her ruine might have saved her Country but in her case if she had perished they were likely to perish too But she is safer then in that for first she had hope out of the words of the Law out of the dignity of her place out of the Justice of the King out of the preparation which she had made by Prayer which Prayer Josephus either out of tradition or out of conjecture and likelihood Records to have been That God would make both her Language and her Beauty acceptable to the King that day Out of all these she had hope of good success and howsoever if she failed of her purpose she was under two Laws of which it was necessary to obey that which concerned the glory of God And therefore Daniels confidence and Daniels words became her well Behold our God is able to deliver me and he will deliver me but if he will not I must not forsake his honor nor abandon his service And therefore Si peream peream If I perish I perish It is not always a Christian resolution Si peream peream to say If I perish I perish I care not whether I perish or no To admit to invite to tempt tentations and occasions of sin and so to put our selves to the hazard of a spiritual perishing to give fire to concupiscencies with licentious Meditations either of sinful pleasures past or of that which we have then in our purpose and pursuit to fewel this fire with meats of curiosity and provocation to blow this fire with lascivious discourses and Letters and Protestations this admits no such condition Si pereas If thou perish but periisti thou art perished already thou didst then perish when thou didst so desperately cast thy self into the danger of perishing And as he that casts himself from a steeple doth not break his neck till he touch the ground but yet he is truly said to have killed himself when he threw himself towards the ground So in those preparations and invitations to sin we perish before we perish before we commit the act the sin it self We perished then when we opened our selves to the danger of the sin so also if a man will wring out not the Club out of Hercules hands but the sword out of Gods hands if a man will usurpe upon Gods jurisdiction and become a Magistrate to himself and revenge his own quarrels and in an inordinate defence of imaginary honor expose himself to danger in duel with a si peream peream If I perish I perish that is not onely true if he perish he perishes if he perish temporally he perishes spiritually too and goes out of the world loaded with that and with all his other sins but it is also true that if he perish not he perishes he comes back loaded both with the temporal and with the spiritual death both with the blood and with the damnation of that man who perished suddenly and without repentance by his sword To contract this and conclude all If a man have nothing in his contemplation but dignity and high place if he have not Vertue and Religion and a Conscience of having deserved well of his Countrey and the love of God and godly men for his sustentation and assurance but onely to tower up after dignity as a Hawk after a prey and think that he may boldly say as an impossible supposition Si peream peream If I perish I perish as though it were impossible he should perish he shall be subject to that derision of the King of Babylon Quomodo Cecidisti Esa 14.12 How art thou faln from Heaven O Lucifer thou son of the morning How art thou cast down to the ground that didst cast lots upon the Nations But that provident and religious Soul which proceeds in all her enterprises as Esther did in her preparations which first calls an assembly of all her Country-men that is them of the houshold of the Faithful the Congregation of Christs Church and the Communion of Saints and comes to participate the benefit of publick Prayers in his house inconvenient times and then doth the same in her own house within doors she and her maids that is she and all her senses and faculties This soul may also come to Esthers resolution to go in to the King though it be not according to the Law though that Law be That neither fornicator nor adulterer nor wanton nor thief nor drunkard nor covetous nor extortioner nor railer shall have access into the Kingdom of Heaven yet this soul thus prepared shall feel a comfortable assurance that this Law was made for servants and not for sons nor for the Spouse of Christ his Church and the living Members thereof and she may boldly say Si peream peream It is all one though I perish or as it is in the Original Vecasher quomodocunque peream whether I perish in my estimation and opinion with men whether I perish in my fortunes honor or health quomodocunque it is all one Heaven and earth shall pass away but Gods word shall not pass and we have both that word of God which shall never have end and that word of God which never had beginning His Word as it is his Promise his Scriptures and his Word as it is himself Christ Jesus for our assurance and security that that Law of denying sinners access and turning his face from them is not a perpetual not an irrevocable Law but that that himself says belongs to us For a little while have I forsaken thee but with great compassion will I gather thee for a moment in mine anger I hid my face from thee for a little season but with everlasting mercy have I had compassion on thee saith the Lord Christ thy Redeemer How riotously and voluptuously soever I have surfeited upon sin heretofore yet if I fast that fast now how disobedient soever I have been to my Superiors heretofore yet if I apply my self to a conscionable humility to them now howsoever if I have neglected necessary duties in my self or neglected them in my Family that either I have not been careful to give good example or not careful that they should do according to my example and by the way it is not only the Master of a house that hath the charge of a Family but every person every servant in the house that hath a body and a soul hath a house and a Family to look to and to answer for yet if I become careful now that both I I my self will and my whole house all my family shall serve the Lord If I be thus prepar'd thus dispos'd thus matur'd thus mellow'd thus suppled thus entendred to the admitting of any impressions from the hand of my God though there seem to be a general Law spread over all an universal War an universal Famine an universal Pestilence over the whole Nation yet I shall come either to an assurance that though there fall so many thousands on this and on that
into tentation and do not deliver thee from Egypt but let thee fall into a sin though he let thee fall so far as to doubt of his mercy for that sin yet Idem Deus all this while all this is the same God and even that voice though it have an account of despair in it is the voice of God and though it be spoken in the mouth of the Devil it is God that speakes it for even then when the Devil possesses man God possesses the Devil God can make his profit and thine of thy sin he can make the horror of a sin committed the occasion of thy repentance and his mercy Amos 3.6 for Shall there be evil in a City and the Lord hath not done it God is no disposer to sin but he is the disposer of sin God is not Lord of sin as Author of sin but he is the Lord of sin as Steward of it and he dispenses not onely for our sins but the sins themselves God imprints not that obliquity infuses not that venome that is in our sinful Actions but God can extract good out of bad and Cordials out of Poyson Be not thou therefore too nimble a Sophister nor too pressing an Advocate against thine own soul conclude not too soon that God hath forsaken thee because he hath let thee fall and let thee lie some time in some sin you know who did so and yet was a man according to Gods own heart for God hath set his heart upon that way to glorifie himself out of Davids repentance rather then out of his innocence In the Hills and in the Vallies too in spiritual as well as in temporal prosperity and adversity too in the Old and in the New Testament in the ways of mercy and of justice too thou maist find the same God who is in every change Idem Deus God that is the same God who commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts And so we have done with the first Proposition Sicut Deus The next is Sicut Deus As God hath done the one so he hath the other God brings himself into comparison with himself Our unworthiness changes not his nature His mercy is new every morning and his mercy endureth for ever One generation is a precedent to another and God is his own Example whatsoever he hath done for us he is ready to do again When he had once written the Law in stone-tables for the direction of his people and that Moses in an over-vehement zeal and distemper had broke those Tables God turn'd to his precedent remembred what he had done and does so again he writes that Law again in new Tables When God had given us the light of the Reformation for a few years of a young King and that after him in the time of a pious truly but credulous Princess a Cloud of blood over-shadowed us in a heavy persecution yet God turn'd to his precedent to the example of his former mercy and in mercy re-established that light which shines yet amongst us and if the sins of the people extinguish it not shall shine as long as the Sun and Moon shall shine above The Lords hand is not shortned nor weakned in the ways of justice and his justice hath a Sicut a precedent an Example too There is Sicut Kore If we sin as Kore and his Complices sinned as Kore and his Complices we shall perish Num. 16.40 There is an Anathema Sicut illud Deut. 7.26 Thou shalt not bring an abomination into thy house not an Idolator into thy house lest thou be an accursed thing Sicut illud as guilty in the eye of God Psal 83.9 as the Idolator himself There is Sicut Midian God can do unto the men of these times as he did unto the Midianites as to Sisera as to Jabin which perished and became as the Dung of the earth He can make their Nobles Sicut Oreb Sicut Zeeb like unto Oreb like unto Zeeb and all their Princes Sicut Zebah Sicut Salmana There are precedents of his justice too But yet in the greatest act of his justice that ever he did which was the general drowning of the whole world though that history remain as an everlasting Demonstration of his power and of his justice yet he would not have it remain as a precedent but he records that with that protestation I will no more curse the earth nor smite any more every living thing as I have done though I have show'd that I can do it and have done it I will do it no more God forbears and wayes his own example in matter of justice but God never shew'd any mercy but he desires that that mercy may be recorded and produc'd and pleaded to our Conscience to the whole Congregation to God himself as a leading and a binding case as he commanded light out of darkness so he hath shin'd in our hearts God proceeds by example by pattern Even in this first great act presented in our Text in the Creation he did so God had no external pattern in the Creation for there was nothing extant but God had from all Eternity an internal pattern an Idaea a pre-conception a form in himself according to which he produc'd every Creature And when God himself proceeds upon pre-conceptions pre-meditations shall we adventure to do or to say any thing in his service unpremeditately extemporally It is not Gods way Now it is a penurious thing to have but one Candle in a room it is too dim a light to work by to live by to have but Rule and Precept alone Rule and Example together direct us fully Who shall be our Example Hierom. Idaea novi hominis Christus Jesus If thou wilt be a new Creature and Circumcision is nothing uncircumcision nothing but onely to be a new Creature then Christ is thy Idaea thy Pattern thine Original for Quid in eo non Novum what was there in him that was not new When was there such a Conception of the Holy Ghost such a birth of a Virgin such a pregnancy to dispute so so young with such men When such a death as God to die when such a life as a dead man to raise himself again Quid in eo non Novum To be produc'd by this Idaea built up by this Model copied by this Original is truely is onely to be a new Creature But that thou mayst put thy self into the way to this it is usefully said Enim vero certum vitae genus sibi constituere Certainly to undertake a certain Profession Nazianz. a Calling in this world and to propose to our selves the Example of some good and godly man in that Calling whose steps we will walk in and whom we will make our precedent Tanti Momenti esse duco says that Father is a matter of so great importance as that upon that says he lies the building of our whole life That little Philosopher Epictetus could give us that
