Fifty Sermons

SERMON XXII.

Preached at Lincolns Inn.

A S the Philosopher says, if a man could see virtue, he would love it, so if a man could see sin, he would hate it. But as the eye sees everything but it self, so does sin, too. It sees Beauty, and Honor, and Riches, but it sees not it self, not the sinful coveting and compassing of all these. To make, though not sin, yet the sinner to see himself, for the explication, and application of these words, we brought you these two lights; first, the Multiplicity of sin, in that elegancy of the holy Ghost, supergressae sunt, Mine iniquities are gone over my head, and the weight, and oppression of sin, in that, Gravatae nimis, As a heavy burden they are too heavy for me; In the first, how numerous, how manifold they are, in the other, how grievous, how insupportable; first, how many hands, then how fast hold sin lays upon me. The first of these two, was our exercise the last day, when we proposed and proceeded in these words, in which we presented to you, the dangerous multiplicity of sin, in those pieces, which constituted that part. But because, as men, how many soever, make but a Multitude, or a Throng, and not an Army, if they be unarmed, so sin, how manifold, and multiform so ever, might seem a passable thing, if it might be easily shaked off, we come now to imprint in you a sense of the weight and oppression thereof, As a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me; The particular degrees whereof, we laid down the last day, in our general division of the whole Text, and shall now pursue them, according to our order proposed then.

First then, sin is heavy. Does not the sinner find it so? No marvel, nothing is heavy in his proper place, in his own Sphere, in his own Center, when it is where it would be, nothing is heavy. He that lies under water finds no burden of all that water that lies upon him; but if he were out of it, how heavy would a small quantity of that water seem to him, if he were to carry it in a vessel? An habitual sinner is the natural place, the Center of sin, and he feels no weight in it, but if the grace of God raise him out of it, that he come to walk, and walk in the ways of godliness, not only his watery Tympanies, and his dropsies, those waters which by actual and habitual sins he hath contracted, but that water, of which he is properly made, the water that is in him naturally, infused from his parents, Original sin, will be sensible to him, and oppress him. Scarce any man considers the weight of Original sin; And yet, as the strongest temptations fall upon us when we are weakest, in our death-bed, so the heavyest sin seises us, when we are weakest; as soon as we are anything, we are sinners, and there, where there can be no more temptations ministered to us, then was to the Angels that fell in heaven, that is, in our mothers womb, when no world, nor flesh, nor Devil could present a provocation to sin to us, when no faculty of ours is able to embrace, or second a provocation to sin, yet there, in that weakness, we are under the weight of Original sin. And truly, if at this time, God would vouchsafe me my choice, whether he should pardon me all those actual and habitual sins, which I have committed in my life, or extinguish Original sin in me, I should choose to be delivered from Original sin, because, though I be delivered from the imputation thereof, by Baptism, so that I shall not fall under a condemnation for Original sin only, yet it still remains in me, and practices upon me, and occasions all the other sins, that I commit: now, for all my actual and habitual sins, I know God hath instituted means in his Church, the Word, and the Sacraments, for my reparation; But with what a holy alacrity, with what a heavenly joy, with what a cheerful peace, should I come to the participation of these means and seals of my reconciliation, and pardon of all my sins, if I knew myself to be delivered from Original sin, from that snake in my bosom, from that poison in my blood, from that leaven and tartar in all my actions, that casts me into Relapses of those sins which I have repented? And what a cloud upon the best serenity of my conscience, what an interruption, what a dis-continuance from the sincerity and integrity of that joy, which belongs to a man truly reconciled to God, in the pardon of his former sins, must it needs be still to know, and to know by lamentable experiences, that though I wash my self with Soap, and Nit • e, and Snow water, mine own clothes will defile me again, though I have washed myself in the tears of Repentance, and in the blood of my Savior, though I have no guiltiness of any former sin upon me at that present, yet I have a sense of a root of sin, that is not grub'd up, of Original sin, that will cast me back again. Scarce any man considers the weight, the oppression of Original sin. No man can say, that an Akorn weighs as much as an Oak; yet in truth, there is an Oak in that Akorn: no man considers that Original sin weighs as much as Actual, or Habitual, yet in truth, all our Actual and Habitual sins are in Original. Therefore Saint Paul's vehement, and frequent prayer to God, to that purpose, could not deliver him from Original sin, and that stimulus carnis, that provocation of the flesh, that Messenger of Satan, which rises out of that, God would give him sufficient grace, it should not work to his destruction, but yet he should have it: Nay, the infinite merit of Christ Jesus himself, that works so upon all actual and habitual sins, as that after that merit is applied to them, those sins are no sins, works not so upon Original sin, but that, though I be eased in the Dominion, and Imputation thereof, yet the same Original sin is in me still; and though God do deliver me from eternal death, due to mine actual and habitual sins, yet from the temporal death, due to Original sin, he delivers not his dearest Saints.

Thus sin is heavy in the seed, in the grain, in the akorn, how much more when it is a field of Corn, a barn of grain, a forest of Oaks, in the multiplication, and complication of sin in sin? And yet we consider the weight of sin another way too, for as Christ feels all the afflictions of his children, so his children will feel all the wounds that are inflicted upon him; even the sins of other men; as Lots righteous soul was grieved with sins of others. If others sin by my example & provocation, or by my connivence and permission, when I have authority, their sin lies heavier upon me, then upon themselves; for they have but the weight of their own sin; and I have mine, and theirs upon me; and though, I cannot have two souls to suffer, and though there cannot be two everlastingnesses in the torments of hell, yet I shall have two measures of those unmeasurable torments upon my soul. But if I have no interest in the sins of other men, by any occasion ministered by me, yet I cannot choose but feel a weight, a burden of a holy anguish, and compassion and indignation, because everyone of these sins inflict a new wound upon my Savior, when my Savior says to him, that does but injure me, Why persecutest thou me, and feels the blow upon himself, shall not I say to him that wounds my Savior, Why woundest thou me, and groan under the weight of my brothers sin, and my Fathers, my Makers, my Savior's wound? If a man of my blood, or alliance, do a shameful act, I am affected with it; If a man of my calling, or profession, do a scandalous act, I feel myself concerned in his fault; God hath made all mankind of one blood, and all Christians of one calling, and the sins of every man concern every man, both in that respect, that I, that is, This nature, is in that man that sins that sin; and I, that is, This nature, is in that Christ, who is wounded by that sin. The weight of sin, were it but Original sin, were it but the sins of other men, is an insupportable weight.

But if a sinner will take a true balance, and try the right weight of sin, let him go about to leave his sin, and then he shall see how close, and how heavily it stook to him. Then one sin will lay the weight of seelinesse, of falsehood, of inconstancy, of dishonor, of ill nature, if you go about to leave it: and another sin will lay the weight of poverty, of disestimation upon you, if you go about to leave it. One sin will lay your pleasures upon you, another your profit, another your Honor, another your Duty to wife and children, and weigh you down with these. Go but out of the water, go but about to leave a sin, and you will find the weight of it, and the hardness to cast it off. Gravatae sunt, Mine iniquities are heavy, (that was our first) and gravatae nimis, they are too heavy, which is a second circumstance.

Some weight, some balast is necessary to make a ship go steady; we are not without advantage, in having some sin; some concupiscence, some temptation is not too heavy for us. The greatest sins that ever were committed, were committed by them, who had no former sin, to push them on to that sin: The first Angels sin, and the sin of Adam are noted to be the most desperate and the most irrecoverable sins, and they were committed, when they had no former sin in them. The Angels punishment is pardoned in no part; Adams punishment is pardoned in no man, in this world. Now such sins as those, that is, sins that are never pardoned, no man commits now; not now, when he hath the weight of former sins to push him on. Though there be a heavy guiltiness in Original sin, yet I have an argument, a plea for mercy out of that, Lord, my strength is not the strength of stones, nor my flesh brass; Lord, no man can bring a clean thing out of uncleanness; Lord, no man can say after, I have cleansed my heart, I am free from sin, I could not be borne clean, I could not cleanse myself since. It magnifies God's glory, it amplifies man's happiness, that he is subject to temptation. If man had been made impeccable, that he could not have sinned, he had not been so happy; for then, he could only have enjoyed that state, in which he was created, and not have risen to any better; because that better estate, is a reward of our willing obedience to God, in such things, as we might have disobeyed him in. Therefore when the Apostle was in danger, of growing too light, lest he should be exalted out of measure, through the abundance of revelation, (says that Scripture) he had a weight hung upon him; There was something given him, therefore it was a benefit, a gift; And it was Angelus, an Angel, that was given him; But it was not a good Angel, a Tutelar, a Guardian Angel, to present good motions unto him, but it was Angelus Satane, a messenger of Satan, sent, as he says, to buffet him; and yet this hostile Angel, this messenger of Satan was a benefit, a gift, and a fore-runner, and some kind of Inducer of that Grace, which was sufficient for him; and it would not have appeared to us, no nor to himself, that he had had so much of that grace, if he had not had this temptation. God is as powerful upon us when he delivers us from temptation, that it do not overtake us; but not so apparent, so evident, so manifest, as when he delivers us in a temptation, that it do not overcome us: some weight does but ballast us, as some enemies never do us more harm, but occasion us, to arm and to stand upon our gard. Therefore, this weight that is complained of here, is not In carne, in our natural flesh; (though in that be no goodness) it is nothing that God from the beginning hath imprinted in our nature, not that peceability, and possibility of sinning; nor it is not in stimule carnis, in these accessory temptations, and provocations which awaken, and provoke the malignity of this flesh, and put a sting into it; we do not consider this heavy weight to be the natural possibility which was in man, before Original sin entered, nor to be that natural proneness to sin, which is original sin it self. But it is, when we ourselves whet that sting, when we labor to break hedges, and to steal wood, and gather up a stick out of one sin, and stick out of another, and to make a fagot to load us, in this life, and burn us in the next, in multiplying sins, and aggravating circumstances, so it is Heavy, so it is too heavy, It is too heavy for me, (for that's also another circumstance) for David himself, for any man even in David's state.

Though this consideration might be enlarged, and usefully carried into this expostulation, can sin be too heavy for me, any burden of sin sink me into a dejection of spirit, that am wrapped up in the Covenans, borne of Christian Parents, that am bred up in an Orthodox, in a Reformed Church, that can persuade myself sometimes, that I am of the number of the elect; Can any sin be too heavy for me, can I doubt of the execution of his first purpose upon me, or doubt of the efficacy of his ordinances here in the Church, what sin soever I commit, can any sins be too heavy for me? yet it is enough that in this Se • , God holds no man up by the chin so, but that if he sin in confidence of that sustentation, he shall sink. But in this personal respect in our text we consider only with what weights David weighed his sins, when he found here that they were too heavy for him. He weighed his sin with his punishment, and in his punishment he saw the anger, and indignation of God, and when we see sin through that spectacle, through an angry God, it appears great, and red, and fearful unto us; when David came to see himself in his infirmity, in his deformity, when his body could not hear the punishment here in this world, he considered how insupportable a weight the sin, and the anger of God upon that sin, would be in the world to come. For me that rise to preferment by my sin, for me that come to satisfy my carnal app • tites by my sin, my sin is not too heavy; But for me that suffer penury in the bottom of a plentiful state exhausted by my sin, for me that languish under diseases and putrefaction contracted by my sin, for me upon whom the hand of God lies heavy in any affliction for my sin, for me, my sins are too heavy. Till I come to hear that voice, Come unto me all you that labor, and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you, till I come to consider my sin in the mercy of God, and not only in his justice, in his punishments, my sins will be too heavy for me; for, though that be a good way, to consider the justice of God, yet it is not a good end; I must stop, but not stay at it, I must consider my sin in his justice, how powerful a God I have provoked; but I must pass through his justice to his mercy; his justice is my way, but his mercy is my ledging; for we cannot tell by the construction and origination of the words, whether Cain said, My sin is greater then can b • e pardoned, or, my punishment is greater then can be borne: But it needs not be disputed; for it is all one; He that considers only the anger of God in the punishment, will think his sin unpardonable, his sin will be see heavy for him. But as a fever is well spent, when the patient is fit to take physic, so if God give me physic, if I take his corrections as medicines, and not as punishments, then my disease is well spent, my danger is well overcome; If I have buried my sins in the wounds of my Savior, they cannot be too heavy for me, for they are not upon me at all; But if I take them out again, by relapsing into them, or imagine them to rise again, by a suspicion and jealousy in God, that he hath not forgiven them, because his hand lies still upon me, in some afflictions, so, in such a relapse, so, in such a jealous mis-interpretation of God's proceeding with me, my sins are too heavy for me; for me, because I do not sustain myself by those helps that God puts into my hands.

