shall know that I am the Lord God shall restore them to life and more to strength and more to beauty and comelinesse acceptable to himselfe in Christ Jesus Your way is Recollecting gather your selves into the Congregation and Communion of Saints in these places gather your sins into your memory and poure them out in humble confessions to that God whom they have wounded Gather the crummes under his Table lay hold upon the gracious promises which by our Ministery he lets fall upon the Congregation now and gather the seales of those promises whensoever in a rectified conscience his Spirit beares witnesse with your spirit that you may be worthy receivers of him in his Sacrament and this recollecting shall be your resurrection Beatus qui habet partem Apâ—â— 20.6 sayes S. Iohn Blessed is he that hath part in the first Resurrection for on such the second death hath no power He that rises to this Judgement of recollecting and of judging himselfe shall rise with a chearfulnesse and stand with a confidence when Christ Jesus shall come in the second Auâ— And Quando exacturus est in secundo quod dedit in primo when Christ shall call for an account in that second judgement how he hath husbanded those graces which he gave him for the first he shall make his possession of this first resurrection his title and his evidence to the second When thy body which hath been subject to all kindes of destruction here to the destruction of a Flood in Catarrhs and Rheums and Dropsies and such distillations to the destruction of a fire in Feavers and Frenzies and such conflagrations shall be removed safely and gloriously above all such distempers and malignant impressions and body and soule so united as if both were one spirit in it selfe and God so united to both as that thou shalt be the same spirit with God God began the first World but upon two Adam and Eve The second world after the Flood he began upon a greater stock upon eight reserved in the Arke But when he establishes the last and everlasting world in the last Resurrection he shall admit such a number as that none of us who are here now none that is or hath or shall be upon the face of the earth shall be denied in that Resurrection if he have truly felt this for Grace accepted is the infallible earnest of Glory SERMON XXII Preached at S. Pauls upon Easter-day 1627. HEB. 11.35 Women received their dead raised to life againe And others were tortured not accepting a deliverance that they might obtaine a better Resurrection MErcy is Gods right hand with that God gives all Faith is mans right hand with that man takes all David Psal 136. opens and enlarges this right hand of God in pouring out his blessings plentifully abundantly manifoldly there And in this Chapter the Apostle opens and enlarges this right hand of man by laying hold upon those mercies of God plentifully abundantly manifoldly by faith here There David powres downe the mercies of God in repeating and re-repeating that phrase For his mercy endureth for ever And here S. Paul carries up man to heaven by repeating and re-repeating the blessings which man hath attained by faith By faith Abel sacrificed By faith Enoch walked with God By faith Noah built an Arke c. And as in that Psalme Gods mercies are exprest two waies First in the good that God did for his servants He remembred them in their low estate Ver 23. Ver. 24. for his mercy endureth for ever And then againe He redeemed them from their enemies for his mercy endureth for ever And then also in the evill that he brought upon their enemies He slew famous Kings for his mercy endureth for ever And then He gave their land for an heritage for his mercy endureth for ever So in this Chapter the Apostle declares the benefits of faith two wayes also First how faith enriches us and accommodates us in the wayes of prosperity By faith Abraham went to a place which he received for an inheritance And so By faith Sarah received strength to conceive seed Ver. 8. Ver. 11. Ver. 34. And then how faith sustaines and establishes us in the wayes of adversity By faith they stopt the mouthes of Lions by faith they quencht the violence of fire by faith they escaped the edge of the sword in the verse immediatly before the Text. And in this verse which is our Text the Apostle hath collected both The benefits which they received by faith Women received their dead raised to life againe And then the holy courage which was infused by Faith in their persecutions Others were tortured not accepting deliverance that they might receive a better Resurrection And because both these have relation evidently pregnantly to the Resurrection for their benefit was that the Women received their dead by a Resurrection And their courage in their persecution was That they should receive a better Resurrection therefore the whole meditation is proper to this day in which wee celebrate all Resurrections in the Root in the Resurrection of the First fruits of the dead our Lord and Saviour Christ Iesus Our Parts are two How plentifully God gives to the faithfull Divisio Women receive their dead raised to life againe And how patiently the faithfull suffer Gods corrections Others were tortured not accepting c. Though they be both large considerations Benefits by Faith Patience in the Faithfull yet we shall containe our selves in those particulars which are exprest or necessarily implyed in the Text it selfe And so in the first place we shall see first The extraordinary consolation in Gods extraordinary Mercies in his miraculous Deliverances such as this Women received their dead raised to life again And secondly we shall seethe examples to which the Apostle refers here What women had had their dead restored to life againe And then lastly in that part That this affection of joy in having their dead restored to life againe being put in the weaker sexe in women onely we may argue conveniently from thence That the strength of a true and just joy lies not in that but that our virility our holy manhood our religious strength consists in a faithfull assurance that we have already a blessed communion with these Saints of God though they be dead and we alive And that we shall have hereafter a glorious Association with them in the Resurrection though we never receive our dead raised to life again in this world And in those three considerations we shall determine that first part And then in the other The Patience of the Faithfull Others were tortured c. we shall first look into the examples which the Apostle refers to who they were that were thus tortured And secondly the heighth and exaltation of their patience They would not accept a deliverance And lastly the ground upon which their Anchor was cast what established their patience That they might obtaine a better Resurrection
employment to which his education had apted him yet the King denied their requests and having a discerning spirit replyed I know M. Donne is a learned man an excellent Divine and will prove a powerfull Preacher After that as he professeth * In his Devotions Expost 8. the King descended almost to a solicitation of him to enter into sacred Orders which though he denied not he deferred for the space of three yeares All which time he applyed himselfe to an incessant study of Textuall Divinity and attained a greater perfection in the learned Languages Greek and Hebrew Forwardnesse and inconsideration could not in him as in many others argue an insufficiencie for he considered long and had many strifes within himselfe concerning the strictnesse of life and competencie of learning required in such as enter into sacred Orders And doubtlesse considering his owne demerits did with meek Moses humbly aske God Who am I And if he had consulted with flesh and bloud he had not put his hand to that holy plough But God who is able to prevaile wrastled with him as the Angel did with Iacob Gen. 32. and marked him for his owne marked him with a blessing a blessing of obedience to the motions of his blessed Spirit And then as he had formerly asked God humbly with Moses Who am I So now being inspired with the apprehension of Gods mercies he did ask King Davids thankfull question Lord who am I that thou art so mindfull of me So mindfull of me as to lead me for more then forty years through a wildernesse of the many temptations and various turnings of a dangerous life So mindfull as to move the learnedst of Kings to descend to move me to serve at thine Altar So merciful to me as to move my heart to embrace this holy motion Thy motions I will embrace take the cup of salvation call upon thy Name and preach thy Gospell Such strifes as these S. Augustine had when S. Ambrose indeavoured his conversion to Christianity with which he confesseth he acquainted his deare friend Alippius Our learned Author a man fit to write after no meane Copy did the like and declaring his intentions to his deare friend D. King the then worthy Bishop of London who was Chaplaine to the Lord Chancellor in the time of his being his Lordships Secretary That Reverend Bishop most gladly received the newes and with all convenient speed ordained him Deacon and Priest Now the English Church had gained a second S. Augustine for I think none was so like him before his conversion none so like S. Ambrose after it And if his youth had the infirmities of the one Father his age had the excellencies of the other the learning and holinesse of both Now all his studies which were occasionally diffused were concentred in Divinity Now he had a new calling new thoughts new imployment for his wit and eloquence Now all his earthly affections were changed into divine love and all the faculties of his soule were ingaged in the conversion of others in preaching glad tidings remission to repenting sinners and peace to each troubled soule