Works

A SERMON PREACHED AT S. MARIES Cambridge, Novemb. V. MDCLXXIV.

A Dreadful and dismal character to be given to a man by an Apostle, and an Apostle now filled with the Holy Ghost to give it. Take out but that little great clause, Thou child of the Devil, and there needs not much more to the picturing of the Devil himself in his proper colors and full proportion: Full of all subtlety, full of all mischief, enemy of all righteousness, and the uncessant perverter of the right ways of the Lord. How little needs there more to the limning out the Prince of darkness himself in his blackest complexion? What is it for these titles to be given to any man? But our Apostle could very well discern between a Brother and a Sorcerer, between a true Christian and a false Prophet, between a Professor of the Gospel, and a professed perverter of the ways of the Lord.

The Text tells us, he set his Eyes upon him, and sees him through, he discovers what he is to the very bottom, and accordingly is warranted by the Holy Ghost, with whom he is filled to give him these brands, O thou full of all subtlety and of all mischief, thou child of the Devil, and enemy of all righteousness.

The two Parties in mention were as different and contrary as light and darkness, as Hell and Heaven; the one an Apostle, the other a Sorcerer; the one a most near servant of God, the other as near a servant of the Devil, the one full of the Holy Ghost, the other full of all subtlety and mischief: and all the agreement that was between them, (if that be any) was that either of them had a double name: for Saul he was also called Paul, and Bar Jesus, he was also called Elymas.

The reason of the Apostles double name, I should look no further for, than to his double relation, as he was a Jew born, and as he was a freeborn Roman. His Hebrew name Saul, relates to his Hebrew original, and his Roman name, Paul to his Roman privilege. And whereas he had been called by his Jewish name, Saul, all along the story hitherto, while he had been conversing among the Jewish Nation: he being now appointed Apostle of the Gentiles, and now set out upon that employment, he is called by his Gentile name all along hence forward, Paul, and Saul no more.

But the resolution about the Conjurers double name is not so easy, and we shall not find Esau in this matter so smooth as Jacob.

First, As concerning his name Bar Jesus; I believe it was almost as far from the signification of that Blessed Name that we adore, as he himself was from adoring him; and I believe it was a very great way from the letters of that Blessed Name. In the Arabic translation, indeed that we have in our Polyglot Bible, it is written with the very same letters. But in the translation, in that Language, published by Erp ••• us it is written otherwise, and better I doubt not; and yet I question whether with the letters proper for it or no▪ I should divine his name Jesus from the Hebrew word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Ain inchoante, which signifies contabescere, morbo corrodi, to languish, to pine away, to be eaten up with some malady; and if I miscount not, you have it but three times in the Bible, and those in the Psalms, Psal. VI. 7. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 rendered by our English, Mine eye is consumed because of grief: by the Interlineary Latin, Erosus est prae indignatione oculus meus. And the very same words you have, Psal. XXXI. 9. where our English renders after the same manner, and that Latin Contabuit; and in the very next verse after, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 My bones are consumed. Now the third person future of that word, if you would write it in Greek letters, you can hardly do it more properly, than in the word Jesus that is before us.

And to this Hebrew word I cannot but conceive, that the Syriac Translator had an Eye, when he writes not Bar Jesus, but Bar Shuma; by which he means not Filius Nominis, a man of Name or renown, as some would have it, and as indeed it might signify, but a man of sores, swellings or breakings out: for so 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 is taken in Levite. XII. 2. in the Targum of Jerusalem, and Jonathan upon the Law; and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in Esa. I. 6. and elsewhere in the Targum of the other Jonathan upon the Prophets. And how Bar Shuma, a man of sores agrees with Bar Jesus, a man wasting and languishing, I need not tell you.

But how doth Elymas agree with both? verse. 8. Elymas the Sorcerer, for so is his name by interpretation: But there is some scruple which name is meant, whether his name Bar Jesus, or his title Magus. And that that hath been the currentest rendering hath been by the Arabic word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Ain inchoante, which signifies a knowing, a wise man, and so may be bowed to the sense of Magus: But both the Syriac and Arabic Translators begin the word Elymas with another Letter. I learn from that incomparable work for pains and learning the Heptaglot Lexicon, that Alima or Elima, Eliph inchoant, in the Arabian Tongue, signifies Dolere or cruciari; to be in pain or anguish. And I think I need to look no further how Elymas doth interpret Bar Jesus, when the one signifies contabescere, and the other dolere; the one morbo corrodi, and the other cruciari, the words being so near a kin.

It were worth inquiring, why his Hebrew name is rendered into Arabic, and not into Greek, as is generally done all along the New Testament with other names. But that discussion is not so proper for this time and occasion.

The man's sickly names therefore, Bar Jesus or Contabescens, and Elymas or dolens, may justly make us to look upon him, as some pitiful, pining, langushing, diseased body. Which whether that were so or no, is not much material, but certainly the titles that the sacred Historian and blessed Apostle do give him, put it out of all question, that he carried a very sad sickly and diseased soul. The Jewish Writers when they would speak out a very wicked man indeed, they say, that he brake out 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to the superfluity of naughtiness, as our English renders the phrase turned into Greek, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Jam. I. 21. Now read this man's Epithites, and guess whether he could have broken out further than he did. The holy Penman calls him a Jew, a false prophet, a Sorcerer, verse. 6. The holy Apostle calls him full of all subtlety, full of all mischief, the child of the Devil, and enemy of all righteousness, in the verse before us. Titles or Epistles, or Stigmata, or call them what you will, so foul that an hours discourse can speak but little to them of what might be, or what were requisite to be spoken, to give every of them their due.

Therefore to confine myself to the time, I shall confine my discourse only to his present action, upon which the Apostles Eye is more peculiarly intent, viz. that he perverted, and ceased not to pervert the right ways of the Lord. Into which sink of his, as into a common sewer, flowed all the rest of his puddles here mentioned, some as causes of his so acting, and some as instruments.

Hither flowed as causes his being a Jew, a false prophet, a Sorcerer: these set him on work. And hither flowed as instruments, his subtlety, his mischievousness, his Devilishness, his enmity against all righteousness: these helped him in his work. And what his work was, or what is meant by his perverting the right ways of the Lord, we need not go far to learn, the eighth verse resolves it fully, he withstood the Apostles Barnabss and Paul: and he sought to turn away the Deputy Sergius Paulus from the faith. He opposed the preaching of the Gospel, and he opposed the conversion of the Gentile.

And such Emissaries, some will tell you, the Jews had abroad in the World for such a purpose; subtle and mischievous men, sent abroad purposely to oppose, and contradict and vilify the Gospel, and to hinder as much as possibly the conversion of any Heathen. It were too bold to say, this man was sent by the Sanhedrin upon such an employment. If he were not, they could hardly have fitted themselves better for such a business, than with him so accomplished and accoutred for so cursed a design. The very mildest title that he carries, viz. as he was a Jew, speaks him capacitated and principled sufficiently for such an Employment, had he been neither false prophet nor Sorcerer.

Accordingly I shall only take up that Epistle and relation of his, and let all the rest alone, and consider him as a Jew, and so acting, as a Jew, in this his cursed employment, Not ceasing to pervert the right ways of the Lord, or to oppose the Gospel.

If you scan and observe the demeanor of the Devil in the two different ages of the World, under Heathenism, and under the Gospel, you will find this to have been his method, and his shifting policy, viz. That under Heathenism he foisted upon the World the greatest lie that could be forged in Hell, to make the Heathen believe, that the Devils that they served were God's. And under the Gospel, when that lie would not do, he set men to oppose and contradict that greatest truth, that could be revealed from Heaven, the truth and tenor of the Gospel. And the first Agents that he employed in this business was the Nation of the unbelieving Jews. A generation by the very principles of their Religion fermented into a sowrness and contrariety to the Gospel, and the right ways of the Lord in it. Our Apostle in Rom. XI. 8. tells us, They were under the spirit of slumber. And 1 Thes. II. 15. he intimates, how they were under a spirit of contradiction: They are contrary to all men. Under the spirit of slumber, so that all their Religion was but • dream of men that slumbered. And under the spirit of contradiction, so that all their acting was to oppose whatsoever was not according to that Dream.

And that that caused both these was their drinking in the enchantments of their Traditions. Which drunkenness cast them into a deep sleep, and which made them rave and rage whilst they thus slept.

It is very observable again, how Satan, and the Nation itself did shift and change the manner and means of their undoing. Before their Captivity into Babylon, they were all for Idolatry, and the Devil cheated them with his great lie, as he did the Heathen, to worship and sacrifice to Devils instead of God. But after that Captivity he something changed his temptation, and they became the means of their undoing; he persuading them to embrace another great lie, that of Traditions, instead of that of Idolatry: and they embracing it. They had so sorely smarted by the seventy years captivity for their Idolatry, that it was not so easy to bring them to that again; but he found it easy to foist upon them this other great lie, to make them believe that every doting Tradition, the invention of foolish men, was a divine Oracle, delivered to Moses at mount Sinai, and so from hand to hand to all posterity.

The Nation had been used to divine Oracles, by Visions, by Prophets, by Urim and Thummim all along. But now all these under the second Temple were ceased and gone: and how should a people that had been always used to such Oracles do without them? Here Satan saw his opportunity to cheat them with a Leah instead of Rachel, to impose upon them the famed oracularity of Traditions instead of the lively Oracles of God: like the deceitful Harlot in the Book of Kings, to lay a dead Child in their bosom instead of a living; and this they wing and cherish and make much of, as if it were the l • ving Child, even to this day.

Now how these Traditions wrought with them I may very well spare my labor to demonstrate, the Gospels and Epistles do it so abundantly. That by their Traditions they transgressed the commandments of God, Matth. XV. 3. That by their Traditions, they made the Word of God of none effect, verse. 6. That by their Traditions they worshipped God in vain, teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men, verse. 9. And in a word, that they were led into a vain conversation by the traditions received from their Fathers, 1 Pet. I. 18. Thus was it as to their effect in general; instances of particulars might be endless. I shall only mention three; and those that may be called the first three, as David's three Champions were, if I may mention so noble persons, and so base things together.

First, These Traditions of theirs made them dream, that Messias should be a pompous temporal Prince, arrayed with all earthly royalty and glory, and crowned with all terrene victoriousness and triumph. And this dream under the spirit of slumber, cast them also under the spirit of opposition against the true Messias when he came. Poor Jesus looked so unlike the gallant Messias they dreamed of, that by the very principles of their Traditions and Religion, they could do no less to him, than what they did, persecute, afflict, torment, crucify him. For he was not the Messias they looked for, but a false Christ forsooth, a false Prophet, a deceiver, a seducer of the Nation.

Secondly, Their Traditions made them dream, that Messias and his Law and Doctrine that he should bring with him, should be so far from abating or abolishing any of the ceremonies of Moses, that he should rather add to them, heighten and enhance them. And this dream under that spirit of slumber cast them also under the spirit of opposition against the Gospel. That is not for their turn, but against it, that cries down those ceremonies, and that justification they expected by them; that lays those shadows aside, and does, as it were, bury Moses, as Christ did his body, in the valley of Beth Peor. So that with them you cannot be a friend to Moses, unless you be an enemy to the Doctrine of Jesus.

Thirdly, and lastly, Their Traditions made them dream, that they were the only beloved of God of all people: that the seventy Nations of the World were abhorred, hated, cursed of him, and were to be destroyed. But oh! dearly loves he the seed of Israel, how entirely does he affect the Children of Abraham! And this dream under the spirit of slumber casts them also under the spirit of contradiction against the calling of the other Nations. What must those dogs eat of the Children's bread? Must these Children of the bond woman come to be heirs with the Children of the free? They forbid us to speak unto the Gentiles, that they might be saved, saith the Apostle in that place to the Thessalonians before quoted. And our Savior must be cast down the steep hill, and dashed all to pieces by his Townsmen of Nazareth for but hinting the calling of the Gentiles, in the story of Elias sent to the widow of Sarepta, and Naaman the Syrian sent to Elisha, and healed.

And thus briefly from this short scantling we may see, how this wretch before us was principled to oppose the Gospel, and to resist the Deputies conversion, by the very dictates of his Religion, as he was a Jew. How he might be forwarded and helped in his so acting by being a false Prophet, and a Sorcerer, by his subtlety and mischievousness, and by the rest of his devilish accommodations for such a purpose, I need not insist to demonstrate, the thing itself speaks it sufficiently.

So much therefore be spoken concerning his Person, and his Qualities and Conditions. Nor need we to stand gazing only upon him, since this day hath discovered some too like unto him. In the verses after my Text, it is related that this varlet was struck blind, and that he went up and down groping for some, that might take him by the hand and lead him. The memorial of this day may direct him, where to find some that may go hand in hand with him; and whether leads the other, it is no great matter; for whithersoever does, it is but the blind leading of the blind.

The day commemorates a Fact and Design, as black as all this wretches Titles. It commemorates men full of subtlety and mischief, as well as he, men that opposed the Gospel, as well as he; and that were principled by their very Religion to oppose it, as well as he. And men, who while they style themselves The Society of Jesus, by their principles and practices give suspicion that they relate more to this Bar Jesus, which we have had in hand, than to him, upon whom they would father their denomination. Men, I say, that are principled by the very dictates and elements of their Religion, to oppose the Gospel and the sincere profession of it. And indeed you can expect no better from Rome, from whence these men's principles came, either from the Place or from the Religion.

I. For the Place. The Holy Ghost hath spoken out the Numen of Rome, which was by no means named or known before, Rev. XIII. 2. The Dragon gave it his power and seat. For that Rome is there meant hath not only the consent of the Interpreters of old, and of the Protestants at this day, but even of the Romanists themselves, if you will but allow them the distinction of Rome Heathen and Christian. And can any good thing be expected thence, where the Dragons donation is the Founder of the power, I doubt, more truly than Constantine's? And can the Gospel but sinned opposition there, when there is such a power delegated from the great opposer? For you read not of any revocation or alienation of that Conveyance of Power.

II. As to her Religion in after times, and at this day, give me leave to use the words written upon the wall of Belshazzers dining room, Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.

1. Mene. Number the Doctrines of that Church and Religion one by one, and how great a company of them will prove to be like those of the Jews, but dreams of men, lying under the spirit of slumber: Universal Bishopship, Primacy, Infallibility, Power to pardon, Purgatory, and Deliverance thence, Transubstantiation, and multitudes more of the like fancy: the believing of which is but like his case in the Prophet, that dreameth that he eateth, and behold! he is still hungry; and dreameth that he drinketh, but behold! he is still thirsty, and his soul fainteth in him.

2. Tekel. Weigh their Doctrines in the balances of Scripture, reason, and impartial judgment; and how great a company of them will prove again like the Jewish, of no greater weight, than fond traditions and the vain inventions of men, even from the Chair, wherein the King sitteth upon the Throne, to the Souls in Purgatory, or the servant behind the Mill.

3. Lastly, Perez, Divide their Doctrines, that everyone may have his part, to whom it belongs; and how great a share will fall to the unbelieving Jew, and how great a share to the Apostatizer, or him that once believed, but was revolted and fallen away?

These two were the great Enemies and Opposers of the Gospel in the Apostles times, before ever the Heathen Rome began to persecute it. And these two, if my conjecture do not very much deceive me, made up the full measure of the stature of the Antichrist, that the Apostles St. Paul and St. John speak of, as extant in those very times. The former, the unbelieving Jew, was the man in the Parable, out of whom the unclean spirit was not yet cast. The Apostatized Jew was he, out of whom indeed that spirit had been cast, but was returned with seven other spirits worse than himself, and dwelt there again. The former opposed the Gospel by enforcing against it the rites and ceremonies of the Law, and justification by it. The latter by that also, as it would serve his turn; but withal abusing the liberty of the Gospel against the Sanctification of it.

These were the Opposers of the Gospel before the Heathen Roman persecution began to meddle with it. And when that ceased, after long succession of time, whether the same spirit and principles were not metempsychosed into Rome now grown Papal, let any impartial Censure judge, by comparing her strictness for Mosaic rites, and the looseness of her Libertine Doctrines. I am deceived, if the Jubilee now coming speak not very fair and far toward the attestation of both these, Mosaic strictness in proclaiming a Jubilee, and Libertine looseness in indulging so easy pardons.

If men's practices speak their principles, as this man's in the Text did, we need not to • ip so much into the principles of this Church, elementing and indoctrinating to the opposing of the power, purity and sincerity of the Gospel; her practices do make them legible abundantly▪ as written in Capital letters of fire and blood. This days memorial gives evidence sufficient, that I may not trouble you with raking into anymore.

Which commemorates a design of cruelty and horror, a design full of all subtlety, of all mischievousness, of all inhumanity, that remote ages to come, will hardly believe, that a Church that takes on her to be the only holy Catholic Church, should ever •• eed so horrid a monster. And why so cruel against a harmless Nation? What had we done that we must be so destroyed? Abimelech's plea to God was, Lord wilt thou also destroy an innocent Nation? And God accepted his plea as good, and would not destroy it. But▪ these men were deaf to any such pleading, and an innocent Nation must perish, because it was so innocent. As all the crime of Abel that must cost him his life was, that he was more righteous than his Brother; so all our guilt was because we had the more righteous and pure Religion. And therefore Mother and Child, our Religion and we must perish together.