It is heavy, too heavy, too heavy for me, says David; if you consider the elect themselves, their election will not bear them out in their sins. But here we consider the insupportablenesse, in that, wherein the holy Ghost hath presented it, Quia onus, because it lies upon me, in the nature and quality of a Burden, Mine iniquities are as a burden, too heavy for me. When all this is packed up upon me, that I am first under a Calamity, a sickness, a scorn, an imprisonment, a penury, and then upon that calamity, there is laid the anger and indignation of God, and then upon that, the weight of mine own sins; this is too much to settle me, it is enough to sink me, it is a burden, in which the danger arises from the last addition, in that, which is last laid on: for, as the sceptique Philosopher pleases himself in that argumentation, that either a penny makes a man rich, or he can never be rich, for says he, if he be not rich yet, the addition of a penny more would make him rich: or if not that penny, yet another, or another, so that at last it is the addition of a penny that makes him rich; so without any such fallacious or facetious circumvention in our case, it is the last addition, that that we look on last, that makes our burden insupportable, when upon our calamity we see the anger of God piled up, and upon that, our sin, when I come to see my sin, in that glass, in that glass, not in a Savior bleeding for me, but in a Judge frowning upon me; when my sins are so far off from me, as that they are the last thing that I see; for, if I would look upon my sins, first, with a remorsefull, a tearful, a repentant eye, either I should see no anger, no calamity; or it would not seem strange to me, that God should be angry, nor strange, that I should suffer calamities, when God is angry; Therefore is sin heavy as a burden, because it is the last thing that I lay upon myself, and feel not that till a heavy load of calamity and anger be upon me before. But then, as when we come to be unloaded of a burden, that that was las • laid on, is first taken off, so when we come, by any means, though by the sense of a calamity, or of the anger of God, to a sense of our sin, before the calamity it self be taken off, the sin is forgiven. When the Prophet found David in this state, the first act that the Prophet came to was the Transtulit peccatum, God hath taken away thy sin, but the calamity was not yet taken away. The child begot in sin shall surely die, though the sin be pardoned. The fruit of the tree may be preserved and kept, after the tree it self is cut down and burnt; The fruit, and off spring of our sin, calamity, may continue upon us, after God hath removed the guiltiness of the sin from us. In the course of civility, our parents go out before us, in the course of Mortality, our parents die before us; In the course of God's mercy, it is so too; The sin that begot the calamity, is dead, and gone, the calamity, the child, and off spring of that sin, is alive and powerful upon us. But for the most part, as if I would lift an iron chain from the ground, if I take but the first link, and draw up that, the whole chain follows, so if by my repentance, I remove the uppermost weight of my load, my sin, all the rest, the declaration of the anger of God, and the calamities that I suffer, will follow my sin, and depart from me. But still our first care must be to take off the last weight, the last that comes to our sense, The sin.

You have met, I am sure, in old Apophtbegms, an answer of a Philosopher celebrated, that being asked, what was the heaviest thing in the world, answered, Senex Tyrannus, An old Tyran; For a Tyran, at first, dares not proceed so severely; but when he is established, and hath continued long, he prescribes in his injuries, and those injuries become Laws. As sin is a Tyran, so he is got over our head, in Dominie, as we shown you in the supergressaesunt, in our former part; As he is an, old Tyran, so he is the heaviest burden that can be imagined; An inveterate sin, is an inveterate sore, we may hold out with it, but hardly cure it; we may slumber it, but hardly kill it. Weigh sin in heaven; heaven could not bear it, in the Angels; They fell: In the waters; The Sea could not bear it in Jonah; He was cast in: In the earth; That could not bear it in Dathan, and Abiram; They were swallowed: And because all the inhabitants of the earth are sin it self, The earth it self shall reel to and fro, as a Drunkard, and shall be removed like a Cottage, and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fall and notrise again; There's the total, the final fall, proper to the wicked; they shall fall; so shall the godly; And fall every day; and fall seven times a day; but they shall rise again and stand in judgment; The wicked shall not do so; They shall rise, rise to judgment; and they shall stand, stand for judgment, stand to receive judgment; and then not fall, but be cast out, out of the presence of God, and cast down, down into an impossibility of rising, forever, forever, forever. There is a lively expressing of this deadly weight, this burden in the Prophet Zechariah. First, there was a certain vessel, a measure shown, and the Angel said, Hic est oculus, This is the sight, (says our first translation) This is the resemblance through all the earth, (says our second.) That is, to this measure, and to that that is figured in it, every man must look, this every man must take into his consideration; what is it? In this measure sat a woman whose name was Wickedness; At first, this woman, this wickedness, sat up in this vessel, she had not filled the measure, she was not laid securely in it, she was not prostrate, not groveling, but her nobler part, her head, was yet out of danger, she sat up in it. But before the Vision departs, she is plunged wholly into that measure; (into darkness, into blindness) and not for a time; for, then, there was a cover, (says the text) and agreat cover, and a great cover of Lead put upon that vessel; and so, a perpetual imprisonment, no hope to get out; and heavy fetters, no ease to be had within; Hard ground to tread upon, and heavy burdens to carry; first a cover, that is, an excuse; a great cover, that is, a defense, and a glory; at last, of Lead; all determines in Desperation. This is when the multiplicity and indifferency to lesser sins, and the habitual custom of some particular sin, meet in the aggravating of the burden: for then, they are heavier then the sand of the Sea, says the holy Ghost: where he expresses the greatest weight by the least thing; Nothing less then a grain of sand, nothing heavier then the sands of the Sea, nothing easier to resist then a first temptation, or a single sin in it self, nothing heavier, nor harder to devest, then sins complicated in one another, or then an old Tyran, and custom in any one sin. And therefore it was evermore a familiar phrase with the Prophets, when they were to declare the sins, or to denounce the punishments of those sins upon the people, to call it by this word, Onus visions, Onus Babylonis, Onus Ninives, O the burden of Babylon, the burden of Nineveh. And because some of those woes, those Judgments, those burdens, did not always fall upon that people presently, they came to mock the Prophets, and say to them, New, what is the burden of she Lord, What Burden have you to preach to us, and to talk of now • Say unto them, says God to the Prophet there; This is the Burden of the Lord, I will even forsake you. And, as it is elegantly, emphatically, vehemently added, Every man's word shall be his burden; That which he says, shall be that that shall be laid to his charge; His scorning, his idle questioning of the Prophet, What burden now, what plague, what famine, what war now? Is not all well for all your crying The burden of the Lord? Every man's word shall be his burden, the deriding of God's Ordinance, and of the denouncing of his Judgments in that Ordinance shall be their burden, that is, aggravate those Judgments upon them, Nay, there is a heavier weight then that, added; Ye shall say no more (says God to the Prophet) the burden of the Lord, that is, you shall not bestow so much care upon this people, as to tell them, that the Lord threatens them. God's presence in anger, and in punishments, is a heavy, but God's absence, and dereliction, a much heavier burden; As (if extremes will admit comparison) the everlasting loss of the fight of God in hell, is a greater torment, then any lakes of inextinguishable Brimstone, then any gnawing of the incessant worm, then any gnashing of teeth can present unto us.

Now, let no man ease himself upon that fallacy, sin cannot be, nor sin cannot induce such burdens as you talk of, for many men are come to wealth, and by that wealth, to honor, who, if they had admitted a tenderness in their consciences, and forborne some sins. had lost both; for, are they without burden, because they have wealth, and honor? In the Original language, the same word, that is here, a burden, Ch • bad, signifies honor, and wealth, as well as a burden. And therefore says the Prophet, Woe unto him that loadeth himself with thick clay. Non densantur nisi per laborem; There goes much pains to the laying of it thus thick upon us; The multiplying of riches is a laborious thing; and then it is a new pain to bleed out those riches for a new office, or a new title; Et tamen lutum, says that Father, when all is done, we are but roughcast with dirt; All those Riches, all those Honors are a Burden, upon the just man, they are bu • a multiplying of fears, that they shall lose them; upon the securest man, they are but a multiplying of duties & obligations; for the more they havet, he more they have to answer; and upon the unjust, they are a multiplying of everlasting torments. They possess months of vanity, and wearisome nights are appointed them. Men are as weary of the day, upon Carpets and Cushions, as at the plough. And the laborers weariness, is to a good end; but for these men, They weary themselves to commit iniquity. Some do, and some do not; All do. The labor of the foolish wearieth everyone of them; Why? Because he knows not how to go to the City. He that directs not his labors to the right end, the glory of God, he goes not to Jerusalem, the City of holy peace, but his sinful labors shall be a burden to him; and his Riches, and his Office, and his Honor he shall not be able to put off, then when he puts off his body in his death-bed; He shall not have that happiness, which he, till then, thought a misery, To carry nothing out of this world, for his Riches, his Office, his Honor shall follow him into the next world, and clog his soul there. But we proposed this consideration of this Metaphor, That sin is a burden, (as there is an infinite sweetness, and infinite latitude in every Metaphor, in every elegancy of the Scripture, and therefore I may have leave to be loath to depart from it) in some particular inconveniences, that a burden brings, and it is time to come to them.

SERMON XXIII.

Preached at Lincolns Inn.

A S a Torch that hath been lighted, and used before, is easier lighted then a new torch, so are the branches, and parts of this Text, the easier reduced to your memory, by having heard former distributions thereof. But as a Torch that hath been lighted & used before, will not last so long as a new one, so perchance your patience which hath already been twice exercised with the handling of these words, may be too near the bottom to afford much. And therefore much I have determined not to need. God did his greatest work upon the last day, and yet gave over work betimes. In that day he made man, and, (as the context leads us, most probably, to think) he made Paradise, and placed man in Paradise that day. For the variety of opinions amongst our Expositors, about the time when God made Paradise, arises from one error, an error in the Vulgat Edition, in the translation of the Roman Church, that reads it Plantaver at, God had planted a garden, as though God had done it before. Therefore some state it before the Creation, which Saint Jerome follows, or at least relates, without disapproving it; and others place it, upon the third day, when the whole earth received her accomplishment; but if any had looked over this place with the same ingenuity as their own great man Tyr: (an active man in the Council of Trent) hath done over the Book of Psalms, in which one Book he hath confessed 6000 places, in which their translation differs from the Original, they would have seen this difference in this place, that it is not Plantaver at, but Plantavit, not that God had before, but that he did then, then when he had made man, make a Paradise for man. And yet God made an end of all this days work betimes; in that day, He walked in the garden in the cool of the Evening. The noblest part of our work, in handling this Text falls upon the conclusion, reserved for this day; which is, the application of these words to Christ. But for that, I shall be short, and rather leave you to walk with God in the cool of the Evening, to meditate of the sufferings of Christ, when you are gone, then pretend to express them here. The Passion of Christ Jesus is rather an amazement, an astonishment, an ecstacy, a consternation, then an instruction. Therefore, though something we shall say of that anon. First, we pursue that which lies upon ourselves, the Burden, in those four mischievous inconveniences wrapped up in that Metaphor.

Of them, the first was, Inclinat; That a Burden sinks a man, declines him, crookens him, makes him stoop. So does sin. It is one of Saint Augustine's definitions of sin, Conversio ad creaturam, that it is a turning, a withdrawing of man to the creature. And every such turning to the creature, let it be upon his side, to her whom he loves, let it be upwards, to honor that he affects, yet it is still down-ward, in respect of him, whom he was made by, and should direct himself to. Every inordinate love of the Creature is a descent from the dignity of our Creation, and a disavowing', a disclaiming of that Charter, Subjicite & dominamini, subdue, and govern the Creature. Est quoddam bonum, quod si diligat anima rationals, peccat. There are good things in the world, which it is a sin for man to love, Quia infra illam ordinantur, because though they be good, they are not so good as man; And man may not decline, and everything, except God himself, is inferior to man, and so, it is a declination, a stooping in man, to apply himself to any Creature, till he meet that Creature in God; for there, it is above him; And so, as Beauty and Riches, and Honor are beams that issue from God, and glasses that represent God to us, and idea's that return us into him, in our glorifying of him, by these helps, so we may apply ourselves to them; for, in this consideration, as they assist us in our way to God, they are above us, otherwise, to love them for themselves, is a declination, a stooping under a burden; And this declination, this incurvation, this descent of man, in the inordinate love of the Creature, may very justly seem to be forbidden in that Commandment, that forbids Idolatry, Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor worship them; If we bow down to them, we do worship them; for it is in the love of all Creatures, as it is in money; Covetousness, that is, the love of money, is Idolatry, says the Apostle; and so is all other inordinate love of any, Idolatry. And then, as we have seen some grow crooked, by a long sitting, a lying in one posture, so, by an easy resting in these descents and declination of the soul, it comes to be a fashion to stoop, and it seems a comely thing to be crooked; and we become, infruniti, that is, quibus nem • frui velit, such as nobody cares for our conversation, or company, except we be ill company, sociable in other sins, Et viliores quo castiores, if we affect Chastity, or any other virtue, we disaffect and distaste other men; for one man's virtue chides, and reproaches a whole vicious company. But if he will needs be in fashion, C • m pervers • perverti, to grow crooked with the crooked, His iniquities shall take him, and he shall be holden with the cards of his sin; that is, in that posture that he puts himself, he shall be kept; kept all his life; and then, (as it follows there) He shall die without instruction; Die in a place, where he can have no Absolution, no Sacrament, or die, in a disposition, that he shall receive no benefit by them, though he receive them. He hath packed a burden upon himself, in habitual sin, he hath chosen to stoop under this burden, in an Idolatrous love of those sins, and nothing shall be able to erect him again, not Preaching, not Sacraments, no not judgments. And this is the first inconvenience, and mischief, implied in this Metaphor which the holy Ghost hath chosen, Mine iniquities are as a burden, Inclinant, they bend down my soul, created straight, to an incurvation, to a crookedness.

