between the Prophets and Jesus so many hundreds of years after they were dead and before he was born Or are these Predictions and their Events to be imputed to Chance It is possible indeed that some one thing may be foretold and happen accordingly but that so vast a number of particulars should be foretold concerning one Person at all adventures and by strange luck come to pass afterwards is fit for them only to believe that can believe that the World was made by a casual hit of Atoms To name these things is enough to confute them 2. All that can be farther desired is to be well assured that these Prophecies were not forged by the followers of Jesus but that they were indeed contained in the ancient Writings that had been delivered down to the Jews of our Saviour's time by their Ancestors and the constant testimony of the Jews themselves who were most bitter enemies to Jesus and to his Doctrine were enough to satisfie us in this point 4ly And Lastly Whereas these Predictions are said to be a more sure word of Prophecy the meaning is this that they are a more convincing Testimony to Jesus than any other taken by its self they are indeed a more permanent Testimony and withal less liable to Cavil and Objection I cannot stand to shew this by making particular comparisons but shall only observe That Prophecy includes all other Testimonies and adds strength to every one of them It comprehends the Miracles of Jesus and of his Apostles his Resurrection and Ascension the Descent of the Holy Ghost and the excellency of his Doctrine because these were all foretold It includes all other proofs as well as the thing proved and those proofs are the more convincing because they also had been foretold by the Prophets From all this it follows That allowing the Scripture that Tradition which other good Histories have and which they have more of than any other ancient Writings in the World then the Prophecies of the Old Testament and the Accomplishment of them in the New do prove the Divine Authority of the Scriptures and this without the help of the Churches Authority and well is it for the Christian Religion that the Scriptures may be proved without the Authority of the Church for otherwise Christianity must never look an Infidel in the face since the Church hath no Authority at all till we are assured of the truth of the Scriptures themselves And I will make bold to add That when all those objections against the Authority of the Old Testament from the time wherein it was put into this form of Books from the light oversights of Transcribers from various readings and all the cavils upon any part of it are put together the word of Prophecy which runs through it all will bear all this reckoning and still remain an invincible argument that the first Authors were inspired that the Prophecy came not in Old time by the will of man but that holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost Well therefore might St. Peter commend the Jewish Converts for taking heed to the word of Prophecy since this was the way to come to a well-grounded Faith indeed and to grow every day to greater assurance and stedfastness therein and for the same reason let us I beseech you be exhorted to like diligence in conversing with the Holy Scriptures that our Minds may be more enlightened with the knowledge of divine Truth and that every doubt if any there be that shakes our Faith may be removed And this Exhortation is so needful that I shall shew that there is no good reason in their Objection against it who have taken a great deal of pains to exclude all but the Clergy and those that have special License from reading the Scriptures the sum of what they say is this That the promiscuous Liberty of reading the Scriptures leads the People into Pride and Self-conceit makes them insolent and ungovernable and ready to throw off all Respect to their lawful Guides That almost all Heresies have proceeded from misinterpretation of Scripture and that there are so many obscure and difficult places in the Old and New Testament that to translate the Bible into vulgar Tongues and to encourage the People to read it is to betray them into the danger of infinite Errors which they are likely enough to fall into by mistaking the sense of the holy Text which therefore is to be kept out of the hands of the Laity as we would keep Children from medling with edged Tools and lay Swords out of mad-mens way Now if this Charge be true the Bible is a very dangerous Book if it be not true there is some other reason doubtless why they that pretend this have no kindness for the Bible I shall omit several advantages that may be taken against this Flourish because I think it may be shown very briefly that it pretends things that do by no means hang well together that it takes things for granted that are not true and that it concludes as strongly against the Scriptures being read by the Clergy as by the Laity It pretends some things that do not hang well together On the one side they tell us that the liberty of reading the Bible is apt to make the People throw off all dependance upon the Priest as to instruction on the one side that there are obscure and difficult passages in it by mistaking the true sense of which they will be led into Heresie and consequently into the way of Damnation Now indeed the Scriptures say this of themselves that there are divers things hard to be understood in them which ignorant and unstable men have wrested to their own destructien But if this be true the best way to keep the People in modest dependance upon the instruction of their Spiritual Guides is to lay the Bible before them and not to keep it from them since there cannot be a more convincing Argument of the necessity of attending to their Pastors in order to farther Instruction than the several difficulties that occur in the Scriptures and the warnings that the Scriptures themselves have given of the danger that unlearned and unstable Men are in of wresting them to their own destruction If it be said that experience shews the contrary and that neither this nor any other Argument can make people modest if they are generally permitted to have the Scriptures I add 2. That this arguing takes things for granted which are not true in point of fact all the Faithful anciently had the Scriptures but we find little complaint by the Bishops and Clergy then of the Wantonness and Insolence of the People so little in comparison of the frequent and earnest exhortations that all would deligently Read the Scriptures that it may be said to be none at all Christian People that had been trained up in the first Rudiments of the Faith were not only allowed them but required to Read the
the Church any more than the Errors of Pergamos made her cease to be so nor that it is impossible the Reformed and the Unreformed part of Christendom should be within the Pale of that one Church which we profess to believe in the Creed any more than it was impossible for the Church of Pergamos to have been a part of the Catholick Church both before and after her Reformation And thus I have gone through the Task I set my self and I hope need to make no Apology for entertaining you with a Controversy of this nature which indeed ought to be no Controversy amongst us But if it were needful I have this to say Whereas the Church of England does not pretend to be an Infallible Guide or Judge and yet requires the People to believe as she believes to profess what she professeth and to do what she enjoineth it is very fit that her Ministers should sometimes make it plain that she requires this because she has reason so to do and is not in these Points deceived though she does not pretend that she cannot err in any I know not whether I have made the things I have discoursed plain enough to every Understanding but whether that be so or not yet every one may perceive that we appeal to his Reason for the Truth and Honesty of our Cause and for my own part if I understood nothing else of the Merits of it I had rather be of a Church which pretends to guide me with Reason than of another that would govern me without it and that because the former is likely to take more care not to mislead me than the latter needs to do which when it has gained me to an implicit Faith and a blind Obedience may lead me whither she pleases As for what I have now said I declare in the Presence of God that I have offered nothing to you but what I believe my self and farther that I am not conscious to my self of any reason why I am fixed in the Communion of this Church in opposition to the other but a full Conviction of the Errors of that Church which if I should profess or practise I could not entertain the least hopes of Salvation And we who are thus convinced are as I take it bound in Conscience to take seasonable opportunities of confirming our Brethren in our Communion and enabling them as well as we can to make it appear that the Arguments and the Answers of the other side are unsatisfactory and vain as I have in some part endeavoured to shew at this time We should indeed not be unwilling to take pains to recover those to the knowledge of the Truth that are educated in damnable Errors but there is much more reason to do all we can to retain those in the profession of the Truth that have been educated in it seeing if they revolt we cannot have that hope of their Salvation which we would fain have of theirs who want sufficient means to discover them It were a blessed state of the Church indeed if all being united in true Faith and Worship we had nothing to do but to persuade and exhort men and to take care of them that they live answerably thereto but since we have two Works upon our hands to guard you against Error as well as to warn you against a wicked Life I do not see how we can discharge our Duty but by doing one as well as the other And that I may not say nothing to the latter I am to tell you in the Conclusion That we do not make the Communion of the best Church in the World to be all in all a man may go to Hell in the Communion of a pure Church and without true Repentance and Reformation the best and purest Church that ever was since the Gospel began could have done him no service And I take it to be as great a Corruption as can be readily thought of for any Church to pretend to save men by a Trick and send them to Heaven any other way than the plain way of keeping the Commandments of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ Keep therefore the pure Profession of the Christian Faith but withal keep a good Conscience void of offence towards God and towards man Hold fast the form of sound words But still remember that if your Works be not answerable your Faith is vain For not the hearers of the Law but the doers thereof shall be justified Not he that saith Lord Lord shall enter into the kingdom of heaven but he that doth the will of our Father which is in heaven The Second Sermon MATTH XVIII 7. Wo unto the world because of offences for it must needs be that offences come But wo to that Man by whom the Offence cometh THE great End of the Gospel is to bring Mankind to Salvation and in order thereunto to convert them from Sin and from all dangerous Error and to lead them to a right Faith and a Holy Life But it is too evident that this End is not attained Universally And if any one should be tempted to suspect that the Christian Religion is not therefore a Divine Revelation because it has in so great part failed of the End which it pretended to pursue he may be easily brought to assurance again by considering the vast good which Christianity hath done in the World but especially by observing that the Gospel hath foretold that all men would not believe and obey Our blessed Lord himself testified that many were called but few were chosen and that strait was the Gate and narrow the way that leadeth to Life and few there be that find it Nay inasmuch as he hath forewarned us of a Day of Judgment and hath told us beforehand That the Word which he hath spoken the same should judge us at the Last Day This was a manifest Declaration that he did not pretend to lead men to Faith and Repentance by such means as could not but be effectual but only by such as were sufficient if we would in any measure comply with his gracious Methods and it was also a plain intimation that a great many would be never the better but the worse for these means that God had provided for their Salvation and that some for not receiving them others for not improving them would fall into greater Condemnation But our Saviour did not foretell these things only but the Causes of them too and what it was that would obstruct the Progress and Design of his Religion For this is the importance of those words of his which I have now chosen for my Subject Wo be to the world because of offences for it must needs be that offences come By Offences or Scandals we are here and almost everywhere in the New Testament to understand those Temptations to Sin and Inducements to Error which some men lay in the way of others They are sometimes otherwise express'd Snares Stumbling-blocks and occasions of Fallings for the
Unity only in Faith and Goodness is to be preserved 2. It is possible that where there are discords there may be yet more truth professed than where there are none and that for the former Reason because there may be Unity in the worst Errors Besides the common Faith that is professed by all Christians one part of the Church may maintain the Purity of that Profession against another that hath superadded new and false Doctrines to it and yet the Reformed part may labour under Discords that affect their very Communion while the other doth not There may be on the one side disobedience to Authority overvaluing of Questions of no great moment a greater stress laid upon Opinions or Practices than the Cause will bear and this shall be sufficient to break Christian Communion and at the same time whilst gross Errors are maintained on the other side with one consent the differences that happen by the bye may be so over ruled by Authority by Force and Power and by the sensible Interests of this World that how wide soever they are they shall not yet rend Communion But in such a case it were the fondest thing in the World to chuse a Doctrine by the mark of Unity among those that profess it Therefore in this divided State of Christendom it is easie to see what Christians are to do to preserve the Unity of the Body of Christ as much as in them lies and to be sure that they are within the Unity of the Church in all respects 1. I need not say that they are to stand fast in the Faith which was first delivered to the Saints in the Common Faith of Christians for without this they could not so much as continue in that Body into which they were baptized only I may add That they are to lay it up in their hearts and to value it as the greatest Treasure and to proclaim their esteem of it and to acknowledge all that profess it to be of the same Body with them This being that Faith which Christ came down from Heaven to establish in the World and which he sent the Holy Ghost to inspire his Apostles withal to reveal it to us and to confirm it for us by the Writings and by the Miracles of inspired Persons 'T is by this Faith and this Profession therefore which includes Baptism that they are Christians who will not allow us to be of the Church 2. Let them keep themselves from entertaining any corrupt or false Doctrines not only any that are contrary to the Scriptures but any as necessary to Salvation which are not to be proved by the Scriptures for thus they will be sure to keep