As God by fire sent from Heaven, in the days of Elias, did determine the question, who was the true God, the Lord or Baal; so he by preventing this fire from Hell hath determined the question, betwixt Rome and us, which is the true Religion, theirs or ours. O! England, happy in thy Gospel and Religion, a Religion doubly lovely and beautiful Tirzah -like, both because thou deservest the hate of such a people, and because God hath so owned thee against thy haters. Blessed be the great God of Grace and Truth, that hath planted thee, watered thee, preserved thee, and so shines upon thee. And so may it grow, and prosper, and flourish, and bring forth blessed fruit under the same influence of Heaven, and let all the people say Amen. Hallelujah.

A SERMON PREACHED AT Guildhall LONDON, Jan. XXIV. MDCLXXIV.

A ND no wonder if there be a new Jerusalem, when at the fifth verse of this Chapter, God proclaims that he makes all things new. And that new Jerusalem must needs be a holy City, when it is sent down from God, and comes out of Heaven. And that holy City coming from Heaven could not but be a most lovely prospect to him that saw it, when the old Jerusalem on Earth had been once so lovely, that it was the glory and joy of the whole Earth, Psal. XLVIII.

Who it was that saw it, he himself tells you, speaking out his name, John: by which I suppose there is none here but understands the blessed Apostle and Evangelist of that name; though time hath been, that some have dreamed of another John: but no account could be given who he was, or whence he came. I shall therefore in this matter, which I believe needs but little dispute now, only say these three things.

• I. That it is disagreeable to all reason to think, that our Savior, when he intended to do some man so much honor and favor, as to impart such noble and glorious visions and revelations to him, as are recorded in this Book, that he should pass by and skip over his own Apostles and Disciples, and should pick out a man, that we all know was no Apostle, that no one knows, whether he were a Disciple or no. But,
• II. It is agreeable to all reason to conceive, that as the man, to whom God vouchsafed the revelation and discovery of the times and occurrences, that were to intervene betwixt his own times and the fall of Jerusalem, was Daniel, a man greatly beloved; so that the John, to whom Christ would vouchsafe the revelation and discovery of the times and occurrences, that were to intervene betwixt the Fall of Jerusalem and the end of the World, was John the Disciple greatly beloved.
• III. Of that Disciple Christ had intimated, that he would that he should tarry till • e came, Joh. XXI. 22. that is, till he should come in vengeance against the Jewish Nation and their City to destroy them; for that his coming, both in that place, and in divers other places in the New Testament, doth mean in that sense, it were very easy to make evident, should we take that subject to insist upon.

Now as our Savior vouchsafed to preserve him alive to see the Fall and destruction of that City, so also did he vouchsafe to him the sight of a new Jerusalem instead of the old, when that was ruined, laid in ashes and come to nothing. He saw it in Vision, we see it in the Text, and upon that let us six our Eyes and Discourse, for we need not speak more of him that saw it.

In the verse before, he sees a new Heaven and a new Earth, and in this verse a new Jerusalem. Something parallel to which is that in Esa. LXV. 17. Behold, I create new Heavens and a new Earth. And in the verse next following, Behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing. The expressions intimate the great change of affairs, that should be in the World under the Gospel, from what had been before. A new Heaven, or a change of Church and Religion, from a Jewish to a Gentile Church, and from Mosaic to Evangelical Religion. A new Earth, or a change in the World, as to the management or rule of it, from Heathenism to Christianity, and from the rule of the four Heathen Monarchies, Dan. VII. to the Saints, or Christians, to judge the World; 1 Cor. VI. 2. or being Rulers or Magistrates in it.

And the new Jerusalem is the emblem and Epitome of all these things under this change, as the old Jerusalem had been, before the change came. There is none but knoweth, that Jerusalem, in Scripture language, is very commonly taken for the whole Church then being, as well as it is taken particularly and literally for the City itself then standing. That City was the Church in little, because there were eminently in it all those things that do make and constitute a true Church, viz. the administration of the Word and divine Ordinances, the Assemblies of the Saints, the Worship of the true God by his own appointment, and the presence of God himself in the midst of all. And can any doubt, but that the new Jerusalem meaneth in the like sense, and upon the like reason, The Church of God under the Gospel, this enriched with all those excellencis and privileges, that that was, yea and much more? There was the Doctrine of Salvation, but wrapped up in Types and Figures, and dark Prophesies; but here unfolded to the view of every Eye, and Moses veil taken off his face. There Ordinances of divine Worship, but mingled with multitudes of carnal rites; here pure adoration in Spirit and Truth. There an assembly only of one People and Nation; here a general assembly compacted of all Nations. There God present in a cloud upon the Ark; here God present in the communication of his Spirit.

Therefore it is the less wonder that it is called the holy City, because of these things, which is the second circumstance considerable in the words, I saw the new Jerusalem, The holy City. It is observable that the second old Jerusalem (for so let me call the Jerusalem that was built and inhabited after the return out of Captivity) was called the holy City, when goodness and holiness were clean banished out of the City, and become a stranger there. When the Temple had lost its choicest ornaments, and endowments that contributed so much to the holiness of the place and City, The Ark, the cloud of Glory upon it, the Oracle by Urim and Thummim, the fire from Heaven upon the Altar: these were all gone, and Prophesy was utterly ceased from the City and Nation: yet even then it is called the holy City in this her nakedness.

Nay when the Temple was become a Den of Thieves, and Jerusalem no better, if not worse; when she had persecuted the Prophets and stoned those that were sent unto her, when she had turned all Religion upside down, and out of doors, and worshiped God only according to inventions of men; yet even then, and when she is in that case, she is termed the holy City, Matth. IV. 5. Then the Devil taketh him up into the Holy City, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the Temple. Nay when that holy Evangelist had given the story of her crucifying the Holy of Holies, the Lord of life and glory, even then he calls her the holy City, Chap. XXVII. 53. The bodies of many Saints, which slept, arose, and came out of their graves after his Resurrection, and went into the holy City, and appeared to many.

Call me not Naomi but call me Marah, might she very well have said then, and so might others say of her, for it might seem very incongruous to call the holy City, when she was a City so very unholy. She was indeed simply and absolutely in herself most unholy, and yet comparatively The holy City, because there was not a place under Heaven besides, which God had chosen to place his Name there; and there he had: and that was it that gave her that name and title. And while she kept the peculiarity of the thing, she kept the name, but at last forfeited both; and then God finds out another City where to place his Name, A new Jerusalem, A holy City, a holier City; her younger sister fairer than she.

Holy, under the same notion with the other, because God hath placed his Name only there: Holier than she, because he hath placed it there in a more heavenly and spiritual manner than in her, as was touched before. And Holier still, because she shall never lose her holiness as the other did, as we shall touch hereafter. And she cannot, but be holy as I said before, when she comes down from Heaven, and is sent thence by God.

And this is the third thing remarkable in the Text, I saw the new Jerusalem coming down from Heaven. The Apostle S. Paul calls her Jerusalem which is above, Gal. IV. 26. Our Apostle sees her coming down from above; and the Prophet Ezekiel in his fortieth Chapter and forward, seeth her pitched here below when she is come down. She is above, and yet she is beneath; much as the case was at Mount Sinai, there was a Tabernacle above, the heavenly pattern on the top of the Mount, and there was a Tabernacle beneath, the material building and fabric at the foot.

Jerusalem that is above; intimating that it is not a material building, but a spiritual, that the Builder is not man, but God: and yet that Jerusalem is come down, and is also here below, because it is among men, and consists of men; Men as lively stones being built up into a spiritual house and building, as it is 1 Pet. II. 5. Most commonly in this book of the Revelations, she is called by the very name of Heaven itself, that where you read Heaven you must understand the Church, partly because she is the only Heaven that is upon Earth; partly because of the presence of God in the midst of her as in Heaven; and partly because of the holy and heavenly things that are in her; and partly because she is the gate of Heaven, and the only passage whereby to come thither. Upon all which accounts together, it is no wonder that she carries the name of the heavenly Jerusalem, the holy City, and the holy City, that came down from God.

And let this suffice to be spoken concerning the meaning of the New Jerusalem, or what it is, viz. the Gospel Church. The great question and dispute is where it is? And whereas our Apocalyptic saw it coming down from Heaven, the great inquiry is, where it lighted, pitched and took its station? Where is the house of the Prince, and where is this City of the great King? Where is the true Church, this new Jerusalem? The finding, where it is not, will be some direction how to seek it, where it is: and let us begin there first.

I. First therefore, Let me say in this case much like what was said of old by the Historian concerning the City Samnium, You may look for Samnium there where Samnium stood, and cannot find it. If you look for the new Jerusalem there where the old Jerusalem stood, you will not find it there: though the Jew would have you to look nowhere else, and have it to be found nowhere else. It is well known what the conception and expectation of that Nation is in this point: how they look for a most stately Jerusalem to be built where the old one stood, for a pompous Kingdom settled in the Land of Canaan suitable to such a City, and for a pompous Messias riding in the midst of both with stateliness suitable to both. I shall say no more to this opinion but briefly only this, (for it is not worth speaking much unto) That this opinion helped forward the murder of the true Messias when he came among them. And I much wonder whether the opinion that produced so bad an effect then, can come to any good effect at any time. Because our Savior, Poor Jesus, did not bring so much pomp and gallantry with him, as that opinion expecteded he was looked upon by them as a false Messias, and under that notion they made him suffer. And it is more than suspicious that such an opinion can prove good, solid and succesful never, that proved so very fatal and mischievous then.

It is true indeed that the Prophet Ezekiel doth delineate his visionary Jerusalem, as seated in the very place where the old had been: for indeed there was then a Jerusalem to be built there, as it was after the return out of captivity. But whosoever shall take measure of the dimensions that he giveth to his City in space and compass, will find it to come near, if not to equal, the space and compass of the whole Land of Canaan. And this Apocalyptic, the best interpreter of that Prophet, measuring his square new Jerusalem at verse. 16. of this Chapter, finds it to be twelve thousand furlongs, or fifteen hundred miles, upon every side of the square, six thousand miles about; and the wall about it also fifteen hundred miles high: The wall of Salvation, Esa. XXVI. 1. So that these things considered, a mystical or spiritual sense is enforced here, and for a literal one there is left little or no room at all. And we must look for the new Jerusalem somewhere else, then where the old one stood, for there is not room for it. Where then shall we seek next, since we cannot find it there. Here,

II. I cannot but remember the story in 2 Kings VI. The Syrians are seeking Elisha at Dothan, and he strikes them blind; and this is not the way, says he, this is not the City, but follow me, and I will bring you to the man whom ye seek, and he brought them to Samaria. We are seeking the new Jerusalem, and there are those that will tell you (but you must let them blindfold you the first) that you of London, we of England, are out of the way, if we look for any new Jerusalem, any true Church here among us, but follow them, and they will lead you where it is, and they will bring you to Rome. A place where I should as little seek for the new Jerusalem, as I should have sought for the old Jerusalem in Samaria; or as I should have sought for true worshippers, and the place of true worship at Shechem, and mount Gerizim. When they pretend to lead you to the new Jerusalem, and bring you to Rome, they could hardly lead you to any place under Heaven more unlikely where to find the new Jerusalem, then there.

Our Divines in their writings have evidenced this abundantly, and I shall not trouble you with rehearsing anything they have spoken. I shall only lay these four Scriptural considerations before you, easy to understand and carry away; and even out of them let any impartial judgment censure and determine in this case. And first, Two concerning the place and City: And then two concerning the Church and Religion.

I. Concerning the Place and City.

First, As the new Jerusalem is never mentioned in Scripture, but with an honorable and noble character, so Rome on the contrary is never spoken of under any name or title, but with a character as black and dismal. One Memoir only excepted, (which is in her story, as Abijah was in the family of Jeroboam, 1 King. XIV. 13. the only one there, in whom was found anything that was good.) And that is, that there was once a Church there, whose faith was renounedly spoken of through the whole world, Rom. I. 8. There was so indeed, and there could not be an Antichristian Church there, unless there had been a Christian Church there first: since, There must be a falling away first, that the man of sin might be revealed, 2 Thes. II. 3.

The first mention that you have of Rome in Scripture is in Numb. XXIV. 24. under the name of Chittim: and there it is branded for the great oppressor and afflicter of Nations: and it is finally doomed to perish forever.

Secondly, You have mention of her armies, Dan. IX. ult. but with this brand upon them, that they are called The abominable army that maketh desolate, there styled by their Vulgar Latin, as in Matth. XXIV. the abomination of desolation.

But thirdly, That which tops up all is, that she is called Babylon in this Book of the Revelations, and described there as she is. For that by Babylon is meant Rome, the Romanists themselves will readily grant you, if you will grant them the distinction of Rome Pagan and Christian, Imperial and Pontifical. And the last verse of Chap. XVII. puts the matter out of all doubt, where it says, that the Woman, the scarlet Whore, which thou sawest is the great City which reigneth over the Kings of the Earth. Upon which everyone that is acquainted with the Rome -history must needs conclude, that no City can there be understood like the City Rome.

Now it is a very improper inquest to look for the new Jerusalem in a place that must perish forever; to look for the holy City among the abominable armies, and to look for Zion the City of God in Babylon that Mother of Harlots, and abominations of the Earth.

Secondly, Whereas old Jerusalem and the Jewish Nation incurred so great a curse and guilt for the murder of the Lord of life, as we all know it did; it requireth very cogent arguments to prove, that Rome that had a hand as deep in that murder, should obtain so great a blessing, and happiness on the contrary, as to be the only Church in the World, and the Mother of all Churches. There is no Christian but knoweth how deep a hand Jerusalem had in that horrid fact: and he knoweth but little that knoweth not that Pontius Pilate was Deputy for Rome there, and how deeply also he was engaged in it, as her Deputy.

And so much be spoken concerning the very Place, and how unlikely it is to find the new Jerusalem there. How improper it is to imagine that that should be the City of God, of which God himself in his Word speaks not one good Word, but evil: to imagine that he should choose that of all Cities for his dearest spouse, that of all Cities had the deepest hand in the murder of his dear Son.

II. Concerning their Church and Religion. If these men that pretend to lead men to the new Jerusalem, and lead them to Rome, would but speak out and plain, and tell them that they will lead them to the old Jerusalem, and so lead them to Rome, they speak something likely. For what is the Church and Religion of Rome, but in a manner that of old Jerusalem, translated out of Judaic into Roman, and transplanted out of Palestine into Italy. And there is hardly an easier or a clearer way to discover that she is not the new Jerusalem, then by comparing her with the old: as God doth most clearly discover the Jerusalem then being, Ezek. XXIII. by comparing her with Samaria and Sodom divers hours would scarce serve to observe the parallel in all particulars, and punctually to compare the Transcript with the Original: I shall only and briefly hint two things to you to that purpose. And,

First, Let me begin with that distinction that the Jews have in their writings once and again; of the Mosaic Law, and the Judaic Law, or the Law of Moses, and the Law of the Jews. And they will tell you, such and such things are transgressions of the Mosaic Law, and such and such are transgressions of the Judaic Law. And as they themselves do make the distinction, so they themselves did cause the distinction. What they mean by the Mosaic Law, we all understand, and by their Judaic Law, they mean their Traditional Law, which they call the Law unwritten. While they kept to the Law of Moses for a rule of faith and life, as they did under the first Temple, they did well in point of Doctrine, and no heresy and heterodoxy tainted them: but when they received and drank in Traditions, as they did under the second Temple, they drank in their own bane and poison.

There is in Scripture frequent mention of the last days, and the last times: by which is meant most commonly the last days of old Jerusalem, and of the Jewish economy, when they were now drawing toward their dissolution. But from what date or time to begin her last days may be some question. If you date them from the time she first received and entertained her traditions, you do but fit the calculation to the nature of the thing calculated. For then did she fall into the consumption and disease that brought her to her grave: then did she catch that infection and plague, that never left her, but grew upon her, till it made her breath her last in a fatal end. Traditions spoiled her Religion, and brought her to worship God in vain, teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men, Matth. XV. 9. Traditions spoiled her manners, and trained her up in a vain conversation, received by tradition from the Fathers, 1 Pet. I. 18. In a word, Traditions, as they made the Law, so they made the Gospel of no effect; and the doctrine of Christ, the death of Christ, the belief in Christ, to be but needless business, and things to no purpose. Nay Traditions leavened them to hate the Gospel, to murder Christ, and to persecute his Disciples. For by the principles of their Traditions they could do no less than all these.

