Fifty Sermons
It is so now; it was so always. We see, in that time, when Christ walked upon the earth, when he came to the raising of Lazarus, and said to his sister Martha, Thy brother shall rise again, she replies to Christ, Alas, I know he shall rise again, at the Resurrection of the last day, I make no doubt of that, we all know that. So also, when Christ put forth that parable, that in placing of benefits, we should rather choose such persons, as were able to make no recompense, he gives that reason, Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just. The Resurrection was a vulgar doctrine, well known to the Jews then, and always. For, even Herod, when Christ preached and did miracles, was apt to say, John the Baptist is risen from the dead; And when it is said of those two great Apostles, (the loving, and the beloved Apostle, Peter, and John ) that as yet they knew not the Scripture, that Christ must rise from the dead, this argues no more, but that as Peters compassion before Christ's death, made him dissuade Christ from going up to Jerusalem, to suffer, so their extreme passion after Christ's death, made them the less attentively to consider those particular Scriptures, which spoke of the Resurrection. For, the Jews in general, (much more, they) had always an apprehension, and an acknowledgment of the Resurrection of the dead. By what light they saw this, and how they came to this knowledge, is our next consideration.
Had they this by the common notions of other men, out of natural Reason? Melanothon, (who is no bold, nor rash, nor dangerous expressor of himself) says well, Articulus resurrectionis propria Ecclesiaevox; It is the Christian Church, that hath delivered to us the article of the resurrection. Nature says it not, Philosophy says it not; it is the language and the Idiotisme of the Church of God, that the resurrection is to be believed as an article of faith. For, though articles of faith be not facta Ecclesiae, they are dicta Ecclesiae, though the Church do not make articles, yet she declares them. In the Creation, the way was, Dixit & facta sunt, God spake, and so things were made; In the Gospel, the way is, Fecit, & dicta sunt, God makes articles of faith, and the Church utters them, presents them. That's manifest verum, evidently, undeniably true, that Nature, and Philosophy say nothing of articles of faith. But, even in Nature, and in Philosophy, there is some preparation A priore, and much illustration A posteriore, of the Resurrection. For, first, we know by natural reason, that it is no such thing, as God cannot do; It implies no contradiction in it self, as that new article of Transubstantiation does; It implies no defectivenesse in God, as that new article, The necessity of a perpetual Vicar upon earth, does. For, things contradictory in themselves, (which necessarily imply a falsehood) things arguing a defectivenesse in God, (which implies necessarily a derogation, to his nature, to his natural goodness, to that which we may justly call even the God of God, that which makes him God to us, his mercy) such things God himself cannot do, not things which make him an unmerciful, a cruel, a precondemning God. But, excepting only such things, God, who is that, Quod cum dicitur, non potest dici, whom if you name you cannot give him half his name; for, if you call him God, he hath not his Christian name, for he is Christ as well as God, a Savior, as well as a Creator; Quod cum astimatur, non potest aestimari, If you value God, weigh God, you cannot give him half his weight; for, you can put nothing into the balance, to weight him withal, but all this world; and, there is no single sand in the sea, no single dust upon the earth, no single atom in the air, that is not likelyer to weigh down all the world, then all the world is to co ••• pose pose God; What is the whole world to a soul? says Christ; but what are all the souls of the world, to God? What is man, that God should be mindful of him, that God should ever think of him, and not forget that there is such a thing, such a nothing? Quod cum definitur, ipsa definitione crescit, says the same Father; If you limit God with any definition, he grows larger by that definition; for even by that definition you discern presently that he is something else then that definition comprehends. That God, Quem omnia nesciunt, & metuendo sciunt, whom no man knows perfectly, yet every man knows so well, as to stand in fear of him, this incomprehensible God, I say, that works, and who shall let it? can raise our bodies again from the dead, because, to do so, implies no derogation to himself, no contradiction to his word.
Our reason tells us, he can do it; doth our reason tell us as much of his will, that he will do it? Our reason tells us, that he will do, whatsoever is most convenient for the Creature, whom, because he hath made him, he loves, and for his own glory. Now this dignity afforded to the dead body of man, cannot be conceived, but, as a great addition to him. Nor can it be such a diminution to God, to take man into heaven, as it was for God to descend, and to take man's nature upon him, upon Earth. A King does not diminish himself so much, by taking an inferior person into his bosom at Court, as he should do by going to live with that person, in the Country, or City; and this God did, in the incarnation of his Son. It cannot be thought inconvenient, it cannot be thought hard. Our reason tells us, that in all God's works, in all his material works, still his latter works are easier then his former. The Creation, which was the first, and was a mere production out of nothing, was the hardest of all. The specific ation of Creatures, and the disposing of them, into their several kinds, the making of that which was made something of nothing before, a particular thing, a beast, afowle, a fish, a plant, a man, a Sun or Moon, was not so hard, as the first production out of nothing. And then, the conservation of all these, in that order in which they are first created, and then distinguished, the Administration of these creatures by a constant working of second causes, which naturally produce their effects, is not so hard as that. And so, accordingly, and in that proportion, the last work is easiest of all; Distinction and specification easier then creation, conservatio • , and administration easier then that distinction, and restitution by resurrection, easiest of all. Tertullian hath expressed it well, Plus est fecisse quam refecisse, & dedisse quam reddidisse; It is a harder work to make, then to mend, and, to give thee that which was mine, then to restore thee that which was thine. Et institutio carnis quàm destitutio; It is a less matter to recover a sick man, then to make a whole man. Does this trouble thee, says Justin Martyr, (and Athenagor as proceeds in the same way of argumentation too, in his Apology) does this trouble thee, Quod homo à piscibus, & piscis ab homine comeditar, that one man is devoured by a fish, and then another man that eats the flesh of that fish, eats, and becomes the other man? Id nec hominem resolvit in piscem, nec piscem in hominem, that first man did not become that fish that eat him, nor that fish become that second man, that eat it; sed utriusque resolutio fit in elementa, both that man, and that fish are resolved into their own elements, of which they were made at first. Howsoever it be, if thine imagination could carry thee so low, as to think, not only that thou wert become some other thing, a fish, or a dog that had fed upon thee, and so, thou couldst not have thine own body, but therewithal must have his body too, but that thou wert infinitely farther gone, that thou wert an •• ilated, become nothing, canst thou choose but think God as perfect now, at least as he was at first, and can he not as easily make thee up again of nothing, as he made thee of nothing at first? Recogita quid fueris, antequam esses; Think over thyself; what wast thou before thou wast anything? Meminisses utique, si fuisses; If thou hadst been anything then, surely thou wouldst remember it now. Qui non eras, factus es; Cum iterum non eris, fies; Thou that wast once nothing, wast made this that thou art now, and when thou shalt be nothing again, thou shalt be made better then thou art yet. And, Redderationem quâ factus es, & ego reddam rationem quâ fies; Do thou tell me, how thou wast made then, and I will tell thee how thou shalt be made hereafter. And yet as Solomon sends us to creatures, & to creatures of a low rank & station, to Ants & Spiders, for instruction, so Saint Gregory sends us to creatures, to learn the Resurrection. Lux quotidie moritur, & quotidie resurgit; That glorious creature, that first creature, the light, dies every day, and every day hath a resurrection. In arbustis folia resurrection erumpunt; from the Cedar of Libanus, to the Hyssop upon the wall, every leaf dies every year, and every year hath a Resurrection. Vbi in brevitate seminis, tam immensa arbor latuit? (as he pursues that meditation.) If thou hadst seen the bodies of men rise our of the grave, at Christ's Resurrection, could that be a stranger thing to thee, then, (if thou hadst never seen, nor hard, not imagined it before) to see an Oak that spreads so far, rise out of an Akorne? Or if Churchyards did vent themselves every spring, and that there were such a Resurrection of bodies every year, when thou hadst seen as many Resurrections as years, the Resurrection would be no stranger to thee, then the spring is. And thus, this, and many other good and reverend men, and so the holy Ghost himself sends us to Reason, and to the Creature, for the doctrine of the Resurrection; Saint Paul allows him not the reason of a man, that proceeds not so; Thou fool, says he, that which thou sowest, is not quickened except it die; but then it is. It is truly harder to conceive a translation of the body into heaven, then a Resurrection of the body from the earth. Num in hominibus terra degenerate, quae omnia regenerare consuevit? Do all kinds of earth regenerate, and shall only the Churchyard degenerate? Is there a yearly Resurrection of every other thing, and never of men? Omnia pereunde servantur, All other things are preserved, and continued by dying; Tu homo solus ad hoc morieris, ut pereas? And canst thou, O man, suspect of thyself, that the end of thy dying is an end of thee? Fall as low as thou canst, corrupt and putresie as desperately as thou canst, sis nihil, think thyself nothing; Ejus est nihilum ipsum cujus est totum, even that nothing is as much in his power, as the world which he made of nothing; And, as he called thee when thou wast not, as if thou hadst been, so will he call thee again, when thou art ignorant of that being which thou hast in the grave, and give thee again thy former, and glorify it with a better being.
The Jews then, if they had no other helps, might have, (as natural men may) preparations a Priore, and illustrations a Posteriore, for the doctrine of the Resurrection. The Jews had seen resuscitations, from the dead in particular persons, and they had seen miraculous cures done by their Prophets. And Gregory Nyssen says well, that those miraculous cures which Christ wrought, with a Tolle grabatum, and an Este sanus, and no more, they were praeludia resurrectionis, half-resurrections, prologues, and inducements to the doctrine of the resurrection, which shall be transacted with a Surgite mortui, and no more. So these natural helps in the consideration of the creature, are praeludia resurrectionis, they are half-resurrections, and these natural resurrections carry us half way to the miraculous resurrection. But certainly, the Jews, who had that, which the Gentiles wanted, The Scriptures, had from them, a general, though not an explicit knowledge of the resurrection. That they had it, we see by that practice of Judas the Maccabee, in gathering a contribution to send to Jerusalem, which is therefore commended, because he was therein mindful of the Resurrection. Neither doth Christ find any that opposed the doctrine of the Resurrection, but those, who though they were tolerated in the State, because they were otherwise great persons, were absolute Heretics, even amongst the Jews, The Sadducees. And Saint Paul, when, finding himself to be oppressed in Judgment, he used his Christian wisdom, and to draw a strong party to himself, protested himself to be of the sect of the Pharisees; and that, as they, and all the rest, in general, did, he maintained the Resurrection, he knew it would seem a strange injury, and an oppression, to be called in question for that, that they all believed; Though therefore our Savior Christ, who disputed then, only against the Sadducees, argued for the doctrine of the Resurrection, only from that place of the Scripture, which those Sadducees acknowledged to be Scripture, (for they denied all but the books of Moses ) and so insisted upon those words, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, yet certainly the Jews had established that doctrine, upon other places too, though to the Sadducees who accepted Moses only, Moses were the best evidence. It is evident enough in that particular place of Daniel, Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth, shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And in Daniel, that word many, must not be restrained to less then all; Daniel intends by that many, that how many soever they are, they shall all arise; as Saint Paul does, when he says, By one man's disobedience, many were made sinners; that is, All, for, death passed over all men, for all have sinned. And Christ doth but paraphrase that place of Daniel, who says, Multi, many, when he says, Omnes, all; All that are in the grave shall hear his voice and shall come forth; They that have done good, unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation. This then being thus far settled, that the Jews understood the resurrection, and more then that, they believed it, and therefore, as they had light in nature, they had assurance in Scripture, come we now, to that which was our last purpose in this first part, whether in this text, in these words of Job, (though after my skin, worms destroy my body) there be any such light of the Resurrection given.
It is true, that in the New Testament, where the doctrine of the resurrection is more evidently, more liquidly delivered, then in the old, (though it be delivered in the old too) there is no place cited out of the book of Job, for the resurrection; and so, this is not. But it is no marvel; both upon that reason which we noted before, that they who were to be convinced, were such as received only the books of Moses, and therefore all citations from this book of Job, or any other had been impertinently and frivolously employed, and, because in the New Testament, there is but one place of this book of Job cited at all. To the Corinthians the Apostle makes use of those words in Job, God taketh the wise in their own craft; And more then this one place, is not, (I think) cited out of this book of Job in the New Testament. But, the authority of Job is established in another place; you have heard of the patience of Job, and you have seen the end of the Lord, says Saint James. As you have seen this, so you have heard that; seen and heard one way, out of the Scripture; you have hard that out of the book of Job, you have seen this out of the Gospel. And further then this, there is no naming of Job's person, or his book in the New Testament. Saint Jerome confesses, that both the Greek, and Latin Copies of this book, were so defective in his time, that seven or eight hundred verses of the original were wanting in the book. And, for the original it self, he says, Obliquus totus liber fertur, & lubricus, it is an uncertain and slippery book. But this is only for the sense of some places of the book; And that made the authority of this book, to be longer suspended in the Church, and oftener called into question by particular men, then any other book of the Bible. But, in those who have, for many ages, received this book for Canonical, there is an unanime acknowledgement, (at least, tacitly) that this piece of it, this text, (When, after my skin, worms shall destroy my body, yet in my flesh I shall see God) does establish the Resurrection.
Divide the expositors into three branches; (for, so, the world will needs divide them) The first, the Roman Church will call theirs; though they have no other title to them, but that they received the same translation that they do. And all they use this text for the resurrection. Verba viri in gentilitate positi erubescamus; It is a shame for us, who have the word of God it self, (which Job had not) and have had such a commentary, such an exposition upon all the former word of God, as the real, and actual, and visible resurrection of Christ himself, Erubescamus verba viri in gentilitate positi, let us be ashamed and confounded, if Job, a person that lived not within the light of the covenant, saw the resurrection more clearly, and professed it more constantly then we do. And, as this Gregory of Rome, so Gregory Nyssen understood Job too. For, he considers Job's case thus; God promised Job twofold of all that he had lost; And in his sheep and camels, and oxen, and asses, which were utterly destroyed, and brought to nothing, God performs it punctually, he had all in a double proportion. But Job had seven sons; and three daughters before, and God gives him but seven sons; and three daughters again; And yet Job had twofold of these too; for Postnati cum prioribus numerantur, quia omnes deo vivunt; Those which were gone, and those which were new given, lived all one life, because they lived all in God; Necquicquam aliud est mors nisi viti, ositatis expiatio; Death is nothing else, but a devesting of those defects, which made us less fit for God. And therefore, agreeably to this purpose, says Saint Cyprian, Scimus non amitti, sed praemitti; thy dead are not lost, but lent. Non recedere, sed praecedere; They are not gone into any other womb, then we shall follow them into; nec acquirendae, atrae vestes, pro iis qui albis induuntur, neither should we put on blacks, for them that are clothed in white, nor mourn for them, that are entered into their Masters joy. We can enlarge our selves no farther in this consideration of the first branch of expositors, but that all the ancients took occasion from this text to argue for the resurrection.
Take into your Consideration the other two branches of moderne expositors, (whom others sometimes contumeliously, and themselves sometimes perversely have called Lutherans and Calvinists, and you may know, that in the first rank, Osiander, and with him, all his interpret these words so; And in the other rank, Tremellius, and Pellicanus, heretofore, Polanus lately, and Piscator, for the present; All these, and all the Translators into the vulgar tongues of all our neighbors of Europe, do all establish the doctrine of the Resurrection by these words, this place of Job. And therefore, though one, (and truly for anything I know, but one) though one, to whom we all owe much, for the interpretation of the Scriptures, do think that Job intends no other resurrection in this place, but that, when he shall be reduced to the miserablest estate that can be in this life, still he will look upon God, and trust in him for his restitution, and reparation in this life; let us with the whole Christian Church, embrace and magnify this Holy and Heroicall Spirit of Job; Scio, says he; I know it, (which is more in him, then the Credo is in us, more to know it then, in that state, then to believe it now, after it hath been so evidently declared, not only to be a certain truth, but to be an article of faith) Scio Redemptorem, says he; I know not only a Creator, but a Redeemer; And, Redemptorem meum, My Redeemer, which implies a confidence, and a personal application of that Redemption to himself. Scio vivere, says he; I know that he lives; I know that he begun not in his Incarnation, I know he ended not in his death, but it always was, and is now, and shall forever be true, Vivit, that he lives still. And then, Scio venturum, says he too; I know he shall stand at the last day to Judge me and all the world; And after that, and after my skin and body is destroyed by worms, yet in my flesh I shall see God. And so have you as much as we proposed for our first part; That the Jews do now, that they always did believe a Resurrection; That as natural men, and by natural reason they might know it, both in the possibility of the thing, and in the purpose of God, that they had better helps then natural reason, for they had divers places of their Scripture, and that this place of Scripture, which is our text, hath evermore been received for a proof of the Resurrection. Proceed we now, to those particulars which constitute our second part, such instructions concerning the Resurrection, as arise out of these words, Though after my skin, worms destroy my body, yet in my flesh I shall see God.
In this second part, the first thing that was proposed, was, That the Saints of God, are not privileged from this, which fell upon Job, This Death, this dissolution after death. Upon the Morte morieris, that double death, interminated by God upon Adam, there is a Non obstante; Revertere, turn to God, and thou shalt not dy the death, not the second death. But upon that part of the sentence, In pulverem reverteris, To dust thou shalt return, there is no Non obstante; though thou turn to God, thou must turn into the grave; for, he that redeemed thee from the other death, redeemed not himself from this. Carry this consideration to the last minute of the world, when we that remain shall be caught up in the clouds, yet even that last fire may be our fever, those clouds our winding sheets, that rapture our dissolution; and so, with Saint Augustine, most of the ancients, most of the latter men think, that there shall be a sudden dissolution of body and soul, which is death, and a sudden re-uniting of both, which is resurrection, in that instant; Quis Homeo, is David's question; What man is he that liveth and shall not see death? Let us add, Quis Deoram? What god is he amongst the Gentiles, that hath not seen death? Which of their three hundred Jupiter's, which of their thousands of other gods, have not seen death? Mortibus morjuntur; we may add to that double death in God's mouth, another death; The gods of the Gentiles have died thrice; In body, in soul, and in fame; for, though they have been glorified with a Deification, nor one of all those old gods, is, at this day, worshipped, in any part of the world, but all those temporary, and transitory God's, are worn out, and dead in all senses. Those gods, who were but men, fall under David's question, Quis Home? And that man who was truly God, falls under it too, Christ Jesus; He saw death, though he saw not the death of this text, Corruption. And, if we consider the effusion of his precious blood, the contusion of his sacred flesh, the extension of those sinews, and ligaments which tied heaven, and earth together, in a reconciliation, the departing of that Intelligence from that sphere, of that high Priest from that Temple, of that Dove from that Ark, of that soul from that body, that dissolution (which, as an ordinary man he should have had in the grave, but that the decree of God, declared in the infallibility of the manifold prophesies, preserved him from it) had been but a slumber, in respect of these tortures, which he did suffer; The Godhead staid with him in the grave, and so he did not corrupt, but, though our souls be gone up to God, our bodies shall.
