for that which is changeable therefore he is said to be unconstant base and earthly that is a simple poore base creature which made himselfe according to his prime originall and studied and gaped after the things of the earth out of which he was extracted He had indeed better things if he would have used them but he was so stupefied and drawne back to his inferiour part that hee was made like unto his first materialls the earth But the other was from heaven not because he had not a body from the earth but because to that body was added a glorious divinity and that his body was not a person as Adams was For if the manhood of Christ had been a person he must have beene lyable as all persons that are borne to condemnation but his was not a person but a nature united to the second person in the Trinity so that although there be two natures in Christ yet there is not two but one person and the actions that come from any man they are the actions of his person of the subject and not the actions of his nature For it is a man that speaks and a man that works and not the body of a man that speaks or the soule of man So therefore it comes to passe that the actions that come from Christ they are the actions of his person not of his humane nature but of his person and so they be the actions of God and man That is of that person in the Godhead that took the manhood unto it and so they are made the actions of an infinite merit and possibility Herein then is the difference that although Adam had a soul as well as Christ yet he had onely a living soule that could enliven no body but himselfe but the Lord had a Spirit that is the Deity it selfe which is able to give life which is the fountaine of life to all the world And although Christ had a body from the earth yet that body was not left unto frailty but was governed and sanctified and glorified by the beatificall vision of God and by the presence of the incorporate union of the Sonne of God So by this comes the difference between them the one was a man and nothing else but from the earth the other was more then a man God and man and so he is the Lord from heaven 3. In respect of their qualities The third difference is in their quality and condition which is noted in this word hee was a Lord. Therefore Adam came not as a Lord he came as a servant he was to serve in all purposes he came to till the garden to till the earth he came to eate and drink to beget children to be the father of a family Hee came into the world to increase and multiply as God commanded him Gen. 1.28 to replenish the earth These although they be faire courses and God gave a blessing unto them yet they be carnall and fleshly there is no respect of excellencie in these things they are matters rather of necessity for the present solace in this world then of glory But Christ came not for this purpose He came not to eate and drink but his meat and drink was to doe the will of his Father Iohn 4 34. He had no generation all his generation is a spirituall regeneration he came to doe God service these were the things he was exercised in Therefore he was the Lord from heaven This is the high prerogative of Christ There were many Angels that came from heaven as well as Christ but they came not as Lords but as servants as fellow servants Rev. 22.9 as in Rev. 22. when Iohn would have worshipped the Angel See thou doe it not saith hee I am thy fellow servant Heb. 1.14 And in Heb. 1. they are ministring spirits that serve for the salvation of those that are elect and chosen for the inheritance Therefore they came not downe as Lords but as servants And although we reade in Scripture of those that came downe as Lords as in the apparition to Abraham Gen. 18. he called the Angell Lord. Gen. 18.3 And the Captaine of the Lords Army that appeared to Ioshua though these came in the glory Ioshuah 5.14 and might of the Lord yet they were not that Lord as here it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lord that came from heaven For that Lord is but one Lord Heb. 1.2 which is the Sonne of God to whom the Father hath given the inheritance of all things Heb. 1.2 hee is the heyre of all things and the Iewes themselves confesse Come let us kill him this is the heyre Mark 12.7 and the inheritance shall be ours Hee then is the Lord from heaven Adam came not as a Lord nor yet from heaven but one onely part of him his soul without any conjunction of the divine nature there came a changeable soule into a fraile body but Christ the Lord from heaven that is the Sonne of God as being Lord of hell and heaven invested himself in a strange and wondrous manner into the body and wombe of a Virgin and tooke that masse and lump of blood whereof his blessed body should be compacted and united it to himselfe and exercised the power of miracles and of gracious wonders and all parts of perfection in that nature and therefore he hath exalted our nature high above the Angels nature for he took not upon him the nature of Angels Heb. 2.16 but he took the seed of Abraham Lastly in their qualities they differ that as the first man came from the earth and is a servant so he is earthly There are two parts of man as the Philosopher saith there is the mind and the understanding that is the subtile and divine and fiery part of man whereby he is appropincate and drawes neere unto God in the similitude of his Image There is another and that is the grosse and materiall part Chrysost as St. Chrysostom expounds it that this earthly man is one that is dull and grosse and nayled and tyed to these things that are present whereas the other 2 Cor. 4.18 is heavenly and altogether upon the things that are not seene for the things that are seene are temporall but them that are not seene are eternall So then the one by his condition was still looking downward the other was all spirit and full of vigour full of life alway looking upward still unto heaven his conversation was also heavenly having given all his followers power to have their conversations there Phil. 3.20 Phil. 3. But our conversation is in heaven from whence wee looke for the Lord Christ who shall change our vile bodies and make them like unto his glorious body So this is the Comparison of these two heads which that I may conclude this point wee must observe very strictly For by that meanes we may be both able to keep out all contrary
intercepted by death Austin And Nebridius S. Austins great friend was not baptised till he was old and S. Austin himselfe was not baptised till his mans estate This errour God confuted by the death of Valentinian and other great spirits which although they were perswaded of the truth of religion yet they put off God and would not take his time but have a time of their owne choosing and therefore God gave them no time as Ambrose saith of the Emperour he wanted not the grace of baptisme because he had the faith of baptisme He yeelded his consent unto the truth and although he went away unbaptised yet he was truely baptised as one who in his heart yeelded to the faith and promises of Christ And if we should take it thus this is the sence of S. Paul in these words what shall they doe that are baptised for dead that is when they are ready to die and goe out of the world if there be no resurrection his argument followes that that which they did so late they would not doe it at all that which they did by constraint putting it off to the last time of their life they would not doe it at all except it were for the hope of the resurrection so that if there be no resurrection there is a maine frustration and a meere delusion of these men that suffer themselves so farre to be overgone with deadly sicknesse as that they looke every houre for death and yet then they take upon them the baptisme of life as a certaine pawne and pledge of the common resurrection This sounds somewhat like a truth but yet it is likely that the Apostle would have condemned this as well as the other being as ridiculous because this is injurious to God and to the Sacrament and pernicious to mens owne soules to tempt God whether he will give them a time of their owne choosing to put off the Sacrament that should be imbraced upon all opportunities to refuse it when God offers it which we should take thankfully and chearefully No doubt but the Apostle would have confuted this errour as the former and not have suffered the Corinthians to have beene so tardy in a point of salvation Wherefore I take this opinion not to be according to the Apostles minde for as I sayd that opinion is most probable and most agreeable to S. Pauls meaning that proves the strongest but this proves nothing that because a man that is driven to it in extremity at the time of his death to doe an action that therefore that action should bee of force that may be done in amazement and feare or by the instigation of others a man it may be is not lead to it by his owne will so much as by the perswasion of another and there is no reason that a man should ground upon such a weake stay to inferre such a strong conclusion The third opinion What shall they doe that are baptised for the dead that is for the forgivenesse of sins which are dead workes For so indeed the Lord seems to signifie when he saith God is not the God of the dead but of the living and also the Apostle when he saith ye were dead in sinnes and trespasses It is true our Saviour Christ includes in that speech both them that were dead naturally and them that were dead spiritually For in one place he saith God is not the God of the dead but of the living speaking of naturall death In another place let the dead bury their dead speaking of them that were dead spiritually and so we may apply it that those that are baptised for dead that is for remission of sinnes wherein the body and soule are dead and for the quickening and reviving of them by spirituall grace But this is too farre off for the Apostles meaning is not here to speake of a thing that is common that being common to all beleevers to be baptised for the remission of sinnes but he speakes of some peculiar baptisme that was not common to all in generall but belonged to some in particular Besides the Apostle speakes not here of the spirituall resurrection but of the corporall he speakes not of the rising from sinne to grace although it be true that they that are baptised are baptised for the remission of sinnes yet it is not proper here for the Apostle speaks of the resurrection of the flesh the spirituall is allegoricall which is from the death of sinne to the life of grace by repentance Therefore that proves nothing and is not likely to be S. Pauls minde for he purposed not to spend his time in trifles but to bring the validity of his arguments directly to conclude the cause Another opinion there is that hath many great and substantiall followers They that are baptised for the dead that is that are baptised into the death of Christ Iesus to be planted with him into the similitude of his death And this hath Chrysostome Theodoret Aquinas Calvin and many other great Divines for the Authors and followers of it And that you may see that it hath some similitude of reason in it looke in Rom. 6.4.5 Rom. 6.4.5 Doe you not know saith the Apostle that they that are baptised into Christ are baptised into his death therefore we are buried together with him in baptisme It is true that every man that makes profession of the faith of Christs baptisme among the rest of the articles that he professeth he must beleeve in Christ that was dead and buried that he was crucified and that he descended into hell and that he rose againe the third day c. And he professeth also that he is ready to dye for Christ when he shall be called to it and till that time come that he will dye spiritually in his heart and in his will to worldly affections which he knowes that Christ never had in him or had any liking to them but utterly abhorred them Therefore this being the symbol and badge of our profession it seemes from hence that every man that is baptised may be said to be baptised for dead that is for a dead Christ in whom he trusts which was dead but now is alive and behold he is alive for evermore Apoc. 1.18 He is baptised for dead that is to the world and the flesh that he may live for ever unto God Chrysostome proves this by an argument that hee thinkes fit and convenient for the purpose for saith he whether of the two is easier to raise the body from death or to raise the soule from sinne no doubt saith hee it is an easier matter to raise the dead body from the grave than to raise a soule that is dead in sinnes and trespasses to newnesse of life And behold saith he in the Romans the Apostle proves the one by the other that although we thinke it easier yet he intimates that that which we thinke to be easier is harder and that which seems more hard
proud thou dust and ashes which art nothing else but a masse and lump of poore rottennesse and putrifaction Take heed lest as thy outward man corrupts daily that the inward man be not corrupted to For there is no corruption like that when a man hath a rotten heart that is the most wofull putrifaction Take heed therefore to thy soule that though thy outward man be like it selfe corrupt 2 Cor. 4.16 yet thy inward-man may be renewed daily in holinesse and righteousnesse to serve the living God that thou mayst procure peace to thine own soule It is sowne in corruption It is raised againe in Incorruption Blessed be the God of Incorruption that although our bodies of themselves be subject to fade and molder away yet it is but for a season for that the Lord hath promised them another state which is incorrupt And although wee cannot understand how it shall be by looking upon these earthly bodies for we see every thing comes to nothing and is dissolved yet the Lord hath given us a signe of it in the starres of heaven which are incorrupt They are uncorrupt even in our common sense and experience for they be not mixed as these elementary bodies be they are not of such a grosse composition and therefore they stand in the firmament in their state and place as they have done from the beginning We have also a sign of it in the Angels which are uncorrupt also and in the soule of man that hee carries within him which is likewise uncorrupt These are emblems of that incorruption that God will worke upon our bodies also It is true the body that is tainted with sin it cannot be otherwise it must be a slave to corruption it is bound over to corruption it is full of putrifaction and it must needs say as Iob Job 17.14 I will say unto rottennesse thou art my mother and to the worm ye are my sisters and my daughters and my kinsfolke Yet the Lord hath made in these spirits and he will waken these bodies wherâ— he cleares and frees them from sinne he will make in them an eternall vigour and the everlasting influence of his goodnesse and grace shall keep that sweetnesse for ever after that it is once infused into it And this incorruption shall come to the bodies of the Saints three waies First by the goodnesse of the matter Secondly by the singularity of the forme Thirdly by the gracious assistance of the efficient cause First for the goodnesse of the matter The Lord shall make that a sollid lively and vigorous matter that shall never againe be subject to frailty as the body was before by sin that as the Indian or China dishes the earth and clay that they are made of is buryed certaine yeares in the ground that so it may ripen and be brought to that colour which after it comes to be capable of So the blessed God will bury these corrupt bodies under the ground to bring them to be a matter fit for his stamp and image to be set on which shall not be corrupt as the former was but shall remain full of strength and vigour and full of life and sweetnesse to indure for ever And then secondly for the forme The forme of man shall be all one as it is now and the matter to onely it shall be refined but the soule then shall be of such absolute power over the body that it shall command it every where The body shall yeeld a full obedience and the soule shall command with a full authority and it shall be so furnished with new abilities with new knowledge with new desires with new Zeale that it is impossible for any temptations to passe as they doe now Now sometimes the soule tempts the body and sometimes the body tempts the soule and they doe mutually work each others subversion but there shall be no such contrariety then but the body shall be for the soule and the soule for the spirit and the spirit for God that God may be all in all Therefore I say in that blessed world they cannot sin men that live in this flesh cannot but sin but God shall restore that blessed life that it shall not possibly sin nor conceive of sin that is with any inclination to sin For it is impossible for any man that is well in his wits that he should desire to be murthered it is impossible for a man that loves his wealth and riches to desire that a man should rob him it is impossible that such thoughts should come into the mind of a man that is well advised so it is impossible for the soule and body in that new world that ever they should have any delight to goe from God For then it were possible for a man to desire to be murthered or for a man to desire to be robbed of his wealth for to goe from God is for a man to lose his treasure to lose his life to lose his wealth to lose all his quiet and contentment and there is no man that would lose these Therefore as these earthly things doe so affect us that we cannot abide to be bereft of them much more then shall God so affect us that wee shall not indure to think of any separation or going from him As the Apostle saith Rom. 8.38 39. What shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Iesus Shall fire or sword or hunger or cold or nakednesse or life or death nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of God iâ— Christ Iesus Thirdly and lastly this incorruption shall be in respect of the gracious assistance of the efficient cause This indeed is the cause of causes this is all in all For though God make a glorious matter and habilitate it with an excellent forme yet notwithstanding if it were not for the continuall influence and pouring in of that glorious life every thing that is made may be marred againe As St. Basil St. Basil saith Everything created is convertible and may be turncal The Angels themselves they live not upon themselves nor they live not upon necessity but by the will and grace of God therefore they are immortall Nothing hath immortality properly in it selfe but God alone as the Apostle saith 1 Tim. 6. To God 1 Tim. 6.16 who onely hath immortality That is who onely hath immortality of himselfe and of necessity hath it and cannot but have it All others have immortality by a dependant grace Here is the chiefe reason of our incorruption because God shall fill us with the sweet water of his river of incorruption which shall continually keepe us in our youth and in our glory and strength and in that state that he hath bestowed on us and the worke that he hath begun he will finish and follow it with his continuall assistance This is the reason why we shall be incorrupt For because of sinfull flesh the Lord permits it here to fall
a spirituall body So it is also written the first Adam was made a living soul and the last Adam was made a quickning spirit It is sown in weaknesse it is raised in power THe earth is Gods store-house whereinto he commits his treasure even the bodies of his Saints the Temples of his holy Spirit saith Tertullian Tertull. God hath made the earth to be as a ware-house therein to lay his commodities and from thence to require fetch them forth againe The sowing of these earthly bodies is manifest to us all but the raising of the seed that is sowne and the comming in of the harvest that is locked up and hid in the chambers of eternity in the omnipotency of God And there is no way for us to have accesse and to look into it but by the eye of faith whereby while we live in this flesh wee have a little peeping as it were through the key-hole to see a glimmering of the happinesse and of the gracious promises consigned unto us in Iesus Christ The things that here are spoken of the sowing of the body are so commonly knowne as that there is no man that calls that in question It is sown in dishonour it is sown in weaknesse It is sown in misery and mortality and the Apostle concludes all It is sown a naturall body but it is raised againe a spirituall body And because hee might seeme to offend some eares that never heard of that distinction that there was such a thing as a spirituall body for if it be a spirit then it is no body and if it be a body then it is not spirituall these things imply a contradiction Therefore the Apostle proves that which he had said he makes good his distinction and tels them There is a naturall body and a spirituall body And this hee proves out of the heads of them both out of the two maine Fountaines of mankinde the two Adams The one working to misery to sinne and to corruption and destruction and the other working to grace to obedience and to eternall glory And hee saith The first of these was made a living soule but the second was made and ordained a quickning Spirit The first was made to live to have life himselfe but he could not give life to another yea and that life that hee had was but mortall and fraile But the second Adam was made to have another kind of life and to be all spirit intending spirituall things and he was not onely able to live in himselfe but to give life to all his followers to quicken all them that belong unto him Yea although they be dead in their graves although they be dead in sins or dead in the damps of conscience yet hee is made a quickning Spirit to rouse and to raise them to the happinesse of the children of God This is the summe of the words read unto you To proceed in order There needs no great distribution or division of the Text because the words are nothing else but the probate of that which the Apostle had spoken before He proves it by the Scriptures that there is such a difference as a naturall body and a spirituall body The Scripture he brings is in Gen. 2.7 Gen. 2 7. where it is said The Lord breathed into Adam the breath of life and so Adam or man became a living soule or a living substance In the order of the words there are two miserable properties that remain to be spoken of touching the bodies of the Saints Division into two miserable Properties That they are sown in weaknesse That they are sown meerly naturall But the glory that God shall put upon them shall be in the highest contrary They shall rise in great strength and they shall be raised in a spirituall nature in a spirituall quality and condition 1 Property Sowne in weaknesse Concerning the first that the body of man is sown in weaknesse every man seeth there is nothing more weak and despicable then that all the whole life of man being nothing but a world of weaknesse as it is the prerogative of God to be Almighty so it is the miserable quality of man to be all weaknesse When he comes first into the world there is nothing more weak then he when he growes in the world the least fitt of disease of an ague any kind of opposition whatsoever will defeat him and bring him on his knees to such a degree of weaknesse and infirmity that he shall scarce support and sustain himself And even those that are the strongest of men that are strong to poure in strong drink Esay 5.22 as the blessed Prophet I say saith that spend their time in ryot those men doe soonest bring upon them this fatall weaknesse and none end so foule as they because though they seeme to struggle with the infirmities of nature and to overcome and transcend them for a time yet that inherent weaknesse which is in the flesh rebounds upon them and works them at last to nothing to the foulest expiration that can be Nay those noble spirits which as Tiberius was wont to say that there were some spirits in the world that account their businesse to be their solace their businesse and labour they account it comfort and consolation to them yet these men pluck and call upon themselves a greater weaknesse then other men so that the life of man whether it be base and degenerous or whether it be noble and spritely is nothing else but weaknesse If a man will doe nothing but sleepe out his time hee shall be surprised at length with base weaknesse If hee be vigilant and use the time that God hath given him to the highest and best purpose he is still overtaken with weaknesse and especially when the conscience of sin works upon a man there is nothing so weakens him as that doth Psal 39.11 When thou chastisest man for sin thou makest him like a garment that is moth-eaten And as the Prophet David saith by reason of my sinnes my bones are rotten and corrupted and all my ulcers stink there is no health in my body Psal 22.14 15. by reason of the sinnes of my soule My heart within me is like melting waxe I am broken like a pitcher like a broken vessell I am like a bottle in the smoak The conscience that God hath left in man to be his factor brings a weaknesse incomparable there is nothing that can be equall unto it But chiefly when all these meet together as in some they doe and when old age begins to rivle the face and to draw the complexion into furrows which was largely extended unto beauty and when the tresles and powers of the body begin to faile and the last terme and period is at hand then there is a wofull spectacle of weaknesse Even when a man cannot goe nor stand upon his supporters but hee reeles and falls when hee cannot taste his food nor smell nor finde
in Luthers explication Saith he the bodies of the Saints shall be so strong at that day that they shall be able to remove Churches out of their places with their finger they shall be able to play with mighty mountaines as children play with tennis-balls His meaning is that they shall have a mighty and infinite power to work upon any thing that God shall set them about or that shall be expedient for them But these kind of speeches and discourses are explanatorie and are rather for recreation then for men to subscribe unto and yet it is most sure that their working power shall be great and admirable and although it shall not be infinite yet it shall be as neare to infinite as can be devised For whatsoever it shall please God to put in their minds to effect they shall be able to doe it and nothing shall make resistance Thirdly some other of the Fathers and of the later Writers Beza Calvin as Beza and Calvin expound it thus It is raised againe in power that is it is freed from the necessities of nature which is weaknesse For the life of man here in this world must be sustained by mennes it must have meat and drink and sleep and rest and an intercourse and change of things there must be physick and medicines to cure his diseases Now at that day the Lord shall so temper the body that it shall be able to live without meat and drink and it shall alway watch without any necessity of sleepe As St. Austin saith in his 5. Tome the 13. Book Chap. 23. Although the bodies of the Saints shall have power to eate and drink in that world yet they shall not stand in need of it they may doe it if they will but they shall have no dependancie upon meat and drink as now they have in this world So it shall rise a strong body That little strength that men have now is maintained by meat and drink under God they have no way else to preserve it and if a man fast sixe or seaven daies he must needs die presently because nature can indure no further abstinence and besides that old age is comming upon him although his meat be most delicate yet notwithstanding the power of digestion so far failes him that he is notable to concoct it and transmit it into bloud and nature as he was wont to doe and especially if his meat grow coorse or his fare be abated then wee know that the best and most singular strength in the world must fade and failâ— For commonly according as the Commons are so is the strength so our life is a meere dependance upon second causes next under God God gives meat a power to nourish and meat by a secondarie meanes nourisheth whereby it comes to be assimilated and made like unto the body and so we live and as meat growes worse or is taken away so the body impaires and when for a long time it is not able to master the meat and to digest it into the substance of the body then likewise the life is impaired and falls But the strength that the bodies of the Saints shall then have it shall be without these dependances the children of God shall be able to live and to keep their strength and vigour and fulnesse and perfection without any of these helps of second causes and although they may stoop to them when they will for variety yet they shall have no necessity of them Aug. Lastly as St. Austin saith in his 3. Tome 13. Book Chap. 26. this strength saith he that the Apostle speaks of I take to be specially this that whereas now of these earthly bodies of ours Mat. 26.41 the Lord Iesus saith the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak and the Apostle saith Rom. 7.19 The good things that I would doe that I doe not and the evill things that I would not doe that doe I Saith the holy Father I take the meaning of that place of Scripture to be this That whereas now the strongest part of man the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak and as a dull asse the Lord shall then prepare it so that he shall proportion and fit the horse to his rider that to the soule which is the rider and commander of the body hee shall give a horse of metall that shall be able to carry it to all actions whereas now it jades and tires upon every good thing The spirit here is willing but the flesh is weak but there shall be so perfect a concord and subjection of the flesh to the spirit that it shall goe hand in hand and shall hold pace with the soule the flesh shall be as willing to doe God service as the spirit and there shall be that wondrous transmutation of qualities that it shall seem rather a flesh made of spirit then otherwise For so it followes in the Text It is sowne a naturall body it is raised a spirituall body It is sowne a naturall body 2. Property Sowne in weaknesse it is raised a spirituall body This is the last difference of the 4. and in this is comprehended the summe of all For hee comprehends in the first word naturall all defects and all weaknesses and infirmities and in the word spirituall he comprehends all perfection and augmentation that God shall give in that day Saint Austin saith Aug. Beza a naturall body is a mortall body Beza saith it is a body subject to mutation a changeable body A bodie it is compounded of elements by a soluble composition A bodie that bows to the earth that goes to the center according to its owne naturall inclination A bodie that must at last bee resolved into its principles and as it is made of Elements so it must goe to Elemenâ—s againe This is a naturall body and thus we know it is with every body in the world For though there must be a change of them that survive when the Lord shall come and that they shall not have this dissolution that our bodies must have yet that change that they shall have shall bee in stead of this dissolution and who knowes in what kinde it shall bee and with what paines it shall bee No doubt it shall bee no great prerogative above us and although they shall not die and goe unto the earth as we doe yet they shall be full of pangs and horrour as the deaths of common men are For it is the nature of this body being animal and having no better a principle whereby it lives then the soule to dissolve and come to its owne principles dust to dust to come to ashes and earth according to Gods decree working upon this flesh of ours It is sowne therefore a naturall body that is subject to change and corruption But now see the hand of God on the other side It is raised a spirituall body This is that wherein the Apostle comprehends all the rest to perswade that