them as a very lovely Song of one that hath a pleasant voyce and can play well on an Instrument for they hear thy words but they doe them not AS there lies alwayes upon Gods Minister a vae si non Wo be unto me if I preach not the Gospel if I apply not the comfortable promises of the Gospel to all that grone under the burden of their sins so there is Onus visionis which we finde mentioned in the Prophets it was a pain a burden to them to be put to the denunciation of Gods heavy judgements upon the people but yet those judgements they must denounce as well as propose those mercies wo be unto us if we bind not up the broken hearted but wo be unto us too if we break not that heart that is stubborn wo be unto us if we settle not establish not the timorous and trembling the scattered and fluid and distracted soul that cannot yet attain intirely and intensely and confidently and constantly to fix it self upon the Merits and Mercies of Christ Jesus but wo be unto us much more if we do not shake and shiver and throw down the refractory and rebellious soul whose incredulity will not admit the History and whose security in presumptuous sins will not admit the working and application of those Merits and Mercies which are proposed to him To this purpose therefore God makes his Ministers speculatores I have set thee for their watchman saies God to this Prophet that so they might see and discern the highest sins of the highest persons in the highest places they are not onely to look down towards the streets lanes and alleys and cellears and reprehend the abuses and excesses of persons of lower quality there all their service lies not below staires nor onely to look into the chamber and reprehend the wantonnesses and licentiousnesse of both sexes there nor onely unto the house top and tarras and reprehend the ambitious machinations and practises to get thither but still they are speculatores men placed upon a watch-tower to look higher then all this to look upon sins of a higher nature then these to note and reprehend those sins which are done so much more immediately towards God as they are done upon colour and pretence of Religion and upon that station upon the Execution of that Commission is our Prophet in this Text Thou art unto them a very lovely song c. for they shall heare thy words but they do them not Through this whole chapter he presents matter of that nature either of too confident or too diffident a behaviour towards God In the tenth verse he reprehends their diffidence and distrust in God This they say sayes the Prophet If our transgressions and our sins be upon us and we pine away in them how should we live How should you live sayes the Prophet thus you should live by hearing what the Lord of Life hath said As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked In the 25 verse he reprehends their confidence they say Abraham was one and he inherited this land we are many this land is given us for our inheritance but say unto them sayes God to the Prophet there You lift up your eyes to Idols and you shed blood and shall you possess the land Ye defile one anothers wife and ye stand upon the sword and shall ye possess the land We were but one and are many 't is true God hath testified his love in multiplying Inhabitants and in uniting Kingdomes but if there be a lifting up of eyes towards Idols a declination towards an Idolatrous Religion if there be a defiling of one anothers wife and then standing upon the sword that it must be matter of displeasure or of quarrel if one will not betray his wife or sister to the lust of the greatest person shall we possess the land shall we have a continuance of Gods blessing upon us we shall not And as he thus represents their over-confident behaviour towards God God is bound by his promise and therefore we may be secure And their over-diffident behaviour God hath begun to shew his anger upon us therefore there is no recovery he reprehends also that distemper which ordinarily accompanies this behaviour towards God that is an Expostulation and a Disputing with God and a censuring of his actions in the 20 ver they come to say The way of the Lord is not equal that is we know not how to deal with him we know not where to find him he promises Mercies and layes Afflictions upon us he threatens judgements upon the wicked and yet the wicked prosper most of all The ways of the Lord are equal But to this also God says by the Prophet I will judge every one of you after his own ways The ways of the Lord are unsearchable look ye to your own ways for according to them shall God judge you And then after these several reprehensions this watchman raises himself to the highest pinacle of all to discover the greatest sin of all treason within doors contemning of God in his own house and in his presence that is a coming to Church to hear the word of God preached a pretence of cheerfulness and alacrity in the outward service of God yea a true sense and feeling of a delight in hearing of the word and yet for all this an unprofitable barrenness and upon the whole matter a despiteful and a contumelious neglecting of Gods purpose and intention in his Ordinance for Our voice is unto them but as a song to an instrument they hear our words but they do them not Though then some Expositors take these words to be an increpation upon the people that they esteemed Gods ablest Ministers indued with the best parts to be but as musique as a jest as a song as an entertainment that they under-valued and disesteemed the whole service of God in the function of the Ministery and thought it either nothing or but matter of State and Government as a civil ordinance for civil order and no more yet I take this increpation to reach to a sin of another nature that the people should attribute reverence enough attention enough credit enough to the preacher and to his preachings but yet when all that is done nothing is done they should hear willingly but they do nothing of that which they had heard First then God for his own glory promises here Divisio that his Prophet his Minister shall be Tuba as is said in the beginning of this Chapter a Trumpet to awaken with terror But then he shall become Carmen musicum a musical and harmonious charmer to settle and compose the soul again in a reposed confidence and in a delight in God he shall be musicum carmen musick harmony to the soul in his matter he shall preach harmonious peace to the conscience and he shall be musicum carmen musick and harmony in his manner he
Congratulation Remuneration in a fair proportion we complain of no want in any of these now Sumus God hath authoriz'd us and God hath exalted us in some measure to deliver his messages and Sumus vobis you do not deny us to be such you do not refuse but you receive us and his messages by us you do hear our words And that 's all that belonged to our second part Part III. Now in both these former parts who can discern who would suspect any foundation to be laid for an Increpation Non facient any preparation for a Malediction or Curse God will send good Preachers to the people and the people shall love their preaching and yet 1 Sam. 3.11 as he said to Samuel he will do a thing at which both the ears of him that hears it shall tingle Now what is that in our case This he will aggravate their condemnation therefore because they have been so diligent herein Et non fecerunt they have done nothing of that which they have heard As our very Repentance contracts the nature of sin if we persevere not in that holy purpose but as though we had then made even with God sin on again upon a new score so this hearing it self is a sin that is such an aggravating circumstance as changes the very nature of the sin to them that hear so much and doe nothing This is not a preparation of that curse in Ezekiel 2.5 whether they will hear or forbear yet they shall know that a Prophet hath been among them that is heare or heare not subsequent judgements shall bring them to see that they might have heard but here God accompanies them with a stronger grace then so Audient they will hear 58. There are Vipers in the Psalm that will not hear how wisely soever the charmers charm Mat. 3.7 But there is a Generation of Vipers which do hear and yet depart with none of their viperous nature O generation of vipers who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come sayes John Baptist there to the Pharisees and Sadduces that came to his baptism They had apprehended Tubam a warning and they did come but when they were come he found them in their Non faciunt without any purpose of bringing forth fruits worthy of repentance Ver. 8. Here then is S. Paul's Judaeus in abscondito a Jew inwardly Quae dixeris Rom. 2.29 Here is the true Recusant and the true Non-conformitan Audiunt sed non faciunt he comes to hear but never comes to doe there 's Recusancy he confesses that he hath received good instruction but he refufes to conform himself unto it there 's Non-conformity First Non facient quae dixeris they will not doe those things which thou hast said and yet that 's strange since they confess thou saist true but yet that 's not so strange for they may be Duri sermones though it be true that we say it may be hard and it may trouble them and perchance damnifie them in their Profit or mortifie them in their Pleasures It may be we may say that thy relapsing into a sin formerly repented submits thee again to all the punishment due to the former sin and that 's Durus sermo a hard saying It may be we may say that a repentance which hath all other formall parts of a true repentance if it reach not to all the branches and to all the specifying differences and