Works

A SERMON PREACHED upon

W E have seen Cain 's sin: here we see his strange reward. Cain slew his Brother; God will not have Cain slain. How is this agreeable to that, Chap. IX. 6. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed? How strange this Providence! Abel might have done good, if he had lived, Cain not; yet behold! this contrary Providence, Abel dies, and Cain lives. What would Cain wish more than this, to live and be secure? What would some give for such a Patent? If he live, What Murthers more may he commit? What a discouragement may he be to Righteousness? How may the eye of human reason stand amazed at this providence? We may take up that of Jeremiah, Chap. XII. 1. Righteous art thou, O Lord, when I plead with thee, yet let me talk with thee of thy judgments. Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper? And the words of Habbakkuk, Chap. I. 3, 4. Why dost thou show me iniquity, and cause me to behold grievance? For spoiling and violence are before me; and there are that raise up strife and contention. Therefore the Law is slacked, and judgment doth never go forth: for the wicked doth compass about the righteousness: therefore wrong judgment proceedeth. And, Shall not the Judge of all the world do right? Yet what Righteousness seems in this? We may satisfy ourselves concerning this, by these considerations:

• I. Abel was happier dying, than Cain living. Balaam was a parallel of Cain, justfying this, Numb. XXIII. 10. Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.
• II. The Righteousness of God's providences is not to be judged of only according to outward appearance. God's judgments are a great deep: and the footsteps of them are not known.
• III. The greatest seeming earthly prosperity may be the greatest punishment. In the words we observe this:

That God reserved Cain to long life. But how he managed it, is scrupulous. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 he set a mark upon him. Rab. Solomon saith it was a letter in his forehead: Some say it was a Horn: some, a trembling, that all might know him for a fratricide, for a wretch that murdered his Brother. But this one would think, rather was the way to get him killed. For how could all that met him know God's mind by this mark, (whatever it was) namely, That God would not have him killed? Therefore Ibn Ezra understands it that God gave him a sign, till he believed it, viz. That God would preserve his life. And so it may best be construed. That God set him a sign, lest, &c.

In the fourteenth Verse Cain says, Behold thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth, and from thy face shall I be hid, and I shall be a fugitive and a Vagabond in the earth: and it shall come to pass, that everyone that findeth me shall slay me. It is questioned here, whether Cain begs death, or declines it. If he begs it, God denies him; if he declines it, he hath his desire with a Curse. Hence we gather this Doctrine.

Doubtless Cain was loaden with punishment. Suppose a Council were called what to do with Cain. You would say, Cut him off: God's wisdom and justice saith, Let him live. Long life and prosperity in itself a blessing, but here a prison, a curse; a poison that kills with delight. Consider Cain 's temper, and then consider him banished from the Church, and from the memorials of his duty that God's constant service would give him, turned loose to his lusts, and the councils of his own heart: the longer he lives in this condition, tis not the better, but the worse for him. See verse. 24. Cain was avenged sevenfold. It was a sore judgment, when God said, My Spirit shall not always strive with Man, Gen. VI. 3. I will trouble them no more, Hos. IV. 14. I will not punish your Daughters when they commit Whoredom. It is a great question, Whether is worse, to be cut off in sin, or to be not interrupted in it. A hard choice, as David 's was, when he said, I am in a great strait. For the clearing of this observe these two things.

• I. That sometimes the longsuffering of God to the wicked, is not the goodness of God to them. See 1 Pet. III. 20. Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the Ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water: Compared with Gen. VI. 3. My spirit shall not always strive with Man. God spared the Canaanites, that their measure might be full. Fulfil ye the measure of your Fathers, saith Christ to the Jews, Matth. XXIII. 32. And Psal LXXIII. 4. There are no bands in their death, but their strength is firm. But verse. 19. How are they brought into desolation, as in a moment? they are utterly consumed with terrors. So God tells Pharaoh, I have preserved thee alive, that I might make my power known in thee.
• II. Sometimes God's forbearance to cut off the wicked, is for their punishment: not only when he strikes them with horror, as he did Lamech, but when they prosper. Let Ephraim alone, was Ephraim 's punishment.

The Uses of this Discourse might be these: 1. To Examine, while we live and prosper; whether it be for our punishment. 2. To be jealous of an untroubled condition. 3. This may teach with more patience and cheerfulness to bear the Cross. For as God's suffering men to succeed and prosper is sometimes a judgment, a token of his displeasure; so afflictions and troubles may be signs of his care and good will. 4. Not to envy the prosperity of the wicked. 5. To labor so to live as to be able to give a comfortable account of long life and age.

A SERMON PREACHED upon

T HE first Commandment with threatening, as Paul saith, the first of the second Table was the first with promise, Ephes. VI. And the threatening is most properly affixed to the Command against Idolatry. Because God hath a special enmity and quarrel against Idolatry, as one of the greatest derogations to his honor, that can be in the World.

Observe in the Prophets the great complaint against the people is for Idolatry and unrighteousness. The former the great injury done to God, the later to Men: the former the height of Impiety, the later of Uncharitableness. When man is bound to love his neighbor as himself, to show him mercy, to be helpful to him, and useful to him in all ways of charity; how high an iniquity is it to defraud, undermine, oppress, and deal injuriously with him? And when bound to worship God alone, as the great, dreadful and glorious Creator of Heaven and Earth, and all things in them; how abominable a wickedness is it to give this honor to a piece of wood, a stock or stone of our own framing?

How God detests this, he hath uttered abundantly in Scripture, partly, by proclaiming Idols to be abominable to him: Deut. VII. 25. and XXVII. 15. And by giving them names of the greatest abomination: Vanities, 1 King. XVI. 26. Jer. XIV. 22. Lyes, Esa. XLIV. 20. Jer. X. 14. And so is that to be understood, Rev. XXII. 15. Without are Dogs and Sorcerers, and Whoremongers, and Murderers, and Idolaters, and whosoever loveth, and maketh a lie. Jonah putteth both the names together, Jonah II. 8. They that observe lying vanities. Nay the very name of abomination itself is given them, 1 King. XI. 7. Nay the very name of Devils is given them, Deut. XXXII. 17. 1 Cor. X. 20. And as thus in his word he hath shown his detestation against Idols and Idolatry; so hath he also in his providence, by those fearful judgments that he hath shown against them that have been Idolatrous. Witness Jeroboam and his house: Ahab and his▪ rooted out, and devoured by this deadly canker: themselves, and their posterity undone, according to the threatening here, Visiting the sins of the Fathers upon the children.

It were a wonder, and thing of amazement, that the Church of Rome should ever be so zealous for Images, were it not that there is something more behind the curtains, than is seen. They distinguish betwixt an Image and an Idol; and say, They worship not the Image, but before it only for a memorandum. But to omit the vanity of such a distinction, which hath been abundantly confuted by our Divines, where is their care of that rule of the Apostle, To avoid all appearance of evil? Certainly, if there be not the appearance of Idolatry in worshipping before an Image, what call you the appearance of Idolatry? The Heathen persecutors of old thought their turn served, if they could bring Christians to cast a little incense into the fire before an Idol. Here the Christians might have pleaded, it was not in worship to Idols, but to please their Masters: but they saw in it so much appearance of Idolatry, that they gave up their lives rather, than to consent to such an appearance of evil.

But that that is behind the curtains with the Papists is covetousness, and gain of money. And if it were not that, I make no question, but they would be f • r cooler in pleading for their Images, than they are. It is upon very good reason that the Apostle calls Covetousness Idolatry, for it is not only making money our God, but it is the very Father and Mother of Idolatry. This is it that hath made these men so bold with adoring of Images: so bold as to take away this Commandment against Idolatry out of the Ten, though a Command so needful, so dreadful, and that hath so terrible a threatening with it, For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God.

A Command, that one might wonder at, but that you can never enough wonder at the wickedness of men's hearts.

First, One would wonder that ever such a Command should need: Thou shalt not worship a stock or stone: nor make that thy God, which thine own hands have made. Reason, and light of nature, and common sense one would think, should so cry this down to men that have their wits about them, that there might not any such Command from God be needful. You may see how the Spirit of God does stand as it were wondering at the sottishness of those that make and worship Idols, in Esa. Chap. XL. and three or four Chapters forward. And did you see a Heathen, or do you see a Papist, worshipping and bowing down to the stock of a tree, as he calls it there; whether have you more cause to mourn to see God so dishonored, or to think what a stock, and stupid thing sinful man is become, to pray to, or trust in a piece of wood or stone?

Secondly, One might wonder, that such a Law given should be so broken. A Law so easy to keep, and in so senseless a thing to break it: Of all sins, what easier to avoid, than falling down to the stock of a tree? And yet how were men infatuated with it, as the Heathen and Israel were continually. Who would have thought, that Israel having seen the wonders in Egypt, and the glory of God at Sinai, should ever, especially so suddenly, have worshipped a golden Calf, and said, These are thy God's, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the Land of Egypt?

What monstrous madness, and senselessness is there in this Idolatry? That 1. Whereas God made man, for man to think that he can make a God. 2. Man that can see and hear, and speak and stir, to think that his help should lie in that that can neither see, nor hear, nor speak, nor stir. 3. For a man to fall down before that that he can cast into the fire, water, dirt, and trample under feet, and the Image not able to say, What doest thou? 4. It being in the power of man to make his image in the likeness of man or beast, then when it is made to think it hath power over him, and he to owe homage, and duty, and sacrifice and devotion to it. So brutish, foolish, besotted a thing is man, when left unto himself, and his own wisdom.

And therefore there was need of such a Commandment against such sottishness; and of tyes and terrors added to affrighten men from the folly: as there are two, you see, in the words I have read.

• I. That God proclaims himself a jealous God.
• II. That he professeth, he visiteth the fathers upon the children.

I. It is no wonder God proclaims himself a jealous God in this case, when the love, service and worship, due to him, is given to an Idol, to a piece of wood or stone, silver or gold. Conceive in your hearts, what jealousy is, and you will find it no wonder, he is so in this case, or indeed in any other, where his honor is given away, and bestowed upon any creature. This title is oft given him in Scripture; and if we well consider what jealousy is in man or woman, we will read terror in the tittle, when God giveth it to himself.

He professeth it to be his Name, Exod. XXXIV. 14. The Lord, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God. Read it again, and tremble, The Lord, whose Name is Jealous, is a jealous God. Moses glosses upon it with a gloss of more terror, Deut. IV. 25. The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God. As if he had said, Does any ask, what God's jealousy means? It means a consuming fire. And so the Prophet Zephaniah explains it also, Chap. I. 18. The whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy. And again, Chap III. 8. For all the Earth shall be devoured by the fire of my jealousy. What fire was that, that devoured Sodom, and Gomorrhah? The fire of God's jealousy. What fire was that, that consumed Jerusalem, and laid it in ashes? Was it the fire the Chaldeans put to it at the first sacking of it, and the Romans at the second? No, it was indeed the fire of God's jealousy. What is that that consumeth ungodly men, as stubble; that unquenchable fire, that devoureth the chaff, when God cometh to purge his floor? It is the fire of God's jealousy. The Prophet Nahum doth yet clear it further, Chap. I. 2. God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth and is furious: the Lord will take vengeance of his adversaries, and reserveth wrath for his enemies. The rest of the verse is an exposition of the first clause, God is jealous. What means that? And read the first clause in the Text, I the Lord thy God am a jealous God. What means that? An avenging God, a God that avengeth in fury, that taketh vengeance on his adversaries, and reserveth wrath and vengeance in store for his enemies, and them that hate him.

But that we may view God's jealousy the better, and with the more dread and trembling (and oh! that we could ever feelingly consider, that the Lord our God is a jealous God ) let us first consider the nature of jealousy in men or women, and by that arise to apprehend, what this jealousy is in God.

Zealous and jealous are comprehended under one and the same word in the Hebrew Tongue: and Zealousness and jealousy are uttered in that Language in the very same syllables: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifies both. In those allegations out of Zephaniah, The land shall be devoured 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , by the fire of his jealousy: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , by the fire of my jealousy. Now the same word is used elsewhere in a sense most sweet and comfortable. That whereas it comes in some places like Elias his fire, and earthquake and wind, that rent the Rocks in terror and dreadfulness; in other places it comes like the still voice, in sweetness and comfort. In Esa. IX. 6, 7. Where he is speaking of Christ, his Names and Kingdom, that he should be called Wonderful, Counselor, &c. And that of the increase of his government, and peace there should be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his Kingdom, to order and establish it with judgment and justice from henceforth, ever forever, he concludes, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this. And so Esa. XXXVII. 32. where he promiseth comfortable things to his distressed people, and saith, Out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and concludes 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Zeal of the Lord of Hosts shall do this. And one for all, Esa. LXIII. 15. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Where is thy zeal, thy strength, and the sounding of thy bowels?

In zeal is a fervent tincture of Love. The zeal of thy house hath eaten me up: that is, the fervent Love I have to thy house. And in jealousy is a high tincture of Love. And accordingly Love and Jealousy are joined, and made as one thing, Cant. VIII. 6. In zeal is Love, and forwarding that we are zealous of. In jealousy, Love and anger at that that provokes to jealousy. A man is jealous of his wife, or the wife of her husband; the bottom of it is Love, but the top is Anger. The bottom Love? How? It is said, that jealousy is too much Love. But that rule fails. For a man may be jealous of his wife he loves not. And yet the bottom of jealousy is love. For a man, though he love not the person of his wife, yet he loves to have the affection of his wife entirely to himself: and cannot endure, that her affections, that are due to him, should be given to another, but disdains it, and is angry at it.

By this we may conceive of the jealousy of God, only adding the observation of that expression that is so frequent, viz. God's complaining that his people went a whoring from him, Hos. I. 2. The Land hath committed great whoredom in departing from the Lord: and so went a whoring after other God's. God takes it in anger and disdain, that men should give away those hearts, affections, that love and service, that is due to God, to anything besides God. God doth very oft title the Church of Israel his children, and oft his wife, that he had married to himself, Jer. III. 1. He had taken them for his wife, she had played the harlot with many lovers, yet if she would return, he would take her again. So Hos. III. 1. and in divers other places. And the expression is very proper: for he had forsaken all other Nations, and clave only to her.

I shall not insist to show, how far the parallel fits any Christian Nation, that God hath taken more peculiarly to himself by the administration of his Covenant among them. Nor shall I insist to show how far England may be called the spouse of God, by his choice. It is undeniable that we have all married ourselves to God by our Baptismal Covenant, and by our Sacramental, and other engagements. And then, what doth the Lord require of us, but that we should be faithful to our husband, and not give ourselves, our hearts and affections to anything besides him: not our worship to an Idol, not our affections to the World, our hearts to pleasure or profit, or earthly vanities; which is to go a whoring from our husband? The Lord our God is a jealous God: and what can we expect, if we serve him so, but that his jealousy will break out in fire and vengeance?

By his Law concerning jealousy twixt man and wife, he hath shown thee, O man, what thou mayest expect twixt thee and God, Numb. V. 12. to the end. He appointed that the suspected wife be brought to trial, undertakes to work a miracle for her discovery; and if guilty, upon drinking the bitter waters, her belly was to swell, her thigh to rot, and she to become a curse. And doth not the Lord discover, whether thy heart hath played the whore, and will he not bitterly punish in his own cause, as he did in the cause of men?

But to return to God's jealousy against the sin of Idolatry particularly, as this title of his, that he is a jealous God, is peculiarly affixed to the Command against Idolatry. And here I shall show some particular evidences and instances of God's jealousy against this sin. And I shall name three passages of the Spirit of God in his style in Scripture, by which he doth hint his distaste, and abominating of this sin of Idolatry: and three passages of God in his providence and disposal, that intimate the same: and all such as are not obviously observed by every Reader of Scripture.

First, To mention the passages of the Holy Ghost's style in reference to this sin.

I. Observe, That in 2 Sam. XI. 21. who smote Abimelech the son of Jerubbosheth? Abimelech was the son of Jerubbaal, or Gideon, as you may see, Judge. IX. where you have Abimelech's story. Why then does the Holy Ghost here misname Gideon, and instead of Jerubbaal call him Jerubbosheth? The reason is, because Baal was the general name of an Idol, and the Holy Ghost in detestation of Idolatry changeth the name Baal, which signifieth a Lord, into Bosheth, which signifies Shame. And he calleth Gideon, Jerubbosheth, instead of Jerubbaal, because Gideon had made an Idol, that all Israel went a whoring after, Judge. VIII. 27.

Of the same observation is that, that the son of Saul, whom his father named Eshbaal, the Holy Ghost in his story nameth Ishbosheth. You have a large story of Ishbosheth Saul's son, in 2 Sam. II. Now look among Saul's sons where they be reckoned, and you find no such name; 1 Chron. VIII. 33. Saul begat Jonathan, and Malchishna, and Abinadab, and Eshbaal. That Eshbaal is he, whom the Holy Ghost in his story calls Ishbosheth, as detesting the name Baal, the name of an Idol: changing it into the name Bosheth, shame. As the same Holy Ghost explains himself, and this matter, Jer. XI. 13. According to the number of the streets of Jerusalem, have ye set up Altars to that Shame, even Altars to burn incense to Baal.