To this he applyed himselfe with all care and diligence and such a change was wrought in him Psal 84. that he was gladder to be a doore-keeper in the house of God then to enjoy any temporall employment Presently after he entred into his holy Profession the King made him his Chaplaine in Ordinary and gave him other incouragements promising to take a particular care of him And though his long familiarity with persons of greatest quality was such as might have given some men boldnesse enough to have preached to any eminent Auditory yet his modesty was such that he could not be perswaded to it but went usually to preach in some private Churches in Villages neere London till his Majestie appointed him a day to preach to him And though his Majestie and others expected much from him yet he was so happy which few are as to satisfie and exceed their expectations preaching the Word so as shewed he was possest with those joyes that he laboured to distill into others A Preacher in earnest weeping sometimes for his Auditory sometimes with them alwayes preaching to himselfe like an Angel from a cloud though in none carrying some as S. Paul was to heaven in holy raptures enticing others by a sacred art and courtship to amend their lives and all this with a most particular grace and un-imitable fashion of speaking That Summer the same month in which he was ordained Priest and made the Kings Chaplaine his Majestie going his Progresse was intreated to receive an entertainment in the University of Cambridge and M. Donne attending his Majestie there his Majestie was pleased to recommend him to be made Doctor in Divinity Doctor Harsnet after Archbishop of York being then their Vice-Chancellour who knowing him to be the Author of the Pseudo-Martyr did propose it to the University and they presently granted it expressing a gladnesse they had an occasion to entitle and write him Theits His abilities and industry in his profession were so eminent and he so much loved by many persons of quality that within one yeare after his entrance into Sacred Orders he had fourteen Advowsons of severall Benefices sent unto him but they being in the Countrey could not draw him from his long loved friends and London to which he had a naturall inclination having received his birth and breeding in it desiring rather some preferment that might fixe him to an employment in that place Immediately after his returne from Cambridge his wife died leaving him a man of an unsetled estate And having buried five the carefull father of seven children then living to whom he made a voluntary promise being then but forty two years of age never to bring them under the subjection of a Step-mother which promise he most faithfully kept burying with his teares all his sublunary joyes in his most deare and deserving Wives grave living a most retired and solitary life In this retirednesse he was importuned by the grave Benchers of Lincolns Inne once the friends of his youth to accept of their Lecture which by reason of M. Gatakers removall was then void of which he accepted being glad to renew his intermitted friendship with them whom he so much loved and where he had been a Saul not so far as to persecute Christianity yet in his irregular youth to neglect the practise of it to become a Paul and preach salvation to his brethren Nor did he preach onely but as S. Paul advised his Corinthians to be followers of him as he was of Christ so he also was an ocular direction to them by a holy and harmlesse conversation Their love to him was exprest many wayes for besides the faire lodgings that were provided and furnisht for him other curtesies were daily accumulated so many and so freely as though they meant their gratitude if possible should exceed or at least equall his merit In
Belial in this Text. For the adhering of persons born within the Church of Rome to the Church of Rome our law sayes nothing to them if they come But for reconciling to the Church of Rome by persons born within the Allegeance of the King or for perswading of men to be so reconciled our law hath called by an infamous and Capitall name of Treason and yet every Tavern and Ordinary is full of such Traitors Every place from jest to earnest is filled with them from the very stage to the death-bed At a Comedy they will perswade you as you sit as you laugh And in your sicknesse they will perswade you as you lye as you dye And not only in the bed of sicknesse but in the bed of wantonnesse they perswade too and there may be examples of women that have thought it a fit way to gain a soul by prostituting themselves and by entertaining unlawfull love with a purpose to convert a servant which is somewhat a strange Topique to draw arguments of religion from Let me see a Dominican and a Jesuit reconciled in doctrinall papistry for freewill and predestination Let me see a French papist and an Italian papist reconciled in State-papistry for the Popes jurisdiction Let me see the Jesuits and the secular priests reconciled in England and when they are reconciled to one another let them presse reconciliation to their Church To end all Those men have their bodies from the earth and they have their soules from heaven and so all things in earth and heaven are reconciled but they have their Doctrine from the Devill and for things in hell there is no peace made and with things in hell there is no reconciliation to be had by the blood of his Crosse except we will tread that blood under our feet and make a mock of Christ Jesus and crucifie the Lord of Life againe SERMON II. Preached at Pauls upon Christmas Day in the Evening 1624. ESAIAH 7.14 Part of the first Lesson that Evening Therefore the Lord shall give you a signe Behold a Virgin shall conceive and beare a Son and shall call his name Immanuel SAint Bernard spent his consideration upon three remarkable conjunctions this Day First a Conjunction of God and Man in one person Christ Jesus Then a conjunction of the incompatible Titles Maid and Mother in one blessed woman the blessed Virgin Mary And thirdly a conjunction of Faith and the Reason of man that so beleeves and comprehends those two conjunctions Let us accompany these three with another strange conjunction in the first word of this Text Propterea Therefore for that joynes the anger of God and his mercy together God chides and rebukes the King Achaz by the Prophet he is angry with him and Therefore sayes the Text because he is angry he will give him a signe a seale of mercy Therefore the Lord shall give you a signe Behold a Virgin c. This Therefore shall therefore be a first part of this Exercise That God takes any occasion to shew mercy And a second shall be The particular way of his mercy declared here Divisie The Lord shall give you a signe And then a third and last what this signe was Behold a Virgin c. In these three parts we shall walk by these steps Having made our entrance into the first with that generall consideration that Gods mercy is alwaies in season upon that station upon that height we shall look into the particular occasions of Gods mercy here what this King Achaz had done to alien God and to avert his mercy and in those two branches we shall determine that part In the second we shall also first make this generall entrance That God persists in his own waies goes forward with his own purposes And then what his way and his purpose here was he would give them a signe and farther we shall not extend that second part In the third we have more steps to make First what this sign is in generall it is that there is a Redeemer given And then how thus First Virgo concipiet a Virgin shall conceive she shall be a Virgin then And Virgo pariet a Virgin shall bring forth she shall be a Virgin then And Pariet filium she shall beare a Son and therefore he is of her substance not only man but man of her And this Virgin shall call this Son Immanuel God with us that is God and Man in one person Though the Angel at the Conception tell Ioseph That he shall call his name Jesus Mat. 1.21 and tell Mary her selfe that she shall call his name Jesus Luc. 1.31 yet the blessed Virgin her selfe shall have a further reach a clearer illustration She shall call his name Immanuel God with us Others were called Iesus Iosuah was so divers others were so but in the Scriptures there was never any but Christ called Immanuel Though Iesus signifie a Saviour Ioseph was able to call this childe Iesus upon a more peculiar reason and way of salvation then others who had that name because they had saved the people from present calamities and imminent dangers for the Angel told Ioseph that he should therefore be called Iesus because he should save the people from their sins and so no Iosuah no other Iesus was a Iesus But the blessed Virgin saw more then this not only that he should be such a Iesus as should save them from their sins but she saw the manner how that he should be Immanuel God with us God and man in one person That so being Man he might suffer and being God that should give an infinite value to his sufferings according to the contract passed between the Father and him and so he should be Iesus a Saviour a Saviour from sin and this by this way and meanes And then that all this should be established and declared by an infallible signe with this Ecce Behold That whosoever can call upon God by that name Immanuel that is confesse Christ to bee come in the flesh that Man shall have an Ecce a light a sign a token an assurance that this Immanuel this Jesus this Saviour belongs unto him and he shall be able to say Ecce Behold mine eyes have seen thy salvation We begin with that which is elder then our beginning 1 Part. Psal 101.1 and shall over-live our end The mercy of God I will sing of thy mercy and judgement sayes David when we fixe our selves upon the meditation and modulation of the mercy of God even his judgements cannot put us out of tune but we shall sing and be chearefull even in them As God made grasse for beasts before he made beasts and beasts for man before he made man As in that first generation the Creation so in the regeneration our re-creating he begins with that which was necessary for that which followes Mercy before Judgement Nay to say that mercy was first is but to post-date mercy to preferre mercy but so is