written in expresse words yet by the Spirit of God and by the demonstration God gave unto the world of Christ the later part was written as well in the mindes of men by the finger of the Holy Ghost as the former part was written in Gen. 2. But I take it the best sense of it is this and so the later Divines hold that the meaning of the Apostle is to make a comparison that as it is written the first Adam was made a living soule so I averre that the last Adam was made a quickning spirit So that the word It is written is to be understood of the first part onely and not of the later but the other I averre by the Spirit of God and by the power of the Gospell So that there is no man that need doubt of it hereafter but that there is infinite difference between the first and the second Adam To come to the sense of the words because I have been too troublesome in this I will be briefe The first man was made a living soule As if he should say he was made in a mutable changeable manner of perfection and it was in his owne free will to have stood and kept close to God if he would have been constant For then he should never have died But because hee would be trying conclusions and fall from his Maker therefore hee was animal a living soule although God made him for another purpose if he would have kept the place God set him in Secondly he was made such an animal as stood in need of second causes hee stood in need of meat and drink of rest and labour and sleepe and such things as these Thirdly he was made a living soule not a life-making soule living in himselfe but not giving life unto others But the Sonne of God was made a quickning Spirit not onely to have life in himselfe but to give life unto all his followers So that Adam took life but he could not give it Christ took life as being man from the Deity and he gives it as being God not onely the life of nature but the life of grace and glory And so he became in every thing a quickning and glorious Spirit The first Adam was made a living soule That is worldly minding the world looking to the earth he was to dig the earth to delve in the garden he was made for that purpose and for other worldly purposes Toward the center was his aspect but Christ was of another making hee was all for spirit all for heaven and heavenly affaires for the businesse of his Father for the reclaiming of soules for the pardoning of sinnes for the working of miracles for the gracious concurrence of those sweet principall meetings of mercy and truth which meet together in him So that the difference by this time appeares manifestly It is said Adam was made a living soule that is to have life in himselfe but not to diffuse and extend it to any other Christ Iesus was made the author of life and of all that we all hope for and pray for of life eternall of happinesse and glory But here are divers questions to be resolved which I will but propound and name unto you and so passe them ouer Quest 1 First it may be demanded because it is said that Adam was made a living soule and that Christ was made a quickning spirit whether Christ were not a living soule as well as Adam and whether Adam were not a quickning spirit as well as Christ And certainely these things are true if we take them in their kinde they be both true For Christ was not onely made a quickning spirit but he had a body as Adam had and hee was a living soule as well as Adam And Adam was not onely made a dull and dumpish thing given unto worldly matters but he was made a quick although not a quickning spirit Therefore for the first we must understand that it is true that the Lord Christ was made a living soule as well as Adam For there is a grosse errour of Eunomius Eunomius which thought that Christ had no reasonable soule but that his Divinity was his soule that it was in stead of a soule and that hee had no other soul but that This is a monstrous abortion for if Christ had not taken our whole nature hee had not saved our whole nature Now the best and chief part of our nature is the soule and it was the soule chiefly and principally that Christ came to save Therefore it is certaine that he tooke our soule as well as hee tooke our flesh and so was made a living soule as well as Adam And it appears also by this in that he had two wills in him as he had two natures the nature of God and the nature of man united in one person So likewise he had two wills the will of God and the will of man yet he subjected alway the lower will unto the higher Not my will but thy will be fulfilled not as I will but as thou wilt But the will of his manhood appeared in this thas as he was a man he was afraid of death Mat. 26.42 he desired that the cup might passe from him he would not have died at that instant yet as he was alway obedient to God the Father he desires that the upper will might prevaile and saith Not my will but thine be fulfilled Let the will of God prevaile and let the will of man be ruled and over-ruled Therefore as Christ had two wills so he had two natures and by consequent the full nature of God and man Or else if hee had not taken the soule of man as well as the body hee could not have delivered the whole nature of man the principall part whereof is the Soule But here is the difference although Christ were made a living soule as Adam was yet hee was more than so hee was not made for that purpose as an ordinary living soule but he had an accession of the glory and grace and strength of the Deity to make this living soule sublimate to perfection to make it capable of unspeakable mysteries which Adam had but in a poore pittance in a low condition hee had a living soule indeed well qualified and adorned with innocencie and the power of originall justice and a power to have life and grace and immortalitie if hee had kept and continued in the commandement but he had no higher matters hee had nothing in him whereby of necessitie he might abstaine from sinne but that he might sinne and be damned for it But in Christ there was an absolute necessitie of holinesse and perfection and of all the parts in him which was not in Adam Quest 2 For the second Question whereas it is said Hee was a quickning spirit Apollinarius Apollinarius inferred upon this that he had a phantasticall body and not a true body This is as grosse as the former for if Christ must take
live in sicknesse and at last to be swallowed up of death to come to rottennesse and putrifaction which is the naturall conclusion of all bodies that live in this world This course God hath appointed first and then upon this God will make his power glorious to bring the body from dust and filth and rottennes to be spirituall to bring it to sweetnesse and glory and beauty this is his order Therefore first they are naturall bodies miserable and weak and obnoxious and then the Lord will supervestire he will invest them with that glory and incorruption which is promised to us in Christ So much for that point the truth of the proposition and the order Now for the comparison of the two heads and fountaines they are laid downe 2. Part. The comparison of the two Adams as the causers of all this Why is this so that there is first the naturall and then the spirituall because God would have Adam the naturall man to come first and Christ the Spirituall man to come last that the one should be the first of men the other the last and that they two should carry the keyes of these closets and treasures the one of corruption the other of incorruption Therefore from them depends all the reason of the former proposition First it is to be observed that hee saith a man First in respect of their order and succession first and last and a man It is spoken of Christ that hee is a man as well as of Adam so that they were both men of the same nature and substance nay the second Adam was the sonne of the first For wee see St. Luke in his Genealogie Luke 3. Luke 3. brings Christ from Adam Which was the sonne of Adam which was the sonne of God So that Manicheus and Valentinus and Martianus have taught us blasphemous doctrines in former times and so have the Swenck-Feldians which have received their errour of late All these are from hence condemned For as Tertullian Tertull. saith Why is Christ called the second man except hee were as true a man as the first therefore of the nature of Adam was the Lord Christ made even by deduction of nature and by a line infallible to the Virgin Mary Although by reason of the sanctifying of the bloud of which his blessed body was to be made and because that there was no intervention of the help of man he is not to be ranked in the common generation of man-kinde for he was not borne as they that are borne of women that is after the naturall ordinary course but by the over-shadowing of the holy Ghost Therefore in this regard hee is greater and far above Adam but concerning the materiall part of his body which hee tooke of the Virgin hee was the son of Adam and so the second man or the last Adam not because hee was the last of all men Iesus Christ hath been many years since in the flesh but because he was to put an end to the state of all things that there should be no new state after the comming of Christ expected Before Christ there was the state of nature of the law of the separation of the Iewes and Gentiles there were divers kinds and degrees but now he is come all the former states of nature and the law are no more to be recapitulated and there is no difference between the Iew and the Gentile Colos 3.11 bond and free male and female but all are one in Christ Iesus Againe Christ is called the last Adam because he saith of himselfe Revâ—l 1.8 that hee is Alpha and Omega he is Alpha in respect of his Deity and he is Omega in respect of his humanity and hee is both Alpha and Omega both first and last in regard that hee is coequall and coeternall with God the Father For as he is God he is Alpha the beginning of all things created he is the first borne of all creatures Colos 1.15 and as hee is Omega he is the last conclusion and end of the Alphabet that there is no more state no more sacrifice no more law no more new to be expected in the world But that which a Christian is to betake him to he must have it in Christ or not at all and all other are deceived that seeke for any other name than that Acts 4 24. for there is no other name under heaven whereby we may be saved This is the first difference in their order The second 2. In respect of their places earth heaven is in respect of the places from whence they were descended The first man is from the earth earthly The second man is the Lord himself from heaven heavenly The places from whence they come are earth and heaven and there is no greater difference can be in all the things in nature Wee cannot say that there is any thing more distant than these two nor any thing more contrary than these two the one being the fountaine of light the other being the receptacle of darknesse The one being the spring of all actions the other being a meerely passive and dull substance The one being the cause impressive the other being the cause receptive The one being the originall and fulnesse of every thing that is good the other being participant as much as it is capable of it For so much as the supreame cause works upon it so much it is prospered by it The one being alway moving and stirring and whirling about the other being restive and not able to stirre out of its place There is nothing more contrary than heaven and earth and such is the deduction of these two prime causes But how was Adam earthly more then Christ Christ had a body of the Virgin and so he was of the bowels of the earth as well as Adam And how was Christ more heavenly and spirituall then Adam had not he a soule and spirit as well as Christ how can these things consist For the first you must understand that the Apostles meaning is where hee saith that Adam was from the earth that is as much as to say his chiefe powers and abilities were still inclined to the earth that he was fraile that hee was made in a condition to goe back againe to the earth that was his destiny and hee had a law imposed upon him to dig and delve the earth and therefore he is said to be of the earth Not because hee had not a soule from heaven for hee had a soule from heaven as well as Christ had but because he was drawne by his inferiour part by his body which was his earthly part because hee was drawne by that from the contemplation of heavenly things and had rather to take an apple with his wife than to follow the justice and uprightnesse of God because hee declined to the earth and base things and left the Creator for a poore creature and because hee left the unchangeable good
I look for my change as well as another man As Iob Iob 14.1 saith All the dayes of my life will I looke for my change So the Apostle saith every man must look for this that he may be prepared For perhaps I may be the last man perhaps the trumpet may sound to night before to morrow for there is no man knowes when the day of doome shall be It is reserved in the bosome of God alone and we are alway to looke for his comming because we know not when he will come whether at midnight Marke 13.5 or at the dawning of the day Therefore wee should alwayes be ready with our lamps lighted and our loynes girded that we may be prepared when the Bridegroome commeth to enter into the Kingdome Mat. 25. Thus the Apostle saith we shall be changed He speaks as if hee should be one of them although long since he were interred in the earth yet because hee knew not his owne dissolution or the destruction of the world when it should be therefore he had it in perpetuall memorie Wee shall not all sleepe but we shall all be changed And what is this change 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how death is called a sleepe I have told you heretofore and I will not repeat it now We shall be changed that is in quality for so the word signifieth even an altering of the quality not a changing of the substance For the same body that suffered death for sinne the same body shall be glorified by the grace and favour of God As sin came upon it to doe it to death so the grace of God shall overflow it to bring it to life For where sin hath abounded grace shall super abound Rom. 14.20 If therefore the sinne of Adam were able to mortifie all to their graves much more shall the grace of Christ be able to quicken all his to life everlasting Therefore I say we shall be changed meaning as concerning the qualities not concerning the substance For that body which was once the Temple of the holy Ghost shall never cease to be the Temples of the holy Ghost and those parts that felt misery by Adams sinne they shall feele sweetnesse of grace by the bounty that shall be revealed through Christ Iesus our Lord. We shall all be changed This change how it shall be made and in what degrees I have partly spoken of it before The Apostle delivers it unto us when hee said It is sowne in weaknesse it is raised in strength It is sown in corruption it is raised in incorruption It is sowne a mortall or naturall body but it riseth a spirituall body It is sown in dishonour it riseth againe in honour These are the manners of the change which having heretofore stood upon I will not now repeat The change therefore shall be in those foure noble qualities which the Apostle formerly described unto us And this change shall be wrought by the omnipotencie of God upon a matter that wee would think could not indure such a strange operation as that is But the Lord is able to command light to come out of darknesse and hath wrought by meane things in the world the great impressions of his power Hee therefore is able to work upon this weak body and to set upon it the stamp of incorruption of glory of immortality and of strength Hee is able to doe it and his power will doe it according to his gracious promise We shall all be changed All we saith the Apostle chiefly this change shall be upon the Saints of God but yet it shall not be so restrained to them but that in part it shall extend to all men I told you in the opening of the Text that the Reprobates shall have their part in this change for their bodies shall be made uncorrupt and immortall but not to glory and beauty not to comfort and consolation as the bodies of the Saints shall but to extremity and misery Like as a brick which lies in the fire continually and is alway burning and yet never consumed or as that Axbestam which the Philosopher speaks of which is not consumed but is able continually to abide the fire so the bodies of those that doe â—ot feare the Lord and worship him the earthly tabernacles of theirs shall be made durable of paine but not capable of honour and glory They shall be made capable of no comfort and yet they shall not be spoyled and consumed by any paine and sorrow that shall lie upon them This change therefore Vse we must desire the Lord that it may be for the better and not for the worse That seeing there shall and must be a change of these bodies that it would please the Lord to change us from these frailties and miseries that we now live in to the blessed joy and hope which he hath called his children unto And that wee may be capable of this we must desire God to make a change of us in this life for the Lord shall change all things hee is the changer of us he is unchangeable himselfe all things else he shall change Psal 102. Thou shalt change the heavens and they shall be changed but thou art the same and thy yeares never faile So that the Lord being onely immutable and the same for ever it is hee that works the change upon all things Wee see in the common course of our life what changes hee works in our ages hee changes childhood to youth and that to manhood and thence to old age A strange and various change In our Climates there is Winter and Summer there is day and night there is stormy and faire weather Wondrous changes bee also in matters politique and civill he turnes warre into peace he changeth peace into warre it is he that suffers Nation to rise against Nation all the changes in the world come from God So wee must imagine in our bodies that shall be changed that all shall be wrought by his owne hand Vse This must teach us first to desire God to make a happy change in our soules before hee make the change in our bodies For there can never be a comfortable change in any mans body except first there be a precedent and a president change in the soule For except the soule be changed from worse to better from wickednesse to holinesse of life it is impossible for a man to looke for a good change of his body where there is no precedent change in his soule Therefore while wee are in this life wee are to looke for this change If the Lord change thy soule from sinfulnesse to holinesse thou maiest bee sure thy body also shall bee changed to happinesse and immortality and glory If thy soule be not changed but thou art worse and worse verily thou shalt have a change in the Resurrection but it shall bee unto dismalnesse to fearefulnesse and to distraction so that a man had better never have beene borne than to be
which is now accomplished but in one the Lord Iesus hath it alone in one Now it is in the first fruits then it shall be in the whole Harvest then it shall be made good to the whole Church which is now only performed to the head of the Church that Death is swallowed up into victory This I take to be the sense of the words To proceed in order First we are to consider it as the words lye and not as the logicall rule would carrie us For logically we have A subject A predicate And a Vinculum or Copulate The subject is corruption This corruptible The predicate is a certaine change it must have this corruptible must take and put on incorruption And the copulate is the oportet it must needs be so and this mortall must put on immortality And then after that there is a blessed comfort that the Church of God shall receive In the meane time shee receives it as being certaine that it shall be but then she shall receive it as a full payment at that time That Scripture which said Death is swallowed up into victory It shall then be utterly accomplished Wherein we are to consider First that the Apostle confirmes and strengthens himselfe by Scripture by that which is written Secondly where it is written Thirdly the substance and matter that is written That Death is swallowed up into victory Where againe we are to consider three termes First what that is that is swallowed Death and all evill and mischiefe Secondly the terme to which it is swallowed or consumed to victory Thirdly the efficient cause who swallowes it and what it is that swallowes Death that must needs be understood the death of the Sonne of God the death of Christ swallowes up the death of men into an absolute victory And then the answer to that question How is Death swallowed up in victory seeing it every day swallowes us up and consumes us how then is Death swallowed up himselfe And that is to be answered in these words because the time is not yet come When this corruption shall put on incorruption and this mortall shall put on immortality then shall be fulfilled this saying Every thing is in its own time when all things are done that should bee done when all things are accomplished that the Lord shall send before then that shall come after But we have it now onely in hope we have it onely in the first fruits we have it in some part we have it in the head then we shall have it in all the members We have it in some few that were raised with Christ to be witnesses of his Resurrection and they are pawnes for all the rest When this corruption hath put on incorruption and this mortall c. Of these parts briefly and in order as it shall please God to give assistance And first to follow the order of the words He saith this corruptible and this mortall speaking of the bodies of men For the soule of man is neither corruptible nor mortall as heretofore wee have touched Therefore those that understand these things of the Resurrection of the spirit of the Resurrection of the soule from vice to newnesse of life they are extremely mistaken and they abuse the word of grace which is here propounded unto us For the Apostle speakes of that part which is corrupt and mortall that the glory of God shall be shewed upon it and he saith this very body this Identicall thing this Idem numero not another body in stead of this but this which is now so corrupt The body shall remaine the same although the accidents and qualities shall be rare and glorious which shall accrew unto it yet it shall be one and the selfe same body As S. Chrysostome saith Chrysost the selfe same it shall be in the selfe same inches and quantity although the qualities shall be altred and it shall have gracious indowments yet they shall be the same substance they shall be the same bodies And againe it is to be observed that hee useth two words together hee repeates it This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality And this hee doth not without very good reason For it is no vaine repetition of the same thing twice over it is not S. Pauls purpose nor his custome so to doe but hee notes in us two certaine infirmities which the Lord shall stay and stanch at that day by that glorious vesture and garment of incorruption and immortality which he shall put upon us First then our body is corrupt that is changing from one forme to another it cannot continue in the same stay And secondly it is mortall that is subject to utter destruction to be altogether without any forme The first is the mutability which the matter whereof we consist cannot endure You understand that in all things that are made there are two great principles the matter and the forme besides the privation The matter is so infinitly capable and desirous of new formes that it cannot endure long to stay in one state still the matter desires a new forme to come upon it as being weary of that which it hath borne before We see it in all things in nature And though God worke his owne will and his gracious wonders by that yet notwithstanding it shewes the variety and disposition of the matter which is still capable and hath an appetite after a new forme and desires to be changed In the fruits of the earth The seed would not continue so a seed but when it is cast into the ground it comes to sprout and to spring and from thence it comes to be a little tree and so a greater and then it comes to grow backward it comes downe againe and comes to be a dead thing We see it in our selves First there is the matter of our nature then wee doe not so continue but it becomes an embrio then it comes from that forme to be a childe and when it is weary of that it comes higher So God brings things to perfection and then back againe to imperfection I speake onely of the variety in the materiall cause which as the Philosopher speaks is the devourer of formes it is ever desiring a new forme to be set upon it So God teacheth us by this that the very appetite of the matter shall carrie us to the certainty of a new forme which shal be set upon us in that blessed day because that this corruptible matter is ever changeable and changing formes It is certaine that God shall then stop the appetite of the matter and give it a forme which shall never be changed and that it shall never desire to change Here nature never stayes nor is never content with any forme but wee come from our prime matter to childhood from childhood wee passe along to youth and youth sends us to middle age middle age brings us to dotage and dotage sends us to our graves