II. In reading Revelations, VII. where the Sealed of the Lord of the twelve Tribes are mentioned and numbered, have you observed that the Tribe of Dan is wanting, and the Tribe of Ephraim not named? You will find Manasseh there, but not Ephraim by name, but Joseph instead of Ephraim, verse. 8. And what is the reason of this? Public Idolatry first began in Dan, Judge. XVIII. And the golden Calves were set up by Jeroboam of Ephraim; and the one in Ephraim and the other in Dan. And the Holy Ghost doth point as it were with the finger at those Idolatries, and show his distaste and abhorring of them, when he will not so much as name the names where they began, among the Lord's sealed for salvation.

III. As here mention is made of visiting to the third and fourth generation, observe that passage, Matth. I. 8. and see whether the style of the Holy Ghost do not hint the very same thing: Joram begat Ozias. Now look in the story of the Kings and Chronicles, and you will find, that Joram begat Ahaziah, and Ahaziah Joash, and Joash Amaziah, and Amaziah Ozias. So that here three descents are wanting or dashed out: and Ozias is grand child to Joram in the fifth generation. What is the reason? Look into the story of Joram, and you will find that he married the daughter of Ahab, the great Idolater, and that he walked in the Idolatries of Ahab, 2 King. VIII. 18. And here the Holy Ghost to hint his distaste of such Idolatry, blots out his children to the third, nay fourth generation, out of the Line and Genealogy of our Savior.

These and other things of the like nature, may be observed in the very style and dialect the Holy Ghost useth in Scripture. Whereby he setteth a brand upon Idolatry, and Idols, as things odious, and abominable, and abhorred of God in special manner.

Shall I also give you three like passages of Providence, which it may be all of you have not observed in your reading; which speak the same thing and proclaim the jealousy of God against Idolatry?

I. Observe that Deut. IX. 21. And I took your sin, the Calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, until it was as small as dust, and I cast the dust thereof into the brook, that descended out of the mount. And why all this ado, to burn, stamp, grind it? And why cast the dust into the brook, and not on the earth or into the air? Why not into the dunghill rather than into the water, that the people must drink? By this very thing God would show, that he was a jealous God against Idolatry, by putting the people to the very same trial for this Idolatry, that the wife suspected of Adultery was to be put to by the jealous husband, Numb. V. she was put to drink water and dust, and if she proved guilty, her belly swelled, and her thigh rotted, and so gave plain evidence of her guilt. So in this cases Moses bids the Levites, Exod. XXXII. 13. Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor. Now how could they know who had committed Idolatry among so many hundred thousands? How could they pick out the men that were guilty? Why, the discovery is in the very same way. The people drink the water, in which was the dust of the Calf, and thereupon those that were guilty, their bellies swelled, and some other miraculous evidence was given, whereby they were discovered, and whereby God discovered himself to be a jealous God, visiting the sins of Idolaters.

II. A second passage is that about the battle at Gibeah, Judge. XX. concerning which let us first take up the words of Deborah, Chap. V. 8. (For though the history of that war is set many Chapters after the story of Deborah, yet was it a great while before her, as might be shown by many evidences, if I would stand upon it) They chose new gods, saith she, then was war in the gates; Was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Israel? No sooner Idolatry, but vengeance; no sooner new gods, but war in the gates: and war with a witness, that destroyed forty thousand of Israel, and above twenty thousand of Benjamin.

She speaks but of forty thousand that perished, as if no shield or spear had been among them all, whereas in all there fell sixty five thousand. But she hints the sad slaughter of Israel; which was sent by God, and encouraged by him to go against Benjamin: and yet when they went to battle, they fell forty thousand. Strange! to be sent by God, and yet miscarry: to be encouraged by God, and yet fall! Oh, they had chosen new gods, and thence this miscarriage. The Tribe of Dan had set up Idolatry, and all Israel quiet, and stir not against it, and so become partakers of it. But when a Whore hath some unhansom and hard usage at Gibeah, then all Israel is suddenly up in arms to revenge her quarrel. Zeal for a Whore to revenge her quarrel against Gibeah, but not zeal for the Lord to revenge his quarrel against Idolatry. And therefore God takes the cause into his own hand, and shows himself a jealous God against Idolatry, and caused forty thousand to fall in battle, though he had sent, and encouraged them to it.

III. A third passage let be that, which yet comes more near the Text: nay seems not only to come up to it, but to go beyond it: and that is Exod. XXXII. 34. where after the sin of the golden Calf, and the Levites slaying three thousand men; yet God still hath some anger in store for that sin, and saith, Nevertheless in the day, when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them. When? The Jews say, That in every scourge and judgment that came upon them, there was a remembrance and a lash for the golden Calf. And S. Stephen speaks no less, or more, in Act. VII. 41, 42. They made a Calf in those days, and offered sacrifice unto the Idol, &c. Then God turned and gave them up to worship the host of Heaven, &c. This speaks God a jealous God against Idolatry, and seems to speak, that he visits the sins of the Fathers upon the children beyond the third and fourth generation succeeding. To which thing we shall speak in course in handling of the words. To which now we are come.

II. Then, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, &c. All the question and scruple about the thing is Quo jure. Where is God's justice in this to visit the sins of him that sinned upon him, that sinneth not; sins of the fathers upon the children, who probably were never witting or assenting to the Fathers sin? It is God's strict commandment to men, Deut. XXIV. 16. The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers, but every man shall be put to death for his own sin. And doth not he go contrary to that rule himself, when he visits the sins of the fathers upon the children? And it is his proclaiming again, Ezek. XVIII. 4. Behold all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine, the soul that sinneth it shall die. And doth he not warp from that assertion, when children are punished for the sins of their Fathers?

That God should impute the sin of Adam to all his posterity, hath been cavilled at in ancient times by some Heretics; and in these later some are not well satisfied about the matter, and cannot, or will not see how God is just in it. Visiting sins unto the third and fourth generation sounds something harsh, this far more; visiting the sin of the first Father upon all generations. Shall he condemn millions of millions for the fault they never committed, charge upon them the crime they never consented to? I shall not stay my discourse upon this. The answer is ready: in Adam was all mankind: in his Covenant was enwrapped all human nature: and the violation of that Covenant was the sin and guilt of whole human nature.

But we shall speak to other kind of examples, that come nearer to the sense of the words before us. And these are of two sorts, viz. in reference to the body or outward condition, or to the soul, or inward.

First, Was not that hard measure, as you may think, that when Corah, Dathan and Abiram, the Parents only had sinned, that not only they should go down quick into the pit, but their houses also, and all that appertained to them? Numb. XVI. 32. The like, that when Achan only was in the transgression, that his sons and daughters, and his very cattle should be put to death, as well as he? Josh. VII. 24.

Secondly, Seems it not hard measure, that when that generation at the building of Babel had only sinned against God in that design for setting up Idolatry, that not only they should be given up to Idolatry, and blindness; but the Heathen, their posterity, to scores of generations? The like, that when that generation only had sinned in murthering Christ, not only they should bear the guilt of his blood, but their posterity through so many ages.

For the unfolding of God's dealings in these things particularly, let me first move this general consideration.

What care Parents had need to take, that they sin not so, as to leave sin and guilt and a curse upon their children, and posterity. Among their cares to leave them well, as the word in the world goes, i. e. rich, to be sure to take this care, that while they leave them well, they leave them not ill. Sin not for thy children's sake, that they smart not for thy faults, when thou art gone. I mention two sins particularly that may draw misery, and entail a curse upon the posterity, cursing their children, and unconscionably scraping a cursed estate together to leave to their children.

Now to assert the Justice of God in this case of visiting the iniquity of the fathers, &c. either for these sins or others: whereas it seems a wrong to the children. Consider these things.

• I. It is most just with God to punish wicked men in their dearest delights, that judgment may come home to them to the quick: to take away the delight of their Eyes and Heart, that punishment may make them smart in the tenderest part. And when Parents are so fond of that part of themselves, their children, that they will venture soul and body and all to Hell for the advancement of their children, is it any injustice in God to lash them in that part, that is most tender and delicate to them?
• II. I might speak, that it appertains to divine justice in special manner to frustrate the designs of ungodly men, and to have them in derision, and to show that they are but fools. To take the wise in their craftiness, and to bring their deep plotted counsels and devises to naught. How frequently doth Scripture harp upon this string? Do I need to cite places, Job V. 12, 13. He disappointeth the devices of the crafty, &c. He taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong, Luke I. 51. He scattereth the proud, saith the holy Virgin: as if she pointed at the proud design of building Babel, which the Lord blasted: and scattered these proud plotters into all quarters of the Earth. Places to this purpose are abundant.

Now when an unconscionable Gripe lays his design deep, by all means right or wrong, (he cares not) to advance his posterity, and to build them up an house, though in blood and injury; and accounts all cocksure: that divine Eye and Justice that sits in Heaven, laughs at his designs, and hath his Councils in derision. The man saith, I will lay land to land, and house to house, and my children shall be great, and rich and prosperous in the World, and I will build up a family of renown. But divine Justice saith, I will dash such confidence, and lay such unjust and unconscionable undertakings in the dust; that men may know, that there is a God, and that he is righteous, that judgeth the Earth. Arise, Lord, let not such men prevail; let such heathenish contrivers be judged in thy sight.

But all this while, still the objection lies: That this is indeed justice to the Father, but where is justice to the Son, who sinned not, nor was partaker in his Fathers wickedness?

For answer to which, we must first take up the last word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 of them that hate me. But who are meant, Parents or Children? Nay, who are those that hate God? Question the World through, and there is not a man upon Earth, but he will deny and disclaim this. But surely the Scripture speaks not in vain, when it speaks so much of the haters of God, as it doth. That ungodly men are meant, there is no doubt, and in what sense they are said to hate God, we may take occasion to speak hereafter. Our present question is, when it speaks of them, that hate him, whether he means Parents or Children, or both? I may very truly answer, both. And the meaning ariseth to this, Visiting the sins of the Fathers, that hate God upon the Children that hate God: of wicked Parents upon wicked Children.

Observe the contrary clause, Showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me. Where first, we may see some answer to the question just now moved, who are haters of God? viz. They that love him not; for there is no medium. The opposites are not, that love him, and love him not; but that love him, and hate him. They that love him not, hate him. Secondly, That which we would observe is, That his showing mercy to thousands of them that love him, implies that everyone loves him, that partakes of mercy. So Visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the Children unto the third and fourth generation, implies that every generation hates him, that is so visited, viz. when Children imitate the wickedness of their Parents. And so God states the point, Ezek. XVIII. First, He begins with a righteous man, verse. 5. and speaks of the particulars of his godliness, hath not eaten upon the Mountains, &c. and concludes, He is just, he shall live, verse. 9. Then at verse. 10. he proposeth the case, that if such a good man beget a bad son, a robber, a shedder of blood, &c. And of him he concludes, He shall surely die, and his blood shall be upon him, verse. 13. Then at verse. 14. he proposeth the case of that wicked man's son, that is not wicked like the father, that seeth all his Fathers sins, which he hath done, and considereth, and doth not such like, &c. He concludes, verse. 17. He shall not die for the iniquity of his Father, he shall surely live. His Fathers sins shall not be visited on him, if he follow not his Fathers iniquity, verse. 20. The soul that sinneth shall die, the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.

So that first, no son is damned for the iniquity of his father, (we speak not of the guilt of Adams sin charged on his posterity, which is another case) but everyone that is damned, is damned for his own sin. For so I take the word Dye in the Prophet, He shall die his blood shall be upon him. A good son to be damned for the sin of a bad father, were to speak the ways of God very unequal indeed; and God contradicts that all along the Chapter. Nay a bad son is not damned for the sin of his father neither: nor does any such thing fall under the notion of God's visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children. Because everyone that is damned, is damned for his own sin.

And secondly, God visiteth not the sin of the fathers upon the Souls of the children. God never made a Soul sinful, because his father was wicked. Nay God never made, or could make any Soul sinful, because he cannot be the Author of sin. Nay God never accounted a child wicked, because his father was wicked. For thus Hezekiah had been undone, the good child of Ahaz as wicked a father, as who was most wicked. We spake of the Heathen given up to Idolatry, because of the first rebellion at Babel; and the Jews given up to blindness, because of the murder of Christ. But neither damned, nor accounted wicked any Heathen or Jews, that walked not in the same steps of those their wicked Predecessors in their blindness, Idolatry or Unbelief, or other sins. So that

Thirdly, God's visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, &c. means by some bodily or external punishment. Whereby the son is punished for his own sins, as well as his Parents. And the meaning of the passage is, that when God comes to visit the sins of wicked children upon them, he remembers the iniquity of their Parents also against them, even in the third or fourth generation.

Shall I give you an instance in the sins of a good father so visited upon wicked children, which may clear the visiting of the sins of a bad father upon wicked children? God had told David, that because of his killing Uriah with the sword, that the sword should never depart from his house, 2 Sam. XII. 10. So his son Amnon perished by the sword, his son Adonijah by the sword, and his son Absalom in as violent a manner. Did not God remember David's sin, and his own threatening in this? And yet did not all these perish for their own sins? God visited their sin, and withal remembered their fathers sin against them also. God damned none of them for David's sin. Nor did God repute them sinful for David's sin: but if they were damned, they were damned for their own sin, and were reputed sinners in the sight of God for their own sin. Yet in the external punishment that fell upon them, there was a remembrance of their Fathers sin also. Hophni and Phinehas perished together in battle: their fathers sin was visited upon them, which he is charged with 1 Sam. II. 29. That he honored his sons more than God. And yet they perished for their own sin. If they were damned, they were damned for their own sin, and not their fathers: and were reputed wicked in the sight of God for their own sin, and not their fathers. And yet in the external punishment that fell upon them, their fathers sin was called to remembrance.

Objection, But many a child is punished for his fathers sin, that it may be is a good child; or at least is free and innocent from the sin of his father. Jeroboams son was taken away in his prime, 1 King. XIV. was not that for Jeroboams sin, that God cut off his child: and he a good son, and that had not consented to his fathers sin, verse. 13. In him there is sound some good thing towards the Lord God of Israel? Here was justice indeed against the father, but where was it to the son, to cut him off so soon? So David's child begot in adultery must die for David's sin, and what had the poor child offended? Many first born in Egypt, it is like, were not guilty of their fathers cruelty towards Israel, and yet they must all go to it, they must die.

It may be, many a covetous unconscionable wretch hath a son that is more honest, and yet the ill gotten estate moulders away, and comes to nothing with an invisible canker. Is here justice to the children, to smart thus for their fathers fault?

To this I answer, First, We are to consider children as part of their Parents; bone of their bone, and flesh of their flesh. And is it not justice in God to punish wicked Parents in what part of themselves he pleaseth? It seems as lawful as for a King to punish a Traitor in what part of his body, head or hand or foot, it seems best to him. If Jeroboams hand wither for the sin of his whole Person, is it not just with God? And is it not a penalty upon the whole person? And upon this account it was not unjust with God, when David had sinned in numbering the people, to smite seventy thousand of the people; if you consider David as a general father to all the people; they part of him, as he was King, as being part of his Kingdom.

And such an answer, if I had not other to give, should I give to an Anabaptist, that asks me, why I baptize my child? I should answer, he is part of myself, and so it is fit he be baptized, because I am: otherwise all of myself is not baptized. And this gives some reason of what the Apostle saith, That the child of a believing Father or Mother is holy, that is, is a Christian, for the believing Parents sake; because he is part of that Parent.

Secondly, There are some punishments, that descend, as I may say, naturally from Parents to Children: nay I may say, some sins that descend so naturally, that God should invert the very course of nature, if they stuck not to the children. Original sin and guilt we derive not from our immediate Parents, but from our first Parent Adam: but some actual sins many children derive from their Parents. When Parents from their children's infancy let them run into lewd courses; and either give them example of such courses, or at least reprove and restrain them not; the children grow lewd and wicked. Whose sin is that lewdness? It is the child's: but it is the Parents also. And many a Parent sees the just punishment of his own fault upon himself in the miscarriage of his child, his coming to fearful wickedness, and very oft to a fearful end. Elias lenity to his wretched sons, in not restraining them, and so David's to Adonijah; did traduce and derive that sinful miscarriage into them. And God even visited that sin of the Parents upon the children in suffering them to grow so abominably sinful.

Many a Parent is guilty of this, and yet little considers it. When their children prove debauched, wild, riotous, they, it may be, will fret to see their expensive and destructive courses. But let them reflect upon themselves, and consider whether their children derive not that wickedness either from their Example, or want of care for their Christian education. Is it any injustice in God, when Parents will have their children so brought up in wickedness, to let them be wicked: any injustice either to Parents or children, that it is so, when children will be so wicked, and Parents will let them be so?

