made the eye would delude it and walk in the Visor of a body 30 years the Prophets Kings Patriarchs might have spared their longing who beheld his Idea and so enjoyed their wish in conceiving it It is no bold conjecture to think that so many eyes were opened to assure the touch of the opener and as many ears unlocked that more then faith might come by hearing the knowledg of him also came this way for the word being made flesh was known by his voice and he that spake as never man spake could he be thought an Eccho if his words cannot witnesse a mouth his food and tast may from the Dug to the Vinegar he conversed with man eating and drinking to the imputation of Gluttony nor was he onely outwardly sociable as the Angels were hunger and thirst set an edge to his appetite his natural heat conquered this nourishment and confessed it by his growth Bodies assumed or counterfeit have their perfection in the cradle and as they need no supply so they thrive not by meat If Christ were an empty shape it will sound as impossible for Simeon to embrace air as for air to support that massie burthen our Saviour from Simeons arm-full waxed tall enough to bear his own Crosse Thomas the Proverb of Unbelief desired no more warrant then the trial of a Touch a sense so corporeal that plants themselves shrinking from a light finger seem in this kind as apprehensive as man no sense pleads more for the solidity of Christs Body then the sense of Feeling SECT II. The most material objection against the reality of Christs body answered of the two senses seeing and feeling Apollinarius error The example of Iacobs couzenage whose hands gainsaid his voice might afford some pretence of staggering but when all are knit in a mutual testimony as well of themselves as the truth he that denies it is lesse ingenious then the confessing Divels The Manithees and Marionits lesse ingenious then the Divels St. Paul could questionlesse have verified his humanity by more essential properties then his figure Phil. 2. 8. found in fashion like a man but none so obvious and familiar as the common objects of those two trusty senses the eye and the touch whose easie intelligence though it pitch first on the outward surface it rests not there but ushers our view to the whole draught and inward Table of man the beauteous variety of usefull Organs the regular property of limbs commended by a streight and comely posture promise at first sight a soul answerable to her province and a master not unlike so fair a lodging such a house were too good for a meaner guest then a reasonable soul and too bad for a better Apollinarius matching the flesh and the Godhead in one compound gives not our Saviour the fashion of a man but of a body and by over advancing the happy estate of the flesh makes us all loosers in the soul SECT III. Who shall be saved and who not as being not capable of a resurrection according to the Iewish Rabbins St. Cyrils exposition Some have had the confidence and that of late years to question whether at the day of doom all mankind universally shall be capable of a resurrection or not the Jewish Rabbins say that they shall not one of them saith that those that perished at Noahs floud shall not be partakers of the resurrection another will not allow the children of unbeleeving parents any share in the resurrection least forsooth their Parents might receive any comfort by it a third thinks the resurrection belonged to Israel and not to Gentiles at all a fourth excepts against them four too viz. Bilha Iacobs concubine that lay with Reuben Doeg that caused Saul to slay Abimelech and the Priests Geheza and Achitophel but St. Paul is peremptory against all such vain exceptions in the 3 Chap. ad Cor. he saith expressely as in Adam all died so in Christ shall all be made alive all the wicked as well as the just all shall rise from their graves but not all to glory the wicked shall not stand All shall rise the wicked as well as the Godly in judgement saith David or else they shall appear in judgement saith St. Cyril but not stand in it i. e. they shall be cast and overthrown in it CHAP. VII How far the ancient Heathen might go by Philosophy onely THe wiser Heathen by Phylosophy and the scale of the creatures ascended so high as to the knowledge of one supream Deity this the course of nature taught them for indeed the whole world is nothing else but a commentary or paraphrase of the Deity howbeit many of the Heathen instead of knowing God by his works mistook many of his works for their Gods But though some of them might discover by the works of the creation a supream Deity yet they could not discern any saving power by that perspective or if they did is was but obscurely as wrapt up and involved in the notion of a common providence as beleeving one supream God and that God to be just and so a rewarder of those that did well but of the son of God to be incarnate and to die in satisfaction for their errours and transgressions of this for ought we know they had not the least knowledge at all However for the resurrection of bodies Plato Plotinus Virgil c. positively conclude that the soul is immortal and capable of eternal blifle or everlasting torture and therefore Overton and his adherents who so strenuously and blasphemously attempt to prove the soul dies with the body Overton having divulged a book to that purpose may be reputed worse then Heathen That the bodies Overtons book of the mortality of the soul of all mankind may arise I thus prove by natural reason SECT II. The general resurrection of bodies at the last day proved possible by natural reason What else doth the night in her black mantle with all those stars as so many torches attending her but proclaim the last days funerall which the next morning revives again I may instance in Quick silver which though you moulder into drops no bigger then Attoms it naturally unites its parts together again and resumes its old form I might instance the silk-worm or Phoenix which is ipsi sibi proles suus c. I could speak likewise out of Iosephus of Pascasin his Holy well that fils of it self every Easter day and of the annual rising of certain Martyrs bones in Aegypt but I should be too prolix Take therefore a brief of all from St. Augustine Tota mundi administratio futura Resurrectionis testimonium est The whole course of nature is nothing else but a testimony and manifestation of the Resurrection That Christ is risen from the dead is an Article of our Belief Fundatissimi fidiae c. a well grounded principle in our Christianitie that now after so many years growth needs no prop to support it nor can we confirm
