natural causes because they were done at all For that is to suppose it impossible there should be miracles which is to say it is impossible there should be a God which is an attempt somewhat beyond what the most impudent Atheists pretended But in this case nothing can be reasonably urged but common experience to the contrary if these were things which were usually done by other causes there would be no reason to pretend a miraculous power but we say it is impossible that such things should be produced by meer natural causes and in this case there can be no confutation but by contrary experience As we see the opinion of the Ancients concerning the uninhabitableness of the torrid Zone and that there were no Antipodes are disproved by the maniâ—est experience to the contrary of all modern discoverers Let such plain experience be produced and we shall then yield the possibility of the things by some natural causes although not by such an exact temperament of body which is only an instance of the strong power of imagination in those who think so whatever that may have on others Such a temperament of body as these persons imagine considering the great inequality of the mixture of the earthly and aerial parts in us being it may be as great a miracle it self as any they would disprove by it 2. But supposing such a temperament of body to be possible how comes it to be so beneficial to others as to propâ—gate its vertue to the cure of diseaseâ— persons We may as well think that a great beauty may change a Black by often viewing him or a skilful Musician make another so by sitting near him as one man heal another because he is healthful himself Unless we can suppose it in the power of a man to send forth the best spirits of his own body and transfuse them into the body of another but by this means that which must cure another must destroy himself Besides the healthfulness of a person lies much in the freedom of perspiration of all the noxious vapours to the body by which it will appear incredible that a man should preserve his own health by sending out the worst vapors and at the same time cure another by sending out the best 3. Supposing we should grant that a vigorous heat and a strong arm may by a violent friction discuss some tumor of a distempered body yet what would all this signifie to the mighty cures which were wrought so easily and with a word speaking and at such great distance as were by Christ and his Apostles Supposing our Saviour had the most exact natural temper that ever any person in the world had yet what could this do to the cure of a person above twenty miles distance for so our Saviour cured the Son of a Nobleman who lay sick at Capernaum when himself was at Cana in Galilee So at Capernaum he cured the Centurion's servant at his own house without going thither Thus we find the Apostles curing though they did not touch them and that not one or two but multitudes of diseased persons And nothing can be more absurd than to imagine that so many men should at the same time work so many miraculous cures by vertue of a temperament peculiar to themselves for how come they only to happen to have this temperament and none of the Jews who had all equal advantages with them for it Why did none of the enemies of Christ do as strange things as they did How come they never to do it before they were Christians nor in such an extraordinary manner till after the day of Pentecost Did the being Christians alter their natural temper and infuse a â—anative vertue into them which they never had before Or rather was not their Christianity like to have spoyled it if ever they had it before by their frequent watchings fastings hunger and thirst cold and nakedness stripes and imprisonments racks and torments Are these the improvers of an excellent constitution if they be I doubt not but those who magnifie it in them would rather want the vertue of it than be at the pains to obtain it 2. But what a natural temper cannot do they think the power of imagination may and therefore in order to the enervating the power of miracles they mightily advance that of imagination which is the Idol of those who are as little Friends to reason in it as they are to Religion Any thing shall be able to effect that which they will not allow God to do nay the most extravagant thing which belongs to humane nature shall have a greater power than the most holy and divine spirit But do not we see say they strange effects of the power of imagination upon mankind I grant we do and in nothing more than when men set it up against the power of God yet surely we see far greater effects of that in the world than we do of the other The power of imagination can never be supposed to give a being to the things we see in the world but we have the greatest reason to attribute that to a divine and infinite power and is it not far more rational that that which gave a Being to the course of nature should alter it when it pleaseth than that which had nothing to do in the making of it So that in general there can be no competition between the power of God and the strength of imagination as to any extraordinary effects which happen in the world But this is not all for there is a repugnancy in the very nature of the thing that the power of imagination should do all those miracles which were wrought by Christ or his Apostles For either they must be wrought by the imagination of the Agent or of the Patient if of the Agent then there can be no more necessary to do the same things than to have the same strength oâ— imagination which they had What is the reason then that never since or before that time were so many signs and wonders wrought as there were then by the Apostles and Disciples of our Lord If Peter and Iohn cured the lame man by the strength of imagination why have no persons ever since cured those whose welfare they have as heartily desired as ever they could do his Certainly if imagination could kill mens enemies there would never need Duels to destroy them nor Authority to punish such as do it and if it could cure Friends there would need no Physicians to heal and recover them and death would have nothing to do but with persons that were wholly Friendless If they say that persons are not sufficiently perswaded of their own power and therefore they do see little good let any of those who contend the most for it attempt the cure when they please of any the most common infirmity of mankind and if they cannot do that let them then perswade us they can do miracles by that which
men as well as of Princes yet they charge all Christians in the strictest manner as they lov'd their Religion and the honour of it as they valued their â—ouls and the salvation of them that they should be subject to them So far were they then from giving the least encouragement to the usurpations of the rights of Princes under the pretence of any power given to a Head of the Church that there is no way for any to think they meant it unless we suppose the Apostles such mighty Politicians that it is because they say nothing at all of it but on the contrary bid every soul be subject to the higher powers though an Apostle Evangelist Prophet whatever he be as the Fathers interpret it Yea so constant and uniform was the doctrine and practice of Obedience in all the first and purest ages of the Christian Church that no one instance can be produced of any usurpation of the rights of Princes under the pretence of any title from Christ or any disobedience to their authority under the pretence of promoting Christianity through all those times wherein Christianity the most flourished or the Christians were the most persecuted And happy had it been for us in these last ages of the World if we had been Christians on the same terms which they were in the Primitive times then there had been no such scandals raised by the degeneracy of men upon the most excellent and peaceable Religion in the World as though that were unquiet and troublesom because so many have been so who have made shew of it But let their pretences be never so great to Infallibility on one side and to the Spirit on the othâ—r so far as men â—ncourage faction and disobedience so far they have not the Spirit of Christ and Christianity and therefore are none of his For he shewed his great wisdom in contriving such a method of saving mens souls in another World as tended most to the preservation of the peace and quietness of this and though this wisdom may be evil spoken of by men of restless and unpeaceable minds yet it will be still justified by all who have heartily embraced the Wisdom which is from above who are pure and peaceable as that Wisdom is and such and only sâ—ch are the Children of it 3. I come to shew That the design of Christ's appearance was very agreeable to the infinite Wisdom of God and that the means were very suitable and effectual for carrying on of that design for the reformation of Mankind 1. That the design it self was very agreeable to the infinite Wisdom of God What could we imagine more becoming the Wisdom of God than to contrive a way for the recovery of lapsed and degenerate Mankind who more fit to employ upon such a message as this than the Son of God for his coming gives the greatest assurance to the minds of men that God was serious in the management of this design than which nothing could be of greater importance in order to the success of it And how was it possible he should give a greater testimony of himself and withal of the purpose he came about than he did when he was in the world The accomplishment of Prophesies and power of Miracles shewed who he was the nature of his Doctrine the manner of his Conversation the greatness of his Sufferings shewed what his design was in appearing among men for they were all managed with a peculiar respect to the convincing mankind that God was upon terms of mercy with them and had therefore sent his Son into the world that he might not only obtain the pardon of sin for those who repent but eternal life for all them that obey him And what is there now we can imagine so great and desirable as this for God to manifest his wisdom in It is true we see a great discovery of it in the works of Nature and might do in the methods of Divine Providence if partiality and interest did not blind our eyes but both these though great in themselves yet fall short of the contrivance of bringing to an eternal happiness man who had fallen from his Maker and was perishing in his own folly Yet this is that which men in the pride and vanity of their own imaginations either think not worth considering or consider as little as if they thought so and in the mean time think themselves very wise too The Iews had the wisdom of their Traditions which they gloried in and despised the Son of God himself when he came to alter them The Greeks had the wisdom of their Philosophy which they so passionately admir'd that whatever did not agree with that though infinitely more certain and useful was on that account rejected by them The Romans after the conquest of so great a part of the World were grown all such Politicians and Statesmen that few of them could have leisure to think of another world who were so busie in the management of this And some of all these sorts do yet remain in the World which makes so many so little think of or admire this infinite discovery of divine Wisdom nay there are some who can mix all these together joyning a Iewish obstinacy with the pride and self-opinion of the Greeks to a Roman unconcernedness about the matters of another life And yet upon a true and just enquiry never any Religion could be found which could more fully satisfie the expectation of the Iews the reason of the Greeks or the wisdom of the Romans than that which was made known by Christ who was the Wisdom of God and the Power of God Here the Iew might find his Messias come and the Promises fulfilled which related to him here the Greek might find his long and vainly look'd for certainty of a life to come and the way which leads to it here the Roman might see a Religion serviceable to another world and this together Here are Precepts more holy Promises more certain Rewards more desirable than ever the Wit or Invention of Men could have attained to Here are Institutions far more pious uâ—eful and serviceable to mankind than the most admired Laws of the famous Legislators of Greece or Rome Here are no popular designs carried on no vices indulged for the publick interest which Solon Lycurgus and Plato are charged with Here is no making Religion a meer trick of State and a thing only useful for governing the people which Numa and the great men at Rome are lyable to the suspicion of Here is no wrapping up Religion in strange figures and mysterious non-sense which the Egyptians were so much given to Here is no inhumanity and cruelty in the Sacrifices offer'd no looseness and profaneness allowed in the most solemn mysteries no worshipping of such for Gods who had not been fit to live if they had been Men which were all things so commonly practised in the Idolatries of the Heathens but the nature of the Worship is such as
The Right Reverend EDW. STILLING FLEET D.D. Lord Bishop of Worcester TWELVE SERMONS Preached on Several Occasions By the Right Reverend Father in God EDWARD Lord Bishop of Worcester The First VOLUME LONDON Printed by I. H. for Henry Mortlock at the Phoenix in St. Pauls Church-Yard 1696. THE CONTENTS A SERMON I. AMos IV. 11. I have overthrown some of you as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and ye were as a fire-brand plukt out of the burning yet have ye not returned unto me saith the Lord. Page 1 SERMON II. Prov. XIV 9. Fools make a mock at sin p. 48 SERMON III. Luke VII 35. But Wisdom is justified of all her Children P. 88 SERMON IV. Rom. I. 16. For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ for it is the Power of God unto salvation to every one that believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek p. 131 SERMON V. Heb. II. 3. How shall we escape if we neglect so great Salvation p. 169 SERMON VI. Heb. XII 3. For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself lest ye be weary and faint in your minds p. 209 SERMON VII Jude V. 11. And perished in the gainsaying of Corah P. 261 SERMON VIII Matth. XXI 43. Therefore say I unto you the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a Nation bringing forth the fruits thereof p. 306 SERMON IX John VII 39. But this spake he of the Spirit which they that believe on him should receive For the Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Iesus was not yet glorified p. 353 SERMON X. Isa. LVII 21. There is no peace saith my God to the Wicked p. 387 SERMON XI 2 Corinth V. 2. Knowing therefore the terrour of the Lord we perswade men P. 431 SERMON XII Matth. XVI 26. For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall he give in exchange for his soul p. 469 Advertisement THERE will speedily be Published a Second Volume of Sermons by the same Author SERMON I. Preached at St. Margarets Westminster Before the Honourable House of COMMONS Octob. 10. 1666. Amos IV. XI I have overthrown some of you as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and ye were as a fire-brand pluckt out of the burning yet have ye not returned unto me saith the Lord. IT is but a very little time since you met together in this place to lament the remainders of a raging pestilence which the last year destroyed so many thousand Inhabitants of the late great and famous City and now God hath given us another sad occasion for our fasting and humiliation by suffering a devouring fire to break forth and consume so many of her habitations As though the infected air had been too kind and partial and like Saul to the Amalekites had only destroyed the vile and refuse and spared the greatest of the people as though the grave had surfeited with the bodies of the dead and were loth to go in the execution of God's displeasure he hath imployed a more furious Element which by its merciless and devouring flames might in a more lively manner represent unto us the kindling of his wrath against us And that by a Fire which began with that violence and spread with that horror and raged with that fury and continued for so long a time with that irreâ—â—stible force that it might justly fill the beholders with confusion the hearers of it with amazement and all of us with a deep and humble sense of those sins which have brought down the judgments of God in so severe a manner in the midst of us For whatever arguments or reasons we can imagine that should compose the minds of men to a sense of their own or others calamities or excite them to an apprehension of the wrath of God as the cause of them or quicken them to an earnest supplication to him for mercy they do all eminently concurr in the sad occasion of this days solemnity For if either compassion would move or fear awaken or interest engage us to any of these it is hard to conceive there should be an instance of a more efficacious nature than that is which we this day bewail For who can behold the ruins of so great a City and not have his bowels of compassion moved towards it Who can have any sence of the anger of God discovered in it and not have his fear awakened by it Who can as we ought all look upon it as a judgment of universal influence on the whole Nation and not think himself concerned to imploâ—e the mercy of Heaven towards us For certainly howsoever we may vainly flatter and deceive our selves these are no common indications of the frowns of Heaven nor are they meerly intended as the expressions of God's severity towards that City which hath suffered so much by them but the stroaks which fall upon the head though they light upon that only are designed for the punishment of the whole body Were there nothing else but a bare permission of Divine Providence as to these things we could not reasonably think but that God must needs be very angry with us when he suffers two such dreadful calamities to â—read almost upon each others heels that no sooner had death taken away such multitudes of our Inhabitants but a Fire â—ollows it to consume our Habitations A Fire so dreadful in its appearance in its rage and fury and in all the dismal consequences of it which we cannot yet be sufficiently apprehensive of that on that very account we may justly lie down in our shame and our confusioâ— cover us because God hath Covered the daughter of Sion with a cloud in his anger and cast down from Heaven to earth the beauty of Israel and remembred not his footstool in the day of his anger For such was the violence and fury of the flames that they have not only defaced the beauty of the City and humbled the pride and grandeur of it not only stained its glory and consumed its Palaces but have made the Houses of God themselves a heap of ruins and a spectacle of desolation And what then can we propose to our selves as arguments of God's severe displeasure against us which we have not either already felt or have just cause to fear are coming upon us without a speedy and sincere amendment If a Sword abroad and Pestilence at home if Fire in our Houses and Death in our Streets if Foreign Wars and Domestick Factions if a languishing State and a discontented People if the ruines of the City and poverty of the Country may make us sensible how sad our condition at present is how much worse it may be if God in his mercy prevent it not we shall aâ—l surely think we have reason enough this day to lay to heart the evil of our doings which have brought all these things upon us and abhor our selves repenting in dust and ashes