So some punishments descend naturally from the sin of the Parent: as when children are made beggars by the riot, prodigal, lewd courses of the Parents; when a whoring lewd Parent gets the foul disease, and so traduceth it to his children; when an unconscionable getter of an Estate leaves it to his children, that like a Leprosy, a Canker, and a Curse sticks to it; and it cannot but rot and come to nothing. What should the justice of God do in this case? Bless a cursed Estate, preserve Children, that the Parents will infect, and keep them from beggary, whom Parents will make beggars? Shall God work miracles for these, that only work rebellion; and change the very course of the nature of things for them that will not change one lust?

Thirdly, We are to distinguish between punishments and trials. A good son of a bad father, may come into affliction because of his fathers sin: and yet that laid upon him not directly as a punishment, but trial. A good child of a prodigal, riotous or unconscionable father may come to poverty, when God aims it not as a judgment on him for his fathers sin, but for trial, and admonition to him against such sins. The father indeed is so punished, when his child comes to misery: but the affliction in the mean time is to the child for his good. The cutting off of Jeroboams son was a sad judgment to Jeroboam, because the only hopeful child he had was so taken away, but it was not intended as a punishment to his child, but in mercy to take him away from wrath to come: As in Esa. LVII. 1. The righteous are taken away from the evil to come.

Fourthly, and lastly, The proper meaning is, God visits upon evil children the sins of their fathers unto the third and fourth generation.

This leaves a lesson to Parents: That they would pity their children; and when they sin, think of them; and of the misery they entail upon them.

A SERMON PREACHED upon

T HE greatest obscurity we have to speak about is in the last clause, He hallowed it: and yet at first sight that seems least obscure of all. The two former clauses may rather, one would think, set us at a stand; and yet the great dispute is about the last: viz. in regard of that Sabbath we now celebrate. When we look upon the world, it may set us at a wonder, that this vast bulk of all things should be made in six days. Heaven and Earth and Seas in six days? How many houses in the world have cost the work of six years? Solomon was building the Temple seven years, and his own house twenty years: and this great Universe and all things in it to be built in six days?

And yet if we look at the power of him that made it, we have as much cause to wonder, that he should be six days about it. He that made all things by his word, could have done it in one moment as well as six days, and with one word as well as six. And he that made all things of nothing could also have made all things in no length of time, but in an instant, in a moment of time, in the twinkling of an eye, as he will change all things, 1 Cor. XV. 52.

And so concerning his resting, If he were weary with working, that he needed resting, why did he work till he was weary? And if he were not weary, why had he need to rest?

Such frivolous, impious and Atheistical Disputes may flesh and blood and carnal reason move about the actings of God, that hath not learned to resolve all his wonderful actings into these two great principles, his Power and Will. That he created all things with the word of his mouth of nothing, is no scruple, if we resolve it into his Power. And that he took six days to do it, who could have done it in a moment, is as little, if we resolve it into his Will. That he was not weary with doing so great a work, it is no scruple, if we resolve it into his Power. And that he rested, though he were not weary, is as little, if we resolve it into his Will.

And therefore how can we better begin our discourse about the matter we are upon, viz. his creating all things by his word, and yet taking six days to do it: and his not being weary with so great a work, and yet resting, though he were not weary; than by adoration of his Power and Will? And therefore as David for all his hast of fleeing from Absalom, yet when he came to the top of the Mount Olivet, he worshipped God, 2 Sam. XV. 32. So let us make so much a stop in the current of our discourse, as to give the Lord his due of his power and pleasure, before we go further. And that let us do in the words, and Oh! that we might ever do it in the devotion of the four and twenty Elders, Revel. IV. 11. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power, for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

All Israel hears more Divinity and Philosophy in these few words, In six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth, and rested the seventh day, &c. than all the great wisdom and philosophy of the Heathen was able to spell out in a thousand years. Some of them were so wide from knowing that the world was made by God, that they thought it was never made at all, but was Eternal, and never had beginning. Others, that it was a God itself, and made itself. Others, that it grew together at hap hazard of Atoms, or motes flying up and down, which at last met and conjoined in this fabric of the world, which we behold. So blind is sinful man to the knowledge of his Creator, if he have no better eyes and light to look after him by, than his own. Israel hath a Divine light here held out before them, whereby they see and learn in these few words, That the World was not Eternal, but had a beginning, and that it was made; and that it made not itself, but was made by God; that it was not jumbled together by hap hazard of I know not What, and I know not How, but that God made it in six days.

That which God speaks so short here, Moses afterward, when he set pen to paper to write his books, enlarges upon, and tells you, in the beginning of Genesis, in what manner God proceeded in this great work, and what he created every day. With that you see the Bible begins the story of the Creation: the proper foundation, that every Scholar should say of his learning there, namely to know his Creator: and to know of whom, and through whom are all things, to whom be glory forever Amen, as the Apostle devoutly, Rom. XI. 36.

Let us consider the two things severally, That God made Heaven and Earth; and secondly, That he made them in six days.

When I look up to Heaven the work of thy fingers, the Moon and Stars, which thou hast ordained, I say, saith David, What is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man, that thou visitest him? We may also say upon such a prospect, Oh! what is God, what a divine and infinite power and wisdom and glory, that made so great, so beautiful, so stately a fabric! Our God made the Heavens, is the Israelites plea against the God's of the Heathen, pitiful pieces of wood and stone, that could neither see nor hear, nor smell, nor stir, but Our God made the Heavens. There is a passage very remarkable, Jer. X. 11. Thus shall ye say to them, the God's that have not made the Heavens and the Earth, even they shall perish from the earth, and from under these Heavens. That verse is in the Chaldee Tongue, whereas every clause of his book besides is Hebrew, and not a Syllable of Chaldee in it. And what is the reason? The people were ere long to be captived into Chaldea, and when they came there the Chaldees would be ready to be persuading them to worship their God's. Poor Israel new come thither could not speak their Language, nor dispute the case with them in their own Tongue. Therefore the Lord by the Prophet puts so much Chaldee into their mouths, as to make a profession of their own God, and to deride and curse the others. Your God's made not Heaven and Earth, and therefore shall perish from the Earth and be confounded; but Our God made the Heavens.

O! what an excellent study is it, to study God as the great Maker of Earth and Heaven to look seriously upon this great Fabric, the Variety, Order, Beauty of the Creatures; and deeply to think, what kind of thing is God, that made all these things with the word of his mouth. How great, dreadful, terrible is the Creator, with whom we have to do! Study upon the first verse of Genesis, God created the Heavens and the Earth. And can you find it otherwise there, than that he did that in a moment; that in an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, he made these two parts of the world, Center and Circumference; spread out this great Canopy over us like a Curtain, and hung this vast Ball, upon which we tread, upon nothing; both at once, and both in a moment? Oh! what an amazing power is here to think of! Oh! what a God have we to deal withal! How can this God crush a sinner, check the pride and presumption of wicked dust and ashes, when he can do such wondrous and incomprehensible things as these? How can this God create comforts to a poor afflicted child of his own? How can he find out means to deliver and relieve a poor distressed Saint, that puts his trust in him, when with a word he can make a world; nay, if he had pleased, could have made a thousand?

Such use and other, might we make of the study of our Creator, and his creating. And O! that he that created us, and all things, would create in us frequent, solid meditations of him, and of his mighty power, and working, whereby he made all things of nothing.

It was once questioned by one, What did God before he made the world? And answered by another, He created Hell for curious and impertinent inquirers. It was once asked by another, With what instruments, tools, and engines did God make the world, if he made it? His own Spirit gives answer to this, By the word of the Lord the Heavens were made, &c. But we may not unusefully, and unchristianly move this question, Wherefore was it, that God made the world? The Scripture answers this too, Prov. XVI. 4. The Lord hath made all things for himself. Rev. IV. 11. For thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are, and were created. But this leaves us to our inquiring still: viz. In what sense to understand his making all things for himself, and what his Will and pleasure aimed at? Did God create Creatures, because he had need of Creatures? Did he make the Heavens, because he wanted a House for himself? And the Earth, because he could not be without Tenants in those tenements below?

And the nail of this question might be driven further: why did he make this world, seeing he will mar it in time, and bring it to desolation? Why made he millions of men, whose end proves to be damned forever? Had it not been as good, this house of the Universe had never been; as to be built, and to be fired, and burnt down again? Had it not been better for millions, that they had never been born, than to be born, and brought into the world for a little time, and then to be damned to Eternity?

But, O vain man, who art thou that disputest against God? Shall the pot or vessel say to him, that made it, why madest thou me thus, or why at all? For his will and pleasure were all things made: and it is not fit to dispute his will or pleasure, that could make all things. But that we may receive satisfaction in this point, and that we may not be ignorant of so great a matter, as the reason why God made the world,

First, we may resolve it without any sticking, that he that created all things, stood in need of nothing; and that gave being to all, needed not anything from the Creature to amend his own well-being. That is a most just challenge of all the world, if it can, to show that God is beholden to any, or had ever need of any: the Apostle makes it, Rom. XI. 35, 36. Who hath been the Lord's Counselor to teach him, or who hath first given to him, &c. But

Secondly, We may give him that for a proper and direct reason of God's creating all things, which the Apostle says, Rom. IX. 23. That he might make known the riches of his glory: viz. That he might glorify himself, and that he might impart of his own riches to his Creature.

It might almost be questioned, whether God could choose but create the world: not to put a necessity, or compulsion upon God, who doth freely whatever he doth, and hath no other tie upon him for his actings than his own Will. But in regard of that infinite goodness that is in God, could that do other than flow out upon the Creature? God from all Eternity dwelt in and with himself, blessed, ever blessed in the enjoyment of himself, and needed nothing beside himself. But could that infinite Ocean of goodness, that was in him, be kept within those bounds of self enjoyment, and not communicate itself to the Creature? A lively, full, flowing fountain cannot contain its ever-flowing waters within its own brims, but it must flow out to refresh and water the places that are about it; The Sun cannot keep its light and heat within itself, but must impart it to the world.

We shall not impose any such necessity upon God, as he hath done upon these Creatures. And yet if we should say, God the everlasting fountain of Being, of Goodness, could not but impart Being, and his Goodness to Creatures; this would speak no imperfection in God, but his infinite perfection. But we will take the thing up in terms of Scripture. He was willing to make known his goodness; it was his pleasure to create the world, that he might communicate the riches of his glory. God would give being to Creatures, that he might glorify his own being; would communicate of his goodness to his Creatures, that he might glorify his own goodness. So all terminates and centers in that great end, his own glory. He created the world to glorify his power: gave being to Creatures that he might glorify his own being: shows goodness to them, that he may glorify his own goodness, and receive glorifying from them. And at last, will destroy the world to glorify his power and justice: damn the wicked to glorify his truth and justice, and glorify his Saints to glorify his grace. So that God made all things for himself, that is for his own glory: doth all things for his own glory: created thee, me, and all flesh, that he might reap glory from us.

But let us consider of the second thing, as it tends to the End of this Command, the setting forth the reason of the Institution of the Sabbath; That he created all things in six days.

And what needed he take six days, that could have done all in a moment? He had as little need to take time for his work, as he had of the world, he being Lord of all. What reason can we give? but that he by his own proceeding and acting would set the clock of time, and measure out days, and a week, by which all time is measured, by his own standard, Evening and Morning, to make a natural day, i. e. day and night: and seven natural days to make a week; six days of labor, the seventh for rest, six for man, the seventh for God.

Shall we trace the story of the six days a little, that we may the more plainly observe the Rest, and blessing of the Sabbath, when it came?

That the world was made at Aequinox, all grant, but differ at which, whether about the eleventh of March, or twelfth of September; to me in September without all doubt. All things were created in their ripeness and maturity: Appels ripe, and ready to eat, as is too sadly plain in Adam and Eves eating the forbidden Fruit. To this we might add that God attributed the beginning of the year to March, upon Ecclesiastical account, upon their coming out of Egypt. Exod. XII. Which argues it had begun from some time else before. And so the Jews well observe, that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 The beginning of the year for telling the year, it from September: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 The beginning of the year for stating of the feasts, is from March. See Exod. XXIII. 16. The feast of in-gathering in the end of the year. After which a new year was presently to begin, when they had gathered in grapes, &c.

So that look at the first day of the Creation, God made Heaven and Earth in a moment. The Heaven, as soon as created, moved, and the wheel of time began to go. And thus for twelve hours there was universal darkness. This is called the Evening, meaning Night. Then God said, Let there be Light, and light arose in the East, and in twelve hours more was carried over the Hemisphere: and this is called Morning, or Day. And the Evening and Morning made the first natural days; twelve hours darkness, and twelve light.

Accordingly did God proceed in the works of the six days, as Moses hath informed us at large; which I shall not insist upon, but come to the works of the sixth day. On that day God created creeping things, and beasts, and lastly man. And that which is needful to observe towards the Lord's resting, and sanctifying the seventh day, is, that before the seventh day came, sin was come into the world, and Christ was promised.

On the sixth day all was marred again. Before that day was ended sin was got into the world, and spoiled the best of the Creation of God, Men, and some Angels. This we have to speak to, wich giveth some illustration concerning the institution of the Sabbath of the seventh day.

That Adam fell on the very day that he was created, needs not so much dispute about, for it is easy to be proved, as it needs sorrow and wonder, Wonder, that he placed in so incomparable happiness, and having perfect power to continue in it, should set so light by that happiness, as to pass it off for an Apple, and that he should lose that happiness on his first day, when he was able to have kept it all his days. And Sorrow, that the noblest of natures, that God had created, should be so soon overthrown, and overthrown so sorely.

For proof of this, we may have recourse to Scripture, to Reason, and to the Correspondence that was twixt the Fall and the Redemption.

I. To prove it by Scripture.

First, Observe that, Psal. XLIX. 12. Nevertheless man being in honor abideth not, but is like the beasts that perish. The Psalmist in the verse before shows the carnal confidence of worldly men: Their inward thought is, that their houses shall continue forever, and their dwelling places to all generations, &c. And in this verse he shows, how vain such confidences are. For that man hath no abiding here in his house, or honor, but he must away. And he lays it down not only as a thing undoubted in itself in the words that you have before you in your English Bibles: but in the Original he includes the most proof of it, that could be produced. For in the Original the words speak literally thus, Adam in honor lodged not all night, but was flitted out of his honor before his first night came. And if it were so with him in his great honor, and in his great ability to have stood and remained in his honor, it is much more so with man, that is become sinful, mortal, and nothing but fading. I say, the words in the Original bear also this sense, that Adam in honor lodged not all night. And so they speak and prove the thing we are upon, that he • ell and faded on the very day he was created; and lost his honor and happiness before night came.

Secondly, Observe that, Joh. VIII. 44. He was a murderer from the beginning. The Syriac renders it from in the beginning; the common phrase whereby the Jewish Nation expressed the days of Creation. So is it their common expression, whereby they denote the works of the Creation, to call them 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 the works in the beginning. And the Jews that stood by and heard Christ speak these words, He was a murderer from the beginning, could not otherwise understand it, than that he was a murderer even from the days of the Creation, that he murdered Adam on the very day that he was created. And so Christ meant in the words, as speaking according to the common and familiar Language of the Nation. For

II. To clear this by Reason, which the Scripture thus hinteth.

First, It is without all question, that the Devil would slack no time, but as he was fallen himself through his spite and malice at the happiness and honor of Adam; so he would hasten all he could, to bring him out of his happiness and honor, which he so much spited and maliced.

It is disputed what day the Angels were created. It is the most probable they were created the first day with the Heavens: and that they were spectators of God's works in the creation, and praised and magnified the Lord for his works all along; so God himself the great Creator tells us, Job. XXXVIII. 4, 5, 6, 7. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth, &c. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest, or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened, or who laid th • corner stone thereof? When the morning Stars sung together, and all the Sons of God shooted for joy. By Stars, and Sons of God is plainly meant the Angels: and they are singing and shouting, when God lays the foundations of the earth; as they did at the laying the foundation of the Temple, Ezra, III. Now the foundation of the earth was laid in the first day, the first work of the Creation: when God in one and the same instant created Heaven and Earth, and in the same instant created the Angels with the Heavens.

Now these Angels that fell, were not fallen doubtless before man was made. For upon creating of Man, who was the last of the Creation, it is said, Gen. I. 31. And God saw everything, that he had made, and behold it was very good: and there was yet nothing bad or evil in the world, no Angels fallen, no sin at all. But when those that fell saw the dignity and honor and happiness, that God had placed man in, a piece of clay, a lump of earth, dust of the ground; and that he put all Creatures under his feet, as it is Psal. VIII. 5, 6. yea and gave Angels charge to attend him, as it is, Psal. XCI. 11: They maliced this happiness and honor, and scorned this service and attendance; and damned themselves merely upon this spite at Man.

Would they therefore, think you, delay any time of tempting man, to try whether they could shake him out of his happiness and honor, and bring him into the same condemnation with themselves? No, the Devil never since slacked time, and put off any opportunities of doing mischief, much less would he then, when he had mischieved himself with such a spleen.

Secondly, I might speak of divers things. As that if Adam had kept the Sabbath in innocence, he had kept the Law; that if he had continued any time without sin, he had begot Cain without sin: if Eve had been a little practiced in obedience, she had not so soon been shaken, when she came to be tried: that their speech showeth, that no fruit had been eaten before. But that which is especially considerable is, that the Redemption was to be shown instantly upon the Creation. Since Christ was to be set up Lord of all, the Savior of all that are saved, and the second Adam repairer of the ruins of the first; it was not only fit, but indeed needful, that he should be proclaimed King and Savior even the first day of man.