Corruption in the skin, says Job; In the outward beauty, These be the Records of velim, these be the parchmins, the endictments, and the evidences that shall condemn many of us, at the last day, our own skins; we have the book of God, the Law, written in our own hearts; we have the image of God imprinted in our own souls; we have the character, and seal of God stamped in us, in our baptism; and, all this is bound up in this velim, in this parchmin, in this skin of ours, and we neglect book, and image, and character, and feal, and all for the covering. It is not a clear case, if we consider the original words properly, That Jezebel did paint; and yet all translators, and expositors have taken a just occasion, out of the ambiguity of those words, to cry down that abomination of painting. It is not a clear case, if we consider the propriety of the words, That Absalom was hanged by the hair of the head; and yet the Fathers and others have made use of that indifferency, and verisimilitude, to explode that abomination, of cherishing and curling hair, to the enveagling, and ensnaring, and entangling of others; Iudicium patietur aeternum, says Saint Jerome, Thou art guilty of a murder, though nobody die; Quia vinum attulisti, si faisset qui bibisset; Thou hast poison'd a cup, if any would drink, thou hast prepared a temptation, if any would swallow it. Tertullian thought he had done enough, when he had writ his book De Habitu muli • bri, against the excess of women in clothes, but he was fain to add another with more vehemence, De cultu foeminarum, that went beyond their clothes to their skin. And he concludes, Illud ambitionis crimen, there's vain-glory in their excess of clothes, but, Hoc prostitutionis, there's prostitution in drawing the eye to the skin. Pliny says, that when their thin silk stuffs were first invented at Rome, Excogitatum ad faeminas denudandas, It was but an invention that women might go naked in clothes, for their skins might be seen through those clothes, those thin stuffs: Our women are not so careful, but they expose their nakedness professedly, and paint it, to cast bird-lime for the passengers eye. Beloved, good diet makes the best Complexion, and a good Conscience is a continual feast; A cheerful heart makes the best blood, and peace with God is the true cheerfulness of heart, Thy Savior neglected his skin so much, as that at last, he scarce had any; all was torn with the whips, and scourges; and thy skin shall come to that absolute corruption, as that, though a hundred years after thou art buried, one may find thy bones, and say, this was a tall man, this was a strong man, yet we shall soon be past saying, upon any relique of thy skin, This was a fair man; Corruption seises the skin, all outward beauty quickly, and so it does the body, the whole frame and constitution, which is another consideration; After my skin, my Body.
If the whole body were an eye, or an ear, where were the body, says Saint Paul; but, when of the whole body there is neither eye nor ear, nor any member left, where is the body? And what should an eye do there, where there is nothing to be seen but loathsomeness; or a nose there, where there is nothing to be smelt, but putrefaction; or an ear, where in the grave they do not praise God? Doth not that body that boasted but yesterday of that privilege above all creatures, that it only could go upright, lie today as flat upon the earth as the body of a horse, or of a dog? And doth it not tomorrow lose his other privilege, of looking up to heaven? Is it not farther removed from the eye of heaven, the Sun, then any dog, or horse, by being covered with the earth, which they are not? Painters have presented to us with some horror, the s • cleton, the frame of the bones of a man's body; but the state of a body, in the dissolution of the grave, no pencil can present to us. Between that excrementall jelly that thy body is made of at first, and that jelly which thy body dissolves to at last; there is not so noisome, so putrid a thing in nature. This skin, (this outward beauty) this body, (this whole constitution) must be destroyed, says Job • in the next place.
The word is well chosen, by which all this is expressed, in this text, Nakaph, which is a word of as heavy a signification, to express an utter abolition, and annihilation, as perchance can be found in all the Scriptures. Tremellius hath mollifyed it in his translation; there it is but Confodere, to pierce. And yet it is such a piercing, such a sapping, such an undermining, such a demolishing of a fort of Castle, as may justly remove us from any high valuation, or any great confidence, in that skin, and in that body, upon which this Confoderint must fall. But, in the great Bible it is Contriverint, Thy skin, and thy body shall be ground away, trod away upon the ground. Ask where that iron is that is ground off of a knife, or axe; Ask that marble that is worn off of the threshold in the Church-porch by continual treading, and with that iron; and with that marble, thou mayst find thy Fathers skin, and body; Contrita sunt, The knife, the marble, the skin, the body are ground away, trod away, they are destroyed, who knows the revolutions of dust? Dust upon the Kings high-way, and dust upon the Kings grave, are both, or neither, Dust Royal, and may change places; who knows the revolutions of dust? Even in the dead body of Christ Jesus himself, one dram of the decree of his Father, one sheet, one sentence of the prediction of the Prophets preserved his body from corruption, and incineration, more then all Joseph's new tombs, and fine linen, and great proportion of spices could have done. O, who can express this inexpreffible mystery? The foul of Christ Jesus, which took no harm by him, contracted no Original sin, in coming to him, was guilty of no more sin, when it went out, then when it came from the breath and bosom of God, yet this soul left this body in death. And the Divinity, the Godhead, incomparably better then that soul, which soul was incomparably better then all the Saints, and Angels in heaven, that Divinity, that God-head did not forsake the body, though it were dead If we might compare things infinite in themselves, it was nothing so much, that God did assume man's nature, as that God did still cleave to that man, then when he was no man, in the separation of body and soul, in the grave. But full we from incomprehensible mysteries; for, there is mortification enough, (and mortification is vivification, and edification) in this obvious consideration; skin and body, beauty and substance must be destroyed; And, Destroyed by worms, which is another descent in this humiliation, and ex • anition of man, in death; After my skin, worms shall destroy this body.
I will not insist long upon this, because it is not in the Original, In the Original there is no mention of worms. But because in other places of Job there is, (They shall lie down alike in the dust, and the worms shall cover them) (The womb shall forget them, and the worm shall feed sweetly on them; & because the word Destroying is presented in that form & number, Contriverint, when they shall destroy, they and no other persons, no other creatures named) both our later translations, (for indeed, our first translation hath no mention of worms) and so very many others, even Tremell • s that adheres most to the letter of the Hebrew, have filled up this place, with that addition, Destroyed by worms. It makes the destruction the more contemptible; Thou that wouldest not admit the beams of the Sun upon thy skin, and yet hast admitted the pollutions of sin; Thou that wouldst not admit the breath of the air upon thy skin, and yet hast admitted the spirit of lust, and unchaste solicitations to breath upon thee, in execrable oaths, and blasphemies, to vicious purposes; Thou, whose body hath (as far as it can) putrefyed and corrupted even the body of thy Savior, in an unworthy receiving thereof, in this skin, in this body, must be the food of worms, the prey of destroying worms. After a low birth thou mayst pass an honorable life, after a sentence of an ignominious death, thou mayst have an honorable end; But, in the grave canst thou make these worms silk worms? They were bold and early worms that eat up Herod before he died; They are bold and everlasting worms, which after thy skin and body is destroyed, shall remain as long as God remains, in an eternal gnawing of thy conscience; long, long after the destroying of skin and body, by bodily worms.
Thus far then to the destroying of skin and body by worms, all men are equal; Thus far all's Common law, and no Prerogative, so is it also in the next step too; The Resurrection is common to all. The prerogative lies not in the Rising, but in the rising to the fruition of the sight of God; in which consideration, the first beam of comfort is the Postquam, After all this, destruction before by worms; ruinous misery before; but there is something else to be done upon me after. God leaves no state without comfort. God leaves some inhabitants of the earth, under longer nights then others, but none under an everlasting night; and, those, whom he leaves under those long nights, he recompenses with as long days, after. I were miserable, if there were not an Antequam in my behalf; if before I had done well or ill actually in this world, God had not wrapped me up, in his good purpose upon me. And I were miserable again, if there were not a Postquam in my behalf; If, after my sin had cast me into the grave, there were not a loud trumpet to call me up, and a gracious countenance to look upon me, when I were risen. Nay, let my life have been as religious, as the infirmities of this life can admit, yet, If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are, of all men, most miserable. For, for the worldly things of this life, first, the children of God have them in the least proportions of any; and besides that, those children of God, which have them in larger proportion, do yet make the least use of them, of any others, because the children of the world, are not so tender conscienced, nor so much afraid, lest those worldly things should become snares, and occasions of temptation to them, if they open themselves to a full enjoying thereof, as the children of God are. And therefore, after my wanting of many worldly things, (after a penurious life) and, after my not daring to use those things that I have, so freely as others do, after that holy and conscientious forbearing of those things that other men afford themselves, after my leaving all these absolutely behind me here, and my skin and body in destruction in the grace, After all, there remains something else for me. After; but how long after? That's next.
When Christ was in the body of that flesh, which we are in, now, (sin only excepted) he said, in that state that he was in then, Of that day and hour, no man knoweth, not the Angels, not the Son. Then, in that state, he excludes himself. And when Christ was risen again, in an uncorruptible body, he said, even to his nearest followers, Non est vestru •• , it is not for you, to know times, and seasons. Before in his state of mortality, 〈…〉 ignor antibus, he pretended to know no more of this, then they that knew nothing. After, when he had invested immortality, per sui exceptionem, (says that Father) he excepts none but himself; all the rest, even the Apostles, were left ignorant thereof. For this non est vestrum, (it is not for you) is part of the last sentence that ever Christ spake to them. If it be a convenient answer to say, Christ knew it not, as man, how bold is that man that will pretend to know it? And, if it be a convenient interpretation of Christ's words, that he knew it not, that is, knew it not so, as that he might tell it them, how indiscreet are they, who, though they may seem to know it, will publish it? For, thereby they fill other men with scruples, and vexations, and they open themselves to scorn and reproach, when their predictions prove false, as Saint Augustine observed in his time, and every age hath given examples since, of confident men that have failed in these conjectures. It is a poor pretence to say, this intimation, this impression of a certain time, prepares men with better dispositions. For, they have so often been found false, that it rather weakens the credit of the thing it self. In the old world they knew exactly the time of the destruction of the world; that there should be an hundred & twenty years, before the flood came; And yet, upon how few, did that prediction, though from the mouth of God himself, work to repentance? Na •• found grace in God's eyes; but it was not because he mended his life upon that prediction, but he was grations in God's sight before. At the day of our death, we write Pridi • r • surr • ctioni • , the day before the resurrection; It is Vigilia resurectionis; Our Easter Eve. Adveniat regnum tuum, possess my soul of thy kingdom then: And, Fi •• voluntas tua, my body shall arise after, but how soon after, or how late after, thy will be done then; by thyself, and thy will be known, till then, to thyself.
We pass on. As in Massa damnata, the whole lump of mankind is under the condemnation of Adams sin, and yet the good purpose of God severs some men from that condemnation, so, at the resurrection, all shall rise; but not all to glory. But amongst them, that do, Ego, says Job, I shall. I, as I am the same man, made up of the samebody, and the same soul. Shall I imagine a difficulty in my body, because I have lost an Arm in the East, and a leg in the West? because I have left some blood in the North, and some bones in the South? Do but remember, with what ease you have sat in the chair, casting an account, and made a shilling on one hand, a pound on the other, or five shillings below, ten above, because all these lay easily within your reach. Consider how much less, all this earth is to him, that sits in heaven, and spans all this world, and reunites in an instant arms, and legs, blood, and bones, in what corners so ever they be scattered. The greater work may seem to be in reducing the soul; That that soul which sped so ill in that body, last time it came to it, as that it contracted Original sin then, and was put to the slavery to serve that body, and to serve it in the ways of sin, not for an Apprenticeship of seven, but seventy years after, that that soul after it hath once got loose by death, and lived God knows how many thousands of years, free from that body; that abused it so before, and in the sight and fruition of that God, where it was in no danger, should willingly, nay desirously. ambitiously seek this scuttered body; this Eastern, and Western, and Northern, and Southern body, this is the most inconsiderable consideration, and yet, Ego, I, I the same body, and the same soul, shall be recompact again, and be identically, numerically, individually the same man. The same integrity of body, and soul, and the same integrity in the Organs of my body, and in the faculties of my soul too; I shall be all there, my body, and my soul, & all my body, & all my soul I am not all here, I am here now preaching upon this text, and I am at home in my Library considering whether S. Gregory, or S. Jerome, have said best of this text, before. I am here speaking to you, and yet I consider by the way, in the same instant, what it is likely you will say to one another, when I have done, you are not all here neither; you are here now, hearing me, and yet you are thinking that you have heard a better Sermon somewhere else, of this text before, you are here, and yet you think you could have heard some other doctrine of down-right Predestinations and Reprobation roundly delivered somewhere else with more edification to you • you are here, and you remember yourselves that now ye think of it. This had been the fittest time, now, when everybody else is at Church, to have made such and such a private visit; and because you would be there, you are there. I cannot say, you cannot say so perfectly, so entirely now, as at the Resurrection, Ego, I am here; I, body and soul; I, soul and faculties: as Christ said to Peter, Noli timere, Ego sum, Fear nothing, it is I; so I say to myself, Noli timere; My soul, why art thou so sad, my body, why dost thou languish: Ego, I, body and soul, soul and faculties, shall say to Christ Jesus, Ego sum, Lord, it is I, and he shall not say, Nescio te, I know thee not, but avow me, and place me at his right hand. Ego sum, I am the man that hath seen affliction, by the rod of his wrath; Ego sum, and I the same man, shall receive the crown of glory which shall not fade.
Ego, I, the same person; Ego videbo, I shall see; I have had no looking-glass in my grave, to see how my body looks in the dissolution; I know not how. I have had no hour-glass in my grave to see how my time passes; I know not when: for, when my eylids are closed in my death-bed, the Angel hath said to me, that time shall be no more; Till I see eternity, the ancient of days, I shall see no more; but then I shall: Now, why is Job gladder of the use of this sense of seeing, then of any of the other? He is not; He is glad of seeing, but not of the sense, but of the Object. It is true that is said in the School, Viciniùs se habent potentiae sensitivae ad animam quàm corpus; Our sensitive faculties have more relation to the soul, then to the body; but yet to some purpose, and in some measure, all the senses shall be in our glorified bodies, In actu, or in potentiâ, say they; so as that we shall use them, or so as that we might. But this sight that Job speaks of, is only the fruition of the presence of God, in which consists eternal blessedness. Here, in this world, we see God per speculum, says the Apostle, by reflection, upon a glass; we see a creature; and from that there arises an assurance that there is a Creator; we see him in aenigmate, says he; which is not ill rendered in the margin, in a Riddle, we see him in the Church; but men have made it a riddle; which is the Church, we see him in the Sacrament, but men have made it a riddle; by what light, and at what window: Do I see him at the window of bread and wine; Is he in that; or do I see him by the window of faith; and is he only in that? still it is in a riddle. Do I see him à Priore, (I see that I am elected, and therefore I cannot sin to death.) Or do I see him à Posteriore, (because I see myself careful not to sin to death, therefore I am elected) I shall see all problematicall things come to be dogmatical, I shall see all these rocks in Divinity, come to be smooth alleys; I shall see Prophe • ies untied, Riddles dissolved, controversies reconciled; but I shall never see that, till I come to this sight which follows in out text, Videbo Deum, I shall see God.
No man ever saw God and lived; and yet, I shall not live till I see God; and when I have seen him I shall never die. What have I ever seen in this world, that hath been truly the same thing that it seemed to me? I have seen marble buildings, and a chip, a crust, a plaster, a face of marble hath pilld off, and I see brick-bowels within. I have seen beauty, and a strong breath from another, tells me, that that complexion is from without, not from a sound constitution within. I have seen the state of Princes, and all that is but ceremony; and, I would be loath to put a Master of ceremonies to define ceremony, and tell me what it is, and to include so various a thing as ceremony, in so constant a thing, as a Definition. I see a great Officer, and I see a man of mine own profession, of great revenues, and I see not the interest of the money, that was paid for it, I see not the pensions, nor the Annuities, that are charged upon that Office, or that Church. As he that fears God, fears nothing else, so, he that sees God, sees everything else: when we shall see God, Sicuti est, as he is, we shall see all things Sicuti sunt, as they are; for that's their Essence, as they conduce to his glory. We shall be no more deluded with outward appearances: for, when this sight, which we intend here comes, there will be no delusory thing to be seen. All that we have made as though we saw, in this world, will be vanished, and I shall see nothing but God, and what is in him; and him I shall see in carne, in the flesh, which is another degree of Exaltation in mine Exinanition.
I shall see him, In car • e suâ, in his flesh: And this was one branch in Saint Augustine's great wish, That he might have seen Rome in her state, That he might have heard S. Paul preach, That he might have seen Christ in the flesh: Saint Augustine hath seen Christ in the flesh one thousand two hundred years; in Christ's glorified flesh; but, it is with the eyes of his understanding, and in his soul. Our flesh, even in the Resurrection, cannot be a spectacle, a perspective glass to our soul. We shall see the Humanity of Christ with our bodily eyes, then glorified; but, that flesh, though glorified, cannot make us see God better, nor clearer, then the soul alone hath done, all the time, from our death, to our resurrection. But as an indulgent Father, or as a tender mother, when they go to see the King in any Solemnity, or any other thing of observation, and curiosity, delights to carry their child, which is flesh of their flesh, and bone of their bone, with them, and though the child cannot comprehend it as well as they, they are as glad that the child sees it, as that they see it themselves, such a gladness shall my soul have, that this flesh, (which she will no longer call her prison, nor her tempter, but her friend, her companion, her wife) that this flesh, that is, I, in in the re-union, and redintegration of both parts, shall see God; for then, one principal clause in her rejoicing, and acclamation, shall be, that this flesh is her flesh; In carne meâ, in my flesh I shall see God.