sins but we must search out particularly those predominant vices which by their boldness and frequency have provoked God thus to punish us and as we have hitherto observed a parallel between the Iudgments of Israel in this Chapter and our own So I am afraid we shall find too sad a parallel between their sins and ours too Three sorts of sins are here spoken of in a peculiar manner as the causes of their severe punishments Their luxury and intemperance their covetousness and oppression and their contempt of God and his Laws and I doubt we need not make a very exact scrutiny to find out these in a high degree among our selves and I wish it were as easie to reform them as to find them out 1. Luxury and intemperance that we meet with in the first verse both in the compellation Ye Kine of Bashan and in their behaviour which say to their Masters bring and let us drink Ye Kine of Bashan Loquitur ad Principes Israel Optimates quosque decem Tribuum saith St. Hierom he speaks to the Princes of Israel and the chief of all the ten Tribes Those which are sed in the richest pastures such as those of Bashan were Who are more fully described by the Prophet in this sixth chapter They are the men who are at ease in Sion v. 1. they put far away from them the evil day v. 3. they lye upon beds of Ivory and stretch themselves upon their Couches and eat the Lambs out of the stock and the Calves out of the midst of the stall v. 4. they chaunt to the sound of the Viol and invent to themselves instruments of Musick like David v. 5. they drink Wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the chief oyntments but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph The meaning of all which is they minded nothing but ease softness and pleasure but could not endure to hear of the calamities which were so near them Nothing but mirth and jollity and riot and feasting and evil consequences of these were to be seen or heard among them Their delicate souls were presently rufled and disturbed at the discourse of any thing but matters of courtship address and entertainment Any thing that was grave and serious though never so necessary and of the greatest importance was put off as Felix put off St. Paul to a more convenient time especially if it threatned miseries to them and appeared with a countenance sadder than their own These were the Kine of Bashan who were full of ease and wantonness and never thought of the day of slaughter which the other were the certain fore-runner of Symmachus renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which others apply to the rich Citizens of Samaria I am afraid we may take it in either sense without a Soloecism Bring and let us drink which as St. Hierom goes on Ebrietatem significat in vino luxuria quoe statum mentis evertunt it implies the height of their luxury and intemperance It is observed by some that our Prophet retains still the language of his education in the bluntness of his expressions the great men that lived wholly at their ease in wantonness and luxury he styles like the heardsman of Tekoa the Kine of Bashan That he thought was title good enough for such who seemed to have souls for no other end than the other had And hath not that delicata insania as St Austin calls it that soft and effeminate kind of madness taken possession of too many among us whose birth and education designed them for more manly imployments Yea what an age of Luxury do we live in when instead of those noble characters of men from their vertue and wisdom and courage it is looked on among some as a mighty character of a person that he eats and drinks well a character that becomes none so much as the Kine of Bashan in the literal sense for surely they did so or else they had never been in so great esteem among the heardsmen of Tekoa A character which those Philosopher would have been ashamed of who looked upon no other end of humane life but pleasure But in order to that they thought nothing more necessary than temperance and sobriety but whatever esteem they had then they have lost all their reputation among our modern Epicures who know of no such things as pleasures of the mind and would not much value whether they had any faculties of the mind or no unless it were for the contrivance of new Oaths and Debaucheries But if this were only among some few persons we hope the whole Nation would not suffer for their madness for scarce any Age hath been so happy but it hath had some Monsters in Morality as well as Nature But I am afraid these vices are grown too Epidemical not only in the City but the Countries too what mean else those frequent complaints and I hope more general than the causes of them that the houses of great men in too many places are so near being publick schools of debauchery rather than of piety and vertue where men shall not want instructers to teach them to forget both God and themselves wherein sobriety is so far from being accounted a matter of honour that the rules of the Persian civility are quite forgotten and men are forced to unman themselves I know nothing would tend more to the honour of our Nation or the advantage of it than if once these publick excesses were severely restrained I do not mean so much by making new Laws for those generally do but exercise peoples Wits by finding out new evasions but by excecuting old ones 2. Covetousness and oppression You see what these great men in Samaria did when they had any respite from their excesses and intemperance then woe be to the poor who come in their way Which oppress the poor and crush the needy v. 1. either by the hands of violence or by those arts and devices which either their honesty or poverty have kept them from the knowledge of And if there be not so much of open violence in our daies the thanks are due to the care of our Magistrates and the severity of our Laws but it is hard to say whether ever any Age produced more studious and skilful to pervert the design of Laws without breaking the letter of them than this of ours hath done Fraud and injustice is now managed with a great deal of artifice and cunning and he thinks himself no body in the understanding of the world that cannot overreach his Brother and not be discovered or however in the multiplicity and obscurity of our Laws cannot find out something in pretence at least to justifie his actions by But i◠appeal be made to the Court of Iudicature what arts are then used either for concealing or hiring Witnesses so that if their Purses be not equal the adverse party may overswear him by so much as his Purse is weightier than the others I
the Revelations of those who had escaped the several plagues which so many had been destroyed by And the rest of the men which were not killed by these Plagues yet repented not of the work of their hands For if we had not greedily suckt in again the poyson we had only laid down while we were begging for our lives if we had not returned with as great fury and violence as ever to our former lusts the removing of one Judgment had not been as it were only to make way for the coming on of another For the grave seemed to close up her mouth and death by degrees to withdraw himself that the Fire might come upon the Stage to act its part too in the Tragedy our sins have made among us and I pray God this may be the last Act of it Let us not then provoke God to find out new methods of vengeance and make experiments upon us of what other unheard of severities may do for our cure But let us rather meet God now by our repentance and returning to him by our serious humiliation for our former sins and our stedfast resolutions to return no more to the practice of them That that much more dangerous infection of our souls may be cured as well as that of our bodies that the impure flames which burn within may be extinguished that all our luxuries may be retrenched our debaucheries punished our vanities taken away our careless indifferency in Religion turned into a greater seriousness both in the profession and the practice of it So will God make us a happy and prosperous when he finds us a more righteous and holy Nation So will God succeed all your endeavours for the honour and interest of that people whom you represent So may he add that other Title to the rest of those you have deserved for your Countries good to make you Repairers of the breaches of the City as well as of the Nation and Restorers of paths to dwell in So may that City which now sits solitary like a Widow have her tears wiped off and her beauty and comeliness restored unto her Yea so may her present ruines in which she now lies buried be only the fore-runners of a more joyful resurrection In which though the body may remain the same the qualities may be so altered that its present desolation may be the only putting off its former inconveniences weakness and deformities that it may rise with greater glory strength and proportion and to all her other qualities may that of incorruption be added too at least till the general Conflagration And I know your great Wisdom and Iustice will take care that those who have suffered by the ruines may not likewise suffer by the rising of it that the glory of the City may not be laid upon the tears of the Orphans and Widows but that its foundations may be setled upon Justice and Piety That there be no complaining in the Streets for want of Righteousness nor in the City for want of Churches nor in the Churches for want of a setled maintenance That those who attend upon the seâ—vice or God in them may never be tempted to betray their Consciences to gain a livelihood nor to comply with the factious humours of men that they may be able to live among them And thus when the City through the blessing of Heaven shall be built again may it be a Habitation of Holiness towards God of Loyalty towards our Gracious King and his Successors of Iustice and Righteousness towards Men of Sobriety and Peace and Vnity among all the Inhabitants till not Cities and Countries only but the world and time it self shall be no more Which God of his infinite mercy grant through the merits and mediation of his Son to whom with the Father and Eternal Spirit be all Honour and Glory for evermore SERMON II. Preached before the KING MARCH 13. 1666 7. Prov. XIV IX Fools make a mock at Sin WHEN God by his infinite Wisdom had contrived and by a Power and Goodness as infinite as his Wisdom had perfected the the creation of the visible world there seemed to be nothing wanting to the glory of it but a creature endued with reason and understanding which might comprehend the design of his wisdom enjoy the benefits of his goodness and employ it self in the celebration of his power The Beings purely intellectual were too highly raised by their own order and creation to be the Lords of this inferiour world and those whose natures could reach no higher than the objects of sense were not capable of discovering the glorious perfections of the great Creator and therefore could not be the fit Instruments of his praise and service But a conjunction of both these together was thought necessary to make up such a sort of Being which might at once command this lower world and be the servants of him who made it Not as though this great fabrick of the world were merely raised for man to to please his fancy in the contemplation of it or to exercise his dominion over the creatures designed for his use and service but that by frequent reflections on the Author of his being and the effects of his power and goodness he might be brought to the greatest love and admiration of him So that the most natural part of Religion lies in the grateful acknowledgements we owe to that excellent and supream Being who hath shewed so particular a kindness to man in the Creation and Government of the world Which was so great and unexpressible that some have thought it was not so much pride and affectation of a greater height as envy at the felicity and power of mankind which was the occasion of the fall of the Apostate spirits But whether or no the state of man were occasion enough for the envy of the Spirits above we are sure the kindness of Heaven was so great in it as could not but lay an indispensable obligation on all mankind to perpetual gratitude and obedience For it is as easie to suppose that affronts and injuries are the most suitable returns for the most obliging favours that the first duty of a Child should be to destroy his Parents that to be thankful for kindnesses received were to commit the unpardonable sin as that man should receive his being and all the the blessings which attend it from God and not be bound to the most universal obedience to him And as the reflection on the Author of his being leads him to the acknowledgment of his duty towards God so the consideration of the design of it will more easily acquaint him with the nature of that duty which is expected from him Had man been designed only to act a short part here in the world all that had been required of him had been only to express his thankfulness to God for his being and the comforts of it the using all means for the due preservation of himself the doing nothing beneath
the dignity of humane nature nothing injurious to those who were of the same nature with himself but since he is designed for greater and nobler ends and his present state is but a state of tryal in order to future happiness and misery the reason of good and evil is not to be taken merely from his present but from the respect which things have to that eternal state he is designed for From whence it follows that the differences of good and evil are rooted in the nature of our beings and are the necessary consequents of our relation to God and each other and our expectations of a future life And therefore according to these measures the estimation of men in the world hath been while they did preserve any veneration for God or themselves Wisdom and folly was not measured so much by the subtilty and and curiosity of mens speculations by the fineness of their thoughts or the depth of their designs as by their endeavours to hold up the dignity of mankind by their piety and devotion towards God by their sobriety and due Government of their actions by the equality and justice the charity and kindness of their dealings to one another Wisdom was but another name for goodness and folly for sin then it was a mans glory to be religious and to be prophane and vitious was to be base and mean then there were no Gods worshipped because they were bad nor any men disgraced because they were good Then there were no Temples erected to the meanest passions of humane nature nor men became Idolaters to their own infirmities Then to be betrayed into sin was accounted weakness to contrive it dishonour and baseness to justifie and defend it infamy and reproach to make a mock at it a mark of the highest folly and incorrigibleness So the Wise man in the words of the Text assures us that they are Fools and those of the highest rank and degree of folly who make a mock at sin It is well for us in the Age we live in that we have the judgment of former ages to appeal to and of those persons in them whose reputation for wisdom is yet unquestionable For otherwise we might be born down by that spightful enemy to all vertue and goodness the impudence of such who it is hard to say whether they shew it more in commiting sin or in defending it Men whose manners are so bad that scarce any thing can be imagined worse unless it be the wit they use to excuse them with Such who take the measure of mans perfections downwards and the nearer they approach to beasts the more they think themselves to act like men No wonder then if among such as these the differences of good and evil be laughed at and no sin be thought so unpardonable as the thinking that there is any at all Nay the utmost they will allow in the description of Sin is that it is a thing that some live by declaiming against and others cannot live without the practice of But is the Chair of Scorners at last proved the only chair of Infallibility Must those be the standard of mankind who seem to have little left of humane nature but laughter and the shape of men Do they think that we are all become such fools to take scoffs for arguments and raillery for demonstrations He knows nothing at all of goodness that knows not that it is much more easie to laugh at it than to practise it and it were worth the while to make a mock at sin if the doing so would make nothing of it But the nature of things does not vary with the humours of men sin becomes not at all the less dangerous because men have so little Wit to think it so nor Religion the less excellent and adantagious to the world because the greatest enemies of that are so much to themselves too that they have learnt to despise it But although that scorns to be defended by such weapons whereby her enemies assault her nothing more unbecoming the Majesty of Religion than to make it self cheap by making others laugh yet if they can but obtain so much of themselves to attend with patience to what is serious there may be yet a possibility of perswading them that no fools are so great as those who laugh themselves into misery and none so certainly do so as those who make a mock at sin But if our authority be too mean and contemptible to be relied on in a matter wherein they think us so much concerned and so I hope we are to prevent the ruine of mens souls we dare with confidence appeal to the general sense of mankind in the matter of our present debate Let them name but any one person in all the monuments of former ages to whom but the bare suspicion of Vice was not a diminution to an esteem that might otherwise have been great in the world And if the bare suspicion would do so much among even the more rude and barbarous Nations what would open and professed wickedness do among the more knowing and civil Humane nature retains an abhorrency of sin so far that it is impossible for men to have the same esteem of those who are given over to all manner of wickedness though otherwise of great sharpness of wit and of such whose natural abilities may not exceed the other but yet do govern their actions according to the strict rules of Religion and Vertue And the general sense of mankind cannot be by any thing better known than by an universal consent of men as to the waâ—s whereby they express their value and esteem of others What they all agree on as the best character of a person worthy to be loved and honoured we may well think is the most agreeable to humane nature and what is universally thought a disparagement to the highest accomplishments ought to be looked on as the disgrace and imperfection of it Did ever any yet though never so wicked and profane themselves seriously commend another person for his rudeness and debaucheries Was any mans lust or intemperance ever reckoned among the Titles of his honour Who ever yet raised Trophies to his vices or thought to perpetuate his memory by the glory of them Where was it ever known that sobriety and temperance justice and charity were thought the marks of reproach and infamy Who ever suffered in their reputation by being thought to be really good Nay it is so far from it that the most wicked persons do inwardly esteem them whether they will or no. By which we see that even in this lapsed and degenerate condition of mankind it is only goodness which gains true honour and esteem and nothing doth so effectually blast a growing reputation as wickedness and vice But if it be thus with the generality of men who were never yet thought to have too much partiality towards goodness we may much more easily find it among those who have had a better ground
Drunkards heart to ake and hand to tremble and to let fall the supposed fatal mixture in the midst of all his jollity and excess How often have persons who have designed the greatest mischief to the lives and fortunes of others when all opportunities have fallen out beyond their expectation for accomplishing their ends through some sudden thoughts which have surprized them almost in the very act been diverted from their intended purposes Did ever any yet imagine that the charms of beauty and allurements of lust were so irresistible that if men knew before-hand they should surely dye in the embraces of an adulterous bed they could not yet withstand the temptations to it If then some considerations which are quite of another nature from all the objects which are presented to him may quite hinder the force and efficacy of them upon the mind of man as we see in Ioseph's resisting the importunate Caresses of his Mistress what reason can there be to imagine that man is a meer machine moved only as outward objects determine him And if the considerations of present fear and danger may divert men from the practice of evil actions shall not the far more weighty considerations of eternity have at least an equal if not a far greater power and efficacy upon mens minds to keep them from everlasting misery Is an immortal soul and the eternal happiness of it so mean a thing in our esteem and value that we will not deny our selves those sensual pleasures for the sake of that which we would renounce for some present danger Are the flames of another world such painted fires that they deserve only to be laughed at and not seriously considered by us Fond man art thou only free to ruine and destroy thy self a strange fatality indeed when nothing but what is mean and trivial shall determine thy choice when matters of the highest moment are therefore less regarded because they are such Hast thou no other plea for thy self but that thy sins were fatal thou hast no reason then to believe but that thy misery shall be so too But if thou ownest a God and Providence assure thy self that justice and righteousness are not meer Titles of his Honour but the real properties of his nature And he who hath appointed the rewards and punishments of the great day will then call the sinner to account not only for all his other sins but for offering to lay the imputation of them upon himself For if the greater abhorrency of mens evil ways the rigour of his laws the severity of his judgments the exactness of his justice the greatest care used to reclaim men from their sins and the highest assurance that he is not the cause of their ruine may be any vindication of the holiness of God now and his justice in the life to come we have the greatest reason to lay the blame of all our evil actions upon our selves as to attribute the glory of all our good unto himself alone 2. The frailty of humane Nature those who find themselves to be free enough to do their souls mischief and yet continue still in the doing of it find nothing more ready to plead for themselves than the unhappiness of mans composition and the degenerate state of the world If God had designed they are ready to say that man should lead a life free from sin why did he confine the soul of man to a body so apt to taint and pollute it But who art thou O man that thus findest fault with thy Maker Was not his kindness the greater in not only giving thee a soul capable of enjoying himself but such an habitation for it here which by the curiosity of its contrivance the number and usefulness of its parts might be a perpetual and domestick testimony of the wisdom of its Maker Was not such a conjunction of soul and body necessary for the exercise of that dominion whâ—ch God designed man for over the creatures endued only with sense and motion And if we suppose this life to be a state of tryal in order to a better as in all reason we ought to do what can be imagined more proper to such a state than to have the soul constantly employed in the Government of those sensual inclinations which arise from the body In the doing of which the proper exercise of that vertue consists which is made the condition of future happiness Had it not been for such a composition the differencâ— could never have been seen between good and bad men i. e. between those who maintain the Empire of reason assisted by the motives of Religion over all the inferiour faculties and such who dethrone their souls and make them slaves to every lust that will command them And if men willingly subject themselves to that which they were born to rule they have none to blame but themselves for it Neither is it any excuse at all that this through the degeneracy of mankind is grown the common custom of the world unless that be in it self so great a Tyrant that there is no resisting the power of it If God had commanded us to comply with all the customs of the world and at the same time to be sober righteous and good we must have lived in another age than we live in to have excused these two commands from a palpable contradiction But instead of this he hath forewarned us of the danger of being led aside by the soft and easie compliances of the world and if we are sensible of our own infirmities as we have all reason to be he hath offered us the assistance of his Grace and of that Spirit of his which is greater than the Spirit that is in the World He hath promised us those weapons whereby we may withstand the torrent of wickedness in the world with far greater success than the old Gauls were wont to do in the inundations of their Country whose custom was to be drowned with their arms in their hands But it will be the greater folly in us to be so because we have not only sufficient means of resistance but we understand the danger before-hand If we once forsake the strict rules of Religion and Goodness and are ready to yield our selves to whatever hath got retainers enough to set up for a custom we may know where we begin but we cannot where we shall make an end For every fresh assault makes the breach wider at which more enemies may come in still so that when we find our selves under their power we are contented for our own ease to call them Friends Which is the unhappy consequence of too easie yielding at first till at last the greatest slavery to sin be accounted but good humour and a gentile compliance with the fashions of the world So that when men are perswaded eithâ—r through fear or too great easiness to disuse that strict eye which they had before to their actions it oft-times falls out with them