I do not say, it was needful that Adam should fall on his first day, that Christ might be proclaimed on his first day: and yet I say, it was needful that Christ should be proclaimed that day, viz. that he might be set up Lord of all men from the first day of man. But especially, that what stability or firmness there is in obedience and holiness, it might be founded in Christ alone. I could almost say, it was needful, that Adam should fall on the day of his Creation, not in regard of any necessity God put upon him, but in regard of the • ickleness of created nature, being left to itself. When I say, it was almost needful, I mean almost inevitable, but that he, left entirely to himself, and to his own strength, should stand the temptation of an Angel, a Creature so far above him by nature, and so far wiser than he, though he were full of wisdom. And you see Satan did not so much tempt his strength, as his wisdom; and there he overturns him by a trick of subtility, out-witting his wisdom.

However it was fit the Redeemer should be held forth, even the first day of man, as the heir of all things, Heb. I. 2. as the root of all to be saved, and the sure foundation of all holiness, grace and eternal life. And

III. Do but observe what correspondence there is twixt the Fall and Redemption; and the later will speak the former to have been on Adams first day. Redemption was wrought on the sixth day, as the Fall had been on the sixth day. And when Christ had wrought that great work, he rested the seventh day in his grave, as God rested on the seventh day, when he had wrought the great work of Creation. To this purpose I might also apply the particular times of the one, and the other. About the third hour, the hour afterwards of sacrifice and prayer, it is very probable Adam was created. And Mark tells you, Chap. XV. 25. And it was the third hour, when they crucified him; that is, when they delivered him up to Pilate to be crucified. About the sixth hour, or high noon, Adam most probably fell, as that being the time of eating. And John tells you, Chap. XIX. 14. that about the sixth hour he was condemned, and led away to be crucified. And about the ninth hour, or three a clock afternoon Christ was promised, which Moses calls the cool of the day: and about the ninth hour Christ cried out with a loud voice, and gave up the Ghost. Such Harmony may be found betwixt the day and hours of the one and of the other: the later helping to prove and clear, that Adam fell on the sixth day, the day on which he was created, and continued not in honor all night.

Ah! what a glassy brittle thing is poor human nature, when it is so shaken all to pieces from so great perfection, that it holds not whole above three hours, or thereabouts? And that it held whole so long, was because it had not yet met with a temptation. And that Satan offered not a temptation all that while, was because he would hold off till they came to their time of eating; and their first meal proves their poison. But Ah! the glorious and divine power of the grace of the Lord Jesus, that enables a poor sinful Soul to hold out against the shocks of all the temptation of Hell, and to break through all, and to get to glory. Compare Adam shaken with the first temptation the Devil offers, with Job not shaken with all that the Devil could do; and to the praise of the glory of his grace, as it is said, Ephes. I. 6. we have cause to cry out all our lives, and so do Saints in glory to eternity, Great is the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now read the words carrying this that hath been spoken in your minds, In six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth, the Sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore God blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it. And on the sixth day Adam fell, and Christ was promised: and on the Seventh day God rested, and blessed the Sabbath day, &c. And so the Chaldee Translater of the Psalms considers of the thing. For upon Psalm. XCII. which is entitled for the Sabbath day, he saith thus, A Psalm or Song, which Adam the first man sung concerning the Sabbath day. And the same Chaldee Translater on Cant. I. yet more plainly: When Adam saw that his sin was forgiven, when the Sabbath came, he sung a Psalm, as it is said, A Psalm or Song for the Sabbath day.

And now looking on this first week of the world in this prospect, viz. as sin come into the world, and Christ promised before the seventh day came, it will give us a clearer prospect of the Sabbath, and of God's resting, viz.

I. That God had created a new creation, before he rested on the Sabbath. For when Adam and mankind, by his fall, was shattered all to pieces, and the noblest Creature, to whom God put all other Creatures in subjection, was himself become like the beasts that perish, the beasts that were put in subjection to him: and when Satan the enemy of God, as well as man, had thus broke all to pieces the chief work-manship of God; here the world was marred as soon as made. And as God in six days made Heaven and Earth, and all things therein, so before the sixth day went out, Satan had marred and destroyed him, for whom all these things were created.

God therefore coming in with the promise of Christ, who should destroy Satan, that had destroyed all; and having now created a new world of grace, and brought in a second Adam, the root of all were to be saved; and having restored Adam, that not only from his lost condition, but into a better condition, than he was in before, as having engrafted him, and all believers into Christ, a surer foundation, than natural perfection, which he had by Creation, but had now lost: then he rested, as having wrought a greater work, than the Creation of nature.

But then you will say, that the first Sabbath was of Evangelical institution, not of moral: that then the law for keeping of it was not written in Adams heart, but was of Evangelical revelation.

I may answer truly, that it was both. For though Adam had not sinned, yet must he have kept the Sabbath. And to this purpose it is observable, that the institution of the Sabbath is mentioned, Gen. II. before the fall of Adam is mentioned, Gen. III. partly because the Holy Ghost would mention all the seven days of the first week together, and partly to intimate to us, that even in innocence there must have been a Sabbath kept; a Sabbath kept, if Adam had continued in innocence: and in that regard the Law of it to him was Moral, and written in his heart, as all the Laws of piety towards God were. It is said, Gen. II. 15. The Lord God took the man, and put him into the Garden of Eden to dress and keep it. Now if Adam had continued in innocence, do you think he must have been at work dressing and keeping the Garden on the Sabbath day, as on the other six? He had God's own copy so laid before him of working six days, and resting the seventh, that he could not but see, that it was laid before him for his Example.

But you will say, All the Moral Law was written in Adams heart, as soon as he was created: now the Law to keep the Sabbath could not be, because the Sabbath was not yet created, nor come. And by then the Sabbath came, the Law in his heart was blurred by sin and his fall.

I answer, The Law writ in Adams heart was not particularly every Command of the two Tables, written as they were in two Tables line by line: but this Law in general of piety and love toward God, and of justice and love towards our neighbor. And in these lay couched a Law to all particulars, that concerned either; to branch forth as occasion for the practice of them should arise. As in our natural corruption brought in by sin, there is couched every sin whatsoever too ready to bud forth, when occasion is offered. So in the Law in his heart of piety towards God, was comprehended the practice of everything, that concerned love and piety towards God, as occasion for the practice was offered. Under this Law was couched a tie and Law to obey God in everything he should command. And so though the command, Eat not of the forbidden fruit, was a Positive and not a Moral Command; yet was Adam bound to the obedience of it by virtue of the Moral Law, written in his heart, which tied him to love God, and to obey him in everything he should command.

And so the Sabbath, when it came, although you look upon it as a positive command in its institution; yet was it writ also in Adams heart, to obey God in that Command, especially when God had set him such a Copy by his own resting.

II. A second thing observable in that first Sabbath, and which was transmitted to posterity as a Law to keep, is, that now it had several ends. As in man there is something of the perfection of every Creature, a Spirit, as Angels; Life, as Beasts; Growth, as Trees; a Body, as Stones; so the Sabbath hath something of the excellency and of the end, of every Law, that was or could be given.

There are four sorts of Laws, which God hath given to men; Moral, Commentorative, Evangelical and Typical. Moral Laws are given in the Ten Commandments. Commemorative Laws, as the Law of the Passover, to commemorate the delivery out of Egypt; Pentecost, to commemorate the giving of the Law. Typical, as Sacrifices, Priesthood, Purifications, sprinkling of blood, to signify good things to come, as the Apostle speaks, and to have their accomplishing in Christ Evangelical, such as repentance, self-denial, believing, &c.

Now the Sabbath is partaker of all these Ends together, and hath the several excellencies of all these ends included in its self. And so had that first Sabbath appointed to Adam.

First, The Moral end is to rest from labors. So in this fourth Commandment, six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God, in it thou shalt do no manner of work, &c. So Jer. XVII. 21. Thus saith the Lord, Take heed to yourselves, to bear no burden on the Sabbath day, nor bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem. Neither bring forth a burden out of your houses, neither do you any work, but hallow the Sabbath day, as I commanded your fathers.

Oh! then I celebrate the Sabbath, saith the Sabbath-breaker, for I do no work but play and recreate, and drink and sit still, and do no work at all. Friend, dost thou think God ever established idleness and folly by a Law? That he hallowed the Sabbath day to be a playing, fooling, sporting day? But Christian, how readest thou, as a Christian? The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; not a Sabbath for thy lust and laziness. And in it thou shalt do no manner of work of thine own, but the work of the Lord thy God. And the rest that he hath commanded is not for idleness, but for piety towards God; for which end he gave all the Laws of the first Table, viz. to leave communion with the world and worldly things that day, and to have it with God, as in Isaiah. LVIII. 13, 14. If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy will on my holy days, and call the Sabbath a delight. As Moses to betake ourselves to the mount of God, and there to have communion with him. To get into the Mount above the world, and there to meet God and converse with him. To be in the Spirit on the Lord's day; and not to recreate the Body, but the Soul. To gather Spiritual strength for that, which it may be hath been scattered in our worldly employment.

Secondly, There is a commemorative end of the Sabbath, to remember God's creating the world. Which Adam might very well, nay must have been employed about, though he had never fallen. When he had been all the week upon his employment, dressing the Garden, and keeping it; then on the Sabbath to set himself to meditate upon God's creating of the world; and to study his power and wisdom and goodness, shown in that glorious workmanship, and to spend the day in prayers to him. Observe the work of that day to us, and the same it should have been to him, in Psal. XCII. which is entitled a Psalm for the Sabbath day. It tells you what the work of the day is, verse. 1. It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord, and to sing praises unto thy name, O most High. And upon what reason, ver. 4. For thou hast made me glad through thy works, I will triumph in the works of thy hands. This is a Sabbath days work; after our sixs days work, to make it our employment to think of God's: to meditate of his wondrous works of Creation and Preservation: and there will come in the thoughts of our Creator and Preserver, and may mind us of our engagement to praise him: to whet our thankfulness and faith with these thoughts.

• 1. When we have labored all the week, to think of our Creator, that hath sustained us, fed, clothed, brought us hitherto. And here is a right Sabbath employment, to let our thoughts stream from our worldly employment to God, and to the remembrance of him, in whom we live, and move and have our being.
• 2. To trust God with our support, though we labor not on the Sabbath, but spend it wholly to him, and not to ourselves. He that created all things, and that hath fed and preserved us hitherto, can support us without our working on his day; nay, and will do it: for do his work, and undoubtedly, thou shalt not want thy wages.

What a lecture did God read in his raining of Manna, that on the Sabbath day he rained none: thereby to show his own owning of his Sabbath, and checking and chiding those, that for greediness and distrust, would go out and think to gather some on that day. And when he provided them Manna on the sixth day for the Sabbath also, what a lecture did he read, that he that observes the Sabbath and does God's Will, ceasing from his own labor, and doing his, shall never be unprovided for.

Thirdly, There is an Evangelical end of the Sabbath, referring to Christ: and that in Adams Sabbath as well as ours. Let us begin with his.

I have shown that on the sixth day Adam sinned, and Christ was promised. So that the last work of God in the days of Creation, was the setting up Christ, and restoring fallen man by him. And here God rested, viz. He had brought in his Son in whom his Soul delighted, and made him heir of all things: and thus he rested in Christ, finished his work in Christ, rested, refreshed, delighted himself in Christ. Now the next day, when the Sabbath came in, what had Adam to do in it, but to remember the Creation, to remember his new creating, when he was broke all to pieces and spoiled? To remember his Creator and Redeemer.

It is said, Gen. III. 21. Unto Adam and his wife did the Lork God make coats of skins, and clothed them. The Lord and Lady of all the world clad in Leather! Which our silks and sattens now would scorn to think of: but from so mean a garb comes all our gallantry, though now we scorn it. But whence came those Skins? Most probably they were the skins of beasts that were sacrificed. For, That sacrifice was from the beginning may be observed from that, that Christ is called The Lamb slain from the beginning of the world: and that not only in prediction, or that it was determined, and foretold by God, that he should be slain: but in figure, that sacrifice was offered from the beginning of the world, which did presignifie his killing, and offering up. And this further appears from the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, which rite and piece of Religion they had learned of their Father Adam.

Here then was work for Adam on the Sabbath, to sacrifice in memory of Christ to be offered up for redemption: and to praise God for creating the world; but especially for vouchsafing Christ, whereby a better world and Estate is created.

And would not Adam, when he had a family, preach to his family of these things upon the Sabbath day?

Fourthly, There is a Typical end of the Sabbath; to signify Eternal Rest. Heb. IV. 3. For we which have belived do enter into rest: As he said, I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my Rest, although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. Where the Apostle signifies, that the Sabbath hinted another rest, to wit, God's Eternal Rest, different from that rest, when God ceased from the works of Creation. The Sabbath typifies the end, viz. Eternal Rest: and the means, viz. to rest in Christ. One end was to Adam in innocence, both to us. This is a lecture that may be read in the Sabbath; in something that is visible to see something invisible, as in the water to see the Sun. This is a way to rest, and resembles that great, and last Rest: as pleasant walks lead at length to the stately House at the end of them.

This is a fit thought for the Sabbath-day morning. Now I rest from the world, how shall I rest from it eternally? Now I deal with God invisibly, but one day visibly. They who love Eternal Rest, will certainly love the Sabbath.

To all these ends, God added another end, as the Sabbath was given to his peculiar people, given at Sinai, with all these ends, and this more; viz. To distinguish the Jews from all others for God's own people. See Deut. V. 15. And remember that thou wast a Servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence, through a mighty hand, and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day. And so in Exod. XXIII. 12. And the Sabbath is reckoned with the Jewish Festivals, Col. II. 16. Let no man judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of an Holy day, or of the new Moon, or of the Sabbath days. They were distinguished by Times from all other people. But how is this Sabbath distinctive? I answer,

• 1. None in the world kept the like resting day. Therefore the Jews were scoffed at by other Nations, as Idle, and taken advantage of on that day.
• 2. They kept this Rest as a redeemed people. Deut. V. How had they toiled in Egypt, and had not the liberty of a Sabbath: Now on the contrary, when they were delivered out of Egypt, they kept the Sabbath, as a signification of their rest from their labors there.

And now look on the Sabbath in its Moral, Commemorative, Evangelical, Typical, and Ceremonial End. Look on it in its Royal Dress, with what possible it can put on, as Queen Esther was dressed; and then view its beauty.

First, in its Antiquity. It was from the beginning: as it is said of the word of God, 1 Joh. I. 1. Ask after the ancient paths, and the Sabbath will be found to be one of them. This is not of the Law, but of the Fathers. It is the first born of Ordinances, and hath a double portion of honor due to it. It was the first day of comfort in the world, after Adam was adjudged to toil and misery. The Jews say of it, that it is a Mediator.

The Consideration of these Ends of the Sabbath may serve to assoyl that controversy about the Antiquity of its Institution: viz. Whether its institution was not before the giving of the Law? In the Dispute about the Sabbath afoot in England some years ago, there were some went so high (shall I say?) or so low, as to maintain that our Sabbath was not of Divine Institution, but Ecclesiastical only; not ordained by God, but the Church. And to make good this assertion, they would persuade you, that there was no Sabbath instituted before the giving of the Law. None from the beginning, but that the world was two thousand five hundred and thirteen years without a Sabbath: for so long it was from the Creation to Israel's going out of Egypt: and that then, and not before was the Law for the Sabbath given.

Then I pray, why should Moses speak of God's sanctifying the Sabbath, when he is speaking of the first week of the world, if he meant not, that the seventh day of that week was sanctified? And what sense were it to read the Command thus, For in six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth, &c. and rested the seventh day, therefore two thousand five hundred and thirteen years after, he blessed the seventh day and hallowed it? But read it as it lies before you, He rested the seventh day, therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it, and must it not needs mean, he blessed that seventh day, that he rested, and sanctified it, and so the seventh successively in following generations?

But you may observe in Moses, that the Sabbath is given upon two reasons or accounts here, because God rested; but in Deut. V. 15. because God delivered them out of Egypt. Thou, O Israel, thou must keep the Sabbath day in remembrance of thy deliverance out of Egypt: but withal he bids them, Remember to keep the Sabbath in memory of God's resting. Therefore certainly the Sabbath was kept in remembrance of that, before it was given to Israel to keep in memory of the deliverance out of Egypt.

I said, Adam should have kept the Sabbath, had he continued in innocence: then certainly he had more need of a Sabbath, for the benefit of his Soul, when he was become a sinner. And those four Ends of the Sabbath already mentioned, were also ends of the Sabbath to him, as well as to us. The beauty then of the Sabbath consists First, in its Antiquity.

Secondly, In the Universality of its reception, throughout of all ages. One generation left it to another, from Father to Son. And it is known to all Churches.

Thirdly, The Bravery of its institution. It had God's example. God hallowed, blessed, dressed it nobly: but his example is an addition without parallel.