A second inconvenience intimated in this Metaphor, a burden, is the fatigat, a burden wearies us, tires us: and so does our sin, and our best beloved sin. It hath wearied us, and yet we cannot devest it. We would leave that sin, and yet there is one talent more to be added, one child more to be provided for, one office, or one title more to be compassed, one temptation more to be satisfied. Though we grumble, not out of remorse of conscience, but out of a bodily weariness of the sin, yet we proceed in it. How often men go to Westminster, how often to the Exchange, called by unjust suits, or called by corrupt bargains to those places, when their case, or their health persuades them to stay at home? How many go to forbidden beds, then when they had rather stay at home, if they were not afraid of an unkind interpretation? We have wearied ourselves in the ways of wickedness; Plus miles in uno torneamento, quam sanctus Monachus in decem annis, says our Holkot, upon that place, a soldier suffers more in one expedition, then a Monk does, in ten years, says he, and perchance he says true, and yet no commendation to his Monk neither; for that soldier may do even the cause of God, more good, in that one expedition, then that Monk in ten years: But it is true as Holkot intended it, (though perchance his example do not much strengthen it) vicious men are put to more pains, and to do more things against their own minds, then the Saints of God are in the ways of holiness. We have wearied ourselves in the ways of wickedness, says he, that is, in doing as other wicked men have done, in ways which have been beaten out to us, by the frequent practice of other men; but he adds more, We have gone the rough Deserts, where there lay no way; that is, through sins, in which, we had no example, no precedent, the inventions of our hearts. The covetous man lies still, and attends his quarter days, and studies the endorsements of his bonds, and he wonders that the ambitious man can endure the shuttings and thrustings of Courts, and can measure his happiness by the smile of a greater man: And, he that does so, wonders as much, that this covetous man can date his happiness by an Almanac, and such revolutions, and though he have quick returns of receipt, yet scarce affords himself bread to live till that day come, and though all his joy be in his bonds, yet demes himself a candles end to look upon them. Hilly ways are wearisome ways, and tire the ambitious man; Carnal pleasures are dirty ways, and tire the licentious man; Desires of gain, are thorny ways, and tire the covetous man; Aemulations of higher men, are dark and • linde ways, and tire the envious man, Every way, that is out of the way, wearies us; But, lass • it sumus; sed 〈◊〉 non datur requires, we labor, and have no rest, when we have done; we are wearied with our sins, and have no satisfaction in them; we go to bed to night, weary of our sinful labors, and we will rise freshly tomorrow, to the same sinful labors again; And when a sinner does so little remember yesterday, how little does he consider to morrow? He that forgets what he hath done, foresees not what he shall suffer: so sin is a burden, it crookens us, it wearies us; And those are the two first inconveniences.

And then a third is Retardat. Though a man can stand under a burden, that he do not sink, but be able to make some steps, yet his burden slackens his pace, and he goes not so fast, as without that burden he could have gone. So it is an habitual sins; though we do not sink into desperation, and stupefaction, though we do come to the participation of outward means, and have some sense, some feeling thereof, yet, as long as any one beloved and habitual sin hangs upon us, it slackens our pace in all the ways of godliness. And we come not to such an appropriation of the promises of the Gospel, in hearing Sermons, nor to such a re-incarnation, and invisceration of Christ and his merits into ourselves, in the Sacrament; as if we were altogether devested of that sin, and not only at that time, we should do. Quis ascendes, says David; who shall ascend unto the hill of the Lord? It is a painful clambering; up a hill. And Saint August. makes use of the answer, Innocens manibus, He that hath clean hands; first, he must have hands, as well as feet; He must do something for himself; And then, Innocent hands; such as do no harm to others, such as hold, and carry no hurtful thing to himself; Either he must have the first Innocence, Abstinence from ill getting, or the second Innocence, Restitution of that which was ill gotten, or he shall never get up that hill; for, it is a steep hill, and there is no walking up, but he must crawl, hand and foot. Therefore, says the Apostle, Deponamus pondus, Let us lay aside every weight; He does not say, sin in general, but every weight, every circumstance that may aggravate our sin, every conversation that may occasion our sin; And, (as he adds, particularly and emphatically) The sin, that does so easily beset us; Easily, because customarily, habitually; And then, says that Apostle, in that place, Let us run; when we have laid down the sin, that does so easily beset us, our beloved and habitual sin, and laid down every weight, every circumstance that aggravates that sin, then we may be able to run, to proceed with a holy cheerfulness and proficiency in the ways of sanctification; but till that we cannot, how due observers soever we be of all outward means; for, sin is a burden, in perverting us, in tyring us, in retarding us.

And last of all, it is a burden, quaetenus praecipitat, as it gives him ever new occasion of stumbling; He that hath not been accustomed to a sin, but exercised in resisting it, will find many temptations, but as a wash way that he can trot thorough, and go forward religiously in his Calling for all them;) for though there be coluber in via, A snake in every way, temptations in every calling, yet, In Christo omnia possumus, In Christ, we can do all things, and therefore, in him, we can bruise the Serpents head) and spurn a temptation out of his way. But he that hath been long under the custom of a sin, evermore meets with stones to stumble at, and bogges to plunge in. It is S. Chrys • stomes application; He that hath had fever, though he have cast it off, yet he walks weakly, and he hath an inclination to the beds side, or to a chair, at every turn that he makes about his chamber. So hath he to relapses, that hath been under the custom of an habitual sin, though he have discontinued the practice of that sin. And these be the inconveniences, the mischiefs, represented to us in this metaphor, A burden, Mine iniquities are as a burden too heavy for me, Because they sink me down, from the Creator to the creature; Because they tire and weary me, and yet I must bear them; Because when they do not absolutely tire me, yet they slacken my pace; and because, though I could lay off that burden, leave off that sin, for the present practice, yet the former habit hath so weakened me, that I always apt to stumble, and fall into relapses.

Thus have you the mischievous inconveniences of habitual sin laid open to you, in these two elegancies of the holy Ghost, supergressae, Mine iniquities are gone over my head, and the gravatae, As a burden they are too heavy for me. But as a good Emperor received that commendation, that no man went ever out of his presence discontented, so our gracious God never admits us to his presence in this his Ordinance, but with a purpose to dismiss us in heart, and in comfort; for, his Almoner, he that distributeth his mercies to Congregations, is the God of comfort, of all comfort, the holy Ghost himself. Nay, they whom he admits to his presence here, go not out of his presence, when they go from hence; He is with them, whilst they stay here, and he goes home with them, when they go home. Princes out of their Royal care call Parliaments, and graciously deliver themselves over to that Representative Body; God out of his Fatherly love calls Congregations, and does not only deliver himself over, in his ordinance, to that Representative Body, the whole Church there, but when every man is become a private man again, when the Congregation is dissolved, and every man restored to his own house, God, in his Spirit, is within the doors, within the bosoms of every man that received him here. Therefore we have reserved for the conclusion of all, the application of this Text to our blessed Savior; for so our most ancient Expositors direct our meditations, first, historically, and literally, upon David, and that we did at first; Then morally, and by just application to ourselves, and that we have most particularly insisted upon; And lastly, upon our Savior Christ Jesus himself; and that remains for our conclusion and consolation; for, even from him, groaning under our burden, we may hear these words, Mine iniquities are gone over my head, and, &c.

First then, that that lay upon Christ, was sin, properly sin. Nothing could estrange God from man, but sin; and even from this Son of man, though he were the Son of God too, was God far estranged; therefore God saw sin in him. Non novit peccatum, He knew no sin; not by any experimental knowledge, not by any perpetration; for, Non fecit peccatum, He did no sin, be committed no sin. What though? we have sin upon us, sin to condemnation, Original sin before we know sin, before we have committed any sin. They esteemed him stricken, and smitten of God; and they mistook not in that; He was stricken and smitten of God; It pleased the Lord to bruile him, and to put him to grief; And the Lord proceeds not thus, where he sees no sin. Therefore the Apostle carries it to a very high expression, God made him to be sin for our sakes; not only sinful, but sin itself. And as one cruel Emperor wished all mankind in one man, that he might have beheaded mankind at one blow, so God gathered the whole nature of sin into one Christ, that by one action, one passion, sin, all sin, the whole nature of sin might be overcome. It was sin that was upon Christ, else God could not have been angry with him, nor pleased with us.

It was sin, and his own sin; Mine iniquities, says Christ, in his Type, and figure, David; and in his body, the Church; and, (we may be bold to add) in his very person; Mine iniquities. Many Heretics denied his body, to be his Body, they said it was but an airy, an imaginary, an illusory Body; and denied his Soul to be his Soul, they said he had no human soul, but that his divine nature supplied that, and wrought all the operations of the soul. But we that have learnt Christ better, know, that he could not have redeemed man, by that way that was contracted between him and his Father, that is, by way of satisfaction, except he had taken the very body, and the very soul of man: And as verily as his human nature, his body and soul were his, his sins were his too. As my mortality, and my hunger, and thirst, and weariness, and all my natural infirmities are his, so my sins are his sins. And now when my sins are by him thus made his sins, no Hell-Devil, not Satan, no Earth-Devil, no Calumniator, can anymore make those sins my sins, then he can make his divinity, mine. As by the spirit of Adoption, I am made the child of God, the seed of God, the same Spirit with God, but yet I am not made God, so by Christ's taking my sins, I am made a servant of my God, a Beads-man of my God, a vassal, a Tributary debtor to God, but I am no sinner in the sight of God, no sinner so, as that man or the Devil can impute that sin unto me, then when my Savior hath made my sins his. As a Soldier would not part with his scars, Christ would not.

They were sins, that lay upon him, part with our sins; And his sins; and, as it follows in his Type, David, sins in a plurality, many sins. I know nothing in the world so manifold, so plural, so numerous, as my sins; And my Savior had all those. But if every other man have not so many sins, as I, he owes that to God's grace, and not to the Devils forbearance, for the Devil saw no such parts, nor no such power in me to advance or hinder his kingdom, no such birth, no such education, no such place in the State or Church, as that he should be gladder of me, then of other men. He ministers temptations to all; and all are overcome by his temptations; And all these sins, in all men, were upon Christ at once. All twice over; In the root, and in the fruit too; In the bullein, and in the coin too; In gross, and in retail; In Original, and in Actual sin. And, howsoever the sins of former ages, the sins of all men for 4000 years before, which were all upon him, when he was upon the Cross, might possibly be numbered, (as things that are past, may easilier fall within a possibility of such an imagination) yet all those sins, which were to come after, he himself could not number; for, he, as the Son of man, though he know how long the world hath lasted, knows not how long this sinful world shall last, and when the day of Judgment shall be; And all those future sins, were his sins before they were committed; They were his before they were theirs that do them. And lest this world should not afford him sins enow, he took upon him the sins of heaven it self; not their sins, who were fallen from heaven, and fallen into an absolute incapacity of reconciliation, but their sins, which remained in heaven; Those sins, which the Angels that stand, would fall into, if they had not received a confirmation, given them in contemplation of the death and merits of Christ, Christ took upon him, for all things, in Earth, and Heaven too, were reconciled to God by him: for, if there had been as many worlds, as there are men in this, (which is a large multiplication) or as many worlds, as there are sins in this, (which is an infinite multiplication) his merit had been sufficient to all.

They were sins, his sins, many sins, the sins of the world; and then, as in his Type, David, Supergressae, his sins, these sins were got above him. And not as David's, or ours, by an insensible growth, and swelling of a Tide in Course of time, but this inundation of all the sins of all places, and times, and persons, was upon him in an instant, in a minute; in such a point as admits, and requires a subtle, and a serious consideration; for it is eternity; which though it do infinitely exceed all time, yet is in this consideration, less then any part of time, that it is indivisible, eternity is so; and though it last forever, is all at once, eternity is so. And from this point, this timelesse time, time that is all time, time that is no time, from all eternity, all the sins of the world were gone over him.

And, in that consideration, supergressae caput, they were gone over his head. Let his head be his Divine nature, yet they were gone over his head: for, though there be nothing more voluntary, then the love of God to man, (for, he loves us, not only for his own sake, or for his own glories sake, but he loves us for his loves sake, he loves us, and loves his love of us, and had rather want some of his glory, then we should not have, nay, then he should not have so much love towards us) though this love of his be an act simply voluntary, yet in that act of expressing this love, in the sending a Savior, there was a kind of necessity contracted on Christ's part; such a contract had passed between him and his Father, that as himself says, there was an oportuit pati, a necessity that he should suffer all that he suffered, and so enter into glory, when he was come; so there was an oportuit venire a necessity, (a necessity induced by that contract) that he should come in that humiliation, and smother, and suppress the glory of the divine nature, under a cloud of human, of passable, of inglorious flesh.

So, be his divine nature this head, his sins, all our sins made his, were gone above his head; And over his head, all those ways, that we considered before, in ourselves; Sicut tectum, sicut fornix, as a roof, as an arch, that had separated between God, and him, in that he prayed, and was not heard; when in that Transeat Calix, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, the Cup was not only not taken out of his hands, but filled up again as fast, as he, in obedience to his Father, drank of it, more and worse miseries succeeding, and exceeding those which he had born before. They were above him in clamore, in that voice, in that clamour which was got up to heaven, and in possession of his Fathers ears, before his prayer came, Father, forgive them, for they are not forgiven that sin of crucifying the Lord of life, yet. They were above his head, tanquam aquae, as an inundation of waters, then when he sweet water and blood, in the Agony, when he, who had formerly passed his Israel thorough the Red Sea, as though that had not been love large enough, was now himself overflowed with a Red Sea of his own blood, for his Israel again. And they were over his head in Dominio, in a Lordship, in a Tyranny, then when those marks of sovereign honor, a robe, and a scepter, and a Crown of thorns were added to his other afflictions. And so is our first part of this Text, the supergressae sunt, the multiplicity of sin, appliable to Christ, as well as to his Type, to David, and to us, the members of his body.

