Fifty Sermons

SERMON XXXVII.

Preached at St. Paul's on Midsommer day. 1622.

O F him, who was this light, which John the Baptist is here denied to be, I spoke out of these words, and out of this place, the first time that I ascended to it, upon the great Epiphany, (as the first Church used to call it) the manifestation of Christ Jesus in the flesh, Christmas day; I reserved the rest of the Text, which concerns John Baptist himself, and his office, for this day, in which the Church celebrates his memory, who, though he were not that light, was sent to bear witness of that light.

We shall make our parts but two, Testem, and Testimonium, the person, and the Office; first, who the witness is, and then what he witnesses. In the first, we shall consider first, the dignity, the fitness of the person, implied in the first word of this part of our Text, but; he was not that light; that is true, but yet he was something towards it; he was nothing considered with Christ, but he was much considered with any other man. And then we shall see his title to his office, Missus est, as he was fit in himself, so he was sent by him that had power to give Commission; and from these two, in which we shall determine our first part, the consideration of his person, we shall descend to the other, his office; and therein stop but upon two steps neither; first, why any testimony was required to so clear a thing as light, and such a light, that light; and then, what kind of testimony John the Baptist did give to that light. So have you the design, and frame of our building, and the several partitions, the rooms; pass we now to a more particular survey, and furnishing of them.

The first branch of the first part, is the Idoneus, that he was fit to be a witness. If we should insist upon the nobility of his race, his father and mother, (his father a Priest, and his mother also descended of Aaron) (and, as all Nations have some notes and marks of nobility, ( Merchandize, or Arms, or Letters, amongst the Jews Priesthood was that, the Priesthood ennobled men) in all well policed States, caeteris paribus, if they were not otherwise defective, they have ever thought it fittest to employ persons of good families, and of noble extraction, as well because, in likelihood they had had the best education, from their parents, and the best knowledge of things that concern the public, by having had their conversation with the best, and most intelligent persons; as also, because they have for the most part, more to lose them inferior persons have, and therefore are likelier to be careful and vigilant in their employment; And again, because they draw a better respect from those to whom they are employed, (which is of great importance in such negotiations, to send persons acceptable to them to whom they are sent) and yet, do not lie so open to the temptations and corruptions of their Ministers, as men of needy fortunes, and obscure extractions do.

This fitness John the Baptist had, he was of a good family and extraction. It adds to him, that as he had a noble, he had a miraculous birth • for, to be born of a Virgin, is but a degree more, then to be borne of a barren woman. A birth, which only of all others the Church celebrates; for, though we find the days of the Martyrs still called, Natalitia Martyrum, their birth-days, yet that is always intended of the days of their death; only in John the Baptist it is intended literally of his natural birth; for, his spiritual birth, his Martyrdom, is remembered by another name, Decollatio Ioannis, John Baptists beheading. If we should enlarge all concerning him, as infinitely, as infinite Authors have done, or contract all as summarily, as Christ hath done, (Amongst those that are borne of women, there is not a greater Prophet then John the Baptist) yet we should find that Saint Augustine had done all this before, Non est quod illi adjiciat homo, cui Deus contulit totum, What man can add more, where God said all, and he hath said of John Baptist, Spiritu Sa • cto replebitur, He shall be filled with the holy Ghost.

Two things especially make a man a competent witness: First, that he have in himself a knowledge of the thing that he testifies; else he is an incompetent witness: And then, that he have a good estimation in others, that he be reputed an honest man; else he is an unprofitable witness. If he be ignorant, he says truth, but by chance; if he be dishonest, and say truth, it is but upon design, and not for the truths sake; for, if those circumstances did not lead him, he would not say truth. John the Baptist had both, knowledge and estimation.

He knew, per scientiam infusam, by infused knowledge; as he was a Prophet; for so Christ testifies that he was. But all Prophets knew not all things; therefore he was more then a Prophet, which is also testified by Christ, in his behalf. More then any former Prophet. And yet, the Prophet Isaiah was (even in his Prophecy) an Evangelist, his Prophecy of Christ was so clear, so particular, as that it was rather Gospel, and History, then Prophecy. John the Baptist was more then that; for, he did not only declare a present Christ, (in that, Isaiah may seem to come near him) but he was Propheta Prophetatus, A Prophet that was prophesied of; even Isaiah himself bore witness of this witness; (A voice cried in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord.) And the Prophet Malachi bore witness of this witness too, (Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me.) So he hath the restimony of the first and last of the Prophets; and of him too, who was the first and the last, the cause and the effect, the moving and fulfilling of all prophecy, of Christ himself, (This is he, of whom it is written,) and so he cites those words of Malachi concerning John the Baptist. John the Baptist then had this competency, by knowledge infused by God, declared in former Prophecies, he knew the matter, which he was to testify. Which is so essential, so substantial a circumstance in matter of testimony, in what way soever we will be witnesses to God, as that no man is a competent witness for God, not in his preaching, not in his living, not in his dying, (though he be a witness in the highest sense, that is, a Martyr) if he do not know, upon what ground, he says, or does, or suffers that, which he suffers, and does, and says. Howsoever he pretend the honor of God in his testimony, yet, if the thing be materially false, (false in itself, though true in his opinion) or formally false, (true in itself, but not known to be so, to him that testifies it) both ways he is an incompetent witness. And this takes away the honor of having been witnesses for Christ, and the consolation and style of Martyrs, both from them, who, upon such evidence, as can give no assurance (that is, traedi tions of men) have grounded their faith in God, and from them, who take their light in corners, and conventicles, and not from the City set upon the top of a hill, the Church of God. Those Roman Priests who have given their lives, those Separatists which have taken a voluntary banishment, are not competent witnesses for the glory of God; for a witness must know; and qui testator de scientia, testetur de modo scientiae, says the Law, He that will prove anything by his knowledge, must prove how he came by that knowledge; The Papist hath not the knowledge of his Doctrine from any Scripture, the Separatist hath not the knowledge of his Discipline from any precedent, any example in the primitive Church.

How far then is that wretched and sinful man, from giving any testimony or glory to Christ in his life, who never comes to the knowledge, and consideration, why he was sent into this life? who is so far from doing his errand, that he knows not what his errand was; not whether he received any errand or no. But, as though that God, who for infinite millions of ages, delighted himself in himself, and was sufficient in himself, and yet at last did bestow six days labor for the creation, and provision of man, as though that God, who when man was sour'd in the lump, poisoned in the fountain, withered in the root, in the loins of Adam, would then engage his Son, his beloved Son, his only Son to be man, by a temporary life, and to be no man, by a violent and a shameful death, as though that God, who when he was pleased to come to a creation, might have left out thee, amongst privations, amongst nothings, or might have shut thee up, in the close prison, of a bare being, and no more, (as he hath done earth and stones) or, if he would have given thee life, might have left thee a Toad, or, if he would have given thee a human soul, might have left thee a heathen, without any knowledge of God, or, if he had afforded thee a Religion, might have left thee a Jew, or, though he had made thee a Christian, might have left thee a Papist; as though that God that hath done so much more, in breeding thee in his true Church, had done all this for nothing, thou passest thorough this world, like a flash, like a lightning, whose beginning or end no body knows, like an Ignis fatuus in the air, which does not only not give light for any use, but not so much as portend or signify anything; and thou passest out of the world, as thy hand passes out of a basin of water, which may be somewhat the fouler for thy washing in it, but retains no other impression of thy having been there; and so does the world for thy life in it. When God placed Adam in the world, he bad him fill it, and subdue it, and rule it; and when he placed him in paradise, he bad him dress, and keep paradise; and when he sent his children into the over-flowing Laud of promise, he bad them fight, and destroy the Idolaters; to everybody some task, some errand for his glory; And thou comest from him, into this world, as though he had said nothing unto thee, but Go and do as you see cause, Go, and do as you see other men do.