Fourthly, The nobleness of its nature.

• 1. In it there was some of every part of the Law. It was Moral, Typical, Ceremonial. As there is something of man in all the Creatures, so there is something in the Sabbath of all the Law.
• 2. By it is the propagation of Religion. See Es. LXVI. 23. And it shall come to pass, that from one new Moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. As Psal. XIX. 2. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. So from Sabbath to Sabbath God is spoken of, and knowledge of divine things revealed. This was the Market-day that still furnished the Jews with what was needful for their spiritual food and sustenance. All marketing was forbidden on it, Neh. XIII. 15, &c. because a greater market was to be minded. So Manna was not rained on that day, because better things were rained.
• 3. By it came benefit to man and beast. It gave them rest from labor, and renewed their strength.

Fifthly, Its Durableness. Exod. XXXI. 16, 17. The children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me, and the Children of Israel forever. It reacheth as the Cherubims wings from one end of the World unto the other.

Hence also we may see what little difference there is twixt our Sabbath and the first Sabbath of the world. Both commemorate the Creation, both the Redemption: but only that ours is removed one day forward: the Sabbath of old on the seventh day of the week, ours on the first.

Much dispute hath been about this change: into which I will not ravel, only observe these things in reference to this, that it is changed to the day of Christ's Resurrection.

I. As great a Change as this do we not read in the Old Testament? viz. the change of the beginning of the year from September to March, Exod. XII. The year had a natural interest to begin in September, because then the world, the year and time began: and yet when God wrought for Israel an extraordinary work in redeeming them from Egypt, a figure of our redemption by Christ, he thought good to change the year from that time, that naturally it did begin.

So though the Passover be appointed to be in that first month, that began the new year, and be called an Everlasting Ordinance, Exod. XII. 16. Yet upon occasion the Lord ordained it to be kept in the second month, Numb. IX.

To this we may add God's changing the very end and memorial of the Sabbath to Israel themselves. Changing, said I? or rather adding a new memorial, which it had not before. In Exod. XX. the memorial is to remember God's creating and resting: in Deut. V. where the Ten Commandments are repeated, it is in memorial of their redemption out of Egypt. Not unclothed of its first end, and memorial, but clothed upon. So if Adam had continued innocent, he must have kept the Sabbath; and then it had been to him, but the memorial of God's creating and resting. But when Christ and redemption by him was set up and come in before the Sabbath came in, then it was clothed with another memorial, viz. the remembrance of the redemption.

II. Christ had power and authority to change the Sabbath, Mark. II. 28. The Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath. He had power over all Divine Ordinances, Hebr. III. 5, 6. Now Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, &c. But Christ as a Son over his own house. He is not a Servant in the house, but a Son to dispose of the affairs of the house, as he sees good. He is greater than the Temple, and so may order the affairs of the Temple, as he saw good.

If a Jew question, why he laid by the Ceremonies of Moses? The answer is ready, because he was greater than Moses, Lord of the house, in which Moses was but a Servant. Nay, it was he that appointed Moses those Ceremonies, and he might unappoint them at his pleasure. That is observable, Act. VII. 38. This is that Moses, that was in the Church in the wilderness with the Angel, which spake to him at Mount Sinai, and with our Fathers who received the lively Oracles to give us. With the Angel? who was that? It was Christ the great Angel of the Covenant, as he is called, Mal. III. 1. The Angel of God's presence, as he is called, Isaiah. LXIII. 9. Then, who spake with Moses at Mount Sinai? It was Christ. Who gave him the Lively Oracles, Laws, Testimonies, Statutes? It was Christ. And then might Christ, that gave them, dispose of them as seemed him good.

So that if a Jew question, why Christ changed Circumcision into Baptism, the Paschal Lamb into Bread and Wine, the Jewish Sabbath, into the Christian Sabbath, The answer is ready, he was Lord of them, and might dispose of them. Het set up Circumcision, the Passover, the Jewish Sabbath, and might take them down, and alter them as he pleased.

III. Ye read once and again in Scripture of God's creating a new world, Isaiah. LXV. 17. Behold! I create new Heavens and a new Earth. 2 Pet. III. 13. We according to his promise look for new Heavens and a new Earth. Rev. XXI. 1. And I saw a new Heaven and a new Earth. Now when was this done? The Apostle tells us when, viz. in his own time, 2 Cor. V. 17. If any man be in Christ he is a new Creature. The meaning of it, is God's creating a new Estate of things under the Gospel: a new Church, the Jews cast off, and the Gentiles taken in: new ordinances in his Church; Ceremonious worship taken down, and Spiritual set up: new Sacraments, Baptism and the Lord's Supper instead of the Circumcision and Passover: a new Command of love to one another: a new Covenant, a new and living way into the most holy; a new Creature, and in a word, all things become new.

Then certainly, a new Sabbath was fit for a new Creation: Lay these two places together Gen. I. 1. In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth, and Isaiah. LXV. 17. Behold! I create new Heavens and a new Earth. In fullness of time God created new Heavens and a new Earth: and as the first Creation had the old Sabbath, so was it not fit, the new Creation should have a new Sabbath? As our Savior speaks, Mat. IX. 17. New cloth must not be put into an old garment, nor new wine into old bottles, but new wine must be put into new vessels and both are preserved. So in this case a new manner of worship, new Ordinances, new Sacraments, to be committed to the old Sabbath? This is improper: but a new Sabbath must be for these, as well as they themselves are new. How pied would Christianity have looked, if it had worn a Coat all new in other respects, but had had on the shirt or piecing of the old Sabbath? And how unfit was it to have tied Christians to the observation of the old Sabbath of the Jews?

IV. The Resurrection of Christ was the day of his birth, and beginning of his Kingdom. Observe the quotation, Acts XIII. 33. The promise which was made unto the Fathers, God hath fulfilled to us their Children, in that he hath raised up Jesus: as it is also written in the second Psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee. When was the day, wherein Christ was begotten? In the day that God raised him from the dead. That is strange: for as he was God, was he not begotten from Eternity; and as he was man, was he not conceived by the Holy Ghost, and born three and thirty years and an half before his Resurrection? Yes, both most true, and yet that true too, that he was begotten from the day of his Resurrection. And the Apostle tells you how to understand it, viz. He was the first begotten, and first born from the dead: begotten that day to the Gentiles and all the world, from thenceforward a Savior to them; and by his Resurrection, as the Apostle saith, Rom. I. 4. Declared to be the Son of God with power by the Resurrection from the dead.

So likewise his Resurrection was the beginning of his Reign and Kingdom. Consider upon that, Mat. XXVI. 29. I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom: That is, when I am risen from the dead. And see Mat. XXVIII. 18. Now I begin to reign, All power is given unto me in Heaven and in Earth. For now he had conquered all his Enemies, Devil, Death and Hell.

Now was not the first day of the week, the day on which Christ rose, fitter to be made the Sabbath, to commemorate his Birth-day from the dead, and his entrance into his Kingdom; than the last day of the week, the old Sabbath, on which day he lay in the grave, and under death? Kings and Potentates use to celebrate their Birth-day, and the day of entrance into their Kingdom, and this King of Kings, was it not fit that such a memorial should be of his Birth-day, and entrance into his Dominion?

And compare the Creation and Christ's Resurrection, whether of them was the greater matter? whether of them the greater work? Was not the Resurrection? Not indeed in regard of the Power, that effected both, but in regard of the effect or concernment of man.

• 1. By his Resurrection he had destroyed him, and that that had destroyed the Creation, viz. Sin and Satan: and did set up a better world, a world of Grace and Eternal Life.
• 2. Had it not been better, that Man as he now was, sinful, had never been created, than Christ not to have risen again to save and give him life? As it was said of Judas, It were better if he had never been born; so it were better for sinful men if they had never been born, than that Christ should not have been born from the dead, to restore and revive them. Observe, that the Resurrection of the Heathen from their dead condition, took its rise and beginning from the Resurrection of Christ, as Christ himself closely compares it from the example of Jonahs rising out of the Whales belly, and converting Nineveh. To that purpose is that prophesy, Isaiah. XXVI. 19. Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise; awake, and sing, ye that dwell in dust? The dead Heathen that had lain so long in the grave of sin and ignorance, when Christ's body rose, had life put into them from that time, and they rose to the life of grace. For by his Resurrection, he had conquered him, that had kept them so long under death and bondage.

Now was it not most proper for the Church of the called Heathen, to have a Sabbath, that should commemorate the cause, time, and original of this great benefit accruing to them?

A SERMON PREACHED upon

T HIS is the First Commandment of the Second Table, and it is the first with promise, Eph. VI. 2. Why it is the first of the second Table the reason is easy: because when the second Table teaches our duty towards our Neighbor, it is proper to begin with the Neighbor nearest to us, such is our Father and Mother; and with the Neighbor to whom we owe most peculiar Duty, as we do to those that are comprehended under this title of Father and Mother. But why this is called the First Commandment with promise, is not so easy to resolve. The difficulties are in these two things:

• I. Because that seems to be a promise in the Second Commandment, Showing mercy unto thousands, &c.

• II. And if it be to be understood the first of the Second Table that hath a promise annexed unto it, that is harsh also, because there is no other promise in the Second Table: and the First Commandment with promise argues some other Commandments, with promise to follow after. Now to these difficulties I Answer,

  First, That in the Second Commandment is rather a description of God, than a direct Promise, A jealous God visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the Children, &c. and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me. As much Gall is mingled there as Honey, as dreadful threatenings as comfort; and therefore not to be looked on as a clear promise, but as an argument and motive to Obedience, taken from both mercy and judgment.

  Secondly, It is true, there is never a promise more in the Second Table, that comes after this; but there are abundance of promises after, in the rest of the Law. And so may this be understood: it is the First Commandment with promise in the whole Law, from the Law given at Sinai, to all the Law that Moses gave them afterwards.

And the first promise in the Law given to Israel is the promise of long life, That thy days may be long in the land, which the Lord thy God giveth thee. So that here especially are four things to be spoken to.

• I. The nature of the promise: that it is a temporal promise concerning this life.
• II. The matter of the promise: Length of life in the Land, which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
• III. The suitableness of the Promise to the Command: Honor thy Father and Mother, that thy days may be long, &c.
• IV. The extent of the Promise: to all, that keep the Commandment. Which four heads will lead us to the consideration of several Questions.

The first leads us to this Observation, That the Promises given to Israel in the Law are most generally, and most apparently promises temporal, or of things concerning this life.

First look upon this Promise, which is first in the Law; and whereas it may be construed two ways, yet both ways it speaks at first voice or appearance, an earthly promise. There may be an Emphasis put either upon, Thy days shall be long, or upon, Thy days long in the land. Honor thy Father and thy Mother, that thy days may be long; that thou mayst have long life. Or, Honor thy Father and thy Mother, &c. That thou mayst have long possession of the Land, which the Lord thy God giveth thee: and mayst not be cast out of it, as the Canaanites were before thee. Now take it either way, what speaks it else, but a temporal promise, and that that refers to this life, and to our subsistence in this world?

And so look upon those promises, that are in Levite. XXVI. and Deut. XXVIII. and you find them all referring to temporal and bodily things.

And hereupon it may be observed, that you hardly find mention of any spiritual promises, especially not of eternal, in all Moses Law. No mention of Eternal Life, joys of Heaven▪ Salvation, or Everlasting glory: none but of things of this life. Hence it was that the Sadducees denied the Resurrection and the world to come, because they only owned the five Books of Moses, and in all his Books they found not mention of any such thing.

And therefore when our Savior is to answer a Cavil of theirs against the Resurrection, Mark XII. 18, &c. observe what he saith, verse. 26. Have you not read in the Book of Moses, &c. For he must prove the thing out of Moses to them, or they would take it for no proof. And observe also, how he proves it by an obscure collection or deduction, viz. because God says, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Therefore they lived, though they were dead. Which he would never have done, had there been plain and evident proof of it: And which if there had been, they could never have denied it.

And that which we are speaking to, that the promises of the Law are of temporal things, is also asserted by that, Heb. VIII. 6. He is the Mediator of a better Covenant, established upon better promises. If the promises of the Law had been Heavenly promises, there could not have been better promises. Had they been of Grace and Glory, there could not have been better promises: but those of the Law were of this world, and earthly things.

Now what shall we say to this, that God should give no better promises to his people? How could an Israelite but look after earthly things, when he had no promise, but of earthly things? How could he look after Heaven, when he had no promise of Heaven? When much of his Religion might very easily become a temptation. The enjoining them so much Ceremonious Worship might, indeed it did, prove a temptation to them to turn all Religion into Ceremony. Their Laws that enjoined them to separate from the Heathen, and to have no Communion with them, might easily become a temptation to them, and so it did, of prizing themselves, and despising others. Their promises, which seemed only to relate to earthly things, might, and indeed did, become a temptation to them to mind earthly things: and either not to be acquainted with, or to neglect things spiritual and heavenly. What then shall we say to these things?

Truly the first thing we may say to them may be to say nothing, but to stand in silence and admiration; and beget such a meditation in us as he had, that stood weeping over a Toad to think how much nobler a creature than that, God had made him, and yet he had not been thankful. The Apostle Paul tells us, Heb. XI. 40. God had provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect. And the Apostle Peter tells us, 2 Pet. I. 4. That there are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by these we might be partakers of the Divine Nature. And now look upon their allowances and ours, their promises and ours: and meditate what God had done to us in comparison of them, and what we have done towards God in reference to these things.

The promises that God made to them in the Law, of Corn and Cattle, of Land and Money, health and long life; if you look upon them reflexively one way, comparing them with sinful men's deserts, and they are great promises in comparison of what any man can deserve: but look upon them reflexively another way, and compare them with what God hath promised in the Gospel, and they are but small and little to them. They were as the lesser light, the Moon, that ruled the Night, and darkness of that mysterious and dark Economy of the Law: but these as the greater light, the Sun, to rule in the bright and glorious light of the Gospel.

Compare what is said here in the Command and Promise, and what is added, Deut. V. 16. That thy days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with thee in the Land which the Lord thy God giveth thee: with such passages as these; Eph. I. 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Heavenly places, the word is ambiguous, (shall I say?) or large to signify either, Heavenly places, and Heavenly things, as you may observe in the Text and Margin. Now whereas the Jews blessing was in an earthly place, the Land which the Lord their God gave them, he hath blessed us in heavenly places. Whereas it should be well with them in all outward earthly things, he hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Heavenly things. Their Promises did capacitate them to be partakers of the Creature, and of things below; but 2 Pet. I. 4. There are given to us exceeding great and precious promises, whereby we are capacitated to be partakers of the Divine Nature.

You see the difference: Now Christian, where hath been thy gratitude, thy improvement? Thou art partaker of a better Covenant, better promises, better things: where hath been thy better Obedience? See what improvement the Apostle, or God by his mouth requires of us upon this account, • Cor. VII. 1. Having therefore these promises, Dearly beloved, Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. I leave everyone to examine himself what cleansing, what perfecting of holiness they have made, because of the Promises.

I come to consider, why God gave Israel such Promises of earthly things as he did.

And first, we are to consider, That God hath given the promise of spiritual and heavenly things to the Church, long before these temporal promises were given to Israel. Christ, Grace, Eternal Life, enjoyment of God were promised from the first day of Adam: and so that promise went all along with the Church before the Law, and continued also under the Law. As the Apostle saith, Gal. III. 17. The Law could not make that promise of no effect. Observe the Apostles manner of Argumentation there. Ye that stand upon justification by Works, ye plead that the Law saith, He that doth these things shall live. Most true, but his life must not be by the Works of the Law, but by the grace of the promise, which was before the Law, and the Law coming after could not disannul it.

And how God made spiritual and heavenly promises before the Law, these and other places do abundantly testify, Luk. I. 70, 71, &c. As he spake by the mouth of his Holy Prophets, which have been since the world began, &c. Tit. I. 2. In hope of Eternal Life, which God that cannot lie, promised before the world began. And that one for all, Joh. I. 4. In Christ was Life. In him came the promise of Life and Grace, even from the beginning: and that Life was the Light that holy men looked and walked after: and that Light shone in the darkness of the types of the Law, and in the darkness of the obscurity of the Prophesies: and the darkness comprehended it not.

So that Israel, when these temporal promises were given them, had also before them the promises of Grace, promises of things spiritual and heavenly: and they were to look through these that were temporal, at those that were spiritual and eternal. Here is given a promise of long life upon earth in the Land which the Lord their God gave them. But they had before them, even from of old, the promises of Eternal life to those that obeyed the Commandments of God: and they were to look at, and after this through the other. And so the holy men among them did. That in Levite. XVIII. 5. Ye shall keep my statutes and my judgments: which if a man do he shall live in them: Which is oft repeated else where, doth it mean only This Life? The Apostle often shows it aimeth higher: viz. at Spiritual and Eternal life. And so the Jews themselves did generally understand it, though they failed in seeking that life, that it aimed at. As it is, Rom. X. 3. They being ignorant of God's Righteousness, and going about to establish their own Righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the Righteousness of God. And when that Man inquired, Matth. XIX. 16. What good thing shall I do, that I may have Eternal Life? and Christ bad him Keep the Commadments; he shown what was meant by that, Levite. XVIII. 5. viz. That by keeping the Commandments, not only life here, but Eternal life hereafter is obtained. And so it is further cleared by his words in Luk. X. 28. This do, and thou shalt life.