And so is the last part, that which we handled today, too, the gravata sunt, the weight and insupportablenesse of sin. They were heavy, they weighed him down from his Fathers bosom, they made God Man. That one sin could make an Angel a Devil, is a strange consideration; but that all the sins of the world, could make God Man, is stranger. Yet sin was so heavy; Too heavy, says the Text. It did not only make God Man; in investing our nature by his birth, but it made him no Man, by devesting that body, by death; and, (but for the virtue, and benefit of a former Decree) submitting that body, to the corruption, and putrefaction of the grave; But this was the peculiar, the miraculous glory of Christ Jesus. He had sin, all our sin, and yet never felt worm of conscience; He lay dead in the grave, and yet never felt worm of corruption. Sin was heavy; It made God Man; Too heavy; It made Man no Man; Too heavy for him, even for him, who was God and Man together; for, even that person, so composed, had certain velleitates, (as we say in the School) certain motions arising sometimes in him, which required a veruntamen, a review, a re-consideration, Not my will, O Father, but thine be done; and such, as in us, who are pushed on by Original sin, and drawn on by sinful concupiscences in ourselves, would become sins, though in Christ they were far from it. Sin was heavy, even upon him, in all those inconveniences, which we noted in a burden; Incurvando, when he was bowed down, and gave his back to their scourges; Fatigando, when his soul was heavy unto death; Retardando, when they brought him to think it long, Viquid dereliquisti, Why hast thou forsaken me? And then, praecipitando, to make that haste to the Consummatum est, to the finishing of all, as to die before his fellows that were crucified with him, died; to bow down his head, and to give up his soul, before they extorted it from him.

Thus we burdned him; And thus he unburdned us; Et cum exonerat nos onerat, when he unburdens us, he burdens us even in that unburdening: Onerat beneficio, cum exonerat peccato. He hath taken off the obligation of sin, but he hath laid upon us, the obligation of thankfulness, and Retribution. Quid retribuam? What shall I render to the Lord, for all his benefits to me? is vox onerati, a voice that groans under the burden, though not of sin, yet of debt, to that Savior, that hath taken away that sin. Exi à me Domine, that which Saint Peter said to Christ, Lord depart from me, for I am a sinful man, is, says that Father, vox onerati, the voice of one oppressed with the blessings and benefits of God, and desirous to spare, and to husband that treasure of God's benefits, as though he were better able to stand without the support of some of those benefits, then stand under the debt, which so many, so great benefits laid upon him: Truly he that considers seriously, what his sins have put the Son of God to, cannot but say, Lord lay some of my sins upon me, rather then thy Son should bear all this; that devotion, that says after, Spare thy people, whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood, would say before, spare that Son, that must die, spare that precious blood, that must be shed to redeem us. And rather then Christ should truly, really bear the torments of hell, in his soul, (which torments cannot be severed from obduration, nor from everlastingness) I would, I should desire, that my sins might return to me, and those punishments for those sins; I should be ashamed to be so far exceeded in zeal, by Moses, who would have been blotted out of the book of life, or by Paul, who would have been separated from Christ for his brethren, as that I would not undertake as much, to redeem my redeemer, and suffer the torments of Hell myself, rather then he should; But it is an insupportable burden of debt, that he hath laid upon me, by suffering that which he suffered, without the torments of Hell. Those words, Vis sanus fieri, hast thou a desire to be well, and a faith that I can make thee well? are vox ex • nerantis, the words of him that would take off our burden; But then, the Tolle grabatum & ambula, Take up thy bed and walk, this is vox oncrantis, the voice of Christ, as he lays a new burden upon us; ut quod prius suave, jam onerosum sit, that bed which he had ease in before, must now be born with pain; that sin which was forgotten with pleasure, must now be remembered with Contrition Christ speaks not of a vacuity, nor of a levity; when he takes off one burden, he lays on another; nay, two for one. He takes off the burden, of Irremediablenesse, of irrecoverablenesse, and he reaches out his hand, in his Ordinances, in his Word and Sacraments, by which we may be disburdened of all our sins; but then he lays upon us, Onus resipiscentiae, the burden of Repentance for ourselves, and Onus gratitudinis, the burden of retribution, and thankfulness to him, in them who are his, by our relieving of them, in whom he suffers. The end of all, (that we may end all in endless comfort) is, That our word, in the original, in which the holy Ghost spoake, is Iikkebedu, which is not altogether, as we read them, graves sunt, but graves fieri; not that they are, but that they were as a burden, too heavy for me; till I could lay hold upon a Savior to sustain me, they were too heavy for me: And by him, I can run through a troop (through the multiplicity of my sins,) and by my God I can leap over a wall; Though mine iniquities be got over my head, as a wall of separation, yet in Christo omnia possum, In Christ I can do all things; Mine iniquities are got over my head; but my head is Christ; and in him, I can do whatsoever he hath done, by applying his sufferings to my soul for all; my sins are his, and all his merit is mine: And all my sins shall no more hinder my ascending into heaven, nor my sitting at the right hand of God, in mine own person, then they hindered him, who bore them all in his person, mine only Lord and Savior Christ Jesus, blessed for ever.

SERMON XXIV.

Preached at White-Hall.

T Hose four Prophets, whom the Church hath called the great Prophets, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, are not only therefore called great, because they writ more, then the lesser Prophets did, (for Zecbary, who is amongst the lesser, writ more then Daniel who is amongst the greater) but because their Prophecies are of a larger comprehension, and extent, and, for the most part, speak more of the coming of Christ, and the establishing of the Christian Church, then the lesser Prophets do, who were more conversant about the temporal deliverance of Israel from Babylon, though there be aspersions of Christ, and his future government in those Prophets too, though more thinly shed. Amongst the four great ones, our Prophet Ezekiel is the greatest. I compare not their extraction and race; for, though Ezekiel were de genere sacerdotali, of the Levitical and Priestly race; (And, as Philo Iud • us notes, all nations having some marks of Gentry, some calling that ennobled the professors thereof, (in some Arms, and Merchandize in some, and the Arts in others) amongst the Jews, that was Priesthood, Priesthood was Gentry) though Ezekiel were of this race, Isaiah was of a higher, for he was of the extraction of their Kings, of the blood royal. But the extraordinary greatness of Ezekiel, is in his extraordinary depth, and mysteriousnesse, for this is one of those parts of Scripture, (as the beginning of Genesis, and the Canticles of Solomon, also are) which are forbid to be read amongst the Jews, till they come to be thirty years old, which was the Canonical age to be made Priests; In so much, that Saint Gregory says, when he comes to expound any part of this Prophet, Noctunum iter ago, that he travelled by night, and did but guess at his way. But, besides that many of the obscure places of the Prophets are more open to us, then they were to the ancients, because many of those prophecies are now fulfilled, and so that which was Prophecy to them, is History to us, in this place, which we have now undertaken, there never was darkness, not difficulty, neither in the first emanation of the light thereof, nor in the reflection; neither in the Literall, nor in the Figurative sense thereof; for the literal sense is plainly that, that amongst the manifold oppressions, under which the Children of Israel languished in Babylon, this was the heaviest, that their own Priests joined with the State against them, and infused pestilent doctrines into them, that so themselves might enjoy the favor of the State, and the people committed to their charge, might slacken their obedience to God, and surrender themselves to all commandments of all men; This was their oppression, the Church joined with the Court, to oppress them; Their own Priests gave these sheep grass which they had trodden with their feet, (doctrines, not as God gave them to them, but as they had tampered, and tempered them, and accommodated them to serve turns, and fit their ends; whose servants they had made themselves, more then God's) And they gave them water to drink which they had troubled with their feet, that is, doctrines mudded with other ends then the glory of God; And that therefore God would take his sheep into his own care, and reduce them from that double oppression of that Court, and that Church, those Tyrannous officers, and those over-obsequious Priests. This is the literal sense of our text, and context, evident enough in the letter thereof. And then the figurative and Mystical sense is of the same oppressions, and the same deliverance over again in the times of Christ, and of the Christian Church; for that's more then figurative, fully literal, soon after the Text, I will set up one shepherd, my servant David, And I will raise up for them a plant of renoune, which is the same that Isaiah had called A rod out of the stem of Jesse, and Jeremiah had called A righteous br • nch, a King thus should reign, and prosper. This prophecy then comprehending the kingdom of Christ, it comprehends the whole kingdom of Christ, not only the oppressions, and deliverances of our forefathers, from the Heathen, and the Heretics in the Primitive Church, but that also which touches us more nearly, the oppressions and deliverance of our Fathers, in the Reformation of Religion, and the shaking off of the yoke of Rome, that Italian Babylon, as heavy as the Chaldee • an. We shall therefore at this time fix our meditations upon that accommodation of the Text, the oppression that the Israel of God was under, then, when he delivered them by that way, the Reformation of Religion, and consider how these metaphors of the holy Ghost, The treading with their feet the grass that the sheep were to eae, and the troubling with their feet the water that the sheep were to drink, do answer and set out the oppressions of the Roman Church then, as lively as they did in the other Babylon. And so, having said enough of the primary sense of these words, as they concern God's Israel, in the first Babylon, and something by way of commemoration, and thankfulness, for God's deliverance of his Israel, from the persecutions in the Primitive Church, insist we now, upon the several metaphors of the Text, as the holy Ghost continues them to the whole reign of Christ, and so to the Reformation.

First, the greatest calamity of those sheep in Babylon, was that their own shepherds concurred to their oppression. In Babylon they were a part, but in Rome they were all; In Babylon they joined with the State, but in Rome they were the State. Saint Jerome notes out of a Tradition of the Jews, that those loafes which their priests were to offer to the Lord, were to be of such corn as those Priests had sowed, and reaped and threshed, and ground, and baked all with their own hands. But they were so far from that at Babylon, and at Rome, as that they ploughed iniquity, and sowed wickedness, and reaped the same; and (as God himself complains) trod his portion underfoot; That is, first, neglected his people, (for God's people are his portion ) And then whatsoever pious men had given to the Church, is his portion too, and that portion they had trodden under foot; not neglected it, not despised it, for they collected it, and audited it providently enough, but they trod it underfoot, when that which was given for the sustentation of the Priest, they turned upon their own splendor, and glory, and surfeit: Christ will be fed in the poor that are hungry, and he will be clothed in the poor that are naked, so he would be enriched in those poor Ministers that serve at his Altar; when Christ would be so fed, he desires not feasts and banquets; when he would be so clothed, he desires not soft raiment fit for Kings houses, nor embroyderies, nor perfumes; when he would be enriched in the poor Church-man, he desires not that he should be a spunge, to drink up the sweat of others, and live idly; but yet, as he would not be starved in the hungry, nor submitted to cold and unwholesome air in the naked, so neither would he be made contemptible, nor beggarly in the Minister of his Church. Nor, was there in the world, (take in Turkey, and all the heathen) (for they also have their Clergy) a more contemptible & more beggarly Clergy then that of Rome; I speak of the Clergy in the most proper sense, that is, they that minister, they that officiate, they that execute, they that personally & laboriously do the service of the Church. The prelacies, and Dignities of the Church, were multiplied in the hands of them, who under pretext of Government, took their ease, and they that labored, were attenuated & macerated, with lean, & penurious pensions. In the best governed Churches there are such Dignities, & supplies without Cure of souls, or personal service; but they are intended for recompense of former labors, and sustentation of their age, of whose youth, and stronger days, the Church had received benefit. But in the Roman Church these preferments are given almost in the womb; and children have them not only before they can merit them, but before they can speak for them; and they have some Church-names, Dean, or Bishop, or Abbot, as soon almost as they have any Christian names. Yea, we know many Church dignities, entailed to noble families, and, if it fall void, whilst the child is so incapable, it must be held for him, by some that must resign it, when it may, by any extent of dispensation, be asked for him. So then the Church joined with the State, to defraud the people; The Priest was poorly maintained, and so the people poorly instructed. And this is the first conformity between the two Babylon's, the Chaldean and the Italian.