God for ought we know reveal unto them this saving knowledge of Christ in articulo mortis at the last gasp and when their own spirit was parting from them breath his holy spirit into them those places of Scripture wherein mention is made of our Saviours spoiling of hell and leading captivity captive may perhaps be understood of his powerfull and mercifull delivering of some of the souls of vertuous Pagans as of Philosophers Law-givers Governours Kings and other private persons renowned for their wisedome prudence fortitude temperance bounty chastity mercy and generally for their civill carriage and moral conversation such as were Hermes Zoroastes however calumniated Socrates Homer Plato Aristotle Plotinus Pythagoras Phocillides Theognes Epictetus Cicero Hercules Theseus Cyrus Solon Lycurgus c. Sect. II. That a wise man onely is capable of mirth The Stoicks among many other excellent contemplations in the discourse of joy came the nearest unto divine truth when they put a main and reall difference between Letari Gaudere mirth and joy the former is a light and toyish passion skipping in wanton manner up into the face the latrer a continual exultation of the soul in the enjoyment of some excellency mirth is a sudden or short fit raised by some pleasant or ridiculous accident joy is a setled content and constant delight by the presence of possessed good mirth is ever in the sensuall appetite joy is onely in the soul and will from which inference they drew that admirable Paradox scoft at by other Phylosophers That a wise man onely rejoyceth truly though a fool be alwaies more merry For which St. Augustine found warrant in Scripture non est gaudium impijs the wicked can never cordially rejoyce and he ads the reason quia effunduntur c. because they are ever restless ever wandring from themselves for it is impossible to find those effects of true joy satiety equality and continuance any where else but in the object of perfect goodness which because no place can afford but heaven there must this joy be and no where else Sect. III. How the Angels may be said to rejoice and the manner of their exultation in Heaven The joy of the Angels whom our Saviour positively affirms to be capable of rejoycing is either essential or accidental either in habit or in act their essential joy is most perfect eternal without change without cause of increase or addition for they behold the presence of God in righteousness and are satisfied Psal 16. 12 and again satisfied by reflex and meditation on the state of their own happiness and yet satisfied again and again in ebriatie sunt ab ubertate donius ejus saith the Psalmist torrente voluptatis sue potavit eos but their accidental joy that is continually increased by the marvellous effects which God daily worketh here in the Church below their knowledge doth kindle their joy anew not by adding more fewel but increasing more flame the habit of joy in the Angels is the same incessant immutable c but the act is increased according as it shall please the most high to impart the measure and present the object and that doubtless he doth most freely to all the Angels SECT IIII. The vanity of all things terestial Solomon a true and competent judge of mundane pleasures and none else In the rule of contrarieties as the folly that comes from wisedome is most foul so the wisedom sprung from folly should be the greatest It was the wisedome of folly which occasioned Solamons Ecclesiastes it was written by the Preacher and who could more thorowly make experience of the divers kinds of pleasures and multiplicities of vanities then a rich commanding Monarch Solomon sayled about the whole world of vanities others had discovered onely some few nooks and bays God suffered him to run through them a time till being recalled he might more fully instill this instruction of wisedome Vanity of vanities all is vanity SECT V. That the world was already in Gods decree myriads of years before its creaation Titus 1. 2. the Apostle speaks of eternal life which God promised before the world began some men may perhaps wonder how that could be when men were not to whom eternall life was to be given the answer therefore must be that this promise or covenant which God made with his son and with us in him from eternity is here meant all the promises of the new Testament are but copies of this original covenant made before the world began and this is the ground of that spoken Proverbs 8. 13. before the mountains were brought forth he rejoyced in the habitable parts of the world and his delight was in the sons of men SECT VI. How many diseases are incident to the body of man a parallel of the infirmities of the body with those of the soul The body of man is but a weak sconce Of the body of man a slight earthwork not above six foot high thrown upin an instant will in a short time if let alone moulder away of it self and yet a wonder it is to see what a number of enemies beleager it on all sides how many diseases and infirmities it is subject too If we look into the muster roles I mean the Physitians books we shall find them upon Tally no lesse then 6000 so many diseases is the body subject to and the soul is incident to as many if not more Now perhaps we are swelled with a Tympany of pride anon inflamed with a Feaver of lost by and by besotted with a Dropsie of drunkennesse after that with a Lethargy of sloth and then again we pine with a Consumption of envy and malice Almighty God therefore hath left us his word the holy Scriptures appointed us the writings sentences and axiomes of the holy Councels fathers confessours and martyrs like an Apothecaries shop as St. Basil speaks whence in every chapter in every tract and in every line as on so many shelves and in so many boxes there are store of preservatives and remedies CHAP. III. The Luxuriousnesse of the present Age History of Cyrus Museus his mad opinion Procopius his reason why Sampson was injoyned not to drink wine Remarkable story of a Monk Rules against Ryot IF there were ever a time when it was requisite to inveigh against gluttony drunkenness certainly it is now for the older the world grows the more doth singrow upon it it improves it self daily where shal we now especially in this our Borean clime hear of a Macarius that hath not taken his fill of meat or sleep 20 years or of such holy men as St. Hierom speaks of that can be content to live with barley bread and muddle water for a long time when they might dayly have fed on dainties or of an Hillarion such an one as the Ecclesiastiacal history tells us of that would threaten his body with a Domabo te c. when he found him beginning to be provender pricked such rare