So that this here was not barely a temporal promise, but had wrapped up in it a further promise, of Life Eternal. And so had the other temporal promises, that were given them. And so some of the Jews interpret that, Levite. XXVI. 11, 12. And I will set my Tabernacle amongst you, and my Soul shall not abhor you. And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and ye shall be my people: not only of God, being among his people here, but of his being in the midst of them, and they about him in Heaven. And so you find the word Heaven in Scripture sometimes to signify the Church here, as well as it signifies the state and place of glory hereafter.

Now if you ask, why God, since he meant spiritual things and eternal under these temporal promises, did not speak out, but used such promises as might prove occasions of missing of those promises through misimprovement? And so we find that this very thing proved the ruin of the Jewish Nation; they being moved hereby to look at temporal things, and to neglect eternal. They looked, and still look for a temporal Kingdom of Christ, pompous and resplendent with worldly Iustre. And this stands, as it were a Wood, or a Fog, betwixt them, and the discerning of his spiritual Kingdom, that they cannot, will not see it. This makes them look for their Canaan again, and to be planted and • ettled there anew. With which opinion too many Christians do concur, and look for some such glorious thing among the Jews, even this year, sixty six. Why, I say, did not God speak out spiritual and eternal things, but only obscurely hinted them in such temporal promises as these?

I Answer, Because God would use the most feeling persuasions to them. Men are not so sensible of things spiritual, as they be of bodily: have not the feeling of things that concern Life Eternal, as they have of this Life. To have said, Honor thy Father and Mother, that thou mayst inherit eternal life, had been a fair argument; but it is not so feeling to flesh and blood. No Man, but is very desirous of long life here; and it is but one of a City, and two of a Tribe, that more desires Life Eternal. The Gadarenes are more sensible of their Swine, than Christ; and not one in many, but a promise of earthly prosperity, or bodily welfare comes nearer his heart, than a promise of everlasting and heavenly glory, health of body, than of soul, showers of rain, than of grace, bags of money, than all the treasures of Christ. Therefore God gave such promises, as might be most feeling and persuasive, those that were most like to take. As the Apostle, I being crafty caught you with guile, as the Jews describe it. As one that gives his Child Nuts and Plums to bring him on to learn; so God gave to them those things, that he was sure would most please them.

The Church of the Jews was a Child under age, Gal. IV. 1, 2, 3. and God deals with them as with Children, giving Ordinances and promises according to its childhood; feeds them with milk, and not with strong meat, because they were not so able to bear it. It is commonly said, they were not able to bear spiritual dispensations in their abstract simplicity; and therefore God gave them such carnal Ordinances, according as they were able to bear them. It is true, they were carnal enough about the worship of God: but was it not because they had such carnal Ordinances from the first? The use of these made them dote on them. Are there not thousands among Christians as carnal about God's service as they? That dote as much upon Ceremony and outward formality in God's worship, as ever they did? And that because they have been brought up in such Ceremonious way, or cannot come up to worship in spirit. And might not the Jews have been as capable of the same spiritual manner of Religion, as the Gentiles were, if God had set it up among them, when he first took them for the Church?

Wherein then did the Childhood of the Church consist?

First, That it was yet but small of stature, in comparison of that full body and growth the Church of God was to come to. See that, Eph. IV. 12, 13. For the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of the Ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the Faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. What is the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ? It is the mystical body of Christ in its full proportion, viz. Jew and Gentile joined together. How small a Babe was the Church of the Jews in comparison with what the Church was, when the Gentiles of all Nations were become the Church?

Secondly, That Church was a Child in knowledge in comparison of the Church under the Gospel. Hence that promise, Isaiah. LXV. 20. There shall be no more thence an Infant of days. The Gospel should bring in such light and means of knowledge, that none should be a Child, or infant in knowledge, if they had a mind to learn. 'It is true, they were so childish, because God afforded no clearer means of knowledge. And it is as true, that in some sort it was needful, the means of knowledge should be but as it was, viz. that God by those means might make way to the knowledge and embracing of spiritual things under the Gospel, when it came. Consider their carnal ordinances, and temporal promises: God in the Gospel was to bring in a spiritual Worship and Religion. A better way, to make way for the embracing of that, could not be used, than by showing before the unprofitableness, the uneffectualness of their carnal worship. This the Apostle speaks to at large in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Chap. IX. 9. That gifts and offerings could not make him, that did the service, perfect. That sprinkling the blood of Goats and Bulls could not purge the Conscience. The experience of this was the way to make men hearken after the Sacrifice of Christ, that would do the work; that blood of Christ, that could purge to the utmost.

And the like might be instanced in other parts of that carnal service. So God gave them especially promises of temporal things, that he might teach them, that they should not be losers by his service. Their service was chargeable in gifts and offerings, and in going up to Jerusalem, &c. Therefore it was needful, that God should ply them with promises of temporal good, that they should lose nothing by his service, if they were faithful to it. Observe that, Exod. XXXIV. 23. Thrice in the year shall all your men-children appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel, What objections might be made against that ordinance; as that while they were absent from home, their Lands might be invaded by their Enemies, &c. But he answers all in the next Verse. For I will cast out the Nations before thee, and enlarge thy borders: neither shall any man desire thy Land, when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God, thrice in the year. And so might they except at the costliness of the Sacrifices, but his promise satisfied all, Thou shalt be blessed in the fruit of thy body and land, in the herds of thy Cattle, and flocks of thy Sheep.

And so had God laid in stock in these promises for the Gospel Church when it should come in: which required so much self-denial, and forsaking House and Lands; and which foretold of Persecution. God had satisfied his people before, that he would take care for their support, that none for Obedience to his Commandments should be a loser.

And thus much of the first thing propounded, viz. The Nature of the promise, That it is Temporal.

We come now in the second place to consider the suitableness of the promise to the Command. And what affinity then, and agreement hath this promise with the Duty enjoined in the Command? One would think it were more suitable to have said, Honor thy Father and Mother, that thou mayest be honored of thy Children. Honor thy Magistrate, and thy Superiors, that thou mayst also come to the like honor. And such an agreement hath that saying of God, 1 Sam. II. 30. Them that honor me I will honor. And why therefore is it said, Honor thy Father and thy Mother, that thy days may be long in the Land?

I Answer, First, There is this harmonious reason: Thy Father and thy Mother under God gave thee being, and if thou honor them, thy being and well being shall be prolonged. If thou desire long life, honor them, that under God gave thee life. I remember here the Gloss of some Jewish Expositors upon these words of Eve, Gen. IV. 1. When Cain was born, she said, I have gotten a man from the Lord. The Hebrew word, that is rendered From, in greatest propriety, when it signifies anything (as sometimes it does not) is With: and so they render it, I have gotten a Man with the Lord. Which they construe to this sense, In the production of Adam, God only had an Agency, and Adam none: and in my production out of Adam, God only had an Agency, and Adam none: but in the production of this my Son, I have been an Agent with God; and I have gotten a Son with the Lord. But be it the one way, or other, (though I should construe it a third way, viz. I have gotten a Man, even the Lord: Or, I have obtained the Lord to become Man: as looking to the promise that Christ should be her seed:) It is very well known how much Parents contribute to the production and life of their Children. And therefore it is but a just claim, and a claim very suitable to that matter; Honor thy Father and thy Mother, that gave thee life, that the life they gave thee may be prolonged. But,

Secondly, This promise is affixed to very many Commandments in the Law. As,

• 1. In General, Deut. V. 33. Ye shall walk in the ways, which the Lord your God hath Commanded you, that ye may live, and it may be well with you, and that ye may prolong your days in the Land which ye shall possess. And so Deut. VI. 2. That thou mightest fear the Lord thy God, to keep all his Statutes and Commandments, which I command thee, thou and thy Son, and thy Sons Son all the days of thy life: and that thy days may be prolonged. And so Chap. XI. 8, 9. &c. And,
• 2. As thus in general it is promised to the Obedience of all the Commandments, so it is affixed to some special Commandments, Deut. XXII. 6, 7. about the Dam and her young. If a birds nest chance to be before thee in the way in any tree, or in the ground, &c. Thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, and take the young to thee; that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayst prolong thy days. Deut. XXV. 15, Thou shalt have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure shalt thou have, that thy days may be prolonged in the Land, &c.

Now the reason of this affixing is, because life is so desirable by all men: and God useth arguments to persuade, which are most feeling, and come nearest, and warmest to the heart. And as that is a melting persuasive, Rom. XII. 1. I beseech you by the mercies of God: so this is as melting an one in regard of men's tenderness to themselves, I beseech you by the mercy to be shown to your own selves.

And thus we have brought ourselves down to the third particular to be discoursed, and that is the matter of the promise, length of life.

But is long life such a Blessing, is it so desirable? What say we to that passage, Job XIV. 1. Man that is born of a Woman, is of few days, and full of trouble? If of few days, where is the long life that is here promised? If full of trouble, where is that desirableness of long life, so as to account it such a Blessing? If we well consider, what the Scripture speaks of the shortness and misery of human life, it may seem to set us at a stand, to think that God should so often promise long life, when there is no such thing, but as Psal. XXXIX. 5. Behold thou hast made my days as an hand breath. And that he should promise it as a blessing, when as Psal. XC. 10. The days of our years are threescore years and ten, and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow. If we live to the utmost Nature can hold out, it is but labor and sorrow.

To speak to these scruples, and to reconcile the shortness of Man's life, and the miseries of the longest life, to the promise in the Text, we are to consider life, not comparatively, but simply.

For, 1. The longest life compared with the Eternity of God is nothing. So David compares it, Psal. XCV. 5. Mine age before thee is nothing: That is, compared to thine Everlastingness and Eternity, is a thing of nothing at all. Though of the longest date that ever life was, yet to thy years that fail not, it is less than nothing. So when the Prophet saith, Isaiah. XL. 15. Behold the Nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance. This is not to be understood simply; for all Nations are a vast bulk and mass in themselves, but compared with God they are but as a drop, but as a smallest grain of dust. And so the Psalmist comparing the lasting of Heaven and Earth, with the everlastingness of God, makes them as of no lastingness at all. Psal. CII. 26, 27. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure, yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment: as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed. But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end.

2. The longest life compared with the Saints in Glory is as nothing, 2 Cor. V. 1. This Tabernacle always dissolving, what is it to an Eternal building in the Heaven? Here we have none abiding City, saith the Apostle; but he saith again, 1 Thess. IV. 17. that we shall be ever with the Lord. Here our life is but a vapor; Jam. IV. as a Sleep; Psal. XC. as nothing: but there we shall live as long as the Lord himself shall live.

3. The longest life compared with the long lives, that some have lived, to wit, the Patriarchs before the flood, is but of very few days: and but as an inch to an ell. And so Jacob compares his life, Gen. XLVII. 9. Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been. That is, few, and full of misery have they been. Jacob was of a very fair age▪ an hundred and thirty years old; and so old a Man as it is likely Pharaoh had never seen so aged and venerable a head; and therefore you find him asking him but that one question, How old art thou? And yet in Jacob 's computation his age was but short in comparison of his Fathers, that had gone before him: his hundred and thirty compared with Adam 's nine hundred and thirty, or Methuselah 's nine hundred sixty nine.

So that we are not to judge of long life so comparatively, but simply; and to measure it by the common stint of Nature, that God hath set. Which Moses holds out to us, Psal. XC. 10. The days of our years are threescore years and ten, and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, &c. And so length of life is to be understood; that that reacheth up to that stint and limit of nature. So that though seventy or eighty years be but a short time in comparison of the Eternity of God, and of Heaven, and in comparison of the ages heretofore; yet it is a long life, because it reacheth up to the utmost on Natures allowance.

And it is a long time, if we consider human frailty; that a poor piece of clay, a Man as brittle as glass, as unstable as water, as fading and fleeting as a blast or shadow, a poor thing that carries death in its principle, and walks in danger of death every moment, should come up to seventy or eighty years, and the pitcher and glass not broken. It is a long time for that, which is frailty itself to hold so from breaking. So that though comparatively to come up to the full stint of Nature be but a short life; yet simply considered, it is a long time for so brittle a thing to hold out. A long time for an ungodly Man to be provoking of God all along, and a long time for a godly man to be from home in this sinful world, and not got to Heaven.

But if long life be so frequent in the mouth of God, as a promise of a blessing, How was it, that God shortened men's lives, when they were at a fair length?

I have formerly observed to you, that lives were shortened at the Flood, and brought from a thousand years almost, to about five hundred, or not so much. Shortned again at the building of Babel, and cut from about five hundred, to two hundred, or little more. And when God gives the Ten Commandments at Sinai, and this promise in this Commandment, he was to shorten lives again; which he did within a year and an half, or thereabout after he had given this promise at Sinai. Now if long life were such a promise, such a blessing, why did he not suffer lives to stand at their first stint, or at that length that those lived before the flood?

Let us a little consider the length of those first lives, and then the shortening of them.

Some ascribe the length of them to natural causes: as that then their bodies were more big, strong and vigorous, than men are now; and that the Elements were then more pure and uncorrupted than they became after, and that their diet was more moderate, wholesome and nourishing. Which if it were so, though some question may be made of it; yet certainly there was something more concurrent to the prolongation of their lives to that long extent, than merely natural causes. Their Diet indeed was changed after the flood, from eating herbs and fruits of the ground, to a liberty to eat flesh and to that refer the words of Lamech upon the naming of his Son, Noah, Gen. V. 29. And he called his Name Noah, saying, this same shall comfort us concerning our work, and toil of our hands, because of the ground, which the Lord hath cursed. That is, he shall be a comfort to the world in that liberty to eat flesh, that shall be granted to him: which will be a great ease from the toil and tugging used before▪ to get all the provision they used by toiling in the ground.

But were the Elements changed after the flood, as well as their Diet was changed?

First, We might ascribe the length of their lives something to the promise of life through Christ, that was given to Adam. And the nearer they were to the giving of the promise, the more might we conceive they received bodily vigor from the promise▪ for temporal life, as well as spiritual life and vigor of soul to life eternal. What was that that made Israel to multiply, and to be so fruitful in Egypt, even when they were overtoiled and worn out with labor? St. Stephen tells you, Act. VII. 17. that is was the strength of the promise. When the time of the promise drew nigh, which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt. This it was, and not the strength of nature, that made the men, though over spent with hard toil and labor, yet to be vigorous for generation. And this was it, that made the Hebrew Woman so lively and quick in time of travail, and delivery, incomparably beyond the Woman of Egypt: as the Midwives do relate of them to Pharaoh, Exod. I. 19. For that was not a lie of the Midwives, as divers Expositors will tell you it was, but it was a true relation of them, observing the wonderful hand of God in such a strange matter. But,

Secondly, We are to consider that in that minority of the world, God spared men to very long lives for propagation sake, and the peopling of the world. And this methinks is hinted in that constant expression, Gen. V. and XI. and begat Sons and Daughters.

It might be some Question, whether the holy and profane before the flood and after, had their lives lengthened alike. Seth the Son of Adam, a holy Man lived nine hundred and twelve years. Do we think Cain the Son of Adam, that wicked wretch, had such a long life? Enos, the Son of Seth, the Grand-child of Adam in that holy line lived nine hundred and five years. Think we Enoch, the Son of Cain, and Grand-child of Adam in that wicked line, lived so long? So after the flood Heber lived four hundred sixty four years. Do we think, that Canaan, or Cush, or Mizraim, or any of that cursed line lived half so long a life?

There is some reason of this question, because we see in other examples that vigor and strength of nature in some of the holy line, because of the virtue of the promise: which you cannot conceive to have been in any Heathen.

However, if those in the wicked line before the flood and after, did not live to that age that those in the holy line did, yet it is doubtless they lived far beyond the age of men afterwards, for the propagating, and peopling of the world. Ishmael, if he were one profane, as he is commonly reputed to be, yet he lived an hundred thirty seven years, Gen. XXV. 17. But,

Thirdly, A chief reason of the long life of the holy Patriarchs that may be given, is this, That they might propagate Religion in their generations. God gives testimony of Abraham, that he hid so, Gen. XVIII. 19. And it was the care and work of the other holy ones to do the like. Noah is said to be a Preacher of Righteousness; and Enoch a Prophet. And they and the rest were as a living Bible to instruct their Childred, and posterity, in the knowledge, fear and service of God. There was then no Scripture written, but the knowledge of God, and of the ways of God was conveyed from generation to generation, by word of mouth of those holy men. And therefore God carried them on to so very great an age, that they might be props and pillars of Religion in their Families, to the sound and sure establishment of it.