to diminish mercy The names of first or last derogate from it for first and last are but ragges of time and his mercy hath no relation to time no limitation in time it is not first nor last but eternall everlasting Let the Devill make me so far desperate as to conceive a time whē there was no mercy and he hath made me so far an Atheist as to conceive a time when there was no God if I despoile him of his mercy any one minute and say now God hath no mercy for that minute I discontinue his very Godhead and his beeing Later Grammarians have wrung the name of mercy out of misery Misericordia praesumit miseriam say these there could be no subsequent mercy if there were no precedent misery But the true roote of the word mercy through all the Prophets is Racham and Racham is diligere to love as long as there hath been love and God is love there hath been mercy And mercy considered externally and in the practise and in the effect began not at the helping of man when man was fallen and become miserable but at the making of man when man was nothing So then here we consider not mercy as it is radically in God and an essentiall attribute of his but productively in us as it is an action a working upon us and that more especially as God takes all occasions to exercise that action and to shed that mercy upon us for particular mercies are feathers of his wings and that prayer Lord let thy mercy lighten upon us as our trust is in thee is our birdlime particular mercies are that cloud of Quailes which hovered over the host of Israel and that prayer Lord let thy mercy lighten upon us is our net to catch our Gomer to fill of those Quailes The aire is not so full of Moats of Atomes as the Church is of Mercies and as we can suck in no part of aire but we take in those Moats those Atomes so here in the Congregation we cannot suck in a word from the preacher we cannot speak we cannot sigh a prayer to God but that that whole breath and aire is made of mercy But we call not upon you from this Text to consider Gods ordinary mercy that which he exhibites to all in the ministery of his Church nor his miraculous mercy his extraordinary deliverances of States and Churches but we call upon particular Consciences by occasion of this Text to call to minde Gods occasionall mercies to them such mercies as a regenerate man will call mercies though a naturall man would call them accidents or occurrences or contingencies A man wakes at mid-night full of unclean thoughts and he heares a passing Bell this is an occasionall mercy if he call that his own knell and consider how unfit he was to be called out of the world then how unready to receive that voice Foole this night they shall fetch away thy soule The adulterer whose eye waites for the twy-light goes forth and casts his eyes upon forbidden houses and would enter and sees a Lord have mercy upon us upon the doore this is an occasionall mercy if this bring him to know that they who lie sick of the plague within passe through a furnace but by Gods grace to heaven and hee without carries his own furnace to hell his lustfull loines to everlasting perdition What an occasionall mercy had Balaam when his Asse Catechized him What an occasionall mercy had one Theefe when the other catechized him so Art not thou afraid being under the same condemnation What an occasionall mercy had all they that saw that when the Devil himself fought for the name of Jesus and wounded the sons of Sceva for exorcising in the name of Jesus Act. 19.14 with that indignation with that increpation Iesus we know and Paul we know but who are ye If I should declare what God hath done done occasionally for my soule where he instructed me for feare of falling where he raised me when I was fallen perchance you would rather fixe your thoughts upon my illnesse and wonder at that then at Gods goodnesse and glorifie him in that rather wonder at my sins then at his mercies rather consider how ill a man I was then how good a God he is If I should inquire upon what occasion God elected me and writ my name in the book of Life I should sooner be afraid that it were not so then finde a reason why it should be so God made Sun and Moon to distinguish seasons and day and night and we cannot have the fruits of the earth but in their seasons But God hath made no decree to distinguish the seasons of his mercies In paradise the fruits were ripe the first minute and in heaven it is alwaies Autumne his mercies are ever in their maturity We ask panem quetidianum our daily bread and God never sayes you should have come yesterday he never sayes you must againe to morrow but to day if you will heare his voice to day he will heare you If some King of the earth have so large an extent of Dominion in North and South as that he hath Winter and Summer together in his Dominions so large an extent East and West as that he hath day and night together in his Dominions much more hath God mercy and judgement together He brought light out of darknesse not out of a lesser light he can bring thy Summer out of Winter though thou have no Spring though in the wayes of fortune or understanding or conscience thou have been benighted till now wintred and frozen clouded and eclypsed damped and benummed smothered and stupified till now now God comes to thee not as in the dawning of the day not as in the bud of the spring but as the Sun at noon to illustrate all shadowes as the sheaves in harvest to fill all penuries all occasions invite his mercies and all times are his seasons If it were not thus in generall it would never have been so in this particular in our case Achaz case in the Text in King Achaz If God did not seeke occasion to doe good to all he would never have found occasion to doe good to King Achaz Subjects are to look upon the faults of Princes with the spectacles of obedience and reverence to their place and persons little and dark spectacles and so their faults and errors are to appeare little and excusable to them Gods perspective glasse his spectacle is the whole world he looks not upon the Sun in his spheare onely but as he works upon the whole earth And he looks upon Kings not onely what harme they doe at home but what harme they occasion abroad through that spectacle the faults of Princes in Gods eye are multiplyed farre above those of private men Achaz had such faults and yet God sought occasion of Mercy Iotham his Father is called a good King and yet all Idolatry was not removed in his time and he
which every one well considered as the petitions of Abraham did upon God may justly be thought to have gained more and more upon his Auditory First this paralytique man in our Text who is Sarcinasibi over-loaded with himself he cannot stand under his own burden he is cadaver animatum It is true he hath a soule but a soule in a sack it hath no Lims no Organs to move this Paralytique this living dead man this dead and buryed man buryed in himselfe is instantly cured and recovered But the Palsie was a sudden sicknesse what could he doe upon an inveterate disease He cured the woman that had had the bloudy issue twelve yeares V. 20. by onely touching the hem of his garment After he extends his miraculous power to two at once he cures two blinde men V. 27. But all these though not by such meanes meerely yet in nature and in art might be possible Palsies and Issues and Blindnesses have been cured but he went farther then ever art pretended to goe V. 24. He raised the Rulers Daughter to life then when he was laughed to scorne for going about to doe it And lastly to shew his Power as over sicknesse and over death so over hell it selfe he cast out the Devill out of the dumb man in some such extraordinary manner as that the multitude marvailed V. 33. and said It was never so seene in Israel This then was his way and this must be ours and it must be your way too Christ preached and he wrought great works and he preached againe It is not enough in us to preach and in you to heare except both doe and practice that which is said and heard Neither may we though we have done all this give over for every day produces new tentations and therefore needs new assistances And so we passe from these more remote to that which is our second Branch of this first part the immediate occasion of Christs doing this miracle When Iesus saw their faith Here then the occasion of all that ensued was faith for without faith Fides Heb. 11.6 it is impossible to please God Where you may be pleased to admit some use of this note for it is not a meere Grammaticall curiosity to note it that it is not said in those words of S. Paul It is impossible to please God or impossible to please him which is with relation to God as our Translation hath it but it is meerely simply onely impossible to please and no more impossible to please any worth pleasing but if we take away our faith in God God will take away the protection of Angels the favour of Princes the obedience of children the respect of servants the assistance of friends the society of neighbours God shall make us unpleasing to all without faith it is impossible to please any but such as we shall repent to have made our selves pleasing companions unto When our Saviour Christ perfected the Apostles Commission and set his last seale to it after his Resurrection he never