themselves from any dangerous Errors and continue not only true but pure Believers and they sure are not the less but the more in the Unity of the Church who receive nothing as necessary to be believed in order to Salvation but what by the undoubted Records of our Christian Faith appears to have been taught by Christ and his Apostles 3. Let every private Christian be most careful to observe the Commands of our Lord Jesus in the Government of all his Affections and all his Actions for Unity in this thing ought to be amongst all Christians since without Obedience no Man how qualified soever he may be in the Church upon other accounts shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven not every one that saith Lord Lord Without this it is not the being of the one Church it is not the professing of the one Faith no nor the being of a pure Profession and a pure Communion that will unite us really and effectually to our Lord Jesus the Head of the Church but we shall be cut off from him as Branches that bring forth no fruit 4. Let him maintain an universal Charity to all Christians Good will to those that are misled and seduced in endeavouring to reduce them as he hath opportunity in praying for them readiness to be beneficial to all his Brethren to forgive Injuries and to overcome evil with good compassion to the miserable pleasure in that which is for the particular good of any one of his Brethren and much more in what is for the general good of all Thus he shall preserve himself in the other Unity which is the Duty of the Church the Unity of Charity and Good will 5. Let him live in strict Communion with the particular Church whereof he is a Member in subjection to the Authority of it in observing the Rules of it for the guidance of Religious Assemblies for the ordering of all things that fall under human Authority i. e. the Authority of the lawful Guides of the Church in order to the Edification and well Governing of it Thus he shall maintain an Unity of Communion with his Brethren and his Guides and so in effect with the whole Christian Church where the Parts of it do as they ought to do and most undoubtedly we are not to be united to any of them in things wherein they do as they ought not The Sum of this Advice is easie to be understood and to a good Man as easie to be practised There is no need for him to trouble his own Mind with nice and intricate Questions about Unity because he will maintain his part in order to the Unity of the Church by doing his plain Duty by sticking to the Faith which is professed by all Christians the Faith into which we were baptized by rejecting whatsoever is contrary to the Scriptures and making them the Rule of his religious Perswasions which all Christians ought to do by observing the Rules of the Gospel for the Government of his Life and Actions in which yet undoubtedly all Churches and every Member of every Church ought to conspire though this part of Unity is hardly remembred when Men talk of the Church by bearing Christian Affection towards all that name the name of Christ whereby he performs the Duty of Unity towards them which whether they do or not they ought to perform too Finally By frequenting the Service of God in publick Prayers and Exhortations in the Administration of Sacraments according to the Order of the Church whereof in particular the Grace and Providence of God hath made him a Member and which observes the Institutions of our Lord Jesus in all the publick Offices of Religion For thus he performs his part of Unity towards the whole Church with respect to Communion nor is he nor can be to blame if others will not be perswaded to it It is a fond thing to think of seeking a True Church that is the only Church in opposition to all others or to be scandalized at the divided State of the Church which we cannot help and under a pretence of seeking for Unity to mind nothing else We are to preserve our selves in the Unity of the Church by professing true Doctrine and by leading good Lives by a charitable Spirit and Behaviour towards all Christians by frequenting
the Temptation Men of Probity and Lovers of Truth should upon diligent examination hold it faster than otherwise they would have done This is one of the great advantages to which that opposition tends which Truth has met with in the World And therefore the more lofty those Pretences are by which the other Church would bring us to an intire submission to her Authority in every point of Religion so much greater reason there is to examine every one of her particulars and if I find that she is mistaken in any of them I am very sure that she is not infallible in all And if she will not allow me to make a Judgment of the Particulars 't is just as if a Man should try to hinder me from casting up my own Accounts by going about to prove that he cannot possibly mistake in doing it he might indeed shew some Wit in working his Demonstration but I should shew a great deal more folly in trusting him To conclude We have a Rule whereby to try the Doctrine I will not only say of a Church or a Pope or a Council but even of an Angel from Heaven if an Angel should come and preach to us and that Rule is the Holy Scripture especially the Writings of the Evangelists and Apostles These are by all Christians acknowledged to be the undoubted and the most ancient Records of our Holy Religion and they have had a Tradition so uncontroulable as no Books in the World ever had the like Whoever therefore is our Guide it is very reasonable that this should be our Rule And of all Churches in the World I will never trust my self to her discretion that will not trust me with the Knowledge and Study of this Rule Here we may if we please make our selves very sure that we are of those whom God will justifie for here we may discern what kind of Persons St. Paul and the Christians of whom he speaks in this place and what all the Apostles and Primitive Disciples of our Lord were For those Books which acquaint us with their Names and which were written by some of themselves do also discover to us what Faith they professed what Doctrine they taught and what Lives they led Now if we profess that very Faith and teach no other Doctrine and frame our practice by their Rules and good Examples then without all question we are such kind of Christians as they were and then altho' we should be used by the World as they were too yet the encouragement and comfort which they had will also belong to us and we too may say Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect it is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth it is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again Having therefore the infallible Rule of God's Word whereby to guide our selves We beseech you Brethren and exhort you by the Lord Jesus that as ye have received of us how you ought to walk and to please God so you would abound more and more that while evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse deceiving and being deceived ye may continue in the things which ye have learned knowing of whom ye have learned them even from the Sayings of our Lord Jesus and his holy Apostles delivered to us in the Scriptures which are able to make us wise unto Salvation through Faith which is in Christ Jesus Let us remember that it had been better for us not to have known the way of righteousness than after we have known it to turn from the holy commandment delivered to us not forgetting by any means that 't is a way of righteousness we have been made to know and an holy Commandment that hath been delivered to us from which therefore we may depart as damnably by an impure Conversation as by leting go our pure Profession in which case we are so far from being justified that we shall be the more condemned by our Faith We have no false Principles to save our Hearts from condemning us if we allow our selves in any way of wickedness and God is greater than our hearts and knoweth all things Whoever else condemns us that is more than recompence enough if God justifieth But who is he that shall justifie us if God condemns FINIS THE SUMM OF A CONFERENCE On Feb. 21. 1686. BETWEEN Dr. Clagett and Father Gooden About the Point of TRANSUBSTANTIATION The Third Edition LONDON Printed for William Rogers at the Sun over-against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet 1698. The SUM of a CONFERENCE On Feb. 21. 1686. BETWEEN Dr. Clagett and Father Gooden About the POINT of TRANSUBSTANTIATION Introduction IT will perhaps appear to some a little strange that I do not say almost Incredible that there should have pass'd a Conference above two years since in which Mr. Gooden was concern'd and the World yet to learn the Substance of it The Vanity of that Gentleman to thrust himself upon all Occasions into Disputes with the most Learned Men of our Church first and then to boast of his own Performances in them was so great that there is scarce a Coffee-house in the Town that has not been filled with the Noise of his impertinent Vapours And if those of the other Communion have been always remarkable for an Assurance becoming the pretended Infallibility of their Church I may venture to say that next to Father P the Jesuit and his Friend Mr. M I scarce know any among them that have ever talk'd so loud or made such Heroical Defiances of the Champions and Armies of our Israel in all Places and upon all Occasions as Mr. Gooden these late Years has done among us But thus shallow Waters always run with the greatest Noise and Violence and little Sophisters who either want Capacity to see into their own Fallacies or think they have forehead enough to carry that off with Clamour and Confidence which they cannot do by Reason and Argument delight to expose themselves and their Religion to the most dangerous Tryals whilst Men of Learning and Judgment are modest and ingenuous and know it to be neither for the Honour of their Church nor their own Reputation to challenge all Mankind to answer Paradoxes and to shew that not to be Demonstration which when brought to the tryal is hardly sense See Mr. G's Pap. I hope this will not be thought too severe a Reflection on the late Pretenders of this kind among us which I speak out of a just respect to the more learned and charitable Persons of the Church of Rome who have been no less scandalized at these forward Zealots than our selves and to whom I ought to give this Testimony That during a long acquaintance with many of them I never met with any thing of the Vanity of those I have before-mentioned Our Differences in matters of Religion made no Disturbance either in our Friendship or Conversation with one another If the discourse at anytime led to a Controversie of
is disgraced with the company of Follies and Lies Thus the Pharisees recommended their absurd Traditions to the People because in the same breath they taught them the Law of Moses Thus some of the Gentiles were ready to reject Christianity when they were made to believe it necessary for them also to observe the Mosaical Law if they would be Christians And this is one of the common Scandals of the World that Truth is so often insincerely represented and false Doctrines propounded still by the same Authority that holds forth some necessary Truths And for this reason the Gospel does not allow but command us to use a Judgment of Discretion not to reject that which is good because it comes from the same Authority that requires evil nor to admit Error because it is accompanied with Truth but to prove all things and to hold fast that which is good 4. All Popular Artifices that are used to recommend either wicked Errors or Practices are also great Offences and lead many silly Souls astray of which kind the most obvious are these An external shew of Strictness and Piety without real Virtue and Godliness at the bottom of it And of this the Pharisees were the first notable Instance who placing Religion in abundance of nice Observations seemed to be the most strict and devout People in the World and therefore our Saviour knowing the wickedness of their Hearts and Lives compared them to whited sepulchres that within were full of dead mens bones and all uncleanness And this Offence would be so powerful whenever it should happen that it seemed good to the Spirit to foretell it expresly viz. That in the latter times some should depart from the faith giving heed to seducing spirits forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats 1 Tim. 4.1 2 3. Another Offence of this kind which was also expresly foretold is pretending the Testimony of Miracles For says our Saviour himself There shall arise false Christs and false prophets and shall shew great signs and wonders insomuch that if it were possible they should deceive the very elect Behold says he I have told you before Matth. 24.24 25. And thus St. Paul foretold that when that wicked one should be revealed his coming should be after the working of Satan with power and signs and lying wonders and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness I shall name but one other popular Device for the supporting of Error and that is to denounce Damnation peremptory against all Gainsayers with which Artifice the Judaizers secured themselves against the Gentile Christians saying Except ye be circumcised and keep the law of Moses ye cannot be saved Now although every man that has a Tongue may if he please lay this weight upon his Cause as to exclude all from Salvation that are not of his way and therefore the Threatning be not worthy of a wise man's thought till the Merits of the Cause be examined yet it has two notable advantages that it is framed to work upon the Passions of men more than upon their Judgment and in most men their Passion is stronger than their Reason and it may be so used as to bear the World in hand that 't is not Uncharitableness but mere Pity and Tenderness to the Souls of men that compels them to speak so harsh but so necessary a Truth And 't is a wonderful thing to observe how easy men are to be managed when on the one side there is a positive Sentence of Damnation to work upon their fears and on the other an appearance of serious Charity to win their Affections for by this Art men of contrary Parties have with strange success served contrary Opinions and Practices I cannot if I were willing reckon all the Offences of this kind that is popular and plausible ways of deceiving But that there would be such our Saviour did not only foretell in the general when he said It must needs be that offences come but in particular also when he said Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheeps cloathing Matth. 7.15 5. To this I may add what St. Paul observes 1 Tim. 6.5 Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth supposing that gain is godliness That any thing may be defended as a part of Religion which makes for worldly Interest It is no such hard matter to perplex things that are plain to find colours for denying things that are evident to hide the weakness or the strength of an Argument to divert from the Cause to the Person so artificially as if the Cause went on still to lose the matter in debate to make Truth look like Error and Error like Truth to those that are willing to be deceived if a man is resolved to bend all his Wit this way for something may be said for any thing 6. And lastly Bad Examples of men professing the true Religion are another most dangerous Offence since I doubt most men are so framed as to take up their Opinions more easily from Authority than from other Arguments and they understand more easily the difference between good and evil Manners than between strong and weak Reasons And then they will be apt to judge of the Truth or Falshood of a Way of Religion by the good or bad Fruits of Practice it brings forth in those that profess it Which doubtless our Saviour intimated in those words Let your light so shine before men that others seeing your good works may glorify your Father which is in heaven But to hold the Truth in Unrighteousness is not only a Scandal to those that are in Error confirming them that are in the wrong way but likewise to those that are in the way of Truth by encouraging them to Sin in like manner especially when Evil Examples are set by those that are particularly obliged to set none but good ones whose Place or Office Wealth or Quality makes them more conspicuous and gives others any kind of dependance upon them And because of the pernicious Influence of Bad Examples we find St. Paul often calling upon the Christians with whom he had to do to fix their observation upon those that were good Brethren says he be followers together of me and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample For many walk of whom I have often told you and now tell you even weeping that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ Thus I have very briefly considering the largeness of the Subject shewn what Offences were to come by laying before you the principal and most obvious Offences which we know by the Predictions of the Scripture and alas for the World by too sad experience And now I proceed to the second Point which was to consider why it must needs be that Offences should come that is why it was not to be expected but that these or such Scandals as these would be given to the World And this Enquiry is necessary to be