circumstance of thy sins so far as a diligent examination of thy conscience can carry thee is a voyd repentance and that 's Durus sermo a hard saying It may be we may say That though thou hast truly intirely repented though thou do leave the practice of the sin yet if thou doe not also leave that which thou hast corruptly got by the wayes of that sin the sin it selfe lies upon thee still and that 's Durus sermo a hard saying And Christs own Disciples forsook him and forsook him for ever John 6.60 Quia durus sermo because that which Christ said seemed to them a hard saying This we may say and they may come to hear and come to say we say true and yet Non facient quae dixeris never do any of that which we say Quia duri sermones because we presse things hardly upon them But yet that 's not so strange as Non facere quae dixerint Qud dixerint not to do those things which they have said themselves That when as the Apostle sayes of the Corinthians Vos estis you are our Epistle not written with ink but with the spirit of the living God so a man by hearing is become Evangelium sibi a Gospel to himself and by the preaching of the Gospel Serm. 3. is come to say Non amplius I will go and sin no more left a worse thing fall unto me yet he goes and sins again fall what will or can fall and Non facit quae dixerit he does not perform his own promise to himself He is affected with some particular passage in a Sermon and then he comes to David's Secundum innocentiam O Lord deale with me according to my future innocence shew thy mercy to me as I keep my selfe from that sin hereafter Job 9.31 and then abominantur eum vestimenta ejus his old clothes defile him again his old rags cast vermin upon him his old habits of sin threw new dirt upon him He goes out of the Church as that mans son went from his father who sent him to work in the Vineyard Matth. 21.28 with that word in his mouth Eo Domine Sir I go but he never went he turns another way Non facit quae dixerat he keeps not his own word with his own soul when he is gone out of his right way a Sickness a Disgrace a Loss overtakes him the arrowes of the Almighty stick in him and the venome thereof drinks up his spirit temporal afflictions and spirituall afflictions meet in him like two clouds and beat out a thunder upon him like two currents and swallow him like two milstones and grinde him and then he comes to his Domine quid retribuam Lord what shall I give thee to deliver me now non facit quae dixerat he payes none of those vowes performes no part of that which he promised then Christ had his Consummatum est and this sinner hath his Christ ends his passion and he ends his action Christ ends his affliction and he ends his affection Distulit securim attulit securitatem sayes S. Augustine of this case as soon as the Danger is removed his Devotion is removed too The end of all is that what punishment soever God reserves for them who never heard of the Name of his Son Christ Jesus at all or for them who have pretended to receive him but have done it Idolatrously superstitiously we that have heard him we that have had the Scriptures preached and applied
Glorification Manna putrified if it were kept by any man but a day but in the Ark it never putrified That treasure which is as Manna from Heaven Grace and Peace yet here hath a brackish taste when Grace and Peace shall become Joy and Glory in Heaven there it will be sincere Sordescit quod inferiori miscetur naturae August etsi in suo genere non sordidetur Though in the nature thereof that with which a purer Metal is mix'd be not base yet it abases the purer Metal He puts his Example in Silver and Gold Though Silver be a precious Metal yet it abases Gold Grace and Peace and Faith are precious parts of our Treasure here yet if we mingle them that is compare them with the Joys and Glory of Heaven if we come to think That our Grace and Peace and Faith here can no more be lost then our Joy and Glory there we abase and over-allay those Joys and that Glory The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a Treasure says our Saviour Matth. 13.44 But is that all Is any Treasure like unto it None For to end where we begun Treasure is Depositum in Crastinum Provision for to morrow The treasure of the worldly man is not so He is not sure of any thing to morrow Nay the treasure of the Godly man is not so in this world He is not sure that this dayes Grace and Peace and Faith shall be his to morrow When I have Joy and Glory in Heaven I shall be sure of that to morrow And that 's a term long enough for before a to morrow there must be a night And shall there ever be a night in Heaven No more then day in Hell Apoc. 21.23 There shall be no Sun in Heaven therefore no danger of a Sun-set And for the treasure it self when the Holy Ghost hath told us 18. That the Walls and Streets of the City are pure Gold That the Foundations thereof are all precious Stones and every Gate of an intire Pearl what hath the Holy Ghost himself left to denote unto us what the treasure it self within is The Treasure it self is the Holy Ghost himself and Joy in him As the Holy Ghost proceeds from Father and Son but I know not how so there shall something proceed from Father Son and Holy Ghost and fall upon me but I know not what Nay not fall upon me neither but enwrap me embrace me for I shall not be below them so as that I shall not to be upon the same seat with the Son at the right hand of the Father in the Union of the Holy Ghost Rectified by the Power of the Father and feel no weakness Enlightned by the Wisdom of the Son and feel no scruple Established by the Joy of the Holy Ghost and feel no jealousie Where I shall finde the Fathers of the first Age dead five thousand years before me Serm. 6. and they shall not be able to say they were there a minute before me Where I shall finde the blessed and glorious Martyrs who went not per viam lacteam but per viam sanguineam not by the milky way of an Innocent Life but by the bloody way of a Violent Death and they shall not contend with me for precedency in their own Right or say VVe came in by Purchase and you but by Pardon VVhere I shall finde the Virgins and not be despised by them for not being so but hear that Redintegration which I shall receive in Christ Jesus call'd Virginity and Intireness VVhere all tears shall be wip'd from mine Eyes not onely tears of Compunction for my self and tears of Compassion for others but even tears of Joy too for there shall be no sudden joy no joy unexperienced there There I shall have all joys altogether always There Abraham shall not be gladder of his own Salvation then of mine nor I surer of the Everlastingness of my God then of my Everlastingness in Him This is that Treasure of which the God of this Treasure give us those Spangles and that single Money which this Mint can coin this VVorld can receive that is Prosperity and a good use thereof in worldly things and Grace and Peace and Faith in spiritual And then reserve for us the Exaltation of this Treasure in the Joy and Glory of Heaven in the Mediation of his Son Christ Jesus and by the Operation of his Blessed Spirit AMEN A SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL April 21. 1616. SERMON VI. ECCLES 8.11 Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily Therefore the heart of the children of men is fully set in them to do evil WE cannot take into our Meditation a better Rule then that of the Stoick Nihil infaelicius faelicitate peccantium Seneca There is no such unhappiness to a sinner as to be happy no such cross as to have no crosses nor can we take a better Example of that Rule then Constantius the Arrian Emperour in whose time first of all the Crosse of Christ suffer'd that profanation as to be an Ensign of War between Christian and Christian When Magnentius by being an usurping Tyrant and Constantius by being an Arrian Heretick had forfeited their interest in the Cross of Christ which is the Ensign of the universal Peace of this world and the means of the eternal Peace of the next both brought the Cross to cross the Cross to be an Ensign of War and of Hostility both made that Cross when the Father accepted for all mankinde the blood of Christ Jesus to be an instrument for the sinful effusion of the blood of Christians But when this Heretical Emperour had a Victory over this usurping Tyrant this unhappy happiness transported him to a greater sin a greater insolence to approach so near to God himself as to call himself Eternum principem The eternal Emperour and to take into his stile and Rescripts this addition Eternitatem nostram Thus and thus it hath pleased our Eternity to proceed Yea and to bring his Arrian followers who would never acknowledge an eternity in Christ nor confess him to be the eternal Son of God to salute himself by that name Eternum Caesarem The eternal Emperour so venimous so deadly is the prosperity of the wicked to their own souls that even from the mercy of God they take occasion of sinning not onely Thereby but even Therefore They do not only make that their excuse when they do sin but their Reason why they may sin as we see in these words Because sentence against an evil work is not excuted speedily c. Divisio In which words we shall consider first The general perversness of a natural man who by custom in sin comes to assign a Reason why he may sin intimated in the first word Because And secondly The particular perversness of the men in this Text who assign the patience of God to be the Reason of their continuance in sin Because sentence is not executed speedily And