It was the flesh of every wanton object here, that would allure it in the petulancy of mine eye. It was the flesh of every Satirical Libeller, and defamer, and calumniator of other men, that would call upon it, and tickle mine ear with aspersions and slanders of persons in authority. And in the grave, it is the flesh of the worm; the possession is transferred to him. But, in heaven, it is Caro mea, My flesh, my souls flesh, my Savior's flesh. As my meat is assimilated to my flesh, and made one flesh with it; as my soul is assimilated to my God, and made partaker of the divine nature, and Idem Spiritus, the same Spirit with it; so, there my flesh shall be assimilated to the flesh of my Savior, and made the same flesh with him too. Verbum caro factum, ut caro resurgeret; Therefore the Word was made flesh, therefore God was made man, that that union might exalt the flesh of man to the right hand of God. That's spoken of the flesh of Christ; and then to facilitate the passage for us, Reformat ad immortalitatem suam participes sui; those who are worthy receivers of his flesh here, are the same flesh with him; And, God shall quicken your mortal bodies, by his Spirit is that dwelleth in you. But this is not in consummation, in full accomplishment, till this resurrection, when it shall be Caro mea, my flesh, so, as that nothing can draw it from the allegiance of my God; and Caro mea, My flesh, so, as that nothing can devest me of it. Here a bullet will ask a man, where's your arm; and a Wolf will ask a woman, where's your breast. A sentence in the Star-chamber will ask him, where's your ear, and a mouths close prison will ask him, where's your flesh? A fever will ask him, where's your Red, and a morphew will ask him, where's your white? But when after all this, when after my skin worms shall destroy my body, I shall see God, I shall see him in my flesh, which shall be mine as inseparably, (in the effect, though not in the manner) as the Hypostatical union of God, and man, in Christ, makes our nature and the God-head one person in him. My flesh shall no more be none of mine, then Christ shall not be man, as well as God.
SERMON XV.
Preached at Lincolns Inn.
1 COR. 15. 50.
S Aint Gregory hath delivered this story; That Eutychius, who was Bishop of Constantinople, having written a book of the Resurrection, and therein maintained that error, That the body of Christ had not, that our bodies, in the Resurrection should not have any of the qualities of a natural body, but that those bodies were, in subtilitatem redacta, so rarifyed, so refined, so atten • ated, and reduced to a thinness, and subtlenesse, that they were aery bodies, and not bodies of flesh and blood. This error made a great noise, and raised a great dust, till the Emperor, to avoid scandal, (which for the most part arises out of public conferences) was pleased to hear Eutychius, and Gregory dispute this point privately before himself, and a small company; And, that upon conference, the Emperor was so well satisfied, that he commanded Eutychius his books to be burnt. That after this, both Gregory and Eutychius fell sick; but Eutychius died; and died with this protestation, In hâc carne, in this flesh, (taking up the flesh of his hand in the presence of them that were there) in this flesh, I acknowledge, that I, and all men shall arise at the day of Judgment. Now, the principal place of Scripture, which in his book, and in that conference Eutychius stood upon, was this Text, these words of Saint Paul; (This I say brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.) And the directest answer that Gregory gave to it was, Caro secundum culpam non regnabit, sed Caro secundum naturam; sinful flesh shall not, but natural flesh, that is, flesh endued with all qualities of flesh, all such qualities as imply no defect, no corruption, (for there was flesh before there was sin ) such flesh, and such blood shall inherit the Kingdom of God.
As there have been more Heresies about the Humanity of Christ, then about his Divinity, so there have been more heresies about the Resurrection of his body, and consequently of ours, then about any other particular article, that concerns his Humiliation, or Exaltation. Simon Magus struck deepest at first, to the root; That there was no Resurrection at all; The Gnostics, (who took their name from knowledge, as though they knew all, and nobody else anything, which is a pride transferred through all Heretics: for, as that sect in the Roman Church, which call themselves Ignorantes, and seem to pretend to no knowledge, do yet believe that they know a better way to heaven, then all other men do, so that sect amongst them, which called themselves Nullanos, Nothings, thought themselves greater in the Kingdom of God, then either of the other two sects of diminution, the Minorits, or the Minims did) These Gnostics acknowledged a Resurrection, but they said it was of the soul only, and not of the body, for they thought that the soul lay dead (at least, in a dead sleep) till the Resurrection. Those Heretics that are called the Arabians, did (as the Gnostics did) affirm a temporary death of the soul, as well as of the body, but then they allowed a Resurrection to both soul, and body, after that death, which the Gnostickes did not, but to the soul only. Hymenaeus and Philetus, (of whom Saint Paul speaks) they restrained the Resurrection to the soul, but then they restrained this Resurrection of the soul to this life, and that in those who were baptized, the Resurrection was accomplished already. Eutychius, (whom we mentioned before) enlarged the Resurrection to the body, as well as to the soul, but enlarged the qualities of the body so far, as that it was scarce a body. The Armenian heretics said; that it was not only Corpus hum • num, but Corpus masculinum, That all should rise in the perfecter sex, and none, as women. Origen allowed a Resurrection, and allowed the Body to be a natural body; but the contracted the time; he said, that when we rose we should enjoy the benefits of the resurrection, even in bodily pleasures, for a thousand years, and then be annihilated, or absorpted and swallowed up into the nature, and essence of God himself; (for, it will be hard to state Origen's opinion in this point; Origen was not, herein, well understood in his own time; not do we understand him now, (for the most part) but by his accusers, and those that have written against him.) Divers of these Heretics, for the maintenance of their several heresies, perverted this Scripture, (Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God) and that occasioned those Fathers who opposed those heresies, so diverse from one another, to interpret these words diversely, according to the heresy they opposed. All agree, that they are an argument for the resurrection, though they seem at first, to oppose it. For, this Chapter hath three general parts; first, Resurrectionem esse, that there shall be a Resurrection, which the Apostle proves by many and various arguments to the thirty fifth verse. And then Quati corpore, the body shall rise, but some will say, How are the dead raised, and with what body, do they come? in that thirty fifth verse: And lastly, Quid de superstitibus, what shall become of them, who shall be found alive, at the day? We shall all be changed, verse fifty one. Now, this text is the knot, and corollary or all the second part, concerning the qualities of the bodies in the resurrection; Now, says the Apostle, now that I have said enough to prove that a resurrection there is, now, now that I have said enough what kind of bodies shall arise, now, I show you as much in the Negative as I have done in the Affirmative, now I teach you what to avoid, as well as I have done what to affect, now this I say brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
Now, though those words be primarily, principally intended of the last Resurrection, yet in a secondary respect, they are appliable in themselves, and very often applied by the ancients, to the first Resurrection, our resurrection in this life. Tertullian hath intimated, and presented both together, elegantly, when he says of God, Nobis arrhabonem spiritus reliquit, & arrhabonem à nobis accepit, God hath given us his earnest, and a pawn from him upon earth, in giving us the holy Ghost, and he hath received our earnest, and a pawn from us into heaven, by receiving our nature, in the body of Christ Jesus there. Flesh and blood, when it is conformed to the flesh and blood of Christ now glorified, and made like his, by our resurrectien, may inherit the kingdom of God, in heaven. Yea flesh and blood being conformed to Christ by the sanctification of the holy Ghost, here, in this world, may inherit the kingdom of God, here upon earth; for, God hath a kingdom here; and there is a Communion in Arms, as well as a communion in Triumph. Leaving then that acceptation of flesh and blood, which many think to be intended in this text, that is, Animalis caro, flesh and blood that must be maintained by eating, and drinking, and preserved by propagation and generation, that flesh, and that blood cannot inherit heaven, where there is no marrying, nor giving in marriage, but Erimus sicut Angeli, we shall be as the Angels, (though such a heaven, in part, Mahomet hath proposed to his followers, a heaven that should abound with worldly delights, and such a heaven the Disciples of Origen, and the Millenarians, that look for one thousand years of all temporal felicity, proposed to themselves; And, though amongst our latter men, Cajetan do think, that the Apostle in this text, bent himself upon that doctrine, non caro, non Animalis caro, flesh and blood, that is, no carnal, no worldly delights are to be looked for, in heaven,) leaving that sense, as too narrow, and too shallow for the holy Ghost, in this place, in which he hath a higher reach, we shall determine ourselves at this time, in these too acceptations of this phrase of speech; first, non caro, that is, non caro corrupta, flesh and blood cannot, sinful flesh, corrupt flesh, flesh not discharged of sinful corruption here, by repentance, and Sanctification, and the operation of God's spirit, such flesh cannot inherit the kingdom of God here. Secondly, noncar • , is non car • corruptibilis, flesh and blood cannot, that is, flesh that is yet subject to corruption, and dissolution, and natural passions and impressions, tending to defectivenesse, flesh that is still subject to any punishment that God lays upon flesh, for sin, such flesh cannot inherit the kingdom of God hereafter; for our present possession of the kingdom of God here, our corrupt flesh must be purged by Sanctification here, for the future kingdom, our natural Corruptiblenesse must be purged by glorification there. We will make the last part first, as this flesh, and this blood, by devesting the corruptiblenesse it suffers here, by that glorification, shall inherit that kingdom; and, not stay long upon it neither. For, of that we have spoken conveniently before, of the resurrection it self. Now we shall look a little into the qualities of bodies in the resurrection; and that, not in the intricacies, and subtleties of the School, but only in that one pattern, which hath been given us of that glory, upon earth, which is the Transfiguration of Christ; for, that Transfiguration of his, was a representation of a glorified body in a glorified state. And then in the second place, we shall come to our first part, what that flesh and blood is that is denied to be capable of the inheritance of that kingdom here, that is, that earnest of heaven, and that inchoation of heaven which may be had in this world; and, in that part we shall see, what this inheritance, what this title to heaven here, and what this kingdom of God, that heaven which is proposed to us here, is.
First then, for the first acceptation, (which is of the later resurrection) no man denies that which Melancthon hath collected and established to be the sum of this text, Statuit resurrectionem in corpore, sed non quale jam corpus est; The Apostle establishes a resurrection of the body, but yet not such a body as this is. It is the same body, and yet not such a body; which is a mysterious consideration, that it is the same body, and yet not such as it self, nor like any other body of the same substance. But, what kind of body then? We content ourselves with that, Transfiguratio specimen appositissimum Resurrectionis, the Transfiguration of Christ, is the best glass to see this resurrection, and state of glory in. But how was that transfiguration wrought? We content our selves with Saint Jerome's expressing of it, non pristinam amisit veritatem, vel formam corporis; Christ had still the same ture, and real body, and he had the same form, and proportion, and lineaments, and dimensions of his body, in it self. Transfiguratio non faciem subtraxit, sed splendorem ad didit, says he; It gave him not another face, but it super-immitted such a light, such an illustration upon him, as, by that irradiation, that coruscation, the beams of their eyes were scattered, and disgregated, dissipated so, as that they could not collect them, as at other times, nor constantly, and confidently discern him. Moses had a measure, a proportion of this; but yet when Moses came down with his shining face, though they were not able to look long upon him, they knew him to be Moses. When Christ was transfigured in the presence of Peter, James and John, yet they knew him to be Christ. Transfiguration did not so change him, nor shall glorification so change us, as that we shall not be known. There is nothing to convince a man of error, nothing in nature, nothing in Scriptures, if he believe that he shall know those persons in heaven, whom he knew upon earth; and, if he conceive soberly, that it were a less degree of blessedness, not to know them, then to know them, he is bound to believe that he shall know them, for he is bound to believe, that all that conduces to blessedness shall be given him. The School resolves, that at the Judgment, all the sins of all, shall be manifested to all; even those secret sinful thoughts that never came out of the heart. And, when any in the School differs or departs from this common opinion, they say only, that those sins which have been, in particular, repented, shall not be manifested: all others shall. And therefore it is a deep uncharitablenes, to reproach any man, of sins formerly repented; and a deep uncharitableness not to believe, that he whom thou seest at the Communion, hath repented his former sins; Reproach no man, after thou hast seen him receive, with last years sins; except thou have good evidence of his Hypocrisy then, or of his Relapsing after; For, in those two cases, a man remains, or becomes again guilty of his former sins. Now, if in heaven they shall know the hearts of one another, whose faces they never knew before, there is less difficulty in knowing them, whom we did know before. From this transfiguration of Christ, in which, the mortal eye of the Apostles, did see that representation of the glory of Christ, the Schools make a good argument, that in heaven we shall do it much more. And though in this case of the Transfiguration, in which the eyes of mortal men could have no proportion with that glory of heaven, this may be well said to have been done, either Moderando lumen, (that God abated that light of glory) or Confortando visum, (that God exalted their sense of seeing supernaturally) no such distinctions, or modifications will be needful in heaven, because how highly soever the body of my Father, or of my friend shall be glorified there, mine eyes shall be glorified as much, and we are both kept in the same proportion there, as we had towards one another here; here my natural eye could see his natural face, and there mine eye is as much mended, as his body is, and my sense as much exalted as mine object; And as well, as I may know, that I am I; I may know, that He is He; for, I shall not know myself, nor that state of glory which I am then in, by any light of Nature which I brought thither, but by that light of Glory which I shall receive there. When therefore a man finds, that this consideration does him good in his conversation, and retards him towards some sins; how shall I stand then, when all the world shall see, that my solicitation hath brought such a woman to the stews, to the Hospital, to hell, who had scaped all this, if I had not corrupted her at first, (which no man in the world knew before, and all shall know then.) Or that my whispering, and my calumny hath overthrown such a man in his place, in his reputation, in his fortune (which he himself knew not before, and all shall know then.) Or, that my counsel, or my example hath been a furtherance to any man's spiritual edification here. He that in rectified reason, and a rectified conscience finds this, in God's name let him believe; yea, for God's sake let him take heed of not believing that we shall know one another, Actions and Persons, in the Resurrection, as the Apostles did know Christ at the Transfiguration, which was a Type of it.
This Transfiguration then upon earth; was the same glory, which Christ had after, in heaven. Qualis venturus, talis apparuit; such as all eyes shall see him to be, when he comes in glory at last, those Apostles saw him then, but of the particular circumstances, even of this transfiguration upon earth, there is but little said to us. Let us modestly take that which is expressed in it, and not search over-curiously farther into that which is signified, and represented by it; which is, the state of glory in the Resurrection. First, his face shined as the Sun, says that Gospel, he could not take a higher comparison, for our Information, and for our admiration in this world, then the Sun. And then, the Saints of God in their glorified state are admitted to the same comparison. The righteous shall shine out as the Sun in the Kingdom of the Father; the Sun of the firmament which should be their comparison, will be gone; But the Sun of grace and of glory, the Son of God shall remain; and they shall shine as he; that is, in his righteousness.
In this transfiguration, his clothes were white, says the text; but how white, the holy Ghost does not tell us at once, as white as snow, says Saint Mark, as white as light, says Saint Matthew. Let the garments of the glorified Saints of God be their bodies, and then, their bodies are as white as snow, as snow that fall's from heaven, and hath tou • ht no pollution of the earth. For, though our bodies have been upon earth, and have touched pitch, and have been defiled, yet that will not lie in proof, not be given in evidence; Though he that drew me, and I that was drawn too, know, in what unclean places, and what unclean actions, this body of mine hath been, yet it lies not in proof, it shall not be given in evidence, for, Accusator fratrum, The accuser of the brethren is cast down, the Devil shall find nothing against me; And if I had spontaneum Daemonem, as Saint Chrysostom speaks, a bosom Devil, and could tempt myself, though there had been no other tempter in this world, so I have spontan • um Demonem, a bosom accuser, a conscience that would accuse me there, if I accuse my self there, I reproach the mercy of God, who hath sealed my pardon, and made even my body, what sins soever had discoloured it, as white as snow.
As white as snow, and as white as light, says that Gospel. Light implies an active power, Light is operative, and works upon others. The bodies of the Saints of God; shall receive all impressions of glory in themselves, and they shall do all that is to be done, for the glory of God there. There, they shall stand in his service, and they shall kneel in his worship, and they shall fall in his reverence, and they shall sing in his glory, they shall glorify him in all positions of the body; They shall be glorified in themselves passively, and they shall glorify God actively, sicut Nix, sicut Lux, their being, their doing shall be all for him; Thus they shall shine as the Sun; Thus their garments shall be white, white as snow, in being glorified in their own bodies, white as light, in glorifying God in all the actions of those bodies.
Now, there is thus much more considerable, and appliable to our present purpose, in this tranfiguration of Christ, that there was company with them. Be not apt to think heaven in an Ermitage, or a Monastery, or the way to heaven a sullen melancholy; Heaven, and the way to it, is a Communion of Saints, in a holy cheerfulness. Get thou thither; make sure thine own salvation; but be not too hasty to think, that nobody gets thither, except he go thy way in all opinions, and all actions.
There was company in the transfiguration; but no other company then Moses, and Elias, and Christ, and the Apostles; none but they, to whom God had manifested himself otherwise then to a mere natural man, otherwise then as a general God. For, in the Law, and in the Padagogie, and Schoolmastership, and instruction thereof, God had manifested himself particularly by Moses, In Elias and the Prophets, whom God sent in a continual succession, to refresh that manifestation which he had given of himself in the Law, before, in the example of these rules, in him, who was the consummation of the Law, and the Prophets, Christ Jesus; And then, in the Application of all this, by the Apostles, and by the Church established by them, God had more particularly manifested himself, then to natural men. Moses, Elias, Christ, and the Apostles, make up the household of the faithful; and none have interest in the Resurrection, but in, and by these; These, to whom, and by whom, God hath exhibited himself, to his Church, by other notions, then as one universal God; For, nothing will save a man, but to believe in God; so as God hath proposed himself, in his Son, in his Scriptures, in his Christ.
These were with him in the transfiguration, and they talked with him, says that text. As there is a Communion of Saints, so there is a Communication of Saints. Think not heaven a Charter-house, where men, who only of all creatures, are enabled by God to speak, must not speak to one another. The Lord of heaven is Verbum, The word, and his servants there talk of us here, and pray to him for us.
They talked with him; but of what? They talked of hi • Decease, (says the text there) which he should accomplish at Jerusalem, all that they talked of, was of his Passion. All that we shall say, and sing in heaven, will be of his Passion, accomplished at Jerusalem, in that Hymn, This Lamb hath redeemed as to God, by his blood; Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing, Amen. Even our glory in heaven, at last, is not principally for ourselves, but to contribute to the glory of Christ Jesus. If we inquire further then this, into the state of our glorified bodies, remember that in this real Parable, in this Type of the Resurrection, the transfiguration of Christ, it is said, that even Beter himself wist not what to say; and remember too, That even Christ himself forbad them to say anything at all of it, till his Resurrection. Till our Resurrection, we cannot know clearly, we should not speak boldly, of the glory of the Saints of God, nor of our blessed endowments in that state.