Thou knowest not, that is, considerest not, what thou wast sent to do, what thou shouldest have done, but thou knowest much less, what thou hast done. The light of nature hath taught thee to hide thy sins from other men, and thou hast been so diligent in that, as that thou hast hid them from thyself, and canst not find them in thine own conscience, if at any time the Spirit of God would burn them up, or the blood of Christ Jesus wash them out; thou canst not find them out so, as that a Sermon or Sacrament can work upon them. Perchance thou canst tell, when was the first time, or where was the first place, that thou didst commit such or such a sin; but as a man can remember when he began to spell, but not when he began to read perfectly, when he began to join his letters, but not when he began to write perfectly, so thou rememberest when thou wentest timorously and bashfully about sin, at first, and now perchance art ashamed of that shamefastness, and sorry thou beganst no sooner. Poor bankrupt! that hast sinned out thy soul so profusely, so lavishly, that thou darest not cast up thine accounts, thou darest not ask thyself whether thou have any soul left; how far art thou, from giving any testimony to Christ, that darest not testify to thyself, nor hear thy conscience take knowledge of thy transgressions, but haddest rather sleep out thy days, or drink out thy days, then leave one minute for compunction to lay hold on; and doest not sin always for the love of that sin, but for fear of a holy sorrow, if thou shouldest not fill up thy time, with that sin. God cannot be mocked, saith the Apostle, nor God cannot be blinded. He seeth all the way, and at thy last gasp, he will make thee see too, through the multiplying Glass, the Spectacle of Desperation. Canst thou hope that that God, that seeth this dark Earth through all the vaults and arches of the several spheres of Heaven, that seeth thy body through all thy stone walls, and seeth thy soul through that which is darker then all those, thy corrupt flesh, canst thou hope that that God can be blinded with drawing a curtain between thy sin and him? when he is all eye, canst thou hope to put out that eye, with putting out a candle? when he hath planted legions of Angels about thee, canst thou hope that thou hast taken away all Intelligence, if thou have corrupted, or silenced, or sent away a servant? O bestow as much labor, as thou hast done, to find corners for sin to find out those sins, in those corners where thou hast hid them. As Princes give • pardons by their own hands, but send Judges to execute Justice, come to him for mercy in the acknowledgement of thy sins, and stay not till his Justice come to thee, when he makes inquisition for blood; and do not think, that if thou feel now at this present • a little tenderness in thy heart, a little melting in thy bowels, a little dew in thine eyes, that if thou beest come to know, that thou art a sinner, thou dost therefore presently know thy sins. Thou wouldst have so much tenderness, so much compassion, if thou knewest that he that fits next thee, were in this danger of God's heavy indignation; thou wouldst commiserate thy neighbors wretched condition so much. But proceed with thyself further, bring this dawning and break of day to a full light, and this little spark to a perfect acknowledgement of thy sins. Go home, with this spark of God's Spirit in you, and there look upon your Rentalls, and know your oppressions, and extorsions; look upon your shop-books, and know your deceits and falsifications; look upon your ward-robes, and know your excesses; look upon your children's faces, and know your fornications. Till then, till you come to this scrutiny, this survey, this sifting of the Conscience, if we should cry peace, peace, yet there were no peace. The Orator said, Imposuimus populo, & Oratores visi sumus; we have cozened the people, and they say we are excellent Orators, powerful, well spoken men. We might flatter you, and you would say, we were sweet, and smooth, and comfortable Preachers, and we might perish together. But if you study yourselves, read your own History, if you get to the knowledge of your errand hither, and the ill discharge of those duties here, the sorrow and compunction which will grow from thence, is a fair degree of Martyrdom, (for as Saint Jerome saith of Chastity, Habet pudicitia servata, Martyrium suum, Chastity preserved is a continual Martyrdom, so a true remorse, if that Chastity have not been preserved, and likewise a true remorse for every sin, is a fair degree of Martyrdom) for, Martyr is Testis, the very name of Martyr signifieth a Witness; and this Martyrdom, this true remorse and sorrow, and compunction for your sins, becomes a witness to yourselves of your reconciliation to God in the merits of Christ Jesus. But we may carry this branch no further, that John the Baptist being a competent witness therefore, because he understood the matter he testified, before we can be competent witnesses to our own Consciences, of our Reconciliation to God, we must understand, (and therefore search into our particular sins) not only that we are sinners, but sinners in such and such kinds, such times, such places, such persons; for that Soul, that is content to rest in generals, would but deceive it self. John Baptists other qualification was, That as he knew the matter about which he was sent, so he had, (and justly) a good estimation amongst them, to whom he was employed.

If I have a prejudice against a Man, and suspect his honesty, I shall not be much moved with his Testimony. The Devil testified for Christ; but, if there were no other Testimony but his, I should demure upon the Gospel, I should not die for that Faith. John the Baptist was a credible person amongst them. How was this credit acquired? It seemeth John the Baptist did no Miracles; Whether he did or no, is not a clear Case; for that which is said, (John the Baptist did no miracles) is not said by the Evangelist himself; Saint John doeth not say, that John the Baptist did no miracles; but those that resorted to him at that place, said that (He doth no miracles) for they had seen none. If he did none, that reason may be good enough, ne aequalis Christo putaretur, it was forborne in him, that he might appear to be inferior to Christ. And, if he did none, yet there were miracles done by him. The reformation of manners, and bringing men to repentance, is a miracle. It is a less miracle to raise a man from a sick bed, then to hold a man from a wanton bed, a litentious bed; less to overcome and quench his fever, then to quench his lust. Joseph that refused his mistress was a greater miracle then Lazarus raised from the dead. Of these resurrections, we have divers examples, Joseph's case, (I think) is singular. There were miracles done so, by John the Baptist preaching to others; and there were miracies done upon himself; & early; for, his springing in his mothers womb, was a miracle; and a miracle done for others: Significatio rei à majoribus cognoscende, non à minori cognitae; The child catechized his elders, in that which himself understood not; that is, the presence of his Savior, in the virgin then present, Divinitus in infante, non humanitus ab infante, says the same Father; it was not a joy, and exultation in the child, but an institution, an instruction to the rest. But miracle or no miracle is not our issue; witnesses for Christ, require not wonder, but belief; we pretend not miracles, but propose God's ordinary means, we look not for Admiration, but Assent. And therefore forbear you acclamations and expectations of wonderful good preachers, and admirable good Sermons. It was enough for John the Baptist that even they confessed, that all that he said was true. Content thyself with truths evident truths, fundamental truths, let matter of wonder and admiration alone.

He was a witness competent to them for his truth, and integrity, and he was so also for the outward holiness of his life; which, for the present, we consider only in the strict and austere manner of living, that he embraced. For, certainly, he that uses no fasting, no discipline, no mortification, exposes himself to many dangers in himself, and to a cheap and vulgar estimation amongst others. Caro mea jumentum meum, says S. Augustine, my body is the horse I ride; iter ago in Jerusalem, my business lies at Jerusalem; thither I should ride; De via conatur excutere, my horse over pampered casts me upon the way, or carries me out of the way; non cohibebo jejunio, says he; must not that be my way, to bring him to a gentler riding, & more command, by lessening his proportions of provender? S. Augustine means the same that S. Paul preached, I beat down my body, says he, and bring it in subjection; And, (as Paulinus reads that place) Lividum reddo, I make my body black and blue; white and red were not Saint Paul's colors. Saint Paul was at this time departed, (in outward profession) from the sect of the Pharisees, and from their ostentations of doing their disciplines in the sight and for the praise of man; but yet, being become a Christian he left not his austerity; And it is possible for us, to leave the leaven of the Papist, the opinion of merit, and supererogation, and doing more then we are bound to do in the ways of godliness, and yet nourish our souls, with that wholesome bread of taming our bodies. Saint Paul had his Disciplines, his mortifications; he tells us so, but he does not tell us what they were; lest perchance a reverence to his person, and example, might bind mis-devout men, to do punctually as Saint Paul did. The same Rule cannot serve all; but the same Reason may.

The institution of friars under a certain Rule, that all of them, just at this time, shall do just thus, cannot be a rule of Justice; but the general doctrine, that everybody needs at sometimes, some helps, some means, is certainly true. Shall the riotous, the voluptuous man stay till this something be a surfeit or a fever? 'It is true, this surfeit and this fever, will subdue the body, but then thou doest it not. Shall a lascivious wanton stay, till a consumption or such contagious diseases as shall make him unsociable, and so, unable to exercise his sin, subdue his body? These can do it, but this is Perimere, non subjugare, not a subduing of the body alone, but a destroying of body and soul together. Moderate disciplines subdue the body, as under the government of a King, a father of his people, that governs them by a law. But when the body comes to be subdued, by pains, and anguish, and loathsome diseases, this becomes a tyranny, a conquest; and he that comes in by conquest, imposes what laws he will; so that these subduings of the body brought in by sin, may work in us, an obduration; we shall feel them, but not discern the hand of God in them; or, if his hand, yet not his hand to that purpose, to relieve us, but to seal our condemnation to us. Beloved, because our Adversaries of the Roman heresy, have erroneously made a pattern for their Eremiticall and Monastical life in John the Baptist, and coloured their idleness, by his example; some of the Reformation have bent a little too far the other way, and denied, that there was any such austerity in the life of St. John, as is ordinarily conceived: They say that his conversation in the Desert, may well be understood to have been but a withdrawing of himself from public and civil businesses, home to his fathers house; for, his father dwelt in that Desert, and thither went Mary to salute Elizabeth. And Joab had his house in this Desert; and in this Desert are reckoned five or fixe good Towns; so that indeed it was no such savage solitude as they fancy. But yet, for a Son of such Parents, an only Son, a Son so miraculously afforded them, to pass on with that apparel • and that diet, is certainly remarkable, and an evidence of an extraordinary austerity, and an argument of an extraordinary sanctity.

Especially to the Jews it was so; amongst them this austerity of life, and abstaining from those things which other men embraced, procured ordinarily a great estimation; We know that amongst them, the Isaiah a severe Sect, had a high reverence: They did not marry, they did not eat flesh, they did not ease themselves by servants, but did all their own work, they used no propriety, they possessed nothing, called nothing their own; Vicatim habitant, & urbes fugiunt, they forsake all great Towns, and dwell in Villages; And yet, flying the world, they drew the world so much after • them, as that it is noted with wonder, per saeculorum Milia gens aeterna, in qua nemo nascitur; that there was an eternal Nation, that had lasted many Generations, and yet never any borne amongst them; I am foecunda illis aliorum vitae poenitentia, for, every man that was crossed or wearied in his own course of life, applied himself to their Sect and manner of living, as the only way to Heaven. And Josephus writing his own life and forwardness, and pregnancy, (perchance a little too favourably or gloriously in his own behalf, to be thoroughly believed; for he saith, that when he was but fourteen years old, the greatest Doctors of the Law, came to him to learn penitiorem sensum juris, the secretest Mysteries of the Law; and their Law, was Divinity) thought himself imperfect till he had spent some time, in the strictness of all the three Sects of the Jews; and after he had done all that, he spent three years more, with one Bannus an Ermit, who lived in the wilderness, upon herbs and roots, John Baptists austerity of life made him a competent and credible witness to them, who had such austerity in estimation.

