamin And then that this enrolling at Bethleem should be just at such a time as the Blessed Virgin was ready to ly down at which time there should be such a concourse of
person our Lord appeared also in great beauty and Majesty and like himself that this was his beloved Son Mat. 17. in whom he was well pleased And this then added to it that after Moses and Elias the law and the Prophets vanished they should in the last place hear him for which purpose viz. their hearing and obeying this Lord also was this voice made unto the people here at Jordan Again a third time when the same our Lord a little before his Passion was in great desolation and desired to be delivered from the approaching paines of death Jo. 12.27 but then afterwards resigning his natural will as in the Garden prayed that his Father would not spare him but glorifie his name Viz. in our Lords passing through all those bitter sufferings preappointed for him his Heavenly Father himself vouchsafed with a voice from heaven to answer his Praier telling him he would glorifie his name yet again Viz. in the admirable Resurrection and Ascension of his Son as he had done already viz. in his glorious Miracles where also our Lord told the people concerning this voice from heaven that it came not for his sake or satisfaction who alwaies knew his Fathers will concerning and Love to him and the glory he had and ever was to enjoy with and from him not for his sake I say but for theirs that they acknowledging this glory the Father both had and would bestow upon his Son should accordingly honour and obey him As also now at his Baptism the visible descent of the Holy Ghost was for the peoples-sake that they might hereby know that he who was full of the Holy Ghost as much before as after this visible descent thereof had it in his power by baptism to confer on others § 142 Often therefore also doth he mind the people for their admittance and believing on him of this his Fathers bearing witness to him Of his Fathers sending him and Sanctifying him see John 8.18 54. 5.32 37. 10.36 which relates as to his Fathers testimony of him by Miracles so doubtless to this signal one received before the beginning of his Ministry at his Baptism and to his Sanctification at this time by the visible appearance of the Holy Ghost sitting on him And this very manifestation thus of our Lord to Israel the Baptist names as one of the ends of his own coming and Baptizing Jo. 1.31 And most congruous also it seems that our Lord's Institution of conferring Baptism for ever being in the name of the Blessed Trinity Father Son and Holy Ghost all these should first after this manner manifest themselves in his own Baptism Which Vnction of his with the Spirit foretold by Esaias chap. 61.1 our Lord also in his Sermon Luk. 4.18 openly applies to himself And this was the first Scripture he as it were casually opened at to explain it to his own country men at Nazareth § 143 After this Testimony given to God the Son by God the Father and God the Holy Ghost at his Baptism in the midst of the admiration and expectation of John and the people beholding him our Lord in the Vehemency of the same Spirit which alwaies remaining in him in the same plenitude and not given by measure yet acted more or less in his Humanity as occasion was offered suddainly departed out of their sight and went speedily toward the Desart from whence John formerly appeared Immediatly saith S. Mark the Spirit drave him into the Wilderness And such Rapts of the Holy Spirit have bin formerly seen in Elias see 1 King 18.12 2 King 2.16 and others Act. 8.39 with an elevation of their bodies also into the Air tho probably not so here of our Lords By wilderness also is here meant the most desolate invious and unfrequented recesses thereof Where were the dens latebrae of wild beasts for their safety for the Evangelist saith he was there with the wild beasts whence we may conjecture John Baptist's Desart also to have bin such however some would mitigate it Where also we may say is the most ordinary dwelling and haunt here on Earth of evil Spirits not so much by their choice though in some respect they hate the places frequented by men and where is some greater appearance of Devotion and of Gods service and worship as from their Condemnation and the Divine restraint See Mat. 12.43 the evil Spirit when having lost his possession of the man his walking in drie or barren and desolate places and Mark 5.3 their haunting the Tombs and Esai 13.21 and 34.14 the Satyrs dancing in such places and Apocal. 18.2 Desolate Babylon becoming the Habitation of Devils To which may be added the experience of Hermits that inhabiting Desarts are more molested with them and here also our Lord met and had his chief combat with the Devil § 144 Into this solitude then our Lord retired after his being anointed with the Holy Ghost and now shortly to enter upon his Ministry retired as we see with great fervency of Spirit to fulfil his Fathers will i. e. the foreseen great Mortifications he was there to undergo no way remitting but advancing this holy impetuosity And here he remained and separated himself during forty daies This being the round number used for 7. sixes of daies or 6. multiplied 7. times and a number in Scripture most frequently prescribed by God according to his Creation of the world in six daies for the dispatch of any great work labour or sufferings Of which may be given very many instances if this would not too much divert the Reader See Gen. 7.4.17 Ezec. 4.6 Jonah 3.4 Gen. 6.3 thrice forty years Deut. 8.2 Gen. 15.13 ten times 40. Judg. 13.1 Apoc. 2 3. and about so many months was the time of our Lords preaching See before § For this time then he sequestred himself to be vacant without admitting the distraction of any human converse or secular business and with those advantages that bodily fasting gives to the operations of the Soul for supplication and praier for the solemn preparation for that high service and ministry he was now entring upon and designed-to and again for the making a more solemn oblation of himself to his Father as to the most voluntary undertaking of all those hardships and sufferings that were set before him and that were desired by him in all these the more to glorifie his name Now though our Lord for such a more intimate conversation with God and perfect Contemplation needed not to use such exteriour means as retirement and abstinence from food and dismission from other Emploiments by reason of the supernatural perfections which from his Deity and plenitude of the Spirit were infused and refunded into his human Nature Yet as Suarez observes In 3. Thom 2. Tom. Disp 2◠§. 1. Per cognitionem anima naturalem non poterat sine speciali miraculo multa simul perfecte considerare neque per operationem phantasiae simul comitari operationem intellectus si circa
16. chap. saying Rabbi thou art the Son of God for so the Baptist also before had several times stiled him thou art the King of Israel that hath bin so long expected by this Nation § 171 Our Lord upon Nathaniels mentioning his Kingship answered that they should hereafter see much greater Confirmation of this their faith and that the time should be when they should behold the Heavens opened and Angels ascending and descending upon the Son of man for so our Lord usually out of humility shall I say or rather a strong love to his Creature man stiled himself ascending and descending upon him as he being alwaies in Heaven as well as on Earth and the sole Mediator between Earth and Heaven who also only had traffick with Heaven and knew all his Fathers secrets there and again when they should see infinite numbers of them attending on him in his appearing at the last day in the full Glory of that his Kingdom which Nathaniel now confessed alluding in all this to the Honour that was done to their fore-father Jacob after his lying in the field alone so desolate and forsaken As also but a little before when our Lord was in the Desart the Angels had descended and ministred unto him In the same manner after this when his Judges asked concerning his being the Son of God he answered them that hereafter they should see the Son of Man coming in the Clouds of Heaven i. e Clouds of Angels flying and waving about him Mat. 26.64 Jo. 6.58 62. And elsewhere some of his followers wondring at his speech of his feeding them with bread which came down from Heaven What and if saith he ye shall see the Son of man ascend up into Heaven where he was before And so his young Schollar Nicodemus wondring at his Sermon of mans being born again of the spirit he tells him of things of greater wonder Viz. of the Son of Mans ascending up into Heaven again as he had descended from Heaven Jo. 3.9 44. and also was then in Heaven § 172 Thus our Lord often represented to his Disciples and others his future Glory his Resurrection Ascension Coming in great Majesty to Judgment and that their faith in him might not languish from the mean appearance of things present And also this suddain and resolute Confession of Nathaniel who but now disputed the matter must needs be a great corroboration and consolation to the four former Discipies gathered to our Lord. All these five being persons of much zeal and piety tho most of them not wealthy had left their daily imployments and trade for a season to come and hear the Sermons of John receive as his penitents baptism from him and some of them at least were admitted into some more familiar acquaintance with him and by this had more notice of our Lord and God looking upon such their sincerity conferred on them the honour after thus prepared by John to be the first Disciples and Attendants on his Son § 173 In this our Lords journey into Galilee he arrived at Cana Nathaniels Town not far distant from Nazareth and about a daies journey from Capernaum as may be gathered from Jo. 4.47 compared with vers 52. which Cana also our Lord took in his way in the second journey he made from Jerusalem into Galilee See John 4.46 Now so it fell out that on this day he came thither was solemnized a Marriage and hither also were assembled our Lords Mother and his Brethren invited to this wedding probably of some of their near kindred the care our Lords Mother had concerning the Wine and her colloquy with the Servants shewing she had some particular interest therein Hither therefore our Lord coming with his new chosen Disciples they were also invited to the marriage And all this seems punctually so ordered by the Divine Providence that whereas our Lord had led his former life so obscurely Now the dignity of his person and Mission from Heaven and his Father there might be manifested in the first place to these his nearer Relations according to the flesh for the rectifying any their former misapprehensions and their believing on this common Saviour and being made partakers of so great a joy and that also his inauguration into and entrance upon his Office might be celebrated with a festival and this marriage signify that which he was one day to consummate with his Spouse the Church and therefore is he very Emphatically by the Baptist stiled the Bridegroome on whom himself attended Jo. 3.29 that whereas John came with fasting he might enter upon his Office with a feast and the children of the Bride-chamber rejoyce with him therefore also his Miracle here was corresponding changing water and penance into Wine and mirth answerable to Johns baptizing with water and he with the Holy Spirit § 174 To give an occasion to our Lord's first Miracle whereby in this publick meeting he was to manifest who he was whether by the multitude of Guests more than were expected among which was our Lord and his company or by some other disappointment for there being a Governor of the feast besides the Bridegroom and a good attendance of Servants and Wine supplyed in so great a quantity for the Guests are signs that that the Married were no very poor or mean persons it happened so that at the end of the feast there wanted Wine Our Lords Mother perceiving it and solicitous of their credit to whom she had so near relation presently told our Lord of it expecting he should relieve them herein either from his doing formerly some such domestick and private miracles upon some necessity in his youth at Nazareth or from the Holy Virgin 's having some prerevelation concerning this future fact By our Lords reply we may conjecture that this was spoken by his Mother before some of his Disciples or Kindred and perhaps in the midst of some Discourse when as our Blessed Lady imagined some urgent necessity thereof Hereupon our Lord for their Edification returned this answer to her What is it to me and thee woman in this matter my Hour or time is not yet Signifying his already well fore-knowing by his omniscience this want or wine and the due time of supplying it and that he was not to be sweyed in his actions by any human relations or respects how near soever but must act all things only according to the will of his Heavenly Father And thus frequently he takes occasion to Vindicate his Divinity and heavenly Original to beget early in his followers a right apprehension of his person and authority and omniscient conduct Some such answer as here he gives also to his Kindred Jo. 7.6 when they minding him of going up to Jerusalem at the feast and shewing his strange works there saying my time is not yet come So after his desputing with the Doctors he answered his Mother when she told him that they had sought him sorrowing why did they so since he was