then lastly The illusion upon this what a fearful state this shuts them up in That therefore their hearts are fully set in them to do evil And these three The perversness of colouring sins with Reasons and the impotency of making Gods mercy the Reason and the danger of obduration thereby will be the three parts in which we shall determine this Exercise Part I. First then in handling the perversness of assigning Reasons for sins we forbid no man the use of Reason in matters of Religion As S. August says Contra Scriptura nemo Christianus No man can pretend to be a Christian if he refuse to be tryed by the Scriptures And as he adds Contra Ecclesiam nemo pacificus No man can pretend to love order and Peace if he refuse to be tryed by the Church so he adds also Contra Rationem nemo sobrius No man can pretend to be in his wits if he refuse to be tryed by Reason He that believes any thing because the Church presents it he hath Reason to assure him that this Authority of the Church is founded in the Scriptures He that believeth the Scriptures hath Reasons that govern and assure him that those Scriptures are the Word of God Mysteries of Religion are not the less believ'd and embrac'd by Faith because they are presented and induc'd and apprehended by Reason But this must not enthrone this must not exalt any mans Reason so far as that there should lie an Appeal from Gods Judgements to any mans reason that if he see no reason why God should proceed so and so he will not believe that to be Gods Judgement or not believe that Judgement of God to be just For of the secret purposes of God Mat. 11.26 we have an Example what to say given us by Christ himself Ita est quia complacuit It is so O Father because thy good pleasure was such All was in his own breast and bosome in his own good will and pleasure before he Decreed it And as his Decree it self so the wayes and Executions of his Decrees are often unsearchable for the purpose and for the reason thereof though for the matter of fact they may be manifest They that think themselves sharp-sighted and wise enough to search into those unreveal'd Decrees they who being but worms will look into Heaven and being the last of Creatures who were made will needs enquire what was done by God before God did any thing for creating the World In ultimam dementiam reverant says S. Chrysost They are fallen into a mischievous madness Et ferrum ignitum quod forcipe deberent digitus accipiunt They will needs take up red hot Irons with their bare fingers without tongs That which is in the Center which should rest and lie still in this peace That it is so because it is the will of God that it should be so they think to toss and tumble that up to the Circumference to the Light and Evidence of their Reason by their wrangling Disputations If then it be a presumpteous thing and a contempt against God to submit his Decrees to the Examination of humane reason it must be a high treason against the Majesty of God to find out a reason in him which should justifie our sins To conclude out of any thing which he does or leaves undone that either he doth not hate or cannot punish sinners For this destroys even the Nature of God and that which the Apostle lays for the foundation of all To believe that God is Heb. 11.6 and that he is a just Rewarder Adam's quia Mulier The woman whom thou gavest me gave me the Apple And Eve's quia Serpens Because the Serpent deceiv'd me and all such are poor and unallowable pleas which God would not admit For there is no Quia no Reason why any man at any time should do any sin God never permits any perplexity to fall upon us so as that we cannot avoyd one sin but by doing another or that we should think our self excusable by saying Quia inde minus malum There is less harm in a Concubine then in another wife Or Quia inde aliquod bonum That my incontinence hath produc'd a profitable man to the State or to the Church though a bastard much less to say Quia obdormivit Deus Tush God sees it not or cares not for it though he see it If thou ask then why thou should'st be bound to believe the Creation we say Quia unus Deus Because there can be but one God and if the World be eternal and so no Creature the World is God If thou ask why thou should'st be bound to believe Providence we say Quia Deus remunerator Because God is to give every man according to his merits If thou ask why thou should'st be bound to believe that when thou seest he doth not give every man according to his merits we say Quia inscrutabilia judicia ejus O how unsearchable are his Jugdements and his ways past finding out For thou art yet got no farther in measuring God but by thine own measure and thou hast found no other reason to lead thee to think that God doth not govern well but because he doth not govern so to thine understanding as thou shouldst if thou wert God So that thou dost not onely make thy weakness but thy wickedness that is thy hasty disposition to come to a present Revenge when any thing offends thee the Measure and the Model by which the frame of Gods Government should be erected and so thou comest to the worst distemper of all insanire cum ratione to go out of thy wits by having too much and to be mad with too much knowledge not to sin out of infirmity or tentation or heat of blood but to sin in cold blood and upon just reason and mature considerations and so deliberately and advisedly to continue to sin Part II. Now the particular reason which the perversness of these men produceth here in this Text is Because God is patient and long-suffering So he is so he will be still Their perversness shall not pervert his Nature his goodness As God bade the Prophet Osea do 1.2 he hath done himself Go says he and take to thee a wife of fornication and children of fornication so hath he taken us guilty of spiritual fornication But as in the fleshly fornications of an adulterous wife the husband is for the most part the last that hears of them so for our spiritual fornications such is the loathness the patience the longanimity of our good and gracious God that though he do know our sins as soon as they speak as soon as they are acted for that 's peccatum cum voco says S. Gregory A speaking sin when any sinful thought is produc'd into act yea before they speak as soon as they are conceiv'd yet he will not hear of our sins he takes no knowledge of them by punishing them till our brethren have
The Incarnation of God and then the death and Crucifying of that God so Incarnate could never have fallen within the desire nor wish of any man neither would any man oâ— himself ever have conceived That the Sacraments of the Church poor and naked things of themselves for all that the wit of man could imagine in them or allow to them should be such means to sâ—al and convey the graces which accompany this Redemption of our souls to our souls Divisio So then Having thus represented unto you a model and designe of the miserable condition of man and the abundant mercy of our Redeemer so far as those words which the Holy Ghost hath chosen in this text hath invited and led us That we may look better upon some pieces of it that we may take such a sight of this Redeemer here as that we may know Him when we meet Him at home at our house in our private meditations at His house in the last judgment I shall onely offer you two considerations Exprobrationem and Consolaâ—ionem First an exprobration or increpation from God to us And then a consolation or consolidation of the same God upon us And in the exprobration God reproches to us first our Prodigality that we would sell a reversion our possibility our expectance of an inheritance in heaven And then our cheapness that we would sell that for nothing Prodigality First then Prodigality is a sin that destroys even the means of liberality If a man wast so as that he becomes unable to releive others by this wast this is a sinful prodigality but much more if he wast so as that he is not able to subsist and maintain himself and this is our case who have even annihilated our selves by our proâ—useness For it is his mercy that we are not consumed It is a sin and a viperous sin it eats out his own womb The Prodigal consumes that that should maintain his Prodigality It is peccatum Biathana ton a sin that murders it self Now as in civil Prodigalities in a wastfulness of our temporal estate the Laws inflicts three kinds of punishment three incommodities upon him that is a Prodigal so have the same punishments a proportion and somethings that answer them in this spiritual prodigality of the soul by sin The first is bonis suis interdicitur He that is a Prodigall in the Law cannot dispose of his own Estate whatsoever he gives or sells or leases all is void as of a mad-man or of an Infant And such is the condition of a man in sin He hath no interest in his own natural faculties He cannot think he cannot wish he cannot do any thing of himself the venem and the malignity of his sin goes through all his actions and he cannot purge it The second incommodity is Testamentum non facit The Prodigal person hath no power allowed him by the Law to make a will at his death And this also doth an habitual sinner suffer For when he comes to his end he may dictate to a Notary and he may bid him write Imprimis I give my Soul to God my Body to such a Church my Goods to such and such persons But if those Goods be lâ—able to other debts â—he Legâ—tarie shall have no profit If the person be under excommunication he shall not lye in that Church If his soul be under the weight of unrepented sins God will do the devil no wrong he will not take a soul that is sold to him before The third Incommodity that a Prodigal incurrs by the Law is Exhaeredatus creditur He is presum'd to be disinherited by his father that whereas by that Law if the father in his Will leave out any of his childrens names and never mention him yet that child which is pretermitted shall come in for a childs part except the father have assigned a particular reason why he left him out If this childe were a Prodigal there needs no other reason to be assigned but Exhaeredatus Creditur He is presum'd to be disinherited And so also if we have seen a man prodigal of his own soul and run on in a course of sin all his life except there appear very evident signs of resumption into Gods grace at his end Exhaeredatus Creditur we have just reason to be afraid that he is disinherited If any such sinner seem to thee to repent at his end Faâ—eor vobis non negamus quod petit saith St. Augustin I confess we ought not to deny him any help that he desires in that late extremity Sed non praesumimus quia bene exit I dare not assure you that that man dyes in a good state he adds that vehemence non praesumo non vos fallo non praesumo I should but deceive you if I should assure you that such a man dyed well There was one good and happy Thief that stole a Salvation at the crucifying of Christ but in him that was throughly true which is proverbially spoken Occasio facit furem the oppotunity made him a thief and when there is such another opportunity there may be such another theif when Christ is to dye again we may presume of mercy upon such a late repentance at our death The preventing grace of God made him lay violent hands upon heaven But when thou art a Prodigal of thy soul will God be a prodigal too for thy sake and betray and prostitute the kingdome of Heaven for a sigh or a groan in which thy pain may have a greater part than thy repentance God can raise up children out of the stones of the street and therefore he might be as liberal as he would of his people and suffer them to be sold for old shoes but Christ will not sell his birth-right for a messe or pottage the kingdome of Heaven for the dole at a Funeral Heaven is not to be had in exchange for an Hospital or a Chantry or a Colledge erected in thy last will It is not onely the selling all we have that must buy that pearl which represents the kingdome of Heaven The giving of all that we have to the poor at our death will not do it the pearl must be sought and found before in an even and constant course of Sanctification we must be thrifty all our life or we shall be to poor for that purchase It is then an unthrifty a perplexed bargain when both the buyer and the seller loose our losse is plain enough for we loose our souls And certainly howsoever the devil be expressed to take some joy at the winning of a sinner howsoever his kingdome be thereby enlarged yet Almighty God suffers not his treason his undermining of man to be unpunished but afflicts him with more and more accidental torments even for that as a licencious man takes pleasure in the victory of having corrupted a woman by his solicitation but yet insensibly overthrows his constitution by his sin so the withdrawing of Gods Subjects from