And truly, he that will any way be a witness for Christ, that is, glorify him, he must endeavor, even by this outward holiness of life, to be acceptable to good men. Vox Populi, vox Dei, the general voice is seldom false; so also Oculi populi, Oculi Dei, In this case God looketh upon man, as man doth; Singuli decipi & decipere possunt, One man may deceive another, & be deceived by another; Nemo omnes, neminem omnes fefellerunt, no man ever deceived all the world, nor did all the world ever join to deceive one man. The general opinion, the general voice, is for the most part, good evidence, with, or against a man. Everyone of us is ashamed of the praise and attestation of one, whom all the world besides, taketh to be dishonest; so, will Christ be ashamed of that witness, that seeketh not the good opinion of good men.

When I see a Jesuit solicit the chastity of a daughter of the house, where he is harboured, and after knowledge taken by the Parents, upon her complaint, excuse it with saying, that he did it but to try her, and to be the better assured of her religious constancy; when I see a Jesuit conceal and foment a powder Treason, and say he had it but in Confession, and then see these men to proclaim themselves to be Martyrs, witnesses for Christ in the highest degree; I say still, the Devil may be a witness, but I ground not my Faith upon that Testimony: A competent witness must be an honest man. This competency John the Baptist had, the good opinion of good men; And then, he had the seal of all, Missus est, he had his Commission, He was sent to bear witness of that Light.

Though this word Missus est, He was sent, be not literally in the Text here, yet it is necessarily implied, and therefore providently supplied by the Translatours in this verse, and before in the sixth verse, it is literally expressed, There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The Law saith, concerning witnesses, Qui se ingerunt & offerunt, suspecti habentur, those that offer their testimony before they be cited, are suspicious witnesses. Therefore they must have a Mission, a sending. For, by Saint Paul's rule, How can they preach except they be sent? Preach they may; but how? with what success, what effect, what blessing? So that the good success of John Bapstists preaching, (For, the multitudes, The people came to him; and not light people carried about with every wind of rumour and noise, and novelty, but Pharisees, and Sadducees, men of learning, of sadness and gravity; and not only Scholars affected with subtleties, but, Publicans too, men intent upon the world; and other men, whose very profession submits them to many occasions of departing from the strict rules, which regularly bind other men, and therefore may be in some things, (which taste of injustice) more excusable then other men; The soldiers likewise came to him, and said, What shall we do?) This his working upon all sorts of men, the blessing that accompanied his labors, was a subsequent argument of his Mission, that he was sent by God. God himself argues against them, that were not sent, so, They were not sent, for they have done no good. I have not sent those Prophets, saith the Lord, yet they ran, I have not spoken to them, and yet they prophesied; but, if they had stood in my counsel, then they should have turned the people from their evil ways, and from the wickedness of their inventions. This note God lays upon them, to whom he affords this vocation of his internal Spirit, that though others which come without any calling, may gather men in corners, and in Conventicles, and work upon their affections and passions, to singularity, to schism, to sedition: and though others which come with an outward, and ordinary calling only, may advance their own Fortunes, and increate their estimation, and draw their Auditory to an outward reverence of their Persons, and to a delight in hearing them rather then other men, yet, those only who have a true inward Calling from the Spirit, shall turn the people from their evil ways, and from the wickedness of their inventions. To such men's planting and watering God gives an increase; when as others which come to declaim, and not to preach, and to vent their own gifts, or the purposes of great men for their gifts, have only a proportionable reward, wind for wind, Acclamation for Declamation, popular praise for popular eloquence: for, if they do not truly believe themselves, why should they look that others should believe them? Qui loquitur ad cor, loquatur ex cord; he that will speak to the heart of another, must find that that he saith in his own heart first.

Whether the Mission of the Church of Rome of Priests and Jesuits hither, be sufficient to satisfy their consciences who are so sent, and sent (in intendment of the Law) to inevitable loss of life here, hath been laboriously enough debated, and safely enough concluded, that such a Mission cannot satisfy a rectified conscience. What are they sent for? To defend the Immunities of the Church: that is, to take away the inherent right of the Crown, the supremacy of the King: What seconds them? what assures them? That which is their general Tenent, that into what place so ever the Pope may send Priests, he may send Armies for the security of those Priests; and (as another expresses it) in all Cases, where the Pope may enjoin anything, he may lawfully proceed by way of War against any that hinder the execution thereof. That these Missions from the Bishop of Rome are unlawful, is safely enough concluded, A priori, in the very nature of the commandment and Mission. For, it is to a place, in which he that sends hath no power, for it is into the Dominions of another absolute King; and it is of Persons; in whom he hath no interest, for they are the subjects of another Prince; and my neighbors setting his mark upon my sheep, doth not make my sheep his. Now, beloved, if that which they cannot make lawful A priori, in the Nature of the thing, you will make lawful in their behalf, A posteriori, in the effect and working thereof; that is, if when these men are thus sent hither, you will run after them to their Masses, though you pretend it be but to meet company, and to see who comes, and to hear a Church-Comedy; if, though you abstain yourself, you will lend them a wife, or a child, or a servant to be present there, A posteriori, by this effect, by this their working upon you, you justify their unjust Mission, and make them think their sending and coming lawful. So also, (to return to our former consideration) If you depart not from your evil ways, and from the wickedness of your own inventions: If for all our preaching you proceed in your sins, you will make us afraid, that our Mission, our Calling is not warrantable, for thereby you take away that consolation, which is one seal of our Mission, when we see a good effect of our preaching in your lives. It lies much in you, to convince them, and to establish us, by that way, which is God's own way of arguing, à posteriori, by the effect, by our working upon you. If you say God is God, we are sent; if you say Baal is God, you justify their sending. Missus est, John the Baptist was sent, it appeared by the effect of his preaching; but it appears too, by a divers and manifold citation, which he had received, upon some of which, there may be good use to insist a little.

First, he was cited, called, before he was at all; and called again before he was borne; called a third time, out of the desert, into the world; and called lastly out of this world into the next; and by all these callings, these citations, these missions, he was a competent witness. His first citation was before he was anything, before his conception. Out of the dead embers of Zacharias' aged loins, and Elizabeth's double obstacle, age and barrenness, when it was almost as great a work as a creation, to produce a child out of the corners, and inwardest bowels of all possibility, and with so many degrees of improbability, as that Zacharias, who is said to have been just before God, and to have walked in all his commandments without reproof, and had, without doubt, often considered the like promise of such a child, made and performed to Abraham, was yet incredulous of it, and asked, how he should know it. Out of this nothing, or nothing naturally disposed to be such a thing, a child, did God excite, and cite this Io. Baptist to bear witness of this light, and so made the son of him, who, for his incredulity, was struck with dumbness, all voice. And, beloved, such a citation as this, when thou wast merely nothing, hast thou had too, to bear witness of this light, that is, to do something for the glory of God. When thy free will is as impotent and as dead as Zacharias' loins, when thou art under Elizabeth's double obstacle of age and barrenness,(barrenness in good works, age in ill) then when thou thinkest not of God, then when thou art walking for air, or sitting at a feast, or slumbering in a bed, God opens these doors, he rings a bell, he shows thee an example in the concourse of people hither, and here, he sets up a man, to present the prayer of the Congregation to him, and to deliver his messages to them; and whether curiosity, or custom, or company, or a loathsomeness to incur the penalties of Laws, or the censures and observations of neighbors, bring thee hither, though thou hadst nothing to do with God, in coming hither, God hath something to do with thee, now thou art here, even this is a citation, a calling, by being personally here at these exercises of Religion, thou art some kind of witness of this light. For, in how many places of the world hath Christ yet never opened such doors for his ordinary service, in all these 1600. years? And in how many places hath he shut up these doors, of his true worship, within these three or four years? Quod citaris huc, That thou art brought hither, within distance of his voice, within reach of his food, intra sphaeram Activitatis, within the sphere and latitude of his ordinary working, that is, into his house, into his Church, this is a citation, a calling, answerable to John Baptists first calling, from his fathers dead loins, and his mothers barren womb; and his second citation was before he was borne, in his mothers womb.

When Mary came to visit Elizabeth, the child sprang in her belly, as soon as Mary's voice sounded in her ears. And though naturally, upon excess of joy in the mother, the child may spring in her; yet the Evangelist means to tell an extraordinary and supernatural thing; and whether it were an anticipation of reason in the child, (some of the Fathers think so, though St. Augustine do not, that the child understood what he did) or that this were a fulfilling of that prophecy, That he should be filled with the holy Ghost from his mothers womb, all agree that this was an exciting of him to this attestation of his Savior's presence, whether he had any sense of it, or no. Exultatio significat, says St. Augustine, This springing declared, that his mother, whose forerunner that child should be, was come. And so both Origen, and St. Cyril, refer that commendation, which our Savior gives him, Inter natos Mulierum, Among those that were born of women, there was not a greater Prophet; that is, none that prophesied before he was borne, but he. And such a citation, beloved, thou mayest have, in this place, and at this time. A man may upon the hearing of something that strikes him, that affects him, feel this springing, this exultation, this melting, and colliquation of the inwardest bowels of his soul; a new affection, a new passion, beyond the joy ordinarily conceived upon earthly happiness; which, though no natural Philosopher can call it by a name, no Anatomist assign the place where it lies, yet I doubt not, through Christ jesus, but that many of you who are here now, feel it, and understand it this minute. Citaris huc, thou wast cited to come hither, whether by a collateral, and oblique, and occasional motion, or otherwise, hither God hath brought thee, and Citaris hîc, here thou art cited to come nearer to him. Now both these citations were before John the Baptist was borne; both these affections, to come to this place, and to be affected with a delight here, may be before thy regeneration, which is thy spiritual birth; a man is not borne, not borne again, because he is at Church, nor because he likes the Sermon, John the Baptist had, and thou must have a third citation; which was in him, from the desert into the public, into the world, from contemplation to practice.