baptism and to whom his commendation and testimony had procured so much reputation for which they thought he should have had the more respect for John fell on Baptizing also and gathering Disciples and that all people repaired unto him they meanwhile making no mention also of his miracles § 190 To whom the humble Baptist as one over-joyed to hear this news to allay their murmurings answers on this manner and took this occasion to make them a Sermon on this subject the last of his that the Gospel mentions wherein he first told them that no man could advance himself any higher than he had received favours from above to be Jo. 19.11 that they themselves could witness the witness which he had alwaies born to our Lord and how he taught that himself was not the Christ but one sent before to make way for him as a paranymphus to go before him that this indeed was the true Bridegroome of the Church and himself only the Bridegroomes friend who rejoyceth in seeing the Bridegroomes caressing of his Bride and in hearing all the sweet and gracious words he speaks to her and in her amorously gathering and adhering to and panting after him and that in this now his joy was compleated That himself was to decrease and cease this his office after a little time but not so the other but his Kingdom to be dilated and encreased more and more that he being an earthly man could of himself speak only low and earthly things to them but that this was the Son of God to whom his Father gave not the Spirit by measure as to others Col. 2.3 1.19 1 Cor. 12.11 1 Pet. 4.10 Jo. 5.19 20 30. Apoc. 1.1 but that he perfectly knew all his Fathers secrets and was now descended from him and from Heaven to reveal to the world what he had there heard and seen 1 Jo. 5.10 and that whosoever believed his words only set his seal to the truths of God but yet that many were so hard-hearted as not to receive his Testimony finally that God loveth this his Son and hath given all things especially touching mans salvation into his hands and that the whole world being sinners and lâ—ing under the wrath of God he came hither that so many as believed on him should not perish but have remission of their sin and eternal life Jo. 17.2 3. but for those who did not so Gal. 3.10 the wrath of God still remained upon them § 191 Much mitigated and lenifyed with this Sermon somewhat contrary to their expectation Johns Disciples acquiesced in their Masters Testimony Nor had any more contention in this matter But yet after this some scruples and controversy we find made by them concerning our Lords Disciples their non-observing some solemn times or hours of falling as they and those reputed the holyest persons among the Jews the Pharisees did they not knowing that our Lord the Bridegroomes Gracious presence and Virtue supplied to these his attendants all proficience in spiritual matters without the usual preparations and helps belonging thereto By which we see how prone men are even in spiritual things to partiality and siding and factions effects of some relicks of self-self-love in those who seem most perfect And lastly John after he was imprisoned thought fit to send some of them to our Lord himself to see and so report to the rest his great works for the more confirming their faith of his being the Messias § 192 The Baptist meanwhile a burning and shining light as our Lord calls him continued his preaching in the coast of Galilee not to draw men from but to send them in faster to the Saviour of the world Nor had he long remained in those parts nearer the Kesidence of Herod but that He being though an Idumean by his descent yet a Proselite of the Jews Religion and hearing of his same esteemed by all the people as a Prophet Mat. 21 26. 14 5. either came to his Sermons in the place where John taught and Baptized or which is more probable sent for him to his Court. Of whom the Evangelist further saith Mark 6.20 that he feared John knowing him to be a just and Holy man and that he heard him gladly and did many things according to his advice and directions § 193 Now Herod having bin very faulty in his manners and Government for our Lord calls him a Fox and at last he was for his crimes ejected out of it by the Emperour and died in Banishment the Baptist having access to him and being a preacher of penance and doubtless illuminated by the Holy Spirit to know those affairs and faults of his with which his Education in the Desart could have bin little acquainted freely reproved him for his many evil deeds and among other for his taking his Brother Philips wife contrary to Gods express command Levit. 18.16 20 21. and that whether his Brother were alive or deceased for that his Brother had had a child by her the Daughter that danced so well before Herod And in this thing Herod was still the more guilty because he had already a former wife the Daughter of Aretas King of Arabia whom in his falling in love with Herodias upon a new compact made with her he put away and so provoked Aretas in revenge of his Daughter to make war upon him wherein he was deservedly very unfortunate Josephus imputes the cause of such his ill success Antiq. Judaic l. 18. c. 10. chiefly to his slaughter of the Baptist but however this war happened very opportunely for affording Herod less leasure to look after the motions of our Lord or giving any disturbance to them But returning to the Baptists reproof we find by the words in the Text It is not lawful for thee c. that this was not spoken of Herod in his absence but made to himself whether publickly or in private or the one after the other both being lawful according to several circumstances and the former sometimes necessary 1 Tim. 1 20. is uncertain § 194 This reproof of Herod for marrying her soon came to the ears of Herodias who perceiving Herods good inclinations to John and his obsequiousness in several matters to follow his Admonitions from which she might have some fears of her being removed from his bed and so the troubles of the war also with Aretas declined was fill'd with an implacable wrath and hatred against the Baptist Who coming in the Spirit of Elias and shewing the same zeal tor observance of Gods laws to Herod as the other to Ahab found a like persecution from her as Elias from Jezabel when as the two Husbands were more indulgent Herod overcome with her importunity and the power she had over Him sent his officers and took John and bound him Matt. 14.3 saith S. Matthew and cast him into prison For which imprisonment he wanted not a more specious pretence of fearing from the concourse of people made to him some sedition and tumults
take up his bed and walk Upon which the impotent man was instantly cured and carrying his bed on the Sabbath was presently questioned by the Jews probably these inquirers being either the Pharisees great zelots for the Sabbath or some of their Disciples for the breach of it in so doing who answered them that he was bid to do so by the person that cured him But our Lord there being a throng of people in the place he presently conveyed himself away and returned into the Temple All which occasioned the cure to be more taken notice of and the person looked after that had done it nor could the poor man give any account of him But a little after he repairing also to the Temple probably there to render more solemn thanks to God for his cure Our Lord now discovers himself to him and minding him of the mercy he had received exhorted him to amendment of life least a worse thing yet should happen unto him in die irae if not in this Rom. 2.4 5. yet after this life § 245 The man after he had paid his due adoration and thanks hasted to the former busy enquirers after the Author of his cure and told them it was Jesus doubtless thinking he should advance his honour and esteem with them thereby But it happened much otherwise for instead of this they sought his death for his own breaking in doing this cure and causing the other man also to break the Sabbath Our Lord then questioned by them concerning it as he was often for the like and made them great variety of answers and defences for it by which they were still silenced at this time answers them as absolute Lord of the Sabbath that he was to do the works for which God his Father had sent him among which was restoring the lame giving sight to the blind c. Mat. 11.5 whether this were on Sabbath or week daies or whoever should suffer scandal thereat But his answer now again was made by them worse than his fault collecting hence an higher accusation for destroying him because faith the Text he not only hath broken the Sababth Jo. 5.18 but said also that God was his Father and made himself equal with God which equality had the Jews miscollected from our Lords words as the Arrians say they did probably our Lord or the Evangelist would have reflected on it § 246 But our Lord well knowing his time not yet come of being delivered into their hands with the same undaunted courage and infinite charity and zeal after their salvation prosecuted his former discourse and took this opportunity to declare to them plainly and fully who he was his Union and intimacy with God his Father and why he was sent by and from him into the world and with what authority and power that all might provide for their Salvation by the believing in and the honouring of him as they did the Father See his Sermon made to them Jo. 5. The chief Contents whereof were these That in nothing he sought his own will our Lord having the same natural affections as other men but these in all things subjected to the Divine good pleasure and disposal but the will of his Father That he did nothing of himself but what he saw his Father do and that as he heard of him so he judged that all judgment also was by the Father committed into his hands see the like Mat. 11.27 Jo. 3.35 and the power of doing whatever the Father doth That every one who heard his words and believed that God had sent him should not come into condemnation .i. e. for his former sins now remitted in him but was passed from death to life speaking of death and life spiritual and eternal and of their regeneration thereto by the Spirit See 1 Jo. 3.14 that they who marvelled now so much at the present works he did namely in curing of diseases c. should yet hereafter see far greater from him namely upon the hearing of his voice by the Archangel all that are in their graves coming forth and receiving from him their final doome the good to the resurrection of life the evil to the resurrection of damnation the like things of his hereafter coming in the clouds c. he told to them before his passion Mat. 26.64 and to Nathanael Jo. 1.51 Angels waiting upon him and going hither and thither as he sent them that therefore it was the Fathers pleasure that all should believe in and do honour unto the Son as they did to the Father whose words and actions were the same and they saw and heard God the Father in the Son And concerning his being such a person and the words he spake to them Truth that they had an abundant testimony though considering his person his own was sufficient Jo. 8.14 16. First from his Father 1 both that which he gave them from heaven concerning him at his Baptism the like to which was done twice afterwards at our Lords tranfiguration before three witnesses Mat. 17.5 which is mentioned again by S. Peter 2 Epis 1.16 17. and at his solemn entrance into Jerusalem before his passion God the Father then from heaven speaking to him Jo. 12.20 23. perhaps for a testimony also to the Greeks or Gentiles see Jo. 7.35 who then first admitted by the Apostles came to worship and to make their humble addresses to him which foresignifyed salvation to be shortly after communicated to them by his now approaching death And a-again 2ly that testimony which his Father gave to him in the Miracles which he wrought by him which testimony he frequently urgeth See Jo. 10.25 38. 15.24 2ly A Testimony from John the Baptist though having that of God he needed not that of men which John was sent before him amongst them as a burning and shining light till the time he was to be eclipsed and silenced and they some of them at least were willing for a season to rejoyce in his light 3ly Testimony also from the Scriptures in which they thought were contained the way to eternal life which Scriptures had they duly searched they might have found them abundantly witnessing of him Lastly testimony from their lawgiver Moses in whom they had so much confidence who also spake clearly of him Jo. 1.45 Deut. 18.15.18 where upon petitioning that they might not hear again the voice of God nor see that terrible fire c he tells them that God would raise them up a Prophet like unto him and would put his own words into his mouth c and to him they should hearken whose words would sufficiently accuse unto God his Father their infidelity though our Lord should hold his peace But that notwithstanding such witness and evidences they would not believe because they had not the love of God in them nor as our Lord did sought the honour that only cometh from him through whatever worldly disesteem but was envious ambitious which shews he spake chiefly to the Pharisees and
to every tittle that the Body of heaven and earth was after a certain time to vanish and pass away but no so one letter of Gods word Again that for the moral commandements and precepts of the Law much less came he to give any relaxation to mens former obedience thereto but to exact the observance of them to the least iota having procured for them from his Father the Holy Spirit for enabling them also to such observance and that he who did not endeavour to keep those that were slighted and accounted the least of these Commandements some of which he mentions below vers 22 28 34 39. not being angry not lusting in our heart not swearing at all c. not rendring evil for evil c. as well as those thought greater could not reach Heaven or eternal happiness In prosecution of which our Lord began to expound to them the true meaning and just extent of several of these Laws corrupted by the former glosses of the Pharisees and human Tradition That the precept of not killing or committing murder extended not only to not taking away our Neighbours life but to any reproaching or vilifying them by words as calling him silly or a fool which said without cause and in malice toward him incurreth not the sentence of a Civil Judg to some corporal punishment or also death in these lesser Courts in the several Cities or that greater at Jerusalem but even of damnation to hell-fire again extendeth also to any anger or disaffection against him in our heart Therefore that before they brought any Sacrifice offering or gift or made any addresses to God concerning themselves or implored his pardon of their faults or any his favours to them they should call to remembrance if there were any displeasure or disgust between them and their neighbour and should presently procure a reconciliation with him especially if such neighbour have any just quarrel against them on the former account that thus they might wisely prevent their neighbours complaints to God the Supreme Judg of all Whose exact justice upon such wrong done would certainly cast them into prison and before any releasment require of them the uttermost farthing if they were not diligent thus before hand and whist they have opportunity in this life to make their composition and peace with him § 266 Our Lord having said this in exposition of the Commandment proceeds to the second of committing Adultery the most natural impetuous and troublesome of our passions being these two Anger and Lust the one from an excess of hate towards another the other of Love After the bridling of the one he now prescribes that of the other and to this purpose tells them that this precept also of not committing adultery extended not only to not actually lying with our neighbors wife but not to much as looking on her or any other woman not our own wife with any lustful thoughts for that all such persons were guilty of committing adultery already with such persons in their heart And therefore that it even our right eye or right hand should be the instrument or tempter to offend God in such a manner it were better if we could procure no other remedy of committing such sin without doing this even to pluck out this though our right eye or cut off our right hand than to sin against God and so have not this eye or hand only lost but our whole Body cast for such offence into eternal flames Intimating at least our cutting-off the observed occasions of sin even though these seem as precious and dear unto us as our eye or right hand That also in marriage they were religiously to observe such an Holy Contract and patiently bear this great Yoke when not well and discreetly engaged without expecting any relief or indulgement of a separation or divorce afterward contrary to the great liberty they had taken herein except in the case of Fornication And in such case also that the parties might not upon this presently clap up new marriages better suting with their new affections and amours but were to live continently and single for God gives ability in such a separation Things which said by our Lord elsewhere the Disciples so check d at Mat. 19.10 that they concluded it was better to forbear marriage if having so streit obligations upon it § 267 From this he proceeds to some liberties and indulgments they practised contrary to the intention of the Divine Law in their conversation with their neighbour especially in a custome of oaths and other aggravating asseverations mostly coming from an evil root in their discourses and treatings which is contrary to the simplicity and moderation that ought to be in their words and reverence towards God and his creatures in relation to him that ought to be observed in their Oath In which matter he instructs them that the precept concerning an oath Lev. 19.12 and Deut. 6.13 Viz. that they should not forswear themselves and should perform unto the Lord their Oaths did not allow them a liberty to swearing also whenever they spake a truth swearing either by God himself or by any of his Creatures Or secure them that swearing also by some of Gods creatures at least such as by some Consecration had not a more special relation to him as the Sacrifice the Gold of the Temple c. signifyed nothing and had no guilt in it according to their false Glosses thinking reverence in using Oaths was only confined to the name of God and to his name not as to swearing but only false-swearing by it But that Mat. 23.16 excepting where necessity and matters of great consequence required it in which case we find Gods greatest Saints for advancing truth to have used it Heb. 6.16 And an end of all strifes among men faith the Apostle is an Oath their ordinary communication and discourse and dealing with their Neighbour was to be without any swearing at all either by God himself whose name they were at no time to take in vain Or by any of his Creatures over the least of which even an hair they had no power to make it white or black and all which they ought to reverence for the relation they have to him who at the first made them and alwaies replenishes and dwelleth in them But that their ordinary communication should be plain and simple and without endeavouring with any such attestations or artifice to add weight to their words Yea Yea Nay Nay as our Lords Amen Amen their assertion only being reiterated where less credited for that what was more than this came of Evil i. e. some irreverence toward God in himself or in his Creatures and again of evil either others having more jealousy of the truth of our words than they ought which in them is malice or from our own desiring to add more weight to our words than the matter requires which in us is a faulty ambition See this Lesson of our Lord repeated