they use to perswade themselves that it is a healthful potion No doubt nothing can more gratifie them than to see men sport themselves into their own destruction and go down so pleasantly to Hell when eternal flames become their â—irst awakeners and then men begin to be wise when it is too late to be so when nothing but insupportable torments can convince them that God was in earnest with them and that he would not always bear the affronts of evil men and that those who derided the miseries of another life shall have leisure enough to repent their folly when their repentance shall only increase their sorrow without hopes of pardon by it 3. But if there were any present felicity or any considerable advantage to be gained by this mocking at sin and undervaluing Religion there would seem to be some kind of pretence though nothing of true reason for it Yet that which heightens this folly to the highest degree in the last place is that there can be no imaginable consideration thought on which might look like a plausible temptation to it The covetous man when he hath defrauded his neighbour and used all kinds of arts to compass an Estate hath the â—ulness of his bags to answer for him and whatever they may do in another world he is sure they will do much in this The voluptuous man hath the strong propensities of his Nature the force of temptation which lies in the charms of beauty to excuse his unlawful pleasures by The ambitious man hath the greatness of his mind the advantage of authority the examples of those who have been great before him and the envy of those who condemn him to plead for the heights he aims at But what is it which the persons who despises Religion and laughs at every thing that is serious proposes to himself as the reason of what he does But alas this were to suppose him to be much more serious than he is if he did propound any thing to himself as the ground of his actions But it may be a great kindness to others though none to himself I cannot imagine any unless it may be to make them thankful they are not arrived to that height of folly or out of perfect good nature lest they should take him to be wiser than he is The Psalmists fool despises him as much as he does Religion for he only saith it in his heart there is no God but this though he dares not think there is none yet shews him not near so much outward respect and reverence as the other does Even the Atheist himself thinks him a Fool and the greatest of all other who believes a God and yet affronts him and trifles with him And although the Athiests folly be unaccountable in resisting the clearest evidence of reason yet so far he is to be commended for what he says that if there be such a thing as Religion men ought to be serious in it So that of all hands the scoffer at Religion is looked on as one forsaken of that little reason which might serve to uphold a slender reputation of being above the beasts that perish nay therein his condition is worse than theirs that as they understand not Religion they shall never be punished for despising it which such a person can never secure himself from considering the power the justice the severity of that God whom he hath so highly provoked God grant that the apprehension of this danger may make us so serious in the profession and practice of our Religion that we may not by slighting that and mocking at sin provoke him to laugh at our calamities and mock when our fear comes but that by beholding the sincerity of our repentance and the heartiness of our devotion to him he may turn his anger away from us and rejoyce over us to do us good SERMON III. Preached at WHITE-HALL Luke VII XXXV But Wisdom is justified of all her Children OF all the Circumstances of our Blessed Saviours appearance and preaching in the World there is none which to our first view and apprehension of things seems more strange and unaccountable than that those persons who were then thought of all others to be most conversant in the Law and the Prophets should be the most obstinate opposers of him For since he came to fulfil all the Prophesies which had gone before concerning him and was himself the great Prophet foretold by all the rest none might in humane probability have been judged more likely to have received and honoured him than those to whom the judgment of those things did peculiarly belong and who were as much concerned in the truth of them as any else could be Thus indeed it might have been reasonably expeâ—â—ed and doubtless it had been so if interest and prejudice had not had a far more absolute power and dominion over them than they had over the rest of the people If Miracles and Prophesies if Reason and Religion nay if the interest of another World could have prevailed over the interest of this among them the Iewish Sanhedrin might have been some of the first Converts to Christianity the Scribes and Pharisees had been all Proselytes to Christ and the Temple at Ierusalem had been the first Christian Church But to let us see with what a jealous eye Power and Interest looks on every thing that seems to ofâ—er at any disturbance of it how much greater sway partiality and prejudice hath upon the mâ—nds of men than true Reason and Religion and how hard a matter it is to convince those who have no mind to be convinced we find none more furious in their opposition to the person of Christ none more obstinate in their infidelity as to this Doctrine than those who were at that time in the greatest reputation among them for their authority wisdom and knowledge These are they whom our Saviour as often as he meets with either checks for their ignorance or rebukes for their pride or denounces woes against for their malice and hypocrisie These are they who instead of believing in Christ persecute him instead of following him seek to destroy him and that they might the better compass it they reproach and defame him as if he had been really as bad as themselves And although the people might not presently believe what they said concerning him yet that they might at least be kept in suspence by it they endeavour to fasten the blackest calumnies upon him and suit them with all imaginable arts to the tempers of those they had to deal with If any appeared zealous for the present peace and prosperity of the Nation and for paying the duty and obedience they owed to the Roman Power which then governed them to them he is represented as a factious and seditious person as an enemy to Caesar as one that intended to set up a Kingdom of his own though to the ruine of his Country That it was nothing but ambition and vain-glory which made
neither eating bread nor drinking wine and ye say he hath a Devil A very severe Devil surely and one of the strictest order among them that was so far from being cast out by fasting and prayer that these were his continual imployment But what could we have sooner thought than that those persons who made the Devil the author of so much mortification and severity of life should presently have entertained Religion in a more free and pleasing humour but this would not take neither for the Son of Man comes eating and drinking i. e. was remarkable for none of those rigours and austerities which they condemned in Iohn and applauded in the Pharisees and then presently they censure him as a gluttonous man and a Wine-bibber a friend of Publicans and Sinners v. 34. i. e. the utmost excess that any course of life was capable of they presently apply to those who had no other design in all their actions than to recommend true piety and goodness to them So impossible it was by any means which the wisdom of Heaven thought fit to use to perswade them into any good opinion of the persons who brought the glad tidings of Salvation to them and therefore our Saviour when he sees how refractory and perverse they were in interpreting every thing to the worse and censuring the ways which infinite Wisdom thought fittest to reclaim them by he tells them that it was nothing but malice and obstinacy which was the cause of it but if they were men of teachable spirits who by an usual Hebraism are called the Children of Wisdom they would see reason enough to admire approve and justifie all the methods of divine Providence for the good of Mankind For Wisdom is justified of all her Children That which I mainly design to speak to from hence is That although the wisest Contrivances of Heaven for the good of Mankind are liable to the unjust cavils and exceptions of unreasonable men yet there is enough to satisfie any teachable and ingenuous Minds concerning the wisdom of them Before I come more particularly to examine those which concern our present subject viz. the life and appearance of our Lord and Saviour it will take very much off from the force of them if we consider that thus it hath always been and supposing humane nature to be as it is it is scarce conceivable that it should be otherwise Not that it is necessary or reasonable it should be so at all any more than it is necessary that men should act foolishly or inconsiderately but as long as we must never expect to see all men either wise or pious either to have a true judgment of things or a love of Religion so long we shall always find there will be some who will be quarrelling with Religion when they have no mind to practise it I speak not now of those who make a meer jest and scoff at Religion of which our Age hath so many Instances but of a sort of men who are of a degree above the other though far enough short of any true and solid wisdom who yet are the more to be considered because they seem to make a slender offer at reason in what they say Some pretend they are not only unsatisfied with the particular ways of instituted Religion any further than they are subservient to their present interest which is the only God they worship but to make all sure the foundations even of Natural Religion it self cannot escape their cavils and exceptions They have found out an Index Expurgatorius for those impressions of a Deity which are in the hearts of men and use their utmost arts to obscure since they cannot extinguish those lively characters of the power wisdom and goodness of God which are every where to be seen in the large volume of the Creation Religion is no more to them but an unaccountable fear and the very notion of a spiritual substance even of that without which we could never know what a contradiction meant is said to imply one But if for quietness sake and it may be to content their own minds as well as the World they are willing to admit of a Deity which is a mighty concession from those who have so much cause to be afraid of him then to ease their minds of such troublesom companions as their fears are they seek by all means to dispossess him of his Government of the World by denying his Providence and care of humane affairs They are contented he should be called an excellent Being that should do nothing and therefore signifie nothing in the World or rather then he might be styled an Almighty Sardanapalus that is so fond of ease and pleasure that the least thought of business would quite spoil his happiness Or if the activity of their own spirits may make them think that such an excellent Being may sometimes draw the Curtains and look abroad into the World then every advantage which another hath got above them and every cross accident which befalls themselves which by the power of self-flattery most men have learnt to call the Prosperity of the wicked and the Sufferings of good men serve them for mighty charges against the justice of Divine Providence Thus either God shall not govern the World at all or if he do it must be upon such terms as they please and approve of or else they will erect an High Court of Justice upon him and condemn the Sovereign of the World because he could not please his discontented Subjects And as if he were indeed arraigned at such a bar every weak and peevish exception shall be cryed up for evidence when the fullest and clearest vindications of him shall be scorned and contemned But this doth not in the least argue the obnoxiousness of him who is so accused but the great injustice of those who dare pass sentence where it is neither in their power to understand the reason of his actions nor if it were to call him in question for his proceedings with men But so great is the pride and arrogance of humane Nature that it loves to be condemning what it cannot comprehend and there needs be no greater reason given concerning the many disputes in the world about Divine Providence than that God is wise and we are not but would fain seem to be so While men are in the dark they will be always quarrelling and those who contend the most do it that they might seem to others to see when they know themselves they do not Nay there is nothing so plain and evident but the reason of some men is more apt to be imposed upon in it than their senses are as it appeared in him who could not otherwise confute the Philosophers argument against motion but by moving before him So that we see the most certain things in the world are liable to the cavils of men who imploy their wits to do it and certainly those ought not to stagger mens faith in matters of
the minds of those who come to it ought to be and as becomes that God whom we profess to serve pure and holy grave and serious solemn and devout without the mixtures of superstition vanity or ostentation The precepts of our Religion are plain and easie to be known very suitable to the nature of Mankind and highly tending to the advantage of those who practise them both in this and a better life The arguments to perswade men are the most weighty and powerful and of as great importance as the love of God the death of his Son the hopes of happiness and the fears of eternal misery can be to men And wherein is the contrivance of our Religion defective when the end is so desirable the means so effectual for the obtaining of it 2. Which is the next thing to be considered There are two things which in this degenerate estate of man are necessary in order to the recovery of his happiness and those are Repentance for sins past and sincere Obedience for the future now both these the Gospel gives men the greatest encouragements to and therefore is the most likely to effect the design it was intended for 1. For Repentance for sins past What more powerful motives can there be to perswade men to repent than for God to let men know that he is willing to pardon their sins upon the sincerity of their Repentance but without that there remains nothing but a fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation that their sins are their follies and therefore to repent is to grow wise that he requires no more from men but what every considerative man knows is fitting to be done whenever he reflects upon his actions that there can be no greater ingratitude or disingenuity towards the Son of God than to stand at defiance with God when he hath shed his blood to reconcile God and Man to each other that every step of his humiliation every part of the Tragedy of his life every wound at his death every groan and sigh which he uttered upon the Cross were designed by him as the most prevailing Rhetorick to perswade men to forsake their sins and be happy that there cannot be a more unaccountable folly than by impenitency to lose the hopes of a certain and eternal happiness for the sake of those pleasures which every wise man is ashamed to think of that to continue in sin with the hopes to repent is to â—tab a man's self with the hopes of a cure that the sooner men do it the sooner they will find their minds at ease and that the pleasures they enjoy in forsaking their sins are far more noble and manly than ever they had in committing them but if none of these arguments will prevail with them perish they must and that unavoidably insupportably and irrecoverably And if such arguments as these will not prevail with men to leave their sins it is impossible that any should 2. For Holiness of Liâ—e For Christ did not come into the World and dye for us meerly that we should repent of what is past by denying ungodliness and worldly lusts but that we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world And what he doth expect he hath given the greatest encouragements to perform by the clearness of his precepts the excellency of his own example the promise of his Grace and the proposition of eternal rewards and punishments whereby he takes oâ—f all the objections men are apt to make against obedience to the Commands of Christ the pretence of ignorance because his Laws are so clear the pretence of impossibility by his own example the pretence of infirmity by the assistance of his Grace the pretence of the unnecessariness of so great care of our actions by making eternal rewards and punishments to depend upon it Let us then reflect upon the whole design of the Gospel and see how admirably it is suited to the end it was intended for to the condition of those whose good was design'd by it and to the whole honour of the great contriver and manager of it And let not us by our impenitency and the unholiness of our lives dishonour God and our Saviour reproach our Religion and condemn that by our lives which we justifie by our words For when we have said all we can the best and most effectual vindication of Christian Religion is to live according to it But oh then how unhappy are we that live in such an Age wherein it were hard to know that men were Christians unless we are bound to believe their words against the tenour and course of their actions What is become of the purity the innocency the candor the peaceableness the sincerity and devotion of the Primitive Christians What is become of their zeal for the honour of Christ and Christian Religion If it were the design of men to make our Religion a dishonour and reproach to the Iews Mahumetans and Heathens could they do it by more effectual means than they have done Who is there that looks into the present state of the Christian World could ever think that the Christian Religion was so incomparably beyond all others in the world Is the now Christian Rome so much beyond what it was while it was Heathen Nay was it not then remarkable in its first times for justice sincerity contempt of riches and a kind of generous honesty and who does not though of the same Religion if he hath any ingenuity left lament the want of all those things there now Will not the sobriety of the very Turks upbraid our excesses and debaucheries and the obstinacy of the Iews in defence and practice of their Religion condemn our coldness and indifferency in ours If we have then any tenderness for the honour of our Religion or any kindness for our own Souls let us not only have the Name but let us lead the lives of Christians let us make amends for all the reproaches which our Religion hath suffered by the faction and disobedience of some by the Oaths and Blasphemies the impieties and profaneness of others by the too great negligence and carelesness of all that if it be possible Christianity may appear in its true glory which will thee only be when those who name the Namâ— of Christ depart from iniquity and live iâ— all manner of holy conversation and godliness SERMON IV. Preached at WHITE-HALL Romans I. XVI For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ for it is the Power of God unto salvation to every one that believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek THese words are uttered by one who was himself a remarkable instance of the truth of the Doctrine contained in them viz. of that divine Power which did accompany the Gospel of Christ. For what can we imagine else should make him now not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ who not long before was not ashamed to persecute all those who professed it One whose