modifies never mollifies their instructions with any milder phrase then this He that beleeveth not shall be damned It is not that he shall be in danger of a Councell Mark 16.16 no nor in danger of hell fire It is not that it were better a Mill-stone were tyed about his neck and he cast into the Sea It is not that it will goe hard with him at the last day It is not that it shall be easier to Tyre and Sidon then to him For he is not bound to beleeve but that Tyre and Sidon and he too may doe well enough Here is no modification no mollification no reservation roundly and irrevocably Christ Jesus himselfe after his Resurrection sayes Qui non crediderit he that beleeveth not shall be damned If the Judge must come to a sentence of condemnation upon any person of great quality in the Kingdome that Judge must not say Your Lordship must passe out of this world nor your Lordship must be beheaded but he must tell them plainly You must be carryed to the place of execution and there hanged Christ Jesus hath given us the Commission and the sentence there Goe into all the world preach the Gospell to every creature And then the sentence followes upon those that will not receive it He that beleeveth not shall be damned These men then who prevailed so farre upon Christ brought faith though not an explicite faith of all those articles which we who from the beginning have been Catechized in all those points are bound to have yet a constant assurance that Christ could and that he would relieve this distressed person in which assurance there was enwrapped an implicite faith even of the Messias that could remove all occasions of sicknesse even sin it selfe There was faith in the case but in whom Whose faith was it Illorum that Christ had respect to To whom hath that Illorum in the Text their faith reference There can be no question but that it hath reference to those foure friends that brought this sick man in his bed to Christ For else it could not have been spoken in the plurall and called their faith And certainly S. Ambrose does not inconveniently make that particular an argument of Gods greatnesse and goodnesse of his magnificence and munificence Magnus Dominus qui aliorum meritis aliis ignostit This is the large and plentifull mercy of God that for one mans sake he forgives another This Ioash acknowledged in the person of Elisha when Elisha was sick the King came downe to him and wept over his face 2 Reg. 13.14 and said O my Father my Father the Chariot of Israel and the horse men thereof Here were all the forces of Israel mustred upon one sick bed the whole strength of Israel consisted in the goodnesse of that one man The Angel said to Paul when they were in an evident and imminent danger of shipwrack Act. 27.24 God hath given thee all them that sayle with thee He spared them not for their owne sakes but for Pauls God gave those passengers to Paul so as he had given Paul himselfe before to Stephen Si Stephanus non sic orasset Paulum hodiè Ecclesia non haberet sayes S. Augustine If Paul had not been enwrapped in those prayers which Stephen made for his persecutors the Church had lost the benefit of all Pauls labours and if God had not given Paul the lives of all those passengers in that Ship they had all perished For the righteousnesse of a few if those few could have been found God would have spared the whole City of Sodome Gen. 18. And when Gods fury was kindled upon the Cities of that Country God remembred Abraham Gen. 19.29 sayes that story and he delivered Lot And when he delivered Jerusalem from Sennacherib he takes his servant David by the hand he puts his servant David into Commission with himselfe and he sayes I will defend this
in the warfare Mat. 26.38 so we have our example in our great Generall Christ Jesus Who though his soul were heavy and heavy unto death though he had a baptisme to be baptised with coarctabatur he was straightned and in paine till it were accomplished and though he had power to lay down his soul Iohn 10.18 and take it up againe and no man else could take it from him yet he sought it out to the last houre and till his houre came he would not prevent it nor lay downe his soule Vae desiderantibus woe unto them that desire any other end of Gods correction but what he hath ordained and appointed for ut quid vobis what shall you get by choosing your owne wayes Tenebrae non lux They shall passe out of this world in this inward darknesse of melancholy and dejection of spirit into the outward darknesse which is an everlasting exclusion from the Father of lights and from the Kingdome of joy their case is well expressed in the next verse to our Text they shall flie from a Lyon and a Beare shall meet them they shall leane on a wall and a Serpent shall bite them they shall end this life by a miserable and hasty death and out of that death shall grow an immortall life in torments which no wearinesse nor desire nor practice can ever bring to an end And here in this acceptation of these words this vae falls directly upon them who colouring and apparelling treason in martyrdome expose their lives to the danger of the Law Scribanius embrace death these of whom one of their own society saith that the Scevolaes the Caves the Porciaes the Cleopatraes of the old time were nothing to the Jesuites for saith he they could dye once but they lacked courage ad multas mortes perchance hee meanes that after those men were once in danger of the Law and forfeited their lives by one comming they could come again and again as often as the plentifull mercy of their King would send them away Rapiunt mortem spontanea irruptione sayes he to their glory they are voluntary and violent pursuers of their own death and as he expresses it Crederes morbo adesos Baron Martyrâ—â— 29. Decemb you would think that the desire of death is a disease in them A graver man then he mistakes their case and cause of death as much you are saith he incouraging those of our Nation to the pursuit of death in sacris septis ad martyrium saginati fed up and fatned here for martyrdome Sacramento sanguinem spospondistis they have taken an oath that they will be hanged but that he in whom as his great patterne God himselfe mercy is above all his works out of his abundant sweetnesse makes them perjured when they have so Tworne and vowed their owne ruine But those that send them give not the lives of these men so freely so cheaply as they pretend But as in dry Pumps men poure in a little water that they may pump up more so they are content to drop in a little blood of imaginary but traiterous Martyrs that by that at last they may draw up at last the royall blood of Princes and the loyall blood of Subjects vae desiderantibus woe to them that are made thus ambitious of their owne ruine ut quid vobis Tenebrae non lux you are kept in darknesse in this world and sent into darknesse from heaven into the next and so your ambition ad multas mortes shall be satisfied you dye more then one death morte moriemini this death delivers you to another from which you shall never be delivered We have now past through these three acceptations of these words Conclusion which have falne into the contemplation and meditation of the Ancients in their Expositions of this Text as this dark day of the Lord signifies his judgements upon Atheisticall scorners in this world as it signifies his last irrevocable and irremediable judgements upon hypocriticall relyers upon their own righteousnesse in the next world and between both as it signifies their uncomfortable passage out of this life who bring their death inordinately upon themselves and we shall shut up all with one signification more of the Lords day That that is the Lords day of which the whole Lent is the Vigil and the Eve All this time of mortification and our often meeting in this place to heare of our mortality and our immortality which are the two reall Texts and Subjects of all our Sermons All this time is the Eve of the Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ That is the Lords day when all our mortification and dejection of spirit and humbling of our soules shall be abundantly exalted in his resurrection and when all our fasts and abstinence shall be abundantly recompenced in the participation of his body his bloud in the Sacrament Gods Chancery is alwayes open and his seale works alwaies at all times remission of sins may be sealed to a penitent soule in the Sacrament That clause which the Chancellors had in their Patents under the Romane Emperours Vt praerogativamgerat conscientiae nostrae is in our commission too for God hath put his conscience into his Church whose sins are remitted there are remitted in heaven at all times but yet dies Domini the Lords resurrection is as the full Terme a more generall application of this seale of reconciliation But vae desiderantibus woe unto them that desire that day only because they would have these dayes of preaching and prayer and fasting and trouble some preparation past and gone Vae desiderantibus woe unto them who desire that day onely that by receâ—â—ing the Sacrament day that they might delude the world as though they were not of a contrary religion in their heart vae desiderantibus woe unto them who present themselves that day without such a preparation as becomes so fearful and mystesious an action upon any carnall or collaterall respects Before that day of the Lord comes comes the day of his crucifying before you come to that day if you come not to a crucifying of your selves to the world and the world to you ut quid vobis what shall you get by that day you shall prophane that day and the Author of it as to make that day of Christs triumph the triumph of Satan and to make even that body and bloud of Christ Jesus Vehiculum Satanae his Chariot to enter into you as he did into Iudas That day of the Lord will be darknesse and not light and that darknesse will be that you shall not discerne the Lords body you shall scatter all your thoughts upon wrangling and controversies de modo how the Lords body can be there and you shall not discerne by the effects nor in your owne conscience that the Lords body is there at all But you shall take it to be onely an obedience to civill or Ecclesiasticall