God to save thee become the Son of man by which name to express the state of his humiliation our Lord usually stiled himself to death with this dearest expression of love to him Tu unanimis meus notus meus Who but now simul mecum dulces capiebas cibos and but this day in domo Domini ambulavimus cum consensu as the sad Psalmist in Spirit foreseeing this Tragedy aggravates it After which said and this Satan-possessed miserable creature no way relenting our Lord moves forward towards the Band that was coming on to apprehend him his Disciples following And asking them first with great Majesty whom they sought for there and they answering for Jesus of Nazareth upon his speaking two words Ego sum as if it had bin the terrible name Jehovah or Ego sum in Exodus they all recoiled as if repulsed with some mastering force and fell flat upon their backs before him so that he and his company might not only have gone from them but marched over them if they had pleased In which action he sheweth to them and to the world his All-Powerful Godhead and that oblatus est as the Prophet quia ipse voluit Esai 53.7 and that not by their force but his own meer good pleasure it was that he would be taken bound and led away by them as also used this act of his power as a means to reduce them to their duty and prevent their Guilt and make them next to turn to another prostration forward in a due reverence and honour to his Sacred person Jo 7.32 46. moved with the like Spirit as those were who came formerly to apprehend him in the Temple But they after a while by his permission recovering their strength made toward him a second time perhaps thinking their former fall an effect of his Magick or black Art able to procure a Blast to throw them down but not to hold them there and full ignorant that they rose again onely by the strength he infused Again he asked them the same Question And answered by them as before he next layes a powerful command on them which though assaulted by his Followers they punctually obeyed That seeing he was the man they sought they should dismiss and not touch the rest of his company mystically shewing thereby his sufferings to be our ransome and his apprehending our freedom He in the yeilding up of himself yet taking most tender compassion as S. John observes of his poor sheep Jo. 17.12 That though they might be scattered yet cone of those whom his Father had given him might be lost by falling into that storm which he well saw now all the Powers of Hell were let loose that none could withstand but himself and that Satans sifting them at that time would have turned to the ruin of their Faith and all of them bin if not as Judas Betrayers yet Denyers of him For if Peter when at free liberty and only asked the question by a Maid did so what may we imagine would he or the rest have done under Restraint and tortures § 22 Yet the Disciples well acquainted with this his omnipotency on several occasions and strongly animated also by seeing the former sudden Prostration of his Enemies had so much courage as to draw and ask him leave to use the few Swords they had in his defence and Peter had such an hasty Valour also according to his usual zeal and late promise to our Lord as without expecting an answer he made a blow at one of the High Priests servants one of the forwardest of the company to lay hands on our Lord upon his Masters instigations thinking to have cleft his head in sunder with it But our merciful Lord diverted it onely to the lopping off one of his ears which had too facilely received his Masters wicked commands and then presently compassionating this mischance desired permission of his Enemies thus far as to touch him and set it on again Thus returning good for evil and preventing the accusation of any resistance or harm done by him or his to the Ministers of publick justice as also in this demonstrating his love and charity to these his Enemies as he had before his power over them § 23 After which turning back towards Peter he bad him to put up his Sword telling him those that used it i. e. without a just Commission as he then did and especially against the ordinary Ministers of the secular Powers Gen. 9.6 and of Justice as those sent then to apprehend him were should incur the old Lex talionis mentioned in Genesis and perish by the Sword Adding also that he needed not his nor any others defence having at his command more than twelve Legions of Angels and had he pleased to have opened theirs as he did the Servant of Elisha his eyes they might have seen all these celestial Armies now environing him but what needed this when they saw the late powerful effect of his breath only in the pronouncing of two words enough had he pleased to have unmade the whole world as also it was made only with a word After which he concluded his speech with those gracious words full of patience humility and resignation after his usual manner to the good pleasure of his Father The cup that my Father hath given or appointed me shall not I drink And if I now make such a rescue how shall that which is written of me be fulfilled Taking care that not one syllable of his Fathers good pleasure declared in the former Scriptures concerning him should fall to the ground and accepting these his sufferings with all willing submission not as from the hands of the Enemies but of his Father § 24 After this addressing his Speech to the chief Priests and Captains of the Temple and Elders that were come to apprehend him Luk. 22.52 he expostulateth with them thereby to reduce them to some remorse of their fact why they came against him thus by night as against a Theif and a Robber and one that sought concealment who indeed was not a Destroyer but the Saviour of mankind and who conversed amongst them all the day publickly in the Temple at what time they had nothing to say to him Then presently as it were recalling himself from this arguing with ungrateful men and resuming the sweet contemplation of the divine preordination But saith he Luk. 22 53. This is your hour Intimating that only by the divine Dispensation and his own full consent to it the Powers of Darkness were now let loose upon him and these their wicked Instruments licensed to act in a time sutable to their designs § 25 So our meek Lord patiently yeilded himself into their hands who took and bound him their first Dejectment and fears now serving only to increase their present fierceness and rougher usage of him as imputing their former prostration to a feat of his Magick or black Art able to play some pretty pranks but
the infinite Graces and love and sweetness he discovered in that look all which upbraided his unkindness the posture he left that innocent Lamb of God in sorrounded with and ready to be torn in peices by so many Wolves and also his leaving him so and hasting to save himself all these we may presume so galled and wounded him as that had not the High Priests Gate bin shut upon him he would now have reentred to recant there publickly his former act and run through all hazards whatever with his dear Lord. But the divine Providence had appointed this for one of our Lords sufferings the clear desertion of all his Followers and that he should tread the Wine-press alone § 41 Yet something may be said on the other side in the lessening of the lapse of this prime Apostle That his love and courage seems to be greater than most of the rest in his following his Master to his trial and venturing into the High Priests Pallace when it was he that just before had cut-off the ear of his servant In his denyal its being without any great scandal not in publick but to some idle people standing about a fire and medling with a matter of no concernment to them In that it was done upon a suddain surprisal not done with premeditation or put to any formal Trial of his fidelity and where perhaps hazarding also the reputation of the other Disciple that brought him in might run in his mind and much more his being questioned for Malchus And as it seemed a shame to deny our Lord at the accusation only of a poor Maid-servant so it might seem a thing of no great consequence to confess him before such a mean person But which is most to be noted he denyed not that Jesus was the Messias or the Son of God he renounced no part of his faith no such thing was he asked nor if put to it would he ever have denyed it but he denyed only his knowledg of or acquaintance with such a person Lastly the Fall of this great Apostle God permitted besides for the aggravation of our Lords sufferings by his cheifest Disciple denying as another of them betraying him for many other good ends As to beget a perfect humility in him a little before too confident of himself to shew us what frail things we are the best of us when our Lord leaves us a little to our selves and hath not his eye upon us To comfort poor sinners in their great miscarriages since the greatest Saints as David and Peter have had their falls To shew the infinitness of Gods mercy to Penitents in his pardoning such great offences and that to persons most obliged to him and from whom he had reason to expect the greatest fidelity Lastly to teach Peter the cheif Pastor of his sheep the more compassion to sinners in reflecting on his own infirmities and faults and to bear with those who are tempted and fall in as much as himself stood not when he was so § 42 What became of the other Disciple no mention is made T is probable that better acquainted with the house he went up into the Court and was present at our Lord's trial and seeing the severe proceedings against him after the Council rose quitted the Pallace with the rest where he saw was no safe staying any longer for any friends of Jesus when also he might take Peter presently after his third misadventure there along with him § 43 Now to return unto our Blessed Lord committed to the custody of the High-Priests Officers and Servants until the morning and the reassembly of the Council in the same place in a fuller body These Officers one would think since the time that being sent to apprehend him they returned to their Masters with a Nunquam sic locutus est homo sicut hic homo should now have treated him with some ordinary civility especially no final sentence being yet passed upon him and the Judges being to reexamine his cause the next morning The ear also our Lord restored but two or three hours before to Malchus and his reprehending Peter for his cutting it off might not have bin so soon forgotten by them But indeed now was the Power of Satan and of Darkness and his chain never so much loosened as at this time before the approaching ruin of his kingdom who therefore ceased not by all those his Instruments to act his utmost malice nor to suffer our Lord to rest one minute § 44 The Ministers therefore having as yet no order for the executing of any higher corporal punishment and because our Lord also was to proceed gradatim through all sorts of sufferings instead of indulging him or themselves any repose in which our Lords servant S. Peter was more civilly used Acts 12.6 after their watching all the fore-part of the night compass him about in a ring and notwithstanding his modest silence no way provoking them fall on abusing him both with their tongues and hands as far as was permitted They spit on his face being the greatest note of ignominy and disgrace that was amongst the Jews see Deut. 25.9 where the man was to be used so that would not raise up seed to his brother And they abhor me saith Job in his typical complaint Chap. 30.10 they forbear not to spit in my face when his tyed hands also could not cleanse it They smote him also on the face with the palmes of their hands They punched and thumped him with their fists and by the Prophecies Esay 50.6 it seems they also plucked off his hair being not tondentes but vellentes of this meek Lamb. These Jews also treated him this night as a Mock-Messias as the next day the Gentiles abused him as a Mock-King and after their cruelty wearied in this way and his rare faculty in Prophecying coming into their mind they remembred a Boys-play to this purpose and got a cloath and blindfolded him whereof the Philistines abusing blind Sampson was a Type and fall on beating him a fresh thus hood-winked that he being the Messias and the Christ and the great Prophet that was to come into the world should now so hooded prophecy and tell them who it was that smote him § 45 Cruel and causeless malice for which of his sweet words or mighty works as he once said to you Jo. 10.32 who left heaven to save you and in whom you never saw fault and who went about every where doing good for which of these do you thus treat him And how could the blessed Angels at least that waited on our Lord have the patience to suffer such vile wretches and the dregs of the people to strike and spit on their Creator the Lord of Heaven and Earth but that they well knew it was the pleasure of their great Master out of his infinite charity to suffer this even for the salvation of those his Tormentors and to receive these blows for the satisfaction of their fault that gave them