Now surely Jerusalem that is above is above this infection; and the new holy City certainly brought no such infection from Heaven, nor was tainted with this contagion, which was the death of the old: as a Priest in Israel could hardly be infected with Leprosy. But you may see the tokens upon the Church of Rome very thick; traditions upon traditions; some of so like stamp to those of old Jerusalem, that you can hardly know them asunder; but all of the like effect and consequence, that they make the Gospel of none effect, as those did the Law; and causing men to worship God in vain, while they are taught for Doctrines the commandments of men. How great a part of their Religion is nothing else but the commandments of men, and other Traditions, and how great a part of their Church is built upon nothing else? The very chief▪ corner stone in all their fabric is of no better substance and solidity, viz. that S. Peter was Bishop there, and there was martyred, when the Scripture and reason gives a far fairer probability that he was Apostle to the circumcision in Babylonia, and there ended his days.

Secondly, You would hardly think that there was a worse brood in the old Jerusalem, than those that we have spoken of; the men so infected with the Plague (and with a Frenzy with it) of traditions. And yet I can name you a worse, and that was those that had forsaken their Judaism, and entertained and embraced the Gospel, but at last apostatized from it, and revolted to their old Judaism again; to their old Mosaic rites, which sometime had been right, but now antiquated, and to their traditional principles, which had never been right, but now least of all to have been embraced; and to a deadly hatred and persecution of the Gospel, that they once professed.

How the Apostles speak of and against this Apostasy in their Epistles, I need not tell you, he that runs may read it: But he that stands still, and reads presely will find, that they find The Antichrist, that then was, in that Apostasy. I say the Antichrist, that then was. For the Scripture gives a hint of a twofold Antichrist, one in the Epistles, and the other in this Book of the Revelation: one that was in those times, and the other that was to be afterwards: one among the Jews that had embraced the Gospel, and the other among the Gentiles, which should embrace it. And if you will let the unbelieving Jew to be one part of the Antichrist, that then was, the Apostatized Jew was much more. Many Antichrists in those times, as this our Apostle tells us, 1 Joh. II. 18. but those were they especially of whom he speaks immediately after; They went out from us, but they were not of us. And the like character do these Apostates carry in other places in the Epistles in terms equivalent.

Now therefore the nearest way to discover the Antichrist, that was to be in after times among the Gentiles, is by observing his likeness and similitude to the former, viz. in apostatizing from the pure and sincere profession of the Gospel to Judaism, or to Mosaic manner of worship, and Judaic principles and Religion.

Which how the Church of Rome hath done, it would require a long time to compare in all particulars; but it will require a far longer time for her to clear herself from that just accusation. How near doth she come to Judaism in the doctrine of Justification? how near in the doctrine of opus operatum? How near in the doctrine of expiation by bare Confession? How near in the doctrine of the value of Traditions? And one for all, how near in turning all Religion into Ceremony? Their present year of Jubilee is it not Mosaic? And were you there at it, and saw the manner of their devotions, their formal Services, and Ceremonious Worship, would you not think you were in the old Jerusalem among the Scribes and Pharisees, rather than in the the new, where the true worshipers worship the Father in spirit and truth.

So that when we departed from the Church of Rome, we did but the same thing, that the Apostles, Disciples, and other holy converts of the Jewish Nation did; they forsook Judaism to embrace the purity of the Gospel. And so did we. And in the way that they call Heresy we worship God.

If I have trespassed too much upon your patience by so prolix a discourse upon so unpleasing a subject, I must crave your pardon. We enquiring after the new Jerusalem, where we might find it, come to the place where your ways parted, and one went right, and the other wrong. The wrong way is the broader, pleasanter, and more trodden; and not a few that stand in it, and cry, This is the right way, and no other. It is good to give warning, it is needful to take warning, that we be not misled, that the men and the way do not deceive us.

And having thus far observed where the new Jerusalem is not to be found, let us now look where it is.

And, first, we must not expect to find it in any one particular place, as you might have done the old Jerusalem; but it is dispersed here and there abroad in the World. It is the Catholic Church, as we are taught in our Creed, and it is not in one only, but in this, and that, and the other Nation. When the new Jerusalem is to be measured in Zach. II. an Angel bids, O run after yonder young man, that is to measure it, and tell him, that Jerusalem shall be inhabited as a City without walls, for the multitude of men and cattle that shall be therein. It is a City unlimited, and therefore not to be bounded within this or that compass. We may use this Paradox of it, That it is a fluid and yet a fixed body, nay fixed because fluid: that is, it is moving sometime into one place, sometime into another, and therefore it shall never fade or perish.

The Jews accused S. Stephen of Heresy and blasphemy, because he said, that the Church and Religion should not always be pinned to that City and Temple, but taken away. In his answer he showeth, that the Church and Religion is a Pilgrim, one while in one place, another while in another: in Mesopotamia, in Charran, in Canaan, in Egypt. And our own observation may tell us, that when it failed in Egypt, and Israel followed the Idols and manners of that Land, as Ezek. XX. that then God found himself a Church in the family of Job and his three friends. The saying of our Savior may suffice for this, The Kingdom of Heaven shall be taken from you, and given to a people, that shall bring forth the fruits of it. And this is that that makes it fixed, or never failing, because when it decayeth in one place it groweth in another. And that promise of our Savior will ever maintain it in life and being, Upon this rock will I build my Church of the Gospel, and the gates of Hell shall never prevail against it: as they have done against the Church of the Jews.

In Matth. XXIV. when Christ foretells of the desolation of that City, Church and Nation, that their Sun and Moon and Stars, Religion and Church and State, should be darkened, and fall, and come to nothing: and they should then see the Son of man, whom they would never own, coming in a thick cloud, and storm of vengeance against them; it might be questioned, where then will God have a Church, when that is gone? He gives an answer, That the Son of man should send his Angels, or Ministers, with the sound of a trumpet, the trumpet of the Gospel, and gather him a Church from all the corners under Heaven. To which may not improperly be applied that, Heb. XII. 22. Ye are come to an innumerable company of Angels. God will never want his Church, but if it be not in one place, it will be in another.

Secondly, There is an invisible Church as well as a visible. Paul's Jerusalem which is above and out of sight, as well as Ezekiel's Jerusalem pitched here below. There is commonly some invisible Church within the visible, as Ezekiel's wheel within a wheel. But there is sometimes an invisible Church, where there is none visible, as those seven thousand men in the days of Elias, when he could not discern one. The Apostle speaking of the new Jerusalem, that we are speaking of, in that place of the Epistle to the Hebrews before alleged, among other things saith, Ye are not come to the Mount that might be touched, meaning Mount Sinai, but ye are come to Mount Zion. One would think when he spake of Mount Sinai, he should rather have called it, the Mount that might not be touched; for God charged that neither man nor beast should touch it, Exod. XIX. But you may see the Apostles meaning, That the Mystical Mount Zion is not such a gross earthly thing, as Mount Sinai was, that was subject to sense and feeling, to be seen and felt and trod upon: but that Zion is a thing more pure, refined and abstract from such sensibleness, spiritual and heavenly.

And from this undeniable notion of a Church invisible, we may easily answer that captious, and scornful question, that you know who put upon us, Where was your Church and Religion before Luther? Why, it was in the Jerusalem that is above, out of the reach, and above the ken of man's discerning: it was upon Mount Zion, above the sphere of sight and sense. It was in such a place and case, as the Church and Religion was in, when there were seven thousand men, that never bowed the knee 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to the Golden Heiser at Dan or Bethel; and yet the greatest Prophet then being could not discern the least sign of any Church at all. Now,

Thirdly, The new Jerusalem must be known by her Pearls and Jewels, upon which it is founded and built up. True Religion is that that must distinguish and discover the true Church. And where that is, it is like the Wisemens Star over the house at Bethlehem, that points out, and tells, Jesus, and his Church is hero. I must confess I do not well understand that concession of some of our Protestant Divines, that yield, That the Church of Rome is a corrupt Church indeed, but yet a true Church. For I do not well understand how there should be a true Church under a false Religion. If the Church of the Jews, under the great corruption of Religion, that was in it might be called a true Church, that was all it could look for. And it must have that title rather because there was never a Church in the World beside it, than from any claim by Religion. But what do you call true Religion?

1. First, That which is only founded on the Word of God; as the Wall of the new Jerusalem, in verse. 14. of this Chapter, is founded upon twelve pearls engraven with the names of the twelve Apostles of the Lamb.

2. That Religion that tends directly to the honoring, of God and saving of souls, and is adequate to these ends. In short, That Religion that can bring to Heaven. For I so little believe, that any man may be saved in any Religion, that I believe there is only one Religion, in which any man may be saved. And when Moses can bring Israel only to the skirts of the Land of Promise, I hardly believe that any Religion will bring them into it.

Though one should not stick to grant that a person may be saved in the Church of Rome, yet should I question, whether in the Faith of Rome. And it is the Faith or Doctrine of a Church more especially that I mean by the Religion of it. Let a Romanist ride all the stages of his Religion, from his uncouth kind of Baptism to his extreme Unction, through his auricular Confessions and Absolutions, through his Penances and Pardons, through his Massings and Crossings, through all his Devotions and Austerities: will all these bring to Heaven, if the main fundamentals of Faith be faulty and failing? Nay if the main fundamentals of belief be clean contrary to the way of God to Heaven? A Scribe or Pharisee in old Jerusalem is as devout in Religion, and as strict and severe in outward conversation as is imaginable, that you would think sanctity itself were there; yet will all this bring to Heaven, when the chief principles of his Faith are directly contrary to the way of Salvation; while he believes to be justified by his own works, and places all in opere operato, in a little formal and ceremonial service? Like him in the story and on the stage, that cried, O! Heaven, and pointed down to the Earth; these pretended for Heaven in their practical Devotions, but pointed downward in their Doctrinal principles.

I shall not insist to illustrate those particulars that I mentioned; I suppose they carry their own proof and evidence with them, that they are most proper touchstones, whereby to try the truth of a Church and Religion. And it is our comfort that we can, that we do, that we desire to bring our Religion to such Tests and touchstones, and refuse not, but most gladly appeal to the impartial Judge, the Word of God, to give judgment of it. I shall not therefore undertake so needless a task, as to go about to prove the truth of our Faith and Religion, since so many Protestant pens have so clearly, and so abundantly done it, far more learned than my Tongue. And since I may make such an Appeal to you, as the Apostle did to King Agrippa, King Agrippa, believest thou the Prophets? I know thou believest. Fathers and Brethren, believe you the Truth of our Religion? I know you believe it. Then I have no more to do but to offer two or three words of humble exhortation and entreaty, viz. Prize it, Cleave to it, Beautifie it.

I. Prize it; for it is the chiefest jewel in all our Cabinet: And the wisest Merchant in all your City cannot find out a Pearl of greater price. It is the life of our Nation at home, and it is the honor of our Nation abroad. It is that that makes our Land a Royal Street of the new Jerusalem. It is that that must make your City a holy City.

We see a new London, as our Apocalyptic saw a new Jerusalem. The buildings stately and magnificent, the furniture sumptuous and very splendid, the shops rich and bravely furnished, the wealth great and very affluent: but your Religion the all in all. As it was said in old time that Athens was the Greece of Greece, and as it may be said at this time that London is the England of England, so let your Religion be the London of London. It is that by which your City must stand and flourish, by which your prosperity must be watered and maintained, and the An • ile, which kept in safety, will keep us in safety.

II. Keep therefore close to your Religion, and leave it not. Dread revolting from the true Religion. The Apostasy in the Apostles times was the sin unto death, in our Apocalypticks first Epistle, and last Chapter. And there is an Apostasy in our time but too common and to be deplored with tears, to a Religion but too like to that, to which they then revolted. I would therefore that those that are tempted either by the lightness of their own hearts, or by the Emissaries of Rome, to revolt from their Religion, would remember that dreadful saying of the Apostle, Heb. X. 26. If we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin; but a fearful expectation of judgment, and firy indignation, which shall devour the adversary. Which is spoken peculiarly of Apostasy, or else it were a passage too terrible for all flesh.

Hannibals father took him at nine years of age to an Altar, and there swore him never to have confederacy and friendship with Rome. If all the World had always been under such a tie, it had been happy for it. I hope our Religion, our Hearts, our God will keep us from entering into league and society with that City, that had so deep a hand in the murder of our dear Savior, and in the blood of his dear Saints.

III. Lastly, Let us strive to adorn our Religion with a suitable conversation: to beautify our Church with the beauty of Holiness. We desire to be owned for Citizens of the new Jerusalem: and whereas our Religion may give us some title to it, it is holiness of conversation that must naturalize and enfranchise us. The new Jerusalem doth challenge a new conversation: and doth not a new London new Hearts and Lives? The City so stately and sumptuously built up, if such top stones be laid on, we may comfortably and joyfully cry, Grace, grace, Peace, peace unto it.

A SERMON Preached upon

I T is our Duty to love all men; and a reason of it is, our likeness to all men: they have Souls like ours; their Souls have all the image of God as well as ours, and capable of the fruition of God, and eternal glory, as well as ours. Which Parity, whether it be not fairly intimated in the words of the Text, judge you, when God for atonement for Souls sets a value to all people alike; the Rich and Poor to meet in one and the same sum, and not one to pay more or less than another, but all alike. The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than half a shekel. This may seem to be something an unequal rating, and the rich to be set too low, and the poor too high.

But to give a clear account of this matter, let us consider,

• I. Of the sum that was to be given, Half a shekel.
• II. The end for which it was given, To be a ransom or atonement for souls. And then,
• III. The parity that is to be in this payment, None to exceed above, nor none to abate beneath another: but all to pay alike.

I. The sum is half a shekel. Now their shekel was of the value of our half crown, and the half shekel was half as much. And as our half crown is either in one piece, or hath five six pences to make it up in value: So they had their shekel either in one piece, or four pieces to make it up. Those four pieces in the Greek language were called Drachmes, in the Hebrew Zuzees, in Latin Pennies. And so the Greek renders the half shekel here two Drachmes. And the two Pennies that the good Samaritan gave, Luke X. 35. is the very same sum, viz. half a shekel: the Roman penny being seven pence half penny, and two of them making half a shekel, or fifteen pence.

And that sum of two pence, that the good Samaritan lays down, is very properly mentioned in that case. For as here the half shekel, which was in value two pence, is to be given for atonement of Souls, so there the two pence, which was in value half a shekel, is given for recovery of life.

Two things concerning this half shekel here mentioned are observable in the New Testament.

First, That the money changers Tables that our Savior overthrew in the Temple, were the Tables of the Collectors and Receivers of this half shekel. And why then should he overthrow their Tables, when the money they received was of God's appointment? It was indeed, but the wretched Receivers made a base trade of getting gain by changing their money. And for giving them single money for their whole shekel or half crown piece, they must be paid some profit. This is that that made our Savior kick down their Tables, and not any crossness against the sum, which was of God's own appointment.

Secondly, In that story, Matth. XVII. 24. It is this half shekel money, that they come to demand, which Christ rather than he will not pay, will fetch it by miracle out of a fishes mouth. Now,

II. What was the end or reason of this gift or payment. It was for the ransom of a Soul, for the atonement of a Soul. Where by Soul is not strictly meant that inward part of man properly so called, but his life and person; for so the word Soul signifies also in Scripture very often. As instead of more, for the first signification, viz. Soul for Life, take that of David, Let them be cut off, that seek after my Soul. For the last, Soul for Person, that in Exod. I. 5. All the Souls that came out of the Loins of Jacob were seventy Souls. The meaning is that this parcel of money was yearly to be paid, as a payment or tribute, to God for the preservation of their lives and persons. And that may be observed by these two things.

First, This was an extraordinary oblation, and not the like commanded in the whole Law, i. e. any offering of money. Lambs and Goats and Bullocks were commanded to be offered, but as for the offering of money there was this payment only. Now the Sacrifices of Lambs and Bullocks were more properly for the atonement of their Souls, viz. for the pardon of their sins, and the withholding or removing of judgment. But this peculiar and extraordinary one of money was for the peculiar and extraordinary end, viz. for the ransom or preservation of their life and person.

Secondly, This you may find hinted in verse. 12. When thou numbrest the people, they shall give everyone a ransom for their Souls, lest there be a plague among them. This must be a ransom for their lives, to keep the plague, or any other deadly occurrence away, that might take away their lives, or destroy their persons.

III. The parity or equality in the payment of this sum. The rich no more, and the poor no less. The reason of which when we come to weigh, let us be sure to do it in God's own balances, or we may easily be mistaken. What the rich pay no more than the poor, and the poor as much as the rich? A Gallant would scorn to be so ranked with the poor, to pay no more than he; and the poor would grudge to be rated with the rich, to pay as much as he. But he that ordained the payment saw very good reason for what he did; and would that they rest in his ordaining, and learn somewhat from such appointing. The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less.

And now let us look over these three things again, and consider what may be learned from them.

I will transpose a little these particulars, and speak of the second first, viz.