pursued upon this account if upon no other That it may appear that the Certainty of Offences coming did not arise from any defect or fault of the Blessed Gospel of our Saviour If we consider the harmless and Dove-like Temper of Christianity the Excellency of its Design the Richness of its Promises the Divinity of its Rules and Precepts the Comforts it has in store for all honest Minds and that instead of running cross to the Interests of Mankind either here or hereafter it shews an infallible way to single Persons and to Communities to be happy in this World and to all men to be for ever blessed in the World to come we would rather have expected it should have been fortold That no man in any Age would ever set himself to oppose the design of the Gospel either in whole or in part If likewise we observe what clear and undeniable Testimonies of Divine Revelation God approved and owned it by how highly reasonable the Principles thereof are and how those things which could not be known but by Revelation yet being once revealed do satisfy our Reason and approve themselves to it How evident the design thereof is how plain the Precepts how few the positive Instructions of it are and how significant and profitable they are and how full of Instruction finally How manifest those necessary Doctrines are the belief whereof is necessary to make a man a Christian and what that Mystery of Godliness is which in the Apostles days was confessed and without controversy If we look upon these things and no farther we should rather have expected that the Doctrine of our Saviour should never have been gainsaid never perverted never mingled with Error never have given occasion to wrangling and discord and never have become the matter of nice and angry Dispute but only of an unblamable Faith and Practice The Gospel of Christ is undoubtedly a faithful Saying or Doctrine clearly revealed and standing upon evident Testimonies of Divine Revelation it is also worthy of all acceptation Why then must it needs be that offences come To which I shall give a plain answer in our Saviour's words to Nicodemus That light is come into the world and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil Joh. 3.18 and therefore it must needs be that offences should come For the Religion of Christ is not suitable to the Spirit of this World and therefore the World hateth it and therefore no wonder if it hath one way or other always sought to obstruct the Progress and Design of it In a word it is not the defect but the exceeding Excellence and Purity of true Christianity that has given occasion to the World to oppose it to pervert it and to discourage the Profession or Practice of it For it is a Religion too wise and too good for them that have no mind to be wise and good themselves and therefore considering the great corruption of human Nature which God would not over-bear by an irresistible Power but cure by rational means and methods no wonder that Offences have come nay that our Saviour said It must needs be that offences come To argue more particularly 1. The Doctrine of the Gospel is a Doctrine of Manners lays a severe Restraint upon all the unreasonable Lusts of men and makes a great many Liberties unlawful which they are for the most part violently inclined to take And therefore every carnal man while he so continues carries within himself a terrible prejudice a secret Enmity against the Truth as it is in Jesus and his Heart riseth with as much Anger against that Doctrine of God that telleth him it is not lawful for him to pursue his worldly and fleshly desires as he would but to subdue and mortify them as Herod when he took his Brother's Wife expressed against John the Baptist for saying It is not lawful for thee to have her Man's Nature affecteth a lawless Liberty and cannot endure to be confined it is diseased and cannot endure to he healed and it was therefore likely enough that very many would reject the Physician and be angry with those very Remedies that our Heavenly Father has sent The true and sincere Doctrine of Christ my Brethren if it be believed cannot but make us very uneasy and unquiet while we are conscious of Sin and are not willing to be reformed because it reveals to us the Wrath of God against all our unrighteousness and ungodliness it forewarns us of a dreadful Sentence at the last day and of an everlasting Punishment which we are unwilling at the same time to venture in which we are unwilling to part with our sins and to reconcile our selves to God by Repentance And men that are lovers of Pleasures and lovers of Gain cannot easily admit a Doctrine which gives them as much uneasiness and disturbance as if the point of a Sword were always turned toward their very hearts For this reason the Pharisees could not endure the Doctrine of Jesus and this was one reason why the Heathens opposed it and persecuted it and is one reason why Christians have corrupted it by finding out other ways to avoid Damnation than by a lively Faith and true Repentance and effectual Reformation and keeping the Commandments of God It is this that hath made way for satisfactory Commutations Merits of others and the absolute Power of the Keys and all those devices which are good for nothing but to reconcile a wicked Life to the hopes of Heaven and to entangle the plain sense of those Words of Christ He that heareth these sayings and doth them not I will liken him to a foolish man that built his house upon the sand and the winds blew and the rain fell and the floods came and beat upon that house and it fell and great was the fall thereof that is it suffered an irreparable Ruin 2. If we consider the Doctrine of Christ as it is a Doctrine both of Faith and Manners it is no way framed to serve the ends of ambitious and worldly-minded men or to help them in pursuing those ends by a pretence of Religion and therefore it was not to be expected but in process of time it would be by some or other moulded for that purpose when opportunity should serve Our Saviour taught the World no other Principles of Morality no other Articles of Faith than what were equally for the Interest of all parts of Mankind to believe and follow a common good and an equal benefit was intended in them all For let them prevail without corruption and alteration the Honour and Safety of Sovereign Princes is secured and a quiet and peaceable Life to Subjects Neighbour-Nations shall give strength and confidence instead of creating jealousies to one another the Master shall be better served and the Servant better used the Church by her Doctrine and Spiritual Authority will be a Guard to the State and receive at the same time Protection from it Here was no
design in Christianity to set up any Nation or Party of men in opposition and to the disadvantage of all mankind beside but it plainly aimed at a general good and under its Penalties requires all its Professors to aim at the same too and condemns those who are lovers of themselves in opposition to all others amongst the greatest Offenders And this Religion as Machiavel well observed was not calculated for the inspiring of men with great designs such I suppose as his Caesar Borgia aimed at It was too plain too Philosophical too Innocent and Charitable to raise an ambitious Heat or to serve it And therefore it was very likely in process of time that it should be helped out by other Principles and Doctrines that would bring in the swelling of worldly Pride into the Church as the African Fathers in their Epistle to Celestine called it and advance one part of it to the depressing of all the rest But because true Christianity serves no such design therefore was our Saviour opposed by the Rulers of the Jews his Doctrine did not tend at all that way viz. to make Hierusalem the Mistress of the World and that all should depend upon her it did not minister to their ambitious and worldly Hopes and therefore was not for their turn 3. If we look upon Christianity as a Rule of Worship it will still hold true that Offences must needs come because the Worship it prescribes is a Worship of great simplicity that has but two or three positive Institutions of Divine Authority viz. the two Sacraments and the Invocation of God through the Name and Mediation of his Holy Son Jesus Now this was not likely to be acceptable to the generality of Mankind who love rather a pompous number of Ceremonies and nice Observations than a grave and decent Administration of Worship For the former does amuse the Senses and entertain the Imagination the latter does that but very little in comparison and rather satisfies our Reason But most people are more apt to be affected with things that touch their Fancy than their Judgment And therefore it was hardly to be expected but in time there would grow very great Excesses in this kind as there did even in St. Austin's days who complained of it not a little in his Epistle to Januarius Neither could it be doubted but such Excesses would be accompanied with false Notions of Religion and of the way to please God For whereas the excellent design of our Saviour in appointing so small a number of external Observations leaving the necessary Rules of Decency to be determined by the Church was this to take men off from all pretence of placing the weight of Religion in outward Ceremonies and by their very Worship to instruct them in Piety and Virtue and to shew them that God will not be pleased without those things whereas he did hereby effectually declare That God who is a Spirit would be worshipped in Spirit and in truth that is with the Affections of a pious Heart and the Obedience that is expressed in a good Life The corrupt Nature of man is as averse from this as 't is fond of the other and desires to please God by so easy a Religion as that which runs out into a world of Mysteries and Shews and Observations and seems to save them the labour of subduing their Lusts and Passions and of serving God by a righteous and holy Life And this was one thing that made the Primitive Christians contemptible and odious to the Heathens That they had so few Rites and Ceremonies so plain and simple a Form of Divine Service but one Altar but one Mediator no Tutelar Deities and Patrons no Throngs of Petty Gods but one or two Mysteries and those too plain and instructing without Pomp and Amuzement for such Causes as these they reckoned the Christians little better than Atheists believing that a Religion which made no stately shew to be as good as none at all 'T is true that God himself appointed a Form of Divine Service to the Israelites that consisted of a vast number of Ceremonies But besides this That they were to be the Types to discover the Messias when he should appear there was another End of Divine Providence observable in that Constitution which was this That they having a Stately and Mystical Form of Worship of their own might be less under a Temptation of learning of the Idolatrous Nations round about them whose numerous and gaudy Ceremonies in their Worship would have bewitched the Jews ten times more than they did if they had not been able to vye with them But God by his Prophet said That he gave them statutes that were not good to be sure not the best in themselves but considering the time the best for them For when God sent his Son into the World who was to teach all mankind to worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth and to convert the Nations from Idolatry the Scheme of the Mosaic Worship was taken down and the Church was furnished with nothing but Prayers and Praises two Sacraments and one Mediator But by all this it appears that the design of the Gospel in this matter runs counter to the fond and foolish Inclinations of mankind and therefore that Offences were ready to come upon this account also So that considering the Temper and Design of the Gospel it was a Religion too good for a wicked World too wise for a vain and foolish World I mean it was too good and too wise to escape Opposition and all change the World would either try to keep it out or when that was in vain to attempt any longer to square and form it better to its own purposes and inclinations It was upon this account viz. of the design of the Gospel which was exalted above a worldly Spirit that a peculiar Temper was required by our Saviour in order to the embracing of his Doctrine A Spirit of Honesty and Sincerity of Humility and Teachableness love of the Truth willingness to learn patience of Reproof and the like without which dispositions the common Prejudices against Christianity would certainly hinder the Efficacy of those Arguments and Motives by which it was recommended And therefore since God did not intend by an irresistible act upon the minds of men to over-rule them into a compliance with the Gospel it was not to be expected but that it should be first of all greatly opposed as it was and afterwards insincerely handled as it hath been and this although the Doctrine of the Gospel is peculiarly furnished with means to infuse a wise and honest disposition into them that want it For those means are consistent with the liberty of Human Nature and after all men may be the worse and not the better for them Nothing could in its own nature be more fit to awaken men to Consideration and to lead them to Honesty and Wisdom and to conquer all worldly and carnal Prejudices than the