The sum of all is, Fiducis Christianorum est resurrectio mortuorum; My faith directs itself first upon that which Christ hath done, he is dead, he is risen; and my hope directs it self upon that which shall be done, I shall rise again. And yet says Luther, Papa, Cardinales & primarii viri, I know the Pope, the Cardinals, the Bishops are I • genio, doctrinâ, ration, prudentiâ excellentes, they abound in natural parts, in reading, in experience, in civil wisdom: yet says he, si tres sunt, qui hunc •• ticulum indubitanter • redunt, If there be three amongst them. that do faithfully and undoubtedly believe this article of the Resurrection of the body, three are more then I look for amongst them. Beloved, as no things are liker one another, then Court and Court, the same ambitions, the same underminings in one Court as in another, so Church and Church is alike too; All persecured Churches are religious, all peaceable Churches are dissolute, when Luther said that of the Church of Rome, (That few of them believed the Resurrection) the Roman Church wall owed in all abundances, and dissoluteness • and scarce a man, (in respect) opened his mouth against her, otherwise then that the holy Ghost, to make his continual 〈◊〉 , and to interrupt their prescription, in every age raised up some to declare their impieties and usurpations. But then, when they bent all their thoughts entirely, and prosperously upon possessing this world, they thought they might spare the Resurrection well enough; As he that hath a plentiful fortune in Europe, cares not much though there be no land of perfumes in the East, nor of gold, in the West-Indies; God in our days, hath given us, and our Church, the fat of the glory of this world too, and we also neglect the other: But when men of a different religion from them, (for they will needs call a differing from their errors, a different Religion, as though all their religion were errors, for (excepting errors) we differ in no point) when, I say, such men came to inquire into them, to discover them, and to induce or to attempt in divers parts of their government a reformation, then they shut themselves up closer, then they grew more careful of their manners, and did reform themselves somewhat, though not thoroughly, and are the better for that reformat on which was offered to them, and wrought more effectually upon others? As we say in the School, that even the Devil is somewhat the better for the death of Christ, so the Roman Church is somewhat the better for the Reformation. Our assiduity of preaching hath brought them to another manner of frequency in preaching, then before the Reformation they were accustomed to, and our answers to their books have brought them to a more reserved manner of writing, then they used before. Let us therefore by their example, make as good use of our enemies, as our enemies have done of us. For, though we have no military enmity, no hostility with any nation, though we must all, and do, out of a true sense of our duty to God, pray ever for the continuance of peace amongst Christian Princes, and to withhold the effusion of Christian blood, yet to that intendment, and in that capacity as they were our enemies in 88. when they provoked by their Excommunications, dangerous invasions, and in that capacity as they were our enemies in 603. when they bent their malice even against that place, where the Laws for the maintenance of our religion were enacted, so they are our enemies still, if we be still of the same religion. He that by God's mercy to us, leads us, is as sure that the Pope is Antichrist, now, as he was then; and we that are blessedly led by him, are as sure, that their doctrine is the doctrine of Devils, now, as we were then. Let us therefore make use of those enemies, and of their aery insolences, and their frothy confidences, as thereby to be the firmer in ourselves, and the carefuller of our children, and servants, that we send not for such a Physician as brings a Roman Priest for his Apothecary, nor entertain such a School-master, as brings a Roman Priest for his Usher, nor such a Mercer, as brings a Priest for his Tailor;) for, in these shapes they have, and will appear.) But in true faith to God, true Allegiance to our Prince, true obedience to the Church, true dealing with all men, make ourselves sure of the Resurrection in the next life; In carne incorruptibili, in flesh that shall be capable of no corruption, by having that resurrection in this life, in carne incorruptâ, in devesting or correcting the corruptions which cleave to our flesh here, that we be not corrupted spiritually, (not disputed out of our Religion, nor jeasted out, nor threatened out, nor bought out, nor beat out of the truth of God) nor corrupted carnally by the pleasures or profits of this world, but that we may conform ourselves to the purity of Christ Jesus, in that measure, which we are able to attain to, which is our spiritual Resurrection, and constitutes our second part, That Kingdom of God, which flesh and blood may inherit in this life.
From the beginning we settled that, That the primary purpose of the Apostle in these words, was to establish the doctrine of the last Resurrection. But in Tertullian's exposition, Arrabonem dedit, & arrabonem accepit; That God hath left us the earnest of his Spirit upon earth, and hath taken the earnest of our flesh into heaven, it grew indifferent, of which Resurrection, spiritual, or bodily, first, or last, it be accepted. but take Tertullian in another place, upon the verse immediately preceding our Text (Sicut portavimus, portemus, (for so Tertullian reads that place, and so does the Vulgate) As we have born the image of the earthly, so let us bear the Image of the heavenly) there from Tertullian it must necessarily be referred to the first Resurrection, the Resurrection by grace in this life, for, says he there, Non refertur ad substantiam resurrectionis, sed ad pr •• sentis temporis disciplinam; the Apostle does not speak of our glorious resurrection at last, but of our religious resurrection now. Portemus, non portabimus, Let us bear his image, says the Apostle; Let us now, not that we shall bear it at the last day. Praeceptive dictum, non promissive; The Apostle delivers it as a duty, that we must, not as a reward, that we shall bear that image. And therefore in Tertulli •• construction, it is not only indifferent, and probable, but necessary to refer this Text to the first Resurrection in this life; where it will be fittest, to pursue that order, which we proposed at first, first to consider Quid regnum, what Kingdom it is, that is pretended to; And then, Quid haeredetas, what estate and term is to be had in it: It is an Inheritance. And lastly, Quid care, & sanguis, what flesh and blood it is, that is excluded out of this Kingdom. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.
First, for this kingdom of God in this world, let us be glad that it is a kingdom, that it is so much, that the government is taken out of the hands of Saints, and Angels and re-united, re-annexed to the Crown, restoted to God, to whom we may come immediately, and be accepted. Let us be glad that it is a kingdom, so much, and let us be glad that it is but a kingdom, and no more, not a Tyranny; That we come not to a God that will dam • e us, because he will dam • e us, but a God that proposes Conditions, and enables us to perform those conditions, in such a measure as he will vouchsafe to accept from us; A God that governs us by his word, for in his word is truth, and by his law, for in his law is clearness. Will you ask what this kingdom of God is? What did you take it to be, or what did you mean by it, when, even now, you said with me, in the Lord's prayer, Thy kingdom come? Did you deliberately, and determinately pray for the day of Judgment, and for his coming in the kingdom of glory, then? Were you all ready for that, when you said so? Purae conscientiae, & grandis audaciae est, It is a very great confidence, and (if it be not grounded upon a very pure conscience) it must have a worse name, Regnum Dei postul are, & judicium non time •• ; To call upon God for the day of Judgment, upon confidence of our own righteousness, is a shrewd distemper; To say, V • ni Domine Jesus, come Lord Jesus • come and take us, as thou findst us, is a dangerous issue. But Adveniat regnum, and then veniat Rex, let his kingdom of grace come upon us, in this life, and then let himself come too, in his good time, and when his good pleasure shall be, in the kingdom of Glory: Sive velimus sive nolimus, regnum Dei utique veniet, what need we hasten him, provoke him? says Saint Augustine; whether we will or no, his kingdom, his Judgment will come. Nay, before we called for it, even his kingdom of grace was come. Christ said to the Scribe, Non longe, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God; And to the Pharisees themselves he said; Intra vos, the kingdom of God is among you, within you. But, where there is a whole Hospital of three hundred blind men together, (as there is at Paris ) there is as much light, amongst them there, as amongst us here, and yet all they have no light, so this kingdom of God is amongst us all, and yet God knows whether we see it, or no. And therefore Adveniat ut manifestet • r Deus, says S. Augustine, his kingdom come, that we may discern it is come, that we may see that God offers it to us; and, Adveniat regnum, ut manefestemur Deo, his kingdom come so, that he may discernus in our reception of that Kingdom, and our obedience to it. He comes when we see him, and he comes again, when we receive him: Quid est, Regnum ejus veniat, quàm ut nos bonos inveniat? Then his Kingdom comes, when he finds us willing to be Subjects to that Kingdom. God is a King in his own right. By Creation, by Redemption, by many titles, and many undoubted claims. But, Aliud est Regem esse, aliud regnare, It is one thing to be a King, another to have Subjects in obedience; A King is not the less a King, for a Rebellion; But, Vere justum regnum est, (says that Father) quando & Rex vult homines habere sub se, & cupiunt homines esse sub • o, when the King would wish no other Subjects, nor the Subjects other King, then is that Kingdom come, come to a durable, and happy state. When God hath shown himself in calling us, and we have shown our willingness to come, when God shows his desire to preserve us, and we adhere only to him, when there is a Dominus regnat, Latetur terra, When our whole Land is in possession of peace, and plenty, and the whole Church in possession of the Word and Sacraments, when the Land rejoices because the Lord reigns; and when there is a Dominus regnat, Laetentur Insulae, Because the Lord reigneth, every Island doth rejoice; that is, every man; that every man that is encompassed within a Sea of calamities in his estate, with a Sea of diseases in his body, with a Sea of scruples in his understanding, with a Sea of transgressions in his conscience, with a Sea of sinking and swallowing in the sadness of spirit, may yet open his eyes above water, and find a place in the Ark above all these, a recourse to God, and joy in him, in the Ordinances of a well established, and well governed Church, this is truly Regnum Dei, the Kingdom of God here; God is willing to be present with us, (that he declares in the preservation of his Church) And we are sensible of his presence, and residence with us, and that we declare in our frequent recourses to him hither, and in our practice of those things which we have learnt here, when we are gone hence.
This then is the blessed state that we pretend to, in the Kingdom of God in this life; Peace in the State, peace in the Church, peace in our Conscience: In this, that we answer the motions of his blessed Spirit here in his Ordinance, and endeavor a conformity to him, in our life, and conversation; In this, he is our King, and we are his Subjects, and this is this Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Grace. Now the title, by which we make claim to this Kingdom, is in our text Inheritance: Who can, and who cannot inherit this Kingdom of God. I cannot have it by purchase, by mine own merits and good works; It is neither my former good disposition, nor God's fore-sight of my future cooperation with him, that is the cause of his giving me his grace. I cannot have this by Covenant, or by the gift, or bequeathing of another, by works of Supererogation, (that a Martyr of the primitive Church should send me a violl of his blood, a splinter of his bone, a Collop of his flesh, wrapped up in a half sheet of paper, in an imaginary six-penny Indulgence from Rome, and bid me receive grace; and peace of Conscience in that.) I cannot have it by purchase, I cannot have it by gift, I cannot have it by Curtesie, in the right of my wife, That if I will let her live in the obedience of the Roman Church, and let her bring up my children so, for myself, I may have leave to try a Court, or a worldly fortune, and be secure in that, that I have a Catholic wife, or a Catholic child to pray, and merit for me; I have no title to this Kingdom of God. but Inheritance, whence grows mine Inheritance? Ex semine Dei; because I am propagated of the seed of God, I inherit this peace. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for, his seed remaineth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of God: That is, he cannot desire to sin; He cannot antidate a sin, by delighting in the hope of a future sin, and sin in a praefruition of his sin, before the act; He cannot post-date a sin, delight in the memory of a pastsinne, and sin it over again, in a post-fruition of that sin; He cannot boast himself of sin, much less bely himself in glorying in sins, never done; He cannot take sins diet, therefore, that he may be able to sin again next Spring; He cannot hunger and thirst, and then digest and sleep quietly after a sin; and to this purpose, and in this sense Saint Bernard says, Praedestinati non possunt peccare, That the Elect cannot sin; And in this also, That when the sins of the Elect, are brought to trial, and to judgment, there their sins are no sins; not because they are none in themselves, but because the blood of Jesus covering them, they are none in the eyes of God. I am Heir then as I am the Son of God, born of the seed of God. But, what is that seed? Verbum Dei, the seed is the word of God, Of his own will beg at he us, (says that Apostle) with the word of truth; And our Savior himself speaks very clearly in expounding the Parable; The seed is the word of God. We have this Kingdom of God, as we have an inheritance, as we are Heirs; we are Heirs as we are Sons; we are Sons as we have the seed, and the seed is the Word. So that all ends in this; We inherit not this Kingdom if we possess not the preaching of the Word; if we profess not the true • ligion still: for, the word of this text which we translate to inherit, for the most part, in the translation of the Septuagint, answers the Hebrew word, Nachal; and Nachal is Haereditas cum possessione; not an inheritance in reversion, but in possession. Take us O Lord for thine inheritance, says Moses; Et possideas nos, as Saint H • erome translates that very place; Inherit us, and Possess us; Et erimus tibi, whatsoever we are, we will be thine, says the Septuagint: You see then how much goes to the making up of this Inheritance of the Kingdom of God in this world, First, Vt habeamus verbum, That we have this seed of God, his word; (In the Roman Church they have it not; not that that Church hath it not, not that it is not there; but they, the people that have it not) and then, Vt possideamus, That we possess it, or rather that it possess us; that we make the Word the only rule of our faith, and of our actions; (In the Roman Church they do not so, they have not pure wheat, but mestlin, other things joined with this good seed, the word of God) and lastly, Vt simus Deo, That we be his, that we be so still, that we do not begin with God, and give over, but that this seed of God, of which we are born, may (as Saint Peter says) be incorruptible, and abide forever; that we may be his so entirely, and so constantly, as that we had rather have no being, then for any time of suspension, or for any part of his fundamental truth, be without it, and this the Roman Church cannot be said to do, that expunges and interlines articles of faith, upon Reason of State, and emergent occasions. God hath made you one, says the Prophet, who be the parties whom God hath married together, and made One, in that place? you and your religion; (as our expositors interpret that place.) And why One, says the Prophet there; That God might have a godly seed, says he, that is, a continuation, a propagation, a race, a posterity of the same religion; Therefore says he, Let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth. Let none divorce himself from that religion, and that worship of God, which God put into his arms, and which he embraced in his Baptism. Except there be error in fundamental points, such as make that Church no Church, let no man depart from that Church, and that religion, in which he delivered himself to the service of God at first. Woe be unto us, if we deliver not over our religion to our posterity, in the same sincerity, and the same totality in which our Fathers have delivered it us; for that, that continuation, is that, that makes it an inheritance: for, (to conclude this) every man hath an inheritance in the Law, and yet if he be hanged, he is hanged by the Law, in which he had his inheritance: so we have our inheritance in the Word of God, and yet, if we be damned, we are damned by that Word; If thy heart turn away, so as that thou worship other God's, I denounce unto you this day, that you shall surely perish. So then, we have an inheritance in this Kingdom, if we preserve it, and we incur a forfeiture of it, if we have not this seed, (The Word, the truth of Religion) so as that we possess it; that is, conform ourselves to him, whose Word it is, by it, and possess it so, as that we persevere in the true profession of it, to our end; for, Perseverance, as well as Possession, enters into our title, and inheritance to this Kingdom.
You see then, what this Kingdom of God is; It is, when he comes, and his welcome, when he comes in his Sacraments, and speaks in his Word; when he speaks and is answered; knocks and is received, (he knocks in his Ordinances, and is received in our Obedience to them, he knocks in his example, and most holy conversation, and is received in our conformity, and imitation.) So have you seen what the Inheritance of this Kingdom is, it is a Having, and Holding of the Gospel, a present, and a permanent possession, a holding fast, lest another (another Nation, another Church) take our Crown. There remains only that you see, upon whom the exclusion falls; and for the clearing of that, This I say brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.
It is fully expressed by Saint Paul, The carnal mind is enmity against God. It is not a coldness, a slackness, an omission, a preterition of some duties towards God, but it is Enmity, and that's an exclusion out of the Kingdom; for, (says the Apostle there) it is not subject to the Law of God; and no subjection, no Kingdom; it is not, says he, neither can it be; It is not, that excludes the present; It cannot be, that excludes the future; so that it is only this incorrigible, this desperate state that constitutes this flesh, and blood, that cannot inherit the Kingdom of God; for this implies impenitablenesse, which is the sin against the holy Ghost. Take the word flesh, so literally, as that it be either the adorning of my flesh in pride, or the polluting of my flesh in wantonness, whether it be a pampering of my flesh with voluptuous provocations, or a withering, a shriveling of my flesh with superstitious and meritorious fastings, or other macerations, and lacerations by inhumane violence upon my body; Take the word Blood so literally, as that it be either an admiring and adoring of honorable blood, in a servile flattering of great persons, or an insinuating of false and adulterous blood, in a bastardizing a race, by supposititious children, whether it be the inflaming the blood of young persons by lascivious discourse, or shedding the blood of another in a murderous quarrel, whether it be in blaspheming the blood of my Savior, in execrable oaths, or the profaning of his blood in an unworthy receiving thereof, all these ways, and all such, doth this flesh and blood exclude from the Kingdom of God; It is summarily, all those works which proceed merely out of the nature of man, without the regeneration of the Spirit of God; all that is flesh and blood, and enmity against God, says the Apostle in that place.