I. The end and purpose for which this sum was given, to wit, as an acknowledgment and an owning that their lives and persons were in the hand of God, and that to him they looked for their Preservation. And therefore it was that they paid this sum, for the ransom of their lives. So that as the payment of this money was a Duty, so it was a Doctrine, teaching them to own their depending upon God for their lives and beings. So that hence we learn,

The Jews were taught it by their being bound to pay a yearly tribute to God for the preservation of their life and being: and we taught it from their example. And I speak to this subject the more willingly, because the thing and the time do concur so fair together; so that the subject we speak of is not only useful and necessary, but seasonable and agreeable both to their time and ours. Concerning their payment of this Pol-money, or dependence money, their own writers tell us, that the Collectors of this Tax began upon the Collection of it the last month of their year; and so went on gathering in the beginning of the new year. That we are come to the last month, nay the last week of our year doth very justly give us occasion to remember our preservation the year that is now gone over our heads, and all the years of our life hitherto; and to consider of that merciful and good Providence, that hath preserved us all along those years. And this, and hardly a more seasonable discourse can we take up at this time, than such an one, as shall remind us, and if it may be, warm us with a feeling of our Dependence upon God for our preservation.

Need I to divide the Theme before us and prove apart, That our Dependence is upon God for our preservation: And, That we are to be sensible of this Dependence? We can hardly find a place in Scripture that proves the one, but it proves both together: and none there is hardly but if they acknowledge the truth of the thing, that men's dependence is upon God for their preservation; but they acknowledge also their sense of it, and that they so own their preservation.

I might instance multitudes of places, but do I need, when there is not a holy man through all the Bible, that speaks of his own preservation, but he owns it to have been from God, and shows himself to have been sensible of it? Job X. 12. Thou hast given me life, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit. Lam. III. 22. It is the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed: And Act. XXVI. 22. Having obtained help of God, &c. There is not a person in Scripture that takes notice of the preserving of his life and person, but he always turns it that way to own God the Author of it; unless it be such a fool as he, that bids, Soul, take thine ease, &c. or as he, Is not this great Babylon that I have built, &c. or they that say, To day, or tomorrow we will go into such a City, and buy and sell and get gain: and never mention God or his providence in the bargain. I hope I need not prove that all our lives, persons, and the preservation of both are in the hand of God, and at his disposal; but I may sum up all in this challenge and appeal, Dare any defy God's Providence and Preservation, and take upon you your own preservation, and to maintain your life and person of yourselves?

But let not such a thing be once mentioned among Christians: but the great business is that Christians would become rightly sensible of their dependence upon God.

I cannot omit one thing in this Law about paying this half shekel, viz. verse. 14. that everyone that was twenty years old and upward, was to pay it. And why then? And why not before? Not but that they that were under twenty years old were under the same preservation, and had reason to acknowledge the same preservation: but at twenty years of age they were come to that age as should be the age of discretion, and that men should now consider under what tuition they lived, and that then it was time to own it; though folly and vanity of youth had not suffered them to do so before. And twenty years of age was the time, when they were in their prime and strength and flush, and when it was the likeliest time to think of their own strength and vigor, and that they stood upon their own subsistence. Then and forward, it was most seasonable to admonish them upon what it was that they subsisted, and who it was that preserved them.

The acknowledgement that it is God that doth preserve our life and being, may be of the Tongue only, and nothing but words, or bare conviction of the truth of the thing, and but little more than words neither. But a feeling acknowledgment of God's preservation is such a thing, as speaks itself by some evident demonstration. It is the Apostles saying, That saving faith worketh by Love; we may say the like of Historical Faith, if it work at all, it worketh by some evidence or demonstration of action. And such evidences or demonstrations in this case are various.

I. Such a person, who owns and feelingly believes his dependence upon God for his preservation, is careful to commit himself to God's protection, and his preserving providence the best he can. We read of persons being under the wings of the Almighty, and putting themselves under his wings; and they are there because they put themselves there, Psal. XCI. 4. He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust. How comes he there? He puts himself there by committing himself to God's providence as he ought to do. As Ruth did II. Chap 12. Psal. XXXVI. 6, 7. Thou savest man and beast. How excellent is thy loving kindness, O God; therefore shall the sons of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings. There is a general providence, that preserves man and beast; but a peculiar protection for them that put themselves under the shadow of his wings.

Can we say that man is under God's protection, that never put himself under God's protection? Can we say God keeps that that was never committed to him? Such an one as a Worldling, an Epicure, that minds not God, nor his duty of committing himself to him? Yes, you will say, for this man lives and is preserved as well as the best; he is kept out of danger as well as the holiest: he is in health, wealth and a thriving condition as well as another man; and therefore sure God keeps him as well as another: He preserves indeed man and beast, as the Psalmist tells us, and so he is preserved as beasts are preserved. But he owns not God in his preservation no more than they.

A man that rightly owns his dependence upon God, commits himself to God by prayer, beseeching him to take him to his care and charge. Thus the Saints of God have ever put themselves under his wings. I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be feared and so shall I be saved from mine enemies. This was David's way to be in safety and preservation continually. And it is according to God's direction, Psal. L. 15. Call upon me in the time of trouble, and I will deliver thee. So Jacob commits himself to God's protection, when he is going for Syria by prayer and a vow. Gen. XXVIII. 20. If God will be with me, and keep me in the way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, &c. And such another copy you have of Jabez, 1 Chron. IV. 9. And Jabez called upon the Lord God of Israel, saying, O that thou wouldst bless me indeed, and inlarg my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldst keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me. And God granted him that which he requested. This is the way to engage God to our preservation, when we thus cast ourselves upon him, and implore his care of us.

II. They that own their dependence upon God for preservation and protection put th • mselves under his protection in the way of his protection. Do you think that God's m • rciful prot •••• on dwells everywhere, and that a man may promise himself to meet with it everywhere; in an Idol Temple, a Whorehouse, lewd company? He that walks in a wicked course of life; can he expect God's merciful providence will meet with him here? The Apostle tells us how to put ourselves under God's protection, 1 Pet. IV. 19. to commit the keeping of our souls to him in well doing. And David long before, Psal. XXXVII. 3. Do good, and verily thou shalt be f • d. Keep in his ways and he will keep thee: be doing his work and he will take care of thee: But canst thou expect his protection and care, when thou art in the ways of the Devil, and doing the work of the Devil? A Christian should always be doing of that, as that he may lawfully and warrantably beg God's blessing upon him while he is doing it. Join prayer and well doing together; and thou art sure to speed well.

III. He that owns his dependence upon God, aims that his preservation be to the service of him that preserves him. As he owns that he lives upon God, so he aims to live to him. This use of God's preserving providence Jacob aimed at, Gen. XXVIII. 21. If God will be with me and keep me in this way, &c. so that I come again to my Fathers house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God. And David, Psal. CXVI. 8, 9. For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling. I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living. And it pinched Job that he should any way have failed of it; Job VII. 20. I have sinned, what shall I do unto thee, O! thou preserver of men? Hast thou preserved me, and do I sin against thee, contrary to the end I should have aimed at under thy preservation? Reason and the very light of nature may argue to such a purpose, that in all equity and justice he that is maintained by God should be serviceable to God. We look for service of our servants and beasts, and all the reason in the World God should have it from Men.

IV. He that owns his dependence upon God, observes God's constant preserving providence; and counts nothing in preserving providence small. No sin is to be accounted little, because it is against a great God; and no good providence is little, because it is exercised towards sinful men. A true owner of his dependence upon God, looks upon God's preserving mercy towards him through this double multiplying glass, his own brittleness, and his own unworthiness; that God should preserve a thing so brittle, and so ill deserving.

And thus I have considered the end of this offering, viz. To be an acknowledgment to God of their dependence on him for their lives, and to implore his care and good providence towards them for their preservation. Now in the second place we come to consider,

II. The quantity of this sum. Half a shekel. What? But half a shekel for the best man in Israel? Why? The price of a servant was thirty whole shekels, and is the rate of the best freeman in Israel, but at a poor half shekel? Exod. XXI. 32. If an Ox push a man servant or maid servant, that they die, the owner of the Ox must give to their Master thirty shekels of silver for the price or value, of his servant he had lost. And so our Savior was sold at the price of a servant, viz. thirty pieces of silver: a poor price to value him at: and you may think it not a rich price to value the best man of Israel, but at half a shekel, when the poorest servant was valued at thirty whole ones.

Do you not observe the difference? That was the price of a Servant twixt man and man; this the rate of men twixt Man and God. A servant might well be worth thirty shekels to his Master, as being able to be profitable to him. But what can poor sinful man be profitable to God? Even an Ox or an Ass may be of a good handsome price twixt man and man, because they may be profitable to man; but what can man be profitable to God? It is Eliphaz question, Job XXII. 2. Can a man be profitable to God, as a wise man may be profitable to himself? You find oft in Scripture mention of the Children of Belial: the word signifies, Unprofitable, but it means an Idol, a God that cannot profit, and whom it is no profit to serve. Our God is not such, he is not an unprofitable Master; it is profit to serve him, but when we have done all we can, we have cause to say, We are unprofitable.

If we should be valued by God according as we can be profitable to God, (as we value our cattle according as they are profitable to us) at what rate should he set us? At a grain of dust, and a dram of ashes, at a puff of vapor, and a blast of wind, at the rate of a moth, and the price of a worm, at the value of nothing, and lighter than vanity: this is the proper weight we carry upon the balance, if we be weighed as we are indeed in ourselves. Therefore never complain that God rates men so low as but half a shekel: wonder rather that he rates or values them so high; nay, that he sets any value upon them at all. For Lord, what is man that thou shouldest value, or think of him, and the Son of man that thou shouldest make account of him. Man is like to vanity, his days are like to a shadow that departeth away; Psal. CXLIV. 3, 4. And yet upon such an one God setteth his eye, upon such an one he setteth some value. He was to offer God half a shekel for his Soul. God lays not this Tax to rate men according to their worth, for that was nothing, nor to lay any heavy burden upon them, for the tax was small, but it was to instruct them,

Men must not think to live on free cost, and that God maintains their lives for nothing but rather let them know that he looks for some pay and tribute from them. The Apostle tells us, that what was written aforetime was written for our learning; and so what was written for them is written for us too. Only the punctual rate and payment of half a shekel lies not upon us, as it did upon them; but what is intimated by the payment of this rate, is intimated to us as well as it was to them. The intimation was, that they, Men, owe God a debt and payment for the preservation of their lives, and he expects it from them. This payment of half ashekel money ceased, when the Jews ceased to be a Nation; but the equity and intimation that it read and carried with it, ceased not, but takes hold upon us as it did on them.

The Ceremonial appointments of the Jewish Nation did not only prescribe the external action, but also enjoined the signified Duty too. They were enjoined to offer sacrifice. The outward action was killing a beast, and offering him upon the Altar for an atonement for their sins. The thing siynified was the sacrificing of Christ, the great oblation for the sins of men. The Duty intimated was, that they should look to the death of Christ, and by that believe to obtain the forgiveness of their sin, and not barely by their sacrifice. So that they were bound both to the moral Duty, to believe in the death of Christ for the atonement of sin: and they were to offer sacrifice too, thereby to signify his death in which they believed. And the like might be said of the other ceremonious burdens that were laid upon them. But we will only take instance in that before us.

They were enjoined to offer this half shekel yearly to God for the preservation of their lives. The thing signified was, that their lives depended upon God, and to him they must look for their preservation. The moral Duty intimated and required, was, That they were bound to pay atribute of obedience to God for his preserving them. For it was not money that God looked after, but to obey is better than sacrifice. The ceremonial part of their work was laid down long ago, but the moral Duty that it signified lays still upon all of us, and all men in the World.

By the way let me tell you this out of the Roman Histories, that when Vespasian had conquered and destroyed Jerusalem, he commanded that the Jews should pay this half shekel, that they used to pay to God for their lives, to his Idol Jupiter Capitolinus at Rome. A sad thing to pay that that was to be paid to God their Preserver, to the Devil the Destroyer. For his God Jupiter Capitolinus was no better than a Devil. And I wish in the parallel it be not too true with too many: that they pay what they owe to God for their lives and preservations to the Devil.

Well, the first thing taught in the payment was, That we should learn and observe, that God doth not preserve and take care of men's lives for naught, but that he expects some tribute and payment for it. And truly that he may in all reason in the World, if we will but compare his case and men's together. Every shepherd, every shepherds boy must be paid for keeping another man's flock; and must the great shepherd have no pay for keeping and leading Israel like a flock? Nay, Satan himself sees it all the reason in the World, though he speak it with a venomous intent, that if God have hedged Job round about, as he had done, and taken such care of him, that he pay him with fear and careful walking before him. Doth Job fear God for naught? Hast thou not made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? I. Chap. 9, 10. Therefore it is no wonder if he fear thee, it is all the reason in the World he should.

There is no care in the world taken of one person by another, but it is repaid with some fair repayment or other: Even the care of Parents to their Children, which you will say nature itself binds them to, yet they expect to be paid with their obedience. That challenge of God is but most just, Mal. I. 6. A Son honoreth his Father, and a Servant his Master; if then I be a Father, where is mine honor, and if I be a Maste, where is my fear? It is the very title and profession of God, that he is the Preserver, Keeper Savior of men; and no pay to him from men for all this? Job VII. 20. O thou preserver of men. The word signifies Observer too. As God looks to men, so he looks after men to see what they do, and how they demean themselves to him that looks to them. So Samuel hints to Saul, and Nathan to David; I have done thus and thus to you, kept you, dignified, promoted, prospered you, and is this the requital you make to me? Need I to tell you that God is called the Watch man of Israel, that never slumbereth nor sleepeth, but continually takes care of them. But the Apostle, 1 Tim. IV. 10. goes further, and tells you, that he is not only the Preserver of Israel, but even of all men. We trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, specially of those that believe. Some from the word Savior would conclude universal grace and redemption; but the word means as in the Book of Judges, a Preserver or Deliverer; and so God is to all, especially those that believe. Though he preserve not unbelievers in the very same manner and degree that he doth believers, yet he preserveth them, and looks for requital from them for their preservation.

Now that in all equity some payment is due to God in this case, let us a little consider of these things.

First, The preciousnes of life; that very thing may argue, that it is not a small debt we owe to him that preserves it. It hath the proper name of precious. Prov. VI. 26. For by means of a whorish woman a man is brought to a piece of bread, and the adultress will hunt for the precious life. And do you not think that Solomon speaks very true when he calls life precious; and do you not think that even the father of lies speaks true when he said, Skin for skin, and all that a man hath will he give for his life? What will any man take for his life to pass it away? What jewels, what rubies, what riches will buy his life from him? No, he accounts it too precious to part with his life for money or monies worth. And this doth enhance the preciousness of life, that it is not only so excellent a being in itself, but without it all things are nothing to him that hath lost it. Bring a dead man bags of gold and heaps of silver, fill his coffin up with pearls and jewels; strew his grave with diamonds and rubies; there is no hearing, no minding, no affecting, when his jewel, that was more worth then all these, his life, is gone.

Now who is the Preserver of this dear jewel, while we carry it about us? Is it we ourselves? The Psalmist tells us, that It is he that made us, and not we ourselves. Psal. C. And reason may tell us, that it is he that preserves us, and not we ourselves. For can we anymore preserve our lives of ourselves, than we can give life to ourselves? When a desperate danger is ready to swallow us up, if God withdraw his preserving providence can man bring his life out of danger? In Scripture Phrase for a man to put his life in his own hand (Judge. XII. 3.) is to venture it to danger, where there is no safety: but in the hands of God it is secure, while he will take charge of it. Feeling is that passage of Daniel to Belshazzar, Dan. V. 23. The God in whose hand is thy breath. Canst thou take it into thine own hand, and there hold it? The Jews tell a story of the Angel of death sent to take away the soul of Moses, but Moses withstood him, and he could not do it; but when God saw his time to take it, no withstanding. The Angel of death in their meaning is the Devil, and the Apostle speaks to their opinion, Heb. II. 14. That through death he might destroy him that • ad the power of death that is the Devil. Now wherein lies the reason, why Satan takes not away our lives, when he pleaseth? Is it in ourselves? Would not he, think you, carry away all men bodily to his den, if it were in his power? And is it our power that doth restrain him? Think of those poor possessed ones in the Gospel, whom the Devil hurried so up and down at his pleasure. Is it our own power that doth restrain him, that he useth not us so? When we read or hear such stories have we not cause, if we had hearts, to look up at a higher power than our own, that we are not, as they were, in his power? And was it his courtesy that he spared their lives, when God had given him liberty to use their bodies as he did? Or was it not, that God restrained him? you may guess it by Jobs case, betwixt whose life and Satan's malice against him God had put this bar, Only take not away his life.

But when God himself comes by death resolvedly to take away any man's life, whose power is it in to hinder? When he is resolved to tear body and soul asunder, who shall say, what dost thou? When he will preserve life no longer, who can make it out, and preserve it himself? The Lord giveth life and the Lord taketh it away, in his hand only is the disposal of our life and being.

Secondly, God shows himselves tender of our lives: doth not only preserve them, but shows that he is tender of them, and willing to preserve them. God is the fountain of being, and giver of life, and it is agreeable to his nature to maintain the being of men, and their lives; but it is not so agreeable to him to destroy them: it is said of him that he doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men, Lam. III. And he saith of himself that he hath no pleasure in the death of the sinner, Ezek. XVIII. And no wonder, for it is somewhat besides his nature: q. d. for it is his nature to give being, and not to destroy it.