divine Assistance which is promised to those who embrace it 1. In confirmation of the Truth of it For the World was grown so uncertain as to the grand foundations of Religion that the same power was requisite now to settle the World which was at first for the framing of it For though the Precepts of Christian Religion be pure and easie holy and suitable to the sense of Mankind though the Promises be great and excellent proportionable to our wants and the weight of our business though the reward be such that it is easier to desire than comprehend it yet all these would but seem to baffle the more the expectations of men unless they were built on some extraordinary evidence of divine power And such we assert there was in the confirmation of these things to us not only in the miraculous birth of our Saviour and that continual series of unparallel'd miracles in his life not only in the most obliging circumstances of his death not only in the large effusion of divine gifts upon his Apostles and the strange propagation of Christian Religion by them against all humane power but that which I shall particularly instance in as the great effect of divine power and confirmation of our Religion was his Resurrection from the dead For as our Apostle saith Rom. 1.4 Christ was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of Holiness by the Resurrection from the dead No way of evidence could be more suitable to the capacities of all than this it being a plain matter of fact none ever better attested than this was not only by the unanimous consent of all the witnesses but by their constant adhering to the truth of it though it cost almost all of them their lives and no greater evidence could be given to the World of a divine power since both Iews and Gentiles agreed in this that such a thing could not be effected but by an immediate hand of God So far were they then from thinking a resurrection possible by the juice of herbs or an infusion of warm blood into the veins or by the breath of living Creatures as the great Martyr for Atheism would seem from Pliny to perswade us when yet certainly nothing can be oâ— higher concernment to those who believe not another life than to have tried this experiment long ere now and since nothing of that nature hath ever happened since our Saviour's resurrection it only lets us know what credulous men in other things the greatest infidels as to Religion are But so far were they at that time from so fond an imagination that they readily yielded that none but God could do it tho' they seem'd to question whether God himself could do it or no. As appears by the Apostle's Interrogation Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead Act. 26.8 This was therefore judged on both sides to be a matter of so great importance that all the disputes concerning Christian Religion were resolved into this Whether Christ were risen from the dead And this the Apoâ—tles urge and insist on upon all occasions as the great evidence of the truth of his Doctrine and this was the main part of their Commission for they were sent abroad to be witnesses of his Resurrection Which was not designed by God as a thing strange and incredible to puzzle Mankind with but to give the highest assurance imaginable to the World of the truth and importance of Christianity Since God was pleased to imploy his power in so high a manner to confirm the certainty of it 2. God's power was seen in the admirable effects of Christian Religion upon the minds of men which was most discernable by the strange alteration it soon made in the state of the world In Iudoea soon after the death of Christ some of his Crucifiers become Christians 3000 Converts made at one Sermon of St. Peter's and great accessions made afterwards both in Hierusalem and other places Yea in all parts of the Roman Empire where the Christians came they so increased and multiplied that thereby it appeared that God had given a Benediction to his new Creation suitable to what he gave to the first So that within the compass of not a hundred years after our Saviour's death the World might admire to see it self so strangely changed from what it was The Temple at Hierusalem destroy'd and the Iews under a sadder dispersion than ever and rendred uncapable of continuing their former Worship of God there the Heathen Temples unfrequented the Gods derided the Oracles ceased the Philosophers puzzled the Magistrates disheartned by their fruitless cruelties and all this done by a few Christians who came and preached to the World Righteousness Temperance and a Iudgment to come whereof God had given assurance to the World by raising one Iesus from the dead And all this effected not by the power of Wit and Eloquence not by the force and violence of rebellious subjects not by men of hot and giddy brains but by men sober just humble and meek in all their carriages but withal such as might never have been heard of in the world had not this Doctrine made them famous What could this then be imputed to less than a Divine Power which by effectual and secret ways carries on its own design against all the force and wit of men So that the wise Gamaliel at whose feet St. Paul was bred seem'd to have the truest apprehensions of these things at that time when he told the Sanhedrin If this counsel or this work be of men it will come to nought but if it be of God ye cannot overthrow it lest haply ye be found to fight against God Act. 5.38 39. 3. In the Divine Assistance which is promised to those who embrace it in which respect it is properly the power of God to salvation and therein far beyond what the Philosophers could promise to any who embraced their opinions For the Gospel doth not only discover the necessity of a Principle superiour to Nature which we call Grace in order to the fitting our souls for their future happiness but likewise shews on what terms God is pleased to bestow it on men viz. on the consideration of the death and passion of our Lord and Saviour Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost which he shed on us abundantly through Christ our Saviour Titus 3.5 There being nothing in humane nature which could oblige God to give to Mankind that assistance of his grace whereby they are enabled to work out this salvation the Gospel is designed for with fear and trembling The whole tenor of the Gospel importing a divine power which doth accompany the preaching of it which is designed on purpose to heal the wounds and help the weakness of our depraved and degenerate nature Through which we
salvation they live in a neglect of that holy obedience which the Gospel requires and so believe themselves into eternal misery But as long as men make their obedience necessary though but as the fruit and effect of Faith it shall not want its reward for those whose hearts are purified by Faith shall never be condemned for mistaking the notion of it and they who live as those that are to be judged according to their works shall not miss their reward though they do not think they shall receive it for them But such who make no other condition of the Gospel but Believing and will scarce allow that to be called a Condition ought to have a great care to keep their hearts sounder than their heads for their only security will lie in this that they are good though they see no necessity of being so And such of all others I grant have reason to acknowledge the irresistable power of Divine Grace which enables them to obey the will of God against the dictates of their own judgments But thanks be to God who hath so abundantly provided for all the infirmities of humane Nature by the large offers of his Grace and assistance of his Spirit that though we meet with so much opposition without and so much weakness within and so many discouragements on every side of us yet if we sincerely apply our selves to do the will of God we have as great assurance as may be that we shall be kept by the power of God through Faith unto Salvation SERMON V. Preached at WHITE-HALL Hebrews II. 3. How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation WHen the wise and eternal Counsels of Heaven concerning the salvation of Mankind by the death of the Son of God were first declared to the World by his own appearance and preaching in it nothing could be more reasonably expected than that the dignity of his Person the authority of his Doctrine and the excellency of his Life should have perswaded those whom he appeared among to such an admiration of his Person and belief of his Doctrine as might have led them to an imitation of him in the holiness of his life and conversation For if either the worth of the Person or the Importance of the Message might prevail any thing towards a kind and honourable reception among men there was never any person appeared in any degree comparable to him never any Message declared which might challenge so welcome an entertainment â—rom men as that was which he came upon If to give Mankind the highest assurance of a state of life and immortality if to offer the pardon of sin and reconciliation with God upon the most easie and reasonable terms if to purge the degenerate World from all its impurities by a Doctrine as holy as the Author of it were things as becoming the Son of God to reveal as the Sons of men to receive nothing can be more unaccountable than that his Person should be despised his Authority slighted and his Doctrine contemned And that by those whose interest was more concerned in the consequence of these things than himself could be in all the affronts and injuries he underwent from men For the more the indignities the greater the shame the sharper the suâ—ferings which he did undergo the higher was the honour and glory which he was advanced to but the more obliging the instances of his kindness were the greater the salvation that was tendred by him the more prevailing the motives were for the entertainment of his Doctrine the more exemplary and severe will the punishment be of all those who reject it For it is very agreeable to those eternal Laws of Justice by which God governs the world that the punishment should arise proportionably to the greatness of the mercies despised and therefore although the Scripture be very sparing in telling us what the state of those persons shall be in another life who never heard of the Gospel yet for those who do and despise it it tells us plainly that an eternal misery is the just desert of those to whom an eternal happiness was offered and yet neglected by them And we are the rather told of it that men may not think it a surprize in the life to come or that if they had known the danger they would have escaped it and therefore our Blessed Saviour who never mention'd punishment but with a design to keep men from it declares it frequently that the punishment of those persons and places would be most intolerable who have received but not improved the light of the Gospel and that it would be more tolerable for the persons who had offered violence to Nature and had Hell-fire burning in their hearts by their horrid impurities than for those who heard the Doctrine and saw the Miracles of Christ and were much the worse rather than any thing the better for it But lest we should think that all this black scene of misery was only designed for those who were the Actors in that dolefull Tragedy of our Saviour's sufferings we are told by those who were best able to assure us of it that the same dismal consequences will attend all the affronts of his Doctrine as if they had been offered to his own person For it is nothing but the common flattery and self-deceit of humane nature which makes any imagine that though they do not now either believe or obey the Gospel they should have done both if they had heard our Saviour speak as never man spake and seen him do what never man did For the same disposition of mind which makes them now slight that Doctrine which is delivered to them by them that heard him would have made them slight the Person as well as the Doctrine if they had heard it from himself And therefore it is but reasonable that the same punishment should belong to both especially since God hath provided so abundantly for the assurance of our Faith by the miraculous and powerfull demonstration of that divine spirit which did accompany those who were the first publishers of this Doctrine to the world And therefore the Author of this Epistle after he hath in the words of the Text declared that it is impossible to escape if we neglect the great salvation offered us by the Gospel in the following words he gives us that account of it that at first it began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed to us by them that heard him God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will So that the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost falling upon the Apostles and the many signs and wonders which were wrought by them were the great testimony of God to the world that these were the persons imployed by himself to declaâ—e that Doctrine whereon the eternal salvation of Mankind did depend And since we have so lately acknowledged the truth of
only to commend pity and good nature to those above them but to use it to those who are under them Not those whose hearts are as full of dissimulation and hypocrisie as the others hands are of blood and violence that care not what they are so they may but seem to be good but such whose inward integrity and purity of heart far exceeds the outward shew and profession of it who honour Goodness for it self and not for the Glory which is about the head of it Not those who neuer think the breaches of the world wide enough till there be a door large enough for their own interests to go in at by them that would rather see the world burning than one peg be taken out of their Chariot-wheels But such who would sacrifice themselves like the brave Roman to fill up the wide gulf which mens contentions have made in the world and think no Legacy ought to be preserved more inviolable than that of Peace which our Saviour lest to his Disciples Lastly not those who will do any thing rather than suffer or if they suffer it shall be for any thing rather than righteousness to uphold a party or maintain a discontented faction but such who never complain of the hardness of their way as long as they are sure it is that of Righteousness but if they meet with reproaches and persecutions in it they welcome them as the harbingers of their future reward the expectation of which makes the worst condition not only tolerable but easie to them Thus we see what kind of happiness it is which the Gospel promises not such a one as rises out of the dust or is tost up and down with the motion of it but such whose never-failing fountain is above and whither those small rivulets return which fall down upon Earth to refresh the minds of men in their passage thither but while they continue here as the Iews say of the water that came out of the rock it follows them while they travel through this wilderness below So that the foundation of a Christians happiness is the expectation of a life to come which expectation having so firm a bottom as the assurance which Christ hath given us by his death and sufferings it hath power and influence sufficient to bear up the minds of men against all the vicissitudes of this present state 2. We have the most large and free offers of divine Goodness in order to it Were it as easie for Man to govern his own passions as to know that he ought to do it were the impressions of Reason and Religion as powerful with Mankind as those of Folly and Wickedness are we should never need complain much of the misery of our present state or have any cause to fear a worse to come There would then be no condition here but what might be born with satisfaction to ones own mind and the life one day led according to the principles of vertue and goodness would be preferred before a sinning Immortality But we have lost the command of our selves and therefore our passions govern us and as long as such furies drive us no wonder if our ease be little When men began first to leave the uncertain speculations of Nature and found themselves so out of order that they thought the great care ought to be to regulate their own actions how soon did their passions discover themselves about the way to govern them And they all agreed in this that there was great need to do it and that it was impossible to do it without the principles of Vertue for never was there any Philosopher so bad as to think any man could be happy without Vertue even the Epicureans themselves acknowledged it for one of their established Maxims that no man could live a pleasant life without being good and supposing the multiplication of Sects of Philosophers about these things as far as Varro thought it possible to 288. although there never were so many nor really could be upon his own grounds yet not one of all these but made it necessary to be vertuous in order to being happy and those who did not think vertue to be desired for it self yet made it a necessary means for the true pleasure and happiness of our lives But when they were agreed in this that it was impossible for a vitious man to enjoy any true contentment of mind they fell into nice and subtle disputes about the names and order of things to be chosen and so lost the great effect of all their common principles They pretended great cures for the disorders of mens lives and excellent remedies against the common distempers of humane nature but still the disease grew under the remedy and their applications were too weak to allay the fury of their passions It was neither the order and good of the Universe nor the necessity of events nor the things being out of our power nor the common condition of humanity no nor that comfort of ill natured men as Carneades call'd it the many companions we have in misery that could keep their passions from breaking out when a great occasion was presented them For he who had read all their discourses carefully and was a great man himself I mean Cicero upon the death of his beloved daughter was so far from being comforted by them that he was fain to write a consolation for himself in which the greatest cure it may be was the diversion he found in writing it But supposing these things had gone much farther and that all wise men could have governed their passions as to the troubles of this life and certainly the truest wisdom lies in thâ—t yet what had all this been to a prepararation for an eternal state which they knew little of and minded less All their discourses about a happy life here were vain and contradicted by themselves when after all their rants about their wise man being happy in the bull of Phalaris c. they yet allow'd him to dispatch himself if he saw cause which a wise man would never do if he thought himself happy when he did it So that unless God himself had given assurance of a life to come by the greatest demonstrations of it in the death and resurrection of his Son all the considerations whatever could never have made mankind happy But by the Gospel he hath taken away all suspicions and doubts concerning another state and hath declared his own readiness to be reconciled to us upon our repentance to pardon what hath been done amiss and to give that divine assistance whereby our wills may be governed and our passions subdued and upon a submission of our selves to his wise Providence and a sincere obedience to his Laws he hath promised eternal salvation in the life to come 3. God hath given us the greatest assurance that these offers came from himself which the Apostle gives an account of here saying that this salvation began at first
of Baubles are in request at the Indies or whether the Customs of China or Iapan are the wiser i. e. than the most trifling things and the remotest from our knowledge But this is to absurd and unreasonable to suppose that men should not think themselves concerned in their own eternal happiness and misery that I shall not shew so much distrust of their understandings to speak any longer to it 3. But if notwithstanding all these things our neglect still continues then there remains nothing but a fearful looking for of judgement and the fiery indignation of God For there is no possibility of escaping if we continue to neglect so great salvation All hopes of escaping are taken away which are only in that which men neglect and those who neglect their only way to salvation must needs be miserable How can that man ever hope to be saved by him whose blood he despises and tramples under foot What grace and favour can he expect from God who hath done despight unto the Spirit of Grace That hath cast away with reproach and contempt the greatest kindness and offers of Heaven What can save him that resolves to be damned and every one does so who knows he shall be damned if he lives in his sins and yet continues to do so God himself in whose only pity our hopes are hath irreversibly decreed that he will have no pity upon those who despise his goodness slight his threatnings abuse his patience and sin the more because he offers to pardon It is not any delight that God takes in the miseries of his Creatures which makes him punish them but shall not God vindicate his own honour against obstinate and impenitent sinners He declares before-hand that he is far from delighting in their ruine and that is the reason he hath made such large offers and used so many means to make them happy but if men resolve to despise his offers and slight the means of their salvation shall not God be just without being thought to be cruel And we may assure our selves none shall ever suffer beyond the just desert of their sins for punishment as the Apostle tells us in the words before the Text is nothing but a just recompence of reward And if there were such a one proportionable to the violation of the Law delivered by Angels how shall we think to escape who neglect a more excellent means of happiness which was delivered by our Lord himself If God did not hate sin and there were not a punishment belonging to it why did the Son of God die for the expiation of it and if his death were the only means of expiation how is it possible that those who neglect that should escape the punishment not only of their other sins but of that great contempt of the means of our salvation by him Let us not then think to trifle with God as though it were impossible a Being so merciful and kind should ever punish his Creatures with the miseries of another life For however we may deceive our selves God will not be mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap for he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting I shall only propound some few Considerations to prevent so great a neglect as that of your salvation is 1. Consider what it is you neglect the offer of Eternal Happiness the greatest kindness that ever was expressed to the World the foundation of your present peace the end of your beings the stay of your minds the great desire of your Souls the utmost felicity that humane Nature is capable of Is it nothing to neglect the favour of a Prince the kindness of Great Men the offers of a large and plentiful Estate but these are nothing to the neglect of the favour of God the love of his Son and that salvation which he hath purchased for you Nay it is not a bare neglect but it implies in it a mighty contempt not only of the things offered but of the kindness of him who offers them If men had any due regard for God or themselves if they had any esteem for his love or their own welfare they would be much more serious in Religion than they are When I see a person wholly immersed in affairs of the World or spending his time in luxury and vanity can I possibly think that man hath any esteem of God or of his own Soul When I find one very serious in the pursuit of his Designs in the World thoughtful and busie subtle in contriving them careful in managing them but very formal remiss and negligent in all affairs of Religion neither inquisitive about them nor serious in minding them what can we otherwise think but that such a one doth really think the things of the World better worth looking after than those which concern his eternal salvation But consider before it be too late and repent of so great folly Value an immortal Soul as you ought to do think what Reconciliation with God and the Pardon of sin is worth slight not the dear Purchase which was bought at no meaner a rate than the Blood of the Son of God and then you cannot but mind the great salvation which God hath tendered you 2. Consider on what terms you neglect it or what the things are for whose sake you are so great enemies to your own salvation Have you ever found that contentment in sin or the vanities of the World that for the sake of them you are willing to be for ever miserable What will you think of all your debaucheries and your neglects of God and your selves when you come to die what would you then if it were in your power to redeem your lost time that you had spent your time less to the satisfaction of your sensual desires and more in seeking to please God How uncomfortable will the remembrance be of all your excesses oaths injustice and profaneness when death approaches and judgement follows it What peace of mind will there then be to those who have served God with faithfulness and have endeavoured to work out their salvation though it hath been with fear and trembling But what would it then profit a man to have gained the whole World and to lose his own Soul Nay what unspeakable losers must they then be that lose their Souls for that which hath no value at all if compared with the World 3. Consider what follows upon this neglect not only the loss of great salvation but the incurring as great damnation for it The Scripture describes the miseries of the life to come not meerly by negatives but by the most sensible and painful things If destruction be dreadful what is everlasting destruction if the anguish of the soul and the pains of the body be so troublesome what will the destruction be both of Body and Soul in Hell If a Serpent