This was that mission, that citation, which most properly belongs to this Text, when the word came to the voice, (The word of God came to John in the wilderness, and he came into all the Country preaching the Baptism of repentance.) To that we must come, to practice. For, in this respect, an University is but a wilderness, though we gather our learning there, our private meditation is but a wilderness, though we contemplate God there, nay our being here, is but a wilderness, though we serve God here, if our service end so, if we do not proceed to action, and glorify God in the public. And therefore Citaris huc, thou art cited hither, here thou must be, and Citaris hîc, thou art cited here, to lay hold upon that grace which God offers in his Ordinance; and Citaris hinc, thou art cited from hence, to embrace a calling in the world. He that undertakes no course, no vocation, he is no part, no member, no limb of the body of this world; no eye, to give light to others; no ear to receive profit by others. If he think it enough to be excrementall nails, to scratch and gripe others by his lazy usury, and extortion, or excrementall hair, made only for ornament, or delight of others, by his wit, or mirth, or delightful conversation, these men have not yet felt this third citation, by which they are called to glorify God, and so to witness for him, in such public actions, as God's cause for the present requires, and comports with their calling.

And then John the Baptist had a fourth citation to bear witness for Christ, by laying down his life for the Truth; and this was that that made him a witness, in the highest sense, a Martyr. God hath not served this citation upon us, nor doth he threaten us, with any approaches towards it, in the fear of persecution for religion. But remember that John Baptists Martyrdom, was not for the fundamental rock, the body of the Christian religion, but for a moral truth, for matter of manners. A man may be bound to suffer much, for a less matter then the utter overthrow, of the whole frame and body of religion. But leaving this consideration, for what causes a man is bound to lay down his life, consider we now, but this, that a man lays down his life for Christ, and bears witness of him, even in death, when he prefers Christ before this world, when he desires to be dissolved, and be with him, and obeys cheerfully that citation, by the hand of death, whensoever it comes; and that citation must certainly be served upon you all; whether this night in your beds, or this hour, at the door, no man knows. You who were cited hither, to hear, and cited here, to consider, and cited hence, to work in a calling in the world, must be cited from thence too, from the face to the bosom of the earth, from treading upon other men's, to a lying down in your own graves. And yet that is not your last citation, there is fifth.

In the grave, John the Baptist does, and we must attend a fifth citation, from the grave to a Judgment. The first citation hither to Church, was served by Example of other men, you saw them come, and came. The second citation, here, in the Church, was served by the Preacher, you heard him and believed. The third, from hence, is served by the law, and by the Magistrate, they bind you to embrace a profession, and a calling, and you do so. The fourth, which is from thence, from this, to the next world, is served by nature in death, he touches you, and you sink. This fifth to Judgment shall be by an Angel, by an Archangel, by the Lord himself, The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the Trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise. This citation is not served by a bell, that tolls to bring you hither; not by a man that speaks to instruct you here; not by a law, that compels you to live orderly in the world; not by a bell, that rings out to lay thee in thy grave; but by the great shout of the Lord descending from heaven, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the Trump of God, to raise the dead in Christ. It is not the Apeperire sores, That the Levites have charge to open these doors every day to you, that you may come in, (that is your first citation, hither ) it is not the Domine labia mea aperies, That God opens our mouth, the mouth of the Preacher, to work upon you, (that is your second citation, here, ) it is not that aperuimus saccos, The opening of your sack of Corn, and finding that, and your money too, that is, your trading in this world, in a calling, (that is your third citation from hence ) nor it is not the Aperuit terra os situm, That the earth opens her mouth, and swallows all in the grave, (that is your fourth citation from thence, ) it is none of these Apertions, these openings; but it is the Aperta monumenta, The grave itself shall be open again; and Aperti coeli, The heavens shall be open, and I shall see the Son of man, the Son of God, and not see him at that distance, that Stephen saw him there, but see him, and sit down with him. I shall rise from the dead, from the dark station, from the prostration, from the prosternation of death, and never miss the sun, which shall then be put out, for I shall see the Son of God, the Sun of glory, and shine myself, as that sun shines. I shall rise from the grave, and never miss this City, which shall be nowhere, for I shall see the City of God, the new Jerusalem. I shall look up, and never wonder when it will be day, for, the Angel will tell me that time shall be no more, and I shall see, and see cheerfully that last day, the day of judgment, which shall have no night, never end, and be united to the Antient of days, to God himself, who had no morning, never began. There I shall bear witness for Christ, in ascribing the salvation of the whole world, to him that sits upon the Throne, and to the Lamb, and Christ shall bear witness for me, in ascribing his righteousness unto me, and in delivering me into his Fathers hands, with the same tenderness, as he delivered up his own soul, and in making me, who am a greater sinner, then they who crucified him on earth for me, as innocent, and as righteous as his glorious self, in the Kingdom of heaven. And these occasions of advancing your devotion, and edification, from these two branches of this part, first, the fitness of John the Baptist to be sent, and then his actual sending, by so divers callings, and citations in him, appliable, as you have seen, to us. More will be ministered, in due time, out of the last part, and the two branches of that; first, why this light required any witness, and then, what witness John the Baptist gave to this light. But those, because they lead us not to the celebration of any particular Festival, (as these two former parts have done, to Christmas and Midsommer ) I may have leave to present to you at any other time. At this time let us only beg of God a blessing upon this that hath been said &c.

SERMON XXXVIII.

Preached at Saint Paul's 13. Octob. 1622.

T His is the third time that I have entertained you (in a business of this nature, intended for God's service, and your edification, I must not say, troubled you) with this Text. I begun it at Christmas, and in that dark time of the year told you who, and what was this light which John the Baptist is denied to be. I pursued it at Midsommer, and upon his own day, insisted upon the person of John the Baptist, who, though he were not this light, was sent to bear witness of this light. And the third consideration, which (as I told you then) was not tied nor affected to any particular Festival, you shall (by God's grace) have now, the office of John the Baptist, his testimony; and in that, these two parts; first, a problematicall part, why so evident a thing as light, and such a light, that light, required testimony of man: and then a dogmatical part, what testimony this man gives of this light. And in the first of these we shall make these two steps, first, why any testimony at all, then why, after so many others, this of John.

First then God made light first, ut innotescerent omnia, that man might glorify God in seeing the creature, and him in it; for, frustra fecisset, (says the same Father) it had been to no purpose to have a world, and no light. But though light discover and manifest everything else to us, and it self too, if all be well disposed, yet, in the fifth verse of this chapter, there is reason enough given, why this light in our text, requires testimony; that is, the light shines in darkness, and the darkness comprehends it not; and therefore, Propter non intelligentes, propter incredulos, propter in • rmos, Sol lucernas quaerit; for their sakes that are weak in their understanding, and not enlightened in that faculty, the Gentiles; for their sakes who are weak in their faith, that come, and hear, and receive light, but believe not; for their sakes that are perverse in their manners, and course of life, that hear, and believe, but practice not, sol lucernas quaerit, this light requires testimony. There may be light then and we not know it, because we are asleep; and asleep so, as Jairus daughter was, of whom Christ says, the maid is not dead but asleep. The maid was absolutely dead; but because he meant forthwith to raise her, he calls it a sleep. The Gentiles, in their ignorance, are dead; we, in our corrupt nature, dead, as dead as they, we cannot hear the voice, we cannot see the light; without God's subsequent grace, the Christian can no more proceed, then the Gentile can begin without his preventing grace. But, because, amongst us, he hath established the Gospel, and in the ministry and dispensation thereof, ordinary means for the conveyance of his farther grace, we noware but asleep and may wake. A sudden light brought into a room doth awaken some men; but yet a noise does it better, and a shaking, and a pinching. The exalting of natural faculties, and good moral life, inward inspirations, and private meditations, conferences, reading, and the life, do awaken some; but the testimony of the messenger of God, the preacher, crying according to God's ordinance, shaking the soul, troubling the conscience, and pinching the bowels, by denouncing of God's Judgments, these bear witness of the light, when otherwise men would sleep it out; and so propter non intelligentes, for those that lie in the suddes of nature, and cannot, or of negligence, and will not come to hear, sol lucernas, this light requires testimony.

These testimonies, God's ordinances, may have wakened a man, yet he may wink, and covet darkness, and grow weary of instruction, and angry at increpation; And, as the eye of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight, so, the ear of this fastidious and impatient man, longeth for the end of the Sermon, or the end of that point in the Sermon, which is a thorn to his conscience; But as, if a man wink in a clear day, he shall for all that discern light thorough his eylids, but not light enough to keep him from stumbling: so the most perverse man that is, either in faith or manners, that winkes against the light of nature, or light of the law, or light of grace exhibited in the Christian Church, the most determined Atheist that is, discerns through all his stubbornness, though not light enough to rectify him, to save him, yet enough to condemn him, though not enough to enable him, to read his own name in the book of life, yet so much, as makes him afraid to read his own story by, and to make up his own Audit and account with God. And doth not this light to this man need testimony, That as he does see, it is a light, so he might see, that there is warmth and nourishment in this light, and so, as well see the way to God by that light, as to see by it, that there is a God; and, this he may, if he do not sleep nor wink; that is, not forbear coming hither, nor resist the grace of God, always offered here, when he is here. Propter incredulos, for their sakes, who though they do hear, hear not to believe, sol lucernas, this light requires testimony; and it does so too, propter infirmos, for their sakes, who though they do hear, and believe, yet do not Practice.