Now that God is tender of the lives of men, and preservs them willingly and tenderly, you have it evidenced in the mouth of three or four witnesses, that the truth of it may be established.

1. He is tender of the lives of very birds and beasts, and therefore forbids all cruelty towards them. Balaam for cruelty towards his poor Ass is reproved both by the Angel, and the Ass herself. And how does God forbid to kill a beast and her young on the same day, to take a bird and her young at the same time, but if he take the young to let the dam go; forbids to seeth a kid in his dams milk: and in a word, it is a token the Holy Ghost gives of a good man, that he is merciful to his very beast.

2. Is it not an evidence that God is tender of men's lives, when he hath made so severe a Law against murder, or taking them away? And what strange discoveries hath he made of murders and murderers, that he that hath taken away a man's life may not go unpunished? So tender is God of the life of man, that as man hedgeth in a choice tree or plant that he is tender of; so hath God man's life with such a siry law, as well as he doth also with his providence.

3. Doth not God tender the life of man, when he would have all men to spin out their lives to life eternal, and shown them a way how to do it, if they would but take his way? God had rather thy life should reach Heaven and Eternity there, than to drop into Hell in the end, and be drowned in eternal death. And this is one thing amongst others that doth highly enhance the preciousness of man's life, that it may be translated to Eternity.

4. And Lastly, If you yet need any evidence and demonstration of God's tenderness to men's lives and willingness to preserve them, and unwillingness to destroy them, look upon yourselves as you are alive here this day. And whence is it, that you are so? Can you give any other proper reason, than this, because God is tender of your lives, and is not willing to destroy them? Hath he not power enough to have cut them off and destroyed them long ago? And have we not given him cause enough to have destroyed them over and over? Whence is it then, that we are all here this day? God hath spared our lives, preserved our lives, tenderly preserved them, or our souls had long ago dwelt in silence.

And are we not in debt to God for this care and tendering of us? Is there nothing to be paid him, not one half shekel, for all our preservation? Doth not all the reason in the world dictate, that when we live by him, we should live as he would have us: that when he spares and preserves our lives, we should lead and spend our lives according to his rule?

And this is all that he requires from us, He looks not for money nor monies worth; not for a shekel nor half a shekel, not for an offering of a lamb or bullock for the ransom of our lives; but all that he requires is, that we pay God obedience and service; live to God as we live by him.

III. Having considered the Quality of this payment, viz. to be a tribute of acknowledgement of their dependence upon God for their lives, and the preservation of them: and the Quantity of it, or the Sum itself, Half a shekel, to imply that they lived not on free cost, but under a rent and homage to God: we come now in the third place to discourse of the Equality of the payment. The rich shall give no more, and the poor shall give no less; but everyone exactly alike. Which may seem something strange, when there was such a diversity of persons. That was a miracle about the measuring of Manna, that everyone should have the same proportion, when they came to measure, and yet such a difference of proportion, when they gathered. And this is something wonderful in the proportioning, that all should pay so exactly alike, when there was such vast difference twixt persons and conditions. Some worth thousands, some worth nothing, some on high on a Bench of State, and some as low embracing a dunghill: and yet all pay alike: What are we become Levellers, All hail, fellows, and no distinction; the rich no better than the poor, and the high become yokefellow with the base? This taught them and may teach us, that which so oft is inculcated in Scripture,

That God is no Respecter of persons in regard of any ones outward condition, Rom. II. 11. There is no respect of persons with God. Act. X. 34, 35. Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons. But in every Nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteouness is accepted with him. But Peter there seems to destroy what he had built up, for he had said, God is no respecter of Persons, and yet immediately after he saith, God accepteth some. But the meaning of him, and of other places that speak the same is, that God respects no men upon any external accounts; he respects not the rich man a whit the more for his being rich, nor any poor man the less for his being poor; he is not like them, Jam. II. 2. Who if they see a man with a gold ring or gay clothing, O! then I pray Sir, come up hither and sit here; but if a poor man in mean garb and habit, then go thou, and stand or sit there at my footstool. The Apostle at verse. 4. gives them their right title, though at first sight not easy to understand, Are ye not become Judges of evil thoughts? His meaning is not, that they judged or passed sentence upon evil thoughts, but that they were evil thoughted Judges, as a Judge of unrighteousness is an unrighteous Judge. When God hath so commanded, that men should judge impartially without respect of persons, are not you evil thoughted Judges, when you so prize the rich, and despise the poor, merely because of their outside, or external condition?

God cannot do so: he cannot gaze with admiration upon a gallant suit and clothings, glittering lace and diamonds: he cannot ever the more regard a man, that hath regarded money and gotten a great deal of it together. Nothing that the World can contribute to a person, can make God to respect him a straw the more. Take but that one instance of Herod Agrippa, Act. XII. When he was in all his pomp and gallantry, and as irchly dressed as money and hands could make him, the sun shining upon his cloth of silver, and cloth of gold raiment, that dazzled the spectators eyes, as Josephus tells the story; the foolish people, they admire him, applaud, adore him; and he speaks and looks more like a God than a Man. In that very instant God shown how little he regards any man for his outside, be it never so gorgeous; for he strikes him with the lowzy disease and he is eaten up with lice, and dies.

God looks upon men as they come into the world, and as they go out, Naked, and not through any deckage that the world hath put on them. And accordingly Exod. XXXIII. 5. When God would call the people to account for their making the golden calf, and look upon them in their proper condition, he bids them put off their ornaments from them. Now God looking upon men in this their naked condition, as men, he sees this equality in all men in the world.

First, That they are all alike his Creature, and therefore he may in this respect value them all alike. The rich did no more create himself then the poor, and the high no more than the low, but they are all alike his creation. Psal. C. He made us, and not we ourselves. And there is no man to be excepted from the word Us, but he made one as well as another. That is a Caveat to the rich and high, which God speaketh to Job, in Chap. XL. 15. Behold now Behemoth, which I made with thee, he eateth grass like an Ox. What doest thou compare with me anything that eateth grass? Yes, I made him as well as thee, and thou madest thyself no more than he did, and you are both my creatures, as well the one as the other. Thou as well as He. So is the rich his creature as well as the poor. Prov. XXII. 2. The rich and the poor meet together, the Lord is the maker of them both. They meet together, and it may be, the rich spits at the poor in scorn and despising: yet the Lord made them both; and in that regard there is no difference betwixt them. And thereupon the same Solomon saith, Prov. XIV. 31. He that oppresseth the poor reproaceth his Maker. As if he cast in the teeth of God, for that he made such a pitiful creature, that were fit for nothing, but to be oppressed and trodden upon. The oppressor thinks himself another kind of creature, whereas they were cast in one and the same mold.

Doth the rich and high and great think, that he is less beholding to God for his creating, than the poor and the mean? Or else does he think, that God laid out more pains and power and love in the creation of him than he did on the other? Did God use more art or skill, or more care and endeavor in making him, than in making the poorest Creature, that goes from door to door? Although the Holy Ghost hath made some difference in relating the history of the Creation of other things, and of man, and hath brought in the whole Trinity consulting for the making of man, Come let Us make Man; yet in the making of several men we must not look for any diversity. And whatsoever men will gather out of Psal. XXXIII. 15. He fashioneth their hearts alike: as some from thence would gather the praeexistence of souls, some the equality of souls: certainly this may be, that God made no difference of his working, when he made all.

Secondly, As all the men of the world are of this parity and equality in regard of the Creators work that made them, so also in regard of the matter or mettle of which they are made. Did God choose any finer clay for the making of one than for another? Dust thou art, was the character of the first Adam, and does any of his posterity differ from that character? Did God look out for finer clay to make a great rich man of, than he did to make a poor? Jer. XVIII. 4. The vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the Potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the Potter to make it. The Potter hath a pot on the wheel, and it hits not to the fashion he aimed at, so that he works it up to vessel of another fashion, but the same clay still. So however there may be some variety in the frame of the vessel made, some diversity in the composure of men, some fair, some foul, some black, some white, some a smooth Jacob, some a rough Esau, yet the clay that these diversified vessels are made of, is but one and the same.

You remember that Isaiah XLV. 9. Woe! to him that striveth with his Maker, let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. The meaning of the latter clause, The potsherds of the earth, is, Men to strive with men is something like, equal match; and if they will needs strive, let them strive one with another, but Woe! to him that striveth with his Maker. You see the title given to all on earth, they are but earthen potsherds, but as bits of a broken pitcher. While the pitcher was whole it was but an earthen pitcher; while Adam was in innocence he was but a vessel of clay, though a vessel of honor: but his fall hath broke the pitcher all to pieces; and all the men of the world are but as sheards of a broken picher. It may be one piece of the potsherd may be bigger than the others are, yet that is but a potsherd still, and of the very same mettle with the other. It may be one piece is finely painted and coloured, which the other is not, yet it is but a potsherd for all its painting, and but of the very same clay, with the other bits for all its bravery.

Thirdly, And as all are of the same dust in their original, and no difference; so is there any difference in the dust to which they shall return? Shall great and rich less turn to dust, than mean and poor; or shall they turn to nobler dust than the other? Shall a more noble or gentile worm seise upon a great man in the grave, than does upon a mean; or a more gallant corruption devour the rich man than doth the poor? There the Kings and Counselors of the earth lie down together, Job II. 14. And there the poor and rich have the same lodging, and the Servant hath the same bed with his Master. And do they not all go to the same, the very same dust, and doth not the same, the very same corruption seize and consume them? Psal. CIII. 14. The Lord that made us knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are dust. Dust in our beginning, dust at our latter end, and one and the same dust, both in our beginning and end, and no difference.

And therefore how can he in this regard but value all at one rate; and when the poor and rich come to pay tribute for the preservation of this dust, our bodies, that all should contribute alike; the rich no more, and the poor no less.

But are all men's Souls alike too, that God should rate them all alike too? Take the word in the text in the proper sense, you shall make an atonement for your Souls; are all Souls looked upon by God alike too? It was an old question in the Schools, An animae sint aequales? Whether all Souls are equal? And our inquiry adds one question more, Whether God weigh all Souls alike? And the the question lies not so much in this, Whether God prize not an holy Soul above a sinful, as whether every Soul be of the same value as a Soul? And the reason of the question is from the vast difference of the tempers of men, in which the acting and nature of the Soul appears. And it were wonder if some of the Jews did not cavil at this Law upon this very point. They took upon them to be exceeding wise; and abundance of them gave themselves that title; and must they be valued with fools and Idiots?

I am not curious to discuss this question copiously. It might be a very proper answer to this question, such as is Joh. XXI. 21. Where Peters inquisitivness receives an answer, What is that to thee? So when any are curious to know, whether all Souls are alike, whether an unlearned Soul is like a learned, an Heathen like a Christian, an Ideot like a solid man, I may say, What is that to thee? search and try and examine, and take care of thine own Soul. Yet to speak something to this case.

First, Distinguish between the Activity of the Soul, and the Capacity of it: what it does and what it is able to do. It is a Maxim, A posse ad esse non valet consequentia. From what a man can do, it will be but a weak consequence to conclude, that therefore he will do it. The Leper to our Savior understood Logic better, and concludes not, that he would make him clean because he could do it; but he begs that he would do it, seeing that he could, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. It is a good consequence to say, a Man does thus, therefore he can do it; but a wild one to say, therefore he can do no otherwise. So as to the judging of the true quality of the Soul, if you would take measure of a Soul aright, you must not barely look at its present acting, but at its capacity, and what in its full largeness and latitude it is able to act: not take measure of a reasonable Soul, as it is in its childhood, but when it is in its full growth, and capacity.

Secondly, Now the acting of a Soul in its full capacity, cannot be while it is in the body. It cannot see God face to face, nor the Devil as he is a Spirit, which it may do when out of the body. It cannot converse with things in eternity, which it cannot but do, when out of the body, either blessed or miserable. It cannot here but be deceived many a time over, there it cannot possibly be deceived; and so I might speak in other particulars.

So that the proper judging of the nature of the Soul and its capacity, is to take it as God did Israel at Sinai, (when he would know what to do with them,) stripped of their ornaments; so must the Soul be stripped out of the Body; loosed of all that that pinioned, hampered or any ways strainted it. And what think you of the Souls of Infants, of Fools and Idiots then and there? Can we think their Souls are Infants, Fools and Idiots in the other world? For

Thirdly, Though the Soul be of a vast capacity while in the body, yet the acting of it even there is many and many a time hindered, and curbed that it cannot reach to its acting in its full capacity, which it could reach to even here, if there were not some hindrance. Take instead of more an instance or two of what may seem nearest to folly and ideotism, and are not. A man is drunk; does his Soul then act according to the proper capacity that it were able to act in, if he were sober? There is a man learned, and an hundred that have no learning at all. Now the reason why those unlearned ones are not learned as well as he, is not, because their Souls were not of capacity to have received learning, but because they had not the means of education in learning that he had. So the acting of the Soul according to its capacity is often time hindered by the want of apt organs or instruments in the body. Do you not see before your eyes by experience a man or woman moped, their understanding clean spoiled by a sad stroke of the Palsy or Apoplexy, that the person is not the same that he was before? and yet his Soul is the very same, but the right acting of it spoiled by the spoiling of the organs or instruments by which it should act. The brain is so shattered by the stroke of a Convulsion, that it cannot be so serviceable to the Soul as it hath been. And so those Naturals and Idiots we are speaking of, their Souls are like to other Souls, spiritual substances, as well as others, immaterial and intellectual as well as others; but there is some defect of the organ or instrument in the body, something that the Intellect should use, is failing or bruised.

Now not to wade farther into this question, these two things are undeniable concerning all Souls in the world.

1. That they are all of the workmanship of God, and no Souls but come out of his hand. Ezek. XVIII. 4. Behold! all Souls are mine. XXXVIII Jer. 16. Zedekiah sware to Jeremiah, As the Lord liveth, who made us this Soul. And he spake very true; though Jeremiah was as good, and he as bad, yet God made both their Souls alike, Jeremia's as well as Zedekiahs, & contra. In that dispute about Praeexistence of Souls, some hold Praeexistence, and some not: yet both hold that the Soul comes immediately from the hand of God. And sure God sends no maimed Soul out of his hand.

2. That all Souls have equally need of God's support. There is a double support of the Soul. Either that God preserve and keep it in the body for the life of the body, or preserve and keep it in grace for the good of the Soul. This distinction the words of the Apostle mean, 1 Tim. IV. 10. He is the Savior of all men, especially of them that believe. He preserves the lives of all that live, but especially he preserves the Souls of those that believe in him.

So that, if the Question be, Doth God preserve all alike? Doth his providence set itself to keep all alike? If not, why should all be bound by this tax in the Text to pay for their preservation alike?

The Answer is easy, though it may seem strang when given; He doth, and he doth not. But I may facilitate it by this distinction.

First, He preserves all alike; that is, all that are preserved have their preservation alike from him, and alike owe their preservation to him. So that none is able to say, I owe my preservation to God less than thou doest. Thou art much beholden to him for the preservation of thy life, but I am not so much. Thou hast had more need of his preservation than I have had.

Secondly, He preserves not all alike, viz. in this sense, That he takes care of the preservation of the Souls of some in another manner than he doth of others. He preserves the persons even of ungodly men, and keeps their Souls in them; but he preserveth the Souls of the godly in well being, as well as their bodies in life. Hence those frequent expressions. He keepeth the Souls of his Saints. The Lord careth for my soul. Commit the keeping of your souls to him, 1 Pet. IV. ult. And that one instead of more, Psal. CXXI. 7. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil, yea, he shall keep thy soul. He shall preserve thee from all evil to thy body; but which is the preservation indeed, he shall take care of the welfare of thy soul.

I shall not need to insist to show the great difference of these two kinds of preservation; even all the wicked of the world are under the former, God's preservation of their lives; but the children of God are under both, the preservation of their bodies and souls also.

There is nothing that differenceth men in the sight of God, but good or evil actions. And the Judge of all the world, that cannot but do right, judgeth and rewardeth everyone according to their works. As the Apostle hints, Rom, II. 6, 7, 8. Who will render to all men according to their works, and For there is no respect of porsons with God. He respects not whether men be high or low, rich or poor, but deals with all according to their works. Hence that in Eccles. IX. beginning. Outward accoutrements distinguish men in the world, but not with God; and poverty or riches, high place or contempt are not signs of his favor or disfavour; but he looks on men according to their doings.

Well; by God's thus equally valuing all, we are taught, that we should undervalue none. God hath set a stint, that we should not be proud nor despise any▪ For,

1. What are we better then another? Yes, I have more estate than another, I go braver; such an one a poor pitiful fellow, not to be compared with me. I, but he is God's workmanship as well as thou. Ye are twins so like, that ye cannot be known asunder. Yea God himself knows no difference betwixt you. Hast thou an immortal soul, so hath he. Hath he a mortal body, so hast thou. Hast thou a soul that is made in the image of God, so he. Hath he a body, that is but dust and ashes, so hast thou. What is added by the world, as we say, of wealth, and honor, and cloths, are such things as will once be clean stripped off, and where is the difference then?