the abundant love of God to man many concluded that howsoever though Adam had not sinned God would have dignified the nature of man in the highest degree that that nature was any ways capable off and since it appears now because that hath been done that the nature of man was capable of such assuming by the Son of God they argue that God would have done this though Adam had not sinn'd He had not come say they ut medicus if man had not contracted that infections sickness by Adams sin Christ had not come in the nature of a Physitian to recover him non ut Redemptor say they If man had not forfeited his interest and state in heaven by Adams sin Christ had not come in the nature of a Redeemer but ut frater ut Dominus ad nobilitandum genus humanus out of a brotherly love and out of a royal favour to exalt that nature which he did love to impart and convey to us a greater and nobler state then we had in our Creation in such a respect and to such a purpose he should have come But since they themselves who follow that opinion come to say That that is the more subtle opinion and the more agreable to mans reason because man willingly embraces and pursues any thing that conduces to the dignifying of his own nature but that the other opinion that Christ had not come if our sins had not occasioned his comming is magis conformis scripturis magis honorat Deum is more agreable to the Scriptures and derives more honor upon God we cannot err if we keep with the Scriptures and in the way that leads to Gods glory and so say with St. August Si homo non periisset filius hominis non venisset If man could have been sav'd otherwise the son of God had not come in this manner ot if that may be interpreted of his comming to suffer only we may enlarge it with Leo Creatura non fieret qui Creator mundi He who was Creator of the world had never become a Creature in the world if our sins had not drawn him to it It is usefully said by Aquinus Deus ordinavit futura ut futura erant God hath appointed all future things to be but to be so as they are that is necessary things necessarily and contingent things contingently absolute things absolutely and conditional things conditionally He hath decreed my salvation but that salvation in Christ He had decreed Christs comming into this world but a comming to save sinners And therefore it is a frivolous interogatory a lost question an impertinent article to enquire what God would have done if Adam had stood But Adam is fallen and we in him and therefore though we may piously wish what St. Augustine utinam non fuisset miseria ne iste misericordia esset necessaria I would man had not been so miserable as to put God to this way of mercy yet since our sins had induced this misery upon us and this necessity if we may so say upon God let us change all our disputation into thanksgiving and all our utrums and quaeres and quando's of the school to the Benedictus and Alelujahs and Osanna's of the Church Blessed be the Lord God of Israel who hath visited and redeemed his people blessed that he would come at all which was our first and blessed that he is come already which is our second consideration venit He came He is come Venit As in the former branch the Gentils the Heathens are our adversaries they deny the venit that a Messias is to come at all so in this the Jews are our enemies they confess the veniet a future comming but they deny the venit that this Messias come yet In that language in which God spoke to man there is such assurance intimated that whatsoever God promises shall be performed that in that language ordinarily in the Prophets the times are confounded and when God is intended to purpose or to promise any thing in the future it is very often expressed in the time past that which God means to do he is said to have done future and present and past is all one with God But yet to man it is much more that Christ is come then that he would come not but that they who apprehended faithfully his future comming had the same salvation as we but they could not so easily apprehend it as we God did not present so many handles to take hold of him in that promise that he would come as in the performance that he was come They had most of these handles that liv'd with him and saw him and heard him but we that come after have more then they which were before them we have more in the history then they had in the Prophets It was time for him to come in the beginning of the world for the Devil was a murderer from the beginning Joh. 8 44. As the Devil was felo de se a murderer of himself as he killed himself Christ gave him over he never came to him in that line he never pardoned him that sin but as he practis'd upon man Christ met with him from the beginning He sav'd us from his killing by dying himself for us for being dead having taken us into his wounds and being risen and having taken us into his glory if we be dead in Christ already the Devil cannot kill us if we be risen in Christ the Devil cannot hold us And so he was Agnus occisus ab origine mundi the Lamb slain from the beginning of the world that is as soon as the world had any beginning in the purpose of God God saw from all eternity that man would need Christ and as soon as there was conceiv'd an ego occido I will kill in the Devils mouth then was an ego vivificabo I will raise from death in Gods mouth and so there was an early comming from all eternity for he is the Ruler of Israel saies the Prophet Mâ—ch 5.2 and his goings forth have been from the beginning and from everlasting it is goings in the plural Christ hath divers goings forth divers commings all from the beginning not only from Moses his In principio which was the beginning of the Creation for then also Christ came in the promise of a Messiah but from St. Johns In principio that beginning which was without beginning the eternal beginning for there Christ came in that eternal decree that he should come Neither is this only as he is Germen Jehovae the bud of Jehovah issuing from him as his eternal Son Esa 4 2. but as the Prophet Michaeas saies in that place cited before it is as he shall come out of Bethlem and as he shall be a Ruler of Israel so as he came in our humane nature as he came to dye for us as he came to establish a Church so his comming is from all eternity for all this was
come now A Sermon Preached at St. Dunstans January 15. 1625. The First SERMON after Our Dispersion by the Sickness SERMON XXI Exod. 12.30 For there was not a house where there was not one dead GOd intended life and immortality for man and man by sin induc'd death upon himself at first When man had done so and that now man was condemned man must die yet yet God gave him though not an absolute pardon yet a long reprieve though not a new immortality yet a life of seven and eight hundred years upon earth And then misery by sin growing upon man and this long life which was enlarged in his favour being become a burden unto him God abridged and contracted his seven hundred to seventy and his eight hundred to eighty years the years of his life came to be threescore and ten and if misery do suffer him to exceed those even the exceeding it self is misery Death then is from our selves it is our own but the executioner is from God it is his he gives life no man can quicken his own soul but any man can forfeit his own soul And yet when he hath done so he may not be his own executioner for as God giveth life so he killeth says Moses there not as the cause of death for death is not his creature but because he employs what person he will and executes by what instrument it pleases him to chuse age or sickness or justice or malice or in our apprehension fortune In that History from whence we deduce this Text which was that great execution the sodain death of all the first-born of Egypt it is very large and yet we may usefully and to good purpose enlarge it if we take into our consideration spiritual death as well as bodily for so in our houses from whence we came hither if we left but a servant but a child in the cradle at home there is one dead in that house If we have no other house but this which we carry about us this house of clay this tabernacle of flesh this body yet if we consider the inmate the sojourner within this house Serm. 21. the state of our corrupt and putrified soul there is one dead in this house too And though we be met now in the House of God and our God be the God of Life yet even in this house of the God of Life and the ground enwrapped in the same consecration not only of every such house but let every mans length in the house be a house of every such space this Text will be verified There is not a house where there is not one dead God is abundant in his mercies to man and as though he did but learn to give by his giving as though he did but practise to make himself perfect in his own Art which Art is bountiful Mercy as though all his former blessings were but in the way of earnest and not of payment as though every benefit that he gave were a new obligation upon him and not an acquittance to him he delights to give where he hath given as though his former gifts were but his places of memory and marks set upon certain men to whom he was to give more It is not so good a plea in our prayers to God for temporal or for spiritual blessings to say Have mercy upon me now for I have loved thee heretofore as to say Have mercy upon me for thou hast loved me heretofore We answer a Beggar I gave you but yesterday but God therefore gives us to day because he gave us yesterday and therefore are all his blessings wrap'd up in that word Panis quotidianus Give us this day our daily bread Every day he gives and early every day his Manna falls before the Sun rises and his mercies are new every morning In this consideration of his abounding in all ways of mercy to us we consider justly how abundant he is in instructing us He writes his Law once in our hearts and then he repeats that Law and declares that Law again in his written Word in his Scriptures He writes his Law in stone-Tables once and then those Tables being broken he repeats that Law writes that Law again in other Tables He gives us his Law in Exodus and Leviticus and then he gives us a Deuteronomy a repetition of that Law another time in another Book And as he abounds so in instructing us in going the same way twice over towards us as he gives us the Law a second time so he gives us a second way of instructing us he accompanies he seconds his Law with examples In his Legal Books we have Rules in the Historical Examples to practise by And as he is every way abundant as he hath added Law to Nature and added Example to Law so he hath added Example to Example and by that Text which we have read to you here and by that Text which we have left at home our house and family and by that Text which we have brought hither our selves and by that Text which we finde here where we stand and sit and kneel upon the bodies of some of our dead friends or neighbors he gives to us he repeats to us a full a various a multiform a manifold Catechism and Institution to teach us that it is so absolutely true that there is not a house in which there is not one dead as that taking spiritual death into our consideration there is not a house in which there is one alive That therfore we may take in light at all these windows that God opens for us Divisio that we may lay hold upon God by all these handles which he puts out to us we shall make a brief survey of these four Houses of that in Egypt where the Text places it of that at home in which we dwell of this which is our selves where we always are or always should be within and of this in which we are met where God is in so many several Temples of his as are above and under ground So that this Sermon may be a general Funeral Sermon both for them that are dead in the flesh and for our selves that are dead in our sins for of all these four houses it is true and by useful accommodation applyable to all There is not a house where there is not one dead First then to survey the first House the House in Egypt Part 1. Pharaoh by drawing upon himself and his Land this last and heaviest plague of the ten the universal the sodain the midnight destruction of all all the first born of Egypt hath made himself a Monument and a History and a Pillar everlasting to the end of the world to the end of all place in the world and to the end of all time in the world by which all men may know that man how perverse soever cannot weary God that man cannot add to his Rebellions so many heavy circumstances but that God can