Pursue we then the holy Ghosts purpose and manner of implying, and expressing it the food ordained for sheep, Grass. In which make we only these two stops, that the sheep are to eat their grass super terram, upon the ground; And they are to eat it sinerore, when the dew is off. First, upon the ground; that is, where the hand of God hath set it; which for spiritual food is the Church. In hard winters we give sheep hay, but in open times open grass. In persecutions of Tyrans, in Interdicts of Antichristian Bishops, who sometimes out of passion, or some secular respect shut up Church doors and forbid service, and Sacraments, to whole Cities, to whole nations, sheep must live by hay, God's Children must relieve themselves at home, by books of pious and devout meditation; But when God affords abundant pastures, and free entrance thereunto, God's sheep are to take their grass upon the ground, God's grace at the Church. Impossible est eum corrigere, qui omnia scit, Chrysost: It is an impossible thing to correct him, that thinks he knows all things already. As long as he will admit counsel from another, he acknowledges the other, to know more then he; but if he thinks, he knows all before, he hath no room for farther instruction, nor love to the place where it is to be had. We read in the Eastern Histories, of a navigable River, that afforded all the inhabitants exportation, and importation, and all commerce. But when every particular man, to serve his own curiosity, for the offices of his house, for the pleasures of his gardens, and for the sumptuousness of Grots and aqueducts, and such waterworks, drew several channells, infinite channells our of this great River, this exhausted the main channel, and brought it to such a shallowness, as would bear no boats, and so, took from them the great and common commodities that it had afforded them. So if every man think to provide himself Divinity enough at home, for himself and his family, and out of laziness and singularity, or state, or disaffection to the preacher leave the Church unfrequented, he frustrates the Ordinance of God, which is, that his sheep should come to his pastures, and take his grass upon his ground, his instructions at his house at Church. And this we could not do in the Roman Church, where all our prayers, and all God's service of that kind, were in a language, not only not understood by him that heard it, but for the most part, not by him that spoke it, It is not of their manifold, and scornful, and ridiculous and histrionical Ceremonies in their service, nor of the dangerous poisons, the direct Idolatries (in the practice of the people) in their service, that we complain of now, but of this, that though it had been never so wholesome grass, it was not so to those sheep, they could not know it to be their proper aliment, for certainly they ask without faith, that ask without understanding; nor can I believe or hope that God will give me that I ask, if I know not what I asked. And what a miserable supply had they for this in their Legends; for many of those Legends were in vulgar tongues and understood by them. In which Legends, the Virgin Mary was every good man's wife, and every good woman's mid-wife, by a neighborly, and familiar, and ordinary assistant in all household offices, as we see in those Legends, and revelations. In which Legends, they did not only fain actions, which those persons never did, but they feigned persons which never were; and they did not only mis-canonize men, made Devils Saints, but they mis-christened men, put names to persons, and persons to names that never were. And these legends being transferred into the Church, the sheep lack their grass upon the ground, that is, the knowledge of God's will, in his house, at Church. And this is another conformity between the two Babylon's, the Chaldean, and the Italian Babylon, that the sheep lacked due food in the due place.

So is it also, that the sheep eat their grass, whilst the Dew was upon it, which is found by experience to be unwholesome. The word of God is our grass, which should be delivered purely, simply, sincerely, and in the natural verdure thereof. The Dews which we intend, are Revelations, Apparitions, Inspirations, Motions, and Interpretations of the private spirit. Now, though we may see the natural dew to descend from heaven, yet it did first ascend from the earth, and retains still some such earthly parts, as sheep cannot digest. So howsoever these Revelations and Inspirations seem to fall upon us from heaven, they arise from the earth, from ourselves, from our own melancholy, and pride, or our too much homeliness and familiarity in our accesses, and conversation with God, or a facility in believing, or an often dreaming the same thing. And with these Dews of Apparitions and Revelations, did the Roman Church make our fathers drunk and giddy; And against these does S. Augustine devoutly pray, and praise God, that he had delivered him from the curiosity of sipping these dews, of hearkening after these apparitions and revelations. But so ordinary were these apparitions then, as that any son, or nephew, or friend, could discern his fathers, or uncles, or companions soul, ascending out of Purgatory into heaven, and know them as distinctly, as if they kept the same hair, and beard, and bodily lineaments, as they had upon earth. And as a ship which hath struck Sail, will yet go on with the wind it had before, for a while, so now, when themselves are come to acknowledge, That it was the unanime opinion of the Fathers, that the souls of the dead did not appear after death, but that it was still the Devil, howsoever sometimes that that he proposed were holy & religious, yet we see a great Author of theirs attribute so much to these apparitions, and revelations, that when he pretends to prove all controversies by the Fathers of the Church, he everywhere intermingles that reverend Book, of Brigids Revelations, that they might also have some Mothers of the Church too; which is not disproportionall in that Church; if they have had a woman Pope, to have Mothers of the Church too. I speak not this, as though God might not, or did not manifest his will by women; The great mystery of the Resurrection of Christ was revealed to women before men; and to the sinfullest woman of company, first. But I speak of that bold injury done to the mysteries of the Christian Religion, by pouring out that dew upon the grass, the Revelations of S. Brigid, upon the controversies of Religion. A book of so much blasphemy, and impertinency, and incredibility, that if a Heathen were to be converted, he would sooner be brought to believe Ovid's Metamorphoses, then Brigids Revelations, to conduce to Religion. And this is also another conformity between the two Babylon's, the Chaldean, and the Italian Babylon, that we could not receive our grass pure, but infected, and dewed with these frivolous, nay pernicious apparitions, and Revelations.

But press we a little closer to the very steps, & metaphor of the holy Ghost, who here lays the corrupting of the sheep's grass in this, That the shepherds had trodden it down. And this treading down will be pertinently considered two ways. Tertullian in his Book De habitu muliebri, notes two excesses in women's dressing; One he calls Ornatum, the other cultum; One mundum muliebrem, the other, (according to the liberty that he takes in making words) Immundum muliebrem; the first is a superfluous diligence in their dressing, but the other an unnatural addition to their complexion; the first he pronounces to be always ad ambitionem, for pride, but the other, ad prostitutionem, for a worse, for the worst purpose. These two sorts of Excesses do note these two kinds of treading down the grass, which we intend; of which one is, the mingling of too much human ornament, and secular learning in preaching, in presenting the word of God, which word is our grass; The other is of mingling human Traditions, as of things of equal value, and obligation, with the Commandments of God. For the first, human ornament, if in those pastures, which are ordained for sheep, you either plant rare and curious flowers, delightful only to the eye, or fragrant and odoriferous herbs delightful only to the smell, nay, be they medicinal herbs, useful, and behooveful for the preservation, and restitution of the health of man, yet if these specious and glorious flowers, and fragrant, and medicinal herbs, be not proper nourishment for sheep, this is a treading down of the grass, a pestering and a suppressing of that which appertained to them. So if in your spiritual food, our preaching of the Word, you exact of us more secular ornament, then may serve, as Saint Augustine says, Ad ancillationem, to convey, and usher the true word of life into your understandings, and affections, (for both those must necessarily be wrought upon) more then may serve ad vehiculum, for a chariot for the word of God to enter, and triumph in you, this is a treading down of the grass, a filling of that ground which was ordained for sheep, with things improper, and impertinent to them. If you furnish a Gallery with stuff proper for a Gallery, with Hangings and Chairs, and Couches, and Pictures, it gives you all the conveniencies of a Gallery, walks and prospect, and ease; but if you pester it with improper and impertinent furniture, with Beds, and Tables, you lose the use, and the name of a Gallery, and you have made it a Wardrobe; so if your curiosity extort more then convenient ornament, in delivery of the word of God, you may have a good Oration, a good Panegyrique, a good Encomiastique, but not so good a Sermon. It is true that Saint Paul applies sentences of secular Authors, even in matters of greatest importance; but then it is to persons that were accustomed to those authors, and affected with them, and not conversant, not acquainted at all, with the phrase and language of Scripture amongst us now, almost every man (God be blessed for it) is so accustomed to the text of Scripture, as that he is more affected with the name of David, or Saint Paul, then with any Seneca or Plutarch. I am far from forbidding secular ornament in divine exercises, especially in some Auditories, acquainted with such learnings. I have heard men preach against witty preaching; and do it with as much wit, as they have; and against learned preaching, with as much learning, as they could compass. If you should place that beast, which makes the Bezoar stone, in a pasture of pure, but only grass, it is likely, that out of his natural faculty, he would petrifie the juice of that grass, and make it a stone, but not such a medicinal stone, as he makes out of those herbs which he feeds upon. Let all things concur in the name of God, to the advancing of his purpose, in his ordinance, which is, to make his will acceptable to you, by his word; only avoid excess in the manner of doing it. Saint Augustine's is an excellent rule, when after in his book De Doctrina Christiana, he had taught a use of all Arts in Divinity, he allows them only thus far, ut cum ingenia his reddantur exercitatiora, cavendum ne reddantur maligniora, that when a man by these helps is the more full, and the more ready & the more able for Church service, he be not also thereby made the more bold and the more confident; Nec ament decipere verisimili sermon, lest because he is able to make anything seem probable and likely to the people, by his eloquence, he come to infuse paradoxicall opinions, or schismatical, or (which may be believed either way) problematicall opinions, for certain and constant truths, and so be the less conversant, and the less diligent in advancing plain, and simple, and fundamental doctrines and catechisticall, which are truly necessary to salvation, as though such plain, and ordinary, and catechisticall doctrines were not worthy of his gifts and his great parts. In a word, in sheep-pastures you may plant fruit trees in the hedge-rouse; but if you plant them all over, it is an Orchard; we may transfer flowers of secular learning, into these exercises; but if they consist of those, they are but Themes, and Essays. But why insist we upon this? Was there any such conformity between the two Babylon's as that the Italian Babylon can be said to have trodden down the grass in that kind, with overcharging their Sermons with too much learning. Truly it was far, very very far from it; for when they had prevailed in that Axiom, and Aphorism of theirs, that it was best to keep the people in ignorance, they might justly keep the Priest in ignorance too; for when the people needed no learned instruction, what needed the Church a learned instructer? And therefore I laid hold of this consideration, the treading down of grass, by oppressing it with secular learning, there by to bring to your remembrance, the extreme ignorance that damp'd the Roman Church, at that time; where Aristotle's Metaphysics were condemned for Heresy, and ignorance in general made not only pardonable, but meritorious. Of which times, if at any time, you read the Sermons, which were then preached, and after published, you will excuse them of this treading down the grass, by oppressing their auditories with over-much learning, for they are such Sermons as will not suffer us to pity them, but we must necessarily scorn, and contemn, and deride them; Sermons, at which the gravest, and saddest man could not choose but laugh; not at the Sermon, God forbid; nor at the plainness, and homeliness of it; God forbid; but at the Soloecismes, the barbarismes, the servilities, the stupid ignorance of those things which fall within the knowledge of boys of the first form in every School. This was their treading down of grass, not with over-much learning, but with a cloud, a damp, an earth of ignorance. After an Ox that oppresseth the grass, after a Horse that devours the grass, sheep will feed; but after a Goose that stanches the grass, they will not; no more can God's sheep receive nourishment from him that puts a scorn upon his function, by his ignorance.

But in the other way of treading down grass, (that is, the word of God) by the Additions and Traditions of men, the Italian Babylon Rome abounded, superabounded, overflowed, surrounded all. And this is much more dangerous then the other; for this mingling of human additions, and traditions, upon equal necessity, and equal obligation as the word of God it self, is a kneading, an incorporating of grass and earth together, so, as that it is impossible for the weak sheep, to avoid eating the meat of the Serpent, Dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. Now man upon his transgression, was not accursed, nor woman; The sheep were not accursed; But the earth was, and the Serpent was; and now this kneading, this incorporating of earth with grass, traditions with the word, makes the sheep to eat the cursed meat of the cursed Serpent, Dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.

Now, in this treading down this grass, this way, this suppressing it by traditions, be pleased to consider these two applications; some traditions do destroy the word of God, extirpate it, annihilate it, as when a Hog doth root up the grass; In which case, not only that turfe withers, and is presently useless, and unprofitable to the sheep, but if you dig never so low after, down to the Center of the earth, it is impossible ever to find anymore grass under it: so some traditions do utterly oppose the word of God, without having under them, any mysterious signification, or any occasion or provocation of our devotion, which is the ordinary pretext of traditions, and Ceremonial additions in their Church. And of this sort was that amongst the Jews, of which our blessed Savior reproaches them, that whereas by the law, children were to relieve decayed parents, they had brought in a tradition, of Commutation, of Compensation, that if those children gave a gift to the Priest, or compounded with the Priest, they were discharged of the former obligation. And of this sort are many traditions in the Roman Church; where, not only the doctrines of men but the doctrine of Devils, (as the Apostle calls the forbidding of Marriage, and of meats) did not only tread down, but root up the true grass.