2. And who hath made the difference as to their outward condition? Answer the Apostles question. What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received it, why boastest thou thyself, as if thou hadst not received it? When we see a person in worse state than ourselves, we commonly look upon ourselves as somebody; whereas we should look up to him, that hath made the difference. And do we see a poor miserable creature, and look upon him with scorn? And do we not rather think, Might not God have made me as poor and miserable, as this poor wretch? He might have clothed me with rags, as well as this poor beggar. He might have made me as silly as this poor Ideot. Down great heart, and proud, and learn to ascribe all the comforts and benefits thou hast above any other poor soul, where it is due, and to ascribe nothing to thyself, but guilt and sinfulness.

If we desire to be esteemed, what is it to be esteemed by God? He hath set all at one rate, as men are in the lump; if we desire to be of a better value, it is wisdom to labor to be so in his eyes that so values all. To esteem ourselves is but a folly, to labor to have others esteem us is but folly, unless it be in an estimation, that God will say Amen to it also. Remember that of the Apostle, It is not he whom man approveth, but whom God approveth. If we would be thought to be beautiful, let it shine in the image of God; if rarely decked, let it be with his ornaments; if to be learned, remember that, He that honoreth me, I will honor.

A SERMON Preached upon

T HE Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Chap. XI. reckoning up, that noble Catalogue of men famous for faith and great actions under the Law, at verse. 32. mentions three, that may seem to be something questionable: and those are Gideon, and Samson and Jephtha: men indeed that had done great acts, but that in the close came off with some foul blot. Gideon, Judge. VIII. 27. made an Ephod, and put it in his own City Ophrah, and all Israel went thither a whoring after it. Samson pulled down the house upon his own head, and so became Felo de se, or guilty of his own death. And was not Jephtha guilty of the death of his own daughter?

That is the question we are now to look into. I have lately shewn you the Heathen sacrificing men and women to their God's, and Heathenish Israelites sacrificing their children unto Moloch; let us now consider, whether Jephtha, a man of a better Name, and Religion fell not under the like miscarriage, in sacrificing of his Daughter. The Text tells us, He did to her according to his vow which he had vowed. And the resolution of the question lies in the resolution of another verse, what his Vow was? That you have at verse. 30, 31. And Jephtha vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, if thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands. Then it shall be that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I come in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt-offering. A rash Vow, as appears by his repenting and renting his garments, verse. 35. A rash Vow, that he could not come off with either breaking or performing it, but with sin. If he performed it not, he sinned in making a Vow that he might not perform. If he performed it, he sinned in performing a Vow that he might not make. So that as the King of Syria once said, Whether they came out for peace, take them alive, or whether they come for war, take them alive. So is Jephtha taken deadlily, whether he hold his Vow or break it: he is caught under a rash and sinful Vow, as a man that hath a Wolf by the ears, that whether he hold him, or let him go he is in danger. If he break his Vow, how can he answer his taking such an engagement upon him, as not to keep? If he hold it, how can he answer making a Vow of so nice a performance?

The words of his Vow are read one way by some Interpreters, and another way by others: and there is one letter in the Hebrew Text breeds this diversity, viz. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that may signify either And, or Or. And accordingly some read it, Whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace, shall surely be the Lord's. And I will offer it up for a burnt offering. And others read it, Or I will offer it up. As meaning, if it be fit to be offered in sacrifice, I will offer it in sacrifice; but if it be not fit, yet it shall be the Lord's. So some of your Bibles give intimation of this diversity of reading, having one in the Text, and the other in the Margin. But in the Text you see it is, And I will offer it up. And so it is in the Greek, Vulgar, Italian, French; and so rendered also from the Eastern Languages.

Now what could meet him out of the doors of his house that was fit for sacrifice? Nothing to be expected to come out thence, but Men, Women and Dogs; and any of these, yea the very Dogs might come out to meet him, and welcome home their Master, but none of these were sit to be sacrificed. Nay a Dog is not fit to be dedicated to God any way. For though there is a supposal, Levite. XXVII. 11. and a permission of dedicating and sanctifying an unclean beast to the Lord, that was not fit to be sacrificed, and that it might be redeemed for a sum of money to be given to the Priest: yet a Dog is particularly excepted in that prohibition, Deut. XXIII. 18. Thou shalt not bring the hire of a whore nor the price of a dog into the house of the Lord for any Vow. And do ye think Jephtha had his dog in his thoughts when he made his Vow? That were more ridculous to imagine. And if any were so simple as to imagine it, it might be answered, He could not think of his dog because he knew a dog could not be so consecrate to God.

Could he then think of a Bullock, Ram, Lamb, Kid or Goat? These were things indeed that were fit to sacrifice; but a double objection lies against thinking that he thought of any of these. The one is because he speaks of coming out of the doors of his house; which no one will understand but of his dwelling house. And it were ridiculous to think of Ox, or Ram, or Lamb, or Goat, coming out of his dwelling house. And the other is, that he speaks of coming to meet him, which expression means to welcome him home, as his Daughter went out to meet him to welcome him home. Now it can little be imagined that he thought of any Bullock, or Lamb, or Goat, coming out to meet him under any such notion.

Therefore these things considered, it is past all doubting, that when he saith, Whatsoever cometh out to meet me, that he meaneth some man or woman or child of his family. And child he had none, but only this one daughter, verse. 33. And it is very like he little thought of her, when he made his Vow, but some of his men or maids. And whereas our English hath rendered it favourably, because of the great question that is raised upon his Vow, Whatsoever cometh out, the Hebrew original will most properly bear it, He that cometh forth: and so the Greek, Latin, and other Translations bear it.

For he was now upon an extraordinary and very great design, viz. To go and fight with the potent army of the Ammonites, his forces not being very great. And therefore it is very likely that he makes an extraordinary Vow to his extraordinary design he was upon. Now this had been but an ordinary and common business to Vow, if I return from the children of Ammon with victory, I will offer the first Lamb, or Ram or Bullock I meet withal at my coming to mine own house. Had this been any great Vow for the imploring his prospering in the great undertaking he went about? But to dedicate a man or a woman to God spoke high, and something like the greatness of the design.

And how he served his daughter when she came first to meet him, is the great question and dispute? Some tender of Jepthahs credit, and reckoning it not fit to lay more hard things on him than the story will well bear, therefore to make the best of it, hold that he did dedicate to God, not sacrifice his daughter; he devoted her to God in keeping her a Recluse and Nun, and never to be married; though he had no other child, and so his family was like to fall. But on the contrary,

First, Nunship and Vow of Virginity by the Papists indeed is pretended to be a great piece of devoting and consecrating the party to God. But that it is so, never was, nor ever will be proved, but only pretended, and with a loud noise cried up; as they did in the great hubbub at Ephesus, Great is Diana of the Ephesians; when none could understand or see any reason for such a hubbub and outcry. Certainly among the Jewish Nation, they were so far from accounting the Vow of Virginity a piece of Devotion and Religion, that they accounted it a reproach for a woman to be childless; nay a reproach for a woman not to be married. You remember that saying of Elizabeth that had thitherto been barren, Luke I. 25. Thus the Lord hath dealt with me in the days when he looked upon me to take away my reproach among men. A great reproach for a woman to live and die childless; but God hath taken away that reproach from me in giving me a child.

And a greater reproach it was for a woman not to be married. And hence is that in Psal. LXXVIII. 63. Their young men were slain by the sword, and their maidens were not praised, for so it is in the Original, which our English hath rendered, were not given in marriage. For it was a dispraise for a woman not to be married. Nay the Jews in their Traditional Law, (by which they were led too much) did not only account it a shame not to be married, but a sin and a breach of God's command. For those words, Gen. I. 28. Be fruitful and multiply, they account not only a blessing, but a Command; and reckon it the first Command of the six hundred and thirteen commands that are in the Law. And to this opinion of theirs it is that the Apostle reflects, 1 Cor. VII. 25. Where treating concerning virginity and marriage, he saith, Now concerning Virgins, I have no command from the Lord, but I give my judgment, as one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful.

Secondly, To this may be added, that Persons dedicated to the Lord, were not thereby bound to perpetual Virginity. For we read of some that were so dedicated, that yet for all that married. As Samson a dedicate Nazarite, yet took him a wife, and that of the daughters of the Philistines. And Samuel dedicated by his parents; and yet afterwards married, and had children.

So that whereas the Papists account vowed Virginity so great a piece of Religion and Devotion, and thereupon their Nuns, and their Priests must not marry; they will hardly find the least warrant for it either in the Old Testament, or the New. It is merely an invention of their own, as indeed is most of their Religion, and clearly without any warrant or allowance of God. It is very unlikely therefore that vowed Virginity should be ever so much in fashion or request in the Jewish Nation, as for them to account it so great a piece of Religion, or that Jephtha should account that a noble performance of his Vow; and account it a great Vow to devote his Daughter to perpetual Virginity.

But if that were not the intent and action of his Vow, what did he to his Daughter? Did he really sacrifice her, and offer her up for a burnt offering? Tha • was less Religion, and less in custom in the Nation, to sacrifice a person. And can it be imagined, that Jephtha, that the Apostle reckons among the faithful, should do such a thing?

I answer, Very true. But may we not think him, though faithful, yet for the present that he might fall under ignorance, and a blind zeal. It is indeed something hard and strange to think so uncharitably of such an one as he was. But,

The Fathers of old were almost unanimously of the mind, that he really sacrificed his daughter. They that have purposely handled this question will tell you, that Tertullian, Athanasius, Nazianzen, Jerome, Ambrose, Chrysostom, Agustine, Theodoret, and others were of that mind. Besides Jewish Writers that might be produced. I will name but two, the Chaldee paraphrase, and Josephus. And divers modern Christians are of the same mind.

But still the objection will return. What such a man as Jephtha murder his own Daughter, and offer her in sacrifice? Would the Apostle ever have reckoned him among the noble army of Faithful ones, had he done such a thing as this?

I answer, First, That comes but a little short of this that is said of Solomon, 1 King. XI. 5. Solomon went after Ashtoreth the Goddess of the Zidonians, and Milcom the Abomination of the Ammonites. Let the Jews plaster the case the best they can, and say, that he himself did not worship these God's, but only suffered his wives to worship them; and that he did not build those high places for Chemosh and Molec, verse. 7. but only suffered his wives to build them. Yet how deeply was he guilty in suffering such a thing. But the Text tells you that he himself went after these God's; which in Scripture language signifies commonly the real committing Idolatry with such God's. And do but remember what the service of Molec was, and offering children to him; and observe that Solomon went after Milcom or Molec, and built high places to Molec: and how little short that does come of Jephtha's sacrificing his daughter? And yet I doubt not of Solomon's salvation; for I doubt not of his repentance.

Secondly, That it was now too common in Israel to worship Molec. Now observe; Judge. X. 6. The children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the Lord, and served Baali • and Ashtoreth, and the gods of Syria, Zidon, Moab, the children of Ammon and the Philistines; and forsook the Lord, and served him not. An evil case were the people in, when they were generally so idolatrous, and so variously idolatrous. Now among others observe, that they served the God of the Ammonites, which was Molec: So that it was no strange thing with them to offer such barbarous and bloody sacrifices, as their own children. That you may guess, that the corruption of the times might suggest to Jephtha the fancy of offering some such sacrifice of Man or Woman to God; the rather since

Thirdly, That he was now going to fight against the children of Ammon, who offered their children to their God Molec. And it seems he thought he should speed better against Ammon, who offered their children to Molec, if he vowed and offered such another sacrifice to God.

We observed before, that nothing could come out of the doors of his house to meet him, that could be fit to be sacrificed by any warrant or allowance of God; not his dog, nor his servant: and therefore that his words cannot but be conjunctive, Whatsoever meets me shall be the Lord's, and I will offer it up. And that the strictness of his Vow as he conceived it, did put him on to the strictness of his performance.

It had been the part of the Priest, and of the great Council of the Kingdom to have prevented such a fact as this. The Priests lips they should have preserved knowledge, they should have taught him better: and the great Council that should have preserved righteousness, and good order should have taken care against such an action. But the Nation it seems was so overgrown with ignorance and idolatry, and particularly with the serving of the Idol Molec, that such a thing as this proved no regret at all to them.

The poor girl his daughter begged two months respite, that she might go upon the Mountains and bewail her Virginity. She might have hoped that in all that time, some rescue might have come to her; either the Counsel of the Priests, or the authority of the State interposing with her Father. But all was so out of tune and overgrown with Idolatry, as may be seen in that Text I cited before, Chap. X. that Jephtha, that was too much led away with the evil example of the times, is not at all restrained, but rather encouraged by the negligence of those, that should have directed and ordered better.

And to one that doth more narrowly search into the Bible, I may recommend this observation to his examination. That in the time of the Judges, the High Priesthood was lost out of the line of the sons of Eleazar into the line of the sons of Ithamar, from one family of Aaron's to another. And whether it might not be, because the then High Priest did not better demean himself about this very matter, let him seriously consider.

I am unwilling to charge Jephtha too heavily, nor lay such a fact to his charge; but I have given you the opinion of the greatest men of note that have written, laying it to his charge, and I have given you some reasons, that might induce and move them to it. But I dare say, none of them that have so held, but they thought that he had repentance proportionable to this miscarriage. And so no doubt had Gideon in setting up his Ephod in his City, which caused all Israel to go awhoring after it. And so repented Solomon after his building of Altars to Molec; and so did Manasseh after his offering of his sons to Molec. And such repentance of Jephtha, I doubt not but the Aposte had an eye to, when he reckons him among the faithful, and those that died in the Faith.

I shall fix only upon one Observation, which fairly offers itself unto us, take we the story one way or other; that he sacrificed his Daughter, or only devoted her to perpetual Virginity, viz.

Do you not think, that Jephtha would have born witness to this, when he found himself caught in the trap of his Vow, and his daughter fallen into it, which he little meant? Could he not wish he had had more care in the making of his Vow, when the keeping of it must prove so bitter? Did not rashness go before his care, when he vowed and considered not what might be the issue? Did not his eagerness go before his prudence, when he vowed somebody, but he knew not whom? And did not his zeal go before his piety, when he vows but violence to some or other, on whomsoever it lights, viz. either to sacrifice them, or otherwise to devote them, though against their will? When he rends his garment upon his daughters meeting him, and cries out that she was one that troubled him; it might have been answered him, as Elias did Ahab, No, I am not he that troubled Israel, but thou and thy fathers house. No, Jephtha, it is not thy daughter that troubles thee, but it is thy Vow that troubles thee, that was made with no more consideration. If more care, prudence and piety had been there, thy present grief and perplexity had not been here.

I name these three most deservedly, and upon very good reason. For as a Vow is a bond or cord, whereby a man binds himself, so these are as a threefold cord twisted to make up such a bond. These are so essential to the constitution of a right and lawful Vow, that let any of them be absent, there will be a sad maim there. Let Care be absent, the Vow will be rash; let Prudence be absent, it will be impertinent: and let Piety be absent, it will be wicked and ungodly.

A Vow is a bond that binds the Soul, and so the Scripture calls it, Numb. XXX. 3. If a woman shall Vow a Vow to bind her Soul with a bond. And a man had need to be prudent and careful how he binds his Soul. It is a tender piece, take heed the bond sit right, lest it gall and fret it. Take heed the bond be not such, as to bind hand and foot, and to cast into utter darkness. What else think you was those forty men's Vow, that bound themselves by an oath, that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul. Had not these men fettered their own Souls for utter darkness by the bond of their Vow?

Now because we have before us a remarkable case of a Vow, let us a little consider of that subject, and what a man does or should do, when he makes a Vow.

And, first, let us begin with this question, Whether a man be bound to make Vows or no? Is a man bound to lay such a bond upon his Soul? It is enjoined, Psal. LXXVI. 11. Vow and pay unto the Lord your God: Let all that are round about him bring presents unto him that ought to be seared. Now doth this bind a man to make Vows, or only bind him to pay them if he have made them? And if it bind to make Vows, doth it bind under the Gospel, as well as under the Law, where most of their Vows were vowing of sacrifices? And so that latter clause of the words cited give intimation, Bring presents, &c. And so some construe that, Eccles. V. 4, 6. If thou hast made a Vow, defer not to pay it. Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin, neither say before the Angel, it was an error. Where by Angel they understand the Priest that should receive the sacrifice. Thou Vowedest; say not before him, thou wast mistaken. Now for the resolution of this Question many things are to be spoken, and especially the nature of a just Vow considered.

To the constitution then of a lawful Vow these two things are requisite and essential.

• I. That it be for a Religious end.
• II. That it have a Religious warrant. And both these must be concurrent, else a Vow cannot be lawful.