only post eos Come not after them which if we were to reflect at all which we always avoid upon publick things would afford a good note for the publick for the Magistrate Come not after these Idolaters but be still beforehand with them That which is proverbially said of particular Bodies will hold in a Body Politick in any State Qui medicè miserè That man hath no health who is put to sustain it or repair it with continual Physick That State hath no safety that refers all to a defensive War Luke 4.24 and to a reparation of Breaches then when they are made That State will be subject to the other Proverb which Chrysostom foresaw Medice cura teipsum That State which hath been a Physitian to all her neighbour States let blood and staunched blood in them so as conduced best to their own health may be put to imploy all her means upon her self to repair and cure her self if she follow that is in this acceptation of the word come after her Idolatrous enemies and be not still beforehand with them But that is not our sphear the Publick the State but yet States consist of Families and Families of private persons and they are in our sphear in our charge And therefore we lay this Inhibition upon all that are Masters of Families Take heed of being snared by following by coming after them in this sense That because thou thinkest thou hast a power in thy wife in thy children in thy servants and canst do what thou wilt with them at any time therefore thou needest not be so scrupulous at first but mayst admit any supplanters any underminers into thy house because they are good company or because they have relation to great persons Come not to this Post eos play not that after-game to put thy self to a necessity of taking sowre and unkinde courses with wire and children after but be beforehand with such Idolaters prevent their snare We lay this Inhibition too upon every particular conscience Covetousness is Idolatry saith the Apostle and Quot vitia tot Idola saith St. Hierom. As many habitual sins as we have so many Idols have we set up True repentance destroyes this Idolatry 't is true but then Take heed of being snared post ea by coming after them by exposing thy self to dangers of relapses again by consideration how easily thou madest thy peace last time with God It was but a sigh but a tear but a bending of the knee but a receiving of the Sacrament that went to it then And post ea when all is done which was done before in the way of sin all that is easily done over again which was done in the way of remedy Say not so for a merry heart and a chearful countenance upon the testimony of a good conscience is a better way to God then all the dejections of Spirit all the sowre contritions and sad remorses in the world Thou art not sure that thou shalt get so far as to such a sadness as God requires for sin thou mayst continue in thy presumption Thou art not sure that thou shalt go no further then God requires in that sadness it may flow out to desperation Be beforehand with thy sins watch the approaches of those enemies for if thou build upon that way of coming after them upon presumption of mercy upon repentance thou maist be snared and therefore take heed And this is the sense of the phrase as the Original will afford it with Idolaters in the State with Underminers in thy House with sins in thy Soul be still beforehand watch their dangerous accesses But St. Hierom and the great stream of Expositors that go with him give another sense of the word Ne imiteris Be not snared by following them And in that sense we are to take the word now Follow them not then that is imitate them not neither in their Severity and Cruelty nor in their Levity and Facility neither not in their Severity when they will apply all the capital and bloody penalties of the Imperial Laws made against Arrians Manicheans Pelagians and Nestorians Hereticks in the fundamental points of Religion and with which Christ could not consist to every man that denys any collateral and subdivided Tradition of theirs that if a man conceive any doubt of the dream of Purgatory of the validity of indulgence of the Latitude of a work of Supererogation he is as deep in the fagot here and shall be as deep in Hell hereafter as if he denyed the Trinity or the Incarnation and Passion of Christ Jesus when in a days warning and by the roaring of one Bull it grows to be damnation to day to beleeve so as a man might have beleeved yesterday and have bin saved when they will afford no Salvation but in that Church which is discernable by certain and inseparable marks which our Country-man Saunders makes to be six and Mich. Medina extends to eleven and Bellarmine declares to be fifteen and Bodius stretches to a hundred when they make every thing Heresie and rather then lack a Text for putting Hereticks to death will accept that false reading haereticum hominem devita which being spoken of avoiding Titus 3.10 they will needs interpret of killing for Erasmus cites a Witness who heard an antient and grave Divine cite that place so and to that purpose follow them not do not imitate them be content to judge more charitably of them For those amongst them who are under an invincible ignorance because their Superiors keep the Scriptures from them God may be pleased to save by that revelation of his Son Christ Jesus which he hath afforded them in that Church Howsoever they who have had light offered to them and wilfully resist it must necessarily perish Follow them not imitate them not in that severity necessarily to damn all who think not in all things as they do Nor follow them not in that facility to make their Divinity and the Tenets of their Church to wait upon temporal affairs and emergent occasions The Anabaptist will delude the Magistrate in an examination or in any practise because he thinks no man ought to be a Magistrate over him in things that have any relation to spiritual Cognizance and Treason in alienating the Subject from his Allegiance must be of spiritual cognizance Where others are too strong for them they may dignifie their Religion so their Jesuit Ribadineyra says and where they are too strong for others they must profess it though with Arms so their Jesuit Bellarmine argues it In this planetary in this transitory in this occasional Religion follow them not We say in Logick Substantia non suscipit magis minus Substantial and fundamental points of Religion and obedience to Superiors is amongst those do not ebb and flow they binde all men and at all times and in all cases Induite Dominum Jesu says the Apostle Put ye on the Lord Jesus Rom. 13 14. and keep him
fixt the Almighty and immoveable God if it can be content to inquire after it self and take knowledge where it is and in what way it will finde the means of cleansing And so this second consideration The placing of this pureness in the heart enlarges it self also into the third branch of this part which is De Modo by what means this pureness is fix'd in the heart in which is involved the Affection with which it must be embrac'd Love He that loveth pureness of heart Both these then are setled Our heart is naturally foul Modus And our heart may be cleansed But how is our present disquisition Who can bring a clean thing out of filthiness There is not one Job 14.4 Adam foul'd my heart and all yours nor can we make it clean our selves Who can say I have made clean my heart There is but one way Prov. 20.9 a poor beggarly way but easie and sure to ask it of God And even to God himself it seems a hard work to cleanse this heart and therefore our prayer must be with David Cor mundum crea Create Psal 51.12 O Lord a pure heart in me And then comes Gods part not that Gods part begun but then for it was his doing that thou madest this prayer but because it is a work that God does especially delight in to build upon his own foundations when he hath disposed thee to pray and upon that prayer created a new heart in thee then God works upon that new heart and By faith purifyes it Act. 15.9 enables it to preserve the pureness as Saint Peter speaks He had kindled some sparks of this faith in thee before thou askedst that new heart else the prayer had not been of faith but now finding thee obsequious to his beginnings he fuels this fire and purifies thee as Gold and Silver in all his furnaces through Believing and Doing and suffering through faith and works and tribulation we come to this pureness of heart And truely he that lacks but the last but Tribulation as fain as we would be without it lacks one concoction one refining of this heart But in this great work the first act is a Renovation a new heart Coâ— Novâ—m and the other That we keep clean that heart by a continual diligence and vigilancy over all our particular actions In these two consists the whole work of purifying the heart first an Annihilating of the former heart which was all sin And then a holy superintendency over that new heart which God vouchsafes to create in us to keep it as he gives it clean pure It is in a word a Detestation of former sins and a prevention of future And for the first Chromakus Anno 390. Mundi corde sunt qui deposuere cor peccati That 's the new heart that hath disseised expelled the heart of sin There is in us a heart of sin which must be cast up for whilst the heart is under the habits of sin we are not onely sinful but we are all sin as it is truly said that land overflow'd with sea is all sea And when sin hath got a heart in us it will quickly come to be that whole Body of Death Rom. 7.24 which Saint Paul complains of who shall deliver me from the Body of this Death when it is a heart it will get a Braine a Brain that shall minister all Sense and Delight in sin That 's the office of the Brain A Brain which shall send for the sinews and ligaments to tye sins together and pith and marrow to give a succulencie and nourishment even to the bones to