The other sort of Traditions, and Ceremonies, do not as the Hog, root up the grass, but as a Mole, cast a slack, and thin earth upon the face of the grass. Now, if the shepherd, or husbandman be present to scatter this earth again, the sheep receive no great harm, but may safely feed upon the wholesome grass, that is under; but if the sheep, who are not able to scatter this earth, nor to find the grass that lies under, be left to their own weakness, they may as easily starve in this case, as in the other; the Mole may damnify them as much as the Hog. And of this sort, are those traditions, which induce Ceremonies into the Church, in vestures, in postures of the body, in particular things, and words, and actions, in Baptism or Marriage, or any other thing to be transacted in the Church. These ceremonies are not the institutions of God immediately, but they are a kind of light earth, that hath under it good and useful significations, which when they be understood conduce much to the increase and advancement of our devotion, and of the glory of God. And this is the iniquity that we complain of in the Roman Church, that when we accuse them of multiplying impertinent, and insupportable ceremonies, they tell us, of some mysterious and pious signification, in the institution thereof at first; They tell us this, and it is sometimes true; But neither in Preaching nor practice, do they scatter this earth to their own sheep, or show them the grass that lies under, but suffer the people, to inhere, and arrest their thoughts, upon the ceremony it self, or that to which that ceremony mis-leads them; as in particular, (for the time will not admit many examples) when they kneel at the Sacrament, they are not told, that they kneel because they are then in the act of receiving an inestimable benefit at the hands of God, (which was the first reason of kneeling then) And because the Priest is then in the act of prayer in their behalf, that that may preserve them, in body and soul, unto eternal life. But they are suffered to go one, in kneeling in adoration of that bread, which they take to be God. We deny not that there are Traditions, nor that there must be ceremonies, but that matters of faith should depend of these, or be made of these, that we deny; and that they should be made equal to Scriptures; for with that especially doth Tertullian reproach the Heretics, that being pressed with Scriptures, they fled to Traditions, as things equal or superior to the word of God. I am loath to depart from Tertullian, both because he is everywhere a Pathetical expresser of himself, and in this point above himself. Nobis curiositate opus non est, post Iesum Christum, nec Inquisitione, post Evangelium. Have we seen that face of Christ Jesus here upon earth, which Angels desired to see, and would we see a better face? Traditions perfecter then the word? Have we read the four Evangelists, and would we have a better Library? Traditions fuller then the word? Cum credimus • nihil desideramus ultra credere; when I believe God in Christ, dead, and risen again according to the Scriptures, I have nothing else to believe; Hoc enim prius credimus, non esse quod ultra credere debeamus; This is the first Article of my Faith, that I am bound to believe nothing but articles of faith in an equal necessity to them. Will we be content to be well, and thank God, when we are well? Hilary tells us, when we are well; Bene habet quod iis, quae scripta sunt, contentus sis; then thou art well, when thou satisfiest thyself with those things, which God hath vouchsafed to manifest in the Scriptures. Si aliquis aliis verbis, quàm quibus à Deo dictum est, demonstrare velit, if any man will speak a new language, otherwise then God hath spoken, and present new Scriptures, (as he does that makes traditions equal to them) Aut ipse non intelligit, aut legentibus non intelligendum relinquit, either he understands not himself, or I may very well be content not to understand him, if I understand God without him. The Fathers abound in this opposing of Traditions, when out of those traditions, our adversaries argue an insufficiency in the Scriptures. Solus Christus audiendus, says Saint Cyprian, we hearken to none but Christ; nec debemus attendere quid aliquis ante nos faciendum putarit, neither are we to consider what any man before us thought fit to be done, sed quid qui ante emnes est, fecerit; but what he, who is before all them, did; Christ Jesus and his Apostles, who were not only the primitive but the pre-primitive Church, did and appointed to be done. In this treading down of our grass then in the Roman Church, first by their supine Ignorance, and barbarism, and then by traditions, of which, some are pestilently iufectious and destroy good words, some cover it so, as that not being declared to the people in their signification, they are useless to them, no Babylon could exceed the Italian Babylon, Rome, in treading down their grass.

Their oppression was as great in the other, In troubling their water, My sheep drink that which you have troubled. When the Lord is our shepherd, he leadeth us ad aquas quietudinum, to the waters of rest, of quietness; of these, in the plural, quietudinum, quietness of body, and quietness of Conscience too. The endowments of heaven are Joy, and Glory; joy, and glory are the two Elements, the two Hemispheres of Heaven; And of this Joy, and this Glory of heaven, we have the best earnest that this world can give, if we have rest; satisfaction and acquiescence in our religion, for our belief, and for our life and actions, peace of Conscience. And where the Lord is our shepherd he leads us, and ad aquas quietudinum, to the waters of rest, multiplied rest; all kind of rest. But the shepherds, in our text, troubled the waters; and more then so; for we have just cause to note the double signification of this word, which we translate Trouble, and to transfer the two significations to the two Sacraments, as they are exhibited in the Roman Babylon; The word is Mirpas; and it denotes not only Conturbationem, a troubling, a mudding, but Obturationem too, an interception, a stopping, as the Septuagint translates it, Prov. 35. and in these two significations of the word, a troubling, and a stopping of the waters, hath the Roman Church exercised her tyranny, and her malignity, in the two Sacraments. For, in the Sacrament of Baptism, they had troubled the water, with additions of Oile, and salt, and spittle, and exorcisms; But in the other Sacrament of they came Ad obturationem, to a stopping, to an intercision, to an interruption of the water, the water of life, Aquae quietudinum, the water of rest to our souls, and peace to our consciences, in withholding the Cup of salvation, the blood of Christ Jesus from us. So that if thou come to David's holy expostulation, Quid retribuam, what shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits towards me; And pursue it to David's holy resolution, Accipiam Calicem, I will take the Cup of salvation, you shall be told, Sir you must take Orders first, or you cannot take that Cup. But water is as common as Air; And as that Element Air, in our spiritual food, that is preaching, (which is Spiritus Domini, the breath of God) is common to all, I • e, predicate omni Creaturae, go preach the Gospel to every Creature, so is this water of life in the Sacrament, common to all, Bibite ex eo omnes, Drink ye all of this; and thereby do the names of Communion, and participation accrue to it, because all have an interest in it. This is that blood, of which Saint Chrysostom says, Hic sanguis facit, ut Imago Dei in nobis floreat; That we have the Image of God in our souls, we have by the benefit of the same nature, by which we have our souls; There cannot be a human soul without the Image of God in it. But, ut floreat, that this Image appear to us, and be continually refreshed in us, ut non Languescat animae nobilitas, that this holy nobleness of the soul do not languish not degenerate in us, we have by the benefit of this blood of Christ Jesus the seal of our absolution in that blessed and glorious Sacrament; And that blood they deny us. This is that blood of which they can make as much as they will, with a thought, with an intention; so, as they pretend a power, of changing a whole vintage at once, all the wine of all the nations in the world, into the blood of Christ, if the Priest have an intention to do so, in the time of his Consecration; And yet, as easily as they come by it, they will givesus none. They have told us, that we had it per Concomitantiam, by a necessary concomitancy; That because we had the body in the bread, and that body could not be without the blood, that therefore we had the blood also. But if the bread alone be enough, if the Cup be impertinent, why did Christ give it? If we have no loss in their detaining it from us, what gain have they in retaining it to themselves, let all have it, or none? It is true that they can perform all the ill, that they would do, by the bread alone. They can work the spiritual ill, of inducing adoration to a Creature, by the bread alone; And they could work the temporal ill, of poisoning an Emperor in the Sacrament, by the bread alone. They can come to all their purposes, to all their ill, by the bread alone, but we have not all our good, because we have not Christ's entire Institution. And so in this troubling, and in this stopping of these waters, in these confusions, we challenge any Babylon, in the behalf of this Italian Babylon, Rome.

All these oppressions are aggravated by the last, and (as weightiest things sink to the bottom) so is this in the bottom the heaviest pressure, that they did this with their feet, they corrupted the grass with their feet, and troubled the waters with their feet. Now in the Scriptures, when this word, feet, doth not signify that part of man's body which is ordinarily so called, but is transferred to a Metaphoricall signification, (as in our text it is) it does most commonly signify Affections, or Power. So the Lord will keep the feet of his Saints; that is, direct their desires, and affections in the ways of holiness. And then for Power, (which is the more frequent acceptation of the word) he will not suffer thy foot to be moved, that is, thy power to be shaked; And all such places, qui festinus, he hath hasteth with his feet sinneth, our interpreters expound of a hasty abuse of Power; And those, they have not refrained their feet, and then, thy feet are sunk in the mire, are still interpreted of Power, of a wonton abuse of Power, or of a withdrawing this Power from man, by God; feet signifies Affections, and them corrupted and depraved, and power, and that abused. David seems to have joined them, (as when they are joined, they must necessarily be the most heavy) in that prayer, Let not the foot of pride come against me. The hand of pride, nay the sword of pride, affects not a tender soul so much, as the foot of pride; to be oppressed, and that with scorn; not so much in an anger, as in a wantonness. Rehoboams people were more confounded, with that scornful answer of his to them, when they were come, (My little finger shall be thicker then my Fathers loins; my father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with Scorpions) then they were with the grievances themselves, for which they came; when the King would not only be cruelly sharp, but wittily sharp upon them, this cut on every side, and pierced deep. And so do the Rabbins, the Jewish expositors expound this text, literally, that in the captivity of Babylon, the great men of their Synagogues, compounded with the State, and for certain tributes, had commissions, by which they governed their people at their pleasure, and so milked them to the last drop, the last drop of blood, and sheared them to the naked skin, & then flayed off that, & all this while laughed at them, contemned them, because they had nowhere, to appeal, nor relieve themselves: And this we complain to have been the proceeding in the Italian Babylon, Rome, with our Fathers, They oppressed them, with their feet, that is, with Power, and with scorn.

First, for their illimited and enormous Power, they had so slumbered, so intoxicated the Princes of the Earth, the weaker by intimidations, the stronger by communicating the spoil, and suffering those Princes to take some fleeces, from some of the sheep in their dominions, as there was no relief any way. They record, nay they boast, gloriously, triumphantly, of three score thousand of the Waldenses, slain by them in a day, in the beginning of the Reformation; and Possevine the Jesuit will not lose the glory of recording the five hundred thousand, slain in a very few years, only in France, and the low Country, for some declarations of their desire of a Reformation. Let all those innumerable numbers of wretches, (but now victorious Saints in the Triumphant Church) who have breathed out their souls in the Inquisition (where even the solicitations of Kings, and that for their own sons, have not prevailed) confess the power, the immensness of that power, then, when as under some of the Roman Emperors, it was treason to weep, treason to sigh, treason to look pale, treason to fall sick, and all these were made arguments of discontent, and ill affection, to the present government: so in Rome, there were Heretical sighs, Heretical tears, paleness, and Heretical sickness; every things was interpreted to be an accusation of the present times, and an anhelation after a Reformation, and that was formal heresy, three pil'd, deep-died heresy: so that a man durst scarce have prayed for the enlarging of God's blessings to the Church, because to with it better, seemed a kind of accusing of it, that it was not well already; and it was heresy to think so. Let those Israelites, which found no way from this Egypt, but by the red sea, no way out of Idolatry, but by Martyrdom, as they have testified for Christ, so testify against Antichrist, how heavy his feet, as feet signify Power, trod upon the necks of Princes and people.

But that that affected and afflicted most, was the scorn and the contempt, that accompanied their oppressions. To bring Kings to Kiss his feet, was a scorn; but that scorn determined in man; but it was a scorn to God himself, to say that he had said, it should be so, to apply Scripture to the justification thereof, Kings and Queens shall bow down to thee, their faces towards the Earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet. But limit we all considerations of their scorn in one; In this, that they did these wrongs professedly, and without any disguise. Great men will oppress and ruin others, a great while before they will be content to be seen and known to do it. There is such a kind of reverence, not only to Law, but even to honor, and opinion, as that men are loath to publish their evil actions; To sin as Sodom did, and not to hide it, is an evidence, of neglecting, and scorning of all the world. And therefore the Roman Historiographers would not forbear to note the insolency of that young gallant, who knowing what any man whom he struck could recover by action against him, would strike every poor soul or inferior person, whom he met in the street and then bid his man give him so much money, as the Law would for damages. And this oppressing with scorn, this proceeding without any respect of fame, we note (for hast) but in two things, in the Italian Babylon Rome; first, in that Book, their Taxa Camerae, and then in that doctrine, their Reservatio Casuum, that they durst compose, and divulge such a book, as their, Taxa Camerae, which is an Index, a Repertory for all sins, and in which every man may see beforehand, how much money, an Adultery, an Incest, a Murder, a Parricide, or any other sin, whose name he would never have thought of, but by that Remembrancer, that book will cost him, that so, he may sin, and not undo himself, sin according to his means, and within his compass, that they durst let the world see such a book, was argument enough that they were feared up, and scorned all that all men could think, or say, or do in opposition.