A Vow is a matter of Religion, by which a man ties himself in a bond to God; and Religiousness must be that, that must give it life and warrant. The Scripture calls a Vow a bond laid by the person that Vows upon the Soul, in the place above cited. And therefore the thing refers unto the Soul, and so is something betwixt the Soul and God. To bind the Soul in reference to anything of the World, is both contrary to the interest of the Soul, and not agreeable to the proper nature of a Vow. I will instance in one as likely, colorable, and common as may be, viz. A Vow never to be surety, nor bound for any man. This may be a good resolution possibly, but hardly possibly a good Vow. For a Resolution and a Vow may admit of a clear distinction. And a man may resolve wisely, justly and warrantably such and such things concerning his estate and affairs in the World: Whereas such Resolutions may not be fit to be turned into Vows. Thou mayest do wisely in resolving never to be bound for any man; or to resolve, I will spend but thus much weekly, monthly, or yearly in houskeeping. But thou mayest not do wisely, or warrantably to bind thyself to these things by a Vow: to bind thy Soul under a bond, and consequently under a curse, if thou break thy bond, for such worldly things as these: To call in God to witness, and to engage to him about such earthly concerns as these.

The Phrase of the Apostle is observable, 1 Cor. VII. 36. where he is speaking of Virginity, which the Papists would bring under a Vow. If any man thinketh he behaveth himself unseemly towards his Virgin, if she pass the flower of her age, and need so require, let him do what he will. Nevertheless he that standeth steadfast in his heart, having no necessity, but hath power over his own will, and hath so decreed in his heart, that he will keep his Virgin, he doth well. You find not here either Vow of Virginity or oath not to marry, but only a steady resolution. Standing steadfast in his heart; and decreeing in his heart: not laying any bond of Vow or oath upon his Soul.

You find not in Scripture of any Vow of any good man, but it was aimed at a Religious end, and in tendency to the service of God, and not to any worldly interest or respect; I mean when considerately made. Such an one was Jacob's, Gen. XXVIII. 20. Such another Vow was that of David, Psal. CXXXII. 2. And without all controversy Paul's Vow, Act. XVIII. 18. had a higher aim and end than any earthly or worldly concernment. Nay even men of no Religion, yet accounted that a Vow aimed at a religious end. Even Absalom, when he made his Vow in Geshur, pretends to such an end, 2 Sam. XV. 8. And the mariners in the Ship with Jonah sacrificed Sacrifices, and vowed Vows, Jonah I. 16. And their Sacrifices and Vows without question looked both the same way, and aimed at the same end, religious worship. And that Vow that the Israelites made, Numb. XXI. 2. Israel vowed a Vow unto the Lord, and said, if thou wilt deliver and give this people into mine hand, then I will utterly destroy their Cities. Though it may seem somewhat hard and unreasonable, yet they aimed at a religious end in it, viz. obedience to God's command, that had enjoined them to destroy the Canaanites, and not to spare them.

These Vows mentioned you see were Conditional; and the persons engaged in them desired in them as it were to bind God to do something for them, and they engaged to do something for God. But there were and are vows absolute, and without any such condition, whereby men out of conscience of their duty bound, or bind themselves to as strict obedience and service of God, as they can; such is that of David, Psal. CXIX. 106. I have sworn, and will perform it, to keep thy righteous judgments. And such was the general end of the vow of the Nazarites, to set themselves peculiarly to some service of God, Numb. VI. 2. When either man or woman shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite to separate themselves unto the Lord. Nazaritism was properly a Vow of humiliation, that a man would chastise himself and deny himself his ordinary delight of liberty, and neatness.

I say of liberty, for he bound himself to a strict avoiding of everything, that might desile him. And this required not a little care and circumspection, and denied him that liberty of walking at freedom, that he might have had. It is said of Elizabeth the Mother of the Baptist, that when she conceived with child, she hid herself five months. And why? Because she carried a Nazarite in her womb: lest she should be any prejudice to the Nazarite she bore, by lighting upon anything unclean to defile her. She thus reclused herself from all company that she might be sure to be far from all defilement. And the Nazarite denied himself the liberty of eating or meddling with anything that came of the Vine, Wine, Grapes, Raisins, or anything the Vine bred.

And, I say, he denied himself of the common neatness and comeliness, that both he might have had, and everybody else had. And that was in that he let his hair grow, and did not cut it as others did. For however long hair among us be accounted a bravery, and men be grown effeminate like women; yet among the Jewish Nation it was accounted cloan contrary, a sluttery, nastiness, and deformity. And they are mightily mistaken, that think that Absalom wore his hair so long, because he was proud of it: he wore it so long because he had vowed Nazaritism, and by way of humiliation, and denied himself that neatness that he used before. For that which the Apostle saith, 1 Cor. XI. 14. Doth not nature itself teach, that if a man have long hair it is a shame to him: the Jewish Nation consented to with all their hearts. And therefore they looked upon Nazarites with their long hair, as men under humiliation, and that wore it so, to take shame unto themselves before God and Men. And so they took up their Vow, as whereby to tie themselves to a more strict way of religiousness and humiliation.

Men generally think there is some weight, and awe and terror in a Vow, and even the profanest of men stand in fear of breaking even of foolish and rash Vows, Prov. VII. 14. The Whore there speaks, This day have I paid my Vows. I have known where a wicked fellow having made a Vow, that he would never go in at his neighbors door, durst not for his Vow sake go in at the door; but could be content to creep in at the window. And another that having made a Vow he would not go into such an Alehouse of so long a time, durst not for his Vow sake go into it, but could be content to be carried in. Now however these wretches dallied with God, and trifled with their Vows, and their own Souls: yet they shown, that there is some awe of a Vow even upon an ungodly heart, and that that stands over them, as with a whip and scourge. A good heart discerns the awe of it much more: and many a good man hath made Vows of careful walking; that he might have his Vow his Monitor, and keep him in awe to it: hath stuck as it were this rod always by him, to mind him to have a care, and to whip him if he failed.

Now is every man bound to make such Vows as these; with David to make a Vow to take heed to his ways, and to take an oath, and swear that he will keep God's commandments? The bond lies upon us from God to walk holily and carefully, have we need, or are we bound to add to the bond, and to lay a Vow upon ourselves so to do?

For answer to this, I shall recommend to you two passages of Solomon, and one of David.

First, That in Prov. XX. 25. It is a snare to a man to devour that which is holy, and after Vows to make enquiry. For a man to Vow, and to devour what he had vowed, and not pay it; and then to make enquiry concerning his Vow; whether he vowed well or ill or no? This is a snare. This should have been done before he made his Vow, and not after. It is best for a man to consider before he Vows, whether he do well in making his Vow, and whether he shall be able to perform it, when he hath made it? The great cause of breaking Vows, or repenting of what a man hath vowed, is want of consideration before hand, what he goes about.

A Vow, even a holy Vow is a thing of deliberation, and not to be undertaken rashly, but as in our Savior's parable, He that builds a Tower had need to sit down and cast, whether he be able to finish it when he hath begun it? To consider whether he be able to perform his Vow, when he hath made it? For as a Vow is to be of a thing lawful and weighty; so it is to be of a thing possible. He that vows that which is not reasonably in his power to perform, casts not himself only into a bond, but into a snare. Such is the Nuns Vow of Virginity, and the Priests Vow among the Papists never to marry. It is not more a Vow, than a Snare, because they cannot say or think it is absolutely in their power to perform it. And the contrary hath been proved, and is daily among them by doleful experience.

A good heart, out of a good intention, may be willing to bind himself under a Vow to walk as carefully before God as possible: but let him well consider before hand, how he can keep his Vow. For consider that considerable place of the same Solomon.

Secondly, Eccles. V. 5. It is better that thou shouldst not Vow, than that thou shouldst Vow, and not pay. Whether Solomon spake there only of vowing a Sacrifice, or generally of any holy Vow, his saying will hold true, that it is better not to Vow, than to Vow and not perform.

Such holy Vows as we speak of, a man's vowing all care possible in his holy walking, proceed either from conscientiousness of his Duty, or consciousness of his frailty. A man out of conscientiousness and a holy zeal to his Duty, binds himself by a Vow to his utmost performance of it; that his Vow may be a continual spur, and Monitor to him to keep up to it. Another out of consciousness of his readiness to fail, or to be sleepy in his Duty, or to be ready to faulter from it, binds himself by a Vow, to be as a Bell to keep him awake to it, and to be a check to his faultering. These men have done well in making their Vows, if they keep them: but if they keep them not, it had been far better not to have vowed, than not to pay. God undoubtedly requires, that they should perform when they have vowed: but we cannot say, that he so strictly requires, that they should Vow. Which makes me remember that of Peter to Ananias, Act. V. 4. While it remained was it not thine own, and when it was sold was it not in thine own power? And thou mightest have chosen, whether thou wouldst have vowed and consecrated it to God or no: but since thou hast taken on thee to devote it to him, the Lord requires that thou shouldst perform, and not faulter with him. As a man may choose whether he will enter into bonds or no, but when he is entered into them, he must look to pay them.

Thirdly, A hint about this matter let us take from Psal. LVI. 12. Thy Vows, O Lord, are upon me. He speaks oft of his own Vows being upon him, here of the Lord's. Either thy Vows, that is, made to thee. So sacrifice was the Lord's sacrifice: Or thy Vows, that is, that thou hast laid upon me; the bonds wherein thou hast bound me.

A Vow in Baptism is laid on us by God; so on Israel by circumcision: and God even as soon as we come into the World, seizes upon us, and would tie us to him: Swaddles us in the bond of the Covenant, as soon as we come into the swaddles, that he might bring us up for his. And as it is said of Jonathan, That he made David swear, and enter into oath with him, because he loved him as his own Soul: so God makes us to swear, and to enter into Vow to him, because he is very tender and loving to our Souls.

It is the great dispute, Whether an Infant in Baptism be capable to have a Vow and bond laid upon him? And thereupon some deny Infant baptism; because he is not able to stipulate, or take any bond upon him; for he knows not what a bond or a Vow means. Man is born as a wild Asses colt, saith Job: and a wild Ass colt little understands any religious concernment, and an Infant, when he is baptized as little.

Very true, and yet Anabaptists cannot say, A wild Ass colt is as fit to have a bond laid upon him, as an Infant. An Infant hath a Soul, and owes duty to God, a wild Ass colt wants both: which moves God to deal after another manner with an Infant, than with an Ass colt. An Infant hath sin and guilt upon it, and so hath not an Ass colt; and upon this account also God deals in another manner with an Infant than an Ass colt. An Infant is born a child of wrath, as the Apostle saith, all are, Ephes. II. 2. God surprizes it as soon as born, and makes it enter into bonds with him, that it may come out of the state of wrath. But further in answer to this objection consider these three things.

I. The child indeed then understands not what it does, and cannot stipulate again in words to God, as God by his Word doth to it; but the very equity of the things, that God lays upon it, doth tie the child in the bond, and wrap him in the obligation, as justly and forcibly, as if the child had said Amen to every particular. For it is the equity of God's commands that lays the obligation of obedience upon men, and not their own consent. For as the Prophet speaks, whether they hear, or whether they forbear, yet the obligation lies upon them. Because it is so meet, fit and just, that they should do what God commands them. By this equity God lays his obligations upon us in our baptismal bond. And though as Infants, we cannot understand, nor consent to it, yet by the justness of the things enjoined we are inwrapped in it. And God's Vows are upon us, and the more because he lays them on for our good, viz. to deliver us from the wrath under which we are born. The bond is, to forsake the Devil and his works, to believe in God and to serve him. And can there be anything more just and equal? And though we are not then able to give consent to the bond and obligation, and though none others should undertake for us, yet doth not the very equity of the thing required oblige us?

II. God by the continual preaching of his Word minds us of the obligation. We know not what we did, nor what it was laid upon us: but he all along now teaches us to know it, and daily is refreshing to us the sight and sense of our bond, and as it were anew tying it on. It is considerable, that the Commands are called the Covenant, and the two Tables of the Ten Commandments, the Tables of the Covenant. And whose Covenant? Both God's and Mans. God's, because God hath indented with man upon such conditions. And Mans especially, because the condition of the obligation is his. And God is continually warning him that it is his obligation. There is a voice behind him, continually telling him this is his duty.

III. As God in Baptism lays his obligation upon us, when we knew not of it, and in preaching of the Word is continually urging of us to know it; so in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper he would have us willingly and knowingly to take it upon us. They know not what the Lord's Supper means, that own not an obligation in it. As in that Sacrament there is taught living by Christ, so there is challenged a living to him. The Sacrament reads, that Christ died for men; and that very thing reads, that men are not to live to themselves. There is a benefit, partaking of Christ to live by him; but there is an obligation also, a bond, to live to him. For as the Covenant is obligatory, so this seal or administration of the Covenant is so too. Now he that in receiving the Sacrament owns not such an obligation, and takes not that bond upon him, understands not what he does. And if his heart do not engage to live to Christ, as much as he desires to live by Christ, he seeks to serve his own turn, and not Christ's.

A SERMON Preached upon

I N this Chapter there is mention of one or two miracles, and there is intimation of two wonders. The miracles are the Altar at Bethel renting and Jeroboams head withered, and at the Prophets prayer restored again. The wonders are, that so brave a Prophet should be deceived as he was, should be destroyed, as he was: and its wondrous, that the Lion that destroyed him should not also destroy his Ass. I know you know the story. He was sent to cry out against the Idolatrous Altar at Bethel and so he did. He is commanded not to eat or drink in that place, and he did not, though the King kindly invited him home. But by the deceiving of another Prophet he is brought back again, when he was got out of Town; he eats and drinks in the Town contrary to what he was commanded; and when he goes out again a Lion meets him by the way and kills him.

There is no difficulty at all in the wordsof the story, it is very easy to be understood: but there is mysteriousness in the providential disposal of God, that appears in the story.

I. The good Prophet to be so destroyed. How would this encourage Jeroboam and the Idolaters at Bethel in their Idolatry? Oh! this man was but a false Prophet, all he said against our golden Calf and Altar was but a scarbabe, for otherwise he would never have come to such an end. And how might they boast, that their new God at Bethel had met with him for his sauciness against him.

II. And how might this discourage other Prophets to go on the message of the Lord, when this poor man sped no better, than to be killed with a Lion.

III. That one Prophet should so deceive another as the old Prophet at Bethel deceived this poor man to his undoing, by telling a lie and making him transgress the command of God. How might this disadvantage the function and credit of the Prophets, for who will believe them, when they lie one to another, and deceive one another?

IV. A poor man to be cheated and deceived into a transgression, having that fair excuse, The old Prophet did deceive me, and I did it: And yet to be so dreadfully punished for it, as that it must cost him his life; and in such a manner too as to be killed by a Lion.

V. That this poor man should suffer so severely for violating but one command of God, Eat not; and Jeroboam should escape so secure that had violated the greatest command in the two Tables, Thou shalt have none other God's but me: and Thou shalt not make unto thyself any graven Image.

This poor man is induced to sin by another, and that by ignorance, and he speeds so sore; and Jeroboam induceth all Israel to sin, and that willfully, and yet he is Jovial and feels and fears no dangers.

VI. It is something obscure what this old Prophet of Bethel was, a true Prophet or a false, a good or a bad. If a true Prophet, why did he lie to him? If a false, how could he foretell him of his end? He was a true Prophet, and this poor good man knew that he was a true Prophet: and the lie that he told was not with intention of any hurt to him, but an officious lie to persuade him to go home with him. He desired to have the company of this good man, and to give him some entertainment at his house. He sees no arguments will persuade him: therefore he minteth that lie, that an Angel had spoken to him, and commanded him to bring him back, and so is the poor man deceived and undone.

In this story of his fatal end, we may first consider a little upon the instrument of his death, a Lion; and then concerning his death and fate itself.

I. A Lion met him and slew him. How much praise have you in Scripture of the Land of Canaan; that it was the pleasant Land, the glory of all Lands, Ezek. XX. 15. The Land flowing with milk and honey, in multiudes of places. A Land upon which the eye of the Lord was from one end of the year to the other. A Land of Vineyards, and Oliveyards, &c. And yet how sadly, and dangerously was that Land infested with ravenous, cruel, wild beasts? Where almost might a man be safe? Samson walking by the vineyard of Timnah, a Lion sets upon him, and had served him as this Lion served this poor man, if he had not met with his match, and Samson had been too hard for him. And a Lion and a Bear ravin upon David's flock and had robbed him of a Lamb and Kid, had not he also been too strong for them. But everyone was not so. As Jacob doubted concerning Joseph, Certainly an evil beast hath devoured him, undoubtedly my son Joseph is so dead. What a sad havoc was it, when about this very place, Bethel, where the Lion destroys this Peophet, two she-Bears at one clap tear in pieces two and forty Children.

And that passage is very remarkable, in the story concerning the battle betwixt David's men and Absalom's, in the wood of Ephraim, 2 Sam. XVIII. 8. The battle was scattered over the face of all the Country, and the wood devoured more people that day than the sword devoured. The wood devoured? How? Why the Lions and Bears, and ravenous beasts that were in the wood, they picked the men up as they were scattered up and down and made a greater slaughter than the sword.

It is something obscure that which is said, Deut. VII. 22. The Lord thy God will put out these Nations before thee by little and little: thou mayst not consume them at once lest the beasts of the field increase upon thee. And among other things that might be inquired upon it, this might be one, why God did not drive out the wild beasts out of the Land, as well as he drove the Canaanites out? And the answer might be various.