the stroke of death beause it must needs be so for this corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality and to assure us of the necessity of the glory that shall be it cannot faile but it must needs come so to passe as the Lord hath promised Oportet it must be so There are certaine bonds that have passed from God to man by the promise of the Almighty that bindes him to it For the word of a King is a King to a man as Demosthenes saith Demost Therefore God hath bound himselfe unto us by his word and by the promises he hath made and likewise we are againe bound by the necessity of congruitie by the necessity of fitnesse that these things should be so For it is of absolute necessity in regard of the fall of Adam and of our corruption that wee have contracted thence that we should not enter into that blessed incorruption till wee have put off this corruption which wee have contracted There is no medling for a sound man to come to them that are in the Pest-house nor there is no conversing for a man that is well in his wits with them that are in Bedlam there is no mingling of Sheepe and Goats together there is no blending of light and darknesse of Christ and Beliall there can be no communion and fellowship betweene corruption and incorruption It is impossible that the corrupt body of man should be able to entertaine and receive that incorruptible crowne of heaven it will burst him in his feeble abilities As is said of Semele that when Iupiter appeared unto â—â—r in his full glorie shee was exhausted by meanes of his Majestie shee expired and lost her life So it is true and certaine this weake vessell cannot endure heaven this corrupt body cannot abide incorruption no more than Gunpowder can endure the approach of fire for it will be swallowed up of it Therefore the Lord prepared a habitation and tabernacle for it in the earth that by the earth hee may bring it to be capacious of the glory they shall receive Therefore there is this necessity that the Apostle saith It must be thus And this necessity is in three respects First in respect of the soule when it is seperate from the body The soule is a part of a man and the body is a part of a man as well as the soule although it be not so great and so excellent a part as that but seeing that God hath appointed that a body and a soule shall alway make a man we cannot say therefore that the body is a man or that the soule is a man but onely by way of eminencie But we must needs take the soule as long as it is seperate from the body to be a thing imperfect for it is not so much blessed as it shall be when the body shall be re-united unto it It is blessed as much intensively but not extensively not in respect of the societie company with the body with the glory and beauty and that joy of the holy Ghost which shall be extended every where as well to the body as to the soul This the soul wants and therefore they lie continually lingring thirsting in expectation Apoc. 6.10 How long Lord holy and true They desire to be restored to their bodies they be naked now the sword is out of his scabbard now the Lord hath drawne them assunder notwithstanding they are both in â—â—e hand of God But then the Lord will again return the sword into his scabbard when he hath clensed pollished it that it shal never afterward be seperated In this regard it must needs be that corruption must put on incorruption For the soule by the hand of God is made uncorruptible and immortall but the body is made both corruptible and mortall therefore that the one may fit the other the Lord must make it by a strange wondrous change he must make this corruption put on incorruption that is he shall so mold the body by lying in the earth that he shall make it by the power of his hand hee shall make it capable of that great incorruption which hee shall give it when the soule and the body shall meete together in one The second reason of this necessity is this because the good God hath ordained in justice to performe all things and that according to that which a man hath done in this flesh 2 Cor. 5.10 for we mst receive according to the things that we have done in this flesh whether they be good or evill as the holy Apostle saith Therfore the Lord will have this corrupt body which hath suffered paine here on earth this body which hath suffered for Gods cause this body which hath suffered death this body which hath endured the flame and persecution this body which hath suffered hunger and thirst and nakednesse this body that hath suffered infamy and ignominy reviling and opprobries as the Lord Iesus did for our sakes this body which hath bin so brought under and made as it were a laughing stock to the world which hath bin made a refuge of scornes this body which beares the prints marks of the Lord Iesus Christ about with it Gal. 6.17 this body which hath bin in martyrdom so ignominious to the sight of the world though it have beene noble in the sight of God this body that hath born all the brunt and toyl labour in affliction this body must be glorified againe for that it stands with Gods justice that every man shall receive according as hee hath done in this flesh whether it be good or evill Therefore it must needs be that this corruption must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality this very body that hath suffered must be honoured that as it hath suffered many evill things for Gods cause so it may receive many good things for its owne cause for the mercy of God which shall be revealed upon it And lastly it is necessary it should be thus Oportet it must needs be that the body must goe to incorruption Aquin. by the way of corruption as Aquinas well noteth because of the conformity of the members to the head Our Lord Iesus Christ went this way therefore we that are his servants must not look to be above our Master Luke 6.40 it is enough that the servant be equall to his Master Christ is our head he is our Master he could not come to immortality but first he died he was mortall before he was immortall and though he were not corruptible although there was no change in his body to corruption yet he was mortall there was a change in the colour there was a change in his strength and life these things were in him for hee was dead these things cannot consist but in him that is dead So much as he was corruptible hee had it for our sakes hee was mortall hee
no other noise nor voice rang among them but victorie victorie and though they lost many men that were slaine and heard of the death of many of their friends yet they were content to offer the lives of their friends in that common sacrifice so the victory might be pronounced amongst them So we reade of Rome and Athens and especially of Carthage for the newes of a victory that they had over the Romanes they did nothing for a whole moneth together but goe with garlands on their heads and celebrate festivalls as men with exceeding joy transported out of themselves For this purpose also the great Conquerours called many Cities after that name by the name of victory as the City of Nice where the first Counsell was kept it signifieth victory and Nicosia-Stratonica and Verturia Thessalonica and many other Cities had their names given them of their victories and the great Captaines would call themselves Nicanors and by the like names victorious men And those that bore the victory they still wore garlands which were alway greene because they would have their names and conquests never to wax old but be alway greene therefore they had their garlands of Laurell So wee see how the world use to be have themselves in victory how they are never daunted with any thing nor grieved with any thing if they may have the victory they are content to lose the life of their best friends This should teach us to apply these things in a spirituall sense to be as wise in our generation as the world is in their generation we were so desirous of victory and so desperate for it that wee would have given all things to be made partakers of it we would have given the first fruits of our bodies for the sinnes of our soules thousands of rammes and ten thousand rivers of oyle that wee might be made victors of this grisly monster but we were not able to do it nay rather then we would not have the victory we were content to lose the life of our Chieftaine Christ Iesus who slept in death that we might ever wake unto life eternall wee were content that he should die for us and the hands of us all were in his bloud we were content that he should die that death by him might be swallowed up into victorie Let us therefore entertaine this glorious motion into our soules let us lift up our heads with melody to God let us know that nothing can make against us now because wee have the victory a constant and perfect victory where there is no enemy resides or remaines The princes of this world have but halfe victories the enemy runs away from them and comes and makes head again and comes the next yeare with a greater force But God when he gets a victory he leads captivity captive he leaves no possibility of rising againe but hee strikes to the maine he strikes the adversary to the heart he cuts off stub and stock of all likelihood and probability that there should not be any fear of it afterward he takes away the essence of the thing and so he makes an absolute victory The Insultatiō Now followes the Insultation whereunto God would raise a christian mans heart Oh death where is thy sting oh hell where is thy victory These words that be in the vocative case in the Apostles writing in the Prophet are in the accusative I will be death unto death and I will be destruction against hell Here the Apostle understanding the purpose of the holy Ghost teacheth us not too much to be tyed to the letter of the Scripture but to the sense and meaning he takes out these two hee singles them out and sets them downe in the constancy of his spirit as though they were two personated enemies Death and Hell that is death and the grave for hee speaks here of the resurrection of the dead of such as are dead in Christ and they shall never come to hell therefore although the word be translated Sheol hell yet it is here taken for the grave onely whereunto the godly goe as well as the ungodly to hell goe not the godly but the ungodly they goe to the grave which is the common receptacle of all and it is a degree of misery and mischiefe that after a man hath lost his ability when he hath lost his life and power when he hath lost his colour and glory and perfection to be thrust down as a brute beast into a pit and to lie there and rot and putrifie therefore because these two are the most shamefull enemies the one to rid a mans body of the precious soule that is in it and the other to bring upon him the most foule and beastly condition of rottennesse the Apostle singles them both out and insults upon them as upon dead Captaines as upon them that are not able any more to strike a stroke but lie devoid of all power and upon their heads he brings forth this insulting sentence Oh death where is thy sting oh hell where is thy victory Oh death where is thy sting thou that hast stung all the men in the world as we know death is painted with a dart in his hand to sting and to strike to the heart to deprive men of their life to take away the heart bloud of men thou that stingest men with sicknesse and takest away their vitall spirits oh death now thy sting is dulled it is broken in pieces it hath no edge it hath no point it can effect nothing further And thou grave which wast wont to have the victory which wast wont to be so victorious as to make the fairest faced dames and the goodliest beauty in the world to bring to dust and ashes to beat a man to powder to bring a man to dust which is the greatest victory that can be to drive a man to dust thou that wast so absolute a victor where is now thy glory and victory as if he should say it is no where it is altogether vanished away there is no appearance nor any more power nor life in thee to worke death we are secured from thee for ever wee are freed from thy sting that thou shalt no more strike us to death with thy dart And thou grave thy victory to turne us to dust is nothing all these are taken out of thy hands for ever So this is the glorious triumphant song which the Church of God hath ever sung over this Conquerour there were two enemies that fought a strange duell that was the death of Christ and the death of nature the Leader of the victorious army died yet notwithstanding he lives for ever the leader of the conquered and banished army killed him and yet notwithstanding he dies for ever for so according to Heb. 2.14 Heb. 2.14 the Lord appointed that by death the Lord Christ should destroy him that had the power of death that is the devill For the devill by means of a commission that
to worke then the labour of love which is alway working like the soule in the bodie The soule and life it is in every part of the bodie and where any part is out of temper or sick there is heat and anguish there every member condoles with that member that is affected and out of place So it is with the labour of love among Gods children 2 Cor. 11.29 Who is offended and I burne not who is weak and I am not weak The passion of Gods Church is as combustible matter when it once takes hold it runs over all this labour of love is the work here spoken of Now he shewes the reason it is a comfortable and sweet speech It is not in vaine The word properly signifieth a thing where there is nothing where there is a vacuum They say in nature there is no vacuum or void place but still there is something every where and rather then there should not bee something things would forget their owne nature the aire will descend to fill up the roome If a man should dig to the Antipodes the aire which is a light thing will descend downe like a heavy body rather than it shall be empty and the water which is a heavy body will ascend up if a man draw with his breath in a conduit or pipe it will mount to the top of a house rather than there shall be a vacuum Now the Lord as hee fills all things with substance so he shall fill your labours also hee shall give it substance and being there is nothing vain in his creation much lesse shall there be any thing in vaine in the regeneration It is a great incouragement for a man to worke when hee is sure of his wages for it not like that foolish saying among foolish men that take up their money before hand and when they have drunke it out and spent it then they say they worke for nothing But hee that works for the Lord he never works for nothing but he is ever sure of his recompence Apoc. 22.12 Behold I come and my reward is in my hand and plentifull is your reward in heaven be glad and rejoyce for copious and great is your reward in heaven Because therefore your labour hath a reward it is a great incouragement to you to the worke The children of God work not for a blind day for a blind purpose but they are sure of the consequent they are sure of a copious reward in heaven But what is this to a Christian he should doe it for Gods cause although there were no reward a christian is bound to doe good although there were no heaven nor no hell It is true I cannot stand upon it at this time but onely to shew the principle of it when the Apostle saith Be abundant because you know your labour is not in vaine This is not a prime argument but a secondarie argument indeed it is a good incouragement It is true we should love the Lord it is due debt we are his creatures we depend upon him and hee may conclude of us as it pleaseth him to make us vessels of wrath or vessels of honour and wee should doe good workes for his sake without any reference to wages God must be loved without any cause and without any measure hee must be loved above all things with all our heart with all our soule and with all our strength Saith Saint Austin We worke not for God as a meane but as the end the maine and chiefe end of all things If wee should love God for some other thing then we should think some other thing better than God and then wee should make God inferiour to another we should make him inferiour to our owne desires which we must not doe Saith Saint Austin Aug. It is a foolish thing for a man to use that which hee should enjoy and to enjoy that which he should use for the things of this world are but the things that wee use and our owne salvation is a thing that wee use in comparison of God It is God that wee enjoy and nothing else there is nothing else that can be enjoyed and wee must not love our salvation it selfe in respect of God hee is the price of all things all things else are of no price but drosse and dung in comparison The blessed Apostles meaning therefore is not that hee would have us labour as hirelings to give a mercenarie love to God but to love God for his owne sake Hee disputes as a man because it is a fit argument to stir men up to labour because they shall have a recompence for it the greatest argument to encourage a man to worke to worke abundantly as the Apostle saith here is to set before him the copiousnesse of the reward it will make him worke plentifully not for the rewards sake but chiefly for the love of God and in the second place for the other Therefore it is unlawfull which the Popish Doctors say for a man to work simply upon the sight of divine wages but a man must worke first and chiefly for God and then in the second respect for the reward And that a man may thus doe for his incouragement it is plaine in the Scriptures The blessed man of God Moses Heb. 11.26 he rather desired to suffer affliction and persecution with the children of GOD than to enjoy the pleasures of sinne for a season Why Because hee had respect to the recompence of reward So Christ incourageth us in this that hee saith Verily I say unto you the more troubles you have in this life the greater shall be your reward in heaven And Saint Matthew speaking of the great blessings that are laid up for the godly he saith Those that have borne part with Christ in the doctrine of his regeneration they shall sit upon twelve thrones and judge the twelve Tribes of Israel Aug. The reward saith Saint Austin is that that sets a man in spirit and if wee would sustaine our labours and troubles let us look to the recompence of reward as Moses did And as St. Paul saith These momentany afflictions they worke unto us an eternall weight of glorie And as Calvin Calvin saith well when the Apostle saith So run that ye may receive 1 Cor. 9.24 saith hee If you take away the hope of the reward all the hopefulnesse and alacrity in running the race it doth not onely waxe cold but it falls downe and failes for the hope of a reward from the Lord it sets us up to make us worke chearefully because wee serve not a churlish Laban but a chearefull God wee serve not as Iacob did a long time to little purpose for two wives and two maids and a little flock but wee serve the blessed God that gives an infinite reward for a cup of cold water hee gives a glorious Kingdome for ever and ever Your labour is not in vaine Why Because it is for the
never looks after the performance of it A man goeth by an Hospitall and saith he will give them somewhat when he comes backe againe and when he comes backe he thinkes not of it Imagine what you will although you forget it yet it stands on account in Gods booke hee will call you to a reckoning for it and if you sneake away and will not pay the shot the Lord will take it upon your bodies and soules in hell For you must not thinke to passe a vow to the Lord in a good mood for a good purpose but the Lord will take it and exact it at your hands Therefore let every man lay downe for himselfe God intrusts every mans selfe he trusts every mans honesty This should be a great comfort and a meanes to provoke us to be true to God Let every man lay by him in store For if every man should have brought it presently to the poore mans box it might have beene thought to have beene done out of a present passion and that he would have taken it out againe afterward after it was cast in if he might have had leave But for a man to be constant in it to let it stand by him a moneth or two moneths or a quarter of a yeare that hee saith and resolveth this they shall have whatsoever become of me I will not abate a penie of the stocke of God of the stocke of charitie when he saith Let every man lay up by him in store his meaning is that God will call every man to account if hee bee inconstant and forgetfull of his vow and promise the Lord will not let such a one escape As whatsoever God hath prospered him with 3 The measure First what is this that he must put apart whatsoever God hath prospered him with so we may turne it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quod ei bene successerit s placuerit but the word is a rare word and therefore it is diversly expressed by Interpreters some say that which is fit some say that which hee thinkes good and these are true for there is no man herein compelled to do any thing but what he doth out of his owne heart of his owne free-will The Lord loves a free-giver a chearfull giver and hee will have no constraint Yet Expositors come not neere the glory of the word for it is a metaphor taken from Merchant-venturers that cast their goods into a bottome it may be halfe their estate sometimes it may be sometimes all and if God give them a good voyage they are made if not then they are downe the winde undone So it signifies a good journey or a good voyage you have the word twice over in the Scripture both before and after this In Rom. 1.10 saith the Apostle I pray to God continually if God would give me a good journey to come to you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The same word is used here hodos a journey heodos a good journey As the Lord is pleased to blesse a man in his trade and course of life so the word is used in 3. Ioh. 2. Beloved brother I desire of God that thou mayest have a good journey that thou maiest prosper and be well and in good health as thy soule prospereth that thou shouldest have a good journey in all things So by these two places you understand what is the meaning of the word that whereas all the provision of the life present here is made upon casualties there is no man can tell when he sets up how the Lord will blesse him before the yeares end some runne bankrupt some againe get by the mercie of God the Lord sets up one and brings downe another Men in their trading here be as Merchant adventurers upon the Sea there is as great adventure on the Land as on the Sea and there is not greater danger there then here so when it pleaseth God that the ship comes well from the sea that it brooks all that it escapes all rocks and pyrats and comes home full fraught then all the neighbours rejoyce about it and shew their joy by shooting off peeces of ordnance for the great benefit they have received and give thanks to God by this merriment So when a Merchant man upon the Land drives out his Trade by his frugalitie and good husbandrie and by his just dealing keepes a good conscience to all men and the Lord raiseth him out of his 100. l. unto an hundred and twenty or more the Lord requires some custome to be payed some impost money there is some scot and allowance to be made Therefore I say we must pay this tribute it belongs it is due unto God For this good journey for this prosperous and good voyage he hath given thee out of this thou must lay up somewhat for the poore Saints Thou must reserve that which is fit for thy person what is fit for thy children and family God gives thee leave to doe this but thou must leave a remnant still for the poore according to the good iourney that the Lord hath given thee The Lord it may be hath multiplied thy hundreds to thousands thou must therefore remember the Lord thy God that hath given thee this great increase and abundance above all that thou couldest hope or conceit in former times for what was every yong beginner that now is growne rich let him say himselfe thou wouldest have beene glad of the tenth part of that that God hath enriched thee with and now the Lord hath multiplied and encreased thee oh let thy hand againe be inlarged toward God and abundant to him that hath so abounded in grace and mercy to thee and as the Lord hath given a man a good iourney a good way and passage a good trade and prospers him that he thrives in his calling so let him againe doe the workes of mercy for the God of mercy But these things that remaine are so full of matter and variety and I have beene so troublesome to your patience already that I must reserve the rest that remaines untill the next time The second Sermon 1 COR. 16.1.2.3 Now concerning the collection for the Saints according as I have ordained in the Churches of Galatia even so doe you In the first day of the Sabbath or of the weeke Let every one of you lay up by himselfe a treasure of whatsoever God hath prospered him c. THere is no point in all divinity that needs more cleare propoundiâ—g and more earnest prosecuting then this of Almes-deeds and brotherly benevolence For men are wondrously and by a strange motion of the spirit of God brought unto it against the current of nature every man thinking that that which is given is lost that it is cast away and there is scarse any man perswaded that he that gives to the poore lends to the Lord although it be a common speech in every mans mouth Therefore the Apostle being appointed by the Church of God to have a speciall
and difficult is more easily atchieved and effected by the hand of God And he proves it out of Matth. 9.5 Mat. 9.5 where our Lord discoursing with the Pharisees when they had said who can forgive sinnes he askes them whether it were easier to say to the sicke of the Palsie take up thy bed and walke or to say thy sinnes are forgiven thee where our Lord clearely gives us to understand that it is a harder matter and a more powerfull thing to say thy sinnes are forgiven thee then to give limbs to him to walke and to take up his bed and goe his way For sicknesses are the punishments of sinne and the Lord removing that once he takes away the cause which is greater than the effect But although this be followed with so many so great and so worthy Interpreters yet me thinkes it hath no congruity with the purpose of the Apostle in this place for as I said before the Apostles meaning is not here to instruct us in the renovation of the soule of newnesse of life in holinesse and sanctification but to tell us of the resurrection of the flesh that is his chiefe argument the maine point he insisteth precisely upon Therefore to say to be baptised for dead is to be baptised for the name of a dead Christ it is too farre fetched and I cannot see how it can be brought in Therefore without prejudice to these glorious and goodly writers we proceed to further examination of these words There be some others that cannot indure what hath beene said before but they must devise trickes of their owne They say Saint Paul alludes to the Leviticall Law Numb 19. Numb 19. when a man had touched any dead carkasse he was to be cleansed before the even but suppose say they that the man dyed by casualty before night before he could come to the Priest before he could have gotten the matter of his purification what was then to be done Then say they his neighbour was to be cleansed for him and so they fall upon an opinion before named But what is their purpose certainly to bring in prayer for the dead because they thinke that as there was baptisme for the dead so there should be prayer for the dead And if the one fall to be so the other must needs be so too For I rather thinke that there should be prayer for the dead than that there should be baptising for them to speake in a sacramentall sence They doe it to bring in their superstitions of holy-water and sprinkling the graves and sepulchers and coffins of dead persons thereby to make them more pure before God and that which is more ridiculous that the Priest should undertake in times past and it may be now too in our times when he was sent for to a sicke body to give him the host and that the party were dead before he came he in the presence of the company was to eate it for him that was deceased and thought that that would be availeable to him for the forgivenesse of his sinnes and for the receiving him into heaven These things have no ground nor warrant neither in this Epistle nor in the old Law There is no such thing that there was any such purification by a proxie but it was alway done in a mans owne person and there was no friâ—nd admitted in any such action Therefore in that devise they make one lye to salve another as their custome is in other of their proceedings Further there is yet another opinion that saith that baptising for the dead it is meant of those that came and offered themselves voluntarily to afflictions and persecution And this is more neare the point for indeed in the Scripture it is a most usuall and common saying to call afflictions by the name of baptisme So Math. 20. Math. 20. Mark 9. Mar. 9. when the sonnes of Zebede come to our Lord and desire a boone of him requesting that one of them might sit at his right hand and the other at his left in his kingdome Christ answers them againe that they knew not what they asked And he proceeds further saith he Can ye drinke of that Cup whereof I shall drinke and can ye be baptised with the baptisme that I shall be baptised withall and they answer againe they could Christ tels them again that indeed they should drinke of that cup and be baptised with that baptisme but to sit at his right hand and at his left c. where we may see he speakes of the baptisme of fire and trouble and persecution That which is intended in those words the same also by comparison may be taught here and interpreted in this place They that are baptised for dead that is those that scorned their lives that cared not for them those that were ready to drinke the cup of Christ that were ready to throw themselves into danger for the glory of their Lord and Master To what end are they thus forward if there be no resurrection from the dead There be many things that favour this interpretation as the sequell that followes in the next words Where the Apostle saith why are we in danger or jeopardie every houre if the dead rise not as if he would bring the argument from abroad home to himselfe and then the sence of the place is this To what purpose doe men adventure their lives and cast themselves into apparant danger of death except they have a certaine hope of the resurrection to life and that that God that takes away their life now can give it them againe with advantage in the world to come This is true but whether it be fully proper or no to rest in this baptisme as absolute I thinke it lyes not in any mans power by any strong and full authority to determine It is true our Lord saith Luke 10. Luke 10. I have a baptisme to be baptised with and how am I pained till it be past Where he meanes in the same sence the baptisme of affliction For a man in affliction is as it were a dead man a man in prison as though he were in the bottome of the water in another element when there is persecution and trouble on every side But yet there is another opinion which shall be the last that at this time I will trouble you withall that is of Beza Beza and others that hold with him that all this that is spoken of baptisme here is not meant of any sacramentall washing but as the word is often used for a legall washing and purifying common and ordinary at the carrying forth of the dead as in Heb. 9. Heb. 9. there are many washings and the word is thus used in divers places in the Gospell As where Christ saith the Scribes and Pharisees when they come from the market they baptised their hands and they baptised their Cups and their Platters and Dishes It is the same word there and it signifieth