description of the manner of Gods actuating a general resurrection Chap. 2. Sect. 2. Equality and continuance where alone to be expected Sect. 5. Eternal life promised on Gods part ere the world was an expesition upon Titus 1. 2 and Proverbs 8. 13. Chap. 4. Sect. 2. Ease how dangerous Chap. 5. Easier to keep out then to cast out lust Chap. 6. Sect. 2. Eye and Touch the fidelity of those two senses Chap. 7. Sect. 2. Emblemes and Types of the resurrection in the book of Nature Sect. 6. Excrements whether at our resurrection our hair and nails that have been cut from us shall not rise with us F Chap 1. sect 3. FAlacious dealing of the Jewish Rabbins perverting the words of David Psal 3. 4. Chap 2. Fulnesse of the Angels joy Sect. 4. Folly proceeding of wisdome the most foul Chap. 3. Feasting of some the famishing of others Feasts the Physitians best friends Chap. 4. Fixing of the eye how obnoxious Chap. 5. c. Chap. 6. Fashion of Christ not fantastical but real Chap. 7. Sect. 3. Familiarity of the Angels with Maxkind Sect. 6. Females whether they shall not be changed at the resurrection and whether there shall be any distinction of Sexes G Chap. 1. Gods special revelation to the Angels Chap. 2. Gods mercy not to be limited to Christians onely Sect. 4. Gods permission of Solomen to wade through the deep sea of vanity the reason why Chap. 3. Gluttony bow rise in these times Chap 4. Gazing too greedily how dangerous instanced in Eve Chap. 5. Gaudie attire the Bawd to lust Chap. 6. Sect God and man made one compound by Apollinarius Chap. 7. Sect. 3. Gods works mistaken by the heathen for their Gods Sect. 4. Gods retalliating vengeance H Chap. 1. Sect. 2. HEaven not shut up till the time of Christs incarnation as Sergius and others affirm Sect. ibid. Hosanna sung to our Saviour as he rode to the Temple the interpretation thereof Sect. 3. How the resurrection of our bodies shall be wrought according to the Iewish Rabbins Sect. 4. The wiser sort of Heathen their opinion concerning the same Chap. 2. Heraclitus with Socrates ranked by Justin Martyr in heaven the authors opinion concerning the souls of deceased Pagans Chap. 3. Hillarion his rare abstinence Chap. 4. How an idle person may be said to be the Devils tempter Chap. 5. Sect. 3. Heathens why they painted their lascivious God and Goddesse naked Chap. 6. How Nicodemus might be said to resort to an Saviour by night c. Chap 7. Heathen by Phylosophy and the scale of the creature ascended very high Sect. 4 Herodias death Hatto Bishop of Ments Gods wonderful judgement towards him Sect. 6. Holy land why in all probability Joseph and the Patriarchs were so solicitous to have their bones buried there I Chap 1 c. Chap 2. Sect 3. JOy how different from mirth a definition of either Chap. 3 Italian Proverb concerning gluttony Chap. 4. Sect. 2. Idlenesse elaborately delineated Chap. 5. Sect. 3. Jacob lived but 147 years why Chap. 6. Sect. 2. Ietelligence of the senses penetrating to the intellect Chap. 7. Sect. 2. Instances proving by natural reason the possibility of a resurrection K Chap 1. c. Chap. 2. KNowledge of Christ might be revealed to the wiser sort of heathen even at their latest gasp Sect. 2. Knowing men are onely capable of true joy Chap. 3. c Chap. 4. Sect. 4. King Davids adultery the occasion thereof Chap. 6. c. Chap. 7. c. L LEaven that a little bone in every mans back shal partake of the nature of that in order to a resurrection c. Chap. 2. Sect. 2. Letari et gaudere their real difference Chap. 3. c. Chap. 4. Sect 2. Lust the exuberance of idlenesse Labour loves strongest Antidote Chap. 5 Licurgus his law concerning women Sect. 3. Lust a soaker of mens estates and how Chap. 6. Legerdemain practised by Christ according to the blasphemy of Marion Chap. 7. c. M Chap. 1. Sect. 2. MInerals juice of hearbs extract their operative faculty Chap. 2 Sect. 2. Mirtha passion most trivial Chap. 3. Macarius his incomparable abstinence Museus his mad opinion Chap. 4. c. Chap. 5. c. Chap. 6. c. Chap. 7. Sect. 2. Martyrs bones annually rising in Aegypt on Easter day N Chap. 1. Sect. 2. No alterations transmigrations or dispersiont of our bodies can force us out of Gods Granarie Chap. 2. Sect. 4. None ever made so perfect a discovery of mundane vanities as Solomon Chap. 3. No Drunkard to your English Drunkard Chap. 4. c. Chap. 5. New fashions how noxious Chap. 6. Sect. 3. Noahs floud those that perished therein not capable of a resurrection according to the Iewish Rabbins Chap. 7. c. O Chap. 1 c. Chap. 2. Sect. 6. OVr Jouls subject to more diseases then our bodies Chap. 3. c. Chap. 4. Orthodox warrant for dancing and kissing Chap 5. Sect. 3. Origens observations in his 20 Homily upon Numbers Chap. 6. Our Saviours a true substantial body Chap. 7. Sect 2. Objects their moving faculty Sect. 6. Our Resurrection whether we shall rise all of one Age. P Chap. 1. c. Chap. 2. PHilosophy alone sufficient to save the wiser sort of Heathen according to some of the Fathers Chap. 3. Procopius his opinion why Sampson was inhibited the use of wine Chap. 4. c. Chap. 5. c. Chap. 6. Plants their admirable intelligence Chap. 7. Plato Plotinus c. their conclusion of the soul to be immortal Sect. 2. Pascasin his holy Well Q Chap. 1. c. Chap. 2. c Chap. 3. QVeen Thomiris Quarrelling the inseparable companion of Drunkennesse Chap. 4. c Chap. 5. c. Chap. 6. Sect. 3. Questions of strange consequence by the Jewish Rabbins Chap. 7. c. R Chap 1. c. Chap 2. c. Chap. 3. Rare examples of temperance and moderation instanced in divers holy men Chap. 4. Sect. 3. Reason why the Israelites were enjoyned to wear embroidered fringes on their garments Chap. 5 c. Chap. 6. Sect. 3. Resurrection of the Children of wicked parents forbidden by the Rabbins their reason why Chap. 7. Sect. 6. Resurrection of our bodies whether it shall be in April early in the morning or at midnight S Chap. 1. c. Chap. 2. Sect. 2. Sacriledge in any to rob the Heathen of Gods mercy Stoicks their admirable Paradox Chap. 3. Socrates his saying Chap. 4. Sect. 2. St. Hieroms saying concerning idleness Chap. 5. St. Anthonies over nice Decorum Chap. 6. c. Chap. 7. Some of the heathen their excellent notions Sect. 6. Suarez his opinion T Chap. 1. c. Chap 2. sect 2. THe joy of the Angels either essential or accidâ—ental Chap. 3. The calamitous condition of these times The story of a Monk tempted by the Dviel Chap. 4. Sect. 2. The golden saying of St. Anthony Theodorets quere in his questions c. Sect. 3. The reason why Alexander having conquered