Now it pleased God by degrees to cut short the length of such lives, but it was still in displeasure. He shortened man's life after the flood, because of the sinfulness of men in their long lives before the flood. He shortened them again at the building of Babel for the sins of those wicked men, that went about to build it. And again in the Wilderness, where he brought in the stint of seventy or eighty years, because of the people's murmuring, and despising the pleasant Land. Upon which Moses then present makes the ninetieth Psalm. See verse. 7, 8, 9. We are consumed in thine anger, &c. And all our days pass away in thy wrath. We spend our years as a tale. And why? Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.

So that by shortening lives in judgment, or in way of judgment, he shown that that we are upon, that prolonging of life is a mercy or blessing. But this with including the proper end of this promise, and of God's prolonging life, viz. That man may more serve and glorify God in his generation, and do more good to his generation, and lay up the more stock for eternal life for himself.

Long life to many an one proves a curse, and it would have been better they had never lived, never been born. Cain 's life and preservation granted him by God, proved but a sad curse to him: and that indeed, not so much upon the account, that God prolongs his life, as upon the account of his own abuse of God's prolongation. Observe that, Gen. IV. 15. And the Lord said unto Cain, Therefore whosoever s • ayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, le • t any finding him should kill him. Cain in verse. 14. reads in his own Conscience the Law of justice, which afterwards was given by the mouth of God, Gen. IX. 6. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed. That made him say, Any one that meets me will kill me. God secures him against this, and gives him a token, that none should kill him. Some think he set some visible mark, or brand upon him, to signify to all that he was Cain: but if God did not tell every man in the world, that he should not kill Cain, as well as he told Cain that he should not be killed, this was the likeliest way to have him murdered, when all that met him knew that he was the murderer. Therefore I should rather render it, and so the Original doth very properly, if not most properly bear it, He sets, or gave him a sign, that any finding him, should not slay him. Cain, take this for a sign, that none shall kill thee, that I denounce sevenfold vengeance to him that doth it. Now this securing him against being killed, and God's prolonging and preserving his life, was it in favor or punishment? Compare the rest of the dealing and words of God to him, and it will seem, and appear the later, viz. that God kept him alive, to anguish of conscience, and the longer misery here.

But how does Cain use this his prolonged time? As much as he can to delude the intent of God: he Marries, builds Cities, sets himself to have and reap content in this world, and his portion here. And this is the way of Cain, Jud. verse. 11. Had it not been better for him, when all was done, that he had never lived so long, never been born? So is it with the wicked of an hundred years old, Isaiah. LXV. 20. The sinner of an hundred years old is cursed. And so it is with thousands, that spending their time in vanity and folly, their life and age be it never so long, proves but a sad curse to them, and hath but heaped the more guilt upon them.

But where is the fault? Not but that long life in itself is a blessing: but that man by abusing it hath turned it to a curse. There is no earthly blessing, but by man's abuse may become a curse. That is terrible in Mal. II. 2. I will ever send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings. But that is because men make such things a curse to themselves. Haman 's honor, an earthly blessing in its self, because a curse to him: but it was through his own fault. Jeroboam 's promotion, an earthly blessing, became a curse to him, and his whole Family; but it was through his own abuse of it. And so may I say of any earthly comfort. And so is long life to many, through their misspending and abusing it.

This I have spoken to take off an Objection against long life 's being a blessing. There is undoubtedly a blessing in long life, otherwise God would never have so frequently, as he doth, held it out as a Promise. And that we may view the blessing the better, we first consider upon those things that may be said against it; that afterwards we may the better view the blessing itself.

O • e Objection then is, That long life to many proves in the end to be but a curse; as I have shown before; and they have the longer score to answer for; the greater heaps of sin to be arraigned upon; the sadder account of so much time misspent.

But for Answer to this, as I said before, There is no temporal thing, which in itself is a blessing, but wicked men by abuse of it make it a curse. They make their Table a snare, their wealth a trap, their long life a curse. And it is no wonder, if they do so by these things: for they make Divine Ordinances, which in themselves are a savor of life, to become to them the savor of death; nay Christ himself to become a stumbling block, and their ruin. Now the goodness or blessing in things is not to be judged of by such men's using, but by what they are in their own nature. As thousands in Hell curse the time, that ever they lived; so thousands in Heaven bless God forever that ever they lived here so long. Long life to the one party was balm, the other made it poison.

There is another Objection, That long life to many proves but long misery, therefore is not such a promise and blessing. Such are the miseries of this life, even to them that spend their time the best; that Solomon tells us, Eccles. VII. 1. That the day of death is better than the day of birth. And Chap. IV. 2, 3. I praised the dead, which are already dead, more than the living which are yet alive. Yea, better is he than both, that hath not yet been, which hath not seen the evil, which is done under the Sun. And how many of the Saints of God, that have spent their lives as well as ever men did, as ever men could spend their lives; yet because of the miseries of life, have desired that their lives might be cut off, and that they might live no longer? How oft is this Job 's mournful tune over and over? Chap. VI. 8, 9. O that I might have my request, and that God would grant me the thing I long for: Even that it would please God to destroy me, and that he would loose his hand and cut me off. And Chap. VII. 15, 16. My soul chooseth strangling, and death rather than my life. I loath it, I would not live always. And so alomst in everyone of his speeches. And the same tune is Elias at, 1 King. XIX. 4. It is enough now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my Fathers. And Jeremy sings the same doleful ditty, when he curseth the day of his birth, Chap. XX. 14. How is long life then a blessing, when the sorrows of it make men so weary of it?

I Answer, This were true indeed, if the blessing of long life consisted only in enjoying earthly prosperity: and then the Children of God were of all men most miserable. For they have the least earthly prosperity. But the blessing of long life consists in things of another nature. For those holy men's desiring, because of their afflictions here, to have their lives cut off.

• 1. We neither wronged them nor Religion, should we say, it was an human frailty and failing in them. But,
• 2. It was not so much for that they undervalued the prolonging of their lives, and the blessing in having life prolonged, as that they placed not their blessedness in living here; but were assured and longed after a better life. Not one of them was unwilling to live, but because he was very well prepared to die, therefore he wished for death rather.

And now that we may come to consider, wherein the blessing of long life consisteth, let us a little take up some places and passages of Scripture: and some arguments in reason, that declare and proclaim it, as of itself to be a blessing.

• 1. Prov. III. 16. Solomon urging men to espouse and marry Wisdom, tells what Portion and Dower they shall have that get her: Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left riches and honor. Observe that he accounts length of days a right hand Dower, and riches and honor but a left hand one. And indeed what are riches and honor, if a man have not length of days to enjoy? And the same Solomon commending old age, saith, Prov. XVI. 31. It is a Crown of glory, or, a glorious Crown, if the long life that brought it up thither, have been spent as it should. I might heap up many such passages, but these suffice.
• II. Consider that it is threatened, for a curse and punishment, that the bloody and deceitful man shall not live out half his days, Psal. LV. 23. That the men of Eli 's House should die in their prime, 1 Sam. II. 31. But I will name but one for all; how oft threatened, such and such shall be cut off. I need not to cite places, the Books of the Law are full of such expressions, shall be cut off from his people, from the congregation, &c. Which some understand of Excommunication, but it means cutting off by the hand of God, by some untimely or fatal death, or shortening of life. It is threatened as a curse, that his days shall not be prolonged, but cut off.
• III. Ye have holy men in Scripture praying for prolonging of their lives, and that upon this warrant, that God promised long life as a blessing, Psal. XXI. 4. He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days forever and ever. And Psal. XXXIX. ult. O spare me that I may recover strength. And Psal. CII. 24. I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days. And so in the case of Hezekiah: how bitterly did he take the tidings of the cutting off of his days? Whether it were that it went sadly with him to die of the Plague, or that he saw not Jerusalem delivered from Sennacherib: yet certainly it cost some tears to think he was to be taken away, even in his prime, and his life prolonged no further.
• IV. To this may be added, that God promised it for a peculiar blessing, Thou shalt come to thy grave in a good old age, Job V. 26. And how feeling a promise is that, Zech. VIII. 4. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, There shall yet old Men and old Women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for every age? Methinks I see the streets full of such venerable heads and gravity, everyone crowned with gray hairs, and old age, a crown of blessing.

But what need I arguments to prove this? What one thing is there in the world, that hath more votes and voices than this? For who is there, that desires not to live long, and see many days? And skin for skin, and all that he hath will he give for his life, that it may be prolonged. And who but will be contented to part with any earthly blessing, so his life may be preserved?

Now wherein it is that long life is a blessing, is best observed by considering what is the proper end and aim of men's living. Friend, wherefore camest thou hither? Why did God bring thee into the world, and why dost thou live? A question very pertinent, and very considerable. For the greatest number of Men and Women in the world, go out of the world before they know or consider, why they came in. Much like Ahimaaz, 2 Sam. XVIII. 29. That entreats Joab to let him run to David, and runs hard, and when he comes to David, to his journeys end, all that he can relate is, When Joab sent thy Servant I saw a great tumult, but I cannot tell what it was. God brings men into the world to run their race; they see a great bustle in the world, and they keep a great stir themselves; and when they come to their journeys end, they cannot give account what the business was for which they came into the world. What do you think he thought he came into the world for, that when he died, commanded this to be written on his Tombstone, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , &c. I have eaten much, and drunken much, and done much mischief in my time, and now here I lie? Who among thousands in his life, or indeed in his thoughts owns the proper end of living?

The Apostle tells us what it is, Act. XVII. 26, 27. God hath made all Nations of men, &c. That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, &c. And the same Apostle, 2 Cor. V. 15. They which live should not live to themselves, but to him by whom they live. The Schools do very truly tell us, that God created reasonable creatures, Men and Angels, that they might serve God, and partake of God, which unreasonable creatures cannot do. So that here is the proper answer to the question, Why do we live: And the proper end of our living; to serve God by whom we live, and to get interest in him, and participation of him; to live to God here, that we may live with him, and enjoy him hereafter.

And by this are we to judge of the blessing of a long life, and not by any earthly thing, or occurrence in our lives. Long life is not therefore a blessing to any, because he lives long in peace and prosperity, because he gets much wealth, much credit, experience, wisdom, in so long a time: but because he hath got much interest in God, and done much service to God. That of Solomon must be understood prudently, and we must be sure to take his right meaning in it, Eccles. III. 4. Better than either living or dead is he that hath not yet been. Is this absolutely true? No, but only relatively; viz. relating to earthly miseries. For the missing of these he scapes best, that never was, and never saw the evil done under the Sun.

But as to the thing itself absolutely considered, that paradox that is sometimes maintained in dispute in the Schools is true in some kind and degree, Praestat esse miserum, quam non esse. It is better to be miserable, than not to be at all: He that never was, nor never shall be, he that never lived, nor never shall live, shall never praise God, never see the works of God, never enjoy God, and that is worse than enduring the miseries that Men meet withal upon Earth.

This is the proper end of life, and the blessing of life, viz. to praise, serve, enjoy God. And by this we must state the blessing of a long life, viz. as allowing more time and space to accomplish, and perfect those ends. And upon the aim at these ends it is, that the Saints of God have begged of God for long life, Psal. XXXIX. ult. That I may recover strength, and be fitter for my duty, and thy work, and fitter for thee, when thou callest. Psal. LXXI. 18. Now also when I am old forsake me not: until I have shown thy strength unto this generation and thy power to everyone that is to come. Isaiah. XXXVIII. 19. The living, the living, he shall praise Thee, as I do this day. This was the end and blessing of prolonging Hezekiah 's life, that he was still alive to praise God. And this is the work of those whose lives are preserved and prolonged.

To prove the blessing of prolonging life, let me first appeal to any here. Man, or Woman, art thou prepared to die, if God should call at this very instant? If God send a messenger to bid thee set thy house in order for thou shalt die, couldst thou take it better than Hezekiah did? Dost thou not desire that God would spare, and yet give some more respite, some longer time, some more space added to thy life? And why? Thou darest not say, that I may enjoy the world, take my pleasure, gather wealth, live in earthly delights yet longer. Why then? O! that I may be better fitted for Heaven; that I may have more repentance, a better composure of heart, a better stock good works, and provision for Eternity. This by thy confession is the blessing, and a choice blessing of a long life; that a man may do God the more service, serve his generation the more, stock himself the more fully with grace for glory.

Herein then properly is the blessing of prolonged life, that men have time to do for God and their Souls, to lay up good store for Heaven and Eternity, to stock up the comforts of a good Conscience, and store of grace, which in old age makes them fresh and flourishing, and does as it were revive them, and make them young again.

And now, Brethren, let my Exhortation be to you that are aged, and gone far in years, to consider seriously with yourselves, whether your prolonged time hath been made a blessing to you by your improvement, or not. Let me be a Monitor this day to all gray heads here, to remember their age. God hath prolonged your time, some to fifty, sixty, seventy years, some to more; What blessing hath this prolonging been to you?

And to youth, that desire long life, my Exhortation to them is to set in a good course betime, that God may delight to prolong their life: and that the lengthening of their life may be a Blessing.

A DISCOURSE UPON THE FOURTH ARTICLE OF THE Apostolic Creed.

T HE ground of this Article of the Creed is in Act. II. 27. Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hell. The reason of its insertion we shall see afterwards. An Article obscure, and that hath bred many disputes: and the rendering of it so in English, some offenses. For it seemeth harsh, that Christ's soul descended into Hell, which in our English Language speaketh most plainly, and usually, The place of the damned: a place very improper to look for the soul of Christ in, when departed out of his body: He and his betrayer Judas to meet in the same place: He that had by death purchased Heaven for others, himself after death to descend into Hell. Not an Article in our Christian Faith hath more need of Explication to bring it to common reason, or Analogy of Faith.

The course I shall take in Explication of it, shall first be to clear it from that meaning, that is improper and offensive, and that carries not probability with it; and then to unfold the proper and genuine meaning of it.

I. The general interpretation of it in the Church of Rome is, That his Soul really and locally descended into the place of torment, but upon some other errand; namely, as they themselves express it, That Christ in his Soul went to Hell to deliver the Patriarchs, and all just men, there holden in bondage till his death. So the Rhemists on Act. II. 27. To this they apply, Eph. IV. 9. Now he that ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the Earth? Where the same Rhemists, He meaneth specially of his descending into Hell.

Likewise they apply to the same sense, 1 Pet. III. 19. By which also he went, and preached unto the Spirits in prison. And there they go further, and say, that Christ also preached in Hell, and delivered some thence, that had been there since the days of Noah. Some that were good men, but had not believed Noah his word about the flood, but when they saw it come, believed, and were sorry for their error, and indeed died by the flood corporally, but in the state of salvation: and being chastised in the next life for their unbelief, were delivered by Christ's descending thither.

Do you not see plainly, whither all this ado tends? Namely, To prove their Purgatory, and to maintain the profit they get by it. The Doctrine of which business is this, That some dying not so bad as to be damned, yet not so absolutely good yet as to go to Heaven, are sent to Purgatory, and there their sins scoured away by fire and torment; yet some after an hundred, some after two hundred years, &c. go to Heaven: but that the Pope by his power, and the Priests by their singing Masses and Dirges, can bring them out sooner, than otherwise their time should be. And hence so vast revenues have been bestowed upon their Monasteries, Chapels and Chanteries, upon this reason, that the Priests there should say Masses, and use Dirges and Prayers for the Souls of the Founders to deliver them out of Purgatory.

And thus they make this Article of Christ's descent a matter rather of Profit, than of Faith; of Money rather than of Edification. And were not profit or worldly advantage in the Wind, there would never be such struggling with them to maintain points against reason and religion, as there is.

Some Protestants hold Local descent, but under another notion, viz. That Christ went to triumph over the Devils and damned. To which opinion, viz. The Local ascent to speak in gross, and to these particular reasons of it.

First, Let us take up the two places last alleged, for the first I shall take up afterwards.

Ephes. IV. 9. Now that he ascended, what is it, but that he descended first into the lower parts of the Earth? Where it is first observable, that they conclude Hell to be under the Earth, or within it: which is a fancy of the Heathen Poets, and others, that concluded both the place of torment, and of happiness to be down in the Earth. These men have learned from Scripture, that the place of the blessed is above in Heaven; and so they refuse that part of the Heathens opinion: but retain the other, that Hell is under ground. Upon what ground who can show? It is neither agreeable to reason, nor at all to Scripture. Not to reason, to imagine a place under ground to be a place for Souls and Spirits; which are so far from an earthly substance. Not to Scripture, which tells us, Ephes. II. 2. That the Devil is the Prince of the Air, and not dwelling under ground. That tells us, Rev. XIV. 10. That the damned are tormented before the Angels, and before the Throne of the Lamb: not in the bottom of the Earth, or under ground. And time will be, when there will be no Earth at all; and where will Hell be found then? May we never know, where the place of Hell is; but certainly it is a most senseless and irrational thing to hold it to be within this Earth.

And to take up the words of the Apostle: he speaks of Christ's ascending and descending. And whence did Christ ascend to Heaven? Not from Hell, but from off the Earth, Act. I. And what then means his descending, but from Heaven to Earth? And whereas he saith, To the lower parts of the Earth, he compares Earth to Heaven, not Earth with itself. As if he should say, He descended from Heaven to these lower parts of the Earth, to dwell among men; as the Scripture doth generally expound his descending from Heaven in such a sense.