we in jeopardy and danger every day and every houre are an exposition of the former Wherein he translates the argument from the common passion of the Church to his owne personall sufferings and those that were the first and principall in persecutions and troubles and he concludes that they were mad men that would undergoe such misery except they hoped for something unlesse they had a certaine hope of reward and recompence in those bodies in which they suffered For it is the body that suffers here the soule cannot be martyred but the body Therefore the Apostle saith Every man shall receive in their bodies according as they have done in their bodies 2 Cor. 5.10 whether it be good or evill Now for a man to undertake such great hazard and danger to be alway in jeopardy to be every houre in perill it is as bad as to be utterly consumed A man were better to be utterly dispatched than to be alway hanging in suspence for men to be still in anxiety to leade their lives in extremity and trouble to have nothing to comfort them here nor to have any expectation in the world to come of the common resurrection there were no madnesse comparable to this But because in these things we must not be presumptuous but must take them as the spirit of God hath suggested and dictated them to other men therefore I will not build certainly upon this sence although I thinke it to be the most true and naturall consequent that can be But we will consider also what the spirit of God hath spoken otherwise This gift of interpretation is not acknowledged nor understood among simple men although it be the greatest gift of all other For a man cannot tell what to build on he cannot tell what to thinke he knowes not what to say or what to conclude on If he ground upon a false interpretation Ierome in Gal. 1. as Saint Ierome saith upon Galath 1. upon these words I mervaile that you are gone to another Gospell saith he what makes this another Gospell false glosses and interpretations by giving a false sence of the Scriptures that which in it selfe is the pure Gospell of Christ may be made the Gospell of man nay that which is worse the Gospell of the divell so Saint Ierome Chrysost And Saint Chrysostome discoursing upon the same argument saith he If Christ himselfe shall not interpret the word which is obscure and darke in it selfe I shall neither gather the doctrine nor settle the conclusion so that the gift of interpretation is of all others the chiefe and prime foundation of divinity Therefore observing the great variety of the ancient Fathers in the Church of God I must of necessity abandon all kinde of darke and obscure speech and all that savours of affected language or eloquence yea and speake plainely as Saint Austin saith It is a farre better thing that the Grammarian or that the Criticke should reprehend us then that the people should not understand us In the divers sences of this Text I touched some others remaine which I will conclude as briefly as I can and then come to the other argument taken from his particular Why doe we thus Why doe we live in danger and jeopardie every houre What shall they doe that are baptised for the dead The first opinion was that the Text is to be understood according to the letter to be baptised for dead men This opinion is followed by many great and learned men and by Musculus which I wonder at for he was a most rare instrument of light to the Church of God throughout all the Scriptures and yet he thinkes this to be a good and a true construction That as Christ Iesus commended the fact of the unrighteous and unjust Steward although he did not commend the fact yet his wisedome is commended so the Apostles purpose is to shew that though it were a vaine thing for them to baptise the dead in the person of the quicke to baptise them by a proxey yet it argued that which the Apostle would inferre that they had a hope of the resurrection or else they would never have done it But because this hath beene condemned by the Fathers as hereticall and foolish therefore I wave that opinion as not being the Apostles meaning A second opinion was concerning those that did put off their baptisme till their death as the fashion was in the first 4 or 500. yeares after Christ The third what shall they doe that are baptised for the dead that is that are baptised into a dead Christ This is followed by a great number of worthy Divines Chrysostome Theophilact Oecumenius Theodoret and Calvine Another opinion What shall they doe that are baptised for the dead that is from the dead so the word signifieth sometimes and so Luther Luther saith that in the primitive times they baptised their children in the Church yards where the dead bodies were buried and were wont to stand upon the grave of the dead man and say This man shall rise againe I beleeve it and I take the Sacrament upon it and here I am baptised If wee could finde such a custome in the Church this were a cleare evidence but there is no history that makes this appeare unto us Notwithstanding if there had beene such a custome as that it being something superstitious it could not greatly inferre the argument and there is no reason to thinke they should be baptised upon the graves of the dead seeing the custome seemed to be contrary to baptise them in their Baptisteria or Fonts which were in little houses neere their Churches in which there was no burying of the dead for divers hundred yeares after Christ that is not till the Fonts were brought into the Churches till when they buried in the Church yards and in the Cloysters below Yet notwithstanding this might be true in some places as in the Church of Asia and in the parts upon the Euxine sea where they never baptised any but at the time of Easter and Whitsuntide and then they baptised them upon the graves of the dead to assure them that the dead that were contained in those graves and turned to dust should rise againe which they would now verifie by taking the Sacrament of baptisme upon it Therefore I give this interpretation the authority it deserves and take it as a true glosse on the Text but yet it is not the fulnesse of the great things the Apostle here intended The next opinion was they that are baptised for the dead that is dead to the world civilly dead that betake themselves to the study of mortification and will not live in those pleasures and delights which the world accounts the onely life Those kinde of pleasures and epicurious delights which worldly men take to be the life of life the Saints of God detest and abhorre them and in baptisme they doe renounce them the pompes and vanities of the wicked world and make
breeds So there is no ague that alway holds a man except it quickly dispatch him but there is some kinde of intervall there is some interim and space betweene one fit and another there is seldome in the world such a plague that still lyes as a heavy burden upon mens shoulders But the children of God are sure to have it so not onely to have dangers but to have one upon another Psal 42.7 one deepe cals upon another because of the noyse of the water pipes as the Prophet speakes they shall have feares without and terrours within the end of one evill is but the beginning of another succeeding evill Behold then your calling that whereunto you are called saith Saint Chrysostome we are set out for the purpose not onely to be vexed in this world but to be vexed continually That we cannot eate our meate nor drinke our drinke without vexation The Lord mingles our bread with teares Psalm 80.5 and our drinke with weeping It is the property of the wicked to feed without feare but even in our feeding and repast we are possest with feares and terrours Iude 12. And saith Saint Bernard Know thy portion know thy portion Math. 10.25 Oh Christian in the Crosse of Christ it was his case and it must be thine it is enough for the servant to be as his Master it is no reason he should be above his Master This 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every houre is that which God requires at our hands if we doe good for him we must doe it every houre if we suffer ill for his sake we must suffer every houre The Crowne of all our actions and of all our obedience is this perseverance and continuance Every houre It is not for an houre or for some few houres of a day but all the time of our life we must be under the Crosse and have the hand of God to pound and bray and beat upon us to get out those sweet smelling spices of patience and godlinesse which the holy Ghost hath infused into us This is the tryall of a Christian to be every houre in ieopardy and to be more constant in suffering than his adversaries can be in tormenting to be so compleat in that panoplia the Armour of the spirit of God that so long as the world can strike he can indure the stroke and be greater at length than all his temptations It is the miserable condition of all our services they be not lasting We are weary of well-doing Galat. 6.9 when we are in prayer we are weary before we can raise our selves to any kinde of zeale in our hearts we have done before we begin When we are in meditation it is a wearinesse to flesh and bloud When we are doing of good deeds to Christ in his poor members we are weary and say come no more I have done so much and so much for you already These are the cut-throats of obedience This noysomnesse and tediousnesse and faintnesse of ours deprives us of all hope of reward Therefore the Apostle saith Gal. 6. Be not weary of well-doing for we shall receive in time Galat. 6.9 if we faint not he that gives every houre and moment to the service of God shall have an eternall houre that is of blessednesse and continuance of felicity in the power of God Almighty But as I said it is with this condition If we faint not we shall receive Implying that if we faint we shall not receive all our precedent benefits all our good deeds that we have done in former time if we hold not on they have no place or acceptance with God Perseverance is the Crowne of the graces of God to be every houre every momēt of time addicted to the glory of God it is the glory of Gods servants It is to no purpose to give a poore creature a small piece of money or some little meanes to helpe him if afterward seeing him in the same case and being as able to helpe him we leave him For his life still continues and as long as life and occasion continues so long must our charity continue or else it is to no purpose It were in vaine for a woman to nurse a childe a quarter or halfe a yeare if she doe it not till it be brought to some reasonable age and strength that it be able to helpe it selfe It is better not to begin a thing than not to finish it after it is begun for a man to lay a foundation of a house and not to be able to build it up is to make himselfe a meere mockery to the common people Luke 14.30 to say This man began to build and was not able to finish it as our Saviour saith so in the matters of God whether we doe good or suffer ill for his name it must either be continually done or else it is not done at all Luke 9.62 To looke backe when we have laid our hand to the Plow is to loose our reward He is a bad debtor that payes his debts by halves he is a bad servant that will doe but halfe his service that will not give account for the whole time his Master hath conferred on him and put him in trust withall So they must needs be accounted base sufferers and runnagate Souldiers that when they have once put their hand to the action for feare of danger flye backe The Lord takes up no such Souldiers Therefore let us pay God his service with a full hand for so his gifts deserve The blessings of God are so infinite that they deserve not a perfunctory service a kinde of time-service to be now up and now downe but as the blessings of God be eternall upon the soule of man so the service and the affections of man should be eternall to God againe This little short life that we have is our eternitie the eternity which God hath is unspeakable without end As God hath promised us life eternall ioy eternall blessednesse eternall so let us labour that all that we doe may be as much as in us lies eternall Let our prayers be eternall our devotion eternall our patience eternall our charity eternall There is nothing tending to the praise of God that should be for a short time but as his blessings and promises are eternall so we should stretch and extend our selves as much as may be to make our services eternall The glory of a Christian is constancie and perseverance he hath constancy against the number of the dangers that come and perseverance against the continuance of them This was the glory of the Apostle when he saith that he was in ieopardy every houre we wrastle with great difficulties the dangers are great and many therein we shew our constancie Againe we know they be long and durable or else we might the better beare them Every moment we are oppressed every houre of our life it waites upon us as a heavy burthen upon our shoulders And
and take heed to that our good manners be not corrupted But evill words corrupt good manners there is no such gangrene as evill words are to the good manners of men therefore we ought to avoyd and detest them for if they be evill words they will corrupt good manners these are evill words therefore we ought to take heed of them so the Apostle argues in these words certainly these are evill words and evill words corrupt good manners and good manners are the virginity of the soule and wee should keepe that inviolable Therefore for our life we must strive to avoyd these evill words as the language of the divell and not of men Be not deceived evill words corrupt good manners These are the branches of the Text. You must understand that some of the Fathers reade the Text otherwise for looke on the words and you shall see how the divers poyntings makes diversitie of lections for whereas presently before the Text the Apostle had said If the dead rise not againe some of the Fathers refer those words to this part of the sentence now read If the dead rise not againe let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye And indeed it may as well be referred this way as the other for it is taken from the common tenent of the Chapter If there be no resurrection which is still to be repeated upon every severall argument But our common reading is this If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus after the manner of men what availeth it if the dead rise not Now Chrysostome Chrysost Theophylact. and Theophilact reade it thus If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus what doth it profit me and there they make a stop If the dead rise not let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye But this as you see is not greatly materiall onely I must note it for the honour of the Church of God to see the variety of that gift of interpretation for as I have often told you there is no gift more excellent in the Church then the gift of proper interpretation to know the sence of the Scriptures and to be able to deduce it to the right parts it is the greatest divinity that can be Although the common people understand nothing but that which concernes manners that which allureth them to good and feares and affrights them from their sinnes yet the especiall divinity is in the matter of interpretation But which way soever wee reade it eyther as a thing spoken with an high stomacke with an indignation Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye Or if we take it as a consequent if there be no Resurrection as Saint Chrysostome saith Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye the Argument is still one and the same But we follow the common exposition which all Translations follow that the words are spoken from a high stomacke the Apostle speakes in a holy impatience What should I doe fighting with beasts at Ephesus after the manner of men if there be no resurrection If there were no Resurrection I would rather follow my cups as the Epicures I would know the things that belong to the pleasures of the world I would make me friends of all men I would offend no man in matters of faith and profession therefore it is onely the conscience to the doctrine of the faith of the Resurrection that bindes me to resist all men and to encounter with the beasts of the field to take whatsoever fals unto me by the providence of God rather than to betray this one poynt of my faith which is the chiefe of all the Resurrection of the body For the sentence that he brings in in the person of the Epicure speaking it is taken out of Isa 22.13 Isa 22.13 It was the voyce of those obstinate and rebellious people the Iewes in the time of that Prophet saith Isay here is nothing but feasting insteed of fasting killing of sheepe and slaying of Oxen. When they should have considered the judgement of God upon their neckes they fell to pleasures and were so farre from repenting and turning to God by contrition that they devised preparation for their bellies to satisfie their lusts Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye A base and detestable speech which the holy Ghost notes against those obstinate Iewes that when the Prophet would bring them to a serious consideration of their miserable estate then being returned from Babylon and that all was wasted round about them and they had nothing left but a poore ruined Citie yet notwithstanding they would not bee wonne to God but would fall still to their pleasures and drowne themselves in the cups of excesse that so they might drinke downe their sorrow as the wicked wretches of the world doe that have no other comfort in misery and affliction but to drinke and seeke to be merry to worke out the crosses and judgements of God by some worldly jollity Thus did Caius Marius Plutarch Plutarch saith of him that being a man of great affliction and misery in his latter dayes when hee saw there was no way for him to escape the hands of Scilla he tooke the advantage of his absence and gave himselfe to drinking and excessive courses to forget his misery and so indeed hee shortened his dayes And it is wondrous and remarkable that the Prophet saith in that place These things saith he are entred into the eares of the Lord of hoasts and they are most abhominable in his sight and whereas you say Esay 22.13 Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye As I live saith the Lord you shall dye indeed the plague shall not be taken from you till you be all consumed till you be all dead under the stroke of it It is the just judgement of God upon obstinate sinners that resolve to make merry when God cals to mourning that kicke against the pricke and strive against the hand of the Almighty that thinke to drowne the memory of Gods judgements in their cups at their tables The Lord shall worke the contrary upon such a man and he shall finde that he hath done himselfe no good by this but hath brought upon himselfe his owne just confusion For so it befell these they dyed indeed and this plague was not removed from them till they were all consumed Vse So we see by this now that the world is no changling The blessed Prophet Isay lived almost 700. yeeres before Saint Paul and in his time there was such a damned crew as this that uttered this speech against heaven against reason against the hand of God and against their owne consciences Afterwards when Saint Paul came into the stage of this world he findes a company of wicked men iust like the former By this we see that the world is ever drowned in iniquity it is alway like it selfe in evill till the hand of God
drawes the ruine of the whole man after it Therefore saith the Apostle Be not deceived goe not out of the way but such words as these drive you out of the way they tell you lyes they leade you into the broad way and you must seeke the narrow way for although the broad way have better passage at the first yet there is nothing but brambles and downefals at the conclusion The wayes that God hath chalked out to us in his word and by common sence and reason from these we must not erre because we know not whether ever God will give us that mercy to call us into them againe or no. So let me say to you as the Apostle saith here Be not deceived Looke to your judgements looke to your affections they are alway ready to deceive they are alway ministring matter of errour and seduction they are meere seducers he that guides without God he is no guide but a misguider and he that leades without God he is no leader but a misleader Take heed what thou thinkest lest thy thoughts deceive thee take heed what thou speakest lest thy words intangle thee take heed what thou doest lest thy bad practise and evill conditions at the last bring thee into by-wayes and pitfals of destruction that thou canst make no deliverance of thine owne soule And then againe the Apostle would teach us this that these very necessary things give us occasion of much errour Who would thinke that a man should erre in these these are the plainest wayes that any man can take For what way can a man take to save his life but by eating and drinking in convenient time and season And yet there is errour in these things too Now then God be mercifull to us for all the rest if such grosse errours be incident to the necessaries of our life what shall we say to the superfluities of it if our meate and drinke be snares and pitfals to drive us out of the way of life eternall what is our money what is our malice what is our quarrelling what our proud and haughty conceits against other men what are all our superfluities that wee give our selves to in this life but meere hels and distractions and professions of our owne damnation We are subject to erre in things necessary for what so necessary as eating and drinking and if we erre in these things necessary much more in our superfluities much more in our garish apparell in our haughty countenance in our ambitious carriage of our selves in the world in hunting after preferments and honours we may ruinate and breake our neckes for ever there for these are superfluities It is not needfull to goe garishly it is not needfull to have haughty supercilious lookes above our brethren behold we may be damned in things necessary much more in our superfluities Therefore be not deceived There is errour in the very meate and drinke we take Rom. 11.9 as the Apostle saith Let their table be made a snare If our table be made a snare what are the rest of our affaires what are our shops what are our great bagges put to usury what is our bribing and feeing what is our lawing with our brethren what is our slandering and seeking the states and lives of others what gins are these If our table be a snare what are these riches of mammon the professed weapons of the divell flagges of defiance to all charity these are snares indeed a man that walkes in these he goes in the middest of snares so the Prophet Hosea saith Ye walk in the middest of snares that is they still intangle others and themselves For there is no man that can slander his brother but first he indangereth his owne soule to the divell There is no man that persecutes his brother but first he himselfe is reiected of God So he thinkes he is onely a snare to other men and yet he is intangled in his owne devices God makes that net which he hath devised to insnare himselfe in even that net he set to intrap others We see what a care we should have of these meane things meate and drinke there is great matter of errour in them we may be deceived by them and so led in by-wayes that we never come againe into the way of salvation Now it remaines to come to the proofe and demonstration of this which the Apostle brings out of a Poet for the words following are the verse of a Poet. The Apostle is so far from being ashamed to name a Poet as that he doth it three or four times in his writings to teach us that there is use of humane secular learning in matters of divinity But this I must refer to the next time FINIS 1 COR. 15.33 Be not yee deceived evill words corrupt good manners THese words are a counter-poyson against the former suggestion pretended in the person of an Epicure Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye Those words are full of infection and therefore they are in a figure brought in by Saint Paul as serving his turne to prove that if there were no Resurrection of the body then he accounts the Epicures good and sensible men to take their time While they might have it For he that lookes for no portion after this life there is no reason but he should take it some where and therefore he must have it in this life But now because all men abhorre the doctrine of the Epicures that the prime and chiefe good should be in pleasures in eating and drinking therefore the Apostle puts it in onely by way of scorne Yet shewing that the Corinthians were more senselesse than those Epicures because it is to no purpose for a man to abdicate himselfe from the pleasures of the worâ—d if there be no hope of a Resurrection But because it might be offensive to Christian eares to bring in that poysonous speech of the Epicures he now qualifies it and gives an antidote against it in these words Be not deceived evill words corrupt good manners And every man should have a speciall care of his manners they being the glory of a man And these words that are spoken in disgrace of the Resurrection by drawing men to enjoy the pleasures of this present life as though there were no life after this all words that tend to this purpose are venemous speeches infectious language and corrupt the faith of men corrupt the hope and corrupt the whole life of a man For none are of a more corrupt life then those that thinke there is no life after this and thereupon give themselves liberty and let loose the reynes to all kinde of impiety lasciviousnesse and loosenesse even because they have no hope in God concerning those things that are reposed for the righteous in Iesus Christ So that here is first to be considered Division into the Apostles purpose and his reason the Apostles Purpose that he would not have us be seduced Be not deceived
ignorance into the Church of God Such simple people understand not what perfection God requires to be in him that is truely called a man of God he must be like Moses Acts 7.22 It is said That Moses was taught in all the learning of the Egyptians And so Saint Paul wisheth that the man of God may be perfect that he may be made up as a full and perfect number in Arithmetique that he may be fitted to every good worke which he cannot be except he can speake to a Poet after the manner of a Poet and to a Philosopher in the language of a Philosopher unlesse he can accōmodate himselfe to the party with whom he deales it is impossible he should be a fit and compleat man in the service of God Now the Apostle shewes us a rule here that those things that are vulgarly knowne and of common use they make a better and deeper impression in the mindes of men Therefore they are most of all to be translated and exhibited in speeches and Sermons to the people of God The reason is as I said before because all truth is from God whatsoever these heathen men had it was a glimmering from God Rom. 2.15 And also because the Apostle tels us Rom. 2. That the Heathens had the Law of God written in their hearts their thoughts eyther accusing or excusing them so that it followes then we cannot reject or cast off their sayings because they stand as matters of greater condemnation or matters of greater perswasion then other speeches for marke how our Lord Christ concludes out of the heathen Woe be to thee Chorazin Matth. 11.21 and woe be to thee Bethsaida for if those workes which thou hast seene had beene done in Tyre and Sydon they had repented long agoe Behold how he argues from the heathens so by the heathens actions we shall have greater condemnation then by those presidents we have in our owne Schooles for if the heathens doe thus it is a double shame for Christians not to attaine their perfection So when our Lord saith to Ierusalem that if the mighty workes that he had done in her had beene done in Sodome and Gomorrah they had repented long agoe in sackcloth and ashes He confutes Ierusalem by a strong and mighty argument taken from the heathen Therefore the deeds and sayings of the heathen are also to be noted and remembred of us because they containe much matter of profit to set forth the truth and glory of Gods word by As Saint Basile Basile saith in his Oration to the young man Procelius There is saith he great matter of good that lyeth in the writings of the Poets and Philosophers and every man cannot gather all the good As we see by experience when a man crops a flower from the earth he can get nothing out of it but the sweetnesse of the smell or the delightfulnesse of the colour but when the diligent Bee comes he will make more of it he will extract honey which is as it were the very spittle of the starres So when simple carnall minded men reade the Poets and the Philosophers they gather nothing but delight and pleasure but when the diligent Bee comes a wise man a serious considerate man he drawes honey out of them As Gregory Nazianzen saith Greg. Naz. speaking concerning the same argument saith he As a man that comes into a garden of Roses into a Rose-yard he seeth goodly Roses and goes to plucke a Rose but in the meane time he labours to shun the prickle so in reading of Poets and Philosophers we should plucke the rose but shun the thorne or prickle alway take the best and leave that which is harmefull For there is a mixture of these as the rose growes in the middest of thorns so the doctrine of the Poets is mixed with barbarisme superstition and corruption Let us separate the drosse from the gold refuse the one and take the other To conclude this point because I know every man doth not apprehend it well It is true indeed there is a great disorder in the quotation of humane learning in Sermons in quoting of Poetry and Philosophy and hath beene alwaies Therefore I doe not in all poynts confirme it onely that it may be it is certaine and that it must be in the Church because arguments drawn from the heathen are used by Christ and all his Apostles yet there must be some cautions used in it Cautions for use of humane Learning in Sermons First they must be few not many for it is a most heterogeneal thing for a man in preaching a whole houre to speake nothing but humane learning for he comes not there to be a Philosopher an Orator or to be a Poet but to convert and winne soules Therfore his chiefe time and the principall part of his speech must be the word of God exhortations out of Scripture and instructions to life and good manners so that too many of these are condemned Secondly they must be those things that are cleare and plaine and faire and that are commonly knowne such as every man is acquainted with As this here was a Proverbe in every mans mouth It was a thing notorious no man could doubt of it Therefore they offend against this rule that fetch and hooke in they know not how nor no man knows by what medium they bring in such sentences but to continue and stuffe up their speeches they bring in long and exorbitant sentences and heape them up together for ostentation Lastly they must not be things of affectation but such as come naturally as we speake by way of common proverbe for proverbs make a great impression in mens mindes common sentences sententious utterances are most powerfull So to conclude this poynt It is necessary for the Preacher as Musculus and Calvin and divers other Writers conclude to know a great deale more then the Bible to know more then the study of the principles of Religion they must be such men as that no man may except against them for their ignorance and blindenesse for they must have a taste of all things and be able to draw out of their treasurie those things that concerne the glory of the kingdome of God And because the heathens had a kinde of over-running as when the Conduit is full the water runnes at waste so when Gods people were full of light and knowledge some went over to the heathens for they have read and heard of our bookes Therefore truth which is the pearle or Iewell of God which is scattered we ought to gather it together againe It was lawfull for the Israelitish women to weare the Iewels of the Egyptian women It was lawfull for the children of Israell to possesse the lands and goods and Vineyards of the inhabitants of Canaan So let us take this Iewell of God his truth from these men that are unworthy to possesse it as pearles are often found in the basest and filthiest places let