If he neither sleep, nor wink, neither forbear, nor resist, yet how often may you surprise and deprehend a man, whom you think directly to look upon such an object, yet if you ask him the quality or color of it, he will tell you, he saw it not? That man sees as little with staring, as the other with winking. His eye hath seen, but it hath returned nothing to the common sense. We may pore upon books, stare upon preachers, yet if we reflect nothing, nothing upon our conversation, we shall still remain under the increpation and malediction of Saint Paul, out of Isaiah, Seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive; seeing and hearing shall but aggravate our condemnation, and it shall be easier at the day of Judgment, for the deaf and the blind that never saw Sacrament, never heard Sermon, then for us, who have frequented both, propter infirmos, for their sakes, whose strength though it serve to bring them hither, and to believe here, doth not serve them to proceed to practice, sol lucernas, this light requires testimony.

Yet, if we be neither dead, nor asleep, nor wink, nor look negligently, but do come to some degrees of holiness in practice for a time, yet if at any time, we put our selves in such a position and distance from this light, as that we suffer dark thick bodies to interpose, and eclipse it, that is, sadness and dejection of spirit, for worldly losses; nay, if we admit inordinate sadness for sin it self, to eclipse this light of comfort from us, or if we suffer such other lights, as by the corrupt estimation of the world, have a greater splendor to come in; (As the light of Knowledge and Learning, the light of Honor and Glory, of popular Applause and Acclamation ) so that this light which we speak of, (the light of former Grace ) be darkened by the access of other lights, worldly lights, then also you shall find that you need more and more Testimony of this light. God is light in the Creature, in nature; yet the natural Man stumbles and falls, and lies in that ignorance, Christ bears witness of this light, in establishing a Chrishian Church; yet many Christians fall into Idolatry and Superstition, and lie and die in it. The Holy Ghost hath born further witness of this light, and, (if we may take so low a Metaphor in so high a Mystery) hath snuffed this candle, mended this light, in the Reformation of Religion; and yet there is a damp, or a cloud of uncharitableness, of neglecting, of defaming one another; we deprave even the fiery, the claven tongues of the Holy Ghost: Our tongues are fiery only to the consuming of another, and they are cloven, only in speaking things contrary to one another. So that still there need more witnesses, more testimonies of this light. God the Father is Pater Luminum the Father of all Lights; God the Son, is Lumen de lumine, Light of light, of the Father; God the Holy Ghost is Lumen de luminibus, Light of lights, proceeding both from the Father, and the Son; and this light the Holy Ghost kindles more lights in the Church, and drops a coal from the Altar upon every lamp, he lets fall beams of his Spirit upon every man, that comes in the name of God, into this place; and he sends you one man today, which beareth witness of this light ad ignaros, that bends his preaching to the convincing of the natural man, the ignorant soul, and works upon him. And another another day, that bears witness ad incredulos, that fixeth the promises of the Gospel, and the merits of Christ Jesus, upon that startling and timorous soul, upon that jealous and suspicious soul, that cannot believe that those promises, or those merits appertain to him, and so bends all the power of his Sermon to the binding up of such broken hearts, and faint believers. He sendeth another to bear witness ad infirmos, to them who though they have shaked off their sickness, yet are too weak, to walk, to them, who though they do believe, are intercepted by temptations from preaching, and his Sermon reduces them from their ill manners, who think it enough to come, to hear, to believe. And then he sendeth another ad Relapsos, to bear witness of this light to them who have relapsed into former sins, that the merits of Christ are inexhaustible, and the mercies of God in him indefatigable: As God cannot be deceived with a false repentance, so he cannot resist a true, nor be weary of multiplying his mercies in that case. And therefore think not that thou hast heard witnesses enow of this light, Sermons enow, if thou have heard all the points preached upon, which concern thy salvation. But because new Clouds of Ignorance, of Incredulity, of Infirmitie, of Relapsing, rise every day and call this light in question, and may make thee doubt whether thou have it or no, every day, (that is, as often as thou canst) hear more and more witnesses of this light; and bless that God, who for thy sake, would submit himself to these Testimonia ab homine, these Testimonies from men, and being all light himself, and having so many other Testimonies, would yet require the Testimony of Man, of John; which is our other branch of this first part.

Christ, (who is still the light of our Text, That light, the essential light ) had testimony enough without John. First, he bore witness of himself. And though he say of himself, (If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true) yet that he might say either out of a legal and proverbial opinion of theirs, that ordinarily they thought, That a witness testifying for himself, was not to be believed, whatsoever he said; Or, as Man, (which they then took him to be) he might speak it of himself out of his own opinion, that, in Judicature it is a good rule, that a man should not be believed in his own case. But, after this, and after he had done enough to make them see, that he was more then man, by multiplying of miracles, then he said, though I bear witness of myself, my witness is true. So the only infallibility and unreproachable evidence of our election, is in the inward word of God, when his Spirit bears witness with our Spirit, that we are the Sons of God; for, if the Spirit, (the Spirit of truth) say he is in us, he is in us. But yet the Spirit of God is content to submit himself to an ordinary trial, to be tried by God and the Country; he allows us to doubt, and to be afraid of our regeneration, except we have the testimony of sanctification. Christ bound them not to his own testimony, till it had the seal of works, of miracles; nor must we build upon any testimony in our selves, till other men, that see our life, testify for us to the world.

He had also the testimony of his Father, (the Father himself which hath sent me, beareth witness of me.) But where should they see the Father, or hear the Father speak? That was all which Philip asked at his hands, (Lord show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.) He had the testimony of an Angel, who came to the shepherds so, as nowhere in all the Scriptures, there is such an Apparition expressed, (the Angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them) but where might a man talk with this Angel, and know more of him? As Saint Augustine says of Moses, Scripsit & abiit, he hath written a little of the Creation, and he is gone; Si hîc esset, tenerem & rogarem, if Moses were here, says he, I would hold him fast, till I had got him to give me an exposition of that which he writ. For, beloved, we must have such witnesses, as we may consult farther with. I can see no more by an Angel, then by lightning. A star testified of him, at his birth. But what was that star? was it any of those stars that remain yet? Gregory Nissen thinks it was, and that it only then changed the natural course, and motion for that service. But almost all the other Fathers think, that it was a light but then created, and that it had only the form of a star, and no more; and some few, that it was the holy Ghost in that form. And, if it were one of the fixed stars, and remain yet, yet it is not now in that office, it testifies nothing of Christ now. The wise men of the East testified of him, too; But what were they, or who, or how many, or from whence, were they; for, all these circumstances have put Antiquity it self into more distractions, and more earnest disputations, then circumstances should do. Simeon testified of him, who had a revelation from the holy Ghost, that he should not see death, till he had seen Christ. And so did the Prophetess Anna, who served God, with fasting and prayer, day and night. Omnis sexus & aetas, both sexes, and all ages testified of him; and he gives examples of all, as it was easy for him to do. Now after all these testimonies, from himself, from the Father, from the Angel, from the star, from the wise men, from Simeon, from Anna, from all, what needed the testimony of John? All those witnesses had been thirty years before John was cited for a witness, to come from the wilderness and preach. And in thirty years, by reason of his obscure and retired life, in his father Joseph's house, all those personal testimonies of Christ might be forgotten; and, for the most part, those witnesses only testified that he was borne, that he was come into the world, but for all their testimony, he might have been gone out of the world long. Before this, he might have perished in the general flood, in that flood of innocent blood, in which Herod drowned all the young children of that Country. When therefore Christ came forth to preach, when he came to call Apostles, when he came to settle a Church, to establish means for our ordinary salvation, (by which he is the light of our text, the Essentiall light shining out in his Church, by the supernatural light of faith and grace) then he admitted, then he required Testimonium ab homine, testimony from man. And so, for our conformity to him, in using and applying those means, which convey this light to us, in the Church, we must do so too; we must have the seal of faith, and of the Spirit, but this must be in the testimony of men; still there must be that done by us, which must make men testify for us.

Every Christian is a state, a common-wealth to himself, and in him, the Scripture is his law, and the conscience is his Judge. And though the Scripture be inspired from God, and the conscience be illumined and rectified by the holy Ghost immediately, yet, both the Scriptures and the Conscience admit human arguments. First, the Scriptures do, in all these three respects; first that there are certain Scriptures, that are the revealed will of God. Secondly, that these books which we call Canonical, are those Scriptures. And lastly, that this and this is the true sense and meaning of such and such a place of Scripture. First, that there is a manifestation of the will of God in certain Scriptures, if we who have not power to infuse Faith into men, (for that is the work of the Holy Ghost only) but must deal upon the reason of men, and satisfy that, if we might not proceed, per testimonia ab homine, by human Arguments, and argue, and infer thus, That if God will save man for worshipping him, and damn him for not worshipping him, so as he will be worshipped, certainly God hath revealed to man, how he will be worshipped, and that in some visible, in some permanent manner in writing, and that that writing is Scripture, if we had not these testimonies, these necessary consequences derived even from the natural reason of man to convince men, how should we convince them, since our way is not to create Faith, but to satisfy reason? And therefore let us rest in this testimony of men, that all Christian men, nay Jews and Turks too, have ever believed, that there are certain Scriptures, which are the revealed will of God, and that God hath manifested to us, in those Scriptures, all that he requires at our hands for Faith or Manners. Now, which are those Scriptures?