But in another place, that Apostle leads us into other considerations; to the Galatians he says, The works of the flesh are manifest: And amongst those manifest works of the flesh, he reckons not only sins of wantonness, and sins of anger, not only sins in concupiscibili, and in irascibili, but in intelligibili, sins and errors in the understanding, particularly Heresy, and Idolatry are works of the flesh, in Saint Paul's inventory, in that place, Heresy and Idolatry, are that flesh and blood which shall not inherit the Kingdom of God. Bring we this consideration home to ourselves. The Church of Rome does not charge us with affirming any Heresy, nor does she charge us with any Idolatry in our practice. So far we are discharged from the works of the flesh. If they charge us with Doctrine of flesh and blood because we prefer Marriage before Chastity, it is a charge ill laid, for Marriage and Chastity consist well together; The bed undefiled is chastity. If they charge us that we prefer Marriage before Continency, they charge us unjustly, for we do not so: Let them contain that can, and bless God for that heavenly gift of Continency, and let them that cannot, mary, and serve God, and bless him for affording them that Physic for that infirmity. As Marriage was ordained at first, for those two uses, Procreation of children, and mutual assistance of man, and wife, so Continency was not prefer'd before Marriage. As there was a third use of Marriage added after the fall, by way of Remedy, so Marriage may well be said to be inferior to continency, as physic is in respect of health. If they charge us with it, because our Priests mary, they do it frivolously, and impertinently, because they deny that we are Priests. We charge them with Heresy in the whole new Creed of the Council of Trent, (for, if all the particular doctrines be not Heretical, yet, the doctrine of inducing new Articles of faith is Heretical, and that doctrine runs through all the Articles, for else they could not be Articles.) And we charge them with Idolatry, in the people's practice, (and that practice is never controlled by them) in the greatest mystery of all their Religion, in the Adoration of the Sacrament; And Heresy and Idolatry are manifest works of the flesh. Our Kingdom is the Gospel; our Inheritance is our holding that; our exclusion is flesh and blood, Heresy and Idolatry. And therefore let us be able to say with the Apostle, when God had called us, and separated us, immediately we conferred not with flesh and blood. Since God hath brought us into a fair prospect, let us have no retrospect back; In Canaan, let us not look towards Egypt, nor towards Sodom being got to the Mountain; since God hath settled us in a true Church, let us have no kind of bias, and declination towards a false; for that is one of Saint Paul's manifest works of the flesh, and I shall lose all the benefit of the flesh and blood of Christ Jesus, if I do so, for flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
We have done; Add we but this, by way of recollecting this which hath been said now, upon these words, and that which hath been formerly said upon those words of Job, which may seem to differ from these, (In my flesh I shall see God) Omne verum omni vero consentiens, whatsoever is true in it self agrees with every other truth. Because that which Job says, and that which Saint Paul says, agree with the truth, they agree with one another. For, as Saint Paul says, Non omni • caro eadem caro, there is one flesh of man, another of beasts, so there is one flesh of Job, another of Saint Paul; And Job's flesh can see God, and Paul's cannot; because the flesh that Job speaks of hath overcome the destruction of skin and body by worms in the grave, and so is mellowed and prepared for the sight of God in heaven; And Paul's flesh is overcome by the world. Job's flesh triumphs over Satan, and hath made a victorious use of God's corrections, Paul's flesh is still subject to temptations, and carnalities. Job's argument is but this, some flesh shall see God, (Mortified men here, Glorified men there shall) Paul's argument is this, All flesh shall not see God, (Carnal men here, Impenitent men there, shall not.) And therefore, that as our texts answer one another, so your resurrections may answer one another too, as at the last resurrection, all that hear the sound of the Trumpet, shall rise in one instant, though they have passed thousands of years between their burials, so do all ye, who are now called, by a lower and infirmer voice, rise together in this resurrection of grace. Let him that hath been buried sixty years, forty years, twenty years, in covetousness, in uncleanness, in indevotion, rise now, now this minute, and then, as Adam that died five thousand before, shall be no sooner in heaven, in his body, then you, so Abel that died for God, so long before you, shall be no better, that is, no fuller of the glory of heaven, then you that die in God, when it shall be his pleasure to take you to him.
SERMON XVI.
Preached at Lincolns Inn.
COLOS. 1. 24.
W E are now to enter into the handling of the doctrine of Evangelical counsels; And these words have been ordinarily used by the writers of the Roman Church, for the defense of a point in controversy between them and us; which is a preparatory to that which hereafter is to be more fully handled upon another Text. Out of these words, they labor to establish works of supererogation, in which (they say) men do or suffer more then was necessary for their own salvation; and then the superfluity of those accrues to the Treasury of the Church, and by the Stewardship, and dispensation of the Church may be applied to other men living here, or suffering in Purgatory by way of satisfaction to God's justice; But this is a doctrine which I have had occasion heretofore in this place to handle; And a doctrine which indeed deserves not the dignity to be too diligently disputed against; And as we will not stop upon the disproving of the doctrine, so we need not stay long, nor insist upon the vindicating of these words, from that wresting and detortion of theirs, in using them for the proof of that doctrine. Because though at first, they presented them with great eagerness and vehemence, and assurance, Quicquid haeretici obstrepunt, illustris hic locus, say the Heretics what they can, this is a clear and evident place for that doctrine, yet another after him is a little more cautelous and reserved, Negari non potest quin ita expeni possint, it cannot be denied, but that these words may admit such an exposition; And then another more modified then both says, Primo & proprie non id intendit Apostolus; the Apostle had no such purpose in his first and proper intention to prove that doctrine in these words. Sed innuitur ill sensus; qui et si non genuinus, tamen à pari deduci potest: some such sense (says that author) may be implied and intimated, because, though it be not the true and natural sense, yet by way of comparison, and convenience, such a meaning may be deduced. Generally their difference in having any patronage for that corrupt doctrine out of these words, appears best in this, that if we consider their authors who have written in controversies, we shall see that most of them have laid hold upon these words for this doctrine; because they are destitute of all Scriptures, and glad of any, that appear to any, any whit that way inclinable; But if we consider those authors, who by way of commentary and exposition (either before, or since the controversies have been stirred) have handled these words, we shall find none of their own authors of that kind, which by way of exposition of these words doth deliver this to be the meaning of them, that satisfaction may be made to the justice of God by the works of supererogation one man for another.
To come then to the words themselves in their true sense, and interpretation, we shall find in them two general considerations. First, that to him that is become a new creature, a true Christian, all old things are done away, and all things are made new: As he hath a new birth, as he hath put on a new man, as he is going towards a new Jerusalem, so hath he a new Philosophy, a new production, and generation of effects out of other causes, then before, he finds light out of darkness, fire out of water, life out of death, joy out of afflictions, Nunc ga • de • , now I rejoice in my sufferings &c. And then in a second consideration he finds that this is not by miracle, that he should hope for it but once, but he finds an express, and certain, and constant reason why it must necessarily be so, because I still up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ &c. It is strange that I should conceive joy out of affliction, but when I come to see the reason that by that affliction, I fill up the sufferings of Christ &c. it is not strange, it cannot choose but be so. The parts then will be but two, a proposition, and a reason; But in the first part it will be sit to consider first, the person, not merely who it is, but in what capacity, the Apostle conceives this joy; And secondly, the season, Now, for joy is not always seasonable, there is a time of mourning, but now rejoicing; And then in a third place we shall come to the affection it self, Joy, which when it is true, and truly placed, is the nearest representation of heaven it self to this world. From thence we shall descend to the production of this joy, from whence it is derived, and that is out of sufferings, for this phrase in passionibus, in my sufferings, is not in the midst o • my sufferings, it is not that I have joy and comfort, though I suffer, but in passionibus is so in suffering as that the very suffering is the subject of my joy, I had no joy, no occasion of joy, if I did not suffer. But then these sufferings which must occasion this joy, are thus conditioned, thus qualified in our text; That, first, it be passio mea, my suffering, and not a suffering cast by my occasion upon the whole Church, or upon other men, mea, it is determined and limited in myself, and mea, but not prome, not for my self, not for mine own transgressions, and violating of the law, but it is for others, pro vobis, says the Apostle, for out of that root springs the whole second part why there appertains a joy to such sufferings, which is that the suffering of Christ being yet, not imperfect, but unperfected, Christ having not yet suffered all, which he is to suffer to this purpose, for the gathering of his Church, I fill up that which remains undone; And that in Carne, not only in spirit and disposition, but really in my flesh, And all this not only for making sure of mine own salvation, but for the establishing and edifying a Church, but yet, his Church, for men seduced, and seducers of men have their Churches too, and suffer for those Churches; but this is for his Church, and that Church of his which is properly his body, and that is the visible Church: and these will be the particular branches of our two general parts, the proposition, Gaudeo in afflictionibus &c. And the reason, Quiae adimpleo &c.
To begin then with the first branch of the first part, The person; we are sure it was Sain • Paul, who we are sure was an Apostle, for so he tells the Colo • sians in the beginning of the Epistle; Paul an Apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, but yet he was not properly, peculiarly their Apostle, he was theirs as he was the Apostle of the Gentiles; but he was not theirs, as he was the Apostle of the Corinthians; If I be not an Apostle to others (says he) yet doubtless I am to you; for amongst the Corinthians he had laid the foundations of a Church, Are ye not my work in the Lord? (says he there) but for the Colossians, he had never preached to them, never seen them; Epaphras had laid the foundation amongst them; And Archippus was working, now at the writing of this Epistle, upon the upper buildings, as we may see in the Epistle it self; Epaphras had planted, and Archippus watered; How entered Paul? First as an Apostle, he had a general jurisdiction, and superintendency over them, and over all the Gentiles, and over all the Church; And then, as a man whose miraculous conversion, and religious conversation, whose incessant preaching, and whose constant suffering, had made famous, and reverend over the whole Church of God, all that proceeded from him had much authority, and power, in all places to which it was directed; As himself says of Andronicas and Iunia his kinsmen; that they were Nobiles in Apostolis, Nobly spoken of amongst the Apostles, so Saint Paul himself was Nobilis Apostolus in Discipulis, reverendly esteemed amongst all the Disciples, for a laborious Apostle; Saint Augustine joined his desire to have heard Saint Paul preach, with his other two wishes, to have seen Christ in the flesh, and to have seen Rome in her glory; And Saint Chrysostom admires Rome, so much admired for other things, for this principally, that she had heard Saint Paul preach; And that, Si • ut • orpus magnum & validum, ita duos haberet illustres oculos, as she was a great and glorious body, so she had two great and glorious eyes; The presence and the memories of Saint Peter, and Saint Paul; he writes not to them then merely as an Apostle not in that capacity, for he joines Timothy with himself at the beginning of the Epistle, who was no Apostle, properly; though upon that occasion, of Paul's writing in his own, and in Timothies name, Saint Chrysostame say, in a larger sense, Ergo Timothy • s Apostolus, if Timothy be in commission with Paul, Timothy is an Apostle too: But Saint Paul by his • ame and estimation, having justly got a power and interest in them, he cherishes that by this salutation, and he binds them the more to accept his instructions, by giving them a part in all his persecutions, and by letting them see, how much they were in his care, even in that distance; A servile application of himself to the humors of others, becomes not th • ministers of God; It becomes him not to depart from his ingenuity, and freedom, to a servile humoring, but to be negligent of their opinion of him, with whom he is to converse, and upon whose conscience he is to work, becomes him not neither. It is his doctrine that must bear him out; But if his discretion do not make him acceptable too, his doctrine will have the weaker root when; Saint Paul and the Colossians thought well of one another, the work of God was likely to go forward amongst them; And where it is not so, the work prospers not.
This was then the person; Paul, as he had a calling, and an authority by the Apostleship, and Paul as he had made his calling, and authority, and Apostleship acceptable to them, by his wisdom and descreet behavior towards them, and the whole Church. The season follows next, when he presents this doctrine to them Nunc Gaudeo, now I rejoice, and there is a Nunc illi, and a Nunc illis to be considered, one time it hath relation to Saint Paul himself, and another that hath relation to the Colossians.
His time, the Nunc illis, was nunc in vinculis, now when he was in prison at Rome, for from thence he writ this Epistle; Ordinarily a prisoner is the less to be believed for his being in prison and in fetters, if he speak such things as conduce to his discharge of those fetters, or his deliverance from that imprisonment, it is likely enough that a prisoner will lie for such an advantage; But when Saint Paul being now a prisoner for the preaching of the Gospel, speaks still for the advancement of the Gospel, that he suffers for, and finds out another way of preaching it by letters and by epistles, when he opens himself to more danger, to open to them more doctrine, then that was very credible which he spake, though in prison; There is in all his epistles impetus Spiritus Christi, as Irenaeus says, a vehemence of the holy Ghost, but yet amplius habent quae e vinculis, says Chrysostom, Those epistles which Saint Paul writ in prison, have more of this vehemency in them: a sentence written with a cole upon a wall by a close prisoner, affects us when we come to read it; Stolne letters, by which a prisoner adventers the loss of that liberty which he had, come therefore the more welcome, if they come; It is not always a bold and veliement reprehension of great persons, that is argument enough of a good and a rectified zeal, for an intemperate use of the liberty of the Gospel, and sometimes the impotency of a satyricall humor, makes men preach freely, and over-freely, offensively, scandalously; and so exasperate the magistrate; God forbid that a man should build a reputation of zeal, for having been called in question for preaching of a Sermon; And then to think it wisdom, redimere se quo queat minimo, to sink again and get off as good cheap as he can; But when the malignity of others hath slandred his doctrine, or their galled consciences make them kick at his doctrine, then to proceed with a Christian magnanimity, and a spiritual Nobility in the maintenance of that doctrine, to prefer then before the greatness of the their persons and the greatness of his own danger, the greatness of the glory of God, and the greatness of the loss which God's Church should suffer by his lenity and prevarication: To edify others by his constancy, then when this building in apparence and likelihood must be raised upon his own ruin, then was Saint Paul's Nunc, concerning himself, then was his season to plant and convey this doctrine to these Colossians, when it was most dangerous for him to do so.
Now to consider this season and fitness as it concerned them; The Nunc illis, It was then, when Epaphras had declrared unto him their love, and when upon so good testimony of their disposition, he had a desire that they might be fulfilled with knowledge of God's will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, as he says verse 9. when he knew how far they had proceeded in mysteries of the Christian Religion, and that they had a spiritual hunger of more, then it was seasonable to present to them this great point, that Christ had suffered thoroughly, sufficiently, abundantly, for the reconciliation of the whole world, and yet that there remained some sufferings, (and those of Christ too) to be fulfilled, by us; That all was done; and yet there remained more to be done, that after Christ's consummatum est, which was all the text, there should be an Adimplendum est, interlined, that after Christ had fulfilled the Law, and the Prophets by his sufferings, Saint Paul must fulfill the residue of Christ's sufferings, was a doctrine unseasonably taught, till they had learnt much, and shown a desire to learn more; In the Primitive Church men of ripe understandings were content to think two or three years well spent in learning of Catechisms and rudiments of Christian Religion; and the greatest Bishops were content to think that they discharged their duties well, if they ca • echized ignorant men in such rudiments, for we know from Genna • dius an Ecclesiastical author, that the Bishops of Greece, and of the Eastern Church, did use to con S. Cyrils sermons (made at Easter and some other Festivals) without book, and preached over those Sermons of his making, to Congregations of strong understanding, and so had more time for their Ca • echizing of others; Optatus thinks, that when Saint Paul says, Ego plantavi, Apollos rigavit, I planted the faith, and Apollos watered, he intended in those words, Ego de pagano feci catechumenum, ill de catechumeno Christianum, That Saint Paul took ignorant persons into his charge, to catechize them at first, and when they were instructed by him, Apollos watered them with the water of Baptism, Tertullian thought he did young beginners in Christianity no wrong, when he called them catulos infantiae re • entis, nec perfectis luminibus reptantes, Young whelps which are not yet come to a perfect use of their eyes, in the mysteries of Religion. Now God hath delivered us in a great measure from this weakness in seeing, because we are catechized from our cra ••• s, and from this penury in preaching, we need not preach others Sermons, nor feed upon cold meat, in Homilies, but we are fallen upon such times too, as that men do not think themselves Christians, except they can tell what God meant to do with them before he meant they should be Christians; for we can be intended to be Christians, but from Christ; and we must needs seek a Predestination, without any relation to Christ; a decree in God for salvation, and damnation, before any decree for the reparation of mankind, by Christ, every Common-placer will adventure to • each, and every artificer will pretend to understand the purpose, yea, and the order too, and method of God's eternal and unrevealed decree, Saint Paul required a great deal more knowledge then these men use to bring, before he presented to them, a great deal, a less point of Doctrine then these men use to ask.
This was then the Nunc illis their season, when they had humbly received so much of the knowledge of the fundamental points of Religion. Saint Paul was willing to communicate more and more, stronger and stronger meat unto them; That which he presents here is, that which may seem least to appertain to a Christian, (that is loy) because a Christian is a person that hath surrendered himself over to a sad and serious, and a severe examination of all his actions, that all be done to the glory of God; but for all this, this joy, true joy is truly, properly, only belonging to a Christian; because this joy is the Testimony of a good conscience, that we have received God, so as God hath manifested himself in Christ, and worshipped God, so God hath ordained: In a true Church there are many tesserae externae, outward badges and marks, by which others may judge, and pronounce me to be a true Christian; But the tessera interna • , the inward badge and mark, by which I know this in myself, is joy; The blessedness of heaven it self, Salvation, and the fruits of Paradise, (that Paradise which cannot be expressed, cannot be comprehended) have yet got no other name in the subtlety of the Schools, nor in the fullness of the Scriptures, but to be called the joys of heaven; Essentiall blessedness is called so, Enter into thy Masters joy, that is, into the Kingdom of heaven; and accidental happiness added to that essential happiness is called so too: There is joy in heaven at the conversion of a sinner; and so in the Revela • ion, Rejoice ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them, for the a • c • ser of our brethren is cast down • There is now joy even in heaven, which was not there before; Certainly as that man shall never see the Father of Lights after this, to whom the day never breaks in this life: As that man must never look to walk with the Lamb wheresoever he goes in heaven, that ran away from the Lamb whensoever he came towards him, in this life; so he shall never possess the joys of heaven hereafter, that feels no joy here; There must be joy here, which Tanquam Cellulae mellis (as Saint Bernard says in his mellifluous language) as the honey-comb walls in, and prepares, and preserves the honey, and is as a shell to that kernel; so there must be a joy here, which must prepare and preserve the joys of heaven itself, and be as a shell of those joys. For heaven and salvation is not a Creation, but a Multiplication; it begins not when we die, but it increases and dilates itself infinitely then; Christ himself, when he was pleased to feed all that people in the wilderness, he asks first, Quot panes habetis, how many loafes have you? and then multiplied them abundantly, as conduced most to his glory; but some there was before. When thou goest to eat that bread, of which whosoever eats shall never die, the bread of life in the Land of life, Christ shall consider what joy thou broughtest with thee out of this world, and he shall extend and multiply that joy inexpressibly; but if thou carry none from hence, thou shalt find none there. He that were to travel into a far country, would study before, somewhat the map, and the manners, and the language of the Country; He that looks for the fullness of the joys of heaven hereafter, will have a taste, an insight in them before he go: And as it is not enough for him that would travail, to study any language indifferently (were it not an impertinent thing for him that went to lie in France, to study Dutch?) So if we pretend to make the joys of heaven our residence, it is a madness to study the joys of the world; The Kingdom of heaven is righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost, says Saint Paul; And this Kingdom of heaven is Intra nos, says Christ, it is in us, and it is joy that is in us; but every joy is not this Kingdom, and therefore says the same Apostle, Rejoice in the Lord; There is no other true joy, none but that; But yet says he there, Rejoice, and again, I say rejoi • e; that is, both again we say it, again, and again we call upon you to have this spiritual joy, for without this joy ye have not the earnest of the Spirit; And it is again rejoice, bring all the joys ye have, to a second examination, and see if you can rejoice in them again; Have you rejoiced all day in Feasts, in Musickes, in Conversations? well, at night you must be alone, hand to hand with God. Again, I say rejoice, sleep not, till you have tried whether your joy will hold out there too. Have you rejoiced in the contemplation of those temporal blessings • which God hath given you? 'tis well, for you may do so: But yet again I say Rejoice; call that joy to an accompt, and see whether you ca •• rejoice again, in such a use of those blessings as he that gave them to you, requires of you. Have you rejoiced in your zeal of God's service? that's a true rejoicing in the Lord; But yet still rejoice again, see that this joy be accompanied with another joy; that you have zeal with knowledge: Rejoice, but rejoice again, refine your joy, purge away all dross, and lees from your joy, there is no false joy enters into heaven, but yet no sadness neither.