present life such great things in God's account that it was not possible for his Son to appear without them Nay how unsuitable had it been for one who came to preach humility patience self-denyal and contempt of the world to have made ostentation of the State and Grandeur of it So that either he must have changed his Doctrine or rendred himself lyable to the suspicion of seeking to get this world by the preaching of another And if his Doctrine had been of another kind he might have been esteemed a great person among the Iews but not the Son of God or the promised Messias in whom all Nations of the Earth should be blessed Which surely they would never have thought themselves to have been in one who must have subdued the neighbour Nations to advance the honour of his own But since the Son of God thought fit to appear in another manner than they expected him they thought themselves too great to be saved by so mean a Saviour If he had made all the Kingdoms of the Earth to have bowed under him and the Nations about them to have been all tributaries to them if Ierusalem had been made the Seat of an Empire as great as the World it self they would then have gloried in his Name and entertained whatever he had said whether true or false with a wonderful Veneration But Truth in an humble dress meets with few admirers they could not imagine so much Power and Majesty could ever shroud it self under so plain a disguise Thus Christ came to his own and his own received him not Yea those that should have known him the best of all others those who frequently conversed with him and heard him speak as never man spake and saw him do what never man did were yet so blinded by the meanness of his Parentage and Education that they baffle their own Reason and persist in their Infidelity because they knew the place and manner of his breeding the names of his Mother and his Brethren and Sisters Are they not all with us whence then hath this man all these things As though Is not this the Carpenters Son had been sufficient answer to all he could say or do 2. The disparagement of his Miracles Since the bare proposal of his Doctrine though never so reasonable could not prevail with them to believe him to be the Son of God he offers them a further proof of it by the mighty works which were wrought by him And though the more ingenuous among them were ready to acknowledge that no man could do the things which he did unless God were with him yet they who were resolved to hear and see and not understand when they found it not for their credit to deny matters of fact so universally known attested they seek all the means to blast the reputation of them that may be Sometimes raising popular insinuations against him that he was a man of no austere life a friend of Publicans and Sinners one that could choose no other day to do his works on but that very day wherein God himself did rest from his and therefore no great regard was to be had to what such a one did When these arts would not take but the people found the benefit of his Miracles in healing the sick curing the blind and the lame feeding the hungry then they undervalue all these in comparison with the wonders that were wrought by Moses in the Wilderness If he would have made the Earth to open her mouth and swallow up the City and the power of Rome if he would have fed a mighty Army with bread from Heaven in stead of feeding some few thousands with very small Provisions if in stead of raising one Lazarus from the Grave he would have raised up their Sampson's and their David's their men of spirit and conduct whose very presence would have put a new life into the hearts of the people if in stead of casting out Devils he would have cast out the Romans whom they hated the worse of the two if he would have set himself to the cure of a distempered State instead of healing the maladies of some few inconsiderable persons if instead of being at the expense of a Miracle to pay tribute he would have hinder'd them from paying any at all then a Second Moses would have been too mean a title for him he could have been no less than the promised Messias the Son of God But while he imploy'd his power another way the demonstration of it made them hate him the more since they thought with themselves what strange things they would have done with it for the benefit of their Country and therefore express the greatest malice against him because he would not imploy it as they would have him From thence they condemn his Miracles as only some effects of a Magical skill and say he dispossessed the lesser Devils by the power of him that was the Prince among them So unworthy a requital did they make for all the mighty works which had been done among them Which as our Saviour saith if they had been done in Tyre and Sidon they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes 3. But altho' all this argued a strange spirit of contradiction in them to all the designs for their own good yet the malice from whence that rose would not sâ—op here for as they had long contrived his ruin so they watched only an opportunity to effect it Which his frequent presence at Ierusalem seemed to put into their hands but his reputation with the people made them fearful of embracing it Therefore they imploy their Agents to deal privately with one of hâ—s Disciples who might be fittest for their design and to work upon his covetous humour by the promise of a reward to bring him to betray his Masâ—er with the greatest privacy into their hands This Iudas undertakes knowing the place and season of his Masters retirements not far from the City where they might with the greatest secrecy and safety seize upon his person Which contrivance of theirs our Saviour was not at all ignorant of but prepares himself and his Disciples for this great encounter He institutes his solemn Supper to be perpetually observed in remembrance of his death and sufferings after which he discourses admirably with his Disciples to arm them against their future sufferings and prays that most divine Prayer St. Iohn 17. which he had no sooner finished but he goes with his Disciples to the usual place of his retirement in a Garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives And now begins the blackest Scene of sufferings that ever was acted upon humane Nature Which was so great that the Son of God himself expresseth a more than usual apprehension of it which he discovered by the Agony he was in in which he sweat drops of blood by the earnestness of his Prayer falling upon his knees and praying thrice saying O my Father
if it be possible let this cup pass from me nevertheless not as I will but as thou wilt Surely this Cup must needs have a great deal of bitterness in it which the Son of God was so earnest to be freed from If there had been nothing in it but what is commonly incident to humane Nature as to the apprehensions of death or pain it seems strange that he who had the greatest innocency the most perfect charity the freest resignation of himself the fullest assurance of the reward to come should express a greater sense of the horror of his sufferings than thousands did who suffer'd for his sake But now was the hour come wherein the Son of God was to be made a Sacrifice for the sins of men wherein he was to bear our griefs and carry our sorrows when he was to be wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities now his soul was exceeding sorrowful even unto death for now the hour of his enemies was come and the power of darkness And accordingly they improve it they came out against him as a Malefactor with swords and staves and having seized his Person being betray'd into their hands by one of his Disciples they carry him to the High Priests house where his professed enemies presently condemn him of Blasphemy and not content with this they express the greatest contempt of him for they spit in his face they buffet him and smite him with the Palms of their hands they mock him and bid him prophesie who it was that smote him so insolent was their malice grown and so spightful was their indignation against him And so fearful were they lest he should escape their hands that the very next morning early they send him bound to the Roman Governour to have the sentence pronounced against him to whom they accuse him of Seditition and Treason but Pilate upon examination of him declares he found no fault in him which made them heap more unreasonable calumnies upon him being resolved by what means soever to take away his life Nay the price of the Blood of the Son of God was fallen so low with them that they preferred the life of a known seditious person and a Murtherer before him And when Pilate being unsatisfied asked stiâ—l what evil hath he done they continue their importunity without any other answer but Crucifie him and making up what wanted in Justice and Reason in the loudness of their clamours And at last seeing the fury and madness of the people with the protestation of his own innocency as to his blood he delivers him up to the people and now he is stripped and scourged and mock'd with a Crown of Thorns a Scarlet Robe and a Reed in his hand all the indignities they could think of they put upon him But though it pleased them to have him exposed to all the ignominies imaginable yet nothing would satisfie them but his blood and therefore he is led forth to be crucified and though so lately scourged and weakened by his sorrows yet he is made to carry his own Cross at least through the City for no other death could satisfie them but the most ignominious and painful And when he was brought to the place of Crucifixion they nail hâ—s hands and feet to the Cross and while he was hanging there they deride and mock him still they divide his garments before his face give him Gall and Vinegar to drink and the last act of violence committed upon him was the piercing of his side so that out of his Pericardium issued both water and blood Thus did the Son of God suffer at the hands of unreasonable men thus was the blood of that immaculate Lamb spilt by the hands of violence and he who left the bosom of his Father to bring us to glory was here treated as if he had been unworthy to live upon the Earth 2. But that which yet heightens these sufferings of Christ is to consider from whom he suffer'd these things it was from sinners which is as much as to say from men if the word were taken in the largest sense of it for all have sinned but being taken by us in opposition to other men so it implies a greater height of wickedness in these thâ—n in other persons But this is not hâ—re to be consider'd absolutely as denoting what kind of persons he suâ—fer'd from but with a particular respect to the nature of their proceedings with him and the obligations that lay uâ—on them to the contrary So that the first shews the injustice and unreasonableness of them the second their great ingratitude considering the kindness and good will which he expressed towards them 1. The injustice and unreasonableness of their proceedings against him It is true indeed what Socrates said to his wife when she complained that he sufferâ—d unjustly What saith he and would you have me suffer justly it is much greater comfort to the person who does suffer when he does it unjustly but it is a far greater reflection on those who were the causes of it And that our Blessed Saviour did suffer with the greatest injustice from these men is apparent from the falseness and weakness of all the accusations which were brought against him To accuse the Son of God for Blasphemy in saying he was so is as unjust as to condemn a King for treason because he saith he is a King they ought to have examined the grounds on which he call'd himself so and if he had not given pregnant evidences of it then to have passed sentence upon him as an Impostor and Blasphemer If the thing were true that he was what he said the Son of God what horrible guilt was it in them to imbrue their hands in his blood and they found he always attested it and now was willing to lay down his life to confirm the truth of what he said This surely ought at least to have made them more inquisitive into what he had affirmed but they allow him not the liberty of a fair tryal they hasten and precipitate the sentence that they might do so the execution If he were condemned as a false Prophet for that seems to be the occasion of the Sanhedrim meeting to do it to whom the cognisance of that did particularly belong why do they not mention what it was he had foretold which had not come to pass or what reason do they give why he had usurped such an Office to himself If no liberty were allowed under pain of death for any to say that they were sent from God how was it possible for the Messias ever to appear and not be condemned for the expectation of him was that he should be a great person immediately sent from God for the delivery of his people And should he be sent from God and not say that he was so for how then could men know that he was So that their way of proceeding with him discovers it self to
when they have onâ—e taken possession of the hearts of men for we can find nothing else at the bottom of all that wretched conspiracy against our Saviour but that his doctrine and design was too pure and holy for them and therefore they study to take him away who was the author of them 3. We consider in what way and manner our Saviour underwent all these sufferings and this as much as any thing is here propounded to our consideration For it is not only who or what but in what manner he endured the contradiction of sinners that we ought to consider to prevent sainting and dejection of mind So another Apostle tells us That Christ suffered for us leaving us an example that we should follow his steps who did no sin neither was guile found in his mouth who when he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judged righteously He uses none of those ranting expressions which none of the patientest persons in the world were accustomed to of bidding them laugh in Phalaris his Bull and when they were racked with pains to cry out Nil agis dolor he tells them not that it is their duty to have no sense of torments and to be jocund and pleasant when their flesh is torn from them or nailed to a Cross if this be any kind of fortitude it is rather that of a Gladiator than of a wise man or a Christian. The worst of men either through a natural temper of body or having hardned themselves by custom have born the greatest torments with the least expression of grief under them And Panoetius one of the wisest of the Stoicks is so far from making insensibleness of pain the property of a wise man that he makes it not the property of a man The inferiour Creatures are call'd Brutes from their dulness and insensibleness and not meerly from want of reason any further than that one follows from the other Bruta existimantur animalium quibus cor durum riget saith Pliny those animals are call'd Brutes which have the hardest hearts and the nearer any of them approach to the nature of man the more apprehensive they are of danger and the more sensible of pain thence Scaliger saith of the Elephant that it is maxima bellua sed non maximè bruta though it be the greatest beast it is the least a Brute Stupidity then under sufferings can be no part of the excellency of a man which in its greatest height is in the Beings the most beneath him But when danger is understood and pain felt and Nature groans under it then with patience and submission to undergo it and to conquer all the strugglings of Nature against it that is the duty and excellency of a Christian If to express the least sense of grief and pain be the highest excellency of suffering the Macedonian Boy that suffer'd his flesh to be burnt by a Coal till it grew oâ—fensive to all about him without alâ—ering the posture of his arm lest he should disturb Alexanders sacrifice out-did the greatest Philosophers of them all Possidonius his pitiful rant over a fit of the Gout so highly commended by Pompey and Tully O pain it is to no purpose though thou beest troublesome I will never confess thou art evil falls extremely short of the resolution of the Macedonian Boy or any of the Spartan Youths who would not in the midst of torments so much as confess them troublesome And what a mighty revenge was that that he would not confess it to be evil when his complaint that it was troublesome was a plain argument that he thought it so It is not then the example of Zeno or Cleanthes or the rules of Stoicism which Dionysius Heracleotes in a fit of the Stone complained of the folly of that are to be the measures of patience and courage in bearing sufferings but the example and Precepts of our Lord and Saviour who expressed a great sense of his sufferings but withal the greatest submission under them When Lipsius lay a dying and one of the by-standers knowing how conversant he had been in the Stoicks writings began to suggest some of their Precepts to him Vana sunt ista said he I find all those but vain things and beholding the Picture of our Saviour near his bed he pointed to that and cryed haec vera est patientia there is the true pattern of Patience For notwithstanding that Agony he was in immediately before his being betray'd when he sees the Officers coming towards him he asks them whom they seek for and tells them I am he which words so astonished them that they went back and fell upon the ground thereby letting them understand how easie a matter it was for him to have escaped their hands and that it was his own free consent that he went to suffer for he knew certainly before hand the utmost that he was to undergo and therefore it was no unreasonable impetus but a setled resolution of his mind to endure all the contradictions of sinners When he was spit upon mocked reproached and scourged none of all these could draw one impatient expression from him The malice and rage of his enemies did not at all provoke him unless it were to pity and pray for them And that he did with great earnestness in the midst of all his pains and though he would not plead for himself to them yet he pleads for them to God Father forgive them for they know not what they do How much more divine was this than the admired Theramenes among the Greeks who being condemned to die by the thirty Tyrants when he was drinking off his cup of Poyson said he drank that to Critias one of his most bitter enemies and hoped he would pledge it shortly Socrates seemed not to express seriousness enough at least when he bid one of his friends when he was dying offer up a Cock to Aesculapius for his deliverance Aristides and Phocion among the Greeks came the nearest to our Saviour's tempeâ— when one pray'd That his Country might have no cause to remember him when he was gone and the other charged his Son to forget the injuries they had done him but yet by how much the greater the Person and Office was of our Blessed Saviour than of either of them by how much the cruelty and ignominy as well as pain was greater which they exposed him to by how much greater concernment there is to have such an offence pardon'd by one that can punish it with eternal misery than not revenged by those who though they may have will have not always power to execute so much greater was the kindness of our Saviour to his enemies in his Prayer upon the Cross than of either of the other in their concernment for that ungrateful City that had so ill requited their services to it Thus when the Son of God was oppressed and afflicted He