us take it and put it into Gods Iewell-house where it hath its proper and naturall consistence Now for the substance of the sentence 2 The substance of the verse and the two Antagonists it is betweene two great Antagonists and adversaries good manners and evill words and which gets the victory over other evill words corrupt good manners that is they put them downe and so get the victory that they have no place or abiding any more in a man so that it cannot be knowne where they were The word manners First Antagonist Good manners although it be well understood yet we may adde something to give further light to it It signifieth a certaine habite in a man that is acquired with long labour and diligence and exercise by which a man hath gotten it to himselfe For there is no man borne with good manners but he is borne as a beast as Aristotle Aristotle saith a little childe is more harsh untractable than a beast a man were better keep and bring up a young Lyon he may doe it with lesse labour then to bring up a childe For because God will punish sinne in the first reliques of it therefore to shew the misery and deformity of it he suffers in children the way of impatience and harshnesse that it is the great and wondrous mercy of God that ever they should come to perfection and that they should have nurses to beare with them to humour them and follow them in all the wayes of their corruption So that manners are not naturall unlesse it be brutish manners but those here spoken of are not gotten but with a great deale of diligence What a stirre have we to over-master that filth and corruption that is in our children with stripes with putting them to schoole with exhortations with all the meanes in the world and all too little to beate out of them that naturall corruption and that pestilent humour that is crept into them by originall traduction of sinne But now the Lord hath given to the education of parents and to those of discretion by long custome to be guardians and guides to these little ones that the rudenesse of their nature and the barbarousnesse of their affections might be mollified As the wilde ground the husbandman by long tillage of it and the wilde Vine by pruning and cutting of it at the last he brings the wilde ground to be good soyle and the wilde Vine to be a fruitfull one so the Lord hath given a blessing upon the gift of education that at last he makes these wilde oats to be good corne in the harvest of God and he settles good manners where there was nothing but furious brutishnesse And when they are so setled by long labour by feare of punishments by hope of rewards and by such meanes as doth cultivate the ground of God although it be long before they be brought to this for there is much warre betweene these two adversaries in the Text when these good manners and thus settled then they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sitting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Sedes Indoles Mos. taken from a word which signifieth to sit and keepe residence For being thus ingrafted and keeping residence they are not easily wrought out againe for they come to be as it were a second nature the law of manners is not easily changed as Saint Basile Basile saith because they were first imprinted when the minde of the childe was tender therefore the impression goeth the deeper and continues the longer When the Lord settles the power of his grace in a man it is not easie for the divell to deface that impression and he shall never doe it utterly Although there be divers actions that may deface it in shew and for the present time but the Apostle here speaks in another respect although hee may extend his speech to the manners of grace among the Corinthians But these things that he speaketh of common profession common religion taught they were brought unto them by God who is the husband man as Christ saith Ioh. 15. I am the true Vine Ioh. 15 1. and my Father is the husbandman This culture whereby by diligent labour they were brought from the harsh Idolatry of the heathen to know Christ to come to the knowledge of his faith of his life of his death of his miracles of the benefits they received by the communion of his body and bloud of his blessed Resurrection and the promise of the reuniting of our bodies and of the returne of our spirits these were manners that grace had taught them besides the common profession of Religion for a man may make a profession of religion and yet have no grace Now if these manners remaine in a man he is past the danger of all the pawes of Sathan The divell shall not be able to plucke up these plants Math. 15.13 which our heavenly Father hath planted as our Saviour Christ saith But if we goe no further then common reason and profession and content our selves with the outward forme of religion then comes that to passe here spoken of that evill words corrupt good manners and though good manners be setled of themselves and keepe their residence strongly yet the mightinesse of our enemy is such that he will pull them out except they have a deeper impression by the spirit of God made in us Now we come to the other adversary which is Evill words Second Antagonist Evill words The manners are called good and the language ill not according to the estimation of men but according to the sheckle of the Sanctuary the ballance of the Sanctuary it is that that maketh good to be good and evill to be evill For many languages among men are accounted good that are base and evill and many manners are accounted evill that are perfect and good Therefore if we will examine what manners are good we must not repaire to the Courts of men to the fashions of men for sometime they are accounted most unmannerly amongst them that are the best mortified and sanctified men of all others Nor when we come to examine what are evill words what is wicked discourse and speech we must not measure it by mans iudgement but according to the Rule and Canon and square of the word of God It is that that judgeth men to be good or ill It is to be observed that the word here hath a great elegancie in it For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth such manners as are of great use and profit And so indeed from all kinde of goodnesse from all honest parts there is great profit profit for a mans selfe profit to his body profit to his soule profit to his state profit to his neighbour by his example so good manners be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things of use and profit whereas the actions of ungodly wicked men they are unprofitable As the Apostle saith
natures they remaine longer uncorrupted and perhaps there be some stones that never knew what corruption meanes but those things that are most tender are most subject to corruption because the Ayre which is the mother of life and death the mother of generation and corruption where it is able to disperse the dimensions of it it works corruption as it gave beginning so it works an end It is the plague of God upon every sonne of Adam that the same ayre that gave him life it works also his dissolution In corruption we may observe that the finer the thing is the worse it is corrupted the nature of things that are most finely modulated when they come to be corrupted they have the vilest stench and corruption of all other there is nothing that is made so exactly as the body of a man yet being dead there is no stench like unto it alway the corruption of the best things is the worst Thus it is also in this spirituall corruption The manners which the grace of God and good education hath planted in man the wilde naturall disposition being rooted out and the grace of God being planted in and grafted there it keeps its seat and residence and as long as it is free from externall and outward danger it is well enough but when there comes an outward heat and the ayre to worke upon it that is temptations from abroad temptations from the devill bad examples in the world this outward heat it works upon the substance of the inward stocke and before a man can thinke of it entreth and pierceth Ionah 4 7. and corruption makes way as the cankerworme in Ionas gourd that though it was greene and fresh in the morning yet it was down and withered before night Againe as the tenderest things soonest corrupt so men of the best wits of the best judgements men that have the greatest memories men of the most dexterious spirits their mindes by Gods just judgement are most subject to sinne and grosse corruption Every man doth not serve the devill with like affection and with like spirit Some know how to serve him after one manner and some after another weaker things are subject to lesse corruption but the finest and the tenderest things are soonest corrupted As the fairest and goodliest flowers are soonest blasted and withered To conclude this point When these things in men are corrupted it is the worst corruption that can be When the understanding is corrupted as the Apostle speaks To the cleane Tit. 1.15 all things are cleane but to the uncleane all things are polluted and corrupted even their understandings When a mans braine is tainted when his understanding is corrupted it is most pestilent When he takes lyes for truth when he follows errours instead of the Oracles of God This is not the condition of a man well educated by grace Therefore I beseech you let us say with the Apostle Evill words corrupt good manners and let us take heed of all ill manners and ill speeches which is the next and the maine thing that I should come unto I shall speake but a word of it The word signifieth not onely a passing flying word but a setled discourse of a company and societie of men a kinde of league that men have together for the words that are flying and passing away they may be rejected and cast away Every wicked man that speaks ill and wickedly he is not presently apprehended or liked of but if a man still keepe on and make his discourse of it if he make it his disputation and argues the case now the danger comes there is nothing worse then such ill words to corrupt good manners Our first parents Adam and Eve were corrupted so even by evill words The serpent offered them no violence but onely spake an evill word and so hee conveighed that poyson He did not offer according to the power that the devill the wicked Angels had to hurt their bodies he offered them no injury by force but he spake the word and so entred into Eve into that grace and justice that was originally in he◠and corrupted it in a moment Behold how soone one sparke of fire kindles a whole stacke of corne how one scabbed sheepe infects all the flocke It is infinite to see how corruption grows and spreads it selfe like a tetter that it is seldome or never restrained and limited except the Spirit of God use a mighty hand in it And as it was at the first so it is now as Saint Austin saith Aug. Thou killest not thy brother by the sword or by a violent hand as Cain killed Abel but thou doest as bad thou speakest a bad word thou givest him bad counsell thou givest him an ill example and that is worse then to kill with the sword for the sword goes but to a mans bodie but evill words they go to the heart to the soule and alway the infection the deeper it is and the nearer the heart the more dangerous and the worse it is Evill words corrupt good manners If evill words corrupt good manners What do evill books then for as long as the word is but spoken it is but winde that goes and comes there is no great regard to be had of it it is a lighter matter and he is a perfect man that never slides and stumbles in his words every man will give a man leave to tosse and roll himselfe in his words and will take it when it comes to his owne turne againe But evill books lascivious wicked books that are set forth when they are exhibited they remaine and hold on Therefore certainly if they shall be damned that speake ill words which tend to the subversion of good manners and to the corruptions of Gods children if they shall be damned ipso facto as all must confesse it follows then those that study damnable books abusive things whereby the good manners of the children of God are cast into hazard these shall receive double damnation If bare evill words are so dangerous what are they when they are set out to the full when the devill will not walke only in bare words lest he prove foolish and contemptible but he will strout it out in action with a lively voyce with a goodly faire cōplexion in stately habite in all pompe and gallantry of apparrell when thus men in a goodly feature act it for the devill for they do nothing but set the devils poyson in a faire glasse or cup and give it people to make themselves drunke of it it must needs be more venemous poyson and more pestilent mischiefe that comes to the soule by reading these books then by other things The Philosophers tell us of a filthy kinde of creature differing from all other creatures which ingenders at the eare the conception of the female is at the eare and the generating of the male is at the eare too Though this may be a fiction as it may be true for we are ignorant
for the eares Those that were wrastlers and fought with the club they were armed with these Amphitedes which were made of some hard matter that so they might keepe the blow from their eares that upon the sudden they might not be stounded and dazelled and struck downe but might stand the longer in the fight Therefore they had these Amphitedes about their eares when they fought at the club And saith Plutarch these ought every yong man to take as a speciall munition against evill speeches For there is no blow either with staffe or club that afflicts the body or so stounds the braine of a man as evill and wicked speeches infect the soule Therefore the best way is to deeme such speeches base and impious to turne the eares from them and to give no audience to them For there is nothing in them but mischiefe the mouthes of wicked men being nothing but as the rawe graves as the Prophet saith Psal 5.9 Their throat is an open sepulchre that as the grave where a corps hath been lately buried being newly raved in there will a filthy vapour stench exhale and come forth to the danger of all the standers by so the throats of evill men their wicked speeches are as a raw grave sepulchre which when it begins to be opened let all the company runne away as fast as they can for there is a deadly stench that will infect them Their throat is an open sepulcher they breathe out the blasts of death of filthinesse and corruption And now he proceeds further and tels them that if they enter into the substance of the things which those men speake they are meere idle dreames of a drunken man their speech and communication is the most sencelesse of all other Therefore he saith Awake ye drunkards to justice or righteousnesse Shewing that all those words that are any way against God and his power and glory in the Resurrection what discourse soever it be that cals that in question it is nothing else but as Saint Basil Basil cals it the meere dreame of a drunken man It is an idle thing for any man to hearken to a drunkards speech especially that which he speaks betweene sleeping and waking so it is much more idle to hearken to these evill speeches and discourses of these blasphemous mouthes Now because the Church of Corinth hath beene infected with this cup and hath taken so much of it that many of them are drunke with it Therefore I will you saith the Apostle to wake now while God hath given you time and opportunitie while by my ministerie and the rest that shall succeed me hee gives you summons and cals you to wake out of this drunken humour from these wicked speeches that tend to sensualitie and carnalitie Let us eate and drinke for to morrow we shall dye and what shall become of us when we are dead These evill speeches are the dregs of hell and the lees of this deadly wine you have taken in abundance to your selves therefore as soone as you can awake And so wake as you may stand up to righteousnesse and follow that and walke therein for ever hereafter for there is difference in them that are waked out of sleepe Some are awaked with lesse noyse the creaking of a doore the least noyse in a chamber will wake some Such are those that are of tender hearts in Gods Church the least advertisement and admonition will bring them home Others are profoundly and deadly asleepe such as are spoken of here drunken men that are more violently asleepe then others they cannot bee drawne from it without extremitie they cannot be waked without calling without jogging or pinching and whatsoever meanes can be used to recover them yea when they are awaked except they bee taken when their sleepe is mellow they grow into desperate furie and madnesse And some when they are awaked they go not to their worke they set not to action but like the foolish sluggard in the Proverbes they cry Prov. 6.10 A little more sleepe a little more folding of the hands a little more turning and tossing as Saint Austin saith Aug. A little more sleepe a little more slumber and I will rise now and now but now and now have no measure nor bounds in them Now because there is such difference in mens wakings the Apostle sets downe the manner how they should wake Awake sufficiently not so as to returne to sleepe againe The sleepe naturall must be iterated and repeated men cannot alway wake but they must have some time to revive and refresh their spirits with the vicissitude change of sleepe But the spirituall waking is of another nature it must be undertaken upon such conditions and performed so as that we never returne by our good wils unto sleepe or if our naturall infirmitie carry us so farre yet never to snort and slumber in sinne any more but to wake to righteousnesse and to do that which is good in the sight of the Lord. And then because it might be somewhat doubtfull what this is that he saith Awake justly to righteousnesse he expounds himselfe in the next words Sinne not Psal 4.4 A phrase common among the Hebrews Psal 4. Commune with your owne hearts and be still and sinne not So here he tels what he meanes when he saith Awake justly that is give not your selves to sinne and corruption for that is the beginning of all these mischiefes Sinne is like Cyrces cups that inveigles and drownes men in slumber that they never rise againe without the wondrous mercy of God Therefore take heed you fall not into it because that brings all other evils it is that which brings the corruption of good words and good manners and you fall into them because you have no care of your conversation That is the first part of the Text. Then in the second he begins to deale more nearely with them and tels them of their proper faults that they were ignorant in things concerning God that they knew not God which is the maine object of all our knowledge For those that know not God or know him but by halves that call in question the omnipotencie of God concerning the raising of our bodies they are meerly ignorant of God He that doubts of Gods power concerning the raising of the dead hee were as good know nothing of God for he limits and straightens the hand of God and makes him inferiour to himselfe and inferiour to his word For his power is greater then his will and his will is revealed in his Word and his Word tels us that he will do it Therefore certainly he can do it because he can do more then he will do Therefore he that cals in question these things he were as good to have no sence or taste of God at all He knows not God he denies the prime and chiefe thing that is in God and therefore he knows him not And so it is with some of
you you have an ignorance concerning God because you call in question his power in this mighty benefit the resurrection of our bodies And then lastly he concludeth with mildnesse and sharpnesse and mingleth both together I speake this to your shame As if he should have said partly I am ashamed that I have spent so much time and so much labour among you and yet still you are in such waverings as these and are no better perswaded in the omnipotent power of God But as I speake this to your shame so I would not have you despaire but onely to take shame of your fault and so be brought to Repentance I speake it not to bring you to a confusion eternall but to a healthy confusion a confusion that brings conversion that conversion may bring salvation by the mercy of God I speak it not to overthrow you but to waken you that have beene intoxicate in a deepe sleepe by the wicked communication of these men This I take to be the sence of the Text. To proceed in order There are three parts Division into 3. Parts First a counsell or exhortation Then a serious expostulation 1. An exhortation 2. An expostulation 3. An Increpation And lastly a forcible dealing by way of Increpation whereby he doth as it were by an holy violence compell them to enter into the wayes of God and to be reclaimed from their sinnes The first is contained in these words Awake to righteousnesse and sinne not 1 delivered And that First in figure and then In plaine speech The figure in these words Awake to righteousnesse The plaine words follow And sinne not The one interprets the other In the figure there are two things 1 There is an Act to awake out of wine awake out of drinke for so the word signifieth Then secondly there is the tearme and manner whereto they must wake Awake to justice awake to perfection not as men halfe asleep and halfe awake to turne on the other side and take a nappe but to wake fully and freely It is such a waking as a man may be expedite to worke in the function of his life whereunto all waking men are disposed Then in the plaine words or exposition hee shews likewise two things 1 First that sinne is the mother of all errour of all grosse and base communication 2 Secondly that by the grace of God if we work with the grace of God we shall not sinne that is we shall not sinne in that grosse manner as these creatures do Although all men be sinners yet if we will tender the grace of God that is in us we shall so live as that we shall not sinne according to that phrase of Scripture which is afterwards to be expounded namely not with a full consent not with a high hand not to continue in sinne not to despaire in sinne but we shall know that if we do sinne we have a Mediatour of our reconciliation we have a Mediator which is God and Man Christ Iesus 1. Tim. 2.5 1. Iob. 1.1 2. who is the propitiation for our sinnes Then in the second part in the exposition there are two things to be considered First he tels them of their fault 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is a word that we cannot well utter in English nor in Latine it is hard to be exprest in both languages to be ignorant of God And then because he would not offend all the company for a fews sake he saith Some of you have not the knowledge of God And then lastly the Application of all to them he saith he speakes it to their shame that is either he was ashamed to spend so much time and labour to so little profit or he spake it to their shame as the common Text reades it I speake it to your shame But yet it is such a speech as is not uttered in a virulent manner to cast them away to make them despaire but to bring them home that they might know what they ought to do for the time to come These are the branches of the Text. Of every one of these as the Lord shall give assistance and but a word of every one because they are common obvious things First it is to be observed 1. Part. The Exhortation Awake c. that the Apostle invites them and cals upon them for waking and for such a waking as if he should speake to a sort of drunkards that were drowned in wine and drunkennesse which is as base a kinde of sleepe as can be For all sleepe naturall of it selfe is justly accounted a meere losse of time the brother of death the field of danger a thing that hath no profit in it that spends one part of our life to no purpose And yet we cannot live without it for the repairing and re-edifying and building up of our bodies againe that were consumed and wasted before with daily labour Now if the naturall sleepe be a loosing of time a loosing of our spirits and a subjecting of us to danger much more then is it in the sleepe of sinne that poysonous sleepe that comes by excesse and drunkennesse These of all other are most dangerous and most hard for a man to bee rouzed out of It is a common thing in Scripture to compare sinners to sleepers and sinne to sleepe There are divers sleepes related in the Scriptures The sleepe corporall of the body and spirituall of the soule The sleepe corporall of the body is either naturall or violent Naturall sleepe is that when the strength of man is weakened and abated and his spirits are againe renewed by a gracious mist and dew that is cast upon the body whereby the naturall spirits the vitall spirits and the animall spirits are refreshed and raised againe to their worke Violent sleepe is either by drunkennesse or disease When nature is overwhelmed by drunkennesse or by disease As by Lethargies or palsies which all worke unto death which is also called sleepe For our Lord Christ saith We go to Lazarus who sleepeth And those that dye in the Lord they sleepe This is naturall sleepe The spirituall sleepe the sleepe that fals upon the spirit of man it is of two sorts in Scripture The one is celestiall and good The other is infernall for hell and hellish purposes Cant. 2.7 The first is that sleepe of the Church I charge you oh daughters of Ierusalem by the roes and by the hyndes that ye wake not my beloved untill she please that is in the meditation of holy things It is a divine rapture whereby the Saints of God have communion and are made one spirit with the Lord. Cant. 5.1 This is called in Scripture a sleepe I sleepe but my heart waketh But that which the Apostle speaks of here is an infernall sleepe that tends to a sleepe of damnation As sleepie diseases nourish death in men and there is no more assured signe that a man shall dye then when he is continually sleeping that he