deterring us before by Gods purity and Justice from so vile an act but after it inviting to repentance and reformation § 55 He then having heard or perhaps seen how far they had proceeded against his innocent Master sentenced him to dy and were now carrying him away to Pilat to procure the Execution now too late repenting himself of his horrid fact brought back to them the money he had received of them but a few hours before and told them he had grieveously sinned in betraying innocent blood Which was thus ordained by divine Providence after the opposition made before by those two upright Counsellors Joseph and Nicodemus that these his Judges might also reflect on their own crime by Judas his confessing his in their condemning that innocent blood he had betrayed But they regardlesly bidding him to look to his own faults himself and asking what his infidelity to his Master was to them hastily repelled him from before them What is thâ—t to us say they Mat. 27.4 Yes surely something 't is to you for besides that you Preists are the Physitians of sick souls to whom poor sinners repair for your Spiritual Counsel and making their attonement and reconciliation with the offended God you may remember that you are the persons that hired this poor Wretch to commit this sinful Act or if he did well in it your charity stood engaged to pacify and assure therein his troubled conscience § 56 Judas receiving no consolation or thanks from them nor seeing any hopes of their relenting or dismissing his Master and they rejecting also the mony which he would now have bin glad to have refunded for his Masters ransome he presently went and threw his poor recompence of his wickedness in the Temple where their Officers might find and dispose of it and so went and hanged himself to get out of his present pain thus dying the accursed death before spoken of not able any longer to endure the goads and pangs of his conscience setting before him the innocency of our Lord the dignity of his person his love and affection to him in great humility washing his feet but last night at Supper so requited all our Lord 's sweet Sermons and charitable actions unworthy of such a treason lastly the divine vengeance and those last words of our Lord concerning him at Supper Mat. 26.24 Filius quidem hominis tradetur sed vae homini illi bonum erat illi si non esset natus homo ille for the Devil we may imagine suggested whatever might more swell his Despair Here was a most bitter Compunction for his sin repentance and confession and that publick lastly restitution and all too little for him who had done such despight to the Spirit of Grace and was now fallen into the hands of the living God Heb. 10.29 30. and a fearful expectation of Judgment and fiery indignation Cap. 10.27 which spirit now having abandoned him all such his relenting could not be sound sincere or acceptable to God but like that of Esau not finding place of a right Repentance though sought carefully with tears Heb. 12.17 § 57 After his having thus made away himself the divine vengeance also pursued him further which seems to be pointed-at by the Psalmist Psal 108.18 Intret Maledictio sicut aqua in interiora ejus For his body thus hung up burst in peices and his bowels so void of compassion to the persecuted Innocent were ejected and emptied out of his body full of stench and corruption and most noisome to all that approached and beheld it Which strange and sad accident also could not but be presently diffamed and spread abroad and might have bin a second warning to those others Actors in this Murther so to prevent that unparallelled Judgment that shortly after followed upon the whole Nation in which also by Josephus this is noted as one of the greatest Roman torments used towards those poor Jews who fled to them for mercy that the Soldiers frequently ripped up their bowels for swallowed Gold § 58 His money thrown down in the Temple afterwards the cheif Preists took up for none else might touch things dedicated And because it was the price of blood though themselves were the Purchasers of it their devotion thought not fit to put it into the Treasury of Holy things there God having prohibited less scandals than this to be brought into the Temple Deut. 23.18 and not permitting David because a shedder of blood though such as ought to be spilt to have a hand in building it they resolved therefore to dispose of it some other way and the divine Wisdom so ordered it that they should lay it out upon land a known peice of ground that ever after called the field of Blood might perpetuate the memory of their wicked fact This ground they designed for a burying place for strangers such Proselytes of the Gentiles as much resorted to their solemn feasts their buryals generally being out of the City a type of Christs blood benefitting those strangers whilst they that shed it lost their share in it Nec introierunt in requiem ejus and a type of the Gentiles now admitted by the Purchase of that blood to be joined and to take their everlasting rest and repose with his former people the Church of the Jews All these particulars we have punctually foretold by the Prophet Zachary Zac. 11.12 13. both the just summ of the price thirty shekels or pieces of silver and the vileness of it exaggerated being the value of a Servant in case his Master was any way deprived of him Exod. 21.32 and the projection of this money in the Temple and the disposing of it to a Potter yet had not these learned men that fulfilled it light to discover it To a Potter i. e. one that traded in vile and cheap ware which shewed the summ fit for a very mean purchase The field it seems by the price of it was some neglected place perhaps where potsherds were cast out as Montetestaced at Rome or where clay was digged for pot-making and it was ever after by the people called the field of blood for a Witness against the cruel purchasers but also as it seems by St. Peters words Acts 1. upon this account that Judas chose the same piece of ground wherein to make away himself and where his bowels and blood by the divine Justice poured out before our Lord's became such a loathsome and offensive spectacle to the beholders § 59 Now to return to the High Priests They and the Scribes and the Elders the whole Multitude of them saith S. Luke Luk. 23.1 not spending much time in consultation concerning a matter long before resolved betimes in the morning Jo. 18.28 led away our Lord thus condemned and bound to the Roman President 's Pallace and delivered him up into the hands of the Romans And so were they themselves afterwards for it the whole Nation led into captivity by Titus their City destroyed a thing sadly foreseen and deplored
to the Crown of Juda or whether he had it from the relation of others viz. the High-Priests the envious oppressors of his innocency and merits as the Presidents own conscience witnessed unto him The Governour replyed that he a Roman understood none of those matters about his Messias-and Kingship but that it was his own Nation that accused him of it and had delivered him as a person very criminous and deserving death Then our Lord to inform him further of the truth answered that the Kingdom he only ownned was not a Kingdom of this World nor such as did disturb any Prince's temporal Rights as did sufficiently appear that he had no Subjects to fight for him or rescue his person from his Enemies and persecutors You are King then said Pilat Our Lord answered he was and that he was sent into the world to bear witness of the truth which himself was and that this was a Spiritual Kingship over hearts there to rule over and destroy all Error and that all those who were the sons of Truth would hear and obey his Doctrine and become his Subjects The Governour asked him what was that Truth he spake of and wherein he laboured to render all men his Schollars and Subjects and having no mind to engage any further discourse about matters as he supposed of the Jewish Religion debated between our Lord and their High Priests he rose suddenly from the bench and went forth the second time to the Jews taking our Lord with him and told them that he found no fault at all in the man § 63 This much enraged them and made them redouble their accusations to all which our Lord as calme as they were furious answered not a word Whereupon Pilat wondring asked Jesus whether he heard not how many things they witnessed against him But neither to Pilat answered he a word which saith the Evangelist Mat. 27.14 made the Governour wonder exceedingly as both knowing his innocency and himself countenancing it § 64 Amongst other things they informed the Governour that he had gone every where raising Sedition amongst the people beginning in Galilee first the out skirts of the countrey and so coming up with Multitudes and Tumults even to Jerusalem perhaps relating to his last triumphal entrance into the City five daies before on Palm-Sunday Pauper humilis riding upon a poor young colt of an Asse without a Saddle and weeping as he went along and a great part of his applause the Hosannas of the children Now Galilee was a place noted formerly for several rebellions See Acts 5.37 38. how one Theudas appeared there that made himself a Prophet and pretended he could do miracles and drew much people after him mentioned but mis-timed by Josephus Antiq. Judaic lib. 20. cap. 5. and after him Judas of Galilee about the birth of our Saviour in the time of the enrolment under Cyrenius Luk. 2.2 which Judas also opposed the paying of taxes or tribute to the Romans Both which Rebels and all their Followers were dissipated and destroyed After these also it seems some Galileans within a few years before had so highly offended Pilat in his government that when they came up to Jerusalem at the solemn Feast to offer Sacrifice he caused them to be put to death and that in some cruel suddain and unexpected manner it should seem by the expression in the Text Luk. 13.1 and by their relating it to our Lord some think they might be some relicks of Judas his Sect that denyed tribute to Cesar for which reason also some made mention of them to our Lord to hear his judgment of their opinion and that made at Jerusalem some opposition in the Feast to the Sacrificing for the safety and prosperity of the Emperour And Pilat is noted both by Philo Judeus De legatione ad Caium and Josephus to have bin pervicaci duro ingenio and very uncompliant with the Jews and who at last complained-of by the Nation to Vitellius then a Superior Prefect of Syria for a slaughter made upon the Galileans was sent by him to Cesar to give an account thereof and so deprived of his government and confined The Jews mention therefore hereof Galilee seems to have conduced much to their purpose But when this was suggested to Pilat he made another use of it and though Herod and he were now at enmity between themselves perhaps for Pilat's cruelty shewed to the Galileans forementioned yet resolved to send to him the Prisoner who was born as was commonly imagined his Subject Galilee being under Herods jurisdiction and lived most of his time in his territories as being desirous to rid his hands of this business with as little displeasure to the Jews as might be and to devolve the odium of it upon Herod now come up to the Feast and because Herod being well acquainted with the Jews law and Religion which also he profest might better discover the Justice of the quarrel the Jews had against him about his Messiasship and the Truth he said he came to promulgate and would perhaps protect him as his Subject against the High Priests malice Thus Satan to whom God gave leave to persecute his only Son not excepting his life as he did Job's hurried our Lord as it were in Triumph to prolong his sufferings before inflicting the last of death from one great person to another to make him the more publick object of scorn and contempt and that all might have an hand in his afflictions and torments the Court of Galilee as well as that of Judea foretold by David Psal 2. Principes convenerunt in unum adversus Christum tuum and observed by S. Peter Acts 4.27 § 65 Herod having never seen our Lord but heard much of his fame and of his miracles rejoiced much on this occasion hoping to have seen him now for his greater reputation or at least the saving of his life do some notable miracle before him which John the Baptist never did Here upon our Lords appearance he fell on questioning him about many things of which he had the curiosity to be informed we may imagine about his Doctrine his Descent his pretension to his Messiasship what evidence he could give of such a pretended extraordinary Mission from God c. And perhaps any one Miracle done by our Lord would have defeated the persecutions of the Jews confirmed the reputation of his being an extraordinary Prophet and procured his liberty For Herod also had the Baptist in great esteem and was drawn both to his imprisonment by the importunity of a woman that bewitched him with her love and to his death by a rash promise which after much afflicted him § 66 But our Lord resigned to his Fathers known will concerning him and thirsting for the salvation of the world by his sufferings and death and the accomplishment of all the Prophecies made of him formerly by the Holy Ghost and justly refusing also projicere sanctum canibus or to satisfy the curiosity of
some other speedy death but there fastned to remain till near the going down of the Sun and then taken and buried that the land might not be defiled by his being above ground Gal. 3 13. See Deut. 21.23 as hath bin said already § § 83 Secondly because our sins deserved the utmost torments and even these eternal and our Lord in this case undertaking the satisfaction of Gods Justice for them this death by crucifying was chosen as being of all those ordinarily inflicted on Malefactors the most dolorous and tedious being only a wounding or piercing of exterior parts the hands and feet that approach not the principal or vital members the Head or Heart and so preserving an integrity of sense Nor was any great effusion of the blood caused by such wounds so to exhaust the spirits for the nailes still filled the holes they made but on the other side this piercing being made in the most nervous parts which Nerves are the Organs of sense produced a most acute pain and so the person was left in this posture fastned hand and foot on the rack abandoned to the Fowles or to Famine if a fever caused by these extream torments did not dispatch him sooner the body usually remaining in such torment for many hours if not daies Our Lord hung so for three hours before he expired in a Miraculous patience resignation and silence all the words he spake scarce taking up three or four minuts of it and when this time was run out the Roman Governour wondred if he was dead so soon and both the other Malefactors were then still alive Therefore the Apostle speaking of this our Lords death puts such an Emphasis upon it That he was obedient to the death even to this death of the Cross By the greatness of his sufferings therefore our Lord would have us learn the true weight and heinousness and desert of our sins the cancelling of which cost him so dear As also such exquisite pains both he and God his Father chose to shew their great love to man and his salvation and if there were no absolute necessity for the Son of Gods satisfaction for us by such exquisite torments the least prick of whose finger would have bin a ransome for a thousand worlds yet surely the more he suffered for us the more he shewed he loved us and the less of his pains were necessary for any satisfaction the more these so greivous demonstrate the greatness of his affection § 84 Thirdly such an horrid and lingring death was chosen by our Lord to remain for ever an example and pattern and consolation to all his followers in their sufferings again for him so often as they call to mind that he endured first far greater for them and that God doth not treat us servants and sinners so severely as he did his innocent and only Son and that we might be ashamed of our tergiversation or impatience of any small sufferings having seen his resignation and alacrity and voluntarily undertaking for us of so much greater § 85 Fourthly setting now aside the extream torments thereof this death seems to be chosen in many other regards For next by it this Evangelical Sacrifice hath a nearer resemblance to all those former made under the Law that were only Types of it Resemblance In our Lords being laid and spread when they fastned him with nails on the wood of the Cross to be consumed on it by degrees so those Sacrifices laid on the wood of the Altar but this on the Cross during much longer before it was consumed the heat of which torture also forced a sitio from our Lord. So saith S. Peter 1 Pet. 2.24 Ipse pecâ—ata nostra pertulit in corpore suo super lignum And S. Paul Eph. 5.2 Tradidit se ipsum pro nobis oblationem hostiam Deo in odorem suavitatis Again in our Lord 's being elevated and lifted up toward Heaven as those also were on an Altar raised up in Salomons Temple ten cubits high 2 Chron. 