the strength and obduration of sin and so it shall do all those services and offices for sin that the brain does to the natural body So also if sin get to be a heart it will get a liver to carry blood and life through all the body of our sinful actions That 's the office of the liver And whilst we dispute whether the throne and seat of the soul be in the Heart or Brain or Liver this tyrant sin will praeoccupate all and become all so as that we shall finde nothing in us without sin nothing in us but sin if our heart be possest inhabited by it And if it be true in our natural bodies that the heart is that part that lives first and dyes last it is much truer of this Cor peccati this heart of sin for this hearty sinner that hath given his heart to his sin doth no more foresee a Death of that sin in himself then he remembers the Birth of it and because he remembers not or understands not how his soul contracted sin by coming into his body he leaves her to the same ignorance how she shall discharge her self of sin when she goes out of that body But as his sin is elder then himself for Adams sin is his sin so is it longer liv'd then his body for it shall cleave everlastingly to his soul too God asks no more of thee but fili da mihi cor Prov. 23.26 My son give me thy heart Because when God gave it thee it was but one heart But since thou hast made it Cor cor as the Prophet speaks a Heart and a Heart a double Heart give both thy Hearts to God thy natural weakness and disposition to sin The inclinations of thy heart And thy habitual practise of sin The obduration of thy heart cor peccans and Cor peccati and he shall create a new heart in thee which is the first way of attaining this pureness of heart to become once in a good state to have as it were paid all thy former debts and so to be the better able to look about thee for the future for prevention of subsequent sins which is the other way that we proposed for attaining this pureness detestation of former habits watchfulness upon particular actions Till this be done till this Cor peccati Peccata Minutiora this hearty habitualness in sin be devested there is no room no footing to stand and sweep it a heart so filled with foulness will admit no counsel no reproof The great Engineir would have undertaken to have removed the World with his Engine if there had been any place to fix his Engine upon out of the World I would undertake by Gods blessing upon his Ordinance to cleanse the foulest heart that is if that Engine which God hath put into my hands might enter into his heart if there were room for the renouncing Gods Judgements and for the application of Gods mercies in the merits of Christ Jesus in his heart they would infallibly work upon him But he hath petrified his heart in sin and then he hath immur'd it wall'd it with a delight in sin and fortified it with a justifying of his sin and adds daily more and more out-works by more and more daily sins so that the denouncing of Judgement the application of Mercies
Prayers Sermons Sacraments which are the Engines and Ammunition which God hath put into our hands though they have a blessed and a powerful operation and produce heavenly effects where they may have entrance in this habitual sinners can have none Some things therefore some great things every man must depart with before he can come to the God of pure eyes Abac. 1.13 When the heart is emptied of infidelity and of those habits of sin that filled it when it is come to a discontinuance and a detestation of those sins then we can better look into every corner and endeavor to keep it clean clean in that measure that the God of pure eyes will vouchsafe to look upon it and the light of his countenance will perfect the work The diligence required on our part is a serious watchfulness and consideration of our particular actions how small soever In the Law whatsoever was unclean to eat made a man unclean to touch it when it was dead Though the body of sin have so far received a deadly wound in thee as that thou hast discontinued some habitual sin some long time yet if thou touch upon the memory of that dead sin with delight thou begettest a new childe of sin 65.20 And as Esai speaks of a childe and of a sinner of an hundred years old so every sin into which we relapse is born an hundred years old it hath all the age of that sin which we had repented and discontinued before upon it it is born an Adam in full strength the first minute born a Giant born a Devil and possesses us in an instant Every man may observe that a sin of relapse is sooner upon him then the same sin was at the first attempting him at first he had more bashfulness more tenderness more colluctation against the sin then upon a relapse And therefore in this survey of sin thy first care must be to take heed of returning top diligently to a remembrance of those delightful sins which are past for that will endanger new And in many cases it is safer to do as God himself is said to do to tie up our sins in a bundle and cast them into the sea so for us to present our sins in general to God and to cast them into the bottomless sea of the infinite mercies of God in the infinite merits of Christ Jesus then by an over-diligent enumeration of sins of some kindes or by too busie a contemplation of those circumstances which encreased our sinful delignt then when we committed those sins to commit them over again by a fresh delight in their memory When thou hast truly repented them and God hath forgotten them do thou forget them too The pureness and cleanness of heart which we must love was evidently represented in the old Law and in the practise of the Jews who took knowledge of so many uncleannesses they reckon almost fifty sorts of uncleannesses to which there belonged particular expiations of which some were hardly to be avoided in ordinary conversation As to enter into the Courts of Justice for the Jews that led Christ into the common Hall would not enter lest they should be defiled Jo. 18.28 Yea some things defiled them which it had been unnatural to have left undone as for the son to assist at his fathers Funeral and yet even these required an expiation For these though they had not the nature of sin but might be expiated without any inward sorrow or repentance by outward ablutions by ceremonial washings within a certain time prescribed by the Law yet if that time were negligently and inconsiderately overslipt then they became sins and then they could not be expiated but by a more solemn and a more costly way by sacrifice And even before they came to that whilst they were but uncleannesses and not sins yet even then they made them incapable of eating the Paschal Lamb. So careful was God in the Law and the Jews in their practise for these outward things to preserve this pureness this cleanness even in things which were not fully sins So also must he that affects this pureness of heart and studies the preserving of it sweep down every cobweb that hangs about it Scurrile and obscene language yea mis-interpretable words such as may bear an ill sense pleasureable conversation and all such little entanglings which though he think too weak to hold him yet they foul him And let him that is subject to these smaller sins remember that as a spider builds always where he knows there is most access and haunt of flies so the Devil that hath cast these light cobwebs into thy heart knows that that heart is made of vanities and levities and he that gathers into his treasure whatsoever thou wast'st out of thine how negligent soever thou be he keeps thy reckoning exactly and will produce against thee at last as many lascivious glaunces as shall make up an Adultery as many covetous wishes as shall make up a Robery as many angry words as shall make up a Murder and thou shalt have dropt and crumbled away thy soul with as much irrecoverableness as if thou hadst poured it out all at once and thy merry sins thy laughing sins shall grow to be crying sins even in the ears of God and though thou drown thy soul here drop after drop it shall not burn spark after spark but have all the fire and all at once and all eternally in one intire and intense torment For as God for our capacity is content to be described as one of us and to take our passions upon him and be called angry and sorry and the like so is he in this also like us that he takes it worse to be slighted to be neglected to be left out then to be actually injur'd Our inconsideration our not thinking of God in our actions offends him more then our sins We know that in Nature and in Art the strongest bodies are compact of the least particles because they shut best and lie closest together so be the strongest habits of sin compact of sins which in themselves are least because they are least perceived they grow upon us insensibly and they cleave unto us inseparably And I should make no doubt of recovering him sooner that had sinned long against his conscience though in a great sin then him that had sinned less sins without any sense or conscience of those sins for I should sooner bring the other to a detestation of his sin then bring this man to a knowledge that that that he did was sin But if thou could'st consider that every sin is a Crucifying of Christ and every sin is a precipitation of thy self from a Pinacle were it a convenient phrase to say in every little sin that thou would'st Crucifie Christ a little or break thy neck a little Beloved there is a power in grace upon thy repentance to wash away thy greatest sins that 's the true the proper Physick of