he had but now been assured of it what instruction doth this yield more readily than that no Man shall be acknowledged by God to be one that fears him but he that upon trial doth what God requires and therefore that we should not presume upon the goodness of our Hearts and Intentions towards God when our Actions contradict our Pretences It is true God sees the Qualities and Dispositions of our Minds with an Infallible Judgment but we not so certainly it is hard for us to tell what degree of Faith or Fear is proper to God's Children is justifying or saving But if in the hardest trials of thy Obedience thou dost keep God's Commandments then thou art sure that thou fearest God and because God would have thee try thy self by this Rule he was pleased to testify his own knowledge that Abraham feared him upon Abraham's ready Obedience as if he had not known it before 2. Another point of Instruction and of good use in all Ages of the World is this That God hath some Servants and Worshippers who are not hired to the Profession of serving him by the worldly ease profit and security that Religion brings and who when that expectation fails them will not turn their backs upon him to choose another Master The Devil insinuated against Job That he served God because God had made an hedge about him and about his house and all that he had on every side because he had blessed the work of his hands and increased his substance in the land but if God would put forth his hand and touch all that he had then he would curse him to his face i. e. That then he would be as profane as he was before godly in outward appearance But upon trial it proved otherwise and he retained his Integrity saying Shall we receive good at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil Job 2.10 Such another instance of this kind was Abraham God had blessed him with great Increase and Prosperity upon the leaving of his Country and there was nothing wanting to compleat his Desires but an Heir to his Blessings which God had a long time denied him and at length gave him But it might be hitherto objected against the sincerity of Abraham's fear of God and dependance upon him That he perceiving how much for the better it was that he left his Country at the Call of God and finding now that all things went well with him did therefore make profession of serving the only true God because he found that it was the way to compass all that his heart could desire in the World How therefore should it appear that he behaved himself Religiously out of Conscience of his Duty in an absolute and entire dependance upon God's Sovereign Power Wisdom and Goodness And that was a thing very necessary to be made out for the Credit of Religion in the World and to demonstrate the ingenuity and sincerity of the Righteous There could be no other way so effectual no demonstration so clear as this That Abraham without murmuring and disputing should let go the dearest of all his Possessions in obedience to the Command of God and this was the trial God made of his sincerity There was nothing that he held more dear to him than his only Son for whose sake it was that he did set a value upon all the rest of his possessions well therefore might it be said upon his ready compliance with this severe Command Now I know that thou fearest God This being as much as to say Now thy sincerity is put beyond all question and all Men must acknowledge that thou art in good earnest what thou hast all along pretended to be one that truly fearest God and who therefore dost that which is good not for worldly and mercenary Ends but because thou art absolutely resolved to depend upon God's Wisdom and Goodness in doing every thing that he requires And we must not think Brethren that this Testimony of Abraham's Faith and Sincerity was given him only for his own sake but for the sake of all Good men that should in any Age of the World tread in the steps of Abraham's Faith viz. That all Religious Men are what they are not for worldly Respects but for Conscience towards God And therefore the trial of Abraham's Faith did not only vindicate him but all God's faithful Servants to the end of the World from the charge of Hypocrisy and pretending Religion for worldly Ends Indeed he was tried in the most extraordinary instance that could be well thought of and there was this reason for it because he was to be the Father of the Faithful the great Example of Faith and Religion And it well became him who was to have so great an Honour conferr'd upon him in all Ages to undergo such a trial of his Faith as might not only be a standing Example of our Duty but a means to vindicate our Sincerity against the Reproaches of the World though we be not tried as Abraham was For if Religion in the general be charged with the Hypocrisy of compassing worldly Advantages under a pretext of Conscience we desire them to look to the Example of our Father Abraham and to consider the proof that he gave of his Sincerity and God's Testimony concerning him Now I know that thou fearest God And this is the temper and disposition of all Abraham's Children That they depend upon God's Providence not because they have a good Estate that they are righteous and just not because it is the way to thrive that they serve God not because he makes an hedge about all they have and observe the Rules of Religion not merely because they are under no unusual temptations to the contrary and the like but because believing in God and fearing and loving him in good earnest they are persuaded they ought so to demean themselves in expectation of his Favour which is better than Life and of his Rewards in a better World In short Abraham the Father of the faithful was therefore tried in this manner that there might be in him an undeniable instance of the sincerity and ingenuity of true believers to the end of the World who live in all good Conscience not expecting the profit of this World in recompence of their Piety and Justice and that Religion will secure their Bodies from Sickness their Goods from Rapine their Names from Reproach their Persons from Affronts and their course of Life from common or from unusual Troubles and Afflictions Abraham and his Children do not traffick with Heaven by their Prayers and Charity to secure or increase their Possessions on Earth And though God hath often blessed Good men as he did Abraham with strange prosperity in this World yet this was not their end nor the reason of their dependance upon God and doing his Will but they were such as they were by Faith By faith they wrought righteousness Heb. 11.33 i. e. They did that thing which
God required because they expected an heavenly Country and believed God to be a rewarder of them that diligently seek him though not always with the prosperity of this Life yet without fail with those pure and ravishing Joys of a better World which will shortly begin and never end To conclude this point It hath been very often the charge of the World upon all the Professors of Piety That in their Hearts they are as bad as others whatever their appearance be That they are as much in love with the Wealth and Pleasures of this Life as those that profess to make them their End and therefore to vindicate the sincerity of his Servants God does sometimes make them undeniable demonstrations of the falshood of this Charge These are the principal points of Instruction that are contained in the Testimony God gave to Abraham I pass on to the Second General in the Text viz. II. The Fact upon which this Testimony of God concerning Abraham was grounded which was his offering up his Son Isaac to God according to that Command which he had received Because thou hast not with-held thy son thine only son from me And here I shall briefly consider 1. The Nature of the Fact And 2. The Nature of the Trial which the Fact supposes 1. The Nature of the Fact which was his stretching forth his hand to slay his son upon the altar And all I shall say as to this matter is that God in that case did not command Murther which is a thing that he had absolutely forbidden for the Command of God made it not to be Murther if it had been effected as it was fully designed on Abraham's part God is the absolute Lord of Life and Death and can without doing any wrong take away Life at his pleasure and he may do it which way he pleases by commanding Abraham to kill his Son as well as by commanding a Fever to do it If Abraham had not had that Command his intention had been wicked such slaying were murtherous not commanded but the Command of God who hath an absolute Right to dispose of every Man's Life made it not to be Murther if it had been effected indeed This is enough for the Nature of the Fact considered in it self But 2. We are to consider it as it was a trial of Abraham's Faith and submission to God and procured that Testimony Now I know that thou fearest God And here there are these two things very remarkable 1. That God singled out his beloved Possession to be offered forthwith for a Sacrifice to himself Take now thy son thine only son Isaac whom thou lovest and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of God laid before him all the stings of so hard an Injunction Take thy son and that thine only son I know thou lovest him dearly but yet he must be a Sacrifice to me and a Sacrifice offered by thine own hand This was such a saying as that of Jesus teaching the heighth of sincere Religion He that will be my disciple must deny himself He that loveth father or mother or children on houses or lands or his own life more than me is not worthy of me For we cannot think that he who would give up such a Possession to God to wit his only Son would deny him any thing Had all his Flocks and his Herds his whole Wealth and Possessions nay had himself been called for to become a Sacrifice to God he that denied not to God his only Son would not have denied him these Here was an example indeed of absolute Resignation to God of Universal Acquiescence in his Will Here was indeed the Spirit of true Religion that Abraham counted nothing too dear for his Maker for this Command was in effect as if God had said Take now all that thou hast without exception of any thing be thou as naked as when thou camest into the World strip thy self of every thing and lay it before me to be disposed of as I please And had this been demanded had all been required he that offered his only Son would with the same readiness have parted with all his Possessions Herein therefore consisted the trial of Abraham's Faith and Obedience which the Fact supposes that when the Question was Whether he loved God above all things and feared him above all things and trusted in him above all things This one single act was a demonstration that he did Which ought to put us in mind that God requires an entire Obedience to and Dependance upon himself and the giving up our most desirable Possessions to him when his Word or his Providence calls for them and that thus we are to be disposed if we be the Children of Abraham who was the Father of the Faithful It is farther remarkable under this head that God required Abraham to do this forthwith without disputing and delaying and therefore the Command was not only a trial of what Abraham would do in an extreme hard case but also how he was constantly provided and prepared to do as became God's Servant in such a case It had not been so notable a trial of the goodness of the Man if he had had a Week or a Month's time allowed him to lay all things together and to reason out the case and to bring himself to a willingness by such arguments as the matter would bear for then it had been supposed that Abraham had not duly weighed these things before nor lived in a constant and habitual sense of his Duty which was to obey universally but in some extraordinary trial of his Obedience must have time allowed him to prepare himself for it But this trial coming of a sudden and the Command being to be executed forthwith as it was plainly demonstrated that Abraham was always ready to offer up his Son and could never have been taken unprovided to do the Will of God in the most difficult case And therefore his example doth not only instruct us that God is to be entirely submitted to but that we are to be always ready and prepared in heart and mind to do well upon the trial of our Faith and Obedience that when it happens in any notable instance we may in some measure come up to that perfection in Self-resignation to God which Abraham as far as it appears by the History of him was a Pattern of For he did set himself to part with his All without murmuring and expostulating and disputing for some such thing seems to be intimated in that saying That he rose early in the morning and immediately went about the execution of God's Command Though without doubt a Man of his human and tender affections could not but feel pain in receiving this command of God and an uneasy strugling between his Faith in God and his Affection to his Child yet it doth not appear that this delayed his resolution to
himself as much pleased with our Faith as he was with Abraham's and will reward it as effectually To sum up all The Testimony of God to Abraham's Faith was not given meerly for his own sake but for the Instruction and Encouragement of all true Believers to the World's end who when they deny themselves and do the hardest Duties and are never offended with the Will of God have I say a Title to the Testimony God gave to Abraham Now I know that thou fearest God Certainly it would be no mean encouragement to us it would raise up our minds to very great degrees of Joy and Triumph to have God say that to us that he did to Abraham but we are to remember that it was said to him once for all in behalf of all his Children that should tread in the steps of his faith This was not an Honour given to Abraham only though to him principally and in the first place it was done him also for the Credit of Religion in all Ages of the World and for the comfort and joy of all Religious and Holy Men and Women to the end of the World Wherefore my Brethren that we may come in for some share in the Praise and Reward of Abraham's Faith let there be in none of us an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God The evil heart of unbelief is the evil heart that causeth unbelief i. e. some corrupt inclination some unmortified Lust some carnal interest or other Do thou therefore in the first place when thou hast an eye upon the example of Abraham conceive how much thou art obliged to take thy sin thy dearly beloved sin whatever it be and slay it that is the first Sacrifice thou canst offer to God to wit a broken and contrite heart an heart clean from worldly and sinful Lusts Do this and thou wilt find nothing too dear for God thy Faith will then make thee to be entirely at the disposal of his Will and Pleasure it will justify and support thee in so doing and the God of Abraham will be thine exceeding great reward The Seventh Sermon MATTH XV. 1 2 3. Then came to Jesus Scribes and Pharisees which were of Jerusalem saying Why do thy Disciples transgress the Tradition of the Elders for they wash not their hands when they eat bread But he answered and said unto them Why do ye also transgress the Commandment of God by your Tradition THough never Man was so unreproveable in his Doctrine and Example as our Lord Jesus yet never was Man more opposed or cavilled at as the Evangelists do abundantly testify in that History of him which they have written for us being upon the matter made up of the Holy Doctrines which he delivered the Good Works in which he was always employed and the Contradictions which he continually met with And it was very necessary that some instances of the last should be recorded for our sakes that they who profess the Truth as it is in Jesus should not think it strange if they happened to meet with such opposition as their Master did and likewise that by his Answers to the Cavils of his Adversaries they might be instructed how they should defend themselves afterwards against the like Objections One instance whereof we have in the Text I have now chosen to speak to Then came to Jesus