this hee was their School-master himselfe Discite à me learne of mee for I am meek In this Chapter hee gives them three lessons in this doctrine of meeknesse Hee gives them foundations and upperbuildings The Text and a Comment all the Elements of true instruction Rule and Example First hee findes them contending for place Quis maximus who should be greatest in the kingdome of heaven The disease which they were sick of was truly an ignorance what this kingdome was For though they were never ignorant that there should bee an eternall kingdome in heaven yet they thought not that the kingdome of Christ here should onely be a spirituall kingdome but they looked for a temporall inchoation of that kingdome here That was their disease and a dangerous one But as Physitians are forced to doe sometimes to turne upon the present cure of some vehement symptome and accdient and leave the consideration of the maine disease for a time so Christ leaves the doctrine of the kingdome for the present and does not rectifie them in that yet but for this pestilent symptome this malignant accident of precedency and ambition of place he corrects that first and to that purpose gives them the example of a little child and tells them that except they become as humble as gentle as supple as simple as seely as tractable as ductile as carelesse of place as negligent of precedency as that little child they could not onely not be great but they could not at all enter into the kingdome of heaven He gives them a second lesson in this doctrine of meeknesse against scandals and offences against an easinesse in giving or an easinesse in taking offences For how well soever we may seeme to be in our selves we are not well if we forbear not that company and abstaine not from that conversation which by ill example may make us worse or if wee forbear not such things as though they bee indifferent in themselves and can do us no harme yet our example may make weaker persons then we are worse because they may come to doe as we do and not proceed upon so good ground as we doe They may sin in doing those things by our example in which we did not sinne because we knew them to be indifferent things and therefore did them and they did them though they thought them to bee sinnes And for this Doctrine Christ takes an example very near to them If thy hand or foot or eye offend thee cut it off pull it out His third lesson in this doctrine of meeknes is against hardnesse of heart against a loathnesse a wearinesse in forgiving the offences of other men against us occasioned by Peters question Quoties remittam How oft shall my brother sinne against me and I forgive him and the example in this rule Christ hath wrapped up in a parable The Master forgave his servant ten thousand Talents more money then perchance any private man is worth and that servant took his fellow by the throat and cast him into prison because he did not presently pay an hundred pence perchance fifty shillings not three pound of our money in such a proportion was Christ pleased to expresse the Masters inexhaustible largenesse and bounty which is himselfe and the servants inexcusable cruelty and penuriousnesse which is every one of us The root of all Christian duties is Humility meeknesse that 's violated in an ambitious precedency for that implyes an over-estimation of our selves and an undervalue of others And it is violated in scandals and offences for that implies an unsetlednesse and irresolution in our selves that we can bee so easily shaked or a neglecting of weaker persons of whom Christ neglected none and it is violated in an unmercifulnesse and inexâ—rablenesse for that implies an indocilenesse that we will not learn by Christs doctrine an ungratefulnesse that we will not apply his example and do to his servants as he our Master hath done to us And so have you some Paraphrase of the whole Chapter as it consists of Rules and Examples in this Doctrine of meeknes endangered by pride by scandall by uncharitablenes But of those two pride uncharitabenes though they deserve to be often spoken of I shal have no occasion from these words of my text to speak for into the second of these three parts The Doctrine of scandals our text fals and it is a Doctrine very necessary and seldome touched upon As the words of our Text are our parts must be three First that heavy word Vae woe Secondly that generall word Mundo Woe be unto the world And lastly that mischievous word A scandalis Woe bee unto the world because of scandals of offences each of these three words wil receive a twofold consideration for the first Vae is first Vox dolentis a voice of condoling and lamenting Christ laments the miseries imminent upon the world because of scandals and then it is Vox minantis a voice of threatning and intermination Christ threatens he interminates heavy judgements upon them who occasion and induce these miseries by these scandals This one Vae denotes both these sorrow and yet infallibility They always go together in God God is loath to doe it and yet God will certainly inflict these judgements The second word Mundo Woe be unto the world lookes two ways too Vae malis woe unto evill men that raise scandals vae bonis woe unto them who are otherwise good in themselves if they be so various as to be easily shaked and seduced by scandals And then upon the last word A scandalis Woe be unto the world because of scandals of offences wee must look two ways also first as it denotes Scandalum activum a scandall given by another and then as it denotes Scandalum passivum a scandal taken by another First then our first word in the firrst acceptation thereof is Vae dolentis the voice of condoling and lamentation God laments the necessity that he is reduced to and those judgements which the sinnes of men have made inevitable In the person of the Prophets which denounced the judgements of God it is expressed so Onus Babylâ—nis Onus Egypti Onus Damasci O the burthen of Damascus the burthen of Egypt the burthen of Babylon And not only so but Onus visionis Not onely that that judgment would be a heavy burthen when it fell upon that Nation but that the very pre-contemplation and pre-denunciation of that judgement upon that people was a burthen and a distastfull bitternesse to the Prophet himself that was sent upon that message In reading of an Act of Parliament or of any Law that inflicts the heaviest punishment that can be imagined upon a delinquent and transgressour of that Law a man is not often much affected because hee needs not when he does but read that law consider that any particular man is fallen under the penalty and bitternesse thereof But if upon evidence and verdict