4. and ascended by steps and the Sacrifice also upon this Altar was elevated or heaved up again and waved before the Lord in the hands of the Priest and the Altar of the oblation of incense was made also of wood Again this death seems the most convenient also for the pouring out of the blood of this Sacrifice even the whole Mass of it gathered to the heart in a great stream at the foot of the Cross as the Priest did to that of the legal Sacrifice at the foot of the Altar as it were all at once by the Soldiers lance instead of the Priests knife but this not till such tedious and lingring torments for several hours first endured whereas the legal was presently dispatched out of its pain and lay a long time indeed to be consumed on the Altar but after it was first deprived of life and sense This death most convenient also for this Lamb of God fulfilling the type of the Paschal Lamb and the prophecies whereby God signified that he would not have a bone of his only Son to be broken nor his body any way mangled or divided any further than four holes made in his hands and feet and a wound in his side whilst meanwhile his stripping and then his long and scorching pains suffered from the fire of Gods wrath against our sins falling all upon him which he endured on the Cross answers to that Lambs being first flayed and then whole and entire stretched out at length and by degrees rosted by fire Thus then this Evangelical Sacrifice in this manner of the offering thereof most resembled the legal § 86 Fifthly this death on the Cross was a death most visible to all and publickly exposed in which could be used no personating fraud or concealment the body nailed up on high naked to be surveyed by the eyes of whatever Spectators for many hours nay examined and discoursed with so that there could be here no pretension of a delusion or cheat And if notwithstanding this so many Hereticks even in the Apostles daies thinking this too great a disparagement to the Son of God have denied the reality thereof what would they have done had our Lord suffered in some other manner less conspicuous § 87 Sixthly a death of those that are violent the most convenient and proper for those pious and charitable words and actions that were to be performed at his death In his making his Will as it were and disposing of his afflicted Mother his great care to the provision of his best beloved Disciple In testifying his free forgiveness of his Enemies Revilers and Torturers by his Praying to his Father also for their pardon In receiving to Mercy at the same time by the vertue of that his death on the Cross the penitent Robber a symbol of his doing the same to all sinners whatever that should at any time repair to him for salvation through those sufferings In manifesting his patience obedience and love
ordained this accident thus significative also of a greater matter viz. That our Lord would not bear his cross alone but that all his Followers for ever were to bear their parts of it § 92 Whilst our Lord passed along in this solemn Procession to his offering up the divine Majesty provided that amidst so many stony-hearted Jews that thirsted after his blood wherewith the Psalmist Psal 21.13.17 describes him compassed about with so many ravenous Dogs and fierce Bulls there should not want those that accompanied such sufferings with their tears and lamented and deplored these pittiless and undeserved cruelties for a testimony against the others as before Joseph and Nicodemus and Pilat's wife and Judas also when too late were Many persons there were of the more devout and compassionate Sex and more secure from the soldiers affronts that followed and lamented him Luk. 23.27 So holy and innocent a person from whom they had heard so many charming Sermons and in whom seen such mighty works Among whom we may imagine were those Galilean Women that in his former life time had waited on and ministred unto him and his beloved Mary and Martha All whose exceeding affection to our Lord doubtless had so conquered their fears as to run thither wherever they could have a sight of him of whom they were likely so soon to be totally deprived § 93 These probably before had stood with the rest of the people in the common Piazza before Pilats Tribunal and there saw and heard all that sad Tragedy that had passed between our Lords own people persecuting and the stranger-Govervour defending him whose miserable usage there still heightned their love and compassion and in them added to all the former endearments of him as it did in the people to their rage and fury Especially amongst these the Blessed Virgin his afflicted Mother who could not be absent from him in life or death where she could have any access and who here most diligently observed all her Son said or did or that was done to him as the Evangelist saith Luk. 2.19 she formerly did those even in his minority and childhood she I say especially may be supposed to be wounded at the heart not only when she stood by the Cross but during all this time with those Sword-points of most pungent Grief which Simeon foretold her of in her and the rest of her Friends hearing their away with this fellow and their crucifiges and their acclamations for Barabbas before the Son of God And the sight of him so used when Pilat cried Ecce Homo and again Ecce Rex Vester that had no operation of pity upon the hard-hearted Jews I may say had too much on them But that we are to believe his Holy Mother as being full of Grace and of the Holy Ghost to have bin indued with a most perfect patience and resignation and silence and her carriage also to have bin an edifying pattern to the rest Thus was our Lord in all those his former sufferings beheld and lamented by his Friends But now after his Condemnation and the Jew's cruelty according to the divine Will satisfied the tide in the people also began to turn and these of our Lords former acquaintance to have many Companions of their Grief and such a mind began to repossess some of them at least as they had had when but two daies before they heard and admired him in the Temple and as they had on Palm-Sunday and those also of the people who all this while retained the same affection toward him his safety now despaired of began more to shew it And thus a great multitude attended our Lord his death and Funeral full of bitter lamentation though amongst these the more or more open in their grief were those of the female Sex On whom our Lord lifting up his all-bloody and disfigured Countenance in great comiseration not of himself suffering nothing but what he pleased but of them being infinitly afflicted for the sins of his own people to whom he came in such love and they received him not but were now casting him the only Son and heir out of his Vineyard and killing him and for the unparallelled judgments of God that he saw now approaching upon them for this fact brake out into that passionate and prophetick speech ye Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me but for your selves and your children telling them the daies were now at hand if their tears at least of their own particulars prevented them not wherein they should bless the barren that never had any children prepared for such a misery wherein they should wish the Mountains to fall on them and the Hills to cover and bury them deep from the face of the divine vengeance Hos 10.8 Is 2 10 19. Apoc 6.16 descending from above on that people For if the flames of Gods wrath meerly for their sakes and sins brake out now in such a manner upon him a Tree alwaies green and flourishing and fruitful and no way deserving or qualified with any cumbustible matter for them to feed on what would this fire do where their impenitence should make them unworthy of his blood to quench it upon their dry dead fruitless wood serviceable for nothing else and so well prepared for it The consideration of which had but a few daies before drawn tears also from himself when the Evangelist saith he in the midst of his triumph from Mount Olivet beholding the City wept over it saying with sobbs interrupting his speech If that thou hadst known even thou at least in this thy day c. Luk. 19.41 This then our Lord in pity to them said to procure the application of their tears not to his sufferings but rather to the cause of them to their own sins and the sins of their people as doubtless from his powerful words many of them afterwards did apply themselves and found mercy obtaining salvation by his blood within the arms of the Church and so when the time came fled from the face of that fire and escaped in the time of that destruction when the Romans the same Instruments the Jews employed to consume this Green-wood were used afterwards by God to burn the dry For it is observed that those Jews of the christian Profession warned from our Lords prediction by their retiring betimes out of the City and out of Judea were generally preserved § 94 Thus this Anathema for us was conveyed out of the Holy City or that should have bin so as an accursed thing for as the devoted Goat laden with the iniquities of the children of Israel was carried out of the Holy Camp Lev. 16.10 and the bodies of those beasts which were offered for expiation of sins and whose blood was carried by the High Priest before God into the Sanctuary were burnt also without the Camp It is the Apostle's observation Heb. 13.11 12 13 so was it to be here in the prototype whose Blood was afterward carried into the Heavenly
this Mary had bin the Blessed Virgin 's own sister her Name would not have bin also Mary this being not usual or convenient to call two sisters undistinguishable by the same Name There was also present Salome John's Mother and others and John likewise our Lords beloved Disciple whose confidence above the rest we saw in the High Priests Palace was there with them but likely none other of the Eleven at least so near affraid of being apprehended if they should have appeared and perhaps John more presuming here as in the Palace because known to the High Priest Here then stood the sad Mother of our Lord beholding and hearing all that was done to and said against her Son with the like patience and resignation as he suffered it and ready with Abraham for the love of God to have offered him up her self had he commanded it Here she and the rest heard also that admirable confession of our Lord by the penitent Thief and our Lord 's gracious answer to him which must needs be a great consolation to them After which Answer our Lord looking down upon his Mother and compassionating her condition as well as Grief spake to her first and calling her Woman perhaps for preventing those affronts to which her near relation to him hated of all if it had bin known made her liable recommended John his beloved Disciple to her love and affection instead of himself as one that thence forward would perform the duty and observance to her of a Son and then speaking to John recommended to him the care and providing for her now aged about fifty and a desolate widow Joseph being formerly dead and now also her only Son taken from her as his Mother he being a single person and Virgin as she and having no Wife or family of his own to take care of as many others had and by reason of his wealthy parents out of which wealth also Johns mother formerly made provision many times for our Lord having the command of so much maintenance as was necessary for their decent subsistance Which recommendation of our Blessed Lady to John shews that notwithstanding the mention we find of her sister and four of our Lords Brethren yet that they were not of so near a Relation as that our Lords Mother after the death of Joseph had any family of her own or these had any constant habitation with her so as that she might rather have bin committed to their care and provision in her now declining age § 101 Our Lord having thus made his Will and disposed of his onely charge his dear Mother whom St. John took to himself and served with all fidelity and supplied with all necessaries till her death spake not at all after this for near the space of three hours from about the sixth till the ninth hour a little before he gave up the Ghost but continuing in silence and prayer and his countenance lift up towards heaven went on finishing that Sacrifice which was to be the redemption of the world consuming and melting away in the flames of Gods wrath toward sinners now in its effects seizing on him in their stead for all the offences of all mankind that had or should be When as he grew nearer to his end the Sun now at midday see Amos 8.9 and when not capable of any natural Ecclipse the Moon being now at the full and at its greatest distance from it began to be darkned and to lose its light this noblest body of the Creation sympathizing as it were with its Lord and covering its face at such a horrid Spectacle and indicating to the hard-hearted Spectators the true Sun of righteousness and that true Light that enlightneth every one that cometh into this world to be now setting and its glory ecclipsed so far as the malice of the Prince of Darkness and his Instruments could effect it and intimating now also the cheif reign of the power of darkness permitted by God to the Prince thereof § 102 All things were now full of terrour and amazement and mens hearts with fear began now to melt and relent and their former taunts and merriments to be changed into a deep silence and expectation what would be the Issue suspecting more miraculous things to follow when about the ninth hour or three of the clock in the afternoon the solemn time of offering up the Evening Sacrifice our Lord when now seeming to be quite spent and near his expiration cried out with a loud and strong voice and such as was not usual to such a manner of death exhausting all their spirits and strength before taking away their life to shew that he laid his life down not compelled but when he pleased though without shortning the time of the sufferings belonging to that cruel death and to testify also against Hereticks the Reality of his sufferings saying with great force that all the multitude heard him those first words of the Psalm penned by the Holy Ghost for a Description of his Passion Eloi Eloi lamma Sabbacthani My God My God why hast thou forsaken me expressing the last pangs of death now approaching and the inexplicable torments and anguish of Body and Soul due to our sins that now lay upon him which he calls his sins in the following part of this verse of that mourning Psalm longe a salute mea verba delictorum meorum and which sin of ours made this patient Lamb of God after three hours silence so break out into this complaint under them where more greivous than the corporal sufferings was the interior anguish of Spirit in his Divinity its suspending from his Humanity all those consolations which might any way relieve its sorrows and with which his Servants in their greatest sufferings are usually refreshed This like to that his Agony in the Garden but now without an Angel where the Apostles mention Heb. 5.7 of our Lord in the daies of his flesh offering up to God prayer and supplications with strong cryes and with tears may well be understood as of the tears and prayers and strong cryes made and shed in the Garden so of these now iterated on the Cross for the weight of Gods wrath lying on our sins which he assumed is inexplicable These words of that prophetick Psalm might have hinted to the learned High Priests and Elders that the Tragedy of this Psalm was just now acted and lively expressed in every part of it and they those miserable Wretches by whose persecutions this prophecy was fulfilled and so might have begotten some compunction in them But either they so blinded as not to understand those words or the other common-people at least mistaking them nor knowing them for the beginning of the Psalm and hearing them pronounced with such a loud voice thought from the similitude of the word Eloi twice repeated that our Lord called upon Elias that he would not forsake him in this his misery but come to help him For it was the common belief that