Scribes and Pharisees which were of Jerusalem c. As to which words I shall not need to say much concerning the Persons that our Saviour had to deal withal because their Character is so well known to all that diligently read the Gospels The Scribes were the Men that professed to Teach the Law and expected to have all their Interpretations received as Oracles The Pharisees were the most subtle and prevailing Sect amongst the Scribes for though as things were in that Age and for some time before the Scribes generally agreed in corrupting the Law and deceiving the People yet they had their Parties and Factions among themselves the Pharisees in our Saviour's time being a Sect of the greatest Power in the Council and of the greatest Reputation with the People and whereas it is said that they were the Scribes and Pharisees or the Scribes of the Pharisaical Party which were of Jerusalem that came to Jesus the meaning is that they were such as kept their Schools in the City of Jerusalem and were therefore of the first rank amongst the Pharisees And now I shall discourse to you of these two things First Of the Objection which these Men made against Jesus and his Disciples Secondly Of the Answer which our Saviour made to the Charge that was laid against them I. Of the Objection which these Men made against Jesus and his Disciples Why do thy Disciples transgress the tradition of the elders for they wash not their hands when they eat bread A Charge laid with as much confidence as anger and therefore they scorned to put any of his Disciples to answer it and thought fit to challenge the Master himself about it Now the first thing that is proper to be considered here is 1. The nature of the Charge which seems to be a general one illustrated by one particular instance The general Charge was That the Disciples of Jesus transgressed the tradition of the elders The particular instance was That they transgressed such Tradition in not washing their hands before meat As to the general Charge they had transgressed the tradition of the elders But what was the Tradition of the Elders The Tradition of the Elders was the Doctrine that had been delivered and the Rules that had been laid down by Wise and Great men and universally received in former Ages One would think therefore that the Laws of Moses and the Rules of the Prophets and whatsoever was commanded in the Scriptures had been the tradition of the elders for all these things had been delivered down by an uncontroulable Tradition from hand to hand for near Two thousand Years But there was no such meaning under these words as they used them By the tradition of the elders or by the ancient Tradition of Wise and Great men they meant no Doctrines or Rules for Faith or Practice that were expressed in the Writings of Moses and the Prophets but such Doctrines as not being written in the Law were delivered down by word of Mouth and by constant usage from Father to Son and so from one Age to another And thus Josephus tells us Antiq. 13.13 That the first and main Principle of the Pharisees was that they denied all those things to be written which concerned Religion The Fundamental Rule of their Sect was this that there was a double Law an Oral Law and a Written Law A Law delivered from Age to Age by word of mouth as well as a Law delivered in such Books as had Authority from Moses and the Prophets To gain reverence to these Traditions they persuaded the People that though they were not written in the
worse but still crushed all Impostures and discountenanced all Villany and Hypocrisie at its first setting out in the World where would be the Patience and Faith of the Saints of those that believe in God and take his Word for their Rule and their Comfort and live in the Expectation of his Promises But when Iniquity grows and thrives and can plead Prescription and Authority when it hath stood long enough to have some colour for Antiquity and hath obtained interest enough to pretend to a kind of Vniversality then it will be seen who they are that love God and Truth and Goodness that are not willing to be deceived that will take pains not to be deceived that will take pains to be rightly informed that prefer Truth before glorious Names and a good Conscience before Applause and Flattery and eternal Life before the Ease and Pleasures of this World God bears long with all the Provocations of Mankind for the same reason that he permits Heresies which is that they who are approved may be made manifest For these and such like reasons as these God in his Wisdom and Goodness bears with infinite Patience those Provocations for a long time together which he could be avenged of in a moment and which he utterly abominates which was the first Observation upon the Text. 2. The second was That God is so much the more just in the final destruction of incurable and obstinate Sinners when their Iniquity is full and ripe for Vengeance For as there was the Patience of God seen for four hundred Years together while the Iniquity of the Amorites was growing from bad to worse so at the end of that Period the Justice of God was seen when their iniquity was full To grow worse for the forbearance of God is the most criminal Presumption in the World and when Men are come to that pass as quite to forget that there is a God or believing him to be to perswade themselves That he either approves or at least connives at their Impieties then the same Wisdom and Goodness which hitherto had kept off their Punishments will bring them on swiftly and suddenly for as on the one side if the degeneracy and the impudence of Sinners should not be suffered to flourish long there will be no Tryal of the Faith of honest Men so if it should be suffer'd to last always the Temptation would at length grow too hard for them God exercises his own Patience that good Men might exercise theirs at length he shews his Justice to reward their Patience The Patience of God is a forbearance guided by Wisdom and Goodness and the Justice of God is a Severity that is also guided by Wisdom and Goodness And neither the one nor the other hath any mixture of that Selfishness and Passion which is for the most part the reason why we sometimes are and sometimes are not severe with those that have offended us This is the true Justice of Punishment to respect the evil that is committed and to punish for that reason and this appears in no instances more than when God punishes after long sparing for if he had been a selfish or a passionate Being he had never suffered Men to go on so long together in the most provoking ways of wickedness because he had it in his Power to Punish them long before as he punishes them at last and therefore that he punishes them at last is an effect of his Wisdom and Goodness and a Demonstration that the common good required it And as there are several good ends to which God's Patience tends in bearing with general Impieties so long as he often doth so there are as many to which his Justice tends in taking Vengeance of them at last For 1. This is a Demonstration that his Providence was not asleep before 2. It is a clear Instruction that Men ought not to presume upon God's Favour merely because they prosper in their ways but that they should measure his Love or his Anger by what they do and not by what happens to them since they who do the same wicked things may go unpunished from one Generation to another and in this World but one Generation may suffer for them 3. That we should not forget to call our past Sins to remembrance and to humble our selves before God for them since if God punishes the sins of the Fathers upon the Children in this Life the like cause have we to fear that he will punish the Sins of our Youth and our riper Years at the latter end of our Life 4. That we should make use of the Patience and long suffering of God to our selves to prevent his Anger from flaming out against us because otherwise we treasure up Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God The truth is these are the uses we ought to make of both those Considerations that I laid before you from the Text which I shall therefore inculcate again And 1. We have no reason to question either the watchfulness of God's Providence or to be cast into perplexities and doubts whether the way of Truth and the way of Error the way of Vertue and Piety and the way of Hypocrisie and Wickedness are so different from one another as is pretended in Religion we have I say no reason to perplex our selves about these things because for many Generations God hath suffer'd deceit and violence to prevail to spread and to flourish in the world for God is not as a Man his ways are above our ways and his thoughts above our thoughts when we look abroad into the World and look back upon so many past Ages wherein Religion hath been made a formal pretence for the establishing of a worldly greatness and Dominion upon gross and palpable Errors supported by Fraud and Force it is foolishly done of us to disquiet our selves with doubts whether we are in the way of the Truth or not since it pleased God for so long a time to suffer the contrary to prevail mightily in the World and for some Ages to baffle all opposition For this is to suppose God to be such a one as our selves impatient of high Indignities and great Provocations ready to kindle upon any notable affront or however unable to bear repeated and long-continued injuries No doubt if our opinion had been asked the Luxury of the old World should have been mortified by some amazing Judgments and the Flood should have been spared the Idolatry of the new Race of Mankind had been prevented or at least by some irresistable Evidence of God's Displeasure banished long before the coming of Christ and Mahomet should either have never appeared or he should have glared only like a Comet and so gone out instead of founding so vast and so long an Empire as it seems he has done But let us leave God to rule the World and be content that he should rule us we are too angry and too passionate to say
fail to punish the Wicked nor to protect the Righteous Brethren let us remember our Profession which is to believe in God and consequently to believe that we are not made safe by Wealth or by Favour by worldly Power or by worldly Policy but that God is more to us than all these things and that we depend intirely upon him that by forsaking him we forsake our Strength and Defence that by adhering to him we have that Power for our Security and that Goodness for our Security which made the World and which governs the World Let us then in this our day consider the things that belong to our peace and seek the Lord while he may be found and call upon him while he is near that he may be near unto us in all our Troubles and Adversities whensoever they oppress us and be found of us at the hour of Death and the day of Judgment that God of Mercy and Love which in himself he always is and which he desires to shew himself to be to us all Let therefore the unrighteous man forsake his ways and the wicked man his thoughts and turn unto the Lord for he will have mercy upon him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon To the God of infinite Goodness let us ascribe all Honour and Glory now and for ever Amen The Twelfth Sermon LUK. XIII v. I tell you Nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish COncerning the Galileans whose Blood Pilate mingled with their Sacrifices and the Eighteen Jews upon whom the Tower in Siloam fell and slew them our Saviour's Discourse to those that were present was this Suppose ye that these Glileans and these Jews were Sinners above all the Galileans because they suffered such things and above all men that dwelt at Jerusalem I tell you Nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise peperish From which Words taken in Connexion with what went before there are two kinds of Observations that may be laid down The former are rather supposed than expressed and they are these Two 1. That God is just in the Punishments that he inflicts upon Sinners 2. That by what means soever Evil happens to Men the Providence of God is concerned in it The second kind are intended more directly viz. 1. That they who suffer very great Evils are not always greater Sinners than those who in the mean time suffer nothing 2. That one reason why such Evils do nat befal all Persons at the same time who are equally Sinners is That while some are visited with the Rod others may take warning by it And 3. That if they do not take warning they shall not escape These are all profitable Instructions and such as this place naturally yields which I shall therefore pursue without taking much pains to shew how they are contained in it Something I shall say but very briefly of the two first because they are supposed in these Sayings of our Lord though not the main things intended The first is that Punishment is due to Sin which is the Ground of all that our Saviour discourses here concerning the Ends of those unhappy Men he knew that his Hearers would be apt to pass an hard Censure upon them and he took care to prevent it but they would never have been in danger of running into that extreme if it had not been fixed in all of them That Punishment was due to Sin and this our Saviour was far from correcting but rather confirmed them in it by concluding That they also should perish except they repented The Truth is this is one of those things that Men know by Nature and it is well that they do for if notwithstanding this Sense the World is so bad how much worse would it have been if these apprehensions could have been extinguished Hence it is that the Conscience of well-doing inspires a Man with assurance and that Guilt makes him a Coward that the disasters of others expose them to be hardly thought of and that our own Afflictions bring our old sins to remembrance The Natives of Melita though they were Barbarians yet when they saw a Viper fasten upon St. Paul's hand presently concluded That he was a murderer whom though he had escaped the Sea yet vengeance would not suffer to live Acts 28. There the natural Sense of Punishment being due to Sin wrought though they carried it too far But with something better reason did Joseph's Brethren when he had brought them into distress argue with one another Verily we are guilty concerning our Brother therefore this distress is come upon us Gen. 42.21 It is this natural belief that supported many Mysteries of Religion every where in all Ages of the World whether those Mysteries were of God's appointing or of Man's inventing A good part of the Sacrifices and Rites of the Heathens and the Jews in their Worship was to make expiation of Sin and the Beast was killed to confess that Punishment was due to that Man for whom it was offered It is this Sense that disposes Men to believe strange Delusions that there is vertue in little things which seem to he no better than Charms to take away the guilt of Sin and to prevent the Punishment of it When people wear Habits and go Pilgrimages and touch Relicks and apply Holy Water and twenty other such Remedies to themselves for the ease of their Minds tho' they take a silly way to their end yet the Principle is good at the bottom That Sin and Punishment are linked together and that one naturally draws on the other if some method be not used to break the Chain which belief is so troublesom to a guilty mind that for this reason the generality of Men are naturally disposed to like a Religion so much the more for having great variety of Reliefs for an uneasie Conscience which is the true reason why Mankind if good care be not taken are ready to run into a thousand Superstitions To prevent which and to bring us into the way of Salvation God sent his own Son into the World to be a Sacrifice for us that we having so great an assurance of the expiation of our Sins should chearfully set our selves to the Reformation of our Hearts and Lives and serve God without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life This is the first Observation That the Principle upon which all this Discourse proceeds is a natural Truth viz. That Punishment is due to Sin 2. That by what means soever evils befal Men it still comes by the Providence of God either directly sending it or at least knowingly permitting it and for wise and good Reasons determining to permit it This also is evidently presumed in this Discourse for upon the relation of those disasters the minds of the hearers presently turned to this Conclusion That they were very great Sinners that suffered such things and consequently that the evil was sent by a just and wise