Darius would not be drawn to look upon his daughters Chap. 5. c. Chap. 6. Sect. 2. The proportion of our bodies probably proving the reasonablenesse of our souls V Chap. 1. c. Chap. 2. c. Chap. 3. VItellius board Chap. 4. Sect. 4. Vain verses and Ribauld talk Chap. 5. Vainness of Women in their Attire Chap. 6. Vigour cannot be in assum'd or counterfeit bodies The end of the Table DISCOVERIES CHAP. I. That the Angels know both what hath been and what is done here on Earth SOme of latter times tells us of a wonderfull Glasse wherein the saints and angels behold whatsoever is done nay whatsoever is thought in the Church below I know not how we may be sure that that Glasse is of Gods making and if it be not it must needs be a false one but if they mean by that glasse a special Revelation making known to those blessed spirits whatsoever may redound to the honour of the Trinity by their knowledge we may safely take them at their words for though God conceal the works of his goodnesse mercy truth and holinesse already past I make no question but his glorious Redemption admirable Dispensation and all other occurrent favours meeting â—â—gether in one center for the good of those appointed to Salvation have been and are always revealed to the whole Court of Heaven SECT II. Whether by the light of Reason onely Salvation may be purchased There hath not wanted those who have peremptorily affirmed an opinion in these our days too much prevaent That all of all nations and people shall be saved and conducted in this manner to heaven The Jews by Moses the Christians by Christ the heathen by Mahomet As I affirm not that the light of naturall reason is enough to save a man so on the other side I dare not aver that none at all were saved till the 15 year of Tiberius and that heaven was quite shut up till after Christs passion were an assertion befitting the mouth of Sergius the Maniche that vouched it against St. Augustine I conclude that all that died of old were saved by a prioristical knowledge of Christ and that it is at the entrance of the heavenly Jerusalem as it was at Christ entrance into Jerusalem below you shall read that those that went before as well as those that came after cried Hosanna to the son of David i. e. save we pray thee oh Messiah incarnate SECT III. The strange opinions of the Iewish Rabbins concerning the resurrection no difficulty therein in respect of God Ask the Jewish Rabbins how the Read more of this Cha. 6. §. 3. resurrection of our bodies shall be wrought and they will tell you of a certain little bone in spina dorsi in every mans back that shall never be subject to any putrefaction and they will find you text for it too in 3. 4. Psal where 't is said he keepeth all their bones so that one of them unum ex ijs as they make the Prophet speak shall never be broken and this bone say they at the last day shall be mollified and softned by a dew from heaven and it shall swell as having the nature of Leven and it shall diffuse its vertue to the collecting of all the dust that belongs to its own body and so fit and prepare it for a resurrection I shall not be so audacious as to passe a definitive sentence or positively to determine how this to humane reason incredible resurgation is effected I had rather make Ezekiel my Oracle who gives the manner how thus he shal breath upon the slain and they shal live Authors of unquestionable repute and dayly experience informs us that the juyce of herbs and minerals extract are of sufficient force to restore sick persons Apio the Gramarian Pliny na hist by the power of Cinocephalia revived Homer how facile then may we conclude it for the supream Architector and Gubernator of the earth by his word alone to actuate an universal resurrection and that though the bodies of all mankind were crumbled into dust and that dust scattered before the wind or were they distilled into water attenuated into ayr or though they were eaten by Canibals and those Canibals devoured by fishes and those fishes by men again I say though they had all these dispersions and alterations and transmigrations yet were they still in the store-house of a powerfull God to whom the whole world is but as one repository or larger cabinet and all the elements but severall drawers in that great frame and those lesser creatures the craws of Ravens bellies of fishes and intrails of beasts but as smaller boxes included in the greater so that wheresoever we shall be laid God will know where to find us though our bodies may be hid to sense yet they are not lost to him he that called us at first out of nothing can by the same mighty voice raise us again from nothing SECT IIII. Yet of the same The Jewish Rabbins tell us of three keys that God keepeth always in his own hands the Key of the Womb whereby he lets us into this life the Key of the Clouds by which he nourisheth and refresheth us with rain and the Key of the Resurrection by which he loseth us from the prisons of death and gives us entrance into a new life I willingly grant the Key of the Resurrection to be in Gods power onely for Christ is that key Clavis Resurrection is as Tertullian calls him he shall open and bring us out of our graves as the Prophet Ezekiel speaks The wiser sort of heathens believed a resurrection and a restitution of our bodies but then they thought the stars and the Planets by whose decay and continuance they measured the stability and perpetuity of all sublunary things to be the onely causes of it and so they ran giddily into Platos circulation of years CAAP. II. That we cannot conscienciously censure the ancient Heathen Sages as damned NOt onely St. Chrisostome but many other of the fathers have set open a dore for Socrates Aristotle c. to enter into heaven by Philosophy alone and Causabon in his animadversions upon Baronius saith that those places in the fathers which seem to look that way are candida interpretatione mollienda to find a favorable interpretation with us since it were not pious in us to improve an uncharitable opinion of them for their perhaps over charitable opinion of the heathen As I dare not therefore with Iustin Martyr rank Socrates and Heraclitus in heaven and as I cannot think Aristotle by writing his books de Coelo hath himself gained a place there so neither dare I passe the sentence of eternal damnation upon them it were sacriledge in any man to rob them of Gods mercy which is over all his works and who is he that shall presume to set bounds to the overflowing Ocean of his compassion to say unto it thus far shalt thou go and no further for might not