As for the whole body entirely together, so for the particular limbs and members of this body, the several books of the Bible, we must accept testimonium ab homine, human Arguments, and the testimony of men. At first, the Jews were the Depositaries of God's Oracles; and therefore the first Christians were to ask the Jews, which books were those Scriptures. Since the Church of God is the Master of those Rolls, no doubt but the Church hath Testimonium à Deo, The Spirit of God to direct her, in declaring what Books make up the Scripture; but yet even the Church, which is to deal upon men, proceedeth also per testimonium ab homine, by human Arguments, such as may work upon the reason of man, in declaring the Scriptures of God. For the New Testament, there is no question made of any Book, but in Conventicles of Anabaptists; and for the Old, it is testimony enough that we receive all that the Jews received. This is but the testimony of man, but such as prevails upon every man. It is somewhat boldly said, (not to permit to ourselves any severer, or more bitter animadversion upon him) by a great man in the Romam Church, that perchance the book of Enoch, which S. Jude cites in his Epistle, was not an Apocryphal book, but Canonical Scripture in the time of the Jews. As though the holy Ghost were a time-server, and would sometimes issue some things, for present satisfaction, which he would not avow nor stand to after; as though the holy Ghost had but a Lease for certain years, a determinable estate in the Scriptures, which might expire, and he be put from his evidence; that that book might become none of his, which was his before. We therefore, in receiving these books for Canonical, which we do, and in post-posing the Apochryphall, into an inferior place, have testimonium ab homine, testimony from the People of God, who were, and are the most competent, and unreproachable witnesses herein: and we have Testimonium ab inimico, testimony from our adversary himself, Perniciosius est Ecclesiae librum recipere pro sacro, qui non est, quàm sacrum rejicere, It is a more pernicious danger to the Church, to admit a book for Canonical, which is not so, then to reject one that is so. And therefore, ne turberis novitie, (saith another great Author of theirs) Let no young student in Divinity be troubled, si alicubi repererit, libros istos supputari inter Canonicos, if he find at any time, any of these books reckoned amongst the Canonical, nam ad Hiero. limam, verba Doctorum & Concilio rum reducenda, for saith he, Jerome's file must pass over the Doctors, and over the Councils too, and they must be understood, and interpreted according to S. Hier. now this is but testimonium ab homine, S. Hier. testimony, that prevailed upon Cajetan, and it was but testimonium ab homine, the testimony of the Jews, that prevailed upon S. Jerome himself.

It is so for the whole body, The bible; it is so for all the limbs of this body, every particular book of the Bible; and it is so, for the soul of this body, the true sense of every place, of very book thereof; for, for that, (the sense of the place) we must have testimonium ab homine, the testimony, that is, the interpretation of other men. Thou must not rest upon thyself, nor upon any private man. John was a witness that had witnesses, the Prophets had prophesied of John the Baptist. The men from whom we are to receive testimony of the sense of the Scriptures, must be men that have witnesses, that is, a visible and outward calling in the Church of God. That no sense be ever admitted, that derogateth from God, that makes him a false, or an impotent, or a cruel God, That every contradiction, and departing from the Analogy of Faith, doth derogate from God, and divers such grounds, and such inferences, as every man confesses, and acknowledges to be naturally and necessarily consequent, these are Testimonia ab homine, Testimonies that pass like currant money, from man to man, obvious to every man, suspicious to none. Thus it is in the general; but then, when it is deduced to a more particular trial, (what is the sense of such or such a place) when Christ saith, Scrutamini Scripturas, search the Scriptures, non mittit ad simplicem lectionem, sed ad scrutationem exquisitam, It is not a bare reading, but a diligent searching, that is enjoined us. Now they that will search, must have a warrant to search; they upon whom thou must rely for the sense of the Scriptures, must be sent of God by his Church. Thou art robbed of all, devested of all, if the Scriptures be taken from thee; Thou hast nowhere to search; bless God therefore, that hath kept thee in possession of that sacred Treasure, the Scriptures; and then, if any part of that treasure lie out of thy reach, or lie in the dark, so as that thou understandest not the place, search, that is, apply thyself to them that have warrant to search, and thou shalt lack no light necessary for thee. Either thou shalt understand that place, or the not understanding of it shall not be imputed to thee, nor thy salvation hindered by that Ignorance.

It is but to a woman that Saint Jerome saith, Ama Scripturas, & amabit te Sapientia, Love the Scriptures, and Wisdom will love thee: The weakness of her Sex must not avert her from reading the Scriptures. It is instruction for a Child, and for a Girle, that the same Father giveth, Septem annorum discat memoriter Psalterium, As soon as she is seven years old, let her learn all the Psalms without book; the tenderness of her age, must not avert her from the Scriptures. It is to the whole Congregation, consisting of all sorts and sexes, that Saint Chrysostom saith, Hortor, & hortari non desinam, I always do, and always will exhort you, ut cum domi fueritis, assiduae lectioni Scripturarum vacetis, that at home, in your own houses, you accustom your selves to a daily reading of the Scriptures. And after, to such men as found, or forced excuses for reading them, he saith with compassion, and indignation too, O homo, non est tuum Scripturas evolvere, quia innumeris curis distraheris? Busie man, belongeth it not to thee to study the Scriptures, because thou art oppressed with worldly business? Imomagis tuum est, saith he, therefore thou hadst the more need to study the Scriptures; Illi non tam egent, &c. They that are not disquieted, nor disordered in their passions, with the cares of this world, do not so much need that supply from the Scriptures, as you that are, do. It is an Author that lived in the obedience of the Roman Church, that saith, the Council of Nice did decree, That every man should have the Bible in his house. But another Author in that Church saith now, Consilium Chrysostomi Ecclesiae nunc non arridet; The Church doth not now like Chrysostom's counsel, for this general reading of the Scriptures, Quia etsi ill locutus ad plebem, plebs tunc non erat haeretica; Though Saint Chrysostom spoke that to the people, the people in his time were not an Heretical people: And are the people in the Roman Church now an Heretical people? If not, why may not they pursue Saint Chrystomes counsel, and read the Scriptures? Because they are dark? It is true, in some places they are dark; purposely left so by the Holy Ghost, ne semel lectas fastidiremus, lest we should think we had done when we had read them once; so saith S. Gregory too, In plain places, fami occurrit, he presents meat for every stomach; In hard and dark places, fastidia detergit, he sharpens the appetite: Margarita est, & undique perforari potest; the Scripture is a Pearl, and might be bored through everywhere. Not everywhere by thyself; there may be many places, which thou of thyself canst not understand; not everywhere by any other man; no not by them, who have warrant to search, Commission from God, by their calling, to interpret the Scriptures, not everywhere by the whole Church, God hath reserved the understanding of some places of Scripture, till the time come for the fulfilling of those Prophecies; as many places of the Old Testament were not understood, till Christ came, in whom they were fulfilled. If therefore thou wilt needs know, whether, when Saint Paul took his information of the behavior of the Corinthians, from those of Chloe, whether this Chloe, were a woman, or a place, the Fathers cannot satisfy thee, the latter Writers cannot satisfy thee, there is not Testimonium ab homine, no such human Arguments as can determine thee, or give thee an Acquittance; the greatest pillars whom God hath raised in his Church, cannot give a satisfaction to thy curiosity. But if the Doctrine of the place will satisfy thee, (which Doctrine is, that S. Paul did not give credit to light rumors against the Corinthians, nor to clandestine whisperers, but tells them who accused them, and yet, as well as he loved them, he did not stop his ears against competent witnesses, (for he tells them, they stood accused, and by whom) then thou mayest bore this pearl thorough, and make it fit for thy use, and wearing, in knowing so much of Saint Paul's purpose therein, as concerns thy edification, though thou never know, whether Chloe were a Woman, or a Place. Tantum veritati obstrepit adulter sensus; quam corruptor stylus; a false interpretation may do thee as much harm, as a false translation, a false Commentary, as a false copy; And therefore, forbearing to make any interpretation at all, upon dark places of Scripture, (especially those, whose understanding depends upon the future fulfilling of prophecies) in places that are clear, & evident thou mayest be thine own interpreter; In places that are more obscure, go to those men, whom God hath set over thee, and either they shall give thee that sense of the place, which shall satisfy thee, by having the sense thereof, or that must satisfy you, that there is enough for your salvation, though that remain uninterpreted. And let this Testimonium ab homine, this testimony of man establish thee for the Scripture, that there is a Scripture, a certain book, that is the word; and the revealed will of God; That these books which we receive for Canonical, make up that book; And then, that this and this is the true sense of every place, which the holy Ghost hath opened to the present understanding of his Church.