wanting to maintain it When all Flesh had corrupted their ways God came and swept away Mankind with a Flood and saved Noah to be the Father of a new and better Generation When their Prosperity had corrupted their ways he called Abraham forth to preserve true Religion in him and in his Family and these and the like Providences are Pledges of the same care to interpose in behalf of Truth and Righteousness when the Faithful seem to fail from among the Children of Men. While God seems to let the World alone and to suffer all Men to go on in their own ways as if he took no notice of them nor were at all concerned at what they did he is all the while trying and proving what they are not indeed for his own Information for he knows all things but for the instruction of those that are to come after If he at every turn should interpose when we think it needful we should very seldom know who are sincere and who are Hypocrites it is very fit that it should be sometimes seen whether Men are what they pretend to be whether indeed they are concerned for that Truth for which they have once pretended a mighty Zeal whether they are governed by Conscience as they say or by mere worldly and politick Considerations for such Discoveries as these are very instructing and serve for the bringing about of much good in the World and in the Church which we may reasonably presume to be one cause why when the Son of Man comes he will find but little Faith upon the Earth because while he suffers the World to go on as if he minded it not he is trying those that pretend to Faith and upon the Tryal many are discovered not to have it In short Divine Providence is so far from being regardless of the Affairs of Men that it then most of all shews it self when Men are tempted to think that it regards nothing i. e. when there is but little Faith to be found in the Earth and this will be abundantly demonstrated at the close of all things that is at the Day of Judgment which will be the most convincing Act of Providence that ever was in the World and one Forerunner of it will be that Question Where is the promise of his coming And now the use of all ought to be that which is the declared intention of our Saviour in the beginning of the Parable And he spake a Parable to them to the end that men ought always to pray and not to faint For the true Ground of Prayer is Faith in the Providence and Promises of God and if there be no time when these fail then ought Men always to pray and not to faint i.e. they ought always to depend upon God's Providence they ought always to believe his Promises they ought always to be certain that their Prayers are heard and will turn to good account for them that God is gracious to all and much more to them that love and serve him and if they do all this then they will always pray and not faint i.e. and not be discouraged And if they ought always to pray then also when they are most apt to be discouraged and when there is but little Faith to be found upon the Earth nay then most of all because when Temptations to Unbelief are greatest we should the most of all strengthen our selves by recourse to God and dependance upon him To this Instance in Prayer there are two things must go 1. A stedfast Resolution to walk in all the ways of God and not to be diverted out of them by any worldly Interest whatsoever For he can have no Faith to go to God who thinks of taking care for himself without regard to his Duty to God A Man is not in a condition to seek the Favour of God or to commend his case to him that contrives how to shift for himself without him 2. A perfect resignation of himself to the Will of God for by this also it is that a Man entitles himself to his Favour and Blessing The most effectual way to obtain the particular Blessings we pray for at any time if they are such things as may prove evil as well as good for us is to leave the matter after all to the disposal of Divine Providence for then if we obtain them we get his Blessing with them too if we do not we are sure to get his Blessing without them which is the general thing we pray for always With these Dispositions we are in a fit case to present our Prayers to God for Spiritual Blessings for our selves and for the Church of Christ which will assuredly come accompanied with Temporal ones too if it be best for us and if God sees that it is better for his Church to be prosperous than to be afflicted in this World and then it is better so to be when Men are sufficiently prepared for it by God's Correction and their own Repentance Men ought therefore always to pray and not to faint for their Prayers thus qualified will not fail of obtaining what they ask which our Saviour thought good to illustrate by an Example in the Parable delivered before the Text viz. of an unjust Judge that neither feared God nor regarded man who nevertheless upon the importunity of a Widow did what was right in her case much more shall God hear the Prayers of his faithful Servants For 1. He is the Just God and is of himself ready to right those that do at any time suffer wrong 2. He is also the merciful God that regardeth Men and when we desire things of him that are needful he is of himself ready to grant what we ask or at least that which is more needful than what we ask 3. Whereas the Judge in the Parable seem'd to contemn the Poverty and Meanness of that Person that sued to him for Justice for which reason she is represented here to be a Widow one of a destitute Condition that wanted a Patron to assert her Right God who is Just and Good to all is particularly gracious to his Servants and esteems them highly and no Circumstances of Meanness and Distress which he suffers them to fall into can alter his Favour towards them for all which Reasons if the Judge in the Parable granted the Widow's Suit merely because she lay upon him and was troublesome to him much more will God to whom we are never troublesome when we make our Requests known to him grant what we ask because he is Righteous and Gracious and loveth and pitieth us as a Father doth his Children The Fourteenth Sermon AN ASSIZE-SERMON PREACHED at St. Maries in Bury 1678. Levit. XIX xii Ye shall not swear by my name falsly THE Religious Use of an Oath depends chiefly upon the Matter and the Discharge The Matter must be worthy of that Obligation which an Oath implies in promising it must not be unlawful that we may swear in Righteousness
whose time Mankind was grown to such an intollerable degree of Licentiousness That God sent the Flood to sweep all away but eight Persons Now it is not to be thought that the World was overspread with such monstrous Vices all of a sudden but that after the manner of all Humane Degeneracy Corruption of Manners and of Principles too came on by degrees and consequently that in Enoch's time who was translated little less than a Thousand Years after the Creation there was a very great decay of Piety and Virtue every where that Men were generally bewitched with the Pleasures of the beautiful and charming place which the Earth was before the Flood and forgot their Creator and had lost the Sense of that infinitely better World which Adam and the religious Patriarchs had by revelation from God given them assurance of In such an Age as this when for the Reason now mentioned it is evident that the generality of Mankind were sunk into Debauchery and perhaps into Infidelity too Enoch was a steddy Pattern of Piety and Virtue and whilst most Men walked after their own Lusts and the best were much to blame he walked with God and lived above the Pleasures and Enjoyments of this Life having God before his Eyes and another Life and a better Life in his Hopes It is therefore very reasonable to conceive that God intended by this surprizing Testimony of translating Enoch alive into a better World to convince the unbelieving to awaken the inconsiderate and to call off that Voluptuous Age from these bruitish Debaucheries to mind better things and to prepare for a better Life especially since in the second place 2. This was a very instructing admonition That God who is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him as the Epistle to the Hebrews says upon this very example of Enoch that God I say rewarded his Piety not with giving him a longer Life in that pleasant World but in another which was therefore a place more happy and desirable than the Earth was even in that delicious state and condition of it before the Flood had made as strange an alteration in that as it made in the Age of Man's Life That God I say should take him alive out of this World when it abounded with all manner of Delights and Pleasures and this at the Age of 365 Years when he was but a young Man as the World was then younger in proportion than we are now at 30 when he was in full Vigour and Capacity for all the Entertainments of Sense which the Earth afforded even to Luxury and this according to the course of Nature to last for some Hundreds of Years to come That God should translate him under these Circumstances to another Life after he had served him with a constant Piety in his younger Years and lived among Men with an unreprovable Innocence and Vertue this I say was a demonstration to all that would consider it That that World to which he was translated was a better World than that from which he was taken and that they might be sure to understand this Instruction God took him not away by the common means of Mortality since if he had died that vicious Age would have imputed that change to any thing rather than to a divine Providence rewarding so excellent a Man with so early a removal to a better Life and therefore he was taken away alive that they might not be able to question the Power that did it or to mistake the Reason why it was done that they might know Enoch had obtain'd a Reward from God suitable to that Life that he had lived here and to that Faith by which he had lived and in which he had wrought righteousness being removed from hence to Pleasures more pure and ravishing than all this World can afford In a Word They might have seen and for some time it is like they acknowledged it though they soon fell back again That the great Business of Mankind here is to live in all Godliness and Honesty and that God doth not reward them that do so with the Pleasures and Glories of this World but with the Enjoyments of a better And now having said thus much concerning the extraordinary Character of Enoch and the singular end it pleased God to make with him in this World I have yet more to do by way of Application and that 1. To propound the Example of Enoch and such as he was who walked with God to our imitation And 2. To propound though not the manner yet the substance of his Reward for our Encouragement to walk as he walked 1. To propound his Example as an Example that is of it self worthy of our imitation and is withal an imitable Example an Example that is worthy to be followed and an Example not too hard to follow that it is worthy of our imitation appears both from that Life to which his Faith led him and from the Nature of that Principle it self by which he lived As to the Life whereunto it leads it is made up of whatsoever things are just honest lovely of good report if there be any vertue praise of Justice Faithfulness Temperance Government of Passions Wisdom and Fortitude which are the Glory of Humane Nature and things acceptable to God and approved of men These things are enough to recommend the Principle from whence they come And yet 2. It is in it self the best whether we consider 1. Our concernment in those things which we believe For if there be a God what is our dependance upon this World to our dependance upon him And if we shall endure beyond this Life and that for ever what are our Fortunes till we die to our Eternal state after Death It is not our mere Nature but our Relation to God that makes us considerable and we are very abject Creatures if we have nothing to do but eat and drink and to live a sensual Life for a little time and then to vanish into nothing Or 2. Whether we consider Faith as a Persuasion grounded upon rational Evidence that is such Evidence as requires a free and unprejudiced and clear Judgment to perceive but which not bearing upon the Senses of Men distinguisheth between the Wise and the Honest on one side and unteachable Persons on the other A Believer doth of all Men make the most proper use of his Reason because he assents to the Principles of Religion For instance That there is a God not upon immediate bodily Sight but upon a means of Conviction suited to a reasonable Nature Or 3. Whether we consider Faith as a means to secure an happy Enjoyment of our selves in this World of which I need to say no more that it is the only true Support of Man's Mind under all the Afflictions and Calamities of Life and that which can make us easie under them will make us happy in every condition that the Example of these Men who have lived by Faith and walked with