There is a necessary sadness in this life, but even in this life necessary only so, as Physic is necessary, Tristitia data, ut peccata deleamus, It is Data, a gift of God, a sadness and sorrow infused by him, & not assumed by ourselves upon the crosses of this world; And so it is physic, and it is Morbi illius peccati, it is proper and peculiar physic for that disease for sin; But, (as that Father pathetically enlarges that consideration) Remedium lippitudinis non t • llit alios morbos, water for fore eyes, will not cure the tooth-ach, sorrow and sadness which is prescribed for sin, will not cure, should not be applied to the other infirmities and diseases of our human condition; Pecunia mulctatus est, (says that Father still) Doluit, non emendavit, A man hath a decree passed against him in a Court of Justice, or lost a Ship by tempest, and he hath grieved for this, hath this reversed the decree, or repaired the shipwreck? Filium amisit, doluit, non resuscitavit. His Son, his eldest Son, his only Son, his towardly Son is dead, and he hath grieved for this; hath he raised his Son to life again? Infirmatur ipse, doluit, abstulit morbum? Himself is fallen into a consumption, and languishes, and grieves, but doth it restore him? Why no, for sadness, and sorrow is not the physic against decrees, and shipwrecks, and consumptions, and death: But then Peccavit quis (says he still) & deluit? peccata delevit; Hath any man sinned against his God, and come to a true sorrow for that sin? peccata delevit he hath washed away that sin, from his soul; for sorrow is good for nothing else, intended for nothing else, but only for our sins, out of which sadness first arose: And then, considered so, this sadness is not truly, nor properly sadness, because it is not so entirely; There is health in the bitterness of physique; There is joy in the depth of this sadness; Saint Basel enforces those words of the Apostle, 2 Cor. 6. 10. Quasi tristes, semper autem gandentes, usefully to this point; Tristitia nostra habet quasi, gaudium non habet, Our sorrow, says he, hath a limitation, a modification, it is but as it were sorrow, and we cannot tell whether we may call it sorrow or no, but our joy is perfect joy, because it is rooted in an assurance: Est in spe certa, our hope of deliverance is in him that never deceived any; for says he then, our sadness passes away as a dream, Et qui insomnium judicat, addit quasi, quasi dicebam, quasi equitabam, quasi cogitabam, he that tells his dream, tells it still in that phrase, me thought I spoke, me thought I went, and me thought I thought, so all the sorrow of God's children is but a quasi tristes, because it determines in joy, and determines soon. To end this, because there is a difference inter delectationem & gaudium, between delight and joy (for delight is in sensual things, and in beasts, as well as in men, but joy is grounded in reason, and in reason rectified, which is, conscience (therefore we are called to rejoice again; to try whether our joy be true joy, and not only a delight, and when it is found to be a true joy, we say still rejoice, that is, continue your spiritual joy till it meet the eternal joy in the kingdom of heaven, and grow up into one joy, but because sadness and sorrow have but one use, and a determined and limited employment, only for sin, we do not say, be sorry, and again be sorry, but when you have been truly sorry for your sins, when you have taken that spiritual physique, believe yourself to be well, accept the seal of the holy Ghost, for the remission of your sins, in Christ Jesus, and come to that health which that physique promises, peace of conscience.
This joy then which Saint Paul found to be so essential, so necessary for man, he found that God placed within man's reach; so near him as that God afforded man this joy where he least looked for it, even in affliction; And of this joy in affliction, we may observe three steps, three degrees; one is indeed but half a joy; and that the Philosophers had; A second is a true joy, and that all Christians have; but the third is an overflowing, and abundant joy, to which the Apostle was come, and to which by his example, he would rouse others, that joy, of which himself speaks again; I am filled with comfort and am exceeding joyful, in all our tribulations; The first of these, which we call a half joy, is but an indolency, and a forced unsensiblenesse of those miseries which were upon them; a searing up, a stupefaction, is not of the senses, yet of the affections; That resolution which some moral men had against misery, Non facies ut te dicam malam, no misery should draw them to do misery that honor, as to call it misery; And, in respect of that extreme anguish which out of an over tenderness, ordinary men did suffer under the calamities of this life, even this poor indolency and privation of grief, was a joy, but yet but a half joy; the second joy, which is a true joy, but common to all Christians, is that assurance, which they have in their tribulations, that God will give them the issue with the temptation; not that they pretend not to feel that calamity, so the Philosophers did, but that it shall not swallow them, this is natural to a Christian, he is not a Christian without this; Think it not strange, says the Apostle, as though some strange thing were come unto you, (for we must accustom ourselves to the expectation of tribulation) but rejoice, says he, and when his glory shall appear, ye shall be made glad and rejoice; He bids us rejoice, and yet all that he promises, is but rejoicing at last, he bids us rejoice, all the way; though the consummate, and determinable joy come not till the end, yet God hath set bounds to our tribulations, as to the sea, and they shall not overflow us; But this perfect joy (to speak of such degrees of perfection, as may be had in this life) this third joy, the joy of this text, is not a collateral joy, that stands by us in the tribulation, and sustains us, but it is a fundamental joy, a radical joy, a viscerall, a gremiall joy, that arises out of the bosom and womb and bowels of the tribulation it self. It is not that I rejoice, though I be afflicted, but I rejoice because I am afflicted; It is not because I shall not sink in my calamity, and be buried in that valley, but because my calamity raises me, and makes my valley a hill, and gives me an eminency, and brings God and me nearer to one another, then without that calamity I should have been, when I can depart rejoicing, and that therefore, because I am worthy to suffer rebuke for the name of Christ, as the Apostles did, when I can feel that pattern proposed to my joy, and to my tribulation, which Christ gives, Rejoice and be glad, for so persecuted they the Prophets, when I can find that seal printed upon me, by my tribulation, If ye be railed on for the name of Christ, blessed are ye, for the spirit of God and of glory resteth on you, that is, that affliction fixes the holy Ghost upon me, which in prosperity, falls upon me but as Sun-beams; Briefly if my soul have had that conference, that discourse with God, that he hath declared to me his purpose in all my calamities, (as he told Ananias that he had done to Paul, he is a chosen vessel unto me, for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my sake) If the light of God's Spirit show us the number, the force, the intent of our tribulations, then is our soul come to that highest joy, which she is capable of in this life, when as cold and dead water, when it comes to the fire, hath a motion and dilatation and a bubbling and a kind of dancing in the vessel, so my soul, that lay asleep in prosperity, hath by this fire of Tribulation, a motion, a joy, an exaltation.
This is the highest degree of suffering; but this suffering hath this condition here, that it be passio mea; And this too, that it be mea, and not pro me, but pro aliis: that it be mine, and no bodies else, by my occasion; That it be mine without any fault of mine, that I be no cause that it fell upon me, and that I be no occasion, that it fall upon others. And first, it is not mine, if I borrow it; I can have no joy in the sufferings of Martyrs and other Saints of God, by way of applying their sufferings to me, by way of imitation and example I may, by way of application and satisfaction I cannot, borrowed sufferings are not my sufferings: They are not mine neither, if I steal them, if I force them; If my intemperate, and scandalous zeal, or pretence of zeal, extort a chastisement from the State, if I exasperate the Magistrate and draw an affliction upon myself, this stolen suffering, this forced suffering is not passio mea, it is not mine, if it should not be mine; Natura cujusque rei est, quam Deus indidit, That only is the nature of everything which God hath imprinted in it: That affliction only is mine, which God hath appointed for me, and what he hath appointed we may see by his exclusions: Let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evil doer, or as a busy-body in other men's matters, (and that reaches far:) I am not possess • r bonae fidei, I come not to this suffering by a good title, I cannot call it mine; I may find joy in it, that is, in the midst of it, I may find comfort in the mercy of Christ, though I suffer as a malefactor; But there is no joy in the suffering itself, for it is not mine, it is not I, but my sin, my breach of the law, my disobedience that suffers. It is not mine again, if it be not mine in particular, mine, and limited in me. To those sufferings that fall upon me for my conscience, or for the discharge of my duty, there belongs a joy, but when the whole Church is in persecution, and by my occasion especially, or at all, woe unto them, by whom the first offense comes; this is no joyful matter, and therefore vae illis per quos scandalum, they who by their ambition of preferment, or indulgence to their present case, or indifferency how things fall out, or presumptuous confidence in God's care, for looking well enough to his own, how little soever they do, give way to the beginnings of superstition, in the times of persecution; when persecutions come, either they shall have no sufferings, that is, God shall suffer them to fall away, and refuse their testimony in his cause, or they shall have no joy in their sufferings, because they shall see this persecution is not theirs, it is not limited in them, but induced by their prevarication upon the whole Church; And lastly, this suffering is not mine, if I stretch it too far; if I over-value it, it is not mine; A man forfeits his privilege, by exceeding it; There is no joy belongs to my suffering, if I place a merit in it; Meum non est cujus nomine nulla mihi superest acti • , says the Law; That's none of mine for which I can bring no action; and what actio • can I bring against God, for a reward of my merit? Have I given him anything of mine? Quid habeo quod non accepi? what have I that I received not from him? Have I given him all his own? how came I to abound then, and see him starve in the streets in his distressed members? Hath he changed his blessings unto me in single money? Hath he made me rich by half pence and farthings; and yet have I done so much as that for him? Have I suffered for his glory? Am not I vas figuli, a potters vessel, and that Potters vessel; and whose hand soever he employs, the hand of sickness, the hand of poverty, the hand of justice, the hand of malice, still it is his hand that breaks the vessel, and this vessel which is his own; for, can any such vessel have a propriety in it self, or be any other bodies primarily then his, from whom it hath the being? To recollect these, if I will have joy in suffering it must be mine, mine, and not borrowed out of an imaginary treasure of the Church; from the works of others Supererogation: mine, and not stolen or enforced by exasperating the Magistrate to a persecution: mine by good title and not by suffering for breach of the Law, mine in particular, and not a general persecution upon the Church by my occasion; And mine by a stranger title then all this, mine by resignation, mine by disavowing it, mine by confessing that it is none of mine; Till I acknowledge, that all my sufferings are even for God's glory, are his works, and none of mine, they are none of mine, and by that humility they become mine, and then I may rejoice in my sufferings.
Through all our sufferings then, there must pass an acknowledgement that we are unprofitable servants; towards God utterly unprofitable; So unprofitable to our selves, as that we can merit nothing by our sufferings; but still we may and must have a purpose to profit others by our constancy; it is Pro vobis, that Saint Paul says he suffers for them, for their souls; I will most gladly bestow, and be bestowed for your souls, (says he. ) But Numquid Paulus crucifixus pro vobis, was Paul crucified for you? is his own question, as he suffered for them here, so we may be bold to say he was crucified for them; that is, that by his crucifying and suffering, the benefit of Christ's sufferings, and crucifying might be the more cheerfully embraced by them, and the more effectually applied to them; Pro vobis, is Pro vestro commodo, for your advantage, and to make you the more active in making sure your own salvation; We are afflicted (says he) for your consolation; that's first, that you might take comfort, and spiritual courage by our example, that God will no more forsake you, then he hath done us, and then, he adds salvation too; for your consolation and salvation; for our sufferings beget this consolation; and then, this consolation facilitates your salvation; and then, when Saint Paul had that testimony in his own conscience, that his purpose in his sufferings, was Pro illis, to advantage God's children, and then saw in his experience so good effect of it, as that it wrought, and begot faith in them, then the more his sufferings encreast, the more his joys encreast; Though (says he) I be offered up, upon the service, and sacrifice of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all; And therefore he calls the Philippians, who were converted by him, Gaudium, & Coronam, his Joy and his Crown; not only a Crown, in that sense, as an auditory, a congregation that compasses the Preacher, was ordinarily called a Crown, Cor • na. (In which sense that Martyr Cornelius answered the Judge, when he was charged to have held intelligence, and to have received Letters from Saint Cyprian against the State, Ego de Corona Domini, (says he, from God's Church, 'tis true, I have, but Contra Rempublicam, against the State, I have received no Letters.) But not only in this sense, Saint Paul calls those whom he had converted, his Crown, his Crown, that is, his Church; but he calls them his Crown in heaven, What is our hope, our joy, our Crown of rejoicing, are not even you it? and where? even in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming, says the Apostle; And therefore not to stand upon that contemplation of Saint Gregory's, that at the Resurrection Peter shall lead up his converted Jews, and Paul his converted Nations, and every Apostle his own Church; Since you, to whom God sends us, do as well make up our Crown, as we do yours, since your being wrought upon, and our working upon you conduce to both our Crowns, call you the labor, and diligence of your Pastors, (for that's all the suffering they are called to, till our sins together call in a persecution) call you their painfulness your Crown, and we shall call your applyablenesse to the Gospel, which we preach, our Crown, for both conduce to both; but especially children's children, are the Crown of the Elders, says Solomon: If when we have begot you in Christ, by our preaching, you also beget others by your holy life and conversation, you have added another generation unto us, and you have preached over our Sermons again, as fruitfully as we ourselves; you shall be our Crown, and they shall be your Crowns, and Christ Jesus a Crown of everlasting glory to us all. Amen.
SERMON XVII.
Preached at Lincolns Inn.
MATTH. 18. 7.
T He Man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the Earth. The man Moses was so; but the Child Jesus was meeker then he. Compare Moses with men, and Moses will scarce be paralleled; Compare him with him, who being so much more then man, as that he was God too, was made so much less then man, as that he was a worm and no man, and Moses will not be admitted. If you consider Moses his highest expression, what he would have parted with for his brethren, in his Dele me, Pardon them, or blot my name out of thy book, yet Saint Paul's zeal will enter into the balance, and come into comparison with Moses in his Anathema pro fratribus, in that he wished himself to be separated from Christ, rather then his brethren should be. But what comparison hath a sudden, a passionate, and indigested vehemence of love, expressed in a phrase that tastes of zeal, but is not done, (Moses was not blotted out of the book of life, nor Saint Paul was not separated from Christ for his brethren) what comparison hath such a love, that was but said, and perchance should not have been said (for, we can scarce excuse Moses, or Saint Paul, of all excess and inordinateness, in that that they said) with a deliberate and an eternal purpose in Christ Jesus conceived as soon as we can conceive God to have known that Adam would fall, to come into this world, & die for man, and then actually and really, in the fullness of time, to do so; he did come, and he did die. The man Moses was very meek, the child Jesus meeker then he. Moses his meekness had a determination, (at least an interruption, a discontinuance) when he revenged the wrong of another upon that Egyptian whom he slew. But a bruised reed might have stood unbroken, and smoking flax might have lien unquenched forever, for all Christ. And therefore though Christ send his Disciples to School, to the Scribes and Pharisees, because they sat in Moses seat, for other lessons, yet for this, he was their School-master himself, Discite à me, learn of me, for I am meek. In this Chapter he gives them three lessons in this doctrine of meekness; He gives them foundations, and upperbuildings, The Text, and a Comment, all the Elements of true instruction, Rule and Example. First, he finds them contending for place, Quis maximus, who should be greatest in the kingdom of heaven. The disease which they were sick of, was truly an ignorance what this kingdom was; For, though they were never ignorant that there should be an eternal kingdom in heaven, yet they thought not that the kingdom of Christ here should only be a spiritual kingdom, but they looked for a temporal inchoation of that kingdom here. That was their disease, and a dangerous one. But as Physicians are forced to do sometimes, to turn upon the present cure of some vehement symptom, and accdient, and leave the consideration of the main disease for a time, so Christ leaves the doctrine of the kingdom for the present, and does not rectify them in that yet, but for this pestilent symptom, this malignant accident of precedency, and ambition of place, he corrects that first, and to that purpose gives them the example of a little child, and tells them, that except they become as humble, as gentle, as supple, as simple, as seely, as tractable, as ductile, as careless of place, as negligent of precedency, as that little child, they could not only not be great, but they could not at all enter into the kingdom of heaven. He gives them a second lesson in this doctrine of meekness against scandals, and offenses, against an easiness in giving or an easiness in taking offenses. For, how well soever we may seem to be in ourselves, we are not well, if we forbear not that company, and abstain not from that conversation, which by ill example may make us worse, or if we forbear not such things, as, though they be indifferent in themselves, and can do us no harm, yet our example may make weaker persons then we are, worse, because they may come to do as we do, and not proceed upon so good ground as we do; They may sin in doing those things by our example, in which we did not sin, because we knew them to be indifferent things, and therefore did them, and they did them though they thought them to be sins. And for this Doctrine, Christ takes an example very near to them, If thy hand, or foot, or eye offend thee, cut it off, pull it out. His third lesson in this doctrine of meekness is against hardness of heart, against a loathsomeness, a weariness in forgiving the offenses of other men, against us, occasioned by Peters question, Quoties remittam, How oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? and the example in this rule Christ hath wrapped up in a parable, The Master forgave his servant ten thousand Talents, (more money then perchance any private man is worth) and that servant took his fellow by the throat, and cast him into prison, because he did not presently pay an hundred pence, perchance fifty shillings, not three pound of our money: in such a proportion was Christ pleased to express the Masters inexhaustible largeness and bounty, (which is himself,) and the servants inexcusable cruelty, and penuriousnesse, (which is every one of us.) The root of all Christian duties is Humility, meekness, that's violated in an ambitious precedency, for that implies an over-estimation of ourselves, and an undervalue of others; And it is violated in scandals, and offenses, for that implies an unsettledness and irresolution in ourselves, that we can be so easily shaked, or a neglecting of weaker persons, of whom Christ neglected none; and it is violated in an unmercifulness, and inex • rablenesse, for that implies an indocilenesse, that we will not learn by Christ's doctrine; & an ungratefulnesse, that we will not apply his example, and do to his servants, as he, our Master, hath done to us: And so have you some Paraphrase of the whole Chapter, as it consists of Rules and Examples in this Doctrine of meekness, endangered by pride, by scandal, by uncharitablenes. But of those two, pride & uncharitabenes (though they deserve to be often spoken of,) I shall have no occasion from these words of my text, to speak, for into the second of these three parts, The Doctrine of scandals, our text falls, and it is a Doctrine very necessary, and seldom touched upon.