Man as to calumniate him to blaspheme him was an inexcusable sin To say of him who had fasted forty dayes and forty nights Mat. 11.19 Mar. 12.14 Ecce homo vorax Behold a man gluttonous and a wine-bibber To say of him of whom themselves had said elsewhere Master we know that thou art true and carest for no man that he was a friend of Publicans and sinners That this man who was The Prince of Peace Heb. 12.3 should indure such contradiction This was an inexcusable sin If any man therefore have had his good intentions mis-construed his zeale to assist Gods bleeding and fainting cause called Innovation his proceeding by wayes good in themselves to ends good in themselves called Indiscretion let him be content to forgive them any Calumniator against himselfe who is but a worme and no man since God himselfe forgave them against Christ who was so Filius hominis The Son of Man as that he was the Son of God too There is then forgivenesse for sin for all sin even for blasphemy Infuturo for blasphemy against the Son but it is Infuturo remittetur It shall be forgiven It is not Remittebatur It was forgiven Let no man antidate his pardon and say His sins were forgiven in an Eternall Decree and that no man that hath his name in the book of life hath the addition sinner that if he were there from the beginning from the beginning he was no sinner It is not in such a sense Remittebatur It was forgiven nor it is not Remittitur that even then when the sin is committed it is forgiven whether the sinner think of it or no That God sees not the sins of his Children That God was no more affected with Davids adultery or his murder then an indulgent Father is to see his child do some witty waggish thing or some sportfull shrewd turne It is but Remittetur Any sin shall be that is may be forgiven if the meanes required by God and ordained by him be entertained If I take into my contemplation the Majesty of God and the uglinesse of sin If I devest my selfe of all that was sinfully got and invest my self in the righteousnesse of Christ Jesus for else I am ill suted and if I clothe myself in Mammon the righteousnesse of Christ is no Cloke for that doublet If I come to Gods Church for my absolution and the seale of that reconciliation the blessed Sacrament Remittetur by those meanes ordained by God any sin shall be forgiven me But if I relie upon the Remittebatur That I had my Quietus est before hand in the eternall Decree or in the Remittuntur and so shut mine eyes in an opinion that God hath shut his and sees not the sins of his children I change Gods Grammer and I induce a dangerous solecisme for it is not They were forgiven before they were committed nor They are forgiven in the committing but They shall be by using the meanes ordained by God they may be And so They shall be forgiven unto men saies the Text and that is first unto every man The Kings of the earth are faire and glorious resemblances of the King of heaven Omni homini they are beames of that Sun Tapers of that Torch they are like gods they are gods The Lord killeth and maketh alive He bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up 1 Sam. 2.6 This is the Lord of heaven The Lords anointed Kings of the earth do so too They have the dispensation of judgement and of mercy they execute and they pardon But yet with this difference amongst many other that Kings of the earth for the most part and the best most binde themselves with an oath not to pardon some offences The King of heaven sweares and sweares by himselfe That there is no sinner but he can and would pardon At first Illuminat omnem hominem He is the true light John 1.9 which lightneth every man that commeth into the world Let that light because many do interpret that place so let that be but that naturall light which only man and every man hath yet that light makes him capable of the super-naturall light of grace for if he had not that reasonable soule he could not have grace and even by this naturall light he is able to see the invisible God in the visible creature and is inexcusable if he do not so But because this light is though not put out brought to a dimnesse by mans first fall Therefore Iohn Baptist came to beare witnesse of that light that all men through him might beleeve Ver. 7. God raises up a Iohn Baptist in every man every man findes a testimony in himselfe that he draws curtaines between the light and him that he runs into corners from that light that he doth not make that use of those helpes which God hath afforded him as he might Thus God hath mercy upon all before by way of prevention thus he enlightneth every man that commeth into the world but because for all this men do stumble even at noon God hath given Collyrium an Eye-salve to all Apoc. 3.18 by which they may mend their eye-sight He hath opened a poole of Bethesda to all where not only he that comes at first but he that comes even at last he that comes washed with the water of Baptisme in his infancy and he that comes washed with the teares of Repentance in his age may receive health and cleannesse For the Font at first and the death-bed at last are Cisterns from this poole and all men and at all times may wash therein And from this power and this love of God is derived both that Catholique promise Quandocunque At what time soever a sinner repents And that Catholique and extensive Commission Quorum remiseritis Whose sins soever you remit shall be remitted All men were in Adam because the whole nature mankinde was in him and then can any be without sin All men were in Christ too because the whole nature mankinde was in him and then can any man be excluded from a possibility of mercy There were whole Sects whole bodies of Heretiques that denied the communication of Gods grace to others The Cathari denied that any man had it but themselves The Novatians denied that any man could have it again after he had once lost it by any deadly sin committed after Baptisme But there was never any Sect that denied it to themselves no Sect of despairing men We have some somewhere sprinkled One in the old Testament Cain and one in the new Iudas and one in the Ecclesiastique Story Iulian but no body no Sect of despairing men And therefore he that abandons himself to this sin of desperation sins with the least reason of any for he prefers his sin above Gods mercy and he sins with the fewest examples of any for God hath diffused this light with an evidence to all That all sins may be forgiven unto men that is
conformity to Angels But divers others of the Ancients have taken Soule and Spirit for different things even in the Intellectuall part of man somewhat obscurely I confesse and as some venture to say unnecessarily if not dangerously It troubled S. Hierome sometimes Ad Hedibiam l. 12. Epist 150 how to understand the word Spirit in man but he takes the easiest way he dispatches himselfe of it as fast as he could that is to speake of it onely as it was used in the Scriptures Famosa quaestio sayes he sed brevi sermone tractanda It is a question often disputed but may be shortly determined Idem spiritus hic ac in iis verbis Nolite extinguere spiritum When we heare of the Spirit in a Man in Scriptures we must understand it of the gifts of the Spirit for so fully to the same purpose sayes S. Chrysostome Spiritus est charisma spiritus The Spirit is the working of the Spirit The gifts of the Spirit and so when we heare The Spirit was vexed The Spirit was quenched still it is to be understood The gifts of the Spirit And so as they restraine the signification of Spirit to those gifts onely though the word do indeed in many places require a larger extension so do many restraine this word in our text The Soule onely Ad sensum to the sensitive faculties of the soule that is onely to the paine and anguish that his body suffered But so far at least David had gone in that which he said before My bones are vexed Now Ingravescit morbus The disease festers beyond the bone even into the marrow it selfe His Bones were those best actions that he had produced and he saw in that Contemplation that for all that he had done he was still at best but an unprofitable servant if not a rebellious enemy But then when he considers his whole soule and all that ever it can do he sees all the rest will be no better The poyson he sees is in the fountaine the Canker in the roote the rancor the venom in the soule it selfe Corpus instrumentum anima ars ipsa sayes S. Basil The body and the senses are but the tooles and instruments that the soule works with But the soule is the art the science that directs those Instruments The faculties of the soule are the boughs that produce the fruits and the operations and particular acts of those faculties are the fruits but the soule is the roote of all And David sees that this art this science this soule can direct him or establish him in no good way That not onely the fruits his particular acts nor onely the boughs and armes his severall faculties but the roote it selfe the soule it selfe was infected His bones are shaken he dares not stand upon the good he hath done his soule is so too he cannot hope for any good he shall do He hath no merit for the past he hath no free-will for the future that is his case This troubles his bones Turbata this troubles his soule this vexes them both for the word is all one in both places as