I. That he might show that there is no absolute quiet, and happiness, and security to be expected here. Canaan the choice Country upon Earth, the only paradise on this side Heaven, and yet even Canaan is not without its inconvenience and molestation. There were Gardens, and Orchards, and Vine-yards, and Olive-yards, but it may be a Lion or Bear lurking in them; there was all pleasure and plenty, but there were wild and ravenous beasts ranging abroad, that one could never say, I will walk without danger.

So would God teach them, that it was not their earthly Canaan that they were to look after, but they must look higher, if they would look for rest and quiet and secure habitation. A man sat under his Vine or under his Fig-tree, it may be on a sudden a wild beast rusheth upon him, and he scapes narrowly, if he scape, devouring. A man is binding sheaves in the field, or a woman gleaning, and suddenly a Lion or Bear is at their back; that there is but a span betwixt them and death, if there proved so much. This was a very evincing lesson that absolute quiet and safety was not to be had there for all the bravery of the Land; but that they must look for another Land of promise, if they would be perfectly safe, quiet and free from danger.

II. These wild and ravenous beasts in the Land, were as it were a rod or scourge ready in the hand of God, to whip transgressors withal, as he saw cause, as he did this poor transgressor in the Text. And he reckons them among the Plagues and punishments that he used to avenge himself by upon the rebellious, Ezek. XIV. 15. If I cause noisome beasts to pass through the Land and they spoil it so that it be desolate, that no man may pass through because of the noisome beasts. And verse. 21. How much more when I send my four sore judgments upon Jerusalem, the sword, and the famine, and the noisome beast, and the pestilence. You have some emblem of a man persecuted with noisome beasts, Amos V. 19. A man flees from a Lion and a Bear meets him, and he gets home and leans his head upon the wall and a Serpent bites him. And you have a real example of it, 2 King. XVII. 25. They feared not the Lord, therefore the Lord sent Lions among them, which slew some of them. And God doth give this as a promise of a singular blessing; Levite. XXVI. 6. I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land.

And how can we choose but remember the mercy of God to this our Land in this particular: That no such ravenous, dangerous beasts do range in our Nation; if men themselves would not be Wolves and Bears and Lions one to another. A man may take his journey and never fear being set upon by any wild beast. No father sending out his son needs to fear any evil beast devouring him; and no mother hath cause to weep with the women of Bethel for their children torn in pieces by he or she-Bears. God hath so blessed our Land, that such dangers are least feared of us. We see no Lions or bears, unless it be under grates and bars. It is to be bemoaned with tears that we are such Lions, and Bears, and brute beasts one to another.

II. And thus much of the instrumental cause of this poor Prophets death, A Lion. The efficient cause was his transgressing a command of God.

Upon which if any heart be moved any whit to murmur, or dispute against the severity of God in this case, let me calm it much after the manner that Joab's messenger must calm David. If the Kings anger arise, and he seem vexed and displeased, saith Joab to the messenger, then say thou to him, Thy servant Uriah is dead also. If thy heart, sinner, arise against God's dealing here, and thou think it very severe that this poor man must die thus, let me say this to calm thee, But thou art not dead, who art as great a transgressor as he▪ Why he died a reason may be given, but canst thou, or all the World, give a reason why thou art a live.

This then let it be the first application of this story: Everyone to consider with themselves, That they after all their sinning are yet alive, when this poor man but for one sin came to so fatal a death. Let me use our Savior's style and question a little, Think you that these Galileans were sinners above all others; or that those eighteen on whom the Tower of Siloam fell were sinners above all others? Thinkest thou this man was a greater sinner than thou art, that he came so to his end and to so fatal an end? Nay, speak heart from the very bottom and in sincerity, Thinkest thou not, that this man was an hundred fold, a thousand fold less sinner than thou art? And yet he was thus taken away and thou yet alive: He a good man, a holy man, a holy Prophet, and yet he so fearfully cut off for violating but one command, and deceived into that miscarriage too. And how many commands hast thou broke knowingly, wittingly, willfully; and how far, how many degrees art thou short of the holiness of this man, and yet alive? Hast thou any heart to complain of God's severity against this poor man, look home and see what cause thou hast to stand amazed at his patience toward thee. He for breaking one command: How many ones hast thou broken? Nay if God had reckoned to cut thee off at the hundredth the thousandth breach of his commands, had not the account been up an hundred, a thousand times over? And yet thou art here.

David questions, Lord what is man? Take the Philosophers answer, Homo mirum. Man is a wonder. And so he is, a wonder in his creation: and so David himself owns, Psal. CXXXIX. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. A wonder in his preservation, when there are so many concurrents, that might dash him all to pieces, and yet he lives.

I will draw nigh, saith Moses, and see this great sight, that is before me; The bush burning and yet is not consumed. And a great sight indeed, that fire that devours all things that it lays hold on, should burn so vehemently in the bush, and yet the bush nothing at all impaired. Draw nigh and turn thine eyes to such a kind of sight in thine own preservation. So many things concurring that might cause thy consuming, dust and ashes, frailty, mortality, sinfulness, provoking of God and yet not consumed. What account can we give of our preservation?

First, Let us look upon this man, and then let us look upon ourselves: As the man that fell among thieves travailing from Jerusalem to Jericho, lay by the way side half dead: So this poor man is fallen into the pa • s of the Lion, and lieth by the way side wholly dead. And is this nothing to us, that we should like the Priest and Levite thus slightly pass by him? The man was a good and holy man, and I make no question but he was saved, though he came to such a fatal end.

Saved? Will you say, when he came to such an end, for transgressing God's command? He died in his sin certainly, and can we think that he was saved?

1. Consider what follows immediately in his story, 28. ver. The Lion had not eaten the carcass nor torn the Ass. God that so severely punished him to the death, yet shown a miracle for him when he was dead. Which showeth that God had not cast away all care of him, though he had so sorely punished him: And it was a very fair sign that God had not suffered the great roaring Lion to devour his soul, in that he suffered not this Lion to devour his carcass. Its David's saying, Doest thou show wonders for the dead? Yes, in one sense he did here: And can we think that God would show such a miracle for a castaway, and for one whose soul was now in Hell, would he show such a wonder for his body?

2. Its true indeed that he died for transgressing of God's command, but had he not repented of that transgression? Its observable what is said of the Prophet, that had brought him back again, verse. 21. That he cried to the man of God that he had brought back: When God had revealed to him, what wrong he had done in lying to the poor Prophet, and making him transgress God's command, and what a sad fate should befall him for his transgression, he cried out with sadness and affection, and told him how it should be with him. And can we think that the good man having his sin so laid before him, and his dreadful punishment, was not deeply touched with the sense of his sin, and with all earnestness sought to God for pardon?

We may not judge of him by ourselves; we little take to heart what we have misdone, and what is denounced by God against our sinning. A holy Prophet was of better temper and of a tenderer heart, and deeply sorrowed for his transgression, when he was convinced of it, and sought for pardon and obtained it. So that though he died for his sin, yet he died not in it. The case of David may give some illustration to this case. When Nathan told him home of his sin about Uriah and his wife, he instantly repents, is pardoned, that he falls not under condemnation for it: but he is not quit from temporal judgment and punishment for it. The sword shall never depart from thine house. And, the child shall die. So this man is told of his fault by the other Prophet; he repents, is pardoned, that he falls not under condemnation; but he is not acquitted from a temporal punishment, and that a severe one, that cost him his life.

We may here take notice of divers things.

First, Of the wild opinions of Antinomians, that say a Believer is not punished for his sins, whatsoever befalls him. But the reason they give spoils what it would prove. For Christ, say they, hath born his punishment: which if it be true, yet it is punishment as to satisfaction, not to castigation. For who among us ever said, that a Believer was punished for the satisfaction of his sin. God punisheth him upon other accounts. David's sin was pardoned, and satisfied for by Christ, when Nathan tells him, the Lord hath done away thy sin; but the punishment followed, viz. the Sword, which was not to depart from his house. And the reason of his punishment was, because he had given occasion to the enemy to blaspheme; therefore God, to vindicate his own honor, and the honor of Religion, punished him, that men might see that God was righteous, and hated iniquity, wheresoever he saw it.

Secondly, Let us remember here that strange passage, Amos III. 2. You have I known of all the families of the Earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities. You have I known, owned, chosen, of all the families of the Earth. What then? One would think he should infer, Therefore I will not punish you; but he says the contrary, Therefor I will. The children of God are punished many and many a time as to temporal punishments, when wicked and ungodly men scape. This poor holy man falls under so sad a fate, while Jeroboam the wickedest wretch upon Earth, that made all Israel to sin, eats and drinks and sleeps, and no hurt comes to him. Some will think that speaks strangely, others will think it speaks as they would have it, in Hos. IV. 14. I will not punish your daughters, when they commit whoredom, nor your spouses when they commit adultery. This is as they would have it; for then they may whore, and drab, and adulterate, and fear no colors. But that is a sad Diapason, Jer. V. ult. What will you do in the end thereof? And that 2 Pet. II. 9. God knoweth how to reserve the unjust to the day of judgment to be punished.

That of the Apostle may state the case on both hands, 1 Cor. XI. 32. When we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the World. When wicked men are not judged, it is a sore sign that they are to be condemned with the World. When God neither judgeth them, nor they judge themselves, there will be a judgment to come will pay for all. For a man to go on uncontrolled in his sinning is the very preface of destruction; and especially if his own conscience do not now and then control him: for that is sometime the whip, wherewith God doth chasten. God saith of some persons, I will not punish, I will not chasten him, when he sins against me, but Let Ephraim alone he is joined to Idols, so let him be. Let the Scribes and Pharisees alone; they are blind leaders of the blind, and let them be so still. Wouldst thou change thy afflicted state with one of these? Wouldst thou part with thy smarting conscience for such • eared, stupid, past feeling souls, and such as God will have nothing to do withal? God hath thee in hand and is chastening thee for thy good, these he hath utterly cast off all care of, and will have nothing to do with.

But what kind of chastening was this to this poor man that it cost him his life, and cut him off, whereas God useth to do good to his people by his chastisements? Heb. XII. 11. No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless afterwards it yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness to them that be exercised thereby. But what fruit was there with this man, when the very chastening was his death? A Jew will tell you that his death did expiate for his sin, and was a means to atone for it; and a Papist will almost be of the same opinion. But God's intention in the dispensing of this providence looked another way, viz. to vindicate his own honor, and to show to the World how tender he is of his own commands. And that is the third thing we may read in this great and dreadful severity, viz.

Thirdly, That God will not abide to have his Commands dallied and trifled withal: that we are not to account that common which he hath sanctified. He is a jealous God, that will not hold him guiltless that breaks his Commandments, Hos. VIII. 12. I have written unto them the great things of my Law. The things of his Law and commands are great things, and what one of them is little, or so to be dealt withal? Though they are one less than another, if compared among themselves, yet none of them are to be reputed little by us. One is less than another in regard of their matter, yet all alike of reverence and dread to us in regard of their Author. A small business you would think for this man, being hungry and weary, to eat and refresh himself in Bethel, and that being invited by another Prophet, and told too by him, that an Angel had commanded him to invite him. But because he had a command from God to the contrary, you see how dear it cost him.

A small thing you would think for Saul to save Agag alive, and to bring away some of the Amalekites cattle, especially when it was to sacrifice to God; yet how severely doth he smart for it, because in it he transgressed God's command to the contrary. How might the poor man have pleaded, as he went to be stoned for gathering sticks on the Sabbath day; Alas! this was not so great a crime to gather a few sticks, especially when I wanted them for the necessity and benefit of my family. But, friend, there is an express command and Word of God against it; the Word of the Lord is sharper than a two edged sword.

That title of the Law is regardable and dreadful, in Deut. XXXIII. 2. From his right hand went a firy Law for them. Or, as it is in the Original, the fire of a Law for them. A Law not only given in fire, as it was in Mount Sinai, but a Law that itself is Fire, to consume and destroy those that transgress it. As our God is a consuming fire, so his Law and Commandment is a consuming fire; Hos. VI. 5. I have hewn them by the Prophets: I have slain them by the words of my mouth. His word is a weapon of slaughter to them that disobey and rebel against it. And whereas it is said, Man shall live by the Word of God, if he obey it; he shall die by the Word of God, if he transgress it. The Commandments of God are edged tools, if slightly meddled withal they cut to the quick; and prove as that stone, if they fall upon one they will grind him to powder. Not one command, but the transgression binds over to eternal condemnation: and therefore it speaks less to say, it binds over to temporal punishment.

Fourthly and lastly, This man's repentance so little a time before his death, as we spake of before, and obtaining pardon, some may chance take hold of, and use it as an argument for puting off repentance till his death bed, and latter end. For may his carnal heart thus argue: if this Prophet repented of his transgression but an hour or two before his death, and obtained pardon; I hope I may do so too, and obtain pardon as well as he. Yes, it is like thou mayest, if thou be like him. He was a holy, a good, a righteous man all his time, only he was now fallen into one transgression a little before his death, and repents of it, and is pardoned. But thou, who thinkest of putting off repentance till thy last time, I doubt, art in another case. He had no sin unrepented of, but only this, that he had just now committed, and that he repented of, and is pardoned. Thou wilt have all thy sins to repent of at thy latter end; and that changeth the case not a little. He walked in the ways of repentance and holiness all his life, thou thinkest not to do so till thy death.

A SERMON Preached upon

I Concluded last day with mention, how God would have none of his Commandments to be dallied and trifled withal, from that dreadful example of the poor Prophet, that broke God's Commandment in eating and drinking in Bethel, being cheated into that transgression by the lie of another Prophet: and yet he escaped not, though his ignorance might something excuse him; but a Lion met him by the way and slew him.

I have chosen these words in the prosecution of that subject: to consider a little upon God's giving his Commands or Laws, and man's too common violating them, and misdemeanor against them. The Law given by the disposition of Angels, but men not keeping it.

The words are the words of Steven, pleading for his life, and answering that charge that his accusers laid against him; of Blasphemy against Moses; for that he had said, That the rites of Moses should be changed: and against the Temple; for that he said, That holy place and City should be destroyed. How he answers particularly to this accusation I shall not trouble you with observing: in the conclusion of his speech he comes to speak home to the persons, both of them that accused him, and of them that sat in judgment upon him. He first calls them all stif-necked, and uncircumcised both in heart and ears. Then he chargeth them all with all resistance of the Holy Ghost, speaking by the mouth of the Prophets: chargeth their Fathers with persecuting and slaying the Prophets, and them with the murder of the great Prophet, Christ: and concludes his speech with the words before us, Who have received the Law by the disposition of Angels, and have not kept it.

In the words is sweet and sower, life and death, light and darkness. Ye received the Law by the disposition of Angels, this is like Ezekiel's book sweet in the mouth: but ye have not kept it, that is in the belly as bitter as gall. In the former clause, you may see Israel before mount Sinai in a happy condition, receiving the Law: in the latter, you may see them a little from it, undoing themselves by making a golden Calf. And to that particular we might very well apply the words. There were thousands of Angels in the Mount, when ye received the Law, but ye so little kept it, that within forty days ye broke the two first Commandments of it, viz. Thou shalt have none other God's before me. And, Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven Image.

But it may be questioned, whether he saying, They received the Law by the Disposition of Angels, means the Angels that were attending God, when he gave the Law at Sinai. True, the Scriptures mention frequently the presence of Angels with God, when he gave the Law. Two only may serve instead of more, Deut. XXXIII. 2. He came with ten thousands of his holy ones, at his right hand was a firy Law for them, Psal. LXVIII. 17. The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of Angels; the Lord is among them, as in Sinai the holy place. But what did the Angels that were there? You read not, nor hear of a word that they spake, but it was the Lord, that spake these words, and said, I am the Lord thy God.

For the understanding therefore of the Martyrs meaning:

First, We may mention a wild conception of the Jews, that say, That all they that heard the Law uttered by God from Mount Sinai, were by that very hearing made like unto the Angels; that they should never have begot children, never grown old, never died, but have been as the Angels, had not that unlucky business of the Golden Calf fallen out, and that turned them to sinful and mortal men again. There is a strange construction in the original Greek, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , which our English renders, By the disposition of Angels; whereas the word in the strictest propriety should be read, Unto the disposition of Angels. As if Steven did rub their own opinion upon them, as is frequently done by the Apostles, and that his meaning should be this, You say and conceive that the very receiving of the Law, did translate and dispose them that heard it into the very predicat and state of Angels, and yet this brave Law you have not kept. The Law that you conceit made others Angels, you have made but dirt; and that that you think had so noble an effect upon them that heard it, hath had no good effect upon you at all; for ye have not kept it.

But this Interpretation I shall not insist upon, though it be very frequent with the Apostles arguing with the Jews, to confute them from their own Opinions and Tenets. I shall name but two to you, 1 Cor. XI. 10. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head, because of the Angels. Where the Apostle argues from their own concessions, practice and custom. And Jude, verse. 9. Yet Michael the Archangel, when contending with the Devil, he disputed about the body of Moses. Not that ever such a dispute was twixt Michael, or Christ, and the Devil about Moses body, but the Jews