God is worthy of our Imition is a Subject that might be spoken to without end But let us consider it 2. As an imitable Example For that it is so the Pattern mentioned in the Text doth abundantly prove Enoch lived in a World that was full of Temptation and those as dangerous as Temptations can possibly be the Temptations of Luxury which in their kind are inferiour to none and as to their degree when Enoch lived they were at the height and as I have shewn already he had bad Examples enough and probably but very few that were good So that Piety lay under great disadvantage in the common Opinion and likely enough it was a matter of some reproach to observe Rules for that Generation of Men was now began of whom we find in the next Chapter that God saw that the wickedness of men was great in the earth and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually They set themselves at no time to do any good all their business was to follow their bruitish Appetites from one day to another without restraint the World was hastning apace to that Condition when Enoch lived and yet he lived so piously set so good an Example as if he had never seen any but good ones himself and whilst almost all Men were busie to fill themselves with the excess of sensual Pleasures his only business in comparison was to please God he looked up every day to his Maker out of whose Hands so lately came that beautiful Fabrick which was made for Man and instead of surfeiting himself with those delightful Entertainments of Sense that were round about him he raised his mind above them to the Contemplation of the Power Wisdom and Goodness of God he offered to the Creator of all things the Sacrifices of Praise and Thankfulness he resign'd himself wholly to his Will and Pleasure he believed his Promise of a better World and in that Faith he wrought Righteousness And what can be said why we who cannot reasonably count our Temptations greater than those he was under why we I say should not also live as he did Why should the Government of our Passions and the ordering of our Conversation by the Rules of Religion be harder to us than it was to him What should hinder us from adoring and praising our Maker every day and from offering our Prayers and Supplications to him Why should not we consider that God is present with us every where and sees us in all that we do that we may always behave our selves as in his Presence May we not with as much advantage as he possibly could have look beyond this World and compare it with Immorality in a far better State of things than this and set our affections upon things above and not upon things on the earth Especially since we have not here a continuing place I mean since we do not expect to live hardly the tenth part of that time upon Earth which the Patriarchs did before the Flood but all our days are few and evil and our Life short and troublesome and therefore doth of it self admonish us to look after another and to provide better for our selves hereafter than we can possibly do here Let no Man say That the Baits of Pleasure and the Cares of Life and the multiciplity of his worldly Affairs that the evil Manners of others and the Snares of Conversation and his unavoidable Engagements in the World will not permit that Justice and Purity that Devotion and Sobriety which Religion requires nor that consideration of God and another Life which is necessary to keep us unspotted from this present world That for this purpose we must retire out of the World and live in Cells or in Houses where there is nothing else to do but to watch and pray where the Cares of Life cannot follow them where evil Examples and where Temptations cannot find them out All this is but unreasonable and vain pretence For I beseech you what was Enoch and his Profession and Order of Life in the World Was he shut up from any part of common Conversation or eased from any part of the common Cares of this Life No by no means he in all respects of Secular Conversation and civil Relation was in the very same Condition that other Men were as you will confess if you look back to verse 21. and so on till you come to the Text And Enoch lived sixty and five years and begat Methusaleh And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methusaleh three hundred years and begat Sons and Daughters And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years And Enoch walked with God c. By which you may see that Enoch who had this Testimony was a married Man and for that reason engaged as much in the necessary Affairs of Civil Conversation as any other and we do not find that after he begat Methusaleh his eldest Son he left his Wife and his Family and betook himself to any retirement and was from that time forward under Vows of single Life it is expresly said that Enoch walked with God after he begat Methusaleh three hundred years and begat Sons and Daughters So that all this time viz. for three hundred Years of which it is said that he walked with God Enoch was the Husband of a Wife the Father of Children the Master of a numerous Family nay he was a Prince in his Generation the seventh from Adam in the Line of Seth the eldest Son by descent from the eldest House of Seth one therefore who in his time made no little Figure in the World and was deeply engaged in the Affairs of Government beyond all others excepting his Father and Grandfather and the Patriarchs that were yet alive Enoch then differed not from other Men in any respect of Civil Affairs he had such Relations and common Engagements as other Men had and in some respects more being descended from Seth in the Patriarchal Line which some believe was the Regal Line too in one Division of Mankind But tho' in these Circumstances he differed not from other Men otherwise than that his Affairs might be more Cumbersome than those of ordinary Persons yet with respect to Religion and Virtue to Faith in God and an Holy Life he differed very much from the generality of Mankind for in the midst of all that Business and Conversation which his place in the World engaged him in he walked with God he was a perfect Man and grew to that heighth of Piety and Righteousness that God thought fit to reward so eminent a Person with translating him alive from Earth to Heaven a plain demonstration against the pretences of the Roman Church That retirement in Monasteries and a single Life are not necessary to the highest degree of Piety that the best part of Religion is not to be coop'd up in a Cloyster but to be seen in the World and in the ordinary
either to correct what is bad or to perfect that which is good in us the best reason of our rejoicing concinues still which is that God still exercises a Paternal care over us as a Father corrects the Faults of his Child because he loves him and would have him do better for the time to come We are therefore to take all in good part the evil as well as good that comes from God's Hand because 't is all meant in good part to us Especially if we consider 5. That he is not and cannot be mistaken in judging what kind of Evil or what degree of Evil is expedient for our good Let that which happens be of what kind it will and how great soever it be in the kind yet from his infinite Wisdom we ought to conclude against all Objections That all things considered it is the best for us We perhaps no not see how it should be so but we have not the less reason to believe it God's thoughts are above ours and his ways above our ways and we are not to argue as if we understood our selves as well as God understands us Our business is to submit to him patiently and to depend upon him intirely and to thank him from our Hearts for his continual Providence over us acknowledging that we are not fit to be humoured in all our Desires neither to enjoy Pleasure longer than he sees 't is for our good nor to say with what pain we should be chastised or with what Trouble we should be exercised we are not wise enough to be our own Chusers and we cannot be better than by being in God's Hands 6. We should take Evil at God's Hand in good part because he is not wanting to supply us with strength to bear it and to support us with comforts of a better kind than those he takes away If he makes us more conformable to his Will we get a better Conscience than we had before and that will of it self enable us to go through many and great Troubles of this Life If he lessens our Love of this World and increases our Faith and Hope of a better Life and fixes our thoughts upon Heaven more than they were wont to be if he inspires us with a greater sense of his Love and gives us more and more of his Holy Spirit then although here are worldly Evils to be born yet there are also such spiritual Consolatives to support us under them that we have more reason to be thankful than to complain God will not suffer us to be tempted above what we are able but will with the Temptation c. So the Apostle assured the Christians and were themselves Examples of it none ever went through greater Troubles and Persecutions than they but they do not speak of themselves as Objects of Pity He says they were strengthned with all might according to God's glorious Power unto all Patience and Long-suffering with joyfulness Col. 1.11 They were indeed troubled on every side yet not distressed perplexed but not in despair persecuted but not forsaken cast down but not destroyed sorrowful yet always rejoycing 1 Cor. iv 8. vi 10. 7. We are to consider that the Troubles of this Life are not always Punishments but sometimes Trials In which case they admit of great Comforts and therefore St. James says My Brethren count it joy when ye fall into divers temptations James 1.2 where by temptations he understands those Troubles that from time to time befel the Christians for their Profession and proved their Sincerity for so 't is explained in the following Words knowing this that the tryal of your Faith worketh patience Such were the Afflictions of Job as we see by the circumstances of his Story God had given this Testimony to him That he was a perfect and an upright man one that feared God and eschewed evil But Satan answered Doth Job fear God for nought Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his House and about all that he hath on every side Thou hast blessed the work of his hands and his substance is increased in the land But put forth thy hand now and touch all that he hath and he will curse thee to thy face Thus the Devil charged Job and in him all Religious Men That his pretence to Piety was meer Flattery not proceeding from a hearty love to God but from the love of worldly Prosperity Now though the Event shewed the falseness of the Devil's Suggestion yet thus far he was in the right That affliction tries whether a Man be a meer mercenary pretender to Religion or whether he be an upright Man fearing God and eschewing evil For he that pretends Religion pretends to serve God and to depend upon him in all conditions of Life and that God is more to him than all the World besides But the reality of this can never be so well seen as when we do his Will and bless his Name even when he deprives us of the good things and sends us the Afflictions of this Life We should therefore receive evil from God's hand as well as Good though we were as perfect as Job was in fearing God and eschewing Evil because though it does not befal us in such a case as a Punishment yet it comes as a Tryal and there are weighty Reasons for Patience under it For 1. It is exceedingly for the Honour of God and Religion if we acquit our selves well in bearing it This shews the Sincerity and the Power of our Faith and that Religion is a Principle of the truest Fortitude and Fidelity when no worldly loss nor outward pain can hinder us from blessing God and persevering in our Duty the World will see that we are very sure we serve a good Master and one whom we believe nothing ought to deter or discourage us from obeying not Death it self nor Vexations worse than Death Hereby we declare that without all this Worlds good he alone is sufficient for our Reward that there is no evil like losing his Favour no good like keeping it 2. It will make also for our own Comfort for although without this a good Man may have reasonable assurance of his own Integrity i. e. by an equal Care to do his Duty in all respects while God makes an Hedge about him on every side yet it cannot be denied that he must needs have yet a more comfortable assurance of it when he goes on to depend upon God under the hardest pressures of Affliction For this is the highest Point of Religion and therefore proves our Sincerity in all the rest Upon this trial we cannot doubt but that it was for God's sake that we abstained from Drunkenness and Theft and hard dealing and Lust and Uncleanness that in pure Conscience and with pious Affections we offered up our daily Prayers and blessed God for all his Gifts and observed his Laws For no other Principle can make a Man persevere in religious dependance upon him when he
themselves allow That there shall be a resurrection of the dead And herein do I exercise my self to have a conscience void of offence towards GOD and men St. Paul and such as he believed all things that were written in the Law and the Prophets those very Writings which the Jews themselves acknowledged to be Divine and tho' to this Faith they added the Doctrine and Practice of a good Life yet they were esteemed Hereticks because they undertook to see with their own Eyes and to judge for themselves instead of submitting to the Authority of the Council that had betrayed and murdered the Lord Jesus 2. They were accused of Sedition too as if they designed to make Stirs and Commotions and to alienate the People from theia Governours Thus when Paul and Silas had converted a multitude of Devout Greeks and not a few of the chief Women at Thessalonica the Jews who believed not moved with Envy took unto 'em certain lewd Fellows of the baser sort and drew some of the Brethren to the Rulers crying These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also who do contrary to the decrees of Coesar saying That there is another King one Jesus Acts 17.5 6. And yet they never made one step by Word or Deed towards deposing Princes and changing Governments Jesus indeed who had commanded them to pay Tribute unto Caesar had also forbidden them to be of the Religion which Caesar was then of and this was drawn into an accusation of Faction and Disloyalty Thus also the same St. Paul being brought before Foelix at Jerusalem the Jews complained by Tertullian their Oratour That they had found him a pestilent fellow and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world and a ring-leader of the sect of the Nazarenes Acts 24.5 3. They concluded them under a sentence of Damnation as far as they could do it Indeed they would have it thought so impossible for a Christian to be saved that some of them after being converted to Christianity were strongly persuaded that they still ought to keep the Law of Moses and would have mingled Judaism and Christianity together as if there was no hope of Salvation out of the Synagogue Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses ye cannot be saved Acts 15.1 4. As 't is usual in such Cases to damn first and then to kill they delivered the Disciples of Christ to death and pretended the service of God for it For which we may take those remarkable Words of St. Paul describing the Temper of the Jews then and what his own once was Says he I was taught according to the perfect manner of the Law of the fathers and was zealous toward God as ye are at this day And I persecuted them even unto the death binding and delivering into prisons both men and women Acts 22.3 4. And in chap. 26. v. 10 11. he declares That he persecuted them oft in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme and being exceedingly mad against them he persecuted them even into strange cities Such was the entertainment they had from the Jews to whom the Word of Salvation was first delivered But when it was carried amongst the Gentiles they condemned it too For 1. It was run down as if it had brought Irreligion and Atheism into the World insomuch that the ancient Apologists were fain in good earnest to set themselves against this absurd Accusation and to shew that it was not all one to serve God at all and not to serve many Gods That there might be Devotion without bowing down to Images and Religion and Worship without Idolatry and better a great deal without these things than with them It was exclaimed against as a late upstart Religion that began but yesterday and was fitter to be hissed than argued out of the World They used to ask the Christians what sort of Men they could name either Greeks or Barbarians that made their Profession and had their Rites and Worship before Jesus appeared You have forsaken say they the Customs of the Fathers that had been observed of old time in all Cities and Countries you have revolted from a Worship which has had the Tradition of all Ages and the Approbation of Kings and People Law-makers and Philosophers and by almost all the World till such as you appeared who are but of yesterday 3. They try to overwhelm it with the most gross and palpable Untruths they gave it out that