our last Translators have observed and rendred it aright not vexed in one place and troubled in the other as our former Translators had it But in both places it is Bahal and Bahal imports a vehemence both in the intensnesse of it and in the suddennesse and inevitablenesse of it And therefore it signifies often Praecipitantiam A headlong downfall and irrecoverablenesse And often Evanescentiam an utter vanishing away and annihilation David whom we alwayes consider in the Psalmes not onely to speake literally of those miseries which were actually upon himselfe but prophetically too of such measures and exaltations of those miseries as would certainly fall upon them as did not seeke their sanation their recovery from the God of all health looking into all his actions they are the fruits and into all his faculties they are the boughs and into the root of all the soule it selfe considering what he had done what he could do he sees that as yet he had done no good he sees he should never be able to doe any His bones are troubled He hath no comfort in that which is growne up and past And his soule is sore troubled for to the trouble of the soule there is added in the Text that particle Valde It is a sore trouble that falls upon the soule A troubled spirit who can beare because he hath no hope in the future He was no surer for that which was to come then for that which was past But he that is all considered in that case which he proposes he comes as the word signifies ad praecipitantiam That all his strength can scarce keepe him from precipitation into despaire And he comes as the word signifies too ad Evanescentiam to an evaporating and a vanishing of his soule that is even to a renouncing and a detestation of his immortality and to a willingnesse to a desire that he might die the death of other Creatures which perish altogether and goe out as a Candle This is the trouble the sore trouble of his soule who is brought to an apprehension of Gods indignation for not performing Conditions required at his hands and of his inability to performe them and is not come to the contemplation of his mercy in supply thereof There is Turbatio Timoris Mat. 2.3 Psal 107.27 A trouble out of feare of danger in this world Herods trouble When the Magi brought word of another King Herod was troubled and all Ierusalem with him There is Turbatio confusionis The Mariners trouble in a tempest Their soule melteth for trouble Luk. 10.41 Luk. 1.29 sayes David There is Turbatio occupationis Martha's trouble Martha thou art troubled about many things sayes Christ There is Turbatio admirationis The blessed Virgins trouble When she saw the Angel she was troubled at his saying To contract this John 11.33 There is Turbatio compassionis Christs own trouble When he saw Mary weepe for her brother Lazarus he groaned in the spirit and was troubled in himselfe But in all these troubles Herods feare The Mariners irresolution Martha's multiplicity of businesse The blessed Virgins sudden amazement Our Saviours compassionate sorrow as they are in us worldly troubles so the world administers some means to extemiate and alleviate these troubles for feares are overcome and stormes are appeased and businesses are ended and wonders are understood and sorrows weare out But in this trouble of the bones and the soule in so deepe and sensible impressions of the anger of God looking at once upon the pravity the obliquity the malignity of all that I have done of all that I shall doe Man hath but one step between that state and despaire to stop upon to turne to the Author of all temporall and all spirituall health the Lord of life with Davids prayer Psal 51.10 Cor mundum crea Create a cleane heart within me
determine wholly and entirely in God too and in his glory Quoniam non in morte Do it O Lord For in Death there is no remembrance of thee c. In some other places Propter misericordiam Psal 40.11 David comes to God with two reasons and both grounded meerely in God Misericordia veritas Let thy Mercy and thy Truth alwaies preserve me In this place he puts himselfe wholly upon his mercy for mercy is all or at least the foundation that sustaines all or the wall that imbraces all That mercy which the word of this text Casad imports is Benignitas in non promeritum Mercy is a good disposition towards him who hath deserved nothing of himselfe For where there is merit there is no mercy Nay it imports more then so For mercy as mercy presumes not onely no merit in man but it takes knowledge of no promise in God properly For that is the difference betweene Mercy and Truth that by Mercy at first God would make promises to man in generall and then by Truth he would performe those promises but Mercy goeth first and there David begins and grounds his Prayer at Mercy Mercy that can have no pre-mover no pre-relation but begins in it selfe For if we consider the mercy of God to mankinde subsequently I meane after the Death of Christ so it cannot bee properly called mercy Mercy thus considered hath a ground And God thus considered hath received a plentifull and an abundant satisfaction in the merits of Christ Jesus And that which hath a ground in man that which hath a satisfaction from man Christ was truly Man fals not properly precisely rigidly under the name of mercy But consider God in his first disposition to man after his fall That he would vouchsafe to study our Recovery and that he would turne upon no other way but the shedding of the blood of his owne and innocent and glorious Son Quid est homo aut filius hominis What was man or all mankinde that God should be mindfull of him so or so mercifull to him When God promises that he will be mercifull and gracious to me if I doe his Will when in some measure I doe that Will of his God begins not then to be mercifull but his mercy was awake and at worke before when he excited me by that promise to doe his Will And after in my performance of those duties his Spirit seales to me a declaration that his Truth is exercised upon mee now as his mercy was before Still his Truth is in the effect in the fruit in the execution but the Decree and the Roote is onely Mercy God is pleased also when we come to him with other Reasons When we remember him of his Covenant When we remember him of his holy servants Abraham Isaac and Iacob yea when we remember him of our owne innocencie in that particular for which wee may be then unjustly pursued God was glad to heare of a Righteousnesse and of an Innocencie and of cleane and pure hands in David when hee was unjustly pursued by Saul But the roote of all is in this Propter misericordiam Doe it for thy mercie sake For when we speake of Gods Covenant it may be mistaken who is and who is not within that Covenant What know I Of Nations and of Churches which have received the outward profession of Christ we may be able to say They are within the Covenant generally taken But when we come to particular men in the Congregation there I may call a Hypocrite a Saint and thinke an excomunicate soule to be within the Covenant I may mistake the Covenant and I may mistake Gods servants who did and who did not dye in his favour What know I We see at Executions when men pretend to dye cheerefully for the glory of God halfe the company will call them Traitors and halfe Martyrs So if we speake of our owne innocency we may have a pride in that or some other vicious and defective respect as uncharitablenesse towards our malicious Persecutors or laying seditious aspersions upon the justice of the State that may make us guilty towards God though wee be truly innocent to the World in that particular But let mee make my recourse to the mercy of God and there can bee no errour no mistaking And therefore if that and nothing but that be my ground God will Returne to me God will Deliver my soule God will Save me For his mercy sake that is because his mercy is engaged in it And if God were to sell me this Returning this Delivering this Saving and all that I pray for what could I offer God for that so great as his owne mercy in which I offer him the Innocencie the Obedience the Blood of his onely Son If I buy of the Kings land I must pay for it in the Kings money I have no Myne nor Mint of mine owne If I would have any thing from God I must give him that which is his owne for it that is his mercy And this is to give God his mercy To give God thanks for his mercy To give all to his mercy And to acknowledge that if my works be acceptable to him nay if my very faith be acceptable to him it is not because my works no nor my faith hath any proportion of equivalencie in it or is worth the least flash of joy or the least spangle of glory in Heaven in it selfe but because God in his mercy onely of his mercy meerely for the glory of his mercy hath past such a Covenant Crede fac hoc Beleeve this and doe this and thou shalt live not for thy deed sake not nor for thy faith sake but for my mercy sake And farther we carry not this first reason of the Prayer arising onely from God There remaines in these words another Reason In morte in which David himselfe and all men seeme to have part Quia non in morte For in death there is no remembrance of thee c. Upon occasion of which words because they seeme to imply a lothnesse in David to dye it may well be inquired why Death seemed so terrible to the good and godly men of those times as that evermore we see them complaine of shortnesse of life and of the neerenesse of death Certainely the rule is true in naturall and in civill and in divine things as long as wee are in this World Nolle meliorem est corruptio primae habitudinis Picus Heptapl l. 7. proem That man is not well who desires not to be better It is but our corruption here that makes us loth to hasten to our incorruption there And besides many of the Ancients and all the later Casuists of the other side and amongst our owne men Peter Martyr and Calvin assigne certaine cases in which it hath Rationem boni The nature of Good and therefore is to be embraced to wish our dissolution and departure out of this World and yet many good and