So also is their Reservation of Cases; that though all Priests have an equal power of remitting all sins, yet are some sins reserved only to Prelates, some only to the Popes Legates, some only to the Pope himself. Is not this a scornful spurning and kicking of the world, a plain telling them that all is done for money, and shall be so, say all the world what it can. They have a national custom in civil curtesies in that place in Italy, to offer entertainments and lendings of money, and the like, but it must not be accepted. It is a discurtesie, to take their courteous offers in earnest. Will they play so with the great Seal of heaven, the remission and absolution of sins, and send out their Priests with that commission, whose sins ye forgive, are forgiven, but see you forgive none upon which we have set a higher price, and reserved to our selves. They had such a fashion in old Rome, whilst the Republic stood; He that was admitted to Triumph must invite the Consuls to the feast, and the Consuls must promise to come, but they must forbear, lest their presence should diminish the glory of the Triumpher. So the Priest must profess that he hath (as he hath indeed) power to remit all sins, but there are a great many, that he must not meddle withal. They practice this reservation upon higher persons then their ordinary Priests, upon Cardinals. A Cardinal is created, and by that creation he hath a voice in all the great affairs of the world, but at his creation Os clauditur à Papa, he that made him, makes him dumb, and he that out of the nature of his place is duly to be heard over all the world, must not be heard in the Consistory, the Pope gives him an universal voice, and then shuts his mouth; He makes him first a Giant, and then a dwarf in an hour; He makes him thunder, and speechless, all at once; fearful to the Kings of the earth, if he might speak, but he must not. They were not content to make Merchandize of our souls, but they make plays, jests, scorns, of matter of salvation, and play fast and loose with that sovereign Balsamum of our souls, the absolution and remission of sins. Though, no doubt, many of them confess in their own bosoms, that which one of them professes ingenuously, and publicly, Diffiteri non possumus abusum Reservationum, & stragem animarum in iis; we cannot deny the abuse of reservations, even to the butchery of those poor souls, who, by reason of these reservations, want their absolution, Dolendum, deflendum, pecuniâ numeratâ, omnia dispensare; This deserves all our tears, all our sighs, that for money, and not without it, all sins are dispensed withal; but there are fixed seasons for salvation, (some remissions and pardons are reserved to certain times of the year) and there are fixed shops of salvation, (some remissions and pardons are appropriated to certain Fairs and Markets, and cannot be given (that is sold) at any other time, or place. And farther we cannot (we need not) extend this accommodation of the words of our text, literally intended of the condition of God's Children in Babylon, but pregnantly appliable to the condition of our Fathers in the Italian Babylon, Rome. But having at this time seen the oppressions that those shepherds inflicted there, for the rest which are many and important considerations, as first that they staid, that they eat that grass, that yet they remained God's sheep, and remained his flock, his Church, though a Church under a greater Church; And then the behavior of the sheep, whilst they staid there, their obedience to God's call in coming from them when he called them, and made them way; And lastly the little ground that our Separatists can have, for their departing from us either by Israel's departing from Babylon, or our Fathers departing from Rome, must be the exercise of your devotion another day.

SERMON XXV.

Preached at White-Hall.

A S by way of accommodation, we have considered these words, as they concern the iniquity and oppression of the shepherds, (that is, the chief rulers amongst the Jews) in the Chaldean Babylon, and as they are appliable to the condition of our Fathers in the Italian Babylon, Rome, so now in this exercise are we to consider, the behavior of the sheep, their nature, and their demeanour under all these pressures; in which we have many steps to go; All these; first, Manebant, that for all this ill usage there they did stay, they did not break out, not scatter themselves, manebant; And then Edebant, though their grass were trodden, and their water troubled, yet they did eat that grass, and they did drink that water, Edebant; And doing so, Manebant Oves, they continued sheep, they lost not the nature, nor property of sheep, Manebant Oves, and Oves Dei, they continued God's sheep; (for the Devil hath his sheep too) my sheep, says God; not those which bad been mine, when they eat fresh grass, and drunk pure water, but then, when they eat trodden grass, and drunk troubled water, they were God's sheep; And more then that, they were Grex Dei, God's flock; for those whom our former translation calls my sheep, the latter calls my flock; God hath single sheep in many corners of the heathen, but these, though thus fed, were his flock, his Church. But then, though they staid God's leisure, and lived long upon this ill diet, yet when God was pleased to call them out of Babylon, out of Babylon they went, when God was pleased to lead our Fathers out of Rome, they left it. And justly, howsoever our Adversaries load us with contumelious names for that departure; in which branch, we shall see the vanity of their criminations, and imputations to us for that secession from them. And then lastly, by way of condoling and of instructing, we shall make it appear to our weak brethren, that our departing from Rome, can be no example, no justification of their departing from us. Our branches then, from whence we are to gather our fruit, being thus many, it is time to lay hold upon the first, which is Manebant, Though these sheep were thus ill fed, yet they did stay.

Optimis ovibus pedes breves; The best sheep have-shortest legs; Their commendation is, not to make hast in straying away. He that hasteth with his feet sinneth; that is, from the station in which God hath placed him. Si innumera bona fecerimus, If we have abounded in good works, and done God never so good service, Non minores Poenas dabimus, quàm qui Christi corpus proscindebant, si integritatem Ecclesiarum discerpserimus, we are as guilty in the eyes of God, as they that crucified the Lord of life himself, if we violate his spouse, or rent the entireness of his Church. Vir quidam sanctus dixit, (says the same father of another, Chrysostom of Cyprian) A certain holy man hath ventured to say, Quod audaciùs sapere videtur, attamen dixit, That which perchance may seem bodily said, but yet he said it; what was it? This, peccatum istud nec martyrio deleri; That this sin of schism, of renting the unity of the Church, cannot be expiated no not by Martyrdom itself. When God had made but a hedge about Job, yet that hedge was such a • ence as the Devil could not break in: when God hath carried Murum aeneum a wall of brass, nay Murum igneum, a wall of fire about his Church, wilt thou break out through that wall, that brass, that fire? Paradise was not walled, nor hedged; and there were serpents in Paradise too; yet Adam offered not to go out of Paradise, till God drove him out; and God saw that he would have come in again, if the Cherubims and the flaming sword had not been placed by God to hinder him. Charme the Charmer never so wisely, (as David speaks) he cannot utter a sweeter, nor a more powerful charm, • hen that, Ego te baptizo, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; And, Nos admittimus, we receive this child, into the congregation of Christ's slock; There is a sweet and a powerful charm, in the Ego te absolvo, I absolve thee from all thy sins; But this blessed charm I may hear from another, if I stray into another Church. But the Ego te baptizo I can hear but once; and to depart from that Church, in which I have received my baptism, and in which I have made my Contracts and my stipulations with God, and pledged and engaged my sureties there, deserve a mature consideration; for I may mistake the reasons upon which I go, and I may find after, that there are more true errors in the Church I go to, then there were imaginary in that that I left. Truly I have been sorry to see some persons converted from the Roman Church, to ours; because I have known, that only temporal respects have moved them, and they have lived after rather in a nullity, or indifferency to either religion, then in a true, and established zeal. Of which kind, I cannot forbear to report to you so much of the story of a French gentleman, who though he were of good parts, and learned, yet were not worthy to be mentioned in this place, but that he soar'd so high, as to write against the learnedst King, that any age hath produced, our incomparable King James. This man, who was turned from the Reformed to the Roman religion, being asked, half in jest; Sir, which is the best religion, you must needs know, that have been of both? answered, Certainly, the religion I left, the reformed religion, must needs be the best religion, for when I changed, I had this religion, the Romans religion, for it, and three hundred Crowns a year to boot; which was a pension given him, upon his conversion. Neither truly doth anything more loosen a man's footing, nor slacken his hold upon that Church in which he was baptized, nor open him more to an undervaluation of all Churches, then when he gives himself leave, to think irreverently, slightly, negligently of the Sacraments, as of things, at best, indifferent, and, many times, impertinent. I should think I had no bowels, if they had not earn'd and melted, when I heard a Lady, whose child of five or six days, being ready to die every minute, she being moved often that the child might be christened, answered, That, if it were God's will, that the child should live to the Sabbath, that it might be baptized in the Congregation, she should be content, otherwise, God's will be done upon it, for God needs no Sacrament. With what sorrow; with what holy indignation did I hear the Son of my friend, who brought me to that place, to minister the Sacrament to him, then upon his death-bed, and almost at his last gasp, when my service was offered him in that kind, answer his Father, Father, I thank God, I have not lived so in the sight of my God, as that I need a Sacrament. I name a few of these, because our times abound with such persons as undervalue, not only all ritual, and ceremonial assistances of devotion, which the wisdom, and the piety of the Church hath induced, but even the Sacraments themselves, of Christ's own immediate institution, and are always open to solicitations to pass to another Church, upon their own surmises of errors in their own. Whereas there belongs much consideration, and a well grounded assurance, of fundamental errors in one Church, and that those errors are repaired, and no other, as great as those, admitted, in the other Church, before, upon any collateral pretences, we abandon that Church, in which God hath sealed us to himself in Baptism. Our Fathers stayed in Rome; Manebant, They stayed, and Edebant, they eat that grass, and they drunk that water, which was trodden and troubled.

Alas, what should they have eaten, what should they have drunk? should a man strangle himselse rather then take in an ill air? Or forbear a good table, because his stomach cannot digest every dish? We do not call money, base money, till the Allay exceed the pure metal; and if it do so, yet it may be currant, and serve to many offices; Those that are skillful in that art, know how to sever the base from the pure, the good parts of the religion from the bad; and those that are not, will not cast it away, for all the corrupt mixture. It is true, they had been better to have stayed at home and served God in private, then to have communicated in a superstitious service. Domum vestram Christi Ecclesian deputamus, I shall never doubt to call your House the Church of Christ. But this was not permitted to our Fathers; to serve God at home; to Church they must come, and there, all their grass was trodden, and all their water troubled. What should they do? God never brings us to a perplexity, so as that we must necessarily do one sin to avoid another. Never • It seems that the Apostles had been traduced, and insimulated of teaching this Doctrine, That in some cases evil might be done that good might follow; and therefore doth S. Paul with so much diligence discharge himself of it. And yet, long after this, when those men, who attempted the Reformation, whom they called Pauperes de Lugduno, taught that Doctrine, That no less sin might he done, to escape a greater, this was imputed to them, then, by the Roman Church, for an Heresy; That that was Orthodox in Saint Paul, was Heresy in them that • studied a Reformation. But the Doctrine stands like a rock against all waves, That nothing that is naturally ill, intrinsically sin, may upon any pretence be done, not though our life's, nor the life's of all the Princes in the world, though the frame, and being of the whole world, though the salvation of our souls lay upon it; no sin, naturally, intrinsically sin might be done, for any respect. Christus peccatum factus est, sed non fesit peccatum, Though Christ pursued our redemption with hunger, and thirst, yet he would have left us unredeemed, rather then have committed any sin. Of this kind therefore, naturally, intrinsically sin, and so known to be to them that did it, certainly our Fathers coming to the superstitious service in the Church of Rome, was not: for had it been, naturally sin, and so known to them, when they did it, they could not have been saved, otherwise then by repentance after, which we cannot presume in their behalf, for there are not testimonies of it. If any of them had invested at any time a scruple, a doubt whether they did well or no, alas how should they devest and overcome that scruple? To whom durst they communicate that doubt? They were under an invincible ignorance, and sometimes under an indevestible scruple. They had heard that Christ commanded to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and Sadducees, and so of the Herodians; that is, of the doctrines of those particular sects; of affirming Fate, and Destiny, and Stoicall necessity, with the Pharisees; of denying Spirits, and Resurrection with the Sadducees; of mis-applying the prophesies concerning the Messias, to the person of Herod, or any earthly King; But yet, after all this, he commands them to observe, and perform the doctrine of the Pharisees, because they sat in Moses chair; Though with much vehemence and bitterness, he call them Hypocrites, though with many ingeminations upon every occasion, he reiterate that name, though he aggravate that name with other names of equal reproach, Fools, blind guides, painted tombs, and the like, yet he commands to obey them; and, which is most remarkable, this is said, not only to the common sort, but even to his own disciples too; Christ had begun his work of establishing a Church, which should empty their Synagogues; but because that work was not yet perfected, he would not withdraw the people from their Synagogues; for there wrought God's Ordinance, (though corrupted by the workmen) which Ordinance was, that the law should be publicly expounded to the people; and so it was there; There God was present; And though the Devil (by their corruption) were there too, yet, the Devil came in at the window, God at the door; the Devil by stealth, God by his declared Ordinance, and Covenant. And this was the case of our Fathers in the Roman Church; They must know that all that hath passed between God and man hath passed Ex pacto, by way of contact and covenant.

The best works of the best man have no proportion with the kingdom of heaven, for I give God but his own: But I have it Ex pacto, God hath covenanted so, Fac, hoc & vives, Do this and thou shalt live; and at the last judgment, Christ shall ground his Venite benedicti, Come ye blessed, and his Ite maledicti, Go ye accursed, upon the Quia, and upon the Quia non, Because you have, and Because you have not done this and this. Faith, that is of infinite value above works, hath yet no proportion to the kingdom of heaven; Faith saves me, as my hand feeds me; It reaches the food, but it is not the food; but faith saves Ex pacto, by virtue of that Covenant; which Christ hath made, Tantummodo creed, Only believe. To carry it to the highest, the merit of Christ Jesus himself, though it be infinite so, as that it might have redeemed infinite worlds, yet the working thereof is safeliest considered in the School to be Ex pacto, by virtue of that contract which had passed between the Father and him, that all things should thus and thus be transacted by Christ, and so man should be saved; for, if we shall place it merely, only in the infiniteness of the merit, Christ's death would not have needed; for his first drops of blood in his Circumcision, nay his very Incarnation (that God was made man) and every act of his humiliation after, being taken singly, yet, in that person, God and man, were of infinite merit; and also, if it wrought merely by the infiniteness of the merit, it must have wrought, not only upon all men, but to the salvation of the Devil; for, certainly there is more merit in Christ then there is sin in the Devil. But the proceeding was Ex pacto, according to the contract made, and to the conditions given; Ipse conteret caput tuum, That the Messias should bruise the Serpents head for us, included our redemption, That the Serpents head should be bruised, excluded the Serpent himself. This contract, then between God and man, as it was able to put the nature of a great fault, in a small offense, if we consider only the eating of an apple, and so to make even a Trespass High-Treason, (because it was so contracted) so does this contract, the Ordinance of God, infuse a great virtue & efficacy, in the instruments of our reconciliation, how mean in gifts, or how corrupt in manners soever they be. Circumcision in itself a low thing, yea obscene, & subject to mis-interpretation, yet by reason of the covenant, He that is not circumcised, that person shall be cut off from my people. So also Baptism, considered in it self, a vulgar, and a familiar thing; yet, except a man be born of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven. The Sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, a domestic, a daily thing; if we consider only the breaking of the bread and participation of the Cup, but if we ascend up to the contract in the institution, it is to every worthy receiver, the seal, and the Conduit of all the merits of Christ, to his soul. God threw down the walls of Jericho, with the sound of Horns, not of Trumpets. A homely sound; yet it did the work; so neither is the weakness, no, nor the corruptnesse of the instruments always to be considered in the Church of God. Our Fathers knew there had passed a contract between God and man, A Church there should be Ad consummationem, to the end of the world, therefore they might safely make their recourse thither; and Porta Inferi, the gates of hell should not prevail against it, therefore they might confidently dwell there; They knew there was a Dic Ecclesiae a bill to be exhibited to the Church, upon any disorder, and a Si noluerit, an excommunication upon disobedience, If he neglect to hear the Church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man, and as a Publican. This Church they saw, and God's contract upon them sealed in Baptism, they knew, God had revealed no other Church, nor contract to them. And therefore, though they did not eat their trodden grass, with that ridiculous temptation, as the Friar is boasted to have eaten a Toad which was set upon the Table, because he had read, whatsoever is set before you eat; Nor, as their Dorotheus, who when his man had reachd him rats-bane, instead of honey, which he called for, refused it not, because said he, If God's will had been, that I should have had honey, he would have directed thy hand to the honey, but being under an invi ciblenignorance, and indevestible scruples, and having this contract, and this Church, to give them some satisfaction and acquiescence, they were partakers of that blessing, That though Serpents and Scorpions lurked in their grass, they had power to tread on scorpions and on serpents, and nothing could hurt them, and That if they drink any deadly thing, it shall do them no harm. And so our Fathers with a good conscience, Manebant, stayed there, and Edebant, they eat trodden grass, and drunk troubled water, and yet Manebantoves, they continued sheep still.