We said before, that a Christian being a Common-wealth to himself, the Scripture was his law, (and for that law, that Scripture, he was to have Testimonium ab homine, the testimony of man) And then, his Conscience is his Judge, and for that he is to have the same testimony too. Thou must not rest upon the testimony and suggestions of thine own conscience; Nec illud de trivio paratum habere, thou must not rest in that vulgar saying, sufficit mihi &c. As long as mine own Conscience stands right, I care not what all the world say. Thou must care what the world says, and study to have the approbation and testimony of good men. Every man is enough defamed in the general depravation of our whole naturē: Adam hath cast an infamy upon us all: And when a man is defamed, it is not enough that he purge himself by oath, but he must have compurgators too: other men must swear, that they believe he swears a truth. Thine own conscience is not enough, but thou must • atisfie the world, and have Testimonium ab homine, good men must think thee good. A conscience that admits no search from others, is cauterizata, burnt with a hot Iron; not cured, but seared; not at peace, but stupefied. And when in the verse immediately before our text, it is said, That John came to bear witness of that light, it is added, that through him, (that is, through that man, through John, not through it, through that light) that through him all men believe. For though it be efficiently the operation of the light it self, (that is, Christ himself) that all men believe yet the holy Ghost directs us to that that is nearest us, to this testimony of man, that instrumentally, ministerially works this belief in men. If then for thy faith, thou must have testimonium ab homine, the testimony of men, and mayest not believe as no man but thyself believes, much more for thy manners, and conversation. Think it not enough to satisfy thyself, but satisfy good men; nay weak men; nay malicious men: till it come so far, as that for the desire of satisfying man, thou leave God unsatisfied, endeavor to satisfy all. God must weigh down all; thyself and others; but as long as thyself only art in one balance, and other men in the other, let this preponderate; let the opinion of other men, weigh down thine own opinion of thyself. 'It is true, (but many men flatter themselves too far, with this truth) that it is a sin, to do anything in Conscientiâ dubiâ, when a man doubts whether he may do it, or no, and in Conscientiâ scrupulosâ, when the conscience hath received any single scruple, or suspicion to the contrary, and so too in conscientiâ opinante, in a conscience that hath conceived, but an opinion, (which is far from a debated, and deliberate determination) yea in conscientiâ errante, though the conscience be in an error, yet it is sin to do aright against the conscience; but then, as it is a sin, to do against the conscience laboring under any of these infirmities, so is it a greater sin, not to labor to recover the conscience, and devest it of those scruples, by their advise, whom God hath endued with knowledge, and power, for that purpose. For, (as it is in civil Judicature) God refers causes to them, and according to their reports, God's ordinary way is to decree the cause, to loose where they loose, to bind where they bind. Their imperfections, or their corruptions God knows how to punish in them; but thou shalt have the recompense of thy humility and thy obedience to his ordinance, in hearkening to them, whom he hath set over thee, for the rectifying of thy conscience. Neither is this to erect a parochial popacy, to make every minister a Pope in his own parish, or to re-enthrall you to a necessity of communicating all your sins, or all your doubtful actions to him; God forbid. God of his goodness hath delivered us, from that bondage, and butchery of the conscience, which our Fathers suffered from Rome, and Anathema, and Anathema Maran-atha, cursed be he till the Lord comes, and cursed when the Lord comes, that should go about to bring us in a relapse, in an eddy, in a whirlpool, into that disconsolate estate, or into any of the pestilent errors of that Church. But since you think it no diminution to you, to consult with a Physician for the state of your body, or with a Lawyer for your Lands, since you are not borne, nor grown good Physicians, and good Lawyers, why should you think yourselves born, or grown so good Divines, that you need no counsel, in doubtful cases, from other men? And therefore, as for the Law that governs us, that is, the Scripture, we go the way that Christ did, to receive the testimony of man, both for the body, that Scriptures there are, and for the limbs of that body, that these books make up those Scriptures, and for the soul of this body, that this is the sense of the holy Ghost in that place; so, for our Judge, which is the conscience, let that be directed before hand, by their advise whom God hath set over us, and settled, and quieted in us, by their testimony, who are the witnesses of our conversation. And so we have done with our Problematicall part; we have asked and answered both these questions, Why this light requires any testimony, (and that is because exhalations, and damps, and vapors arise, first from our ignorance, then from our incredulity, after from our negligence in practicing, and lastly, from our slipperiness in relapsing, and therefore we need more and more attestations, and remembrances of this light) and the other question, Why after so many other testimonies, (from himself, from his Father, from the Angel, from the Star, from the Magi, from Simeon, from Anna, from many, many, very many more) he required this testimony of John; and that is, because all those other witnesses had testified long before, and because God in all matters belonging to Religion here, or to salvation hereafter, refers us to man, but to man sent, and ordained by God, for our direction, that we may do well; and to the testimony of good men, that we have done well. And so we pass to our dogmatical part, what his testimony was; what John the Baptist and his successors in preaching, and preparing the ways of Christ, are sent to do; he was sent to bear witness of that light.

Princes which send Ambassadors, use to give them a Commission, containing the general scope of the business committed to them, and then Instructions, for the fittest way to bring that business to effect. And upon due contemplation of both these, (his Commission, and his Instructions) arises the use of the Ambassadors judgment and discretion, in making his Commission, and his Instructions, (which do not always agree in all points, but are often various, and perplexed) serve most advantageously towards the ends of his negotiation. John the Baptist had both; therefore they minister three considerations unto us; first, his Commission, what that was; and then his Instructions, what they were; and lastly, the execution, how he proceeded therein.

His Commission was drawn up, and written in Esa • , and recorded and entered into God's Rolls by the Evangelists. It was, To prepare the way of the Lord, to make straight his paths, that therefore every valley should be exalted, every mountain made law; and all this he was to cry out, to make them inexcusable, who contemn the outward Ministry, and rely upon private inspirations. This Commission lasts during God's pleasure; and God's pleasure is, that it should last to the end of the world; Therefore are we also joined in Commission with John, and we cry out still to you to all those purposes.

First, that you prepare the way of the Lord. But when we bid you do so, we do not mean, that this preparing or pre-disposing of yourselves, is in yourselves, that you can prevent God's preventing grace, or mellow, or supple, or fit yourselves for the entrance of that grace, by any natural faculty in yourselves. When we speak of a co-operation, a joint working with the grace of God, or of a post-operation, an after working upon the virtue of a former grace, this co-operation, & this post-operation must be mollified with a good concurrent cause with that grace. So there is a good sense of co-operation, and post-operation, but praeoperation, that we should work, before God work upon us, can admit no good interpretation. I could as soon believe that I had a being before God was, as that I had a will to good, before God moved it. But then, God having made his way into you, by his preventing grace, prepare that way, not your way, but his way, (says our Commission) that is, that way that he hath made in you, prepare that by forbearing and avoiding to cast new hindrances in that way. In sadness and dejections of spirit, seek not your comfort in drink, in music, in comedies, in conversation; for, this is but a preparing a way of your own. To prepare the Lord's way, is to look, and consider, what way the Lord hath taken, in the like cases, in the like distresses with other servants of his, and to prepare that way in thyself, and to assure thyself, that God hath but practiced upon others, that he might be perfect when he comes to thee, and that he intends to thee, in these thy tribulations, all that he hath promised to all, all that he hath already performed to any one. Prepare his way; apply that way, in which he hath gone to others, to thyself.

And then, by our Commission we cry out to you, to make straight his paths. In which we do not require, that you should absolutely rectify all the deformities and crookedness, which that Tortuositas Serpentis, the winding of the old Serpent hath brought you to; for, now the stream of our corrupt nature, is accustomed to that crooked channel, and we cannot divert that, we cannot come to an absolute directnesse, and streightnesse, and profession in this life; and, in this place, the holy Ghost speaks but of a way, a path; not of our rest in the end, but of our labor in the way. Our Commission then is not to those sinless men, that think they have nothing for God to forgive; But, when we bid you make straight his paths, (as before we directed you, to take knowledge what his ways towards others had been) so here we intend, that you should observe, which is the Lord's path into you, by what way he comes oftnest into you, who are his Temple, and do not lock that door, do not pervert, do not cross, do not deface that path. The ordinary way, even of the holy Ghost, for the conveying of faith, and supernatural graces, is (as the way of worldly knowledge is) by the senses: where his way is by the care, by hearing his word preached; do not thou cross that way of his, by an inordinate delight, in hearing the eloquence of the preacher; for, so thou hearest the man, and not God, and goest thy way, and not his. God hath divers ways into divers men; into some he comes at noon, in the sunshine of prosperity; to some in the dark and heavy clouds of adversity. Some he affects with the music of the Church, some with some particular Collect or Prayer; some with some passage in a Sermon, which takes no hold of him, that stands next him. Watch the way of the Spirit of God, into thee; that way which he makes his path, in which he comes oftnest to thee, and by which thou findest thyself most affected, and best disposed towards him, and pervert not that path, foul not that way. Make straight his paths, that is, keep them straight; and when thou observest, which is his path in thee, (by what means especially he works upon thee) meet him in that path, embrace him in those means, and always bring a facile, a fusil, a ductile, a tractable soul, to the offers of his grace, in his way.