the Christians were Worshippers of the Sun nay that they adored an Asses-head and sometimes a Cross They did not stick to say That in their solemn Assemblies they kill'd a Child and committed Incest They also upon no occasion in the World disarm'd them as a seditious and disloyal People and accused them of Treason tho' none ever set better Examples of Fidelity to their Governours To conclude Our Predecessors of the Primitive Church were now and then condemned to several sorts of deaths and it was often a great deal more safe to be some notorious Malefactor than to be a Christian In a word The Gospel met with that Opposition which no Religion ever did before The Gods of other Nations new Gods every day were admitted into a Temple at Rome with some formality and without trouble But when the Disciples of Jesus came to call Men to the Worship of the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he had sent Jews and Gentiles conspired to extinguish their Religion and to blot out their name for ever insomuch that the Jews at Rome could tell St. Paul As concerning this Sect we know that it is every where spoken against Those therefore whom God justifies have been and may be condemned by Men Which will not seem strange to any of us if we consider what the Causes of it are For instance 1. That hatred of truth which reigns in a great part of Mankind They cannot bear sound Doctrine nor can they therefore bear those that profess and practice it Truth is against them and therefore they will be against the Truth and all that follow it So long as Pride Lust Avarice Revenge Luxury and such things remain there will be so many Causes of condemning that which God approves To which we must add 2. The inflexibleness of true Doctrine and of those that maintain it to the designs of Worldly Men. Christianity was said to be a perfect Scheme of Religion that would suffer no additions or alterations It was stiff and would not bend to the Pleasure of Priests or of States-men as all that would which the Heathens called Religion among themselves Whilst it was kept in wise and honest hands and truly represented there was no room for Cheating no Allowances for pious Frauds no place for convenient Inventions Innovations could not be brought into the Faith of Christians or the Substance of their Worship but they would be corruptions of both without tampering with it it could not serve the ambition of a
little Faith in the Earth The World will be in a careless Posture as it was before that the Flood came and took them all away And for the same reason there is but little Faith in the Earth when God enters into Judgment with the World for the Violence and Iniquities of Men and asserts the Cause of Innocence and Rightousness against them for in all such Cases the Temptations to Unbelief and Apostacy are very great and likely to prevail upon many of those that believe so that this is the meaning That in such a wicked Age as calls for the coming of the Son of Man the open Enemies of God which are the greater number will be void of all regard whatsoever to his Word and to his Providence or if they take any notice of it it is that of the Scoffers mentioned by St. Peter Who will say Where is the promise of his coming Many of his professed Servants will be weary of depending upon him and give way to Temptations and depend more upon the arm of Flesh Than upon the Promise of God and the Faith of many good Men will be very much weakned and abated so that when he cometh he will find but little Faith upon the Earth And thus I perswade my self to have given you a true Illustration of these remarkable Words of our blessed Saviour and that upon the two significations of the Son of Man's Coming which seem to be both intended in this Text and indeed it is very hard to know which was principally intended the day of the general Judgment or the Destruction of Jerusalem The day of general Judgment is in it self the principal meaning of Christ's Coming and therefore ought not to be excluded but yet the Parable with the Application of it being manifestly intended to stir up that Generation to pray to God and not to faint and to give a firm Faith to the Promises of God notwithstanding the great troubles they were like to meet with from the unbelieving Jews therefore neither could the coming of the Son of Man to be avenged of these his Enemies and to deliver his Servants be excluded but was as directly intended as the other And now I proceed to observe the two main Points which the Text supposes besides those which it affirms and the considering of them will not a little contribute to a more perfect understanding of this place 1. It is supposed manifestly that after the first Coming of Christ to call the World to repentance and to be offered up for our sins there would yet be degenerate Ages sometimes and a most corrupt state of things before his second personal Coming to judge the World 2. It is also supposed that his Providence would then appear to set all things right when there was the greatest need to interpose in behalf of his Church 1. That his first coming would not infallibly prevent the degeneracy and corruption of future Ages For notwithstanding that evidence of Truth which he taught many false prophets would arise and deceive many and notwithstanding the Power of his Doctrine iniquity would abound and the love of many would wax cold And notwithstanding both these advantages yet his own servants would sometimes be reduced to that state that it should be needful to them to cry unto God day and night which is a matter that may cause some wonder if we do not consider the reason of it That the Principles and Manners of Men were so often and so generally corrupted before the Coming of the Son of God into the World is that which might not appear strange at all to those that consider the weakness and folly of Mankind That after the Creation the Earth should so abound with luxury and violence that God swept all Mankind away with the Flood but eight Persons That after Noah's Family had peopled the Earth again Men should fall into Idolatry so universally that God called Abraham out of his own Country and entred into a particular Covenant with him for the maintaining of the true Worship in his Family and Posterity That Pharaoh should oppress the Israelites after his Country had been saved by them That the Israelites should fall to worship other Gods after that the true God had wrought so many miraculous Deliverances for them That when not without much ado they were cured of Idolatry they should fall into scandalous ways of Hypocrisie and Immorality These and the like things perhaps are not so much to be wondred at because God had not as yet used the last means to instruct Mankind and to oblige them to Piety and Vertue but that there should be Times as bad as the worst of those after Christ himself had appeared in the World to die for Sinners and to bring the Doctrine of Salvation to Mankind with the most convincing Evidence that could be desired and with the most powerful Motives that could be thought of that notwithstanding all this Oppression Violence Fraud Hypocrisie Error Superstition Idolatry and scandalous Examples should for some Ages reign no less than before the times of Christ and to that degree as to shake even the Faith of good Men and if it were possible to deceive the very best of all this seems to be an amazing Consideration and tho' the noble Examples of Christian Piety and Vertue that have appeared in the World and the assured Expectation of a larger Progress that Christianity will make in the Earth and of better Effects that it will produce may answer the Objection yet that the World that the Church should be so bad under the last means is what may raise some admiration But you are to consider That when our Lord first came into the World he came not to establish a Religion which should either by its Truth convince or by its Power reform Mankind whether they will or no but what was sufficient for both purposes if they would be wise and honest and suffer the Concernments of eternal Life to prevail with them above their worldly Interests and therefore there was as much reason to expect an universal Reformation as to expect that Men would not resist the Evidence of Truth in Matters of the greatest concern to them in the whole World but to bring them to this the Gospel was furnished with no irresistible means but left them under the natural liberty they had before with a provision of Grace that might be resisted and therefore it was in it self likely that the Truth would be opposed by some and corrupted by others and by many held in unrighteousness that several to whom it was propounded would not believe it and several that believed it would not obey it and in time that it would be mixed with Errors and Superstitions and framed to the Designs of Ambition and Covetousness nay the better and more Divine a Religion that of the Gospel is the more violently it would be opposed by some and the more certainly corrupted by others So that if we
consider the Excellency of the Gospel with the Purpose of God not to overbear the World into the Faith and Obedience of it by forcing the natural Liberty of Men it had rather been much more strange if it had escaped opposition and corruption than to have been both opposed and corrupted as it hath Thus our blessed Saviour himself and his Apostles foretold that it would be Take heed that no man deceive you for many shall come in my name saying I am Christ and shall deceive many many false Prophets stall arise and deceive many and if any one shall say unto you Lo here is Christ and there is Christ believe it not for there shall arise false Christ's and false Prophets and shall shew great signs and wonders insomuch that if it were possible they should deceive the very elect Behold I have told you before Thus he foretold how Christianity should be corrupted by Impostures and Frauds Again says he They shall deliver you up to be afflicted and killed and ye shall be hated of all nations for my names sake and then shall many be offended and shall betray one another and shall hate one another Thus he foretold the violence that should be used to extinguish the Profession of the Truth Again saith St. Paul 2 Thess 2. There shall be a falling away and the man of sin shall come with all deceiveableness of unrighteousness in them that perish because they received not the Love of the Truth that they might be saved And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie that they might all be damned who believe not the Truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness Theâ—e he foretels a fearful Apostasie from the Purity and Simplicity of the Christian Profession Again says he 2 Tim. 3.1 2. This know that in the last days perilous times shall come For men shall be lovers of their own selves covetous boasters proud blasphemers disobedient to parents unthankful unholy without natural affection truce-breakers false accusers incontinent fierce despisers of those that are good traitors heady high-minded lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God There he foretels a terrible corruption of Manners And again 1 Tim. 4.1 2 3. The Spirit speaketh expresly says he that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils speaking lies in hypocrisie having their Conscience seared with an hot iron forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the Truth Now lay all these things together and here is as plain warning as can possibly be given of most corrupt and degenerate Times even after Christ's first coming and so that is expresly foretold which the Text evidently supposes For here would be glorious Pretences to deceive Violence to compel and wicked Examples to offend the Disciples of Christ And what Provision hath our Lord left to secure them from being misled where there is so much danger They are to attend to the Doctrine which he delivered us at first by his Holy Apostles to secure themselves from being deceived they must lay to Heart the Promises of the Gospel to arm themselves against the Temptations of the World and the Power of evil Examples and they are to consider that all these things were foretold by our Lord himself and his Apostles that they might not be scandalized when they should happen nor be tempted to suspect that either Christianity was not of God from the first or at least that our Lord has neglected all care of it since because it doth so little good as yet in the World because it runs out into so many Errors and because the Truth of it is so vehemently opposed for says our Saviour Behold I have told you before But still it is in their power whether they will take warning by such Predictions and whether they will guard themselves against Errors and Evil Examples and therefore a very corrupt state of Things in the Christian World will in all likelihood shake the Faith of many Believers and cause some to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them not regarding the admonitions of Christ and his Apostles before-hand And so when Christ comes he will find but little Faith upon the Earth And this is the Observation which in the first place is unavoidable from the Text That even after Christ there would be degenerate Ages for this is plainly supposed as the cause why there would be but little Faith found when he should come to visit the Earth for the Iniquities and Offences it abounds with The 2. Supposition is That the Providence of our Lord would then appear to set things right when there was the greatest need to interpose in behalf of his Church For whereas it is said When the son of man cometh shall he find faith on the earth It is intimated manifestly that his coming is then to be expected when little Faith is to be found amongst Men and consequently when Scandals and Temptations are so strong that it is an hard matter to bear up against them I have said already that the Evidence of Christianity doth not make all Men receive it and that the Power of Christianity doth not make all that receive it wise and good Men and it is not to be denied but that amongst Christians themselves there are as monstrous Errors and leud Examples as ever there were in the World before Christianity or as there are now where Christianity is not at all professed Now at this rate should the Lord of the Church our Lord Jesus Christ let things go as they would it would in time come to pass that nothing of Christianity would remain in the World but the name of it and that for no other purpose but to do more hurt with it than could be done without it But how is it that Divine Providence will interpose or according to the expression of the Text that the Son of man will come and will make good his Promise of being with his Church to the end of the World which is never more remarkably fulfilled than when he interposes in those Circumstances which make Men think that he will not interpose and that he is not at all concerned what becomes of the State of Religion or the Affairs of the Church Because our Lord hath not made the Gospel an irresistable means of convincing Vnbelieuers and reforming wicked Men therefore it would in time be needful that in order to the keeping up of true Religion and making Christians such as they ought to be that he I say should by his Providence correct his own Disciples and reduce wretched Mankind into an unavoidable necessity of consideration that Truth and Righteousness should not utterly fall from among the Children of Men. When there is the greatest danger of losing the true Profession of Christianity our Lord will not be