possesse immortality and impossibility of dying onely in a continuall dying when as a Cabinet whose key were lost must be broken up and torne in pieces before the Jewell that was laid up in it can be taken out so thy body the Cabinet of thy soule must be shaked and shivered by violent sicknesse before that soule can goe out And when it is thus gone out must answer for all the imperfections of that body which body polluted it And yet though this soule be such a loser by that body it is not perfectly well nor fully satisfied till it be reunited to that body againe when thou remembrest Mat. 26.36 and oh never forget it that Christ himselfe was heavy in his soule unto Death Mat. 26.39 That Christ himselfe came to a Si possibile If it be possible let this Cup passe That he came to a Quare dereliquisti Mat. 27.46 a bitter sense of Gods dereliction and forsaking of him when thou considerest all this compose thy selfe for death but thinke it not a light matter to dye Death made the Lyon of Judah to roare and doe not thou thinke that that which we call going away like a Lambe doth more testifie a conformity with Christ then a strong sense and bitter agony and colluctation with death doth Christ gave us the Rule in the Example He taught us what we should doe by his doing it And he pre-admitted a fearfull apprehension of death A Lambe is a Hieroglyphique of Patience but not of stupidity And death was Christs Consummatum est All ended in death yet he had sense of death How much more doth a sad sense of our transmigration belong to us to whom death is no Consummatum est but an In principio our account and our everlasting state begins but then Apud te propitiatio Psal 130.4 ut timearis In this knot we tie up all With thee there is mercy that thou mightest be feared There is a holy feare that does not onely consist with an assurance of mercy Pro. 21.15 but induces constitutes that assurance Pavor operantibus iniquitatem sayes Solomon Pavor horror and servile feare jealousie and suspition of God diffidence and distrust in his mercy and a bosome-prophecy of self-destruction Destruction it selfe so we translate it be upon the workers of iniquity Pavor operantibus iniquitatem And yet sayes that wise King Pro. 28.14 Beatus qui semper Pavidus Blessed is that man that alwayes fears who though he alwayes hope and beleeve the good that God will shew him yet also feares the evills that God might justly multiply upon him Blessed is he that looks upon God with assurance but upon himselfe with feare For though God have given us light by which we may see him even in Nature for He is the confidence of all the ends of the Earth and of them that are a far of upon the Sea Though God have given us a clearer light in the Law and experience of his providence upon his people throughout the Old Testament Though God have abundantly infinitely multiplied these lights and these helpes to us in the Christian Church where he is the God of salvation yet as he answers us by terrible things in that first acceptation of the words which I proposed to you that is Gives us assurances by miraculous testimonies in our behalfe that he will answer our patient expectation by terrible Judgements and Revenges upon our enemies In his Righteousnesse that is In his faithfulnesse according to his Promises and according to his performances of those Promises to his former people So in the words considered the other way In his Holinesse that is in his wayes of imprinting Holinesse in us He answers us by terrible things in all those particulars which we have presented unto you By infusing faith but with that terrible addition Damnabitur He that beleeveth not shall be damned He answers us by composing our manners and rectifying our life and conversation but with terrible additions of censures and Excommunications and tearings off from his own body which is a death to us and a wound to him He answers us by enabling us to speake to him in Prayer but with terrible additions for the matter for the manner for the measure of our Prayer which being neglected our very Prayer is turned to sin He answers us in Preaching but with that terrible commination that even his word may be the savor of death unto death He answers us in the Sacrament but with that terrible perplexity and distraction that he that seemes to be a Iohn or a Peter a Loving or a Beloved Disciple may be a Iudas and he that seems to have received the seale of his reconciliation may have eat and drunke his own Damnation And he answers us at the houre of death but with this terrible obligation That even then I make sure my salvation with feare and trembling That so we imagine not a God of wax whom we can melt and mold when and how we will That we make not the Church a Market That an over-homelines and familiarity with God in the acts of Religion bring us not to an irreverence nor indifferency of places But that as the Militant Church is the porch of the Triumphant so our reverence here may have some proportion to that reverence which is exhibited there Revel 4.10 where the Elders cast their Crownes before the Throne and continue in that holy and reverend acclamation Thou art worthy O Lord to receive Glory and Honor and Power for as we may adde from this Text By terrible things O God of our salvation doest thou answer us in righteousnesse SERM. LXIX The fifth of my Prebend Sermons upon my five Psalmes Preached at S. Pauls PSAL. 66.3 Say unto God How terrible art thou in thy works Through the greatnesse of thy Power shall thine Enemies submit themselves unto thee IT is well said so well as that more then one of the Fathers seeme to have delighted themselves in having said it Titulus Clavis The Title of the Psalme is the Key of the Psalme the Title opens the whole Psalme The Church of Rome will needs keepe the Key of heaven and the key to that Key the Scriptures wrapped up in that Translation which in no case must be departed from There the key of this Psalm the Title thereof hath one bar wrested that is made otherwise then he that made the Key the Holy Ghost intended it And another bat inserted that is one clause added which the Holy Ghost added not Where we reade in the Title Victori To the chiefe Musician they reade In finem A Psalme directed upon the end I think they meane upon the later times because it is in a great part a Propheticall Psame of the calling of the Gentiles But after this change they also adde Resurrectionis A Psalme concerning the Resurrection and that is not in the Hebrew nor any thing in the place thereof And after one Author
away I am sure that thou who art returned to him and hast re-manifested thy selfe to him who in the diffidence of his sad soule thought thee gone for ever wilt never depart from mee nor hide thy selfe from me who desire to dwell in thy presence And so by this liberality I stand by giving I receive comfort We follow our text Rex Christus in the Context our Prophet as he places this liberality in the King in the Magistrate in the People Here the King is Christ The Magistrate the Minister The People the people whether collectively that is the Congregation or distributively every particular soule Afford your devotions a minute to each of these and we have done When we consider the liberality of our King the bounty of God to man in Christ it is Species ingratitudinis It is a degree of ingratitude nay it is a degree of forgetfulnesse to pretend to remember his benefits so as to reckon them for they are innumerable Sicut in visibilibus est Sol Nazlan in intelligibilibus est Deus As liberall as the Sun is in Nature God is in grace Bonitas Dei ad extra liberalitas est It is the expressing of the Schoole and of much use That God is Essentiall Goodnesse within doores in himselfe But Ad extra when he comes abroad when this interiour Goodnesse is produced into action Barnard then all Gods Goodnesse is Liberality Deus est voluntas Omnipotens is excellently said by S. Bernard God is all Almightinesse all Power but he might be so and we never the better Therefore he is Voluntas omnipotens A Power digested into a Will as Willing as Able to doe us all all good What good Receive some drops of it in S. Bernards owne Manna his owne honey Creans mentes ad se participandum So good as that he hath first given us soules capable of him and made us so partakers of the Divine Nature Vivificans ad sentiendum So good as that he hath quickned those soules and made them sensible of having received him for Grace is not grace to me till it make me know that I have it Alliciens ad appetendum So good as that he hath given that soule an appetite and a holy hunger and thirst to take in more of him for I have no Grace till I would have more and then Dilatans ad capiendum So good as that he hath dilated and enlarged that soule to take in as much of God as he will And lest the soule should lose any of this by unthankfulnesse Luke 6.31 God is kind even to the unthankfull sayes God himselfe which is a degree of goodnesse in which God seldome is nay in which God scarce looks to be imitated To be kinde to the unthankfull But if the whole space to the Firmament were filled with sand and we had before us Clavius his number how many thousands would be If all that space were filled with water and so joyned the waters above with the waters below the Firmament and we had the number of all those drops of water And then had every single sand and every single drop multiplied by the whole number of both we were still short of numbring the benefits of God