Christians being only six foot square and eight foot high and the entrance into it on the East-side about three foot high and three foot three inches broad On the right side of which Sepulcher from the entrance the Sacred body of our Lord was placed see Mark 16.5 compared Jo. 20.12 with his head toward the West After this the door or mouth of the Cave was shut up and fenced with a massy piece of rock cut out for the purpose not to be removed but by the help of many hands to hinder any violation of the Sepulcher or Body or robbing it of those costly linnen and spices that should be bestowed upon it Such a cave it was where Lazarus was buried Jo. 11.38 31 41. with a great Stone rolled upon the entrance into it which our Lord then commanded to be removed and our Lords raising of him a lively type of the same thing he would shortly after perform in raising himself Meanwhile those women our Lords former Disciples and Attendants that assisted not in this action keeping some distance perhaps in respect of these honourable persons with whom they had no acquaintance observed all that was done where their Lord was laid and how the Sepulcher made fast and it being now too late because night approached they intended after the Sabbath ended to express their last love and affection to ther dear Lord also in bringing some more sweet odours and spices for preserving and perfuming of his Sacred body and the narrow roome where it lay more to shew the honour and devotion they bare to it and once more to behold to touch and kiss those most holy Relicks than that there was now need of any more such cost § 113 Thus our so cruelly murthered Lord was now at rest whilst his glorious Soul meanwhile that was never separated from the Deity and now attended on with multitudes of Angels descended into Hell and the lowest parts of the Earth and of his Kingdom and there triumphed over the Powers of Darkness conquered as to their former Tyranny over man and over the lower part of this world by his late death and delivered also thence such imprisoned Souls as were capable of the mercy and favours of his Passion according to that of the Prophet Zee 9.11 Tu quoque in sanguine testamenti tui emisisti vinctos tuos de lacu in quo non est aqua and so with them entred into Paradise the place of joy and Repose for all happy souls till the resurrection of their bodies where he was adored by them as the Author of their Salvation and endless felicity and amongst the rest by the Soul of his late Fellow-sufferer though upon a just account the penitent Theif and so this its beatifical presence they there injoyed till the appointed time of its return to exalt also his crucified body to the state of glory Thus I say our so cruelly murthered Lord was now at rest but not so the consciences of the Pharisees and High Priests Whose seeing these two noble persons Joseph and Nicodemus thro so much popular hate to have so honourably interred his Body gave them a great jealousy and the predictions also about his rising again the third day much disturbed them Though a thing which was quite forgotten by our Lords Disciples and Followers who one would think had most cause to have remembred it and which he had so often told them of and they had upon hearing it from him also disputed amongst themselves what should be meant by it as they descended from the holy Mount after our Lord's Transfiguration and after this again were by him minded of it but the night before his passion as they went along to the Garden he telling them then also that when risen he would go before them into Galilee Mat. 26.32 I say this forgotten by them yet now very much troubled and disquieted the thoughts of the High Priests They could now call to mind how when they asked him a sign once and again Mat. 12.38.16.4 he alleged to them that of Jonah and that the Son of man as Jonah in the Whales belly should lye three daies in the heart of the earth and so be cast up again and the jaws of Death not be able to detain him And his saying that if they destroyed the Temple meaning his Body after three daies he would raise it up which speech of his though before they made it misconstrued by them an Article to condemn him yet now they could apprehend in another and its right sense and might thereby have condemned themselves Now also perhaps the words of our Lord spoken with so much Majesty before them at his arraignment ran in their mind that they should shortly see him sitting on the right hand of Power and lastly the obsequious respects they saw given to his body by those two eminent persons they conceived might arise from some such hopes and were performed from some such expectation Remembring therefore these predictions and perhaps not free from all fears of such an event after having beheld such wonderful things at and before his death they thought it meet at least to prevent any cheat in the business and to hinder that his Disciples might not upon such rumour of his rising again to deceive the credulous people remove secretly his body and so shew the empty Sepulcher and suborn some to say they had seen him though indeed no reason they had to suspect any such thing but rather that his Disciples if finding his words false would at least recant their former error and confess him an Impostor and a false Prophet Therefore they hasted again to Pilat for all that it was the Sabbath it being late over night before they were informed of his solemn and sumptuous Burial and relating to him these predictions and the bad consequence that might be of them importuned him that there might be set a watch before the Sepulcher till the third day and as if jealous also of the corruption of the Watch that the Sepulcher might be sealed besides But why this seal because if the body were taken away there must be a breach of the seal and so this theft discovered But so would there be a breach of it if the body risen again For how could they imagine that that power which raised the body might or would not also throw open the door for its passage But this Seal served well meanwhile to save it from the pillage of the Soldiers and to guard it from the Guards Some Antients say that the stone was by them fastned to the Sepulcher with iron These things were done accordingly by themselves the Governour leaving this wholly to their own ordering and doubtless much wondring at these their extravagant jealousies and fears So to the Monument they go set this Guard and seal the stone and this with no regret that it was on the Sabbath of the breach of which but by better works surely than these they had so
so his glorified Body should not remain alone but have also a great train of other glorified Bodies whom he thought meet to wait upon him and with it ascend to Heaven Who to shew his conquest not only over his own but our death and to confirm to us also our resurrection by vertue of his were together with him the Primitiae dormientium and the primogeniti ex mortuis in whom the divine Wisdom thought fit then to foreshew what is to be performed and made good to the rest of the bodyes of all his Saints now lying in their dust at the great day And some of these Saints also in these their new restored bodyes came into the Holy City saith the Evangelist stiling it so as if now sanctified with their presence and in alluding to the celestial Jerusalem of which these glorified bodyes were now to be eternal Inhabitants and there these also appeared to many saith the Text according as the Divine providence disposed testifying to them the Resurrection of our Lord and further confirming it with their own and so presently disappeared again Now what glorified persons these should be whether some holy men or also Disciples of our Lord that were lately before deceased as the Baptist S. Simeon Anna Zachary S. Joseph or others whose Sepulchers were near the City and well known and now viewed to be opened and empty by such as remembred their interment appearing to such to whom their persons were formerly well known or also whether most of the more eminent former Patriarchs and Prophets that had lain now so long a time in the dust and whom our Lord would gratify with a more early Resurrection we not knowing how far his favours now at this his entrance into his glory might be extended though what S. Peter saith of David Act. 2.34 seems somewhat to weaken such an opinion here I say it would be too curious to inquire further into such a matter hidden from us to whom several things of the Oeconomy of the next world for certain reasons of the Divine Wisdom are as yet but very sparingly revealed § 117 Amidst these extraordinary discourses of our revived Lord by the Guards and by the Saints risen with him the Galilean women who on the Eve of the Sabbath had observed where his Body was laid and knew nothing of the Guards that were set there the next day and having now prepared a more choice composition of spices and odours than the former hast of his burial would permit to Nicodemus in which women also used to be better skilled rose up very early in the Morning to go to the Sepulcher there to visit his precious Body and pay this last office of their duty and love unto it These were Mary Magdalen and Mary our Blessed Ladyes sister-in-law and mother of our Lords Brethren Salome the mother of James and John Joanna the Wife of Herods Steward and some others besides But no mention is there of our Lords Mother the Blessed Virgin amongst them and the reason why she who had a much greater love to and grief for her Son than any other yet was not so active as they in expressing it seems to be either that John to whose prudent care she was committed had restrained her return to the Sepulcher so to put some bounds to her grief and that this might not add sorrow to sorrow or rather because both the faith of his Resurrection before it came to pass was never diminished or ecclipsed in her who also full of Grace laid up in her heart all our words and well remembred what others forgot and also because most probably our Lords consolation of her so soon as he was risen was not at all deferred but that by his immediat apparition to her he afforded her an early recompence of her former suffering those sword-points of sorrow at his Cross and also of the faith which in her alone withered not at that time as in the rest Though our Lord mean-while did not think fit to use her having so near a relation to his person for a witness to others of his return to life which she also might then understand from him was to be discovered by certain degrees for the greater trial of his Disciples and evidence of the fact and so whilst others went to and fro she remained after this beatifical sight all this morning in the posture of so great a Mourner retired continuing in a rapture of joy and uncessant praises and thanksgivings to God For none can here rationally imagine that our Lord who vouchsafed to honour Mary Magdalens love and tears and S. Peters primacy and extraordinary affection to him with a gratious sight of him before the other men or women omitted this to his own Mother more loving and beloved by him § 118 The most Holy Virgin thus retired and the other women as yet busy in ordering their Provisions Mary Magdalen more regardless as formerly Luk. 10.42 of such by-businesses more fervorous and impatient in her affection to be with what was yet left her of our Lord whom only the devout observation of the Sabbath could have restrained from the Sepulcher so long ran before the rest whilst it was yet dark saith S. John with a valour more than a womans to this place there rather to expect and stay for her company For this S. Johns particular story of her as also our Lords appearing to her alone before the other mentioned also by S. Mark Mark. 16.9 He appeared first to Mary Magdalen seems to intimate But here some of the Evangelists writing things more compendiously in which others are more copious and some with more others with fewer circumstances and so for persons also some mentioning more than other do wherein yet is no contradiction whilst I give the substance of what these Sacred Historians have delivered I desire your pardon if I do not or cannot punctually observe the order of every thing done in this so small a time and yet so very full of various occurrences since as S. Jerome on Mat. 28. observes particularly of these women there seems to have bin several excursions to and returns from the Sepulcher made by them and perhaps not of all of them together Crebro abeunt saith he recurrunt non patiuntur a Sepulcro Domini diu abesse aut longius Mary Magdalen then coming thither thus alone when the soldiers were already fled away of whom she knew nothing saw the great stone rolled from the Sepulcher and our Lords body taken thence at which surprized with great wonder and grief she ran back into the city to the house where S. Peter abode with S. John and the Blessed Mother of our Lord probably all the Disciples not lodging together to tell them the sad News See Ink. 24.9 12 24. that the Monument was thrown open and no body there These two the chief of the society and between whom seems to have bin a more particular friendship who also had