1 Pet. III. 19. By which he went and preached to the Spirits in prison. It is plain here, S. Peter speaks of Christ's preaching by his Spirit in the mouth and Ministry of Noah: As I have somewhere explained it.

These Texts thus spoken to, whereby they would prove Christ descended into Hell to preach to, and deliver Souls; now let us take their opinion in pieces, and consider them several.

And first comes to be observed, how improbable, ridiculous, and irreligious an opinion it is to conceive that the Patriarchs were in Limbo. Dato uno absurdo multa sequuntur. Yield one absurdity and many more follow. So grant this, and these rough and rugged absurdities follow.

• 1. That it was almost four thousand years before any Soul went to Heaven. Christ died Anno Mundi MMMDCCCCLX, but forty short of four thousand: and is it not absurd to think Heaven empty all that while? At the Creation, the Earth, the Air, the Waters were filled with Inhabitants, and Heaven to be a Tenement that stood empty? Sure God was a very hard Landlord, that would take in no Tenant of so long a time.
• 2. It is as absurd a thing to think a Thief should be the first that went to Heaven. For by this Opinion, the good Thief did so. The house to stand long empty, and a Thief, that repents but at the last gasp, taken in first: and Abraham, Isaac and Jacob not yet entertained, nor admitted there. Publicans and Harlots shall enter in before you. Yes, before you, Scribes and Pharisees, that shut the door of the Kingdom of Heaven against yourselves. But for Abraham, and Moses, and the other ancient Prophets and good men, that sought after Heaven all their time, to be shut out, and a Thief and a Robber let in before them; this is hardly hansom to conceive.

• 3. It is an absurd thing, that Abraham while he lived should be a friend of God, converse with God, entertain God at his Table; and when he is dead, he is become a mere stranger to God, thrust into a hole; where there is no sight of God, no communion with him: but God and Abraham now are as mere strangers. For Moses to converse with God face to face, when alive; and when dead, there is an end of all his communion. How comfortless would he have gone to Mount Nebo to die, had he believed, as the Papists do, that he must go to Limbo, and never enjoy God for so many hundred years, till Christ should come to fetch him out?

  When he appeared in Glory, Luke IX. 31. Think ye that he came out of Limbo in that glory? And when Abraham is proposed in that parable before Christ's death, Luke XVI. 22, 23. Think ye that he is proposed as being in Limbo, or in Heaven?

• 4. It is absurd to think, that Holy ones, that served God all day, and should at night receive their wages, should be denied it. God forbids to detain wages, and he not to pay his workmen of a thousand, two thousand years after they have done their work? Abel a faithful servant of God, died for him, and his truth; and when he comes to expect his reward in Heaven: No, Abel, thou must to Limbo, where there is no glimpse of Heaven, nor comfort from God for this three thousand five hundred years.

David in Psal. XXIII. saito, He will dwell in the house of God forever. In the Temple here, and then in Heaven hereafter. No, will a Papist say, David, thou must dwell a thousand years in Limbo, before thou comest to Heaven. A hard Master! that rewards his servants no better, that serve him here, and when they should come to enjoy the fruit of all their labor, then God puts them away far from him, and they enjoy not what they labored for.

Such Doctrine is that of the Romanists, and such absurdities they make people believe to build up their Purgatory for their profit. Nor are they only thus Absurd, but as Irreligious in this Doctrine.

1. That they will make men believe, that there was not divine and spiritual power in Christ for salvation, without his bodily power, and personal presence: they limit the Spirit, and the operation of Christ to his presence. They give that to Christ's presence, that God never meant. They account the Virgin Mary so incomparably holy and happy above all others, because she carried Christ in her womb, and arms; as though it were that, and not Faith and Grace, that made her so holy and happy.

Superstition is standing upon a thing over and above: leaping over that which is the proper duty and reality of holiness, and resting upon something besides it. So concerning Christ, superstition hath taught men to take up something in opinion, and practice, over and besides what is needful about the worship and love of Christ. To worship the Cross because Christ suffered on it: To put holiness in those places, where he once was, as the Manger, the Sepulcher, &c. Of this nature and rank is placing so much in the bodily presence of Christ, and overlooking the efficacy and work of his Spirit. Transubstantiation is of this form, and this that we are speaking of, the like, viz. That the Patriarchs could not be saved by the divine power and Spirit of Christ, but he must come first in Person before, to bring them to Heaven.

2. They make Grace not sufficient to save, but something else must be added, viz. Purgatory sire, to purge out those sins that Grace did not, or could not purge out. It is said, 2 Cor. XII. 9. My grace is sufficient for thee. They will say, Not; Purgatory fire must help out to sufficiency. They will tell you, It is rare for any to die so spotless, as instantly to go to Heaven, but he must have some scouring elsewhere before.

And indeed this may deserve our consideration, not to make us think of any Purgatory hereafter, but to affect us with what we have to do here.

It is undoubted, that to die in any sin is damnable. Ye shall die in your sins, is as much as, when ye die ye shall be damned, because ye shall die in sin. See Joh. VIII. 21. Ye shall die in your sins: whether I go, ye cannot come. He that dies in his sins, in any of his sins, must never come where Christ is. Imagine a man had got off all his sins but one, and that stuck to him dying, that would damn him, as well as all. Suppose it this, I cannot, will not forgive such an one, that hath done me this wrong; that spot of malice will keep him out of Heaven, as well as if he were daubed all over with all sins whatsoever. Nay, to come to a lower rate, Be it but a little love of the World, an unwillingness to part with the pleasures and profits of it; is it possible that man should go to Heaven, that had rather be here? Nay, yet lower, Be it some particular sin, that he hath chanced to forget, and not repent of, can he with that go to Heaven?

Hitherto Papists and we agree, that there is no going to Heaven with any spot of sin upon the Soul: but here we differ: They say, A man may go out of this World with many spots of sin upon him, yet at last go to Heaven, these being purged out in Purgatory. We say with the Scripture, That after death there is no Redemption; that this is the acceptable time, and day of Salvation: that if a sinners Sun set in a cloud, it will be dark with him forever: that if he die in any sin, his condition is damnable, and no help afterwards, Esa. XXII. 14. Surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye die. And then it shall never be purged.

And the Reasons of this are,

First, Because any one sin loved, unrepented of, damneth as well as many: by the rule of S. James, Chap. II. 10, 11. For whosoever shall keep the whole Law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a Transgressor of the Law.

Secondly, Because the other World is a World of Eternity; and in Eternity there is no change. He that goes sinful into that, can never be changed.

Thirdly, Because it is impiety to make anything sharer with the Blood and Grace of Christ in man's Salvation. It is said, We are saved by his Blood, and by his Grace. There needs no Purgatory sire, unless these were weak, and insufficient.

Object. But is it possible any one should die without some sin sticking to him? Original sin sticks: It may be a man has forgot some actual sin to repent of it: it may be there is some impatience upon him, his heart may fly out into passion: never without infirmities.

Answer I. Let me question, Durst any die with any sin sticking on him? Thou bearest malice: darest thou die so? Thou art proud, covetous; darest thou die so? Who is so little taught the Doctrine of Salvation, as to put himself to such a venture? At least, who is not convinced of the danger? Balaam loved the wages, the wages of unrighteousness, yet he could wish to die the death of the righteous, Numb. XXIII. 10. Even Conscience beareth witness to this truth, that dying in any sin is damnable.

But how is it possible but some sin will stick to the best of men? I answer,

II. True, that there is no man living without sin: but we are to distinguish upon two things.

First, Twixt sin and guilt. If we consider presly, it is not the sin that immediately damns, but the guilt of the sin. A thief hanged: the sin of robbing is past, and gone; but the guilt of it brings him to the gallows: so sin as to the act is over and gone, but the guilt sticks. Now there is some sin, which binds not a man over to guilt to condemn him, Psal. XXXII. 2. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not sin. There is sin, but the guilt of it is not charged on men. But what sin is that? I might answer, All sins already pardoned, have they been never so great, Rom. VIII. 33. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. But we speak of sins that stick at the instant of death. Therefore,

Secondly, We distinguish upon the sticking of sin to the flesh, and to the heart. A Saint hath sin sticking to the flesh, not to the heart, Rom. VII. ult. With the mind I serve the Law of God, but with the flesh the Law of sin. As if we get the disease from the heart, it is not so deadly: so Saints having got sin from their hearts, it is not damning to them. They hate it, but it cleaves to their flesh. So that, the guilt of such sins is pardoned all along, because the Saint all along strives and prays against them. It is not I, but sin in me. Not my heart, or consent, but sin in my flesh, that will neither be got out, nor quiet. In a word, a dying sin cannot kill a dying man. Sin is mortified all along, and if in death it stirs, yet it is dying, and hath not power to kill.

And this have I spoken to remove that error about this Article of the Creed, that Christ descended to Hell to fetch Souls to Heaven, that yet wanted something to bring them thither.

II. A second opinion, and interpretation is, that he descended locally to triumph over the Devils and the damned. An Interpretation that seems to carry more sense, and innocence; and yet is far from the meaning of the Article. To take it into examination.

First, To consider something concerning Christ's Soul, when separate from his body.

• I. It is undoubted that it went to Heaven, as soon as departed, and it is very unwarrantable to look for it in Hell: unless we have good evidence of the Scripture, at least of reason for it. His words on the Cross to the good thief were, To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise, Luke XXIII. 43. and his last words to God were, Father, into thy hands I commend my Spirit, verse. 46. Now who can doubt, but he was instantly in Heaven, and his Soul with God? And when, and indeed why, should it go to Hell? Christ was dead but thirty six hours; and his Soul to be on the Cross, in Heaven, and Hell in that time, is a flitting up and down, that unless the Spirit of Christ himself in Scripture tell us so, how can we believe it? That it flitted from the Cross, to Heaven, Scripture is plain: but that it flitted from Heaven to Hell, we are yet to seek. Ye shall seek me, and not find me. Truly according to this opinion, we know not where to seek him, nor to find him in that time. If you will take the propriety of his own words, ( Luke XXIII. 46. Father, into thy hands I commend my Spirit. And John XVII. 11, 13. I am no more in the World, but these are in the World, and I come to thee. And now I come to thee ) you may certainly conclude that his Soul was with God, while it was separate: but that it was in Hell any moment of that time, there is not one tittle of Scripture to give any evidence, but Act. II. 27. Thou wilt not leave my Soul in Hell: and this Article: of which we shall show a far other sense.
• II. Was it possible that Christ's Soul should go from Heaven to Hell? The Souls of the glorified Saints cannot; and I question whether Christ's could or not. See Luke XVI. 26. Between us and you, there is a great gulf fixed; so that they which would pass from us to you, cannot. Whence I observe two things, 1. What is meant by a great Gulf; an unsuperable unpassableness from one to another. But especially, 2. They that would pass from hence to you. Are there any in Heaven, that ever would go to Hell? The Devils indeed chose it: but I question, whether they understood what Hell meant so well, as they do now. But never blessed Soul did, nor could do it. They are too much delighted with the happy enjoyment of God, to make such a choice. But Christ by that expression in the Parable does the more show, how it is impossible for a Soul once in Heaven to go thence to Hell: that if it could be supposed, they would do it, it cannot be done. And could Christ's Soul do it anymore? Could Christ's Soul have any delight to leave the joys of Heaven to go to Hell?
• III. There is no reason, no Scripture to tell us, that Christ's Soul had anything to do, as to the work of Redemption, or Mediatorship, when separate from the body. What will you make of this Triumphing? Was it any part of his Redeeming, or Mediatorship? If it were not, what was it? If it were, why not acted per totum Christum, by whole Christ? Christ performed the whole Law, as Totus Christus, whole Christ, viz. As to his human nature, in Soul and Body. He was upon the Cross, as Totus Christus, Whole Christ: he rose, ascended, sits in Heaven, as Totus Christus, Whole Christ, Body and Soul. And we are bound to believe in toto Christo, In whole Christ, as Redeemer, and Mediator, as God, so perfectly Man of Body and Soul consisting. And it were but an improper piece of Faith, to believe so great a thing, as his work in Hell is made to be, to be done by a part of Christ; for his Soul was but one part of him. But,

Secondly, Let us speak a little to this Triumphing.

I. The opinion is taken up, I suppose, in allusion to the custom of the Romans. They conquered and then led their prisoners in Triumph: the Conqueror in his triumphal Chariot, the Captives in chains after it. Cleopatra would kill herself, rather than be thus led in triumph. Now what was this, but a pompous, proud, and vain show. And what will they make of this Triumph of Christ? Nothing but a show. For what did he in this Triumph? Who can imagine what, but show himself there? Did he conquer Hell then? If he did, what was it with? What did his Soul there to conquer Hell? How he conquered Hell and Death by dying and rising, we can tell; but how his Soul conquered with bare going thither, who can tell you?

Or did he augment the torments of the Devils and damned? That needed not, nor indeed could it be done, as I shall show afterwards. What then did Christ's Soul there in its Triumph, unless (as He, Veni, vidi, vici, I came, I saw, I overcame, ) it conquered Hell by looking into it? Natura nihil facit frustra. Nature does nothing in vain: much less the God of nature. And Christ in his life time never did, spoke, thought anything in vain. And it is unhansom to think, that his Soul after death, should go out of the bosom of his Father into Hell, to do, nobody can imagine what. For who can tell what it did in Triumphing there?

II. Was not Christ under his Humiliation, till his Resurrection? Was he not under it, whilst he lay in the grave? He himself accounts it so, Psal. XVI. 10. Thou wilt not suffer, my Soul being in the state of separation, my Body to see corruption: to be trampled on by death, to be triumphed over by Satan, that yet had it there. If you imagine his Soul triumphing, or vapouring in Hell (for I cannot imagine what it should do there, unless to vapor) how might Satan vapor again? Thou Soul of Jesus, dost thou come to triumph here? Of what, I pray thee? Have I not cause to triumph over thee? Have I not procured his death? Banished thee out of his body, and got it into the grave? And dost thou come to triumph here? Let us first see, whether he can get out from among the dead, before we talk of his triumph over him that had the power of death.

So that if we should yield to so needless a point, as Christ's going to triumph in Hell, yet certainly it would be but very unseasonable to have gone thither, when he had not yet conquered, but his body was still under death, and as yet under the conquest of Satan. This had been to triumph before Victory: as Benhadad's vapor was to Ahab, when he received that answer, Let not him that girdeth on his sword, boast himself, as he that putteth it off.

The beginning of Christ's Kingdom, was his Resurrection: for then had he conquered death, and him that had the power of death, the Devil. And so the Scripture generally states it. I need cite no proof, but two of his own speeches, Matth. XXVI. 29. I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the Vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom: that is, after my Resurrection, when I have conquered the Enemies of God, and set up his Kingdom. And Matth. XXVIII. 18. And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in Heaven and in Earth. And this was after his Resurrection. But is it not improper, to dream of a Triumph, before a Conquest? That Christ should Triumph as King, before he had put on his Kingdom? As Esth. V. 3. On the third day she put on the Kingdom. For so it is in the Hebrew. The days before, she had been under fasting, mourning, humiliation; and that was not a time of Royalty, and Triumph. So on the third day, Christ rose, and put on his Kingdom: the days before he had been under death, had abased himself: a very unfit and unseasonable time for his Soul to go and triumph.

III. As concerning Christ's triumphing over Devils. His Victory over Satan was of another kind of nature, than to go amongst them, to show terribly, or speak terribly: for what else can we imagine his Soul did in that Triumph in Hell? It is said, Heb. II. 14. That through death he might destroy him, that had the power of death, that is the Devil. Destroy him? How? We may say of him, as he of the Traitor, Vivit, etiam in Senatum venit; He lives, yea, he comes into the Council-house. So, Is the Devil destroyed? He is alive, walketh, rageth, ruleth. He walked about the Earth, before Christ's death, Job I. So hath he done ever since, 1 Pet. V. 8. Your adversary the Devil, as a roaring Lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. He was a murderer from the beginning, to Christ's death, Joh. VIII. 44. So hath he been ever since: he goes about seeking to devour, and he doth devour. He wrought in the children of disobedience before, and he now worketh, Eph. II. 2. And how hath Christ conquered, destroyed him? You must look for the Conquest and Triumph of Christ over him, not so much in destroying his Person, as destroying his Works, 1 Joh. III. 8. For this purpose the son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the Devil.

I might here speak of many things; I shall only mention two or three particulars, wherein the Victory of Christ over the Devil by his death doth consist.

1. By his death he hath conquered the very clamors of Satan, paying a ransom for all his people, Rom. VIII. 33. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? Satan is ready to say, I lay a charge and claim to them, for they have been disobedient. But Christ hath paid a satisfaction for all their disobedience. Satan, thou art cast in thy suit; the debt is paid. How is the Devil confounded at the loss of such a prize, as he expected? And how does the Death and Merits of Christ here Triumph? Now Goliath, David defies thee: touch one in the Camp of Israel, if you can or dare: they are all redeemed, and ransomed: thou hast nothing to do with them. And the ransomed of the Lord shall go to Zion with everlasting joy. Rejoice, O Heathens, for the false accuser is cast out.