all the spirituall parts of the Indulgence be performed by the poore sinner yet if he give not that money though he be not worth that money though that Merchant of those Indulgencies doe out of his charity give him one of those Indulgencies yet all this doth that man no good in these cases they are indeed Rei suae Legati Ambassadours to serve their own turns and do their owne businesse When that Bishop sends out his Legatos à latere Ambassadours from his own chair and bosome into forain Nations to exhaust their treasures to alien their Subjects to infect their Religion these are Rei suae Legati Ambassadours that have businesses depending in those places and therefore come upon their own errand Nor can that Church excuse it self though it use to do so upon the mis-behaviour of those officers when they are imployed for they are imployed to that purpose And Tibi imputae quicquid pateris ab eo qui sine te nihil potest facere Since he might mend the fault it is his fault that it is done he cannot excuse himself if they be guilty and with his privity for as the same devout man saith to Eugenius then Pope Ne te dixeris sanum dolentem latera If thy sides ake if thy Legats à latere be corrupt call not thy self well nec bonum malis innitentem nor call thy self good if thou rely upon the counsell of those that are ill They those Legats à latere are as they use to expresse it incorporated in the Pope and therefore they are Rei sui Legati Ambassadours that ly to doe their own businesse But when we seek to raise no other warre in you but to arme the spirit against the flesh when we present to you no other holy water but the teares of Christ Jesus no other reliques but the commemoration of his Passion in the Sacrament no other Indulgencies and acquittances but the application of his Merits to your souls when we offer all this without silver and without gold when we offer you that Seal which he hath committed to us in Absolution without extortion or fees wherein are we Rei nostrae Legati Ambassadours in our own behalfs or advancers of our owne ends And as we are not so so neither are we in the second danger to come sine Principali Mandato without Commission from our Master Christ himselfe would not come of himselfe but acknowledged and testified his Mission The Father which sent me he gave me commandment what I should say and what I should speake Those whom he imployed produced their Commissions Neither received I it of man neither was I taught it but by the revelation of Iesus Christ. How should they preach except they be sent is a question which Saint Paul intended for a conclusive question that none could answer till in the Romane Church they excepted Cardinals Quibus sine literis creditur propter personarum solennitatem who for the dignity inherent in their persons must be received though they have no Commission When our adversaries do so violently so impetuously cry out that we have no Church no Sacrament no Priesthood because none are sent that is none have a right calling for Internall calling who are called by the Spirit of God they can be no Judges and for Externall calling we admit them for Judges and are content to be tried by their own Canons and their own evidences for our Mission and vocation or sending and our calling to the Ministery If they require a necessity of lawfull Ministers to the constitution of a Church we require it with as much earnestnesse as they Ecclesia non est quae now habet sacerdotem we professe with Saint Hierome It is no Church that hath no Priest If they require that this spirituall power be received from them who have the same power in themselves we professe it too Nemo dat quod non habet no man can confer other power upon another then he hath himself If they require Imposition of hands in conferring Orders we joyn hands with them If they will have it a Sacrament men may be content to let us be as liberall of that name of Sacrament as Calvin is and he says of it Institut l. 4. c. 14. § 20. Non invitus patior vocari Sacramentum it a inter ordinaria Sacramenta non numero I am not loth it should be called a Sacrament so it be not made an ordinary that is a generall Sacrament and how ill hath this been taken at some of our mens hands to speak of more such Sacraments when indeed they have learnt this manner of speech and difference of Sacraments not onely from the ancient Fathers but from Calvin himself who always spoke with a holy warinesse and discretion Whatsoever their own authors their own Schools their own Canons doe require to be essentially and necessarily requisite in this Mission in this function we for our parts and as much as concerns our Church of England admit it too and professe to have it And whatsoever they can say for their Church that from their first Conversion they have had an orderly derivation of power from one to another we can as justly and truly say of our Church that ever since her first being of such a Church to this day she hath conserved the same order and ever hath had and hath now those Ambassadours sent with the same Commission and by the same means that they pretend to have in their Church And being herein convinced by the evidence of undeniable Record which have been therefore shewed to some of their Priests not being able to deny that such a Succession and Ordination we have had from the hands of such as were made Bishops according to their Canons now they pursue their common beaten way That as in our Doctrine they confesse we affirm no Heresie but that we deny some Truths so in our Ordination and sending and Calling when they cannot deny but that from such a person who is by their own Canons able to confer Orders we in taking our Orders after their own manner receive the Holy Ghost and the power of binding and loosing yet say they we receive not the full power of Priests for we receive onely a power in Corpus mysticum upon the mysticall body of Christ that is the persons that constitute the visible Church but we should receive it in Corpus verum a power upon the very naturall body a power of Consecration by way of Transubstantiation They may be pleased to pardon this rather Modesty then Defect in us who so we may work fruitfully and effectually upon the mysticall body of Christ can be content that his reall and true body work upon us Not that we have no interest to work upon the reall body of Christ since he hath made us Dispensers even of that to the faithfull in the Sacrament but for such a power as exceeds the Holy Ghost who in the incarnation