it by the creation of any new Arguments but onely by the resurrection and reviving of the old Let it be given out that his Disciples came by night and stole him away while they slept none but a besotted Jew given over to believe lies can The Jewes contradict themselves credit it for if the Watchmen were asleep how could they tell that his Disciples stole him 〈◊〉 if they were nor asleep why would they suffer his Disciples to steal him And besides who can beleeve that his Disciples a poor disconsolate and forsaken company Doves under the tallons of the Jewish Vultures and Romane Eagles should adventure upon a guarded Sepulcher to brave a band of armed Souldiers Can you think that they who before he was crucified stole for fear themselves away would now adventure to steal him away that they that could not watch with him before one hour at prayer should now watch whole nights to steal his body from the Grave And if they had stollen him what did they expect but a body as dead and livelesse as their own hopes Thus when such strange impossibilities are brought to back it a lie doth confute it self and blinded malice helpeth to establish confirm the truth nor by such forgeries as these is our Belief any whitshaken but rather ratified and confirmed But and this is the main Objection of our present Sadduces an exemplary cause is not enough this demonstrates neither a power nor a will in Christ to do it a pattern cannot raise me I may have the Map or the Copy of the Universe yet by that Map by that Copy not be able to make another I may see the picture of Christr Resurrection upon a wall but that will no more raise me then it will make me valiant to read of Hannibal Caesar Alexander Objects have a moving and attracting power in them but no forcing casualty the heavens are a fair sight but they cannot make a blind man see no more can a bare pattern raise a dead man from the Grave I Answer That besides this there is a proper efficacy in Christ an Influence distilling from him the head to us the members a dew on our souls and a dew on our bodies such a dew as will make a withered soul and a dead bodie revive again Our Saviour who raised himself from his Monument shall be the cause of our Resurrection he is the root we are the branches if the root live the branches will spring forth and it is no absurd conclusion he is risen and therefore we shall rise Christs resurrection and ours are links of the same chain pull one and all will follow if there passed such a power from his cloaths why not such a power from his resurrection Now Christ who had depositum carnis nostrum as Tertullian saith by raising up himself hath given us a pledge and an assurance that he will us raise also so that he may raise in us a belief and an assurance of it he hath given us many types and emblemes of it in the book of Nature it is writ in every field we walk in Consider the Lillies and al flowers how they die and grow fresh again corruption is the chiefest cause of their continuance the earth also receives not the seed but to restore it again Sect. III. That the Angels are always conversant with us here below c. St. Paul though he gave a sufficient reason for the covering of women in the Church because of the Angels and their reverence for they are every where they pitch round about us Yet if our eys were opened like Gods servant or closed up either That the Angels are always conversant with us in a holy dream like Iacob we should behold them ascending and descending descending from the Presence-Chamber of the great King and ascending up with our requests again descending to comfort our desires to illuminate our understandings Inter sunt Cantantibus adjunt Orantibus in sunt Meditantibus saith St. Bernard When we sing they make up the Quire with us when we offer up our Orisons they hover about us c. and which is more they joyn in the first Petition of the Lords Prayer with us Sect. IIII. The equality of Gods Iustice observable many instances out of Scripture and other Authors It is usuall with Iehovah to sute and proportion the punishment according to the offence of the sinner that many times the judgement is but as it were an anagram of the sin so that you may easily read the offence in the punishment God doth retalliate to sinners pay them as we say in their own coin The Aegyptians they drown all the males of the children of Israel and they themselves their master Pharaoh and all his host perish in the red sea Corah Dathan and Abiram opened their mouths against Moses and Aron the Lords anointed King and Priest and the earth presently opened her mouth and swallowed them up Sodom burned with unnaturall lust and they were burned up with fire that a shower of brimstone should descend from above and a shower of fire from that which is naturally water that hell it seif should come down from heaven is a prodigie onely exceeded by the sin that caused it Adombezek that had taken the 70 Kings and barbarously cut of their great toes had his own toes cut off soon after and it wrung from him this expression As I have done so hath God requited me Iudg 1. 7. Because Moab burned up the bones of the King of Edom therefore God burnt up Moab And the Jews that bought Christ of Iudas for thirty pence at the sacking of Jerusalem by the Roman Emperour Titus 30 of them were sold for a peny Herodias that by her lascivious dancing procured Herod to cut of St. Iohn Baptists head had her own head cut off by the breaking of the ice as she passed over a river Nicephorus Eccles Hist lib. 1. chap. 20. Hatto that mercilesse Bishop of Ments who set fire on his barn where many poor people were congregated to get relief for their hunger and burned them up like Vermine was himself followed with troops and armies of mice and rats who found him out though immured in a strong Castle seated in the midst of a river and falling on him devoured him to the bones Munster relates he story at large in the third book of his Cosmotgraphy SECT V. Concerning Christs resurrection two Queres For Christs resurrection whether when he rose his humane soul came and united it self to the body by its own motive faculty or else assisted by the power of the Deity Whether his body penetrated the Tomb-stone or whether the Angels that removed it were ministerial in it and furtherers of his Resurrection SECT VI. Enquiries in referrence to our own Resurrection c. For our own Resurrection Whether we shall not rise all of one age about 32 which we have good ground to think because it is said in Ephes 5. Till wee come