Sheep, that is, without Barking, or biting. Some faint and humble bleatings there were always in the days of our Fathers; In every age there arose some men, who did modestly, and devoutly, but yet courageously and confidently appear, and complain against those treadings, and those troublings. Every age, every nation had some such bleatings, some men who by writing or preaching against those abuses, interrupted the tyrannical prescriptions of that Church, and made their continual claim, to their Christian liberty; But still they continued sheep, without denying either their fleece or their throats to those Pastors. We read in Natural story of divers pastures, and divers waters, which will change the color of cattle, or sheep, but none that changes the form, and makes them no such cattle, or no sheep. Some waters change sheep of any color to white. And these troubled waters, temporal or spiritual afflictions, may bring God's children to a faint and lean, and languishing paleness. If it do, as Daniel and his fellows, appeared fairer, and fatter in flesh, with their pults and water, which they desired rather then the Kings polluted delicates, then others that sed voluptuously: so the hearts of God's children shall be filled, as with marrow and with fatness, when others shall have all their hearts desire, but leanness in their souls. There are waters that change all coloured sheep to black. So may these troubled waters, afflictions, effect that upon God's children, The enemy shall come, and before him all faces shall gather blackness; as Jerusalem complains, That their faces were blacker then coals. If it do, yet as long as they stay, and continue sheep, members of the body, as long as they partake of the body, they shall partake of the complexion of the Church, who says of her self, I am black, O daughters of Jerusalem, but comely, (acceptable in the sight of my Christ) and that shall be verified in them, which Solomon says, By the sadness of the countenance, the heart is made better; that is, by the occasion of the sadness, God's correction. But the strangest change is, that some waters change sheep into red, the most unlikely, most extraordinary, most unproper color for sheep, of any other. Yet there is one redness natural to our sheep in the Text, the redness of blushing, and modesty, and self-accusing; And there is another redness, which is not improper, the redness of zeal and godly anger. The worst redness that can befall them, is the redness of sin, and yet, lest that should deject them, God proceeds familiarly with them, Come now, and let us reason together, Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like Crimson, they shall be as wool. Yea, to show, that where sin abounds, grace also may abound, to show that that whiteness of God's mercy doth pursue and overtake this redness of sin, it pleases the Holy Ghost to use such a phrase as expresses a redness in whiteness itself; He says, that the religious men of the Jews before that time, were whiter then milk, and redder then pearl: Mippeninim is the original word, which the Rabbins translate pearl; And the Vulgate Edition hath it, Rubicundiores ebore antiquo, redder then the oldest yvory, which is the whitest thing, that can be presented. Perchance to intimate thus much, that there is neither in the holiest actions, of the holiest man, any such degree of whiteness, but that it is always accompanied with some rednes, some tincture, some aspersion of sin, nor any such deep redness in sin, any sin so often, and deeply died in grain, but that it is capable of whiteness, in the application of the candor, and pureness, and innocence of Christ Jesus: Therefore may the Holy Ghost have wrapped up this whiteness in redness, redder then Pearl. Our Fathers were not discouraged, when they were discolored; what paleness, what blackness, what redness soever, these troubled waters induced upon them, still they were sheep; They become not Foxes, to delude the State with equivocations; nor Wolves, to join with the State to the oppression of the rest; nor Horses, to suffer themselves to be ridden by others, and so made instruments of their passions; no nor Vnicorns, to think to purge and purify the waters for all the forest, to think to reform all abuses in State, and Church at once; but they continued sheep; opened not their mouths in biting, nor barking, in murmuring, or reproaching the present government. So our Fathers staid, Manebant, so they eat that grass, so they continued sheep, and, as it follows next, Oves Dei, God's sheep, my sheep have eaten, my sheep have drunken.

God's sheep; for nature hath her sheep; some men by natural constitution, are lazy, drowsy, frivolous, unactive, sheepish men. And States have their sheep; timorous men, following men, speechless men, men, who because they abound in a plentiful State, are loath to stire. Nay the Devil hath his sheep too; Men whom he possesses so entirely, that, as the Law says, Domintum est potestas, tum utendi, tum abutendi, Only he is truly Lord of anything, who may do what he will with it, he does what he will with those men, even to their own ruin. And from these folds and flocks did the Devil always serve his shambles, in his false Martyrdoms in the Primitive Church; when (as Eusebius notes) envying the honor which the Orthodox Christians had in their thousands of Martyrs, the Heretics studied ways of equalling them in that. And though within four hundred years after Christ, the Church, (who could not possibly take knowledge of all) was come to celebrate, by name, five thousand Martyrs (as some books have the account) for every day in the year, yet the Heretics went so far towards equalling them, as that they had some whole sects, (particularly the Euphemitae) which called themselves Martyrians, men exposed to the slaughter. One limb of the Donatists, the Circumcelliones, might have furnished their shambles; They would provoke others to kill them; and if they failed in that, they would kill themselves. And this was, as Saint Augustine says, Ludus quotidianus, their daily sport, they plaid at no other game. And left all these means should not have provided Martyrs enow, Petilian, against whom Saint Augustine writes, invented a new way of Martyrdom, when he taught, that if a man were guilty in his Conscience of any great offense to God, and only to punish that fault, did kill himself, he was by that act of Justice a Martyr. The Devil had his sheep then; He hath so still; Those Emissarii papae, those whom the Bishop of Rome sends hither into this kingdom; whom Baronius calls Candidates Martyrii, pretenders to Martyrdom, suitors for Martyrdom; Men, who (as he adds there) do sacramento spondere sanguinem, take an oath at Rome that they will be hanged in England; and, in whose behalf he complains de sterilitate Martyrii, that there is such a dearth of Martyrdom, that they find it hard to be hanged; and therefore, (perchance) they find it necessary to enter into Powder plots, and actual Treasons, because they see that for Religion merely, this State would never draw drop of blood, & sacramento sanguinem, they have taken an oath to be hanged, and are loath to be forsworn. But the sheep of our text, were not Natures sheep, men naturally lazy, and unactive, nor State sheep, men loath to adventure, by stirring, nor the Devils sheep, men headlong to their own ruin, even by way of provocation; But they were God's sheep, men, who, out of a rectified conscience, would not prevaricate, not betray nor forsake God, if his glory required the expense of their lives, and yet would not exasperate nor provoke their superiors, how corrupt soever, by unseasonable, and unprofitable complaints: so our Fathers stayed in Rome, so they eat trodden grass, and drunk troubled waters, so they continued harmless sheep towards others, and the sheep of God, such as though they staid there and fed upon an ill diet, God had distinguished from Goats, and reserved for his right hand, at the day of separation. And they were more then so; they were not only his sheep, but his flock; for so, this translation reads it, my flock hath eaten, my flock hath drunk.

God had single sheep in many nations; Job's, and Naaman's, and such; servants, and yet not in the Covenants, sheep, and yet not brought into his flock. For though God have revealed no other way of salvation to us, but by breeding us in his Church, yet we must be so far, from straitening salvation, to any particular Christian Church, of any subdivided name, Papist or Protestant, as that we may not straiten it to the whole Christian Church, as though God could not, in the largeness of his power, or did not, in the largeness of his mercy, afford salvation to some, whom he never gathered into the Christian Church. But these sheep in our text, were his flock, that is, his Church. Though they durst not communicate their sense of their miseries, and their desires to one another, yet they were a flock. When Elias complained, I, even I only am left, and God told him, that he had seven thousand besides him, perchance Elias knew none of this seven thousand, perchance none of this seven thousand and knew one another, and yet, they were his flock, though they never met. That timber that is in the forest, that stone that is in the quarry, that Iron, that Lead that is in the mine, though distant miles, Counties, Nations, from one another, meet in the building of a material Church; So doth God bring together, living stones, men that had no relation, no correspondence, no intelligence together, to the making of his Mystical body, his visible Church. Who ever would have thought, that we of Europe, and they of the Eastern, or Western Indies, should have met to the making of Christ a Church? And yet, before we knew, on either side, that there was such a people, God knew there was such a Church. He that lies buried, in the consecrated dust under your feet, knows not who lies next him; but one Trumpet at last shall raise them both together, and show them to one another, and join them, (by God's grace) in the Triumphant Church. These that knew not one another, that knew not of one another, were yet God's flock, the Church in his eye; for there, (and only there) the Church is always visible. So were our Fathers in Rome, though they durst not meet, and communicate their sorrows, nor fold themselves so in the fold of Christ Jesus, that is in open, and free Confessions. They therefore that ask now, Where was your Church before Luther, would then have asked of the Jews in Babylon, Where was your Church before Esdras; that was in Babylon, ours was in Rome.

Now, beloved, when our Adversaries cannot deny us this truth, that our Church was enwrapped, (though smothered) in theirs, that as that Balsamum natural, which Paracelsus speaks of, that natural Balm which is in everybody, and would cure any wound, if that wound were kept clean, and recover anybody, if that body were purged, as that natural balm is in that body, how diseased soever that body be, so was our Church in theirs, they vex us now, with that question, Why, if the case stood so, if your Fathers, when they eat our trodden grass, and drunk our troubled waters, were sound and in health, and continued sheep, and God's sheep, and God's flock, his Church with us, why went they from us? They ought us their residence, because they had received their Baptism from us. And truly, it is not an impertinent, a frivolous reason, that of Baptism, where there is nothing but conveniency, and no necessity in the case. But, if I be content to stay with my friend in an aguish air, will he take it ill, if I go when the plague comes? Or if I stay in town till 20 die of the plague, shall it be lookd that I should stay when there die 1000? The infection grew hotter and hotter in Rome; & their may, came to a must, those things which were done before de facto, came at last to be articles of Faith, and de jure, must be believed and practiced upon salvation. They chide us for going away, and they drove us away; If we abstained from communicating with their poisons, (being now grown to that height) they excommunicated us; They gave us no room amongst them but the fire, and they were so forward to burn Heretics, that they called it heresy, not to stay to be burnt.

Yet we went not upon their driving, but upon God's calling. As the whole prophecy of the deliverance of Israel, from Babylon, belongs to the Christian Church, both to the Primitive Church, at first, and to the Reformed since, so doth that voice, spoken to them, reach unto us, Egredimini de Babylon, Go ye out of Babylon with a voice of singing, declare, show to the ends of the earth, that the Lord hath redeemed his servant Jacob. For, that Rome is not Babylon, they have but that one half-comfort, that one of their own authors hath ministered, that Romae regulariter male agitur; that Babylon is Confusion, disorder, but at Rome all sins are committed in order, by the book, and they know the price, and therefore Rome is not Babylon. And since that many of their authors confess, that Rome was Babylon, in the time of the persecuting Emperors, and that Rome shall be Babylon again, in the time of Antichrist, how they will hedge in a Jerusalem, a holy City, between these two Babylon's, is a cunning piece of Architecture. From this Babylon then were our Fathers called by God; not only by that whispering sibilation of the holy Ghost, sibilab • populum, I will hiss for my people, and so gather them, for I have redeemed them, and they shall increase, not only by private inspirations, but by general acclamations; everywhere principal writers, and preachers, and Princes too, (as much as could stand with their safety) crying out against them before Luther, howsoever they will needs do him that honor, to have been the first mover, in this blessed revolution.

They reproach to us our going from them, when they drove us, and God drew us, and they discharge themselves for all, by this one evasion; That all that we complain of, is the fault of the Court of Rome,