As the words of our Text are, our parts must be three. First, that heavy word Vae, woe; Secondly, that general word, Mundo, Woe be unto the world; And lastly, that mischievous word, A scandalis, Woe be unto the, world because of scandals, of offenses. each of these three words will receive a twofold consideration; for the first, Vae, is first Vox dolentis, a voice of condoling and lamenting, Christ laments the miseries imminent upon the world, because of scandals, and then it is Vox minantis, a voice of threatening, and intermination, Christ threatens, he interminates heavy judgments upon them, who occasion and induce these miseries by these scandals; This one Vae denotes both these; sorrow, and yet infallibility; They always go together in God; God is loath to do it, and yet God will certainly inflict these judgments. The second word, Mundo, Woe be unto the world, looks two ways too; Vae malis, woe unto evil men that raise scandals, vae bonis, woe unto them who are otherwise good in themselves, if they be so various, as to be easily shaked and seduced by scandals. And then upon the last word A scandalis, Woe be unto the world, because of scandals, of offenses, we must look two ways also; first, as it denotes Scandalum activum, a scandal given by another, and then, as it denotes Scandalum passivum, a scandal taken by another.
First then, our first word, in the firrst acceptation thereof, is Vae dolentis, the voice of condoling and lamentation; God laments the necessity that he is reduced to, and those judgments which the sins of men have made inevitable. In the person of the Prophets which denounced the judgments of God, it is expressed so, Onus Babyl • nis, Onus Egypti, Onus Damasci? O the burden of Damascus, the burden of Egypt, the burden of Babylon; And not only so, but Onus visions, Not only that that judgment would be a heavy burden, when it fell upon that Nation, but that the very pre-contemplation, and pre-denunciation of that judgment upon that people, was a burden and a distasteful bitterness, to the Prophet himself, that was sent upon that message. In reading of an Act of Parliament, or of any Law that inflicts the heaviest punishment that can be imagined upon a delinquent, and transgressor of that Law, a man is not often much affected, because he needs not, when he does but read that law, consider that any particular man is fallen under the penalty, and bitterness thereof. But if upon evidence and verdict he be put to give judgment upon a particular man that stands before him, at the bar, according to that Law, That that man that stands there that day, must that day be no man; that that breath breathed in by God, to glorify him, must be suffocated and strangled with a halter, or evaporated with an Axe, he must be hanged or beheaded, that those limbs which make up a Cabinet for that precious Jewell, the image of God, to be kept in, must be cut into quarters, or torn with horses; that that body which is a consecrated Temple of the Holy Ghost, must be chained to a stake, and burnt to ashes, he that is not affected in giving such a judgment, upon such a man, hath no part in the bowels of Christ Jesus, that melt in compassion, when our sins draw and extort his Judgments upon us in the mouth of those Prophets, those men whom God sends, it is so, and it is so in the mouth of God himself that sends them. Heu vindicabor, (says God) Alas, I will revenge me of mine enemies; Alas, I will, is Alas, I must, his glory compels him to do it, the good of his Church, and the sustentation of his Saints compel him to it, and yet he comes to it with a condolency, with a compassion, Heu vindicabor, Alas, I will revenge me of mine enemies: so also in another Prophet, Heu abominationes, Alas for all the evil abominations of the house of Israel; for (as it is added there) they shall fall, (that is, they will fall) by the sword, by famine, by pestilence, and (as it follows) I will accomplish my fury upon them; Though it were come to that height, fury, and accomplishment, consummation of fury, yet it comes with a condolency, and compassion, Heu abominationes, Alas for all the evil abominations of the house of Israel, I would they were not so ill, that I might be better to them. Men sent by God do so, so does God that sends those men, & he that is both God and man, Christ Jesus does so too: We have but two clear records in the Scriptures of Christ's weeping, and both in compassion for others, when Mary wept for her dead brother Lazarus, and the Jews that were with her wept too, Jesus also wept, and he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled. This was but for the discomfort of one family, (it was not a mortality over the whole Country) It was but for one person in that family, (it was not a contagion that had swept, or did threaten the whole house) it was but for such a person in that family, as he meant forthwith to restore to life again, and yet Jesus wept, & groaned in the Spirits, & was troubled; he would not lose that opportunity of showing his tenderness, and compassion in the behalf of others. How vehement, how passionate then, must we believe his other weeping to have been, when he had his glorious and beloved City Jerusalem in his sight, and wept over that City, and with that stream of tears poured out that Sea, that tempestuous Sea, those heavy judgments, which, (though he wept in doing it) he denounced upon that City, that glorious, that beloved City, which City (though Christ charge, to have stoned them that were sent to her, and to be guilty of all the righteous blood shed upon the earth) the holy Ghost calls the holy City for all that, not only at the beginning of Christ's appearance, (The Devil took him up into the holy City) (for at that time she was not the unholyer for anything that she had done upon the person of Christ,) but when they had exercised all their cruelty, even to death, the death of the Cross upon Christ himself, the Holy Ghost calls still the holy City; Many bodies of Saints, which slept, arose, and went into the holy City. When the Fathers take into their contemplation and discourse, that passionate exclamation of our Savior upon the Cross, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? those blessed Fathers, that never thought of any such sense of that place, that Christ was, at that time, actually in the real torments of hell, assign no fitter sense of those words, then that the foresight of those insupportable, and inevitable, and imminent judgments upon his City, and his people, occasioned that passionate exclamation, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? That as, after he was ascended into heaven, he said to Saul, Cur me persequeris? He called Saul's persecuting of his Church, a persecuting of him, so when he considered that God had forsaken his people, his City, his Jerusalem, he cried out, that God had forsaken him. God that sent the Prophets; the Prophets that were sent; Christ who was both, the person sent, and the sender, came to the inflicting and denouncing of judgments, with this Vae dolentis, a heart, and voice of condoling and lamentation.
Grieve not then the holy Spirit of God, says the Apostle; extort not from him those Judgments, which he cannot in justice forbear, and yet is grieved to inflict. How often do we use that motive, to divert young men from some ill actions, and ill courses, How will this trouble your friends, how will this grieve your Mother, this will kill your Father? The Angels of heaven who are of a friendship and family with us, as they rejoice at our conversion, so are they sorry and troubled at our aversion from God. Our sins have grieved our Mother; that is, made the Church ashamed, and blush that he hath washed us, and clothed us, in the whiteness and innocence of Christ Jesus in our baptism, and given us his blood to drink in the other Sacrament. Our sins have made our mother the Church ashamed in her self, (we have scandalized and offended the Congregation) and our sins have defamed and dishonored our mother abroad, that is, imprinted an opinion in others, that that cannot be a good Church, in which we live so dissolutely, so falsely to our first faith, and contract, and stipulation with God in Baptism. We have grieved our brethren, the Angels, our mother, the Church, and we have killed our Father: God is the father of us all; and we have killed him; for God hath purchased a Church with his blood, says Saint Paul. And, oh, how much more is God grieved now, that we will make no benefit of that blood which is shed for us, then he was for the very shedding of that blood! We take it not so ill, (pardon solow a comparison in so high a mystery; for, since our blessed Savior was pleased to assume that metaphor, and to call his passion a Cup, and his death a drinking, we may be admitted to that Comparison of drinking too) we take it not so ill, that a man go down into our Cellar, and draw, and drink his fill, as that he go in, and pierce the vessels, and let them run out, in a wasteful wantonneste. To satisfy the thirst of our souls, there was a necessity that the blood of Christ Jesus, should be shed; To satisfy Christ's own sitto, that thirst which was upon him, when he was upon the Cross, there was a necessity too, that Christ should bleed to death. On our part there was an absolute and a primary necessity; God in his justice requiring a satisfaction, nothing could redeem us, by way of satisfaction, but the blood of his Son. And though there were never act more voluntary, more spontaneous, then Christ's dying for man, nor freer from all coaction, and necessity of that kind, yet after Christ had submitted himself to that Decree and contract that passed between him, and his Father, that he, by shedding his blood, should redeem Mankind, there lay a necessity upon Christ himself to shed his blood, as himself says first to his Disciples that went with him to Emans, Nonne op • rtuit, ought not Christ to suffer all these things? do ye not find by the prophets that he was bound to do it? and then to his Apostles at Jerusalem, Sic opertuit, Thus it behooved Christ to suffer. There was then an absolute necessity upon us, an obediential necessity upon Christ, that his blood must be shed; But to let him die in a wantonness, to let out all that precious liquor, and taste no drop of it, to draw out all that immaculate and invaluable blood, and make no balsamum, no antidote, no plaster, no fomentation in the application of that blood, to labor still under a burning fever of lust, and ambition, and presumption, and find no cooling julips there, in the application of that blood, to labor under a cold damp of indevotion, and under heartless desperation, and find no warming Cordials there, to be still as far under judgments and executions for sin, as if there had been no Messias sent, no ransom given, no satisfiaction made, not to apply this blood thus shed for us, by those means which God in his Church presents to us, this puts Christ to his woeful Interjection, to cast out this woe upon us, (which he had rather have left out) woe be unto the world, which, though it begin in a vae dolentis, a voice of condoling and lamenting, yet it is also vae minantis, a voice of threatening, and intermination, denoting the infallibility of Judgments, and that's our next consideration.
I think we find no words in Christ's mouth so often, as vae, and Amen. Each of them hath two significations; as almost all Christ's words, and actions have; consolation, and commination. For, as this vae signifies (as before) a sorrow, (woe, that is, woe is me, for this will fall upon you) and signifies also a Judgment inevitable and infallible, (woe, that is, woe be unto you, for this Judgment shall fall upon you) so Amen is sometimes vox Asserentis, and signifies vere, verily, Verily I say unto you, when Christ would confirm, and establish a belief in some doctrine, or promise of his, (as when he says Amen, Amen, verily verily I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do, shall he do also, and greater works then these shall he do) so it is vox Asserentis, a word of assertion, and it is also vox Deserentis, a word of desertion, when God denounces an infallibility, an unavoydablenesse, an inevitablenesse in his judgments, Amen dico, verily I say unto thee, thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing; so this Amen signifies Fiat, this shall certainly be thus done. And this seal, this Amen, as Amen is Fiat, is always set to his vae, as his vae is vox minantis; whensoever God threatens any Judgment, he means to execute that Judgment as far as he threatens it; God threatens nothing in terrorem only, only to frighten us; every vae hath his Amen, every Judgment denounced, a purpose of execution. This then is our woeful case; every man may find upon record, in the Scriptures, a vae denounced upon that sin, which he knows to be his sin; and if there be a vae, there is an Amen too, if God have said it shall, it shall be executed, so that this is not an execution of a few condemned persons, but a Massacre of all: It is not a Decimation, as in a rebellion, to spare nine, and hang the tenth, but it is a washing, a sweeping away of all: every man may find a Judgment upon record against him. It doth not acquit him that he hath not committed an adultery; and yet, is he sure of that? He may have done that in a look, in a letter, in a word, in a wish: It doth not acquit him, that he hath not done a murder; and yet, is he sure of that? He may have killed a man, in not defending him from the oppression of another, if he have power in his hand, and he may have killed in not relieving, if he have a plentiful fortune. He may have killed in not reprehending him who was under his charge, whē he saw him kill himself in the sinful ways of death. As they that write of Poysons, and of those creatures that naturally malign and would destroy man, do name the Flea, as well as the Viper, because the Flea sucks as much blood as he can, so that man is a murderer that stabs as deep as he can, though it be but with his tongue, with his pen, with his frown; for a man may kill with a frown, in withdrawing his countenance from that man, that lives upon so low a pasture as his countenance, nay he may kill with a smile, with a good look, if he afford that good look with a purpose to delude him. And, beloved, how many die of this disease; how many die laughing, die of a tickling; how many are overjoyed with the good looks, and with the familiarity of greater persons then themselves, and led on by hopes of getting more, wast that they have? An adultery, a murder may be done in a dream, if that dream were an effect of a murderous, or an adulterous thought conceived before. The Apostle says, I know nothing by myself, yet am I not thereby justified, we sin some sins, that all the world sees, and yet we see not, but then, how many more, which none in the world sees but ourselves? Scarce any man scapes all degrees of any sin; scarce any man some great degree of some great sin; no man escapes so, but that he may find upon record, in the Scriptures, a vae, and an Amen, a Judgment denounced, and an execution sealed against him. And, if that be our case, where is there any room for this milder signification of these two words, vae, and Amen, which we spoke of before, as they are words of Consolation? If because God hath said Stipendium peccati mors est, the wages of sin is death, because I have sinned, I must die, what can I do in a Prayer? can I flatter God? what can I do in an Alms? Can I bribe God, or frustrate his purpose? Can I put an Euge upon his vae, a vacat upon his Fiat, a Nonobstante upon his Amen. God is not man, not a false man that he can lie, nor a weak man that he can repent. Where then is the restorative, the consolatory nature of these words? In this, beloved, consists our comfort, that all God's vae's and Amens, all judgments, and all his executions are Conditional; There is a Crede & vives, Believe and thou shalt live; there is a Fac hoc & vives, do this and thou shalt live; If thou have done otherwise, there is a Converte & vives, turn unto the Lord and thou shalt live; If thou have done so, and fallen off, there is a Revertere & vives, return again unto the Lord, and thou shalt live. How heavy so ever any of God's judgments be, yet there is always room for David's question, Quis scit, who can tell whether God will be gracious unto me? What better assurance could one have, then David had? The Prophet Nathan had told David immediately from the mouth of God, this child shall surely die, and ratified it by that reason, because thou hast given occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, this child shall surely die, yet David fasted, and wept, and said, who can tell whether the Lord will be gracious unto me, that the child may live? There is always room for David's question, Quis scit, who can tell? Nay there is no room for it, as it is a question of diffidence and distrust; every man may and must know, that whatsoever any Prophet have denounced against any sin of his, yet there are conditions, upon which the Lord will be gracious and thy soul shall live. But if the first condition, that is Innocency, and the second, that is Repentance, be rebelliously broken, then every man hath his vae, and every vae hath his Amen, the judgments are denounced against him; and upon him they shall be executed; for God threatens not to fright children, but the Mountains melt, and Powers, and Thrones, and Principalities tremble at his threatening. And so have you the doubled signification of the first word vae, as it is vox Dolentis, and as it is Vox minantis, God is loath, but God will infallibly execute his judgment, and we proceed to the extension of this vae, over all, vae mundo, woe unto the world, and the double signification of that word.
I have wondered sometimes that that great Author, and Bishop in the Roman Church, Abulensis, is so free, as to confess that some Expositors amongst them, have taken this word in our Text, Mundo, adjective, not to signify the world, but a clean person, a free man, that it should be vae immuni, woe unto him that is free from offenses, that hath had no offenses; perchance they mean from crosses. And so, though it be a most absurd, and illiterate, and ungrammaticall construction of the place that they make, yet there is a doctrine to be raised from thence, of good use. As God brought light out of darkness, and raises glory out of sin, so we may raise good Divinity out of their ill Grammar; for vae mundo, indeed, vae immuni, woe be unto him that hath had no crosses. There cannot be so great a cross as to have none. I lack one loaf of that daily bread that I pray for, if I have no cross; for afflictions are our spiritual nourishment; I lack one limb of that body I must grow into, which is the body of Christ Jesus, if I have no crosses; for, my conformity to Christ, (and that's my being made up into his body) must be accomplished in my fulfilling his sufferings in his flesh. So that, though our adversaries out of their ignorance mislead us in a wrong sense of the place; the Holy Ghost leads us into a true, and right use thereof. But there is another good use of their error too, another good doctrine out of their ill Grammar; Take the word mundo, adjective, for an adjective, and vae mundo, vae immuni, woe unto him that is so free from all offenses, as to take offense at nothing; to be indifferent to anything, to any Religion, to any Discipline, to any form of God's service; That from a glorious Mass to a sordid Conventi • le, all's one to him, all one to him whether that religion, in which they meet, and light candles at Noon; or that, in which they meet, and put out candles at midnight; what innovations, what alterations, what tolerations of false, what extirpations of true Religion soever come, it shall never trouble, never offend him; 'It is true, Vae mundo indeed, woe unto him that is so free, so unsensible, so unaffected with anything in this kind; for, as to be too inquisitive into the proceedings of the State, and the Church, out of a jealousy and suspicion that any such alterations, or tolerations in Religion are intended or prepared, is a seditious disaffection to the government, and a disloyal aspersion upon the persons of our Superiors, to suspect without cause, so, not to be sensible that the Catterpillars of the Roman Church, do eat up our tender fruit, that the Jesuits, and other enginiers of that Church, do seduce our forwardest and best spirits, not to be watchful in our own families, that our wives and children and servants be not corrupted by them, for the Pastor to s • acken in his duty, (not to be earnest in the Pulpit) for the Magistrate to slacken in his, (not to be vigilant in the execution of those Laws as are left in his power) vae mundo, vae immuni, woe unto him that is unsensible of offenses. Jealously, suspiciously to mis-interpret the actions of our Superiors, is inexcusable, but so is it also not to feel how the adversary gains upon us, and not to wish that it were, and not to pray that it may be otherwise; vae mundo, vae immuni, woe to him that is un-offended unsensible, thus. But as I have wondered that that Bishop would so easily confess, that some of their Expositors were so very unlearned, so barbarously ignorant, so enormously stupid, as to take this vae mundo adjective, so do I wonder more, that after such confessions, and acknowledgements of such ignorances and stupidities amongst them, they will not remedy it in the cause, but still continue so rigid, so severe in the maintenance of their own Translation, their Vulgate Edition, as in places, and cases of doubt, not to admit recourse to the Original, as to the Supreme Judge, nor to other Translations: for, by either of those ways, it would have appeared, that this vae mundo could not be taken adjective, but is a cloud cast upon the whole world, a woe upon all, no place, no person, no calling free from these scandals, and offenses, from temptations, and tribulations; when there was a vae Sodom, that God reigned fire and brimstone upon Sodom, yet there was a Zoar, where Let might be safe. When there was a vae Egypto, woe and woe upon woe upon Egypt, there was a Go • hen a Sanctuary for the children of God in Egypt. When there is a vae inhabitantibus, a persecution in any place, there is a Fuge in aliam, leave to fly into another City. But in such an extension, such an expansion, such an exaltation, such an inundation of woe, as this in our text, Vae mundo, woe to the world, to all the world, a tide, a flood without any ebb, a Sea without any shore, a dark sky without any Horizon; That though I do withdraw my self from the woeful uncertainties, and irresolutions and indeterminations of the Court, and from the snares and circumventions of the City; Though I would devest, and shake off the woes and offenses of Europe in Afrique, or of Asia in America, I cannot, since wheresoever, or howsoever I live, these woes, and scandals, and offenses, temptations, and tribulations will pursue me, who can express the wretched condition, the miserable station, and prostration of man in this world? vae mundo.