to the measure of the Age of Christ Whether in our Resurrection our hair and our nails that have been cut whether those excrementious parts shall not rise with us Then for the time of the Resurrection Whether it shall be in April as Athanasius thinks in his sixth Homily and for the time of the day Whether it shall be early in the morning which we have cause to think because Christ rose at that time or in the middle of the night as St. Hierome thinks because Christ 't is said shall come as a Thief in the night and as St. Ambrose collects from those words viz. In that night two shall be lying in one bed c. Then for the place where we shall be raised whether in the valley of Megiddo where Iehosaphat fell as the Rabbins think or at least in some part of the Holy Land the reason perhaps why Ioseph and the Patriarchs were so solicitous to have their bones carried from Aegypt and other places to be buried there Then whether we shall rise naked or cloathed which we may justly dispute because the seed that springs up is covered with a husk Whether God will not use the help of the Angels in raising us whether they shall gather our bones and dust together as Suarez thinks and we have some ground to beleeve because 't is said in the Parable of the Sower The Angels are the Reapers and they shall separate the wicked from the just Lastly when we rise whether there shall be any distinction of Sexes Male or Female amongst us Scotus thinks there shall not and perhaps that Text may intimate as much where it is said There is no Marrying nor giving in Marriage but we shall be like the Angels of God A SERAPHICK RHAPSODY ON The Incarnation the Progression And the PASSION OF Iesus Christ By SAMUEL SHEPPARD LONDON Printed by B. Alsop MDCLII A SERAPHICK RHAPSODIE On the Passion of Christ CHrist comming to write our acquittance with his bloud knew well that humility would suit best with the head when the body was sick with pride He bowed the Heavens and came down i e the honour of his Godhead was not put off by cloathing it with rags of flesh from his birth to his burial reacheth the humiliation of his manhood never ceasing till his head was thrown under earth his footstool Thus his passion began in the stable where he was no sooner born but the Creed immediately tels us he suffered the bloud of his circumcision was but so many warning drops of this great shower in his passion and whereas others were born to live his onely errand was to die to this end he villified himself being brought up in poverty ranked with the meanest no companion but for Publicans and Sinners never taken notice of by the chiefer sort The Jews grossly expected the Messiah in worldly pomp as if God would be known by his cloaths such is the Sorcery of bewitching Mammon that a gawdy traine would have gone further with them then a miracle but doth any come to Petition in State or to beg in robes humility was the right garb of Christs intendment for none can vault or mount himself without shrinking his joints none can raise another unlesse he stoop to do him courtesie the surest building hath the lowest foundation and Christ our Corner-stone our strong Tower whereby we ascend into heaven must be first deep layed in the bowels of the earth In the eye of man Christ humbled himself but the object of his obedience was God whether active in fulfilling the law or passive in bearing the punishment for the law this latter obedience neither contradicts his equality with the father nor his willingnesse in suffering for his brethren because an equal may be sent by his equal performing the task undertaken by his own consent the Heathen superstitiously thought it ominous when the Oxe was not half a Priest not religiously bowing his neck to the stroke Christ then could be no gratious sacrifice unlesse his bloud was sent out as willingly as it was cruelly drawn Obedience is better then sacrifice but sacrifice with obedience is far better both which were gently united by our Saviour who voted his death presented his person and quietly admitted violence as much without the assailers compulsion as his own command witnesse his injoyning the peace to his followers the Host of Angels shall have no watch-word for they were the taller souldiers because he will not be rescued from surprizing miseries Peter shall not perswade nor the Jews work him out of his peremptory resolution De cruce non vult descendere qui potuit de morte resurgere saith St. Augustine he will not keep himself alive that can rise being dead others as they are not born when they will so neither can they die when they will Voluntary expence of life is but a glorious murther and so the example of Christs death might bring us thither from whence the benefit redeems us but our Saviour having life in his own dominion had power to lay it down power to take it up again no man took it from him he layed it down of himself John 10 18. so that Pilate's arrogance herein was much out who had no authority to condemn but from the person condemned wherefore that perplexed and passionate Pilate reluctancy but an ambush to the Divel reluctancy of his appetite was but an bush to the Divel and to Christs obedience a Trophey for as the one would not scarce have ventured without imitation so the other could not have conquered without opposition The fire of virtue having not matter to scedon will die of idleness passion augments the liberty of the wil whose active courage runs best w th fetters most declares her magnanimity in a stiff contradiction Christ therefore whose Ely took our infirmities was freely troubled both for the greater proof of his manhood and greater victory nay valour was here the cause of fear and all these unwilling motions proceed of very willingness neither can affections being naturall powers be made unlawful by workings but over-masterings and these inferior orbs of the soul may enjoy their proper course so they turn with the swinge of ther prime mover not spurning at the wills decrees Isaack may ask his father where is the Lamb for innocency cannot die without a word and our Saviour may well begin his prayer with an If but the conclusion is absolute the cup shall not passe from him and I likewise will pass to it The soul her self though impenetrable must not scape which being the original womb of Disobedience in us first returns his paenal Obedience in Christ the very Qualm seisure of his Agony was heavier then unto Death whose pangs were known before they were felt known augmented by that accurate apprehension which in the heat of his fit made the soul work more upon the body then the body wrought afterwards upon the soul For how sharp was the