that the Glory quite took away his fight Resembling spirits also in passing how soon and whither they please without any gravity or retardment or impediment of solid bodyes interposed we may imagine according to the swiftness of a Sun-beam or of our thoughts with which we render our selves in our imagination present in places most remote and acting there what we please Mary as commanded hasted to the main Body of the Disciples that remained together and told them this joyful news as they mourned and wept saith S. Mark chap. 16.10 11. But they saith he aggravating their great incredulity and disconsolation when they had heard that he was alive and had bin seen of her yet believed not and so she hasted again toward the Sepulcher to meet with our Lord again or at least the women her companions § 121 Meanwhile the other Galilean women also were arrived therewith great store of spices prepared much sollicitous by the way how they should remove the stone from the Sepulcher such men as were our Lords Friends not daring to appear or herein to assist them and seeing the great Stone that troubled them so much rolled away presently went into it where they saw the body gone and an Angel in the form of a yong man clothed with a long shining robe sitting as Mary's Angel did on the right side of the Sepulcher where our Lord had lain at which sight being much affrighted he bid them take courage he knew whom they sought our Lord that was crucified but that he was not there they saw the place empty but was risen again as he had often told them which now they well remembred when he was with them in Galilee that they should presently carry this joyful news to the Disciples and to Peter particularly named as the chiefest of them and the most respected by our Lord and perhaps as was said before he and John not lodging with the rest telling them that after such a time they should depart into their own Countrey Galilee where was the greatest frequency of his Disciples and Followers and most liberty for their meeting together from the disturbance of the Jews and there in such a Mountain apart and at such time assembled they should all together see him and enjoy the consolation of his presence The holy women filled with great fear and joy to whom also by this Mary Magdalen had joined her self and related her happy adventures also hasted with this second message to the disconsolate Disciples who dared not to stir abroad or see themselves how things were And upon the way as they were going our Lord suddainly appeared to them also saying All hail to them too Before whom they presently fell down and took hold of his feet and adored him A thing which to Mary when all alone he would not permit but here indulged perhaps that this might the more confirm to them as also to the Disciples to whom they carried the news the reality of his person And so them also he presently dismissed to go and tell his Brethren as he stiled them that he was risen and in Galilee they should all have a full view of him and vanished again out of their sight § 122 Come to the Disciples their message was also entertained with the same obstinate incredulity as Mary Magdalen's and perhaps also St. Peter and St. John's Relations For St. John saith of himself that when he came to the Sepulcher and saw how things were there he believed But the rest of the Disciples would credit nothing as sorrow is loth to be deceived lest such deceit discovered should redouble it and this perhaps because the reports brought them were only of suddain apparitions and these presently vanishing again though they touched him not able to detain him which they might take either for the delusion of some spirits for such things they could not imagine of a solid body or else strong imaginations of the fancy advanced by our Lords former predictions and by a longing expectation especially this thing hapning only to the women and first to her that was most transported with love and also they presuming that our Lord if truly risen would have honoured his holy Mother of whose visit to her or Peter they as yet knew nothing or them sooner with his presence than these others or rather would have returned in a more publick manner manifesting himself to all the world as now being Death-free and so above all the effects of his Enemies malice and would have entred upon the administration of his kingdom for such a thing ran in their mind and such thing they were harping upon Act. 1.6 Whilst on the other side our Lord this while afforded his presence to others and withheld it from them to try and give occasion to the greater operation of their faith a thing in us ever most highly prized and valued by him as who had bin more particularly instructed by him concerning this reviving than others and should have needed less conviction for the perswasion of it and yet in this outdone by the High Priests who much suspected it and therefore at St. Peter and Johns repairing to the Sepulcher no Angels appeared nor was the message there delivered by an Angel to the Disciples but women But this was done also to shew them their great weakness and hardness of heart which also in his next apparition in the Evening he objected to them and had a good effect for preserving in them the greater humility without which no person can be gracious to him the courage of these women meanwhile well deserving those manifestations of our Lord of which their fears were unworthy But indeed the Divine providence also seems thus to have disposed things that their Testimony who were to publish to all the world the Gospel of our Lords Resurrection might be rendred the more credible from the great averseness and difficulty themselves had at first to admit or believe it as also S. Thomas his standing out and trying further experiments after all the rest convinced served for the same ends This also much more illustrated the wonderful operations of the descent of the Holy Ghost upon them that was shortly after obtained of his Father by our Lords Ascention shewing all their spiritual strength and courage to have bin from its efficacy Who though now full of fears and incredulity they hid themselves and despaired as it were of the Divine Omnipotency and Goodness then proclaimed to all the world the Magnaliae Dei and feared neither Prisons nor death for the Testimony of Jesus Quales Doctores Sanctae Ecclesiae ante adventum bujus Spiritus fuerint scimus post adventum illius cujus fortitudinis facti sunt conspicimus saith S. Gregory § 123 The same day also before any other of the Apostles our Lord appeared to S. Peter at some time when alone Luk. 24 34. 1 Cor. 15 5. An Apparition mentioned by St. Paul and St. Luke some think it might
on the eighth day of his Resurrection observing punctually the same day of the week as before thus to recommend the solemnity thereof to all Posterity for which it hath ever since been solemnly honoured also in the Church and called the Lords Day see Apoc. 1. when this great Festival was now concluded and the Disciples were all together again at Even whom perhaps business in the day time had divided purposing now their return into Galilee and Thomas now with them being also a Galilean where we find him afterwards going on fishing with St. Peter and others our Lord I say about the same time of night and the doors shut as before appeared again in the midst of them and after his usual salutation Pax vobis He according to his zeal John 17.12 Quos dedisti mihi custodivi nemo ex eis periit particularly addressed his speech to St. Thomas and when shewing his omniscience he had repeated to him the incredulous words spoken by him in his absence with a most gracious condescendence to his weakness invited him to examine his body freely to put his finger hardily in the holes of the Nails and his hand into the larger wound made in his side and at last become a true Beleiver and joine his Testimony thereof to the world with the rest of his Apostles St. Thomas doubtless upon such an appearance and speech to him much confounded and being already sufficiently perswaded and convinced of his error and fault needed now no further experiment for the confirmation of his Faith had not our Lord pressed him to it After which as it were elevated into another extreme he cried out My Lord my God and acknowledging more than these scars evidenced to him not only the Resurrection of his true body but the Divinity of his Person which effected it equalled that confession of the highest Apostle Mat. 16.16 Upon which our Lord gently reprehending such an obstinat and resolute unbelief as had formerly lodged in him uttered those gracious and comfortable words for all those that by reason of his suddain removal from the Earth could not have St. Thomas his lot to see feel or touch him that he indeed believed because he had seen him but Blessed they who have not seen and yet have believed leaving this Benediction on the greater virtue of their faith for ever who in latter times not having the like Evidence should nevertheless persevere in the like faith and adherence to him In the constitution of which faith a pious affection of the will is indeed a principal ingredient according to Quod volumus facile credimus and that which God most valueth and rewardeth § 133 Thus our good Lord in condescension to our weakness and for laying a foundation of the Christian Faith the freer from all contradiction and dispute was pleased to retain the breaches of his sufferings still in his glorified body and to suffer one of his dear Disciples to fall into such a gross and obstinate incredulity as the searching of these only could cure And these honourable marks received in that infernal and bloody war with the powers of Darkness are still retained by him at this day with these he appeared before the Throne Agnus tanquam occisus saith S. John Apocal. 5.6 and with those he will appear in Majesty at his second coming to Judgment for the greater confounding of those Beholders who inflicted them and of all the wicked when he then represents to them the great things he suffered to have saved them See Zach. 12.10 and 13.6 compared with Apoc. 1.7 Behold he cometh with Clouds saith St. John and every eye shall see him and they that pierced him and they shall bewail themselves upon Him and those his scars he now sitting at Gods right hand perpetually shews to his heavenly Father for mitigating his wrath to sinners and these himself also daily looks upon to mind him how much out salvation cost him and so the more to perfect preserve and take care of so dear a purchase For which gracious ostentation of them they seem also to have bin placed in the most visible parts of his body so that he cannot now stretch forth an hand or move a foot without shewing these holy Relicks of his infinite love to mankind Therefore are they so quickly observed by the Prophet Quae sunt plagae istae in medio manuum tuarum Zach. 13.6 These also remain to be hereafter to all his Saints in the beholding of these plagae quibus plagatus est as he answers in the Prophet in domo eorum qui diligebant eum wherewith he was wounded in the house of his friends or who had reason to be so an eternal incentive of their love and gratitude toward him as also now the meditation of them an excitive of a penitent grief in us for our sins that caused them as the same Prophet foretold chap. 12.10 alluded to by St. John Aspicient in eum quem confixerunt plangent eum planctu quasi super unigenitum dolebunt super eum ut doleri solet in morte primogeniti the only begotten Son of God slain for us Magnus planctus sicut planctus Adadremmon in campo Mageddon i. e. like the mourning for the pious Josiah the great Darling and last good King of Judah shortly after which the Nation of the Jews was delivered up into captivity as it was also after our Saviour slain Yet here we may not imagine that these piercings of our Lords Flesh that now still remain unclosed are any Deformity to that Sacred Body but rather are represented therein with some extraordinary splendor and beauty and become a singular ornament to it § 134 These scars then were thus perused by St. Thomas and after such his confession and Doxology he honoured with the same Commission for publishing this Gospel to the world as the other Apostles had bin that day sevennight After which our Lord appointed a certain day and place in Galilee see Mat. 28.16 when he would yet more publickly shew and manifest his Resurrection from death not only to them now well confirmed therein but also to the rest of his Disciples and Converts most numerous in that Countrey of his most frequent residence and preaching and where also such a concourse of them might be with the least noise or notice of the State And so the Paschal Feast ended the Apostles as also our Lords Mother and the other Galilean women that had 〈◊〉 on him returned with great joy to their ordinary abodes there expecting the time of this happy revisit and publishing to all his Followers especially the glad news of the revivification of our Lord and at what time and place they also might be made eye witnesses thereof § 135 Though the Apostles had already received a Commission from our Lord of publishing the Gospel and our Lords Resurrection and kingdom to the Jew and Gentile of Baptizing them yet were they not to enter upon this
office till they were endued with further Gifts from on high to be procured for them by our Lords Ascension In expectation therefore of these things and of his reappearance to them in Galilee many of them continued together as also our Lords Holy Mother probably in Capernaum the place of our Lords former ordinary abode at S. Peter's or also Zebedee's house and spending their time there as afterwards at Jerusalem Act. 1.14 in Praier and Praises and holy discourse and frequented by many others that had bin former Disciples and Admirers of our Lord to whom privatly they communicated his Resurrection and confirmed them in the faith § 136 After not many daies St. Peter whom the rest much observed and complyed with mentioned one evening to those with him his purpose to go out on fishing for which the calmness and darkness of the night whereby the fish are less frighted with their Nets as the best season used before by them see Luk. 5.5 some think because our Lords apparitions were usually on the first day of the week his Resurrection day that this was the Evening after the Sabbath was ended and when they had bin two or three daies in Galilee This employment St. Peter might undertake for the present but without all thoughts doubtless of any continuance of it not to seem void of business or ashamed of his former Trade as also to make some better provision for their necessary sustenance The Disciples that were present consented also to go with him probably all or most of them also formerly Fishermen The Persons were Zebedees two sons James and John Between the latter of which and St. Peter was a more intimate affection and they seldom parted from one another Thomas Nathanael and two others not named some conjecture these might be St. Andrew Peter's Brother and St. Philip his Fellow-townsman And Nathanael here who is not mentioned by this name but only by St. John being a Galilean a familiar acquaintance of Philips and called at the same time with him and who then made such an early and noble confession of our Lord Jo. 1.49 acknowledging him the Son of God and King of Israel and then also declared by our Lord so sincere and upright a Person and here also joined with them by the name of Disciples here Jo. 21.14 being meant Apostles is supposed to have bin one of the twelve and in the other Evangelist called by his Fathers name Bar-Tholomew as Peter Bar-Jona which Bartholemew in reciting of the Apostles names is also joined and placed next to Philip Mat. 10.3 and Mark 3.18 The Ship and Nets they used probably were those which in their former constant attendance on our Lord were left to the management of their near Relations and friends old Zebedee and his Servants and perhaps St. Peters Wife and his Mother for their better lively-hood by some hired servants still continued the trade Which Ships or Barkes also were on several occasions made use of by our Lord whilst he passed to and fro upon the the Lake to the Regions and Towns adjoining These Persons then being many of the chief of the Apostles seven of them in all which is a number much celebrated in Scripture went out together on fishing and that they might be the better prepared for the next mornings Miracle all that night though labouring hard caught not a fish as it also hapned to Peter before at our Lords first calling him from his trade Luk. 5.5 and he might imagine this a punishment of his return to it now so long deserted when designed for another employment The next morning our Lord standing on the shore but unknown in his former loving and familiar way calling them children asked them if they had any meat as if he would have bought some fish of them to whom they answering they had none he directed them to cast their Net on the right side of the ship and they should find some which they very obsequiously did perhaps suspecting something concerning the Person by his language of calling them children he making choice of this dearest term of love and affection rather than others of subjection and frequently using it See Mark 10.24 children how hard is it and John 13.33 little children yet a while I am with you c which word also the Apostles used to their Disciples and Converts 2 Cor. 6.13 Gal. 4.19 perhaps also they calling to mind