it and well To pray And therefore if from our words proceed any vexation to your consciences you must not say Transeat calix let that Cup passe no more of that matter for it is the physick that must first stirre the humour before it can purge it And if our words apply to your consciences the soverain balm of the merits of your Saviour and that thereupon your troubled consciences finde some rest be not too soon secure but proceed in your good beginnings and continue in hearing as we shall continue in all these manners of praying and intreating which fall into the word of our Text Obsecramus by being beholden to you for your application or making you beholden to us for our ministration which was the first use of the words of grieving for you or grieving you for your fins which was the second of troubling your consciences and then of setling them again in a calm reposednesse which was the third signification of the word in their Translation Yet does the Holy Ghost carry our office I speak of the manner of the execution of our office for for the office it self nothing can be more glorious then the ministration of the Gospel into lower terms then these He suffered his Apostles to be thought to be drink They were full of the Holy Ghost and they were thought full of new wine A dramme of zeal more then ordinary against a Patron or against a great Parishioner makes us presently scandalous Ministers Truly beloved we confesse one sign of drunkennesse is not to remember what we said If we doe not in our practise remember what we preached and live as we teach we are dead all the week and we are drunk upon the Sunday But Hannah praid and was thought drunk and this grieved her heart so must it us when you ascribe our zeale to the glory of God and the good of your souls to any inordinate passion or sinister purpose in us And yet hath the Holy Ghost laid us lower then this To be drunk is an alienation of the minde but it is but a short one but S. Paul was under the imputation of madnesse Nay our blessed Saviour himself did some such act of vehement zeal as that his very friends thought him mad S. Paul because his madnesse was imputed to a false cause to a pride in his much learning disavowed his madnesse I am not mad O noble Festus But when the cause was justifiable he thought his madnesse justifiable too If we be besides our selves it is for God and so long well enough Insaniebat amatoriam insaniam Paulus S. Paul was mad for love S. Paul did and we doe take into our contemplation the beauty of a Christian soul Through the ragged apparell of the afflictions of this life through the scarres and wounds and palenesse and morphews of sin and corruption we can look upon the soul it self and there see that incorruptible beauty that white and red which the innocency and the blood of Christ hath given it and we are mad for love of this soul and ready to doe any act of danger in the ways of persecution any act of diminution of our selves in the ways of humiliation to stand at her doore and pray and begge that she would be reconciled to God And yet does the Holy Ghost lay us lower then this too Mad men have some flashes some twilights some returns of sense and reason but the foole hath none And we are fools for Christ says the Apostle And not onely we the persons but the ministration it self the function it self is foolishnesse It pleased God by the foolishnesse of preaching to save them that beleeve Anger will bear an action and Racah will bear an action but to say Foole was the heaviest imputation and we are fooles for Christ and pretend nothing to work by but the foolishnesse of preaching Lower then this we cannot be cast and higher then this we offer not to climbe Obsecramus we have no other Commission but to pray and to intreat and that we doe in his words in his tears in his blood and in his bowels who sent us we pray you in Christs stead which is that that constitutes our second Part with what respect you should receive us In mittendariis servanda dignitas mittentis To diminish the honour of his Master is not an humility but a prevarication in any Ambassadour and that is our quality expressed in this verse God is the Lord of Hosts and he is the Prince of peace He needs neither the Armies of Princes nor the wisdome of Councell Tables to come to his ends He is the Proprietary and owner of all the treasures in the world Ye have taken my silver and my gold and The silver is mine and the gold is mine All that you call yours all that you can call yours is his your selves are but the furniture of his house and your great hearts are but little boxes in his cabinet and he can fill them with dejection and sadnesse when he will And does any Prince govern at home by an Ambassadour he sends Pursuivants and Serjeants he sends not Ambassadours God does and we are they and we look to be received by you but as we perform those two laws which binde Ambassadours First Reisuae ne quis legatus esto Let no man be received as an Ambassadour that hath that title onely to negotiate for himself and doe his own businesse in that Country And then Nemini credatur sine principale mandato Let no man be received for an Ambassadour without his Letters of Credence and his Masters Commission To these two we submit our selves First we are not Rei nostrae legati we come not to doe our own businesse what businesse of ours is it what is it to us that you be reconciled to God Vae mihi si non Necessity is laid upon me and â—oe unto me if I preach not the Gospel but if I doe I have nothing to glory in nay I may be a reprobate my self I can claim no more at Gods hand for this service then the Sun can for shining upon the earth or the earth for producing flowers and fruits and therefore we are not Rei nostraeâ— legati Ambassadours in our own behalfs and to doe our own businesse Indeed where men are sent out to vent and utter the ware and merchandises of the Church and Court of Rome to proclaime and advance the value and efficacy of uncertain reliques and superstitious charms and incantations when they are sent to sell particular sinnes at a certain price and to take so much for an incest so much for a murder when they are sent with many summs of Indulgencies at once as they are now to the Indies and were heretofore to us when these Indulgencies are accompanied with this Doctrine that if the Indulgence require a certain peece of money to be given for it as for the most part they doe if