the corne grows thus because it hath a double end For as you know it is made after a kinde of a long fâ—shion with two ends out of which co es the moysture and juyce which is the life and soule of the seed For if those ends should be cut or bitten off the seed could never rise againe Therefore the Ants and pâ—smires those creatures that hoard up corne against the Winter when they carrie it into their holes where they lay it they are carefull to bite off both ends of the corne to snappe them off For they understand by nature that if they should let them alone the corne would sprout and so they could not live on it God hath given them this instinct to know that out of the two ends comes the soule and life and juyce as being in those ends brought to a point out of which the life worketh This now the husbandman easily understands But the mystery concerning the body he doth not understand so well but yet he must make the argument from his field to Gods field from his hand to Gods hand from the blessing upon the corne to the blessing upon the body and then he shall see that the argument will follow clearly Is it possible that the Lord should have such a care and providence of a poore dead corne that fals into the earth that hee should raise it againe with a new colour and in great abundance and multiply it that it grows from one state to another from a blade to an eare and from thence to full corne in the eare Is it possible the Lord shall thus proportion and suite his power to a graine of corne that fals into the ground and will he neglect the temples of the holy Ghost will he neglect the image of God the body upon which he hath drawne the lineaments of Christ and for which he hath made a promise that hee will conforme it unto his body If God be carefull for the fowls of heaven and for the lillies of the field Mat 6.30 much more will hee be carefull for us oh we of little faith Therefore the bodies of the Saint are so precious in Gods sight that all the corne in the world doth not amount to that summe as one of those bodies For God gave the body of his Sonne to redeeme the body of the meanest of his and shall we doubt but that he that is so rich in glory upon the weake dead body of the corne will be much more glorious and powerfull in raising up these roots of life againe which though they seeme to bee dead are breeding of immortality by the power of him that is able by his mighty power to subdue all things to himselfe Saint Chrysostome askes the question saith he why did not the Apostle rather runne to the same argument that hee alledgeth to the Philippians to the omnipotencie of God Phil. 3.21 rather then to take this argument For when he treats there with the Philosophers Phil. 3. concerning this argument he proves it from that maine point because God can do all things therefore he will do this From whence wee looke for the Saviour who shall change our vile bodies and make them like his glorious body according to his mighty power c. But saith he the Apostle here to these thought this the best teaching Hence we may learne Vse that it is a singular kinde of teaching when a man can instruct his scholler by the trade that he is frequently exercised in which hee is most familiar with That teaching is most operative and working the most impressive teaching that can be So our Lord Iesus teacheth his disciples that were fishermen out of their owne trade Come Mat. 4.19 and I will make you fishers of men So when he speaks to the common people to the multitude hee teacheth the plough-man by a plough-man Matth. 13.3 A sower went forth to sowe seed and some fell on the high way and some fell on thorny ground and some on good ground So Saint Paul Act. 17. he teacheth the Athenians which is a strange doctrine by their owne idols Act. 7.23 Ye men of Athens I see ye are too much given to superstition and idolatrie for as I came by one of your altars I see it written there To the unknowne God So our Saviour Christ teacheth men to make them friends of the unrighteous mammon Luk. 16.9 by the common lucre and gaine which was gotten among the Publicanes And in S. Iohn Baptist every man hath a lesson out of his owne trade he said to the souldiers do thus and to the Publicans Luk. 3. do thus still he teacheth them out of their owne particular calling and actions To teach us to labour and desire in this manner every one to bee taught out of those things that are common and obvious daily to us for therein is the greatest power of perswasion He that is conversant about the fire in fire-works and especially such as worke in glasse-houses where if he cannot see a cleare picture of hell he is a very sencelesse man and very bruitish in his understanding Psal 107.23 He that goes downe to the sea in ships and exerciseth his businesse in great waters if he cannot see a wondrous act of Gods providence in his preservation he understandeth nothing He that is a Student and doth not see in his books and the difficulties of learning and remembring if he do not see the infinite and admirable blessing of the Almighty in saving his wits and memory and in raising him from one degree of learning to another hee understands nothing In our ordinarie meats and drinks he that seeth not God seeth nothing hee hath his feeding and preservation from him and therein hee hath a signe of his everlasting refreshment and preservation Let us therefore scorne no Art nor thinke basely of any kinde of labour and good exercise because there is matter of good doctrine lyeth in the poorest profession that can be That which thou sowest I will prove out of thine owne actions out of thy owne trade this doctrine that I teach Thou that propoundest this question thou art not more simple then a plough-man and I will prove it unto thee from thence by the poorest labour in the earth for the man that tils the ground he is of lesse account then an Artizan yet even the very plough-man shall prove and make good that this doctrine that I teach is probable and possible And why because That which thou sowest is first dead and then it is quickened againe Concerning the dying of the corne the Philosophers make a distinction because they knew not this doctrine of the Resurrection They thought when the habite was gone when the privation had put out the habite that it could never come backe againe Therefore they thought that the corne had ever life in it But the Scripture tels us that it is dead that is it is dead to us
which are the judges of life and death For who can tell what is dead and what is alive in the creature but he that is Lord of the creature Therefore though it have a kinde of action though it have a kinde of life lurking in it yet to our sence it is to no purpose it is of no use it is a meere jellie that is good neither for man nor beast Therefore it is dead So our Lord Christ saith Ioh. 12.24 Verily saith he comparing himselfe to the wheat-corne the corne of wheat saith hee except it fall into the ground and dye it remains alone and brings forth nothing but is single still but when it fals into the ground when it is buried and dyes in the earth then it brings forth much fruit So the Sonne of Man if he should live still in the world and not dye hee should remaine alone hee should do no good hee should be a single Christ no man could be saved by him but if he dye and rise againe hee shall raise a mighty harvest unto God So we see the truth of this doctrine manifested against the Philosophers That the corne is simplie dead it is demonstrated hence because the corne of God which is farre better then the common corne it dyes the bodies of men are truly dead yea the body of that wheat corne the Sonne of God himselfe was dead It is idle therefore for them to imagine that it hath a perfection to it selfe though it be corrupted to us For it is certaine that all these things dye the corne dyeth man dyeth the Sonne of God dyed according to that part of his humane nature which was mortall Therefore hee compares himselfe to a wheat corne to shew the great and sweet convenience betweene him which is the head and we that are his members how it is figured in these parcels of nature First the Lord hath made the corne of the earth to feed man and hath given a gracious abundance unto it that it comes forth in a goodly beautie and with strange varietie And then he teacheth us that the bodies of men shall rise so too which are much more deare then corne And lastly he hath given us a patterne in his owne body being cast into the earth which else should have remained single but being once interred and rising againe brings forth abundance of fruit This we may see in the bread of this life and in the bread of heaven how they both worke to give us an assurance of the Resurrection The bread of this life is corne the bread of heaven is Christ he is the Mannah that came downe from heaven Job 6.58 and these breads the bread of the body and the bread of the soule make up the conclusion as a certaine thing that that which is nourished by both these breads shall follow the qualitie of them The body of man is nourished with the one and the soule of man with the other Therefore the substance of the man must rise because the bodily bread riseth and the spirituall bread riseth and we feed of them and according to that which a man feeds on he is conformed As the Philosopher saith man is nourished of that thing whereof he consists and he consists of that whereby he is nourished And further we may observe in the phrase hee doth not say that the corne liveth but it is enlivened as Saint Chrysostome Chrysost and Saint Basil Basil observe Because hee would give us to note that all is in the power of God that worketh all in all Therefore he saith It is quickened It signifieth a passion or suffering and to be wrought upon from a higher cause It is quickened it is enlivened from a higher superior power So that the growing of the corne is not meerly from the influence of the Sunne or of the Moone no nor from the goodnesse of the soyle nor from the diligence of the husbandman nor from any naturall inherent qualitie but God gives it a body God gives it life And if his eye of providence be so watchfull in these particular cases in things of this small qualitie much more will he be watchfull in that great worke wherein he hath bound himselfe by a promise and if that be too little he hath sworne it we have his oath that it shall be so He hath given us to know in his Word 1. Cor 3.6 that it is not in Paul that plants nor in Apollo that waters but God that gives the increase that is there is nothing that can bring forth fruit no not a tree except the Lord give the increase All the second causes are nothing it is God that works all as the Psalmist saith Psal 127.1 2. It is to no purpose for men to rise early or to go to bed late and to eate the bread of carefulnesse It is in vaine for the watchmen to watch the Citie except the Lord keepe it The Apostle doth not say It doth not live except it dye but he saith It is not quickened it is not enlivened still hee reflects upon God and yeelds unto him the praise and glory of all things for from him onely comes the blessing and increase And lastly to conclude with the time hee saith that after the corne is dead it is quickened againe it is enlivened againe so it shall be with the bodies of men after they be dead but hee saith except it first bee dead it cannot be alive so that dying is the necessary reason of living It is a condition absolute if wee must live we must of necessity dye first Vse This must teach us that there is no exemption and priviledge from death if we look to be of their number that shall come to life Men cannot possibly be clad over this body with glory this body is not capable of the garment of glory except either it be brought to a change as they shall be that live at the comming of Christ or else it dye and be raised againe It is impossible that the robe of glory should cover this body of ours as it is Vse This should comfort us against death that because we shall dye first therefore wee shall be quickened againe it hath the force of a cause or condition in it it cannot bee otherwise Because the corne dyes therefore it lives and the reason that it lives is because it first dyes There is no hope of recoverie of life except first there bee a passage through death Hence we have exceeding comfort against the sorrows of death Those things that seeme to argue cleane contrary against us they make most for us For because there be such unlikelihoods of the Resurrection therefore we shall rise because we shall be dead therefore we shall be alive because we shall be closed within the grave as in a prison therefore we shall be inlarged because we are brought to dust and ashes therefore we shall bee brought to glory and to a heavenly condition
the flesh is that which we beleeve the resurrection of this flesh that is of men and chiefly of them that beleeve in Iesus Christ how the Lord hath set his hand upon this flesh his workmanship appeares to be wonderfull How he hath laid the foundation of it in the bones How he hath brought the flesh over it to be a covering and veile for the soule How he hath inlivened it that wheresoever there is flesh there is life and hath put the soule in it to dwell in the cabinet of the flesh How he hath divided and distinguished the parts in their severall joynts in their severall uses and proportions How he hath watred it with bloud and veines and with juyce and moysture every where How he hath inflamed it with arteries How he hath made it sensible with sinews How he hath extended and stretched it out with muscles How he hath covered all with a faire and beautifull skinne How he hath fenced some parts with haire as in men and with divers other fences more thicke and solid as in the diversitie of beasts with feathers as in fowls with skales as in fishes and yet all to live after one manner that there is none of these can live but they have veines and arteries and sinews and a braine which is the place of sence and a heart which is the place of life and a liver which is the place of concoction and they have bloud whereby they live That the Lord I say should set such a wondrous hand upon flesh now it argues he will do greater matters for it hereafter For he would not be so liberall of his grace and providence upon it here except he intended further glory for it hereafter Indeed in the trees and plants and fruits that grow upon the earth there is a glorious and sweet lustre and great variety but being compared unto flesh it is nothing And therefore in the Scriptures the flesh is made the subject of the promises and manhood it selfe is tearmed by the name of flesh as being that habitation or house that God meanes to raise againe when it is fallen downe to rebuild it up better then ever it was before For the flesh must fall as the flower of the field although it continue longer then the flower of the field but the Lord shall raile it unto everlasting glory So then this must teach us in the generall Vse that as oft as we looke upon our flesh or upon the flesh of others we ought still to possesse our mindes with holy meditations of the glory that shall be revealed upon that flesh to thinke of the resurrection of that flesh As the Lord hath built it wondrously and beautified it to singular purpose in this world so when it is ruinated he shall rebuild it to a farre greater beauty that shall never fade away but shall have a constant being as he himselfe is for ever It should teach us also to have a care of this flesh Vse that God hath so graced and that we do not disgrace it and betray it to the divell that we do not subject it to damnable purposes that we do not swell it with drunkennesse that we do not spoyle it with filthinesse that we do not distract it with worldly cares that we do not any way abuse and imbezell that substance that God meanes to grace that he hath set his image and stampe upon here and that hereafter meanes to better this his workmanship let not us prophane that which God hath made holy So much for the first point that the Apostles argument goes greater and higher the further wee go in nature still the more insight we have in the worke of the Lord and in the certaintie of the promises Therefore the Apostle riseth from things that grow in the earth from vegetables to things that live and move and there hee shews the resurrection more clearly 2. Part. The fourefold diversity of flesh Then the second thing to bee considered is this that the Apostle saith that all flesh is not one flesh For there is dâ—versitie of it It is true all flesh agrees in the generall they all live with a soule all men and beasts and fishes and birds they all have a soule and live in one manner by their bloud and by digestion of meat which turnes into bloud and nourishment So in the generall all flesh is one but in their severall kindes they are so varied that there is scarce any proportion one with another when we go to the particular differences of them For saith hee although they be one in the maine yet they be different in their specialties The first and chiefest that he names is the flesh of men And then after that the flesh of beasts Thirdly the flesh of fishes Fourthly of birds and fowls of the heaven For indeed according to their different motion the diversitie of their flesh may be conceived That the motion of men should be upon the earth and yet by reason of an heavenly aspect his countenance should bee erected unto heaven where his thoughts ought to be continually That the beasts should have a prone dejected motion looking alway toward the earth and as it were groveling there That the fishes should glide in the watery element being as it were not of our world but of another countrey That the fowls should mount up in that spirit and vigour that God hath given them by reason of a wing and a feather whereby they leave the seat wherein we must live and betake themselves unto the upper region By this variety of their motion we may necessarily gather this that there is a great variety in their natures For there is nothing more argueth the varietie of a thing then the ordinary motion of it to observe how it is moved The Apostle puts no other difference that might be conceived as the flesh of serpents c. because that may be referred to some of these it may be referred unto beasts or unto fishes but he contents himselfe with these foure as comprehending in them all the world of flesh which God created And in the first ranke in the prime place he saith there is one flesh of men whereon the Lord hath stamped his own image and hath made it the goodliest of all flesh setting such an admirable beautie in it and indowing some flesh with such excellent wisedome and judgement and that which is the chiefe of all setting the stampe of holinesse upon it which is the onely ornament of the flesh and of the spirit also that there is nothing that can compare with man I meane no visible thing in the world can enter into any tearms of comparison with that glorious image of God Such a goodly aspect to heaven Such a majestie and power in behaviour Such an erect upright and tall stature Such a goodly complection and proportion in the parts of the body Such an admirable dexteritie in all his actions Such valour such wisedome such
deserved well in this world were turned into starres and so they imagined Hercules and Antonius and Arctophilax and a great number of toyes and trifles that they devised as though the starres were the bodies of men or that they were persons of a spirituall substance But the Lord teacheth us that they are no earthly bodies they are things that were created in the first beginning and they are bodies which notwithstanding seeme to be nothing lesse then bodies they seeme to be spirituall things to be spirits rather then bodies being of such a swiftnesse and of that rare operation and brightnesse Yet the Lord tels us that they are bodies that is that they have a kind of earthlinesse in them they have a kinde of matter in them For although they be farre different from these inferiour things from these inferiour bodies yet in respect of the first Creator they are but bodies For there is but one spirit there is but one pure Spirit which is God himselfe All things else have a kinde of dreggie matter in them which makes them bodies the bodies which are heavenly that is the starres are bodies because they are visible because they are circumscribed because they have figure and proportion and they are bodies because they are kept within a certaine compasse and limit Whence it follows that seeing they are bodies therefore they are not to be worshipped as the Heathens used to do and as the Indian people at this day worship them but hence we see they ought not to bee worshipped Why even because they are but bodies nay they are insensible bodies they have not sence to guide them So that for all their puritie and the use they are of to the world yet in the perfection of life they are not comparable unto the beasts of the field for the beasts of the field that have sence are more perfect in their kinde then the Sunne in the firmament Eatenus because to have life and sence is a better kinde of being then to be without it The starres are bodies without sence they are bodies without soules and they are over-ruled by other things or else as they bee bodies they could not possible rule themselves Now these goodly bodies how they should bee carried up and downe every 24. houres after what manner whether they flye as the birds in the ayre so they in their spheares and orbes or whether they swimme as the fishes in the sea as divers men have imagined a man would thinke that one of those wayes they must needs be moved but it is certaine they do neither of them For they have a mighty power that God hath given them and the Angels execute this power and they turne the whole globe over Psal 104.2 as the Psalmist saith where he cals it the curtaine of heaven which is bespangled with stars and the whole curtaine is turned over together as an Ancient or Flagge displayed that is imbossed with gold all the whole compasse and circumference is moved together or as a woman when she turnes the rimme of a wheele about both the circle and the center are moved together and so all the wheele moveth round together so the power of the Angels move the celestiall bodies by the appointment of God that in twenty foure houres they compasse the whole earth which is as much in effect as if a bird should flye fifty times the space of the world in halfe a quarter of an houre The rarenesse therefore of this motion and the strangenesse of it argueth that God hath set over them some spirituall mover which wee call their standings and their Intelligences which move them to and fro in an unspeakable manner And for the manner of it that it should be in such a contrary course that never a starre should rise to morrow in the same manner as it doth to day and that the Sunne should never rise at one and the same point twice in the yeare but still varie and by varying make the compasse of the yeare as the Moone makes the compasse of the moneth For the Sunne hath one motion whereby hee makes the day and the Moone another motion whereby shee makes the night Againe there is another motion of the Sunne whereby hee makes the yeare and the Moone hath another motion whereby she makes a moneth And so for the rest of these heavenly bodies some of them fulfill their course and period in twelve yeares some in five yeares some in thirty some in a hundred yeares the Lord having set such a rare guidance in these things that there is nothing but a man may know it before hand a man may tell fifty yeares yea an hundred yeares before hand when there shall be an eclipse and the presages of these things are certainly knowne This argues that these bodies celestiall are moved by spirits celestiall For of themselves being but bodies they could not possible do thus they could not keepe this exact and swift motion nor they could not rowle over of themselves it is impossible being but bodies that they should do these things Now I come to the second point 2. Part or comparison wherein the Apostle compares these bodies together in respect of their glory There is a great glory indeed in terrestriall bodies there is a great glory in gold and silver and many men esteeme them more then the starres of heaven There is a great glory and lustre in jewels and precious stones there is a goodly transparent beauty in them in the lustre that they give There is a great glory in the beauteous faces of Gods Saints and in the gorgeous and pompous out-settings of Kings and Princes in their Courts of state There is great glory in every part of humane felicitie but being compared to this glory of the heavenly bodies they are meere foyles to that For saith the Apostle there is one glory of the heavenly and another glory of the earthly That is there is a farre greater glory of the heavenly then can bee supposed to bee in the earthly For first of all the glory in the heavenly bodies is pure but the glory in the earthly is mixed the purer the glory is and the more it is separate the more singular and excellent it is Now the glory which is in the stars above is pure in comparison of these earthly things And although they bee speckled and spotted in respect of God and be full of dregges in comparison with the Angels yet in relation to earthly things they are most pure even puritie it selfe All these inferiour things in their glory they have a mixture They are mingled of foure things there is nothing so glorious but it is composed of the foure elements even of Earth Water Fire and Ayre and these elements are never so well glued together but they will worke themselves asunder iâ— time whereas that celestiall beauty is pure without mixture it is an Essence that is elaborate to the full God hath brought
of the Lord out of the prime materialls and beginnings It is raised never to fall downe againe It is raised not to relapse againe but to stand as a goodly monument for ever It is raised by the mighty hand of him that raiseth the poore out of the dust and mire Psal 113.7 8. and makes them equall to the Princes of his people Therefore in this word the Apostle would teach us also wherein our hope consists It is sowne that is a hopefull action but after it is sowne it must be raised againe that is a dependant action which is not in our selves but from the Lord. Therefore we must raise our hearts unto God and returne our devotion and best affections to him while we live here that he may raise these bodies of ours when they have no power to raise themselves but when they shall lie in the dust of confusion he shall raise them up that they may be living Temples for the holy Ghost for ever to inhabit It is necessary before hand to raise our spirits unto him that he may make a requitall unto us at the great day of his Visitation So much for the metaphors It is sowne in corruption Corruption is the worst change that can be It is a motion from a being to a not-being For as generation is a work of God whereby something which was not is brought to have a being so corruption is a work which God permits to be done whereby a thing is brought to fall from that being either to no-being at all to have no being in our sense or else to such a base and naughty being that a man can see no reason why it should ever have been so glorious and so goodly to come to such a foule disgracefull downfall Corruption therefore is the destruction of the thing that was made as in all things we see in the world In naturall artificiall things when a matter is corrupt once it grows fit for nothing and although there be some kind of liquors that when they are corrupted they serve for some use as wine when it is corrupt it turnes to vineger and although it be not fit to drink yet it serves to raise the appetite in sauce and so divers other things doe so corrupt that notwithstanding they serve for some use but yet the chiefest and greatest number of things when they come once to be corrupted they come as much as to say to nothing to a kind of dissolution for there is nothing that can be turned unto nothing simply but because the use and property and substance is so disgraced and a contrary thing succeeds a better it is as if the thing were not at all Now this corruption is done two waies It is effected either by separation of the matter Or by removing of the forme The matter and the form you know are the chief things of which every body consists and we see that in death these things hold exactly For the forme of man being his reasonable soule as long as that is in the body it is cōpact and free from corruption and it keeps the beauty in the forme and image of God in its proper frame and figure But when the soule is gone then corruption works and dissolves the matter to Now when the matter is dissolved or the element is dissolved and corrupted this is that corruption which the Apostle speaks of here when hee saith The body is sowne in corruption that is the principles of the body which consist of bloud and flesh and skin and bones and colour and complexion and proportion and figure and frame all these goe away presently after the soule is gone And though some hold longer then other as being of more sollid parts yet they continue not long even but a few yeares and in some grounds a few dayes destroy the whole man This corruption began when wee began God t is true made the body of man uncorrupt had he persisted in obedience but as soone as man by his prevarication by transgression of Gods command was drawne into sinne he brought upon him this worme of corruption which never ceaseth to work upon the powers and faculties of flesh and bloud and upon every part till at the last it work it to an utter nothing to a very desolation And this corruption if it could be contained it were well if it could consist within some termes For corruption is proper to the body but yet through the infection of sin the gangrene hath so poysoned and possessed the whole man that corruption by a metaphor is brought into the soule to which is the speciall part of man And when the best things are corrupted the corruption is most wofull of all Matth 6.23 If the light that is in thee be darknesse how great is that darknesse saith the Lord Iesus Men in this world are corrupt in body they are corrupt in soule they are corrupt in their understandings in their speeches they are corrupt in their wayes Psal 53.1 as the Prophet saith Corrupt they are and become abominable in their doings there is none that doth good no not one They are corrupt in their consciences the consciences of wicked men are defiled with hypocrisie that they stink in the nostrils of God and men And to this corruption every man is subject more or lesse But the chiefe corruption intended here is corruptibility that is the rottennes of the parts of the body when they are once dissolved and melted and fall from one another To conclude this point because we know it by experience and we beare about us these corrupt bodies and we are troubled with the signs of corruption every day if we understand any thing Vse 1 It should teach us therefore not to triumph in any of these worldly things that puffe up the flesh and fill the mind with vaine conceits of its owne sufficiency but rather let us study mortification such as becomes the children of God let us weep for our owne corruptions for they grow so fast upon us that they make us odious even unto our owne selves when wee come to have a sense of our selves Againe it teacheth us this to take heed how we Vse 2 patch over this corruptibility as we use to do What a deale of cost what a deal of painting and art and labour and time is spent now adaies to conceal this corruption Corrupt bodies will not seem to be corrupt but they will be immortall and eternall and those offensive things that be in nature and that grossenesse and loathsomnesse that lurks in these bodies we seek by perfumes and by orient colours and singular diet to suppresse them and obscure them that they may not appeare But now the Lord hath put a worm in this flesh see it and acknowledge it and waile over it make not thy selfe better then thou art deceive not thy selfe thou art nothing but dust and ashes a corrupt creature a masse of corruption Why then art thou