may make a Prayer a Libel if upon colour of preaching or praying against toleration of Religion or persecution for Religion he would insinuate that any such tolerations are prepared for us or such persecutions threatned against us But if for speaking the mysteries of your salvation plainly sincerely inelegantly inartificially for the Gold and not for the Fashion for the Matter and not for the Form Nanciscor populi gratiam my service may be acceptable to Gods people and available to their Edification Nonne Dei donum shall not I call this a great Blessing of God Beloved in him I must I do And therefore because I presume I speak to such I take to my self that which follows there in the same Father that he that speaks to such a people does not his duty if he consider not deliberately Quibus Quando Quantum loquatur both to whom and at what time and how much he is to speak I consider the persons and I consider that the greatest part by much are persons born since the Reformation of Religion since the death of Idolatry in this Land and therefore not naturaliz'd by Conversion by Transplantation from another Religion to this but born the natural children of this Church and therefore to such persons I need not lay hold upon any points of controverted Doctrine I consider also Quando the time and I consider that it is now in these days of Easter when the greatest part of this Auditory have or will renew their Hands to Christ Jesus in the Sacrament of his Body and his Blood that they will rather loose theirs then lack his and therefore towards persons who have testified that disposition in that seal I need not depart into any vehement or passionate Exhortations to constancy and perseverance as though there were occasion to doubt it And I consider lastly Quantum how much is necessary to be spoken to such a people so disposed and therefore farther then the custom and solemnity of this day and place lays an Obligation upon me I will not extend my self to an unnecessary length especially because that which shall be said by me and by my Brethren which come after and were worthy to come before me in this place is to be said to you again by another who alone takes as much pains as all we and all you too Hears all with as much patience as all you and is to speak of all with as much and more labour then all we Much therefore for your ease somewhat for his a little for mine own with such succinctness and brevity as may consist with clearness and perspicuity in such manner and method as may best enlighten your understandings and least encumber your memories I shall open unto you that light which God commanded out of darkness and that light by which he hath shin'd in our hearts and this light by which we shall have the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus Divisio Our parts therefore in these words must necessarily be three three Lights The first shows us our Creation the second our Vocation the third our Glorification In the first We who were but but what but nothing were made Creatures In the second we who were but Gentiles were made Christians In the third we who were but men shall be made saints In the first God took us when there was no world In the second God sustains us in an ill world In the third God shall crown us in a glorious and joyful world In the first God made us in the second God mends us in the third God shall perfect us First God commanded light out of darkness that man might see the Creature then he shin'd in our hearts that man might see himself at last he shall shine so in the face of Christ Jesus that man may see God and live and live as long as that God of light and life shall live himself Every one of these Parts will have divers Branches and it is time to enter into them In the first the Creation because this Text does not purposely and primarily deliver the Doctrine of the Creation not prove it not press it not enforce it but rather suppose it and then propose it by way of Example and Comparison for when the Apostles says God who commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts he intimates therein these two Propositions first that the same God that does the one does the other too God perfects his works and then this Proposition also As God hath done the one he hath done the other God himself works by Patterns by Examples These two Propositions shall therefore be our two first Branches in this first Part. First Idem Deus the same God goes through his works and therefore let us never fear that God will be weary and then Sicut Deus as God hath done he will do again he works by pattern and so must we and then from these two we shall descend to our third Proposition Quid Deus what God is said to have done here and it is that he commanded light out of darkness In these three we shall determine this Part and for the Branches of the other two Parts our Vocation and our Glorification it will be a less burden to your memories to open them then when we come to handle the Parts themselves then altogether now Now we shall proceed in the Branches of the first Part. Part 1. Memb. 1. Idem Deus In this our first Consideration is Idem Deus the same our God goes through all Those divers Hereticks who thought there were two Gods for Cordon thought so and Marcion thought so too the Gnostiques thought so and the Maniches thought so too though they differ'd in their mistakings for errour is always manifold and multiform yet all their errours were upon this ground this root They could nor comprehend that the same God should be the God of Justice and the God of Mercy too a God that had an earnestness to punish sin and an easiness to pardon sin too Cordon who was first though he made two Gods yet he used them both reasonable well for with him Alter Bonus Alter Justus Iren. 1.28.29 one of his Gods is perfectly good merciful and the other though he be not so very good yet he is just Marcion who came after says worse because he could not discern the good purposes of God in inflicting Judgements nor the good use which good men make of his Corrections but thought all acts of his Justice to be calamitous and intolerable and naturally evil therefore with him Alter Bonus Alter Malus he that is the merciful God is his good God and he that is so just but just is an ill God Hence they came to call the God of the New Testament a good God because there was Copiosa Redemptio plentiful Redemption in the Gospel and the God of the Old Testament Malum Deum an ill God
because they thought all penalties of the Law evil They came lower to call that God which created the Upper Region of man the Brain and the Heart the presence and privy Chamber of Reason and consequently of Religion too a good God because good things are enacted there and that God that created the Lower Region of man the seat and scene of Carnal Desires and inordinate Affections an ill God because ill actions are perpetrated there But Idem Deus the same God that commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts The God of the Law and the God of the Gospel too The God of the Brain and the God of the Belly too The God of Mercy and the God of Justice too is all one God In all the Scriptures you shall scarce find such a Demonstration of Gods Indignation such a severe Execution as that upon the Syrians when after the slaughter of one hundred thousand foot in the field in one day the walls of the City into which they fled fell and slew twenty seven thousand more The Armies of the Israelites were that day but as little flocks of kids says the Text there and yet those few slew one hundred thousand The Walls of Aphak promised succour and yet they fell and slew twenty seven thousand Now from whence proceeded Gods vehement anger in this defeat The Prophet tells the King the cause Because the Syrians have said The Lord is God of the hills but he is not God of the vallies The Israelites had beaten them upon the Hills and they could not attribute this to their Forces for they were very small they must necessarily ascribe it to their God but they thought they might find a way to be too hard for their God and therefore since he was a God of the mountains they would fight with him in the vallies But the God of Israel is Idem Deus one and the same God He is Jugatinus and Vallonia both as St. Aug. speaks out of the Roman Authors he is God of the mountains he can exalt and he is God of the Vallies he can throw down Our Age hath produced such Syrians too Men who after God hath declared himself against them many ways have yet thought they might get an advantage upon him some other way They begun in Rebellions animated persons of great blood and great place to rebels their Rebellions God frustrated Then they came to say to say in actions Their God is God of Rebellions a God that resists Rebellions but he is no God of Excommunications then they excommunicated us But our God cast those thunder-bolts those Bruta fulmina into the Sea no man took fire at them Then they said He is a God of Excommunications he will not suffer an Excommunication stollen out in his Name against his Children to do any harm but he is no God of Invasion let 's try him there Then they procured Invasion and there the God of Israel shew'd himself the Lord of Hosts and scattered them there Then they said he is the God of Invasions annihilates them but he is not the God of Supplantations surely their God will not pry into a Cellar he will not peep into a vault he is the God of water but he is not the God of fire let 's try him in that Element and in that Element they saw one another justly eviscorated and their bowels burnt All this they have said so as we have heard them for they have said it in loud Actions and still they say something in corners which we do not hear Either he is not a God of Equivocations and therefore let us be lying spirits in the mouthes of some of his Prophets draw some men that are in great Opinion of Learning to our side or at least draw the people into an Opinion that we have drawn them or else he is not the God of jealousie and suspition and therefore let us supple and slumber him with security and pretences and disguises But he is Idem Deus that God who hath begun and proceeded will persevere in mercy towards us Our God is not out of breath because he hath blown one tempest and swallowed a Navy Our God hath not burnt out his eyes because he hath looked upon a Train of Powder In the the light of Heaven and in the darkness of hell he sees alike he sees not onely all Machinations of hands when things come to action but all Imaginations of hearts when they are in their first Consultations past and present and future distinguish not his Quando all is one time to him Mountains and Vallies Sea and Land distinguish not his Ubi all is one place to him When I begin says God to Eli I will make an end not onely that all Gods purposes shall have their certain end but that even then when he begins he makes an end from the very beginning imprints an infallible assurance that whom he loves he loves to the end as a Circle is printed all at once so his beginning and ending is all one Make thou also the same interpretation of this Idem Deus in all the Vicissitudes and Changes of this World Hath God brought thee from an Exposititious Child laid out in the streets of uncertain name of unknown Parents to become the first foundation-stone of a great family and to enoble a posterity Hath God brought thee from a Carriers Pack upon which thou camest up to thy change of Foot-Cloathes and Coaches Hath God brought thee from one of these Blew-Coats to one of those Scarlet Gowns Attribute not this to thine own Industry nor to thine own Frugality for Industry is but Fortunes right hand and Frugality her left but come to Davids Acclamation Dominus Fecit It is the Lords doing That takes away the impossibility Psal 118.22 If the Lord will do it it may be it must be done but yet even that takes not away the wonder for as it follows there Domiminus fecit est Mirabile though the Lord have done it it is wonderful in our eyes to see whom and from whence and whither and how God does raise and exalt some men And then if God be pleas'd to make thee a Roll written on both sides a History of Adversity as well as of Prosperity if when he hath fill'd his Tables with the story of Mardoche a man strangely raised he takes his Spunge and wipes out all that and writes down in thee the story of Job a man strangely ruin'd all this is Idem Deus still the same God and the same purpose in that God still to bring thee nearer to him though by a lower way If then thou abound Luk. 12.19 come not to say with the over-secure man Soul thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thine ease eat drink and be merry and if thou want come not to that impatience of that Prophet Satis est Lord this is enough now take away my life Nay though the Lord lead thee