himself lest ye be weary and faint in your minds SERMON VII Preached before the KING JANUARY 30. 1668 9. JUDE V. 11. And perished in the gainsaying of Corah AMong all the dismal consequences of that fatal day wherein the Honour of our Nation suffered together with our Martyr'd Soveraign there is none which in this Place we ought to be more concerned for â—han the Dishonour which was done to Religion by it For if those things which were then acted among us had been done among the most rude and barbarous Nations though that had been enough to have made them for ever thought so yet they might have been imputed to their ignorance in matters of Civility and Religion but when they are committed not only by men who were called Christians but under a pretence of a mighty zeal for their Religion too Men will either think that Religion bad which did give encouragement to such actions or those persons extremely wicked who could make use of a pretence of it for things so contrary to its nature and design And on which of these two the blame will fall may be soon discovered when we consider that the Christian Religion above all others hath taken care to preserve the Rights of Soveraignty by giving unto Caesar the things that are Caesars and to make resistance unlawful by declaring that those who are guilty of it shall receive to themselves damnation But as though bare resistance had been too mean and low a thing for them notwithstanding what Christ and his Apostles had said to shew themselves to be Christians of a higher rank than others they imbrue their hands in the Blood of their Sovereign for a demonstration of their Piety by the same figure by which they had destroyed Mens Rights to defend their Liberties and fought against the King for preservation of his Person But the actions of such Men could not have been so bad as they were unless their pretences had been so great for there can be no highter aggravation of a wicked action than for Men to seem to be Religious in the doing of it If the Devil himself were to preach sedition to the world he would never appear otherwise than as an Angel of Light his pretence would be Unity when he designed the greatest Divisions and the preservation of Authority when he laid the seeds of Rebellion But we might as well imagine that the God of this World as the Devil is sometime called should advance nothing but Peace and Holiness in it as that Christianity should give the least countenance to what is contrary to either of them Yet the wickedness of Men hath been so great upon earth as to call down Heaven it self to justifie their impieties and when they have found themselves unable to bear the burden of them they would fain make Religion do it Such as these we have a description of in this short but smart Epistle viz Men who pretend inspirations and impulses for the greatest villainies who believed it a part of their Saintship to despise Dominions and speak evil of Dignities who thought the Grace of God signified very little unless it serv'd to justifie their most wicked actions These in all probability were the followers of Simon Magus the Leviathan of the Primitive Church who destroyed all the natural differences of good and evil and made it lawful for Men in case of Persecution to forswear their Religion The great part of his Doctrine being that his Disciples need not be afraid of the terrours of the Law for they were free to do what they pleased themselves because Salvation was not to be expected by good works but only by the Grace of God No wonder then that such as these did turn the Grace of God into lasciviousness And when it proved dangerous not to do it would deny their Religion to save themselves For they had so high opinions of themselves that they were the only Saints that as Epiphanius tells us they thought it the casting Pearls before Swine to expose themselves to danger before the Heathen Governours by which they not only discovered what a mighty value they set upon themselves but what mean and contemptible thoughts they had of that Authority which God had established in the world But this they would by no means allow for they thought all the Governments of the world to be nothing else but the contrivance of some evil spirits to abridge men of that liberty which God and nature had given them And this is that speaking evil of Dignities which they are charged with not only by our Apostle here but by St. Peter before him Although the phraâ—e used by St. Peter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be taken by the use of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first of Maccabees not for the bare contempt of Authority expressed by reviling language but for an open resistance of it which the other is so natural an introduction to that those who think and speak contemptibly of Government do but want an occasion to manifest that their actions would be as bad as their thoughts and expressions are And from hence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here in the words of the Text is made use of to express one of the most remarkable seditions we ever read of viz. that of Corah and his Company against Moses and Aaron whose punishment for it did not deter these persons who went under the name of Christian from joyning in seditious practices to the great dishonour of Christianity and their own ruine For therefore the Apostle denounces a Woe against them in the beginning of the verse and speaks of their ruine as certain as if they had been consumed by fire or swallowed up by the earth as Corah and his accomplices were And they perished in the gainsaying of Corah In the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Aorist saith Grotius is taken for the future or present and so implying that these courses did tend to their misery and ruine and would unavoidably bring it upon them If the evidence in history had been clear of the Carpocratians joyning with the Iews in the famous rebellion of Barchochebas wherein such multitudes of Christians as well as Heathens were destroyed in Africa Egypt and other places and the time of it had agreed with the time of writing this Epistle I should then have thought that this had been the Rebellion here spoken of for all the Actors in it were destroyed by the Roman Power and some of the chief of them made publick examples of Justice for the deterring of others from the like practices But however this be we find these persons here charged with a sin of the same nature with the gainsaying of Corah and a judgment of the same nature as the consequent of the sin for they perished in the gainsaying c. And therefore we shall consider the words 1. As relating to the fact of Corah and
through all and prospered their endeavours with great success Now they had all humane encouragements and God only opposes them and makes them desist with the loss of their workmen and materials and perpetual dishonour to themselves for attempting to fight against God in building him a Temple against his will From which we see that in all the senses the Jews undeâ—stood the Kingdom of God it was remaâ—kably taken â—rom them within so many years after Christ the true Passover was slain by them as had passed from their first Passover after their going out of Aegypt to their entrance into Canaan The Difficulty will be far less and the concernment not so great as to the Jews to prove that the Kingdom of God in the sense our Saviour meant it for the Power of the Gospel was taken from them For the event it self is a clear proof of it Instead of that therefore I shall now prove that this taking away the Kingdom of God from them was the effect of their sin in crucifying Christ. Therefore I say c. To make this clear I shall proceed by these following steps 1. That it is acknowledged by the Jews themselves that these great calamities have happened to them for some extraordinary sins For to these they impute the destruction of the City and Temple their oppressions and miseries ever since and the deferring the coming of the Messias For some of them have confessed That all the terms prefixed for the coming of the Messias are past long ago but that God provoked by their great sins hath thus long deserred his appearance and suffered them in the mean while to lye under such great calamities 2. The sin ought to be looked on as so much greater by how much heavier and longer this punishment hath been than any inflicted upon them before For if God did in former captivities punish them for their sins when they were brought back again into their own land after 70 years we must conclude that this is a sin of a higher nature which hath not been expiated by 1600 years captivity and dispersion 3. The Jews have not suffered these calamities for the same sins for which they suffered before For then God charged them with Idolatry as the great provoking sin and it is very observable that the Jews were never freer from the suspicion of this sin than under the second Temple and particularly near their destruction They generally pretended a mighty zeal for their Law and especially opposed the least tendency to Idolatry insomuch that they would not suffer the Roman Ensigns to be advanced among them because of the Images that were upon them and all the History of that time tells us of the frequent contests they had with the Roman Governours about these things and ever since that time they have been perfect haters of Idolatry and none of the least hindrances of their embracing Christianity hath been the infinite scandal which hath been given them by the Roman Church in that particular 4. It must be some sin which their Fathers committed and continues yet unrepented of by them to this day Their Fathers committing it was the meritorious cause of the first punishment their Châ—ldren not repenting of it is the cause why that judgment lies still so heavy upon them And now what sin can we imagâ—ne this to be but putting to death the true Messias which they will acknowledge themselves to be a sin that deserves all the miseries they have undergone and it is apparent that in all this long captivity they never have had the heart to repent of the Sin of crucifying Christ other sins they confess and say they hearâ—ily repent of but why then hath not God accepted of their repentance and brought them back into their own Land according to the promises he long since made unto their Fathers Which is a certain argument it is some sin as yet unrepented of by them which continues them under all their sufferings and what can this be but that horrid sin of putting to death the Son of God with that dreadful imprecation which to this day hath its force upon them His blood be upon us and our Children and this sin they are so far from repenting of that they still justifie their Fathers in what they did and blaspheme Christ to this day in their prayers where they think they may do it with safety And to all this we may add that the ensuing calamities were exactly foretold by that Christ whom they crucified and if no other argument would convince them that he was at least a Prophet yet the punctual accomplishment of all his predictions ought to do it as will appear by comparing Matth. 24. with the series of the story And it is observable that the very place where our Saviour foretold these things viz. the Mount of Olives was the first wherein the Roman Army encamped before Hierusalem And as they had crucified the Son of God and put the Lord of glory to open shame mocking and deriding him in his sufferings so when the Romans came to revenge his quarrel upon them they took the captive Jews and crucified them openly in the view of the City 500. oft-times in a day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in different forms for sport sake as Iosephus tells us who was then in the Roman camp and withal adds their numbers were so great that there was no room left for the crosses to stand or wood enough to make crosses of And they who had bought the blood of the Son of God for Thirty pieces of silver had this sin of theirs severely punished when such multitudes of the Jews 2000 in one one night had their bowels ript up by the Roman Souldiers in hopes to have found the gold and silver there which they were supposed to have swallowed And what greater argument can we have to believe that such judgments fell upon them upon the account of their sin in crucifying Christ than that they were so punctually foretold so long before and had all things so exactly answering in the accomplishment of them For when Christ spake those things the Jews thought their destruction as incredible as that he was the Messias but what greater evidence could there be to them that he was so than that God did so severely avenge his blood upon them and continues to do it for their unbelief and impenitency to this very day But it may be some will say What are all these things to us we are none of those who crucified Christ or justifie the doing it Thanks be to God the Kingdom of God is not taken from us but we enjoy what was taken from them To which I answer If we really were what we pretend to be these things are of great consequence to be considered by us 1. For is it nothing to us to have so great an argument of the truth of our Religion as the sufferings of the Jews to this day is for the sin
his highest and most peculiar attributes thence he is said to resist the proud as though he made an attempt upon God himself and he loaths the Hypocrite in heart as one that mocks God as well as deceives men The first tendency to the destruction of this Nation of the Jews was the prevalency of the Pharisaical temper among them which was a compound of Pride and Hypocrisie and when the field was over-run with these tares it was then time for God to put in his sickle and cut them down God forbid that our Church and the Protestant Religion in it should be in danger of destruction for that would be a judgment beyond fire and sword and plague and any thing we have yet smarted by that would be the taking away the Kingdom of God from us and setting up the Kingdom of darkness that would be not only a punishment to our own Age but the heaviest curse next to renouncing Christianity we could entail upon posterity But however though God in mercy may design better thâ—ngs for us we cannot be sufficiently apprehensive of our danger not so much from the business of our enemies as those bad Symtoms we find among our selves When there is such monstrous pride and ingratitude among many who pretend to a purer worship of God than is established by Law as though there were little or no difference between the Government of Moses and Aaron and the bondage of Egypt O England England what will the Pride and unthankfulness of those who profess Religion bring thee to Will men still preferr their own reputation or the interest of a small party of Zealots before the common concernments of our Faith and Religion O that we did know at least in this our day the things that belong it our peace but let it never be said That they are hid from our eyes But if our common enemy should enter in at the breaches we have made among our selves then men may wish they had sooner known the difference between the reasonable commands of our own Church and the intolerable Tyranny of a foraign and usurped power between the soft and gentle hands of a Mother and the Iron sinews of an Executioner between the utmost rigour of our Laws and the least of an inquisition If ingratitude were all yet that were a sin high enough to provoke God to make ouâ— condition worse than it is but to whaâ— a strange height of spiritual pride are those arrived who ingross all true godliness to themselves as though it were not possible among us to go to Heaven and to Church together As though Christ had no Church for 1500 years and more wherein not one person can be named who thought it unlawful to pray by a prescribed form As though men could not love God and pray sinsincerely to him that valued the peace and order of the Church above the heats and conceptions of their own brains Where differences proceed meerly from ignorance and weakness they are less dangerous to themselves or others but where there is so much impatience of reproof such contempt of superiours such uncharitable censures of other men such invincible prejudices and stiffness of humour such scorn and reproach cast upon the publick worship among us What can such things spring from but a root of bitterness and spiritual pride I speak not these things to widen our differences or increase our animosities they are too large and too great already nor to condemn any humble and modest dissenters from us but I despair ever to see our divisions healed till Religion be brought from the fancies to the hearts of men and till men instead of mystical notions and unaccountable experiences instead of misapplying promises and mis-understanding the spirit of prayer instead of judging of themselves by mistaken signs of Grace set themselves to the practice of humility self-denial meekness patience charity obedience and a holy life and look on these as the greatest duties and most distinguishing characters of true Christianity And in doing of these there shall not only be a great reward in the liâ—e to come but in spight of all opposition from Atheism Profaneness or Superstition we may see our divisions cured and the Kingdom of God which is a Kingdom of peace and holiness to abide and flourish among us SERMON IX Preached at WHITE-HALL WHITSUNDAY 1669. JOHN VII 39. But this spake he of the Spirit which they that believe on him should receive For the Holy Ghost was noâ— yet given because that Iesus was not yet glorified WHat was said of old conceâ—ning the first Creation of the World that in order to the accomplishment of it the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters is in a sense agreeable to the nature of it as true of the renovation of the World by the doctrine of Christ. For whether by that we understand a great and vehâ—ment Mind as the Jews generally do or rather the Divine power manifesting it self in giving motion to the otherwise dull and unactive parts of matter we have it fully represented to us in the descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost For that came upon them as a rushing mighty Wind and inspired them with a new life and motion whereby they became the most active instruments of bringing the World out of that state of confusion and darkness it lay in before by causing the glorious light of the Gospel to shine upon it And lest any part should be wanting to make up the parallel in the verse before the text we read of the Waters too which the Spirit of God did move upon and therefore called not a dark Abyss but flowing rivers of living water He that believeth on me as the Scripture hath said out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water Not as though the Apostles like some in the ancient Fables were to be turned into Fountains and pleasant Springs but the great and constant benefit which the Church of God enjoys by the plentiful effusion of the Holy Spirit upon them could not be better set forth than by rivers of living water flowing from them And this the Evangelist in these words to prevent all cavils and mistakes tells us was our Saviour's meaning But this spake he of the Spirit which they that believe on him should receive And lest any should think that our Blessed Saviour purposely affected to speak in strange metaphors we shall find a very just occasion given him for using this way of expression from a custom practised among the Jews at that time For in the solemnity of the feast of Tabernacles especially in the last and great day of the Feast mentioned v. 37. after the Sacrifices were offered upon the Altar one of the Priests was to go with a large Golden Tankard to the Fountain of Siloam and having filled it with water he brings it up to the water-gate over against the Altar where it was received