the least relish of it when his eyes waxe dim when he can retaine nothing in his stomack but he casts it up againe when hee can hardly speak a word nor know his best friends but all the organs of life and sense are drowned in death This is that poore weaknesse which the Apostle speaks of It is sown in weaknesse When he is casheerd and deprived of all sense of all power and motion and nothing remaines but a base and desperate imbecility and such a kind of infirmity as that there is no hope in flesh and bloud that ever there shall be made any recovery This is the state of all men Vse And it must teach us beloved to weepe over our weaknesse to think of it in the degrees and parts of it The Lord hath given us many prognosticants of it every sicknesse and every qualme and every distresse of conscience and whatsoever troubleth us in this world they be nothing but so many Kalenders of that great weaknesse that once shall come and make an end of us And therefore as it is said Man hath not one death alone but a number of deaths and that which takes him away is called the last death for he hath many before that This is the state of sowing the body But now behold the promise of the great God! he will raise it up in power the weaker it is sown the stronger it shall rise and this weaknesse that we have it is no argument of discomfort nor a mean to make us distrust but it is a surer tye to binde God to performance and a sure evidence of our deliverance that as our weaknesse is great so our strength shall be much more infinite which shall be wrought by the mighty power of God whereby he is able to subdue all things to himselfe It is raised againe in power or in strength For it is raised by him that is the strong God by him that is El Eli Elohim the God of strength of might and of majesty By that God that loves to make his strength seen in our weaknesse and to make his glory perfect in our infirmity by that God that delights to work in contraries and to bring fire and water out of the same principle that God hath undertaken to raise up this weak body Therefore the Apostle saith It is raised speaking in the present tense as of a thing done not in the future tense It shall be To bring us acquainted with the truth before it be done and to make us assured of it as if it were performed already We are as sure indeed to be raised to that glorious strength which God hath promised as if the deed were done for it is in the counsell of the great God in which those things that hee hath promised be as if they were already performed because he is true that hath promised and because he is able to keep his promise he is able to keep his word for it is his onely prerogative to keep his word and his promise for ever And this is that wondrous comfort that he hath given unto us that if it were possible for the body to have more weaknesse then it hath if it were possible to be debased worse by infirmity then it is yet then we had a stronger argument to prove the strength to come to which the body shall be restored For the weaknesse which we have and carry about us the greater it is the stronger proofe it makes for Gods infinite mercy in the deliverance of us For as we see by experience that vessels and barrells of gunpowder laid up in vaults and cells the more waight is laid upon them the greater pyles and masse of building there is over them the more furiously and strongly they break forth at the touch and traine of the least fire So likewise it is certain that the bodies that are turned into powder to dust these powder-bodies of ours for at last they must all all come to pulverell to dust powder these bodies the more weight is upon them the more earth the more difficulty and the greater weaknesse they have whereby they are compassed and surrounded it makes way for the more strength to burst out when the fire of God shall light and touch upon it when there shall be a re-union of the spirit a deduction of the soule when that fire shall light upon it that comes from heaven then they shall rise in a glorious strength for the more they have beene held downe by weaknesse the more they shall be rescued and ransomed and restored to a greater vigour It is raised in power and strength and in a strength that is answerable to the weaknesse that where the weakness is the greatest there the strength shall transcend in greatnesse And what is this strength It is reduced by the Fathers into foure particulars First St. Austin and St. Chrysostom and generally all the Fathers think Aug. Chrysost that the strength that shall be most eminent in the body when it riseth shall be in the power of motion which because I have before spoken of I will but now touch it As the top of the flame that is in a dry reed it runs upon the reed and you know when such platts of ground are on fire they set all a fire about them so the body of man it shall be able to flye to run and to move as swiftly as the flame doth upon the top of any combustible matter And as the Sun and the Stars and the Angels and spirits of men doe never sleepe and yet are still in motion and are never weary of their motion so the body that shall be raised and fitted againe unto the soule shall be without labour and pain without weaknesse and wearinesse and shall never faile nor faint but shall be able to hold out in an everlasting motion as the Sunne and the Stars doe in the firmament In which sense as Luther Luther saith they shall be able to goe ten thousand furlongs in the twinkling of an eye I name that as a matter of recreation because his spirit was wondrous cheerfull and merry in the Notes that he gives tending to that purpose The second thing wherein this strength shall consist shall be in the efficacy and power of their working So that those that be the weakest things in the world now that one devill if he were permitted were able to wrythe the necks of ten thousand people about then at that day God shall give them that strength of body that they shall be able to encounter a whole legion of devils which shall then have no power over the bodies of men as now they have nor shall not be able to possesse them and to rule them at their pleasure nor to make monsters of them but the body of one Saint shall put to flight and fright a whole legion of sathans complices And this mighty power whereby they work that I may a little still proceed
fall into a grosse error which they might conceive by this doctrine of his For if it shall be raised a spirituall body why then say the heretiques Apollinarius Eunomius and such like then it is not the same For it is now a meere naturall body and what is so contrary as naturall and spirituall Animal and spirituall are clean contrary therefore the Scripture still bids us live after the spirit and distinguisheth betweene the sonnes of the flesh and the sons of the spirit there is nothing more contrary then these now it is impossible that a thing should be capable of that which is contrary Therefore they say if it shall be a spirituall body then it shall not be Idem corpus the same body Another crew say If they shall be spirituall bodies then they are not flesh and bloud and bones as these elementary bodies are that die and are committed to the ground but it shall be another thing made by God of a strange composure Against this the Apostle tells us that there is such a distinction of a naturall body and a spirituall body and yet none of these monsters follow neither For it is the pleasure of the great God to adde such excellencies to that body which was before dust and ashes and mortall and to draw such lines upon it to give it such beauty and perfection that it shall seeme rather a spirit then a body it shall be so full of quicknesse and motion and life and dexterity that it shall rather seeme a spirit then a body To speak comparatively Hence we learne That seeing the Apostle proves his distinction that it is not lawfull for any man to make of his owne head of his owne braine any generall principles or definitions or divisions or distributions concerning the doctrine of the Gospell but he must shew reason for it Then secondly what reason doth the Apostle give for it why It is also written Hee proves this his doctrine by the Scriptures and unlesse he could have proved it out of them he must have been subject to the censure of all these heretiques that all that they had passed upon him should have gone for good except he could have refuted them by the Scriptures So he tells them that It is written So that here we have a maine conclusion of our faith to hold to alwaies and to stick to that wee must beleeve no man further then the Scriptures If he will speak his own minde he may doe it for illustration or for arguments sake but to put the devices of his owne head and braine to goe for points of religion for matters of faith it is a damnable thing he must have no more credit then the Scriptures will afford him hee must make no distinctions and differences except it be found in the written word If this had been well observed the Church of God had never come to that miserable distraction that it hath been in for the space of these thousand yeares every Intruder still presuming to make his owne devices fundamentall to avert the points of religion to make distinctions such as man never saw in the Scriptures As to talk of Purgatory invocation of Saints and of other errors newly sprung up in these later times Such things as these have no kind of being in the Scriptures no nor any shew of being notwithstanding these proud imperious spirits will bring them upon the Church of God and lay a heavy yoak upon the people of God to beleeve them as if they were the very oracles of Almightie God himselfe Wee must take heed of these things Teach mee as far as thou wilt out of Gods booke but if thou teach me otherwise thou art a liar and no teacher thou art a seducer and an imposter and no pastor as St. Bernard Bernard and also Gregorie Gregorie saith Therefore this blessed Apostle he puts downe his proofe he will have them beleeve him no further then hee brings Scripture for it It is written saith he As if he should say I make not this distinction of a naturall body and a spirituall body I have it made to my hand for it is written And where is it written it is a hard thing to find that all the whole sentence is not to be found any where but the first part of it is written that the first Adam was made a living soule the other part is made up by the spirit of the Apostle understanding the difference betweene the first and the second Adam to make up the antithesis of that notable difference betweene the one and the other Some of the Fathers doe take it thus that the whole sentence may seeme to be written that oft-times in the Scripture things are said to be written and to be done which are not written nor done meaning not in their kinde but in their effects by some consequence As St. Chrysostom saith of this Chrysost from the reason and event of the thing it was written because that men did see every christian knows that Christ Iesus doth so farre passe and surmount the first Adam as God surpasseth man as the soule surpasseth the body therefore the event and consequent of the thing makes it as if it were written For God hath made it good and so hath set it as a sure writing in the world And so he gives instance from divers Scriptures in the like things As in Heb. 12.21 Heb. 12.21 the Apostle saith speaking of the terrour of Moses when he was in the mount when the Law was given the terror was so great that Moses said I feare exceedingly Now in the booke of Exodus Exod. 19. Chap. 19. where those things are related there is no such thing mentioned that Moses said any such words but the Glosse expounds it That it is certaine upon the deed upon the teror that Moses conceived he trembled It was a thing done although it were not spoken he did tremble So here also it may be said Although there be no such words as the second part of this sentence that the second Adam was made a living spirit yet de facto it is true For all the Church of God knowes and subscribes that there is a maine difference betweene them Such other places there are as that in Isay 7.14 Isay 7.14 A virgin shall conceive and bring forth a sonne and they shall call his name Emanuell Now this was never done de facto as St. Chrysostom observes Chrysost the people never called him so they called him Iesus not Emmanuel And although the Angell gave that name to the virgin yet the people used it not and yet saith St. Chrysostom though it were not done de facto yet it was done de jure it was done in right and reason for that the things themselves do send forth such a voice and testimony that he was Emmanuel God with us Therefore these Fathers think the meaning of the Apostle is this That although it were not
And there wee cease not neither but still wee seeke for a new forme the matter still would have a new coate None of these content us but wee desire of God a forme that never may be changed This corruption must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality The other condition of our nature is that as it cannot endure to be in the same kinde but still seeks new fashions and new formes so at length it comes to that forme that seemes to extinguish it utterly as if it had never beene which brings matter and forme and all to nothing as a man would think the goodliest temper the stateliest comely body the best and freshest countenance the best brued bloud and the sweetest colour these which are the materialls of man it brings them all at length to a handfull of dust that a man would think that now the matter had quite lost its forme and that it should never desire a further forme For it is mortalized it is brought to nothing it is brought to stench and corruption and it seemes to be drowned there there is no hope that ever it shall rise againe But yet still the appetite works for the matter works still to the God of nature and desires of him a new forme to give it a new garment And the Apostle saith that God shall heare that matter and hee shall regard the cries of it and shall graunt the petition that this dust shall make unto him and he shall give it a new vestment which shall be of such a fashion as it shall never desire any more to change and put off again For this corruption must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality 6 â—art The metaphor Shall put on A sweet and blessed metaphor is this word put on It must be put on in stead of the ragges wee put off for mortality and corruption stick close to us not as a close-bodied garment sticks to the body but as the skinne and the flesh cleaves to the bones And we can never put them off and be rid of them but by the common law and necessity of dying and rotting in the grave There are only some few that shall have the prerogative which shall live at the comming of Christ they shall have a change in stead of this death But for us that must goe the common way of nature wee know our doome Now then this ragged garment and vesture that wee carrie about us by reason of Adams sinne and our corruption which wee have multiplied and added to Adams transgression it must first be shaken off by the omnipotent hand of God it must be so purely and so fully removed as that no threeds nor no tagg of it remaine And then when that is done there is time and place for the new robe to be put upon us for that blessed garment which is to come in the place of this But first these torne raggs must be cast away they must first be put off and then this blessed vestment which the Lord hath prepared even the vestment of incorruption and immortality shall succeed in the place of this So that from hence we see the truth of the former doctrine again Saith S. Austin the garment is one thing Aug. and the thing garnished and decked is another the garment is not the man but an accident to the man and it may be that hee may be here and that may be there or it may be here and he may be away and yet notwithstanding the man may be the same So likewise the bodies that the Saints have in this world they shall be still the same bodies the same in incorruption that they were in corruption the same body that it was when it was mortall the same shall it be when it is immortall the same in substance but not the same in glory and quality Tertull. For as Tertullian saith the Apostle disputes of the glory of the bodies and not of the substance of them Therefore as a man that is of any state and account in this world he hath divers suites of cloathes but he hath but one body so it is true in this case that the Lord upon one and the selfe same body shall poure multiplicity of garments and riches of the rayment which hee shall give in that blessed day The garment of beauty the garment of eternity the garment of strength of wisedome of all kinde of excellencies both of body and soule The Lord shall sit them then with many changes of apparell but still it shall be one and the selfe same body For this mortall must put on the glorious garment of immortality and this corruptible must put on incorruption So the Fathers in the Greeke Church taught their men and women in the Church to say I beleeve the resurrection of This flesh When we say the Creed wee say I beleeve the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting But still they when they came to this article they clapt their hand upon their breast and said I beleeve the resurrection of This flesh punctually pointing at themselves because the Apostle saith This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality to shew that it belongs to the person properly and peculiarly to this very subject that he makes his proposition of And this glorious garment what it is but the garment which God himselfe hath worne from all eternity Hee is incorruptible that is unchangeable and he is immortall that is it is impossible for him to grow worse For God can never change from better to worse and hee shall give that power to the bodies of his Saints that their perfection shall be so great as that it shall not possibly be made better and they shall be so singular that it is impossible they should be made worse or decline For hee shall set them in the highest pitch of perfection in the top of excellencie that they shall receive neither majus nor minus neither more nor lesse neither better nor worse they shall have no kinde of change This is that glorious apparell that God puts on The Lord is King Psal 93.1 hee hath put on his glorious apparell hee hath girded himselfe with strength and majestie This is that apparell which the Apostle S. Iames speaks of when he saith That the Lord is without any change Iam. 1.16 or shadow of changing This garment which God hath put upon himselfe from all eternity hee will vouchsafe in a degree and measure to his Saints in time they shall be eternall from the time after as he hath beene from worlds and ages to world without end himselfe one and the same for evermore Now whereas hee saith in the vinculum of this proposition that Oportet this must needs be thus Vse that it can be no other way but thus This thing the Apostle adds for our comfort and consolation both to encourage us patiently to abide
was dead and buried and hee testified his mortality three dayes together by lying in the grave Therefore as Christ went this way and could not goe to heaven untill he had tasted of death first he must suffer and so enter into glory It followes therefore Luke 24.26 that all his members must second him and subscribe to that course which their Lord and head went and be content to be like unto him it must be with us as it was with him therefore this corruption must put on incorruption That is wee cannot come to that glory but by dying first we must die to live first we must be in our graves in stinke and filthinesse that wee may be raised to beauty and strength and perfection according to the glorious promise which God hath made in Christ Now the next thing to be observed is the triumph of the Church when this is done when this corruption hath put on incorruption and this mortall hath put on immortality when this blessed garment is once fitted when this vestment shall be once applyed unto these bodies as never to be put off again Then shall be fulfilled this saying This garment of incorruption and immortality that is this garment of glory and beauty wherein God shall invest his Saints it shall not be like these garments of ours that are put upon our outsides which cover onely our outward parts They touch not our intrailes they come not neare the heart but this blessed garment of incorruption it shall run through all the veynes of man it shall possesse him every where it shall be as the life is in all the parts of the body in every part there is life as well as in the rest It shall be as the health is it is the breath of heaven which runs through all the parts of the body if one part or member be sick all the rest are so too for company It shall be as the soule is in every part and substance of the bodie the soule is in all the parts of the body it is as well in the little finger as in the braine of a man And after this kind shall this garment be put on not as our cloathes which we put on and off not as our garments which keepe us warme in our outward parts and never touch our inward But this as the Spirit of God shall rule through the whole man there shall be no part nor no blood but it shall be uncorrupt there shall be no flesh in man but it shall be immortall There is no part but it shall be garnished and adorned with this rare and singular quality which shall run through the whole man and shall possesse him wholly and shall take that root in him as it shall be impossible for it to be extirpated for it is the glorious hand of God that shall plant them there and nothing therefore shall be able to supplant them Wee must put on incorruption And it shall be so put on as the sun puts on his glory never to put it off againe as the stars put on their light never to be eclipsed never to have their light taken from them Wee must not put on the robe and garment of immortality as Kings and Princes put on their gay cloathes and apparell Chrysost As St. Chrysostom saith when Kings and Princes goe to the bath on earth although they be never so gloriously apparelled yet when they goe into the bath they must put off their cloathes as well as other men and when they goe to their graves they must divest themselves and goe after the order of other men But the Saints of God shall not put on the cloathes of incorruption as a man that goes to the bath but they shall put it on as God hath put on eternity they shall put it on as the sun hath put on his light never to be darke They shall put it on as the moon and stars which have the same beauty and figure continually Although to us it seeme different and the light of the starres are not seene in the day time yet there is no hindrance in them they have the same coat on them The Saints shall have a garment like the coat and habite of the lillies of which our Saviour saith that Solomon in all his royalty Luke 12.27 was not cloathed like one of them their garments shall be so fit and so durable and so sweet and so naturall without any price without any cost The Lord shall then fit the garment to the party Making of garments requires great skill and much art for it is no ordinary thing for to fit a body truely with a garment or vesture But the Lord will shew that wondrous art in fitting this garment to our bodies in such a wondrous aptnesse in such a fitnesse and proportion and compleatnesse that in every part of mans body there shall appeare this beauty and this comelinesse this glorious apprehension of these heavenly qualities shall appeare in every part of man The Lord shall so fit the body that the garment shall glosse and beautifie and adorne the least part of the body Therefore let us lift up our heads Rom. 13.11 for our salvation drawes neerer then when wee first beleeved and let us delight our selves and labour to put on this new garment this blessed vesture that we all seeke so much after Wee are tired with these stinking cloathes Vse with these perishing vanities of the world Wee are faine to perfume them with sweet odours as the fashion of the times are now wee cannot indure the graine of our owne bodies but wee must perfume them with exotick and strange smels But that garment shall bee so perfumed it shall bee so amiable by the power of God that it shall need no other smell or perfume The curiosity of our dispositions cannot indure a garment a yeare together Shee is accounted a sordid woman that weares that garment this yeare which shee ware the last and shee is neglected and despised of her meanes and friends But the Lord shall so fit this garment that we shall still take delight wee shall have a holy pride in wearing of it and it shall still bee the better for wearing and have continually more splendor and beauty then when we first put it on For this mortall must put on immortality to all delight and glory to a lasting glory and a continuall glosse and beauty that shall never fade but still increase to the party that weares it Now let our appetites appeare in desiring of it When when shall it bee And so I come to the last point that I will trouble you with at this time When great promises are made all delayes are tedious Prov. 13.12 Hope that is deferred kills the heart of man therefore it is naturall for us still to call and urge for the time When Lord when why when this corruptible hath put on incorruption and this mortall hath put on immortality when this