the former Miracle our Lord had wrought in this kind after they had laboured so another whole night and caught nothing This was no sooner done but they perceived their Net so ponderous with the fishes it had enclosed that not able to lift it up into the ship they were forced to drag it along toward the shore Upon which St. John said to Peter that certainly it was our Lord either by his quicker sight better discerning him or from this great Miracle perswaded thereof Peter according to his wonted fervour and courage and moved by an extraordinary love he bare to our Lord impatient of the slow motion of the Ship dragging gently the laden Net girding only close to him his Fishers coat without further apparelling himself threw himself into the Sea it being not far to the shore Methinks this action somewhat resembling these two Disciple's behaviour at our Lords Sepulcher where John first discovered and Peter first entred where after his having adored our Lord and the others now arrived he went up again into the Boat to help them to land the Net full of great fishes in number one hundred fifty three yet without the least breach of the Net The former story of the Apostles fishing at their first call to follow Christ and so to become Fishers of men and the Miracle then done by our Lord varying in several Circumstances from this gave occasion to St. Austin in Johan Tract 122. knowing no casualty to be in our Lords Works but all as Parables significative and predesigned with an infinite wisdom more than we can for the present discover to conjecture these two fishings to represent the two states of the Church before and after the Resurrection when all things will be perfected In the first therefore he observes That the Disciples were bidden by our Lord then in the Ship together with them to cast their Nets but not so particularly on the right side of the ship That the fish caught were some great some small not drawn to the land but taken into the ship that by the Multitude of them the Net was broken and by their weight the ship in hazard to be sunk no certain number of them taken no feast or entertainment of the Fishermen after their toil But in this latter Our Lord is standing on and calling to them from the shore the Apostles being seven that is a compleat number are bidden to cast their Net and all the fish are taken on the right side of the ship these a certain number all great ones drawn to land no Net broken or
see Acts 10.34 15.7 And as S. Paul had an extraordinary Mission from Christ Acts 9.11 So had he one from the Church of Antioch Act. 13 3. and both his Baptism and Mission from the Ministry of those who received this Power from the Colledge of the Apostles of which Peter was the Head Our Lord to make this charge effect the deeper impression on Peter and all his Successors ceased not thus but repeated it asking him again and again only omitting the first comparison till Peter was grieved Jo. 21.17 and ashamed whether he loved him and upon the same Answer of his appealing to our Lords omniscience made now three times from whom our Lord may seem to require this trinal confession to expiate and reverse his former trinal Denyal he thrice iterated to him the same charge that in the absence of himself he should return this love to his little ones whom he sometimes called Lambs sometimes Sheep to shew all in his fold old or young committed to his government and that all strong or weaklings have need of the Pastors feeding them and were subjected to him After our Lord had thus instructed this chief Servant and Steward of his houshold Peter what he should do he began to preacquaint him also with what he should suffer for him the more to pre-arm him for future Events and that nothing hapning unexpected or that was not known to be by the divine Providence predesigned such things might afterwards less surprise him and that the conceit of a present secular Kingdom of our Lord and their advancement in his Court might be removed out of his mind He then began to tell him with a double serious Amen pronounced before it That as in his yonger age he had gone whither and done what he pleased so hereafter in his old age he must expect a change That as he must undertake great labours for his sake so undergo great afflictions and be made like unto his Master he so loved Mat. 26.35 as in his preaching of so in his sufferings for the truth and fulfil the promise he had once engaged of dying if not with yet for him That one day as himself had done he must stretch out his hands and another gird him and carry him away whither he would not to Prison and to the Cross signifying to him that he should glorify God his Father by Martyrdom and the Cross as himself had done Which accordingly happened in the thirteenth year of Nero after he had diligently fed Christ's sheep after this transiens universa visiting all places Acts 9.32 for thirty five years § 138 And so our Lord rising up and saying to Peter chiefly intended in a mystical sense follow me i. e. my example in undergoing such Events as he had discovered to him with all valour alacrity and constancy he walked on the shore Peter at a nearer distance attending him Who turning him about and seeing John coming after them probably somewhat before or faster than the rest presuming on the love our Lord bare to him to whom also Peter as well as our Lord had an extraordinary affection he took the boldness having heard his own doom to inquire of his al-knowing Master concerning this his dear friend what the Divine good pleasure had ordeined also touching him To whom our Lord repressing the Apostles curiosity returned somewhat a dubious Answer That if he would have John tarry till his coming this nothing concerned him but that he should prepare himself to follow him in that way of death and suffering as himself had trod before him See Jo. 13.36 Now Johns stay till our Lords coming being capable of several senses viz. either our Lords last coming to the general Judgment in those times imagined not far off or his coming in that signal Judgment of his upon the Jewish Nation at the destruction or Jerusalem which St. John only out-lived or his coming when he calleth and removeth his Servants away from hence by natural death ordinarily in Scripture-language called his coming see Mat. 24.42 46 50. Apoc. 2.24 3.5 this last we may imagine from the Event was our Lord's meaning though the Disciples either hearing these words from our Lord or related to them by St. Peter from hence gathered that John our Lords Favorite should not dye but remain till his second coming then commonly thought near at hand to which imagination of theirs as also of others following St. Johns long life and some miraculous deliverances gave still more strength who died not till sixty seven years after this was spoken by our Lord and remained alive almost thirty years after the Destruction of Jerusalem This opinion St. John now much aged when he writ this his Gospel endeavoured to remove telling them our Lord had expresly said no such thing but left our Lords words any further unexpounded as not seeming any way to decline or wave his own Martyrdom which doubtless he much thirsted for and had in some manner already undergone and outlived it Tertull de Praescript Cap. 36. being in Domitian's persecution of the Christians sent by the Proconsul of Asia as a chief Heresiarch to Rome and there cast into a vessel of scalding Oil to have taken away his life but was miraculously preserved to make good our Lords words and so banished into Patmos from whence returned he writ his Gospel shortly after which our Lord came to call him away in a natural and peaceable death when above ninety years old § 139 After these occurrences besides the Sea of Galilee related by S. John in a Post-script chap 21. after he had finished his Gospel Chap. 20. One Motive of which Postscript perhaps was the rectifying a mistake in some of the Disciples concerning our Lords Prophecy of his staying till he came Our Lord suddainly disappeared leaving them in a longing expectation of his return to them and a more publick manifestation of himself in Galilee at the time and place preappointed § 140 At which time a great Multitude of our Lords Converts in Galilee having notice of it from the Apostles were gathered together this being supposed the Apparition St. Paul speaks of 1 Cor. 15. when he saith he was seen of above five hundred Brethren at once in a certain Mountain of Galilee imagined the same upon which he was transfigured and where Moses and Elias appeared to him and which was by St. Peter called the Holy Mount This Mount is by many thought to be Mount Tabor a most beautiful Hill exactly round and ascensible only on one side not so steep as the others and having a Plain for about half a mile Diameter at the top which hill our Lord living so near it situate about some three or four miles from Nazareth perhaps had sometimes frequented in his youth But it seems rather to be another Mountain nearer to Capernaum the place of his ordinary Residence in Galilee where also a-nights he frequented Prayer called his twelve Apostles delivered the Beatitudes
in such a case to rend their vest before with both their hands from the neck to the middle and said there was now no more need of witnesses who well knew how little they besteaded him that he had sufficiently condemned himself The rest also of his Assessors charged him with blasphemy themselves in this blaspheming and that for this he merited death and so delivered him into the custody of the High Priests Officers till the morning which now approached it being now after Cock-crow and raised the Court. See Luk. 22.26 Mat. 27.1 Or if some of our Lords Judges may be thought to have sate in consultation the rest of that night yet our Lord was removed from before them and remitted to the Officers custody till a fuller Assembly of the next morning should determine their further proceedings § 38 Our Lord thus left in the Officers hands let us now return and see what becomes of his poor Disciples It was said that after the Sword drawn and Malchus his Eare cut off and our Lord apprehended and bound all of them fled but St. Peter and another Disciple by the advantage of the darkness of the night followed the Troop at some distance which other Disciple seems to be S. John because he relates the matter so punctually and conceals the name as he useth when speaking of himself As for that Disciple's being known to the High Priest I conceive he might be so without the High Priest himself but onely some of his Family having familiar acquaintance with him or without the High Preist's knowing any thing of his Discipleship to Jesus or also with his conniveance at it our Lords Disciples having as yet given the High Preist not the least offence and this also makes it the more probable that Zebedee his father seems to have bin according to his condition a wealthy man as may be gathered from his wifes perhaps after her husbands decease being one that accompanied Mary Magdalen and the wife of Herodes Steward wealthy persons also whom God had provided for this purpose in ministring to our Lord's necessities in his travels out of their substance as also after his death in providing costly spices for embalming him See Mat. 27.55.56 compare Luk. 8.2.3 And this also might be some reason of her confident request Mat. 20.20 of having her two sons more highly preferred in our Lords Kingdom and lastly of our Lords recommending his mother to John as for other reasons so because he was better able to provide for her and perhaps as having also an house in Jerusalem Jo. 19.27 but be this as it will § 39 Those two Disciples followed our Lord to the High Priest's gate And the other Disciple pressed also into the Pallace with our Lord and the Guard Jo. 18.25 but Peter perhaps more timorous for the Exploit he had done in the Garden stayeth without till his companion speaking to a woman the Portress brought him in which made her presume him a Galilean Peter thus entred presumed not to go up into the Court where the Council sate on the trial of our Lord as probably the other Disciple did but stayed below amongst the servants and officers at the fire in the Hall or Court of the Pallace Mat. 26.69 Mark 14.66 warming himself and expecting what would be the end Mat. 26.58 When the Maid-servant the Portress remembring who brought in Peter and probably the discourse of the company then being of our Lords apprehension and Followers said unto Peter before them all Art not Thou also one of this mans Disciples Jo. 18.17 Peter much amated hereat denyed it and said he was none of his Disciples he knew no such man nor understood what she said and after taking an opportunity withdrew himself from them into the Porch perhaps intending to have gone clear away but the gate being shut he thought it not best to discover his fears but return again into the Hall and former company where doubtless he heard talk of the severe proceedings against our Lord in the Court Meanwhile he being absent in the Porch the Cock crew and gave him a fair warning of his fault but his troubled thoughts took no notice of it There he had not staied long but another Maid said of him to the standers-by that he was one of the company that was with Jesus But he denyed with an oath Mat. 26.72 the second time that he knew him Near upon an hour after this some others of the company again began to compass and question him saying That surely he was one of them for his speech also bewrayed him for a Galilean And which was the worst of all one of the High Priest's servants a kinsman of his whose ear Peter had cut off pressed him yet closer saying did not I see thee in the Garden with him Here having cause to fear his assaulting the High Priests servant and making resistance to Authority might also come into Examination still in more distraction he began saith St. Matthew execrari jurare that he knew not the man and presently the Cock crew again And upon it our Lord by this time after the Court was risen being brought down by the Officers into the Hall looked back and gave a glance upon Peter § 40 Upon which our Lord's words also came into his remembrance that before the Cock crew twice he would thrice deny him And as fast as he could getting out of the Pallace with the crowd after the Assembly dissolved he now had liberty to ease his wounded mind and so fell a weeping bitterly both for his great fault though not of betraying as Judas yet of denying and foreswearing such a Master and for his great presumption in so rashly promising what he saw when left to himself and Jesus taken from him he was not able to perform Now also came fresh into his mind on the other side the great love and affection his Lord had shewed to him and the rest in his fare-well-Sermon to them and Prayer for them in his telling them of the present danger and requesting them to watch and pray when also carelesly neglecting him in his terrible Agony they fell fast a sleep again in his freely meeting the Troops and delivering up himself to procure their dismission lest some ill should happen to them his own rash venturing into the Court where few bring away the innocency they carried thither and the state and over-awing of great persons and the flattery of them by Inferiors corrupts mens manners his being daunted who before so stoutly drew his Sword against an Army with the questioning not of a Court or the Magistrate but only by a silly maid-servant his not only denying his Lord but fixing it too with curses and oaths his taking no warning nor thinking of our Lord's admonition when as it were on purpose being gone apart he so distinctly heard the first Cock-crow nor when the last had not his dear Master turned himself about and cast an Eye upon him But then