conflict O how was the soul preserved when the body was forced to rain blood when every Pore gasped as if the soul meant to follow and he to die as often as it had places to expire at Indeed well it might for this single Death was conceived as a multitude of Deaths a Death for those that died before and after Behold a ghastly sight for he that never committed one sin to be charged with so many heaps of sin whose load could not chuse but be the heavier because Innoccency lay under and came so near to Guilt as to be punished the Cup of sower Grapes mixed with those thoughts burst out into billows of Sweat so that Floods ran over him Psal 69. Oh what bleeding was within when it streamed so without never was such a Sweat because never such a Cause no such heat but that of Hell Sin being the Fewel of both by whose vehemency each Pore became an Eye and each Member wept that by the tears of his whole body the whole body of his Church might be cleansed and yet his sufferance swells to the largest extent of Obedience exercised in sundry torments by all persons upon his parts Friend and Foe Jew and Gentile King Priest and People all joyn against him in the Front of which conspiracy comes Judas a Wolf trained up in the school of a Lamb with a Kisse Was ever such a salutation between God the Devil with a kisse doth this courteous blood-sucker kil his Masters Traytor Dost thou so kisse the Son lest he be angry Well take thy leave Judas never shalt thou come so near again this hanging about Christs neck shall cost thine own a worser hanging whilest Heaven and Earth for betraying him that came from both shall with vengeance thrust thee from them and leave thy Carcasse to thy new Master the Prince of the Aire It could not chuse but make his Enemies bold to see his Disciple so cruel who now prepare to kill the true Passeover though not for their own but our eating the seed of Abraham came out with Bills and Staves to take him who came down from Heaven to take the seed of Abraham and violently attach him with their hands whom they could not apphehend with their hearts They take him but as Sampson was taken by the Philistines to the losse and ruine of themselves both felt the God of Israel when they held him in bondage both smarted under their prisoner By tying his hands which might have loosed theirs they tied themselves in a double knot but that hindred not his proceeding who through Adams captivity through a rash freedome regained us liberty with a deliberate captivity Thus with bonds of liberty he travelled to Caiphas a man that went for a High Priest but first Murther must call in Annas his reverend Father-in-Law that so the generation of Vipers might be more allied in bloud After Annas Caiphas with good manners may be avillain a zealous counterfeit who having with deep conjuration wrung out the truth accuseth God himself of Blasphemie The watch word being given the servants are diligent in reviling him that never spake amiss they blind his eys challenge a Prophesie that so they might prove him a Seer by making him not to see they pluck off his hair Esay 5. 6. that no hair of us might perish threshing his cheeks with buffets wherein our offences have a hand Yet to all these reproaches he sets his face at a flint Esa 5. 6. as flint indeed from whence those smiters smore fire for their own Damnation The night being spent with those hellish Pastimes they benight the Day with Actions of Darknesse their fury hurries him to Pilate where the Scribes ommitting Blasphemie as an idle brangling before a secular Judge object him a Traytor against the God Caesar this killing Plea they keep till last and make it the first Argument of his guilt that They brought him as if their infallible Chair could neither erre nor slander whereas affectors of credit are most commonly Liars these holy Murtherers though by no meanes they will enter the Judgement Hall because of the Passeover nor be defiled with a place of bloud yet with a clear Conscience they prosecute that deed which defiles the place Pilate espying their malice makes a friend of a bad office shifts him over to Herod This King was more like a Courtier then himself a most Herod his Character curious piece of Vanity who after some discourse of stately impertinency would fain have God recreate his Highnesse with a Miracle Behold a Miracle of Patience Our Saviour returns him and his scoffs not so much as a word Silence is the best reply to a A speaking silence Babler which both secretly darts at the Conscience of the Adversary and retains the station of Meeknesse Our Saviour was often dumb as a Lamb his dumbnesse now hath made him white as a Lamb for Herod mocking him with a white Robe as a Candidate or suitor onely for a Kingdome unwillingly deciphers his integrity in its true colours thus attired he is tosled back again like a Tennis-ball to Pilate where death is little unlesse an odious comparison with Barrabas kill him double this of the two is the Goat which to the utter pollution of the Dismissers is set at liberty Gen. 16. and the destroyer of the living is thought more worthy of life then he that raised their dead Pilate being weary of being just against the stream delivers him to the place of crucifying to be scourged by souldiers a punishment ordained by the Romanes for small offences as the Axe for capital But Christ who suffered for our slips as well as for our crimes endured not onely the Crosse but scourging a punishment most suitable to the nature of sin whereof any Act though never so little makes as many breaches in the Law is the lash imprints in the body When the whip had launced our Saviours flesh their own humour bad Commands are still over-done proceeds to scorn him in state and inviting the multitude to their pettulant fury they repeat what was done last night with advantage with thorns they crown his head not remembring the Parable of Jotham that fire might come out of the Bramble All Crowns are thornie and the Heathenish Sacrifices used to be crowned but when this Sacifice of Jew and Gentile is crowned with thorns when his head is tyed in the thickets is not this the Oblation that was slain for Isaac and all the flock of the Faithfull Next in ridiculous honour they invest him in a Purple garment Why should their spight be at such charges the white Robe now clapt on his bleeding Members would soon take the dye of a better Purple But to make him a compleat mock-Emperour with bended knees they gave him a Reed for a Scepter Innocent King herein thy obedience is most remarkable for whereas other members were meerly passive here the hand was made an instrument of its own shame