there are but few that can come in the houre of death to make this insultation But all should aspire for it and looke after it and should desire God to inable them to doe thus as St. Paul speaketh and as many Saints and Martyrs have in their martyrdome insulted over death with these words For this was often the motto in their mouthes Oh death where is thy sting oh hell where is thy victory Division into five Parts Now that we may proceed in order First wee are to consider that which hee saith the word shall be fulfilled which was written And then where it is written And thirdly what it is that is written Death is swallowed up into victory And fourthly when this shall bee performed Then then when our bodies are changed and this corruptible hath put on incorruption 1. Cor. 15. and this mortall hath put on immortality then shall bee fulfilled this saying And lastly the use and ground of all that is to take heart and courage for these things are written for consolation A man that can take no comfort against death shall never have any comfort any time of his life if there were no joy in our death there could bee none in our life Therefore all this is to renew the spirits of Gods children and to make them undaunted when that great and common Adversary shall ceaze upon them The Insultation is in the 55. verse 1. Part. The fulfilling of the prophecy which is taken out of Hosea 13.14 Oh death where is thy sting oh hell where is thy victory Of these parts briefly and in order as it shall please God to give assistance And first concerning the fulfilling of the Prophesie The holy Apostle would raise up the Saints of God to applaud and to take delight and to gratulate one another to see the fulfilling of Prophesies come to an end For all Prophesies must bee fulfilled Matth. 24 35. and though heaven and earth should passe away yet no jote and tittle of the Law and the Prophets can passe till all bee fulfilled and accomplished Now the Apostle brings to their minde those sweet prophesies of former time whereby he concludes the certainty of these things which he now delivers to them For there is no greater contentment to any man that is a true judicious Reader of the Scriptures then this to see that the things promised in the Gospel are not yesterday matters they bee no new things no late devises but they be almost as ancient as the world they are drawne out of the treasures of God in former ages by the holy Prophets that spake in former times what should come to passe in the fulnesse of time And as St. Pauls manner is still hee confirmes his doctrine by the precedent doctrine of the Prophets so here in this saith St. Chrysostome speaking many infinite incredible things it was needfull for him to set to a seale and to conclude all with the authority of some Author that had gone before And he tells them this is a word written It is a book-case it is no new thing which he saith but that which God had inspired before into the holy Prophet Isay and the Prophet Hosea and divers others concerning the same doctrine that he reveales unto them Therefore to conclude this point Vse We should learne by this example to confirme our faith to incourage our selves by the constancy of Gods word the constant truth which hath beene from age to age And that is it which must settle and stablish if there were any thing which swerved from the common custome or any thing that were new then wee might doubt whether it were from God or no. But because in all things it is so consonant to it selfe and God is the same God of the Old Testament and of the New it is a great confirmation to us to keepe us from doubting and from many scruples which Satan the enemy of mankind suggests unto us 2. Part. Whore this is written But where this word is written or who is the Authour of it as I said Divines doe diversly interpret Some thinke it is from Isay some thinke it is from Hosea and some that it is a writing from them both that it is two testimonies It is not unlikely that his purpose was to cite both the Prophets two of them together Matth. 18.16 that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word might bee established Therefore the first part of the sentence is taken out of Isay the second part out of Hosea That in Isay is Isay 25.8 Isay 25.8 you shall see there the Lord makes a banquet to his Church and the conclusion of that heavenly banquet is this God shall destroy death for ever hee shall swallow up death into victory as it is here spoken His meaning and purpose is there to speake of the deliverance from the captivity of Babylon but because there is no use in these temporall blessings except wee referre them to spirituall for these outward things be but as earnests of greater graces which God hath reposed for us in a better world therefore the argument followes As the common Tenent of the Scriptures hold still that from things present wee may argue things to come and from things temporall wee may prove to our selves the assurance of things spirituall So the deliverance out of the captivity of Babylon did signifie to them and was an assurance of the deliverance from hell of the deliverance from the bondage of destruction of the deliverance from the bondage of sin and the bondage of death Therefore the Apostle translates that according to the meaning of the Prophet which raiseth Gods people to understand that they had greater enemies to encounter with then Babylon And if God should have stayed his hand there and have given them a meere deliverance out of Babylons countrey they should be no better then men of a few dayes continuance For they must die after that deliverance and they had greater enemies then Babylon was from whom they must desire to bee delivered and whom they stood in feare of which would draw a more dangerous consequence then all their enemies else besides For Babylon could but inthrall their bodies and that but for a time but hell would destroy both body and soule for ever Therefore God saith hee would destroy death hee would destroy the death of the body and the death of the soule the first death and the second death and he would swallow both into victory That is the death of Christ should get the mastery of them that they should never need to feare them afterward they should bee so couched in silence that they should have no power nor strength remaining in them but they shall bee as though they had never beene they shall be so obliterate Now for the other place Hosea 13.14 Hosea 13.14 where the Prophet discourseth strangely after a wondrous and hidden manner For I think there was
to thousands and millions in the world that beleeve in him that although there be sinne now in our mortall bodies yet it doth not raigne it commands us not to every thing it finds us not as the Centurions servants to goe when it saith goe but it is in many things broken and dissipated and the Lord hath beat sathan under our feet that is the usuall work of sathan sinne and foule impressions in your soules and understandings Thus the Lord hath given us victory over sinne in himselfe fully in us it is begun but for that wee shall have occasion afterwards to discourse The Lord himselfe being free from all sinne hee was therefore a Conquerour over that pestilent viper that poyson of our nature and he gave his people the infusion of his Spirit to guide them by the which Originall sinne is weakned the sire is abated and allayed the edge of sin is lessened The last is over the Law That still is the greatest enemy that still layes before us the judgments of God Doe this and live Doe that and be damned Follow this course and thou shalt be damned for ever If thou be a drunkard if thou be lustfull if thou be covetous and worldly if thou be revengefull and malicious the sentence of damnation is passed upon thee that is all the comfort wee have by the Law but Christ hath given us victory over this enemy which followes us at the heeles when wee doe amisse and still puts us into qualmes of conscience for our misdeeds and curbes and bridles us by the checks of conscience that if a man could but see the end of these foule actions as hee seeth the beginning he would never doe them because there is no equality between the short time of sinning and the eternity of punishment But against all this Christ hath given us victory for he hath fulfilled the law of God he hath stopped the crimination he he hath stayed all those slanders and all those accusations that the devill would make by the law or that those that have been curious observers of the law would make and those accusations that an evill conscience would make by the power of the Law of God which hath enlightened it He hath silenced all these in this life but the consummation of this we must understand is to come when this corruptible shall put on incorruption and this mortall shall put on immortality They are now gone before in the head they shall then follow in the body Saith St. Austin Aug. Whatsoever Christ hath done in his owne body it shall follow in our mortall bodies When hee shall change them 1 Cor. 15. and make them like unto his owne glorious body according to his mighty power whereby he is able to subdue all things to himselfe This is that goodly victory in the which the Lord hath interested us all To conclude and refer the rest till the next time I beseech you beloved in the Lord let us consider what part we have in this victory wee ought not to insult and triumph in a vaine presumption in blessings that pertaine not to us but if we think we have the victory let us labour to finde it and so enter into judgement with our owne soules who it is that overcommeth Apoc. 3. To him that overcommeth will I give to eate of the tree of life in the middest of the paradice of God to him that overcommeth will I give a white stone c. And what must he overcome He must overcome himself and all his passions he must overcome the feare of death the power of sinne and the terrours of the Law A fearfull encounter and a great troop of enemies is laid open the Lord strengthen poore David that he may be able to encounter with this mighty Goliah for it seemes that hell it selfe is open upon him when therefore we doe give our selves that liberty as to doe what our selves list against the good will and command of God let us not thinke to have any part in this victory we are rather as so many conquered slaves and vassals that lie at the command of death that whereas wee should tread Satan under our feet Satan tramples us under his and makes us the most base and vile creatures in the world Thou that hast enough in this world and yet canst not tell when thou hast enough but still art distracted with envious desires and makest thy self great by other mens falls that raisest thy owne fortunes by other mens ruines that usest any meanes good or bad by hooke or by crooke to advance thine owne estate to make thy selfe rich and settest thy selfe onely to the study of the Idoll Mammon what kinde of victory or what hope of conquest canst thou have in that great and mighty victory which wee pretend the Lord Iesus hath given us surely none There is no such gally-slave in the world as a man that is given and addicted to his wealth and riches in this present life for it pierceth men through with many sorrowes as the Apostle saith They that will be rich 1 Tim. 6. pierce themselves thorow with many sorrowes Behold the sting of death is the sting that pierceth them the sting of death is sinne and this sting it pierceth through the heart and stabbs the soule of every covetous man in the world that they cannot claime any part of that victory which God communicates to his children but they are foyled base creatures that are made for slaughter and destruction And so againe for them that live in their pleasures in their voluptuous and filthy courses that will grow old in adultery that will make no end of their filthinesse and uncleannesse but with greedinesse seeke when one prey is enjoyed how to obtaine another these that make their vessells that should be Temples of God the brothell-houses of the Devill that are no sooner tempted but they yeeld these comming Creatures how or with what face with what confidence can they lay claime to the victory that we have in God through Iesus Christ our Lord being nothing else but bruits and are given over yeelding themselves they have taken the marke of the beast and follow Satans direction and command as if Christ had no power to be their Chieftaine but the Prince of darknesse must rule The like may bee said of all these malicious prowling spirits that be in the world that take delight to sting their brethren to doe mischiefe without cause to sow the seeds of dissention that will wrangle out their lives to trouble others to bring upon them endlesse suits and questions that shall never be decided to vexe the world with begging or buying of new found offfices to make their hands full out of every thing sacred and prophane to play the very roaring Lions in their dennes that no man can tell how hee should live or keepe himselfe quiet with them That these Creatures I say should come and claime any part in this
victory that we have in Christ it were a fanaticall madnesse a ridiculous base delusion Therefore let them that are willing to comfort their owne soules against the day of trouble let them thinke that there is no comfort to bee had but in this victory and there is no comfort can bee had in this victory except they strive to be Victors and Conquerors in Christ to have a part in him and to fight as well as they may under his banner as long as they live in sinne that they seeke it and study it and mainetaine it and defend it let them delude their owne soules and deceive themselves which is the grossest and most fearefull deceit of all others for a man to deceive himsefe they may thinke they are Conquerers but they are the Devills vanquished ones they are his captives they are held in the Devils Irons God be mercifull to us for there is none that lives in sin but the poore miserable thiefe that lies in the dungeon is better then hee But this victory notwithstanding is the Churches and wee are of the Church wee are baptized wee are called to the knowledge of the misteries of the Gospel and God doth not call men for nothing hee doth not make his mysteries idle It is true therefore as long time as God hath vouchsafed us wee have still time to bee victors and though our soules cleave to the earth though they sticke to the pavement yet God can raise us out of the dust and make us equall with the Princes of his people as the Prophet David saith Psal 113. Therefore let us call to the Lord God and though wee find no strength in our selves nor no meanes nor will if there bee not so much as a will yet let him that hath the wills of men in his hand that hath the hearts of men in his hand and turnes them as the rivers of waters let him doe as it pleaseth him let him worke this for us that can worke nothing for our selves To whom bee praise and glory obedience and thanksgiving both now and for evermore Amen FINIS SERMONS On 1 COR. 15. Of the Resurrection 1 COR. 15.56 57. But thanks be to God that hath given us victory through Christ our Lord therefore beloved Brethren be stedfast and unmoveable abounding in the worke of the Lord alway because you know your labour is not lost nor in vaine in the Lord. THere is nothing more certain Note then that it is the portion of a Christian soule to fight and labour in this life present The Church is a militant Church a People that are alway at combat and conflict with the devill and with men and if these faile with himselfe too Saith S. Austin St. Aug. we would faine be freed from this fight from this continuall perturbation but the comfort that God hath given against it is that as we are called to a triall so the Lord assists us too in the day of Trouble and assures us of the victory that howsoever we cannot overcome all these enemies by any grace that is inherent in us but that we are often foyled and conquered yet we have another Meane to conquer them by that is by faith and the apprehension of the victory that the Lord Iesus Christ hath purchased for us over the devill and all these Adversaries and this victory can be given us but by one hand it lyes onely there to dispense that is in the hand of God which is the Lord of Hoasts and Armies It is he alone that enclines the battaile it is hee that weakneth the adversaries and that strengthens those that follow his colours when they are foyled hee raiseth up them that are fallen it is he that beateth downe Sathan under our feet that was our conquerour This spirituall conquest is of all others the most excellent for the rest as Isay Isay 8. saith They are gotten with tumult and with tumbling of garments in bloud But this conquest that we have in the Lord Iesus it was like a Lamb-slaughter in the day of Madian You know in the day of Madian what kinde of victory it was Gideon went out hee did nothing the Lord did all for him for still hee brought downe his troups from thousands to hundreds to three hundred and when they were to be set to worke they did nothing but onely clash their broken pitchers and the Lord wrought a great slaughter in the Hoast of Madian Such a victory is the conquest wee have in Iesus Christ our Lord he is still the victor that got the conquest without all appearance of second Causes without all union of forces and power in the world that God may be all in all In other victories there be many sharers that may claime a part in the conquest there is something belongs to the Generall some to the Colonels some to the Captaines some to the other Officers some to the common Souldiers There is no man but hee may claime a part in the common victory But in this victory that we have obtained by the meanes of Christ Iesus our Lord there is nothing that belongs to any but to God Therefore the Apostle saith Thanks be to God thanks be to no man thanks be to no Angell thanks be to no power that can be supposed to help us but the thanks and praise must rest in God alone which hath wrought all this for us As the Heathen Orator said to Caesar when hee had overcome his anger and had pardoned his Enemie In other warres saith he there is a communication of the praise of the wars it belongs to one as well as to another But in this victory which thou hast gotten over thy selfe Orat. pro Milone in giving and forgiving thou hast gotten the glory The like may wee much more truly say of God as the Apostle saith here Thanks be to God and to none but to him that hath given us victory for he alone with his owne hand and his stretched out arme Psal 94. hath gotten himselfe the victory as the Psalmist saith So Tertullian Tertul. speaking of this point in his fifth booke against Marcian Chap. 10. The Apostle saith he being well advised how the conquest comes to a Christian hee gives no thanks to any other God but him alone that put the word of triumph and insultation into his mouth That God that gave him power to say by way of triumph Oh Death where is thy sting Oh grave where is thy victory To that same God that gave him the word of triumph he returnes the word of thanksgiving and retribution of praise because it belongs onely to him If Marcians god as Marcian supposed hee had another god than that which is the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ can tell mee such things as hee hath done or that hee hath published any such thing to the world as this I will account him the Father of mercy But till then I will account him Marcians Idoll
in heaven and when a man is not cumbred with the labours of the world his minde is better and more easily induced to do good a man that is puzzelled about his worke he saith he hath other mattrrs to do then to attend a poore man he cannot be for him now he puts him off till another time and bids him come to morrow as the wise man saith Say not to thy neighbour Come againe to morrow Prov. 3. if thou have it now by thee A man being distracted with his businesse he takes his opportunitie and makes these excuses to answer God and his owne conscience with these or the like and saith he cannot now intend it he is otherwise busied But when hee hath a relaxation from his labour which is the proper fruit of the Sabbath the minde of man is made more gentle and more easily perswaded to do any good worke because it knows that therefore a man is lift up from the cares and troubles of this life to the speculation of heavenly things therefore he is the more easily perswaded to do the works of heavenly charitie and divine operation which the Spirit of God acts in the hearts and soules of all his children So that is one reason why the Apostle bids that this gathering should be on the first of the Sabbath because then men are at leasure then they are not cumbred with the world they are freed from peevishnesse and impatience which oft times hinders a poore man of an almes which if he had come when the partie was at quiet and rest he might have obtained 2 Reason The benefits received on that day Another reason is because of the benefits that we receive upon that day the commemoration of the blessings God hath vouchsafed us upon that day upon that day the root of life rose the Lord Iesus who rising againe from the dead hath opened to us a certaine gappe and hope of life everlasting the meditation of the good creatures of God the state of the Gospell cals us unto the liberty of the sonnes of God all the whole blessings of the Gospell be represented and accumulated unto us upon that day Therefore that was the fittest time to be thankfull to God for his mercies wherein God is most abundant in mercy to us that then wee should returne somewhat backe againe some small widdows mite some little portion to Gods children for all those infinite treasures we have received for this is all that God requires that we should give but something of his owne of some but the thousand part of some but the hundreth part this is all that he requires for that great store those mighty summes and infinite riches and treasures and masses of wealth he hath given us That we should make a little acknowledgement by giving some small sprinkling for all this That is another reason why the Apostle would have this collection be upon the Sunday wherin the memory of al the blessings of God upon body and soule are the goodliest in every thing therefore it makes men more prone and inclined to do some good for him that hath wrought so much good for them The third reason is Reas 3 The exercises of the day because upon that day the publique meetings were made where there was prophesie and preaching and praying and singing of Psalmes and holy revelations and instructions from heaven all which were as fire to kindle the zeale of a man to be for God and for his brethren and to joyne together the members of the Lord Iesus in a firmer conjunction then any other societie in the world If a man love a man abroad in the market he will love him ten times better in the Church if there be any pietie or any coales of love to kindle his affections elsewhere it will be much more in the Church where every word of God every Sermon every prayer every thanksgiving every Psalme that is sung brings some fuell to that heavenly flame Therefore for this cause the Apostle chuseth that time as being the most select and choise opportunitie for the conferring of that which God had blessed them withall upon the first day of the weeke that is upon the Lords day 4 Reason The Sacrament was th n received And lastly because that upon that day the Church was alway wont to receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper it was not with them then as it is with us now men will receive it when they list but every Sunday was with them a Sacrament day and oft times every day in the weeke but on the Lords day they never failed Therefore as a testimony of their thankfulnesse to God for the benefit of the body and bloud of Christ which was offered on the Crosse as a ransome and propitiation for all their sins they thought they were bound in conscience and they were easily induced and perswaded upon the receiving of the Sacrament to give something to the sacred and holy Saints that belong unto the Lord. And so indeed after our Sacrament we have still a collection in remembrance of that there it was according to the greatnesse of their spirits and the greatnesse of their meanes which were supereminent ours are according to our poore meanes and measure and according to the scantinesse of our affections which is every day colder then other For these reasons the Apostle requireth that these things should be done and layd up upon the Sabbath day For then men are best affected of all times if ever a man will give any thing he will give it then when he is at rest for God and when he is expressing his thankfulnesse to God for the great mercies that he hath powred upon him in all the course of his life then he heares the word that stirres him up to good actions then he joynes in prayer with the Church of God then he understands that God hath not spared the precious bloud of Christ much lesse therefore should he spare a peny a small thing to give for his sake that hath given his bloud for his redemption Thus wee see great reason why the Apostle appointed the collection to bee made at this time It is true the collection for the Saints is due and seasonable at all times but especially when there is the fairest and goodliest opportunitie and then it is likely to prove best when there are the strongest motives to worke men unto it Vpon the first of the weeke But now we must launch into a great Sea to prove this doctrine which I need not do for men that are setled But because these last times affoord a number of monstrous doctrines and this Citie especially is plagued with those Iewish Sabbatarians that would still retaine the Iewish Sabbath and can very hardly be drawne from it but in their conventicles they draw away Gods children and trouble them that are not able to give a reason of their faith let us therefore a little search into this
away from him yea and his dearest beloved shall stop their noses at him This should teach us to humble our selves in this disconsolation Vse and to adde this to all the honors we have in the world if we have any or doe yet looke for any This dishonour of death is a cooling card that should make a man moderate in all his proceedings It should make him fearfull in all his doings It should make him understand that he ought not to be puffed up with conceits and pretences of honour but to qualifie himselfe with this comparing his dishonour which the Lord will lay upon sinfull flesh There is nothing so honourable but it shall be covered with shame and dishonour at the hour of death when we shall depart this world It is sowne in dishonour Well! although it be thus yet the Lord hath a help for this againe it shall be raised after another manner It shall be raised in honour in great glory As disgrace and dishonour is the worst of punishments so honour and grace and glory againe is the best of preferments There is nothing so sweet unto us as that to be above others to be beloved of others to be admired of others and to be served of others this is that sweet breath of life and that sweet contentment that shall fill us with marrow and fatnesse And this God purposeth to poure upon these dishonourable bodies that die so beastly and deformed that they are trampled on by the feet of beasts if they lie abroad and if it be in the Church where wee usually bury the poorest and basest of men tread upon them I say the Lord shall raise it at that day in such honour that it shall be like the stars of heaven it shall be like the Sunne in glory it shall be like the Angels of God it shall be like the Sonne of God Phil. 3.21 for he shall change these vile bodies and make them like his glorious body according to his mighty power whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3.21 Now by the contrary dishonour we may see that the honour of the Saints shall consist 1. In a goodly stature 2. In a perfect beauty 3. In a gracious fragrancie In the stature of the body there shall be no uncomelinesse there shall be no crookednesse there shall be nothing wanting that can be required as we use to say of images that are drawne in waxe that they are compleat so likewise God shall so paint his image in the bodies of his Saints when they shall rise that it is not possible to find it so in any thing but in the Exemplar in the master-piece the body of Christ there is nothing else that shall be more glorious As in those happy Countries where the leaves are alwaies greene and the earth is alway budding and bringing forth so the bodies of Gods Saints as St. Austin saith shall have that greennesse and vigorousnesse of incorruption possesse them totally St. Augustine And lastly that it shall be of a gracious fragrancy it is certaine that that also may be opposed to the stench of these carkasses The dead body is dishonoured in nothing more then by a caryon-like smell for thereby it differs nothing from a beast nay it is far worse then a beast for there is nothing so putrifies as the body of a man there is nothing brings forth such ugly things as that For out of the brain comes scorpions and snakes and out of the flesh toads and serpents which is not usuall among the beasts For some of them bring forth bees and some wasps but of Ages and Eumines and divers others it is reported that scorpions and snakes came out of their heads after they were dead and wreathed about their faces And we know by wofull experience of late time of divers gentlemen that were troubled with such a wofull thing that they had wormes in their braines and in their entrailes I say therefore answerable to this as the miserie is great to which the body of man is subject greater then other creatures because he is the onely sinner so at that day God shall make an aboundant recompence by pouring upon it the spring of beauty and sweetnesse and fragrancie that they shall be as a garden of spices in the nostrills of God and of his Saints Every Saint shall also be as a glasse to each other and every one shall see his fellowes beauty and they shall reflect one upon another in the joy and gladnesse of the Holy Ghost to see the wonderous work which God hath wrought upon this piece of frailty And even as Iacob was as the smell of a field when he came near his Father Behold saith Isaack I smell the smell of my sonne as the smell of a field Gen. 27.27 which the Lord hath blessed There being nothing more delightfull to the sense then a blooming field of new corne and of sweet grasse and flowers that rise out of the earth And therefore the holy man compares his sonne to a field which the Lord hath blessed Much more shall these be fragrant fields the Lord blessing them with infinite variety of goodnesse and of grace and sweetnesse that the field of God shall be more pleasant then the fields and gardens of men and then all the paradises in this world And as the head of this company is described Cant. 1. Cant. 1.3 4. Draw me and I will run after thee in the odour of thine anointments noting unto us the sweetnesse that is incorporated in the body of Christ And as we reade also of St. Paul Acts 19.12 that by the blessing of God he had napkins and handkerchiefs brought from his body that were of such sweetnesse that they were able to cure diseases so also we may understand what shall be the variety there from the sweetnesse that is now in the body arising from the mixture of the bloud in the veines which makes a perfect sympathy and harmony The Lord at that day shall make all things much more abundant As the Church also is described by the sweetnesse of her cloathes in the Canticles Cant. 1.14 My Spouse saith Christ is as a garden of myrrh or of spices and her breasts are like the clusters of grapes and like the fruit of Engedi So every man and woman shall be although here they be sickly and subject to never so many infirmities and diseases in this life yet the Lord shall so alter the bodies of those that serve him here in that blessed estate there that they shall be sure to finde a singular proportion of beauty of strength and of fragrancie that all the just shall be termed the field and paradise which God hath blessed FINIS SERMONS On 1 COR. 15. Of the Resurrection 1 COR. 15.43 It is sowne in weaknesse it is raised in power It is sown a naturall body it is raised a spirituall body There is a naturall body and there is