of the Spirit was reserved for which was after the glorious ascension of Christ to Heaven This was reserved as the great Donative after his Triumph over Principalities and Powers when he was ascended up on high he sends down the greatest gift that ever was bestowed upon mankind viz. this gift of his Holy Spirit Hereby Christ discovered the greatness of his Purchase the height of his Glory the exercise of his Power the assurance of his Resurrection and Ascension and the care he took of his Church and People by letting them see that he made good his last promise to them of sending them another Comforter who should be with them to assist them in all their undertakings to direct them in their doubts to plead their cause for them against all the vain oppoâ—itions of men And he should not continue with them for a little time as Christ had done but he should abide with them for ever i. e. so as not to be taken from them as himself was but should remain with them as a pledge of his love as a testimony of his truth as an earnest of God's favour to them now and their future inheritance in heaven for he should comfort them by his presence guide them by his counsel and at last bring them to glory Nothing now remains but that as the occasion of our rejoycing on this day doth so much exceed that of the Jews at their ceremony of pouring out the â—ater so our joy should as much exceed in the nature and kind of it the mirth and jollity which was then used by them With what joy did the Israelites when they were almost burnt up with thirst in the Wilderness tast of the pleasant streams which issued out of the rock that rock saith the Apostle was Christ and the gifts of the Spirit are that stream of living water which flows from him and shall not we express our thankfulness for so great and unvaluable a mercy Ouâ— joy cannot be too great for such a gift as this so it be of the nature of it i. e. a spiritual joy The Holy Ghost ought to be the Fountain of that joy which we express for God's giving him to his Church Let us not then affront that good Spirit while we pretend to bless God for him let us not grieve him by our presumptuous sins nor resist his motions in our hearts by our wilful continuance in them The best way we can express our thankfulness is by yielding up our selves to be guided by him in a holy life and then we may be sure our joy shall never end with our lives but shall be continued with a greater fulness for ever more SERMON X. Preached at WHITE-HALL MARCH 2. 1669. ISAIAH LVII 21. There is no peace saith my God to the Wicked IF we were bound to judge of things only by appearance and to esteem all persons happy who are made the object of the envy of some and the flattery of others this text would seem to be a strange Paradox and inconsistent with what daily happens in the world For what complaint hath been more frequent among men almost in all Ages than that peace and prosperity hath been the portion of the wicked that their troubles have not been like other mens that none seem to enjoy greater pleasures in this world than they who live as if there were no other The consideration of which hath been a matter of great offence to the weak and of surprise to the wisest till they have searched more deeply into the nature of these things which the more men have done the better esteem they have always had of divine providence and from thence have understood that the true felicity of a man's life lies in the contentment of his own mind which can never arise from any thing without himself nor be enjoyed till all be well within For when we compare the state of humane nature with that of the beings inferiour to it we shall easily find that as man was designed for a greater happiness than they are capable of so that cannot lie in any thing which he enjoys in common with them such as the pleasures of our senses are but must consist in some peculiar excellencies of his being And as the capacity of misery is always proportionable to that of happiness so the measure and the kind of that must be taken in the same manner that we do the other Where there is no sense of pleasure there can be none of pain where all pleasure is confined to sense the pain must be so too but where the greatest pleasures are intellectual the greatest torments must be those of the mind From whence it follows that nothing doth so much conduce to the proper happiness of man as that which doth the most promote the peace and serenity of his mind nothing can make him more miserable than that which causeth the greatest disturbance in it If we can then make it appear that the highest honours the greatest riches and the softest pleasures can never satisfie the desires conquer the fears nor allay the passions of an ungoverned mind we must search beyond these things for the foundations of its peace And if notwithstanding them there may be such a sting in the conscience of a wicked man that may inflame his mind to so great a height of rage and fury which the diversions of the World cannot prevent nor all its pleasures cure we are especially concerned to fix such motion of man's happiness which either supposes a sound mind or else makes it so without which all the other things â—o much admired can no more contribute towards any true contentment than a magnificent Palace or a curiously wrought bed to the cure of the Gout or Stone All which I speak not as though I imagined any state of perfect tranquility or compleat happiness were attainable by any man in this present life for as long as the causes are imperfect the effect must be so too and those Philosophers who discoursed so much of a happy state of life did but frame Ideas in Morals as they did in Politicks not as though it were possible for any to reach to the exactness of them but those were to be accounted best which came the nearest to them but I therefore speak concerning a happy state of life for these two reasons 1. That though none can be perfectly happy yet that some may be much more so than others are i. e. they may enjoy far greater contentment of mind in any condition than others can do they can bear crosses and suffer injuries with a more equal temper and when they meet with vicissitudes in the world they wonder no more at it than to see that the Wind changes its quarter or thaâ— the Sea proves rough and tempestuous which but a little before was very eveâ— and calm They who understand humane nature have few things left tâ— wonder at and they who do the least wonder are the
himself in the tranquillity of his mind or the peace which men have in society with one another In either of these senses it will appear true that there is no peace to the wicked 1. Taking peace for the tranquillity of a man's mind in order to which it is necessary for a man to have some certain foundation to build his peace upon and that he be secured from those things which will overthrow it both which shew it impossible for a wicked man to have any true peace in his mind because he can have no certain grounds to build it upon and those things do accompany his wickedness which will certainly overthrow it 1. A Wicked man can have no certain foundations for his peace By which I do not mean any contracted dulness or brutish stupidity which if we will call peace the most insensible parts of the creation do infinitely exceed us in it but such a composure and settlement of our minds which ariseth from a due consideration of things and differs as much from the former temper as a vigorous and healthful state of body doth from the dull effects of a Lethargy And such a peace as this no wicked man can ever have but upon one of these suppositions Either 1. That Wickedness is but a meer name of disgrace set upon some kind of actions but that really there is no such a thing as sin or the differences of good and evil or else 2. Supposing there is such a thing as sin it is ridiculous to believe there ever should be such a punishment of it as men are affrighted with 3. Or Lastly supposing there be a punishment of sin to come it is madness to abstain from the present pleasures of sin for the fear of it These being only the imaginable grounds a wicked man can have any peace in his mind from I shall particularly shew the falseness and the folly of them 1. That there is no such thing as Sin or Wickedness in the world and that the differences of good and evil are meerly arbitrary things and that those are names only imposed upon things by the more cunning sort of men to affright men from the doing some actions and to encourage them to do others But what a miserable case are those in who can never enjoy any contentment in themselves unless all the differences of good and evil be utterly destroyed We should conclude that man's condition desparate who believes it impossible for him to have any ease in his mind unless he could be transformed into the shape of a beast or petrified into the hardness of a rock These are things not utterly impossible but yet they are possible in so remote a degree that it is all one to say he can have no ease as to say that he expects it only upon those terms But it is utterly inconsistent with the supposition of humane nature or a being endued and acting with reason to make all things equally good or evil For what doth reason signifie as it respects the actions of men but a faculty of discerning what is good and fitting to be done from what is evil and ought to be avoided And to what purpose is such a faculty given us if there be no such difference in the nature of things Might not men with equal probability argue that there is no such thing as a difference in the things about which life and sense are conversant as in those wherein reason is imployed With what impatience would those men be heard who should assert that there is no such thing as a difference in the qualities of meats and drinks but that they do all equally tend to the preservation of life that it is pedantical and beneath a Gentleman to talk of any such thing as Poisons that will so suddenly and certainly destroy mens lives and that these are things which none talk of or believe besides those whose trade is either to kill or cure men With how much wit and subtilty might a man argue upon these things that it is impossible for any man to define what the nature of poison is or in what manner it destroys the life of man that men have conquered the malignity of it by use and that the same things which have been poison to some have been food and nourishment to others But notwithstanding all these plausible arguments none of these brave spirits dare venture the experiment upon themselves and yet these only changing the terms are the very same arguments used against the natural differences of good and evil viz. the difficulty of defining or setting the exact bounds of them and the different customs or apprehensions of men in the world concerning the things which are called good and evil If we proceed farther to the objects of sense how ridiculous would those persons appear that should with a mighty confidence go about to perswade men that the differences between light and darkness between pleasure and pain between smells and tasts and noises are but phantastick and imaginary things Who would ever believe that those are men of the most excellent sight to whom light and darkness are equal for others who pretend not to so much wit are wont to call such persons blind Or that those have the most exquisite sense that feel no difference of pain and pleasure which was wont to be thought the sign of no sense at all And surely the persons I am now arguing against love their palats too well to admire those who can discern no difference of tasts and would be well enough contented to be thought deaf if they could put no distinction between the pleasant sound of vocal or instrumental Muâ—ick and the harsh jarring of two Saws drawn cross each other Thus it appears that nothing would make mâ—n more ridiculous than to explore and laugh at the difference that there is in the means of life and the objects of sense Let us now proceed higher Dare any man say there is no such thing as Reason in Man because there appears so little of the truth of it in Men and so mucâ— of the counterfeit of it in Bruits or that there is no such thing as a difference of Truth and Falshood because they are so commonly mistaken for one another What reason then imaginable can there be that there should not be as wide a distance in the matters of our choice as in the objects of our sense and understanding Is it that we have natural faculties of sense and perception but not of choice that every one is able to refute by his constant experience that finds a greater liberty in his choice than in his perception The reason of which is wholly unintelligible unless a difference be found in the nature of the things proposed to his choice that some have a greater excellency and commendableness in them more agreeable to humane nature more satisfactory to the minds of those who choose them than others are And must all this difference be
destroyed meerly because all men are not agreed what things are good and what evil We call goodness the beauty of the soul and do men question whether there be such a thing as beauty at all because there are so many different opinions in the world about it Or is deformity ever the less real because the several nations of the world represent it in a colour different from their own Those arguments then against the natural differences of good and evil must needs appear ridiculous which will be granted to hold in nothing else but only the thing in question And yet in the midst of all the ruines and decays of humane nature we find such evident footsteps and impressions of the differences of good and evil in the minds of men which no force could extinguish no time could deface no customs could alter Let us search the records of ancient times and enquire into the later discoveries of nations we shall find none so barbarous and bruitish as not to allow the differences of good and evil so far as to acknowledge that there are some things which naturally deserve to be praised and others which deserve to be punished Whereas if good and evil were meerly names of things there can be no reason assigned why praise and honour should necessarily belong to some things and infamy and disgrace to follow others If the things themselves be arbitrary the consequences of them would be so too But is it possible to imagine that any man should deserve to be punished as much for being true to his trust as for betraying it for honouring his Parents as for destroying them for giving to every one their due as for all the arts of injustice and oppression Is it possible for men to suffer as much in their esteem for their fidelity temperance and chastity as they always do for their falseness intemperance and lasciviousness How comes the very name of a lie to be a matter of so much reproach and dishonour that the giving of it is thought an injury so great as cannot be expiated without the satisfaction of the giver's blood if it be in it selâ— so indifferent a thing Nay I dare appeal to the consciences of the most wicked persons whether they are so well pleased with themselves when they come reeking from the satisfaction oâ— their lusts and sodden with the continuance of their debaucheries as when they have been paying their devotions to God or their duties to their Parents or their respects to their Country or Friends Is there not whether they will or no an inward shame and secret regret and disquiet following the one and nothing but ease and contentment the other What should make this difference in those persons who love their vices far more than they do the other and if it were possible for them would bring vertue more out of countenance than sin is yet after all their endeavours though vice hath the stronger Interest vertue hath the greater Reveâ—ence Thus considering humane nature as it is we find indelible characters remaâ—ning upon it of the natural differences of good and evil but then if we consider it with a respect to the Maker of it that will cast a clearer light upon them and make those characters appear more discernible For nothing can be more absurd than to imagine a creature owing its being and all it hath to the bounty of a Being infinite in all Perfectâ—ons and yet not to be obliged to give all honour worship and service to it To rip up the bowels of a Mother to whom a man owes his coming into the world to assassinate a Prince to whom he owes all the honours and riches he hath in it are crimes of so black a nature that the worst of Men can hardly be supposed to commit them nor the worst of Devils to defend them But to blaspheme God and to deride his service seems to have a much greater malignity in it in as much as our obligations to his honour and service are much greater than they can be to any created Being But if there be no natural differences of good and evil even this must be accounted an indâ—fferent thing as well as the former and what safety can there be in conversing with those men whom no bonds of Religion Nature or Gratitude can tye Let us if it were possible suppose a Society of men constituted of such who make all things equally good and evil in their own nature what a monstrous Leviathan would they make among them no Religion no Law no Kindness no Promises no Trust no Contracts could ever oblige them not to do any thing which they thought might be done with safety By which it appears that these principles are so inconsistent with humane Nature and all the bonds of Religion and Duty that whoever owns them must suppose mankind more savage than the beasts of prey he must renounce his Reason destroy all Religion and disown a Deity For if there be a God we must be inviolably bound to observe and obey him and the very notion of a God implies a Being infinitely perfect and if there be such perfections in God they cannot but be so in their own nature and if they be so in their own nature they must in their degree be so in us as well as in him so that if Goodness Holiness and Righteousness be absolute perfections as they are in God they must be perfections so far as they are in us and the contrary must be imperfections which makes the differences of good and evil so far from being arbitrary that those things which agree to the perfections of God as well as his will must needs be good and those which are repugnant to them must needs be evil The result of all is that if a wicked man can have no peace in his mind without overthrowing the differences of good and evil he can have no peace without the greatest violence offered to God to nature and himself and if this be the way to Peace let his Reason judge 2. The second foundation which a wicked man must build his peace upon is that supposing there be such a thing as sin yet that men have no cause to disturb themselves with the fears of so great a punishment to follow after as that which sinners are afrighted with But what security can a sinner have against the fears of punishment when his conscience condemns him for the guilt of his sins Is it that God takes no notice at all of the actions of men that he will not disturb his own eternal peace and happiness by observing all their follies So some of old imagined who pretended that out of meer kindness to the Deity they gave him his Quietus est and took from him as much as in them lay the care and government of the world but it was really a greater kindness to their lusts which made them do it and makes many now-a-days so willing upon the same frivolous
Laws and make his own terms with God can he dissolve the chains of darkness with a few death-bed tears and quench the flames of another world with them O foolish sinners who hath bewitched them with these deceitful dreams will heaven-gates fly open with the strength of a few dying groans will the mouth of hell be stopt with the bare lamentation of a sinner Are there such charms in some penitent words extorted from the fear of approaching misery that God himself is not able to resiâ—â— them Certainly there is no deceit more dangerous nor I fear more common in the world than for men to think that God is so easie to pardon sin that though they spend their lives in satisfying their lusts they shall make amends for all by a dying sorrow and a gasping repentance As though the unsaying what we had done or wishing we had done otherwise since we can do it no longer for that is the bottom of all putting off repentance to the last were abundant compensation to the justice of God for the affronts of his Majesty contempt of his Laws abuse of his Patience and all the large indictments of wilful and presumptuous sins which the whole course of our lives is charged with The supposal of which makes the whole design of Religion signify very little in the world Thus we have examined the foundations of a sinner's peace and found them very false and fallacious 2. We are now to shew that those things do accompany a sinner's course of life which certainly overthrow his peace which are these two 1. The reflections of his Mind 2. The violence of his Passions 1. The reflections of his Mind which he can neither hinder nor be pleased with No doubt if it were possible for him to deprive himself of the greatest excellency of his being it would be the first work he would do to break the glass which shews him his deformity For as our Saviour said Every one that doth evil hateth the light lest his deeds should be reproved not only the light without which discovers them but that light of conscience within which not only shines but burns too Hence proceeds that great uneasiness which a sinner feels within as often as he considers what he hath done amiss which we call the remorse of conscience and is the natural consequent of the violence a man offers to his reason in his evil actions It was thought a sufficient vindication of the innocency of two Brothers by the Roman Judges when they were accused for Parricide that although their Father was murthered in the same room where they lay and no other person was found on whom they could fasten the suspicion of it yet in the morning the door was open and they fast asleep For as the Orator saith No man can imagine that those who had broken all the Laws of God and nature by so great an act of wickedness could presently sleep upon it for they who do such things can neither rest without care nor breathe without fear We are not to believe saith he the fables of the Poets as though wicked men were haunted and terrified with the burning torches of the furies but every man's wickedness is the greatest terrour to himself and the evil thoughts which pursue wicked men are their constant and domestick furies It would be endless to repeat what force the more civil Heathens have given to conscience either way as to the peace which follows innocency and the disquiet which follows guilt Which they looked on as the great thing which governed the world Quâ sublatâ jacent omnia as the Orator speaks without which all things would be in great disorder for these punishments they are sure not to escape though they may do others and these they thought so great and weighty that upon this ground they vindicated divine providence as to the seeming prosperity of wicked men thinking it the most unreasonable thing in the world to call those persons happy who suffered under the severe lashes of their own consciences If there were such a force in the consciences of those who had nothing but the light of nature to direct them how much greater weight muâ—t there be when the terrours of the Lord are made known by himself and the wrath of God revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness of men I know that wicked men in the height of their debaucheries pretend to be above these things and are ready to laugh at them as the effects of a strong spleen and a weak brain but I appeal to their most sober thoughts when the streams of wine are evaporated and the intoxication of evil company is removed from them when in the deep and silent night they revolve in their minds the actions of the foregoing day what satisfaction they then take in all the sinful pleasures they have pursued so eagerly but especially when either their lusts have consumed their bodies or the vengeance of God hath overtaken them when death begins to seize upon their vitals and themselves not wholly stupified through the power of their sins or their disease let then if it were possible any repâ—esent the fears the horrour and astonishment which the consciences of wicked men labour under in remembrance of their evil actions How mean and poor would they leave themselves if with all their honours and riches they could purchase to themselves a reprieve from death and from the miseries which follow after it what would they then give for the comfort of a good conscience and the fruit of a holy righteous and sober life with what another sense of Religion do men whose minds are awakened speak then in comparison of what they did in the days of their mirth and jollity Neither is this to take them at the greatest disadvantage as some of them have been ready to say for I suppose their minds as clear then as at any time and so much the clearer because freed from the impediments of such freedom of their thoughts at another time for the same thoughts would have possessed them before only the pleasures and the hopes of life diverted their minds from them but now the nearness of the things they feared and the weight and consequence of them make them more diligently examine and impartially consider them But that demonstrates the great misery of a sinner's State that what cures the other greatest troubles of our life doth the most increase his which is the exercise of reason and consideration that allays the power of griefs that easeth the mind of vain fears that prevents many troubles and cures others that governs other passions and keeps them in their due bounds but this is it which of all things doth the most increase the trouble of a wicked man's mind for the more he considers the worse he finds his condition and while he finds his condition so bad he can never enjoy any peace in his mind 2. The violence of his