as God But then of God in Christ infinitely super-infinitely short To have been once nothing and to be now co-heire with the Son of God is such a Circle such a Compasse as that no revolutions in this world to rise from the lowest to the highest or to fall from the highest to the lowest can be called or thought any Segment any Arch any Point in respect of this Circle To have once been nothing and now to be co-heires with the Son of God That Son of God who if there had been but one soule to have been saved would have dyed for that nay if all soules had been to be saved but one and that that onely had sinned he would not have contented himselfe with all the rest but would have dyed for that And there is the goodnesse the liberality of our King our God our Christ our Jesus But we must looke upon this liberality as our Prophet leads us in the Magistrate too Magistratus that is in this part The Minister As I have received mercy I am one of them as S. Paul speaks And why should I deliver out this mercy to others in a scanter measure then I have received it my selfe from God Why should I deliver out his Talents in single farthings Or his Gomers in narrow and shallow thimbles Why should I defalke from his generall propositions and against all Grammar and all Dictionaries call his Omnes his All a few Why should I lie to the Holy Ghost Acts 5. as S. Peter charges Ananias Soldest thou the land for so much Yea for so much Did God make heaven for so few yes for so few Why should I say so If we will constitute a place for heaven above and a place for hell below even the capacity of the place will yeeld an argument that God as we can consider him in his first meaning meant more should be saved then cast away As oft as God tells us of painfull wayes and narrow gates and of Camels and needles all that is done to sharpen an industry in all not to threaten an impossibility to any If God would not have all why tooke he me And if he were sorry he had taken me or were wearied with the sins of my youth why did he not let me slide away in the change of sins in mine age or in my sinfull memory of old sins or in my sinfull sorrow that I could not continue in those sins but still make his mercies new to me every morning My King my God in Christ is liberall to all He bids us his Officers his Ministers to be so too and I am even thus far If any man doubt his salvation if any man thinke himselfe too great a sinner to attaine salvation let him repent and take mine for his with any true repentant sinner I will change states for God knowes his repentance whether it be true or no better then I know mine Therefore doth the Prophet here promise this liberality as in the King in Christ Populus and in the Magistrate the Minister so in the people too in every particular soule He cryes to us his Ministers Consolamini Consolamini Comfort O Comfort my people Esay 40.1 and he cryes to every one of you Miscrere animae tuae Have mercy upon thine own soule Ecclus. 30.24 and I will commiserate it too Be liberall to thy selfe and I will beare thee out in it God asks Quid potui What could have been done more to my Vineyard Doe but tell him Esay 5.4 and he will doe that Tell him that he can remove this dampe from thy heart Tell him as though thou wouldest have it done and he will doe it Tell him that he can bring teares into
a phrase very remarkeable by David He bringeth the winde out of his Treasuries And then follow in that place Psal 135.7 all the Plagues of Egypt stormes and tempests ruines and devastations are not onely in Gods Armories but they are in his Treasuries as hee is the Lord of Hosts hee fetches his judgements from his Armories and casts confusion upon his enemies but as he is the God of mercy and of plentifull redemption he fetches these judgements these corrections out of his treasuries and they are the Money the Jewels by which he redeemes and buyes us againe God does nothing God can doe nothing no not in the way of ruine and destruction but there is mercy in it he cannot open a doore in his Armory but a window into his Treasury opens too and he must looke into that But then Gods corrections are his Acts as the Physitian is his Creature God created him for necessity When God made man his first intention was not that man should fall and so need a Messias nor that man should fall sick and so need a Physitian nor that man should fall into rebellion by sin and so need his rod his staffe his scourge of afflictions to whip him into the way againe But yet sayes the Wiseman Ecclus. 38.1 Honour the Physitian for the use you may have of him slight him not because thou hast no need of him yet So though Gods corrections were not from a primary but a secondary intention yet when you see those corrections fall upon another give a good interpretation of them and beleeve Gods purpose to be not to destroy but to recover that man Do not thou make Gods Rheubarbe thy Ratsbane and poyson thine owne soule with an uncharitable misinterpretation of that correction which God hath sent to cure his And then in thine owne afflictions flie evermore to this Prayer Satisfie us with thy mercy first Satisfie us make it appeare to us that thine intention is mercy though thou enwrap it in temporall afflictions in this darke cloud let us discerne thy Son and though in an act of displeasure see that thou art well pleased with us Satisfie us that there is mercy in thy judgements and then satisfie us that thy mercy is mercy for such is the stupidity of sinfull man That as in temporall blessings we discerne them best by wanting them so do we the mercies of God too we call it not a mercy to have the same blessings still but as every man conceives a greater degree of joy in recovering from a sicknesse then in his former established health so without doubt our Ancestors who indured many yeares Civill and forraine wars were more affected with their first peace then we are with our continuall enjoying thereof And our Fathers more thankfull for the beginning of Reformation of Religion then we for so long enjoying the continuance thereof Satisfie us with thy mercie Let us still be able to see mercy in thy judgements lest they deject us and confound us Satisfie us with thy mercie let us be able to see that our deliverance is a mercy and not a naturall thing that might have hapned so or a necessary thing that must have hapned so though there had beene no God in Heaven nor providence upon earth But especially since the way that thou choosest is to goe all by mercy and not to be put to this way of correction so dispose so compose our minds and so transpose all our affections that we may live upon thy food and not put thee to thy physick that we may embrace thee in the light and not be put to seeke thee in the darke that wee come to thee in thy Mercy and not be whipped to thee by thy Corrections And so we have done also with our second Part The pieces and petitions that constitute this Prayer as it is a Prayer for Fulnesse and Satisfaction a Prayer of Extent and Dilatation a Prayer of Dispatch and Expedition and then a Prayer of Evidence and Declaration and lastly a Prayer of Limitation even upon God himselfe Satisfie and satisfie us and us early with that which we may discerne to be thine and let that way be mercy There remaines yet a third Part 3 Part. Gaudium what this Prayer produces and it is joy and continual joy That we may rejoyce and be glad all our dayes The words are the Parts and we invert not we trouble not the Order the Holy Ghost hath laid them fitliest for our use in the Text it selfe and so we take them First then the gaine is joy Joy is Gods owne Seale and his keeper is the Holy Ghost wee have many sudden ejaculations in the forme of Prayer sometimes inconsiderately made and they vanish so but if I can reflect upon my prayer ruminate and returne againe with joy to the same prayer I have Gods Seale upon it And therefore it is not so very an idle thing as some have mis-imagined it to repeat often the same prayer in the same words Our Saviour did so he prayed a third time and in the same words This reflecting upon a former prayer is that that sets to this Seale this joy and if I have joy in my prayer it is granted so far as concernes my good and Gods glory It hath beene disputed by many both of the Gentiles with whom the Fathers disputed and of the Schoolemen who dispute with one another An sit gaudium in Deo de semet Whether God rejoyce in himselfe in contemplation of himselfe whether God be glad that he is God But it is disputed by them onely to establish it and to illustrate it for I doe not remember that any one of them denyes it It is true that Plato dislikes and justly that salutation of Dionysius the Tyran to God Gaude servato vitam Tyranni jucundam that he should say to God Live merrily as merrily as a King as merrily as I doe and then you are God enough to imagine such a joy in God as is onely a transitory delight in deceivable things is an impious conceit But when as another Platonique sayes Plotinus Deus est quod ipse semper voluit God is that which hee would be If there be something that God would be and he be that If Plato should deny that God joyed in himselfe we must say of Plato as Lactantius does Deum potius somniaver at quà m cognoverat Plato had rather dreamed that there was a God then understood what that God was Bonum simplex sayes S. Augustine To be sincere Goodnesse Goodnesse it selfe Ipsa est delectatio Dei This is the joy that God hath in himselfe of himselfe And therefore sayes Philo Iudaeus Hoc necessarium Philosophiae sodalibus This is the tenent of all Philosophers And by that title of Philosophers Philo alwaies meanes them that know and study God Solum Deum verè festum agere That only God can be truly said to keepe holy day and to rejoyce This