the Ree◠dashed against thy head shews thy sufferings to be the doings of thy own Scepter In this variety of torments I find no women save onely one whom the Devil to preserve his old slight of tempting had set on Peter Eve the cause of all had done enough already and such hands were to weak for the Jews hate which required the utmost vigour of bloody souldiers but out Saviour having tyred them also Pilate who thought it mercy to use him thus cruelly presents him in his wofull formalities to move compassion Behold the man alas alas the King is this a Competitioner for a Caesar they like hounds having fastened upon the prey and comming again to full gaze yell out with full cries Crucifie him Crucifie him Since then Iustice is turned to a cry Esay 3. I appeal to you behold the man a man so torn in all his parts that no part can be known by it self but by the property of its torture Behold his head tented with thorns his cheeks macerated with buffets his face chequered with blood and spittle his hand behold with a Reed his back plowed over with stripes O that ye would behold what words hath stounded his ears what swords have passed through his soul shall yet the spear rip up his side shall yet the nail pierce his feet shall this man be crucified Behold him again and then behold your selves how many Jews are in each of you since each of you have procured al these outrages hear the cry of your selves Crucifie him Crucifie him well if he must die if the same Judge having thrice pronounced him innocent must in the same breath condemn Christ and himself his willingnesse is as ready as the necessity is urgent let him become obedient unto Death Phillip 2. 8. But could the Creatot die and be brought himself so near that nothing out of which he breathed all things No Death being onely a Divorce of the natural parts could not separate the Godhead the man onely died the person was but in a sound the commerce and influence of the whole Divinity like the Spirits in a falling Disease did not vanish but retire that astonishing voice My God my God why hast thou for saken me infers no more For how should God and Man be accorded by him who suffered a dis-union of God and Man in himself all this was but a sharp pull of his former Agony where an Augel did then chear him but now he is forsaken of all induring the height of Anguish in the end of Life that we might receive the greater comfort in the point of Death And hereby he gives his enemy the fiercest blow at last while he stretcheth himself and roars over the prey as it became the Lion of the Tribe of Juda. But what had Death to do to punish when Baptism had nothing to wash 〈◊〉 his seeming ☞ contradiction is the main thing of our Salvation For if Death be the wages of sin and sin be not in Christ it remains that our sins put him to death which he discharges as a Surety not as a Debter Adams Disobedience in the easiest Command is recompenced by Christs Obedience in the hardest Injunction for Obedience consisting in the renowning our selves is most eminent in Death There is a Death in Death which makes it more then Death the Jews malice and our Saviours obedience are well met to entertain it both which emulate each other So habituate and obdurate themselves that they forgetting their Splcen may now beleeve they do justice and Christ were he any besides himself might think he died deservedly Could any Tyranny have startled his Obedience the Crosse had done it whose gripes are implyed to be infinite while their Eury is here matched as an even measure with the Patience of God Behold yee that passe by Was ever sorrow like this sarrow Jer. 1. 21. A sorrow that might be felt by looking on felt by that which had no feeling The Earth was moved at his constancy it fell a shaking when his hands were Why the Earth shook at our Saviours Passion fastened it reeled and staggered when it missed his feet whose touch supported it One timely wound at the heart had been a friendly murther But when all the extream parts are beset with distinct killings yet none so kind as to dispatch him when the nail onely tortures not destroying the part but deading the sense making Death live the Crosse it self must needs be the onely Pulpit to expresse Anguish But why all these stations Tardiora sunt remedia quem mala It is easier to spill then to gather to marre then to mend In mans creation and fall God and Divels were quick at work but when it comes to redemption how many premises how many ages of expectance what growth what preparation what lingring execution must joyn to finish the Sacrifice for should our Saviour have made hast in his task it would have filled us with wonder rather then thanks and would have relished more of power then love but great must his love be when he dwels on his pain when he delights in sorrow and huggs it instead of them he loves Whilest his body was thus afflicted the Jews took care that his soul should not be idle who provided a punishment mixed with as much shame as smart for although the Crosse had never been made infamous by the communion of Slaves yet how shamefull it was might be read in his own countenance the seat of shame he enjoyed not here the priviledg of others Death the face was covered with nothing but shame and to its greater confusion it beheld the bodies nakedness the first object of shame not in secret as our first Parents did but before a cloud of insulting scorners such as durst mock him when he was clad in purple it is true our Saviour had no cause of shame in himself yet Innocency may be dipt in a blush as well as guilt not for any conscions ground in its own bosome but a timerous suspition of sinister thoughts in others which made the Sun remember its duty in cloaking him from shame who cloathed it with light seasonably denying his beams in a time unseasonable The Statists of the Synagogue well knew what they ask'd when they they ask'd for a crucifying in death they stroke at his life in the death of the Crosse they aimed at his name they that hated his Doctrine more then his person slew him but to come at his memory in murthering which they might ever raise a continuall slaughter not onely on him but on all those that should follow so vile a master this wooden engine was a stumbling block to the Jew and Gentile to whom it seemed incredible that the author of life should die so base a death again that such a death should be the spring of life it appeared a greater riddle then that the honey should be hived in a carkass but we know how the disgrace of this