followed upon these things very little among themselves we may be sure by the heats and animosities that were continually among them the issue of which was the Temple was profaned by Antiochus rifled by Pompey their own Princes deposed and Usurpers ruled over them and when the Son of God himself could not reclaim them their Temple Nation and Government were all involved in one common ruin Thus we see how these words of the Prophet were fulfilled upon this people But some have been ready to say that God's proceedings with the Iews ought not to be drawn into an example to any other nations because his dealings with them were peculiar and by vertue of a particular Covenant which God made with them which he hath not done with any other nation in the world This objection were of great force if God himself had not in the words before mentioned declared the same concerning any other Nation or Kingdom and if the instances were not as remarkable in other people as in that of the Jews If we search the Monuments of former Ages and consider the strange revolutions which have happened in the mighty Empires and Kingdoms of the World we shall find no one circumstance more considerable in them than this That the Nations which God hath made use of for a scourge to others have been remarkable for nothing so much as for the vertues opposite to the most prevailing vices among those who were overcome by them Thus when the Chaldean Monarchy fell the Persians who were the sword in God's right hand were eminent for nothing more than their great temperance and frugality while the Babylonians perished by their luxury and effeminacy And when the Persian Monarchy degenerated into the same vices the Macedonians were raised up to be the executioners of God's wrath upon them because they were at that time freer than any other people from those softening and destroying vices And when the Persian luxury had infected their Conquerours the severe Discipline and Vertue of the Romans made them more successful in subduing the remaâ—nders of the Groecian Empire than their courage and number could And when the Romans themselves after a long time of God's forbearance with them and several respites from punishment by the vertue and conduct of such excellent Princes as Antoninus and Alexander Severus in the Heathen and Constantine and Theodosius in the Christian Empire fell into as great a degeneracy of manners as any we ever read of then did God let loose as it were the Goths and Vandals and other barbarous Nations out of their several Dens who seemed to be designed rather to destroy than to conquer So sudden so numerous so irresistible in most places were the incurâ—ions they made But what was it which gave them so strange success was it their long practice and skill in military affairs No they were rude and unexperinced was it their mighty courage No they were despised by the Romans as great Cowards and begged for peace when it was denied them But as Salvian tells us who lived in those times and knew the manners of both sides the Goths and Vandals were of a very severe chastity among whom fornication was punished sharply and adultery a crime scarce heard of whereas all manner of uncleanness and licentiousness did abound among the Romans who yet were then called Christians The Goths were devout and pious acknowledging divine providence making their solemn supplications to God before their victories and returning him the praise of them afterwards but the Romans were fallen into that degree of Irreligion and Atheism that nothing was more common among them than to droll upon Religion A nostris omnia fermè religiosa ridentur as Salvian speaks they thought all things managed by chance or fate and ascribed very little to God And where these sins abounded most they were carried up and down as by a divine instinct as they confessed themselves and where they conquered as he particularly speaks of the Vandals in Africa they purged all the stews of uncleanness and made so great a reformation by the severity of their Laws that even the Romans themselves were chast among them Thus we see how those great and mighty Empires have been broken to pieces by the weight of their impieties falling upon them May the consideration then of these things move us in time to a reformation of our lives beâ—ore our iniquities grow full and ripe for vengeance We have seen many revolutions and God knows how many more we may see if that should be true of us which the same Author saith of the Romans in the midst of all their changes Sola tantum vitia perdurant their vices remained the same still Thanks be to God that things have a fairer appearance at present than they have had and never so good a time to amend as now but if men flatter themselves with present security and their sins increase as their fears abate the clouds which seem dispersed may soon gather again and the face of the Heavens will change if we do not And if it be not in our power to reclaim others from their sins let us endeavour to preserve the honour of our Church by amending our own and convince our enemies by living better than they And give me leave to say and so I conclude that among all the expedients which have been thought of for the peace of this Church and Nation that of leaving off our sins and leading vertuous and exemplary lives will at last prove to be the most successful SERMON XI Preached at WHITE-HALL MARCH 27. 1672. 2 CORINTH V. 2. Knowing therefore the terrour of the Lord we perswade men IF ever any Religion was in all respects accomplished for so noble a design as the reformation of mankind it was the Christian whether we consider the Authority of those who first delivered it or the weight of the arguments contained in it and their agreeableness to the most prevailing passions of humane nature Although the world was strangely degenerated before the coming of Christ yet not to so great a degree but that there were some who not only saw the necessity of a cure but offered their assistance in order to it whose attempts proved the more vain and fruitless because they laboured under the same distempers themselves which they offered to cure in others or the method they prescribed was mean and trivial doubtful and uncertain or else too nice and subtle to do any great good upon the world But Christianity had not only a mighty advantage by the great holiness of those who preached it but by the clearness and evidence the strength and efficacy of those arguments which they used to perswade men The nature of them is such that none who understand them can deny them to be great their clearness such that none that hear them can choose but understand them the manner of recommending them such as all who understood themselves could not but desire to
shall be more happy and others more miserable by it The righteous shall not only see God but know what the seeing of God means and that the greatest happiness we are capable of is implyed therein and the wicked shall not only be bid to depart from him but shall then find that the highest misery imaginable is comprehended in it It is a great instance of the weakness of our capacities here that our discourses concerning the happiness and misery of a future life are like those of Children about affairs of State which they represent to themselves in a way agreeable to their own Childish fancies thence the Poetical dreams of Elysian fields and turning wheels and rouling stones and such like imaginations Nay the Scripture it self sets forth the joys and torments of another world in a way more suited to our fancy than our understanding thence we read of sitting down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob to represent the happiness of that State and of a gnawing worm and a devouring fire and blackness of darkness to set forth the misery of it But as the happiness of Hâ—aven doth infinitely exceed the most lofty metaphors of Scripture so doth the misery of Hell the most dreadful representation that can be made of it Although a worm gnawing our entrails and a fire consuming our outward parts be very sensible and moving metaphors yet they cannot fully express the anguish and torment of the soul which must be so much greater as it is more active and sensible than our bodies can be Take a man that afflicts himself under the sense of some intolerable disgrace or calamity befallen him or that is oppressed with the guilt of some horrid wickedness or sunk into the depth of despair the Agonies and Torments of his Mind may make us apprehend the nature of that misery although he falls short of the degrees of it And were this misery to be of no long continuance yet the terror of it must needs be great but when the worm shall never dye and the fire shall never be quenched when insupportable misery shall be everlasting nothing can then be added to the terrour of it and this is as plainly contained in the sentence of wicked men as any thing else is But here men think they may justly plead with God and talk with him of his judgments what proportion say they is there between the sins of this short life and the eternal misery of another which objection is not so great in it self as it appears to be by the weak answers which have been made to it When to assign a proportion they have made a strange kind of infinity in sin either from the object which unavoidably makes all sins equal or from the wish of a sinner that he might have an eternity to sin in which is to make the justice of God's punishments to be not according to their works but to their wishes But we need not strain things so much beyond what they will bear to vindicate God's Justice in this matter Is it not thought just and reasonable among men for a man to be confined to perpetual imprisonment for a fault he was not half an hour in committing Nay do not all the Laws of the world make death the punishment of some crimes which may be very suddenly done And what is death but the eternal depriving a man of all the comforts of life And shall a thing then so constantly practised and universally justified in the world be thought unreasonale when it is applyed to God It is true may some say if annihilation were all that was meant by eternal death there could be no exception against it but I ask whether it would be unjust for the Laws of men to take away the lives of offenders in case their souls survive their bodies and they be for ever sensible of the loss of life if not why shall not God presâ—rve the honour of his Laws and vindicate his Authority in governing the world by â—entencing obstinate sinners to the greatest misery though their souls live foâ— ever in the appreâ—ension of it Especially since God hath declared these things so evidently before-hand and made them part of his Laws and set everlasting life on the other side to ballance everlasting misery and proposed them to a sinner's choice in such a manner that nothing but contempt of God and his Grace and wilâ—ul impenitency can ever betray men into this dreadful State of eternal destruction 2. Thus much for the Argument used by the Apostle the terrour of the Lord I now come to the assurance he expresseth of the truth of it Knowing therefore the terrour of the Lord we perswade men We have two ways of proving Articles of Faith such as this concerning Christ's coming to judgment is 1. By shewing that there is nothing unreasonable in the belief of them 2. That there is sufficient evidence of the truth and certainty of them In the former of these it is of excellent use to produce the common apprehensions of mankind as to a future judgment and the several arguments insisted on to that purpose for if this were an unreasonable thing to believe how come men without Revelation to agree about it as a thing very just and reasonable If the conflagration of the world were an impossible thing how came it to be so anciently received by the eldest and wisest Philosophers How came it to be maintained by those two Sects which were St. Paul's enemies when he preached at Athens and always enemies to each other the Epicureans and the Stoicks It is true they made these conflagrations to be periodical and not final but we do not establish the belief of our doctrine upon their assertion but from thence shew that is a most unreasonable thing to reject that as impossible to be done which they assert hath been and may be often done But for the truth and certainty of our doctrine we build that upon no less a foundation than the word of God himself We may think a judgment to come reasonable in general upon the consideration of the goodness and wisdom and justice of God but all that depends upon this supposition that God doth govern the world by Laws and not by Power but since God himself hath declared it who is the Supreme Judge of the world that he will bring every work into judgment whether it be good or evil since the Son of God made this so great a part of his doctrine with all the circumstances of his own coming for again this end since he opened the commission he received from the Father for this purpose when he was upon earth by declaring that the Father had committed all judgment to the Son and that the hour is coming in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth they that have done good to the resurrection of life and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation Since
his company 2. As implying as great displeasure of God under the Gospel against the same kind of sin as he discovered in the immediate destruction of those persons who were then guilty of it 1. As relating to the fact of Corah and his company and so the words lead us to the handling 1. The nature of the Faction which was raised by them 2. The Judgment that was inflicted upon them for it 1. For understanding the nature of the Faction we must enquire into the design that was laid the persons that were engaged in it the pretences that were made use of for it 1. The design that was laid for that and all other circumstances of the story we must have resort to the account that is given of it Numb 16. where we shall find that the bottom of the design was the sharing of the Government among themselves which it was impossible for them to hope for as long as Moses continued as a King in Iesurun for so he is called Deut. 33.5 Him therefore they intend to lay aside but this they knew to be a very difficult task considering what wonders God had wrought by him in their deliverance out of Egypt what wisdom he had hitherto shewed in the conduct of them what care for their preservation what integrity in the management of his power what reverence the people did bear towards him and what solemn vows and promises they had made of obedience to him But ambitious and factious Men are never discouraged by such an appearance of difficulties for they know they must address themselves to the people and in the first place perswade them that they manage their interest against the usurpation of their Governours For by that means they gain upon the peoples affections who are ready to cry them up presently as the true Patriots and Defenders of their Liberties against the encroachment of Princes and when they have thus insinuated themselves into the good opinion of the people groundless suspicions and unreasonable fears and jealousies will pass for arguments and demonstrations Then they who can invent the most popular lies against the Government are accounted the Men of integrity and they who most diligently spread the most infamous reports are the Men of honesty because they are farthest from being Flatterers of the Court The people take a strange pride as well as pleasure in hearing and telling all the â—aults of their Governours for in doing so they flatter themselves in thinking they deserve to rule much better than those which do it And the willingness they have to think so of themselves makes them misconstrue all the actions of their Superiours to the worse sense and then they find out plots in every thing upon the people Whatever is done for the necessary maintenance of Government is suspected to be a design meerly to exhaust the people to make them more unable to resist If good Laws be made these are said by factious men to be only intended for snares for the good people but others may break them and go unpunished If Government be strict and severe then it is cruel and tyrannical if mild and indulgent then it is remiss and negligent If Laws be executed then the peoples Liberties be oppressed if not then it were better not to make Laws than not to see them executed If there be Wars the people are undone by Taxes if there be Peace they are undone by Plenty If extraordinary Judgments befall them then they lament the sins of their Governours and of the Times and scarce think of their own If miscarriages happen as it is impossible always to prevent them they charge the form of Government with them which all sorts are subject to Nay it is seldom that Governours escape with their own faults the peoples are often laid upon them too So here Numb 16.14 Moses is charged with not carrying them into Canaan when it was their own sins which kept them thence Yea so partial have the people generally been against their Rulers when swayed by the power of Faction that this hath made Government very difficult and unpleasing for what ever the actions of Princes are they are liable to the censures of the people Their bad actions being more publick and their good therefore suspected of design and the wiser Governours are the more jealous the people are of them For always the weakest part of mankind are the most suspicious the less they understand things the more designs they imagine are laid for them and the best counsels are the soonest rejected by them So that the wisest Government can never be secure from the jealousies of the people and they that will raise a Faction against it will never want a party to side with them For when could we ever have imagined a Government more likely to be free from this than that which Moses had over the people of Israel He being an extraordinary person for all the abilities of Government one bred up in the Egyptian Court and in no mean degree of honour being called the Son of Pharaohs Daughter one of great experience in the management of affairs of great zeal for the good of his Country as appeared by the tenderness of his peoples interest in their deliverance out of Egypt one of great temper and meekness ☞ above all men of the earth one who took all imaginable care for the good establishment of Laws among them but above all these one particularly chosen by God for this end and therefore furnished with all the requisites of a good man and an excellent Prince yet for all these things a dangerous sedition is here raised against him and that upon the common grounds of such things viz. usurpation upon the peoples rights arbitrary Government and ill management of affairs Usurpation upon the peoples rights v. 4. the Faction makes a Remonstrance asserting the Priviledges of the people against Moses and Aaron Ye take too much upon you seeing all the Congregation are holy every one of them and the Lord is among them Wherefore then lift you up your selves above the Congregation of the Lord. As though they had said we appear only in behalf of the Fundamental Liberties of the people both Civil and Spiritual we only seek to retrench the exorbitances of power and some late innovations which have been among us if you are content to lay aside your power which is so dangerous and offensive to Gods holy people we shall then sit down in quietness for alas it is not for our selves that we seek these things what are we but the cause of Gods people is dearer to us than our lives and we shall willingly sacrifice them in so good a Cause And when Moses afterwards sends for the Sons of Eliab to come to him they peremptorily refuse all Messages of Peace and with their men of the sword mentioned v. 2. They make votes of non-Addresses and break off all Treaties with him and declare these for their reasons that he