Take the word, World, in as ill a sense as you will, as ill as when Christ says, I pray not for the world, (and they are very ill, for whom Christ Jesus who prayed for them that crucified him, would not pray:) Take the word world, in as good a sense as you will, as good as when Christ says, I give my flesh for the life of the world, (and they are very good that are elemented, made up with his flesh, and alimented and nursed with his blood:) Take it for the Elect, take it for the Reprobate, the Reprobate and the Elect too are under this vae, woe to the world, from temptations, and tribulations, scandals, and offenses.
So it is if the world be persons, and it is so also, if it be times; Take the world for the times we live in now, and it is Novissima hora, this is the last time, and the Apostle hath told us, that the last times are the worst. Take the world for the Old world, Originalis mundus, as Saint Peter call's it; the Original world, of which, this world; since the flood, is but a copy, and God spared not the Old world, says that Apostle. Take it for an elder world then that, the world in Paradise, when one Adam, the Son of God, and one Eve produced by God, from him, made up the world: or take it for an elder world then that, the world in heaven, when only the Angels, and no other creatures made up the world; Take it any of these ways, we in this latter world do, Noah in the old world did, so did Adam in the world in Paradise, and so did the Angels in the oldest world of all, find these woes from offenses, and scandals, temptations, and tribulations.
So it is in all persons, in all men, so it is in all times, in all ages, and so it is in all places too; for he that retires into a Monastery upon pretence of avoiding temptations, and offenses in this world, he brings them thither, and he meets them there; He sees them intramittendo, and extramittendo, he is scandalized by others, and others are scandalized by him. That part of the world that sweats in continual labor in several vocations, is scandalized with their laziness, and their riches, to see them anoint themselves with other men's sweat, and lard themselves with other men's fat; and then these retired and cloistrall men are scandalized with all the world, that is out of their walls. There is no sort of men more exercised with contentious and scandalous wranglings, then they are: for, first, with all eager animosity they prefer their Monastical life before all other secular callings, yea, before those Priests, whom they call Secular Priests, such as have care of souls, in particular parishes, (as though it were a Diminution, and an inferior state to have care of souls, and study and labor the salvation of others.) And then as they undervalue all secular callings, (Mechaniques, and Merchants, and Magistrates too) in respect of any Regular order, (as they call them) so with the same animosity do they prefer their own Order, before any other Order. A Carthusian is but a man of fish, for one Element, to dwell still in a Pond, in his Cell alone, but a Jesuit is a useful ubiquitary, and his Scene is the Court, as well as the Cloister. And howsoever they pretend to be gone out of the world, they are never the farther from the Exchange for all their Cloister; they buy, and sell, and purchase in their Cloister. They are never the farther from Westminster in their Cloister, they occasion and they maintain suits from their Cloister; and there are the Courts of Justice noted to abound most with suits, where Monasteries abound most. Nay, they are never the farther from the field for all their Cloister; for they give occasions of armies, they raise armies, they direct armies, they pay armies from their Cloister. Men should not retire from the mutual duties of this world, to avoid offenses, temptations, tribulations, neither do they at all avoid them, that retire thus, upon that pretence.
Shall we say then, as the Disciples said to Christ; If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to mary? If the world be nothing but a bed of Adders, a quiver of poisoned arrows, from every person, every time, every place, woes by occasion of offenses, and scandals, it had been better God had made no world, better that I had never been born into the world, better, if by any means I could get out of the world quickly, shall we say so? God forbid. As long as Job charged not God foolishly, it is said, in all this Job sinned not; but when he came to curse his birth, and to loath his life, then Job charged God foolishly. When one Prophet (Elijah) comes to proportion God the measure of his corrections, Satisest, Lord, this is enough; Thou hast done enough, I have suffered enough, now take away my life. When another Prophet comes to wish his own death in anger, and to justify his anger, and dispute it out with God himself, for not proceeding with the Ninevites, as he would have had him do; nay for the withering of his gourd that shadowed him, in all these, they did, in all such, we do charge God foolishly; And shall we that are but worms, but silk-worms, but glow-worms at best, chide God that he hath made slow-worms, and other venomous creeping things? shall we that are nothing but boxes of poison in ourselves, reprove God for making Toads and Spiders in the world? shall we that are all discord, quarrel the harmony of his Creation, or his providence? Can an Apothecary make a Sovereign triacle of Vipers, and other poisons, and cannot God admit offenses, and scandals into his physic? scandals, and offenses, temptations, and tribulations, are our leaven that ferment us, and our lees that preserve us. Use them to God's glory, and to thine own establishing, and then thou shall be a particular exception to that general Rule, the Vae mundo à scandalis, shall be an Euge tibi à scandalis, thou shalt see that it was well for thee, that there were scandals and offenses in the world, for they shall have exercised thy patience, they shall have occasioned thy victory, they shall have assured thy triumph.
SERMON XVIII.
Preached at Lincolns Inn.
The second Sermon on MATTH. 18. 7.
W Ee have seen in the first word the vae, as it is vox Dolentis, the voice of condoling and lamenting, that it is accompanied with a Heu; God's judgments come against his will, he had rather they might be forborne, he had rather those easy conditions had been performed; And as it is vox minantis, a voice of threatening and intermination, it is accompanied with an Amen; if conditions be rebelliously broken, God's judgments do come infallibly, inevitably; And we have seen in the second word, vae mundo, and the twofold signification of that, that these offenses, and scandals fall upon all the world; the wicked embrace temptations, and are glad of them, and sorry when they are but weak; the godly meet temptations, and wrestle with them, and sometimes do overcome them, and are sometimes overcome by them; but all have them, and yet we must not break out of the world by a retired life, nor break out of the world by a violent death, but take God's ways, and stay God's leisure. In this our third part, we are to consider the root from which this over-spreading vae, this woe proceeds, A scandalis, from scandals, from offenses, and the double signification of that word, first, Scandalum activum, the active scandal, which is a malice, or at least an indiscretion in giving offense, and Scandalum passivum, the passive scandal, which is a forwardness, at least an easiness in taking offense; To know the nature of the thing, look we to the derivation, the extraction, the Origination of the word. The word from which scandal is derived (scazein) signifies claudicare, to halt; and thence, a scandal is any trap, or Engin, any occasion of stumbling, and laming, hid in the way that I must go, by another person; and as it is transferred to a spiritual use, appropriated to an Ecclesiastical sense, it is an occasion of sinning. It hath many branches; too many to be so much as named; but some fruits from some of them we shall gather, and present you. First, in our first, the Active Scandal, to do anything that is naturally ill, formally sin, whereby another may be occasioned or encouraged by my example to do the like, this is the active scandal most evidently, and most directly, and this is morbus complicatus, a disease that carries another disease in it, a fever exalted to a frenzy; It is Peccatum pragnans, peccatum gravidum, a spauning sin, a sin of multiplication, to sin purposely, to lead another into temptation. But there is a less degree then this, and it is an active scandal too; To do anything that in it self is indifferent, (and so no sin in me, that do it) in the sight of another that thinks it not indifferent, but unlawful, and yet because he hath a real, or a reverential dependence upon me, (my Son, my Servant, my Tenant) and thinks I would be displeased if he did it not, does it against his conscience by my example, though the sin be formally his, radically it is mine, because I gave the occasion, And there is a lower degree then this; and yet is an active scandal. If I do an indifferent thing in the sight and knowledge of another, that thinks it unlawful, though he do not come to do it, out of my example, by any dependence upon me, yet if he come to think uncharitably of me, or to condemn me for doing it, though this uncharitableness in him be his sin, yet the root grew in me, and I gave the scandal. And there is a lower degree then this, and yet is an Active scandal too. Origen hath expressed it thus, Scandalum est quo scandentium pedes offenduntur; To hinder the feet of another, that would go farther, or climb higher in the ways of godliness; but for me, to say to any man, What need you be so pure, so devout, so godly, so zealous, will this make you rich, will this bring you to preferment? this is an active scandal in me, though he that I speak to, be not damnified by me. Of which kind of scandal, there is an evident, and an illustrious example, between Saint Peter, and Christ; Christ calls Peter a scandal unto him, when Peter rebuked Christ for offering to go up to Jerusalem in a time of danger. Christ was to accomplish the work of our salvation at Jerusalem, by dying, and Peter dissuades, discounsels that journey; and for this, Christ lays that heavy name upon his indiscreet zeal, and that heavy name upon his person, Vade retro, Get thee behind me Satan, thou art a scandal unto me. This is Scandalum oppositionis, the scandal of opposing, dissuading, discounselling, discountenancing, and consequently the frustrating of God's purpose in man; This is but by word, and yet there is a less then this, which is Scandalum timoris, when he that hath power in his hand, in a family, in a parish, in a City, in a Court, intimidates them who depend upon him, (though nothing be expressly done or said that way) and so slackens them in their religious duties to God; and in their constancy in Religion it self; And vae illis, woe unto them that do so, and vae mundo ab illis; woe unto the world, because there are so many that do so. And yet there is another scandal which seems less then this, Scandalum amoris, the scandal of love; as Saul gave David his daughter Mich • l, ut esset ei in scandalum, that she might be a snare unto him; that is, that David being over-uxorious, and over-indulgent to his wife, might thereby lie the more open to Saul's mischievous purposes upon him, and vae illis, woe unto them that do so; and vae munde ab illis, woe unto the world, because there are so many that do so, that study the affections, and dispositions, and inclinations of men, and then, minister those things to them, that affect them most, which is the way of the instruments of the Roman Church, to promise preferments to discontented persons, and is indeed, his way, whose instrument the Roman Church is, The Devil; for this is all that the Devil is able to do, in the ways of temptation, Applicare passivis activa, To find out what will work upon a man, and to work by that. The Devil did not create me, nor bring materials to my creation; The Devil did not infuse into me, that choler, that makes me ignorantly and indiscreetly zealous, nor that flegm that chokes me with a stupid indevotion; He did not infuse into me that blood, that inflames me in licentiousness, nor that melancholy that damps me in a jealousy and suspicion, a diffidence and distrust in God. The Devil had no hand in composing me in my constitution. But the Devil knows, which of these govern, and prevail in me, and ministers such temptations, as are most acceptable to me, and this is Scandalum amoris, the scandal of Love.
So have ye then the Name, and Nature, and extent of the Active Scandal; against which, the inhibition given in this Text is general, we are forbidden to scandalize any person by any of these ways, The scandal of Example, or the scandal of Perswasion, The scandal of Fear, or the scandal of Love. For, there is scarce any so free to himself, so entirely his own, so independent upon others, but that Example, or Perswasion, or Fear, or Love may scandalize him, that is, Lead him into temptation, and make him do some things against his own mind. Our Savior Christ had spoken, De pusillis, of little children, of weak persons, easy to be scandalized, before this Text, and he returns, ad pusillos, to the consideration of little children, persons easy to be scandalized again; this Text is not of them, or not of them only, but of all; say not thou of any man, aetatem habet, he is old enough, let him look to himself, he hath reason as other men have, he hath had a learned and a religious education, ill example can do him no harm; but give no ill example to any, study the settling, and the establishing of all; for, scarce is there any so strong, but may be shaked by some of these scandals, Example, Perswasion, Fear, or Love. And he that employs his gift of wit, and Counsel to seduce and mislead men, or his gift of Power, and Authority to intimidate, and affright men, or his gift of other graces, loveliness of person, agreeableness of Conversation, powerfulness of speech, to ensnare and entangle men by any of these scandals, may draw others into perdition, but he falls also with them, and shall not be left out by God in the punishments inflicted upon them that fall by his occasion.
The Commandment is general, scandalize none, scarce any but may be overthrown, by some of these ways; And then the Apostles practice was general too, we give no occasion of offense in anything. As he requires that we should eat and drink to the glory of God, so he would have us study to avoid scandalizing of others, even in our eating and drinking; If meat make my brother to offend, (offend either in eating against his own conscience, or offend in an uncharitable mis-interpretation of my eating) In aeternum, says the Apostle there, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth; Nor, destroy my brother with my meat, for whom Christ died. That's the Apostles tenderness in things; (He would give no occasion of offense in anything) And it is as general in contemplation of persons, he would have no offense given, neither to the Jew, nor to the Grecian, nor to the Church of God: He was as careful not to scandalize, not to give just occasion of offense to Jew, not Gentile, as not to the Church of God; so must we be towards them of a superstitions religion amongst us, as careful as towards one another, not to give any scandal, any just cause of offense. But what is to be called a just cause of offense towards those men? Good ends, and good ways, plain, and direct, and manifest proceedings, these can be called no scandal, no just cause of offense, to Jew, nor Gentile, to Turk, nor Papist; nor does Saint Paul intend that we should forbear essential and necessary things, for fear of displeasing perverse and peevish men. To maintain the doctrinal truths of our religion, by conferences, by disputations, by writing, by preaching, to avow, and to prove our religion to be the same, that Christ Jesus and his Apostles proposed at beginning, the same that the general Councils established after, the same that the blessed Fathers of those times, unanimely, and dogmatically delivered, the same that those glorious Martyrs quickened by their death, and carried over all the world in the rivers, in the seas of their blood, to avow our religion by writing, and preaching, to be the same religion, an then to preserve and protect that religion which God hath put into our hearts, by all such means as he hath put into our hands, in the due execution of just Laws, this is no scandal, no just cause of offense to Jew not Gentile, Turk nor Papists. But when leaving fundamental things, and necessary truths, we wrangle uncharitably about Collateral impertinencies, when we will refuse to do such things as conduce to the exaltation of Devotion, or to the order, and peace of the Church, not for any harm in the things, but only therefore because the Papists do them, when, because they kneel in the worship of the bread in the Sacrament, we will not kneel in Thanksgiving to God for the Sacrament; when because they pray to Saints, we will reproach the Saints, or not name the Saints, when because they abuse the Cross, we will abhor the Cross; This is that that Saint Paul protests against, and in that protestation Catechizes us, that as he would give no just occasion of offense to the true Church of God, so neither would he do it to a false or infirm Church. He would not scandalize the true Church of God, by any modifications, any inclinations towards the false; nor he would not scandalize the false and infirm Church, by refusing to communicate with them, in the practice of such things, as might exalt our Devotion, and did not endanger nor shake any foundation of religion: which was the wisdom of our Church, in the beginning of the Reformation, when the Injuctions of our Princes forbad us to call one another by the odious names of Papist, or Papistical Heretic, or Schismatic, or Sacramentary, or such convitions (as the word of the Injunction is) and repr • achfull names; but cleaving always entirely, and inseparably to the fundamental truths of our own religion, as far as it is possible we should live peaceably with all men. Saint Paul would give no offense to the true Church of God, he would not prevaricate, nor to the Jew nor Gentile neither, he would not exasperate. And this may be enough to have been said of the active scandal • , and pass we now, in our order, to the Passive.
It is no wonder to see them who put all the world, into differences, (the Jesuits) to differ sometimes amongst themselves. And therefore though the Jesuit Maldonado say of this Text, That Christ did not here intend to warn, or to arm his Disciples against scandals, as scandals occasions of sin, but only from offering injury to one another, That scandal in this text is nothing but wrong, yet another Jesuit, (Vincemius Rhegius) is not only of another opinion himself, but thinks that opinion (as he calls it) absurd; It is absurd, says he, to interpret it so; for, can a man's own hand or foot, or eye, be said to injure him? And yet, in this place, they are often said to scandalize him, to offend him. The interpretation that Maldonado departs from, himself acknowledges to be the interpretation of Saint Chrysostom, of Euthymius, of Theophylact, of others of the Fathers; and, by the council of Trent, he is bound to interpret Scriptures according to the Fathers, and he is angry with us, if at any time we do not so; and here he departs from them, where, not only his reverence to them, but the frame, and the evidence of the place should have kept them to him; for here Christ utters his vae, as it is vae Dolentis, as he laments their miseries, and as it is vae Minantis, as he threatens his judgments, not only upon them that offend and scandalize others, but upon them also that are easily scandalized by others, and put from their religion, and Christian constancy with every rumour. Par • m distat scandalizare, & scandalizari; It is almost as great a sin to be shaked by a scandal given, as to give it. Christ intends both in this Text; the Active, and the Passive scandal; but the latter, meliùs quadrat, says a later Divine, worthy to be compared to the Ancients, for the exposition of Scriptures, it fits the scope and purpose of Christ best, to accept and interpret this vae, (Woe be unto the world) of the Pas • ive scandal, the scandal taken.
In that, we consider the working of this Vae, three ways; first, vae quia illusiones fortes, woe unto the world because these scandals and offenses, temptations, and tribulations are so strong in their nature; and then vae quia infirmi vas, woe because you are so weak in your nature; and again, vae quia Pravaricatores, woe because we prevaricate in our own case, and make ourselves weaker then we are, and are scandalized with things which are not in their nature scandalous, nor were scandalously intended. The two first, are woe because we shall be scandalized, for scandals are truly strong, and you are truly weak; The other is woe because ye will be scandalized, when, and where you might easily unentangle the snare, and devest the • scruple. First, for the vehemence, the violence, the unavoydablenesse and impetuousness of these scandals, temptations, and tribulations under which we all suffer in this world, it may be enough to consider that one saying of our Savior's, They shall seduce, Si possibile, even the elect, where (by the way, it is not merely, not altogether, as we have translated it, If it were possible, for that sounds, as if Christ had positively, and dogmatically determined, that it is not possible for the elect to be seduced; but Christ says only, Si possibile, if it be possible, as being willing to leave it in doubt, and in suspense how far, in so great scandals, so very great temptations, even the elect might be seduced. Ista Dominici sermonis dubitatto, trepidationem mentis in electis relinquit; this doubtfulness in Christ's speech, makes the very elect stand in fear of falling, in the midst of such temptations, for, howsoever the elect shall rise again, the elect may fall by these scandals, and though they may be reduced, they may be seduced. We are to consider men, as they are delivered in the approbation, and testimony of the Church, that judges s • cundum allegata & probata, according to the evidence that she sees and hears, and not as they are wrapped up in the infallible knowledge of God; and so, our election admits an outward trial, that is, Sanctification: so S. Peter writes, to the strangers elect through sanctification. They were strangers, strangers to the Covenant, and yet Elect; for, as all of the household, all within the Covenant, all children of the faithful, are not elect, (for to be born of Christian parents within the Covenant, gives us a title to the Sacrament of Baptism, so as that we may claim it, and the Church cannot deny it us; but this birth doth not give us that title to heaven, which Baptisin itself does) so all strangers, all that are without the Covenant, are not excluded in the election. S. Peter admits stragers to election, but yet no otherwise then through sanctification; when we are come to that hill,