Our Commission reaches to the exalting of your valleys, Let every valley be exalted; In which, we bid you not to raise yourselves in this world, to such a spiritual heighth, as to have no regard to this world, to your bodies, to your fortunes, to your families. Man is not all soul, but a body too; and, as God hath married them together in thee, so hath he commanded them mutual duties towards one another; and God allows us large uses of temporal blessings, and of recreations too. To exalt valleys, is not to draw up flesh, to the heighth of spirit; that cannot be, that should not be done. But it is to draw you so much towards it, as to consider (and consider with an application) that the very Law, which was but the schoolmaster to the Gospel, was given upon a mountain; That Moses could not so much as see the Land of promise, till he was brought up into a mountain; That the inchoation of Christ glory, which was his transfiguration, was upon a mountain; That his conversation with God in prayer; That his return to his eternal Kingdom by his ascension, was so too, from a mountain; even his exinanition, his evacuation, his lowest humiliation, his crucifying was upon a mountain; and he calls, even that humiliation, an exaltation, Si exaltatus, If I be exalted, lifted up, says Christ signifying what death he should die. Now, if our depressions, our afflictions be exaltations, (so they were to Christ, so they are to every good Christian) how far doth God allow us, an exalting of our valleys, in a considering with a spiritual boldness, the heighth and dignity of mankind, and to what glory God hath created us. Certainly man may avoid as many sins, by this exalting his valleys, this considering the heighth and dignity of his nature, as by the humblest meditations in the world. For, upon those words of Job, Manus tuae fecerunt me, Saint Gregory says, Misericordiae judicis, dignitatem suae conditionis opponit; Job presents the dignity of his creation, by the hand of God, as an inducement why God should regard him; It is not his valley, but his mountains, that he brings into God's sight; not that dust which God took into his hands, when he made him, but that person which the hands of God had made of that dust. Man is an abridgement of all the world; and as some Abridgements are greater, then some other authors, so is one man of more dignity, then all the earth. And therefore exalt thy valleys, raise thyself above the pleasures that this earth can promise. And above the sorrows, it can threaten too. A painter can hardly diminish or contract an Elephant into so little a form, but that that Elephant, when it is at the least, will still be greater then an Ant at the life, and the greatest. Sin hath diminished man shrowdly, and brought him into a narrower compass; but yet, his natural immortality, (his soul cannot die) and his spiritual possibility, even to the last gasp, of spending that immortality in the kingdom of glory, and living forever with God, (for otherwise, our immortality were the heaviest part of our curse) exalt this valley, this cold of earth, to a noble heighth. How ill husbands then of this dignity are we by sin, to forfeit it by submitting ourselves to inferior things? either to gold, then which every worm, (because a worm hath life, and gold hath none) is in nature, more estimable, and more precious; Or, to that which is less then gold, to Beauty; for there went neither labor, nor study, nor cost to the making of that; (the Father cannot diet himself so, nor the mother so, as to be sure of a fair child) but it is a thing that happened by chance, wheresoever it is; and, as there are Diamonds of divers waters, so men enthrall themselves in one clime to a black, in another to a white beauty. To that which is less then gold or Beauty, voice, opinion, fame, honor, we sell ourselves. And though the good opinion of good men, by good ways, be worth our study, yet popular applause, and the voice of inconsiderate men, is too cheap a price to set ourselves at. And yet, it is hardly got too; for as a ship that lies in harbor within land, sometimes needs most of the points of the Compass, to bring her forth: so if a man surrender himself wholly to the opinion of other men, and have not his Criterium, his touchstone within him, he will need both North and South, all the points of the Compass, the breath of all men; because, as there are contrary Elements in everybody, so there are contrary factions in every place, and when one side cries him up, the other will depress him, and he shall, (if not shipwreck) lie still. But yet we do forfeit our dignity, for that which is less then all, then Gold, then Beauty, then Honor; for sin; sin which is but a privation, (as darkness is but a privation) and privations are nothing. And therefore exalt every valley, consider the dignity of man in his nature, and then, in the Son of God his assuming that nature, which gave it a new dignity, and this will beget in thee a Pride that God loves, a valuing of thyself above all the temptations of this world.

But yet exalt this valley temperately, consider and esteem this dignity modestly, for our Commission goes farther, not only to the exalting of every valley, but, Omnis mons humiliabitur, every mountain must be made low: which is not to bring our mountainous, and swelling affections, and passions, to that flatnesse, as that we become stupid, and insensible. Mortification is not to kill nature, but to kill sin. Bring therefore your Ambition to that bent, to covet a place in the kingdom of heaven, bring your anger, to flow into zeal, bring your love to enamour you of that face, which is fairer then the children of men, that face, on which the Angels desire to look, Christ Jesus, and you have brought your mountains to that lowness, which is intended, and required here.

Now, this Commission, John the Baptist was, and we are, to publish in deserto, in the Desert, in the wilderness; that is, as Saint Jerome notes, not in Jerusalem, in a tumult • ary place, a place of distraction, but in the Desert, a place of solitude, and retiredness. And yet this does not imply an abandoning of society, and mutual offices, and callings in the world, but only informs us, that every man is to have a Desert in himself, a retiring into himself, sometimes of emptying himself of worldly businesses, and that he spend some hours in such solitudes, and lay aside, (as one would lay aside a garment) the Lawyer, the Physician, the Merchant, or whatsoever his profession be, and say, Domine hîe sum, Lord, I am here, I, he whom thou madest, and such as thou madest him, not such as the world hath made me, Hî sum, I am here, not where the affairs of the world scatter me, but here, in this retiredness, Lord, I am here, command what thou wilt; in this retiredness, in this solitude, (but is not a Court, is not an Army, is not a Fair a solitude, in respect of this association, when God and a good soul are met?) but in this home solitude, in this home Desert, are we commanded to publish this Commission, as the fittest time to make impressions of all the parts thereof, Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his path, exalt your valleys, and bring down your mountains. And this was John Baptists Commission, What to do, And then he had Instructions with his Commission, how to do it; which is another consideration.

His Commission was long before in Isaiah, so he was Legatus natus, born an Ambassador; his Instructions were delivered to him by God immediately, when The Word of God came unto John, in the wilderness. Princes oftentimes vary their Instructions from their Commissions, and to perplex their Ambassadors, God proceeded with John Baptist, and doth with us directly. Our Commission is to conform you to him, our Instructions are to do that, that way, By preaching the Baptism of Repentance, for the remission of sins. It is, in a word, by the Word and Sacraments. First, he sends us not as Spies, to lie, and learn, nor to learn and lie; but to deal apertly, manifestly, to publish, to preach; which as it forbids forcible and violent pressing the Conscience by secular or Ecclesiastical authority, so it forbids clandestin and whispering Conventicles; It is a Preaching, a working by instructing and informing the understanding; it is a Preaching a public avowing of God's Ordinance, in a right Calling. He gives us not our Instructions to offer Peace and reconciliation to all, and yet he not mean it to all; He bids us preach unto all; he bids all hearers repent, and he allows us to set to his seals of reconciliation, to all that come as penitents. He knows who will, and who will not repent, we do not; but both he knows, and so do we, that all may, so far as that, if they do not, they find enough in themselves to condemn themselves, and to discharge God and us. Our Instructions are to preach, that is our way, and to preach Repentance; there begin you in your own bosoms: He that seeks upwards to a River, is sure to find that head; but he that upon every bubbling spring, will think to find a River, by that may err many ways. If thou repent truly, thou art sure to come up to God's Decree for thy salvation; but if thou begin above at the Decree, and say, I am saved, therefore I shall repent, thou mayest miss both. Repent, and you shall have the Seals; the Seals are the Sacraments; John's was Baptism; but to what? He baptized to the amendment of life. This then is the chain; we preach, you repent; then we give you the Seals, the Sacraments, and you plead them, that is, declare them in a holy life; for, till that (Sanctification) come, Preaching, and Repentance, atd Seals, are ineffectual. A good life inanimates all. And so, having done with his Commission, what he was to do, and his Instructions, how he was to do it, we pass to our last branch, in this last part, The execution of his Commission, and Instructions, what, and how he did it, what Testimony he gave of this light.

First, he testified, se non esse, that he was not this light, this Christ, this Messias. And secondly, Christum esse, that this light, this Christ, this Messias was come into the world, there was no longer expectation: And lastly, hunc esse, that this particular person whom he designed and specified in the Ecce Agnus, behold the Lamb of God, was this Light, this Christ, this Messias. He was not, One was, Christ was; In these three consists his Testimony. First, he testified that himself was not the Messias, he confessed and denied not, and said plainly, I am not the Christ. Therefore, lest I. Baptist might be overvalued, and their devotions fixed and determined in him, S. Augustine enlarges this consideration, Erat Mons illustratus, non ipse Sol; John the Baptist was a hill, and a hill gloriously illustrated by the Sun, but he was not that Sun; Mirare, mirare, sed tanquam montem; John the Baptist deserves a respect, and a regard; but regard him, and respect him but as an hill, which though high, lis but the same earth; and mons • int •• ebiis est nisi luce luce vestiatur, A hill hath no more light in itself, then the valley, till the light invest it; Si montem esse lucem putas, in monte naufragium facies; If you take the hill, because it shines, to be the light itself, you shipwreck upon the top of a hill. If we rest in the person, or in the gifts of any man, to what heighth soever this hill be raised in opinion, or in the Church, still we mistake; John the Baptist, men of the greatest endowments, and goodness too, are but instruments, they are not the workman himself. And therefore as they are most inexcusable, that put an infallibility in the breast of one man, (our adversaries of Rome ) so do they transgress too far that way, that run, and pant, and thrust after strange preachers, and leave their own Church deserted, and their own Pastor discouraged; for someone family, by the greatness thereof, or by the estimation thereof, may induce both those inconveniences. Truly, though it may seem boldly said, it may be said safely, that we were better hear some weaknesses from our own Pastor, then some excellencies from another; go farther, some mistakings from our own, then some truths from another; for, all truths are not necessary; nor all mistakings pernicious; but obedience to order is necessary, and all disorder pernicious. Now what a way had John the Baptist open to him, if he had been popularly disposed. Amongst a people, that at that time expected their Messias, (for, all the Prophecies preceding his coming were then fulfilled) and such a Messias as should be a Temporal King, and had invested an opinion, that he, John the Baptist, was that Christ, what rebellions, what earth-quakes, what inundations of people might he have drawn after him, if he would have countenanced and cherished their error to his advantage? They would have lacked no Scriptures, to authorize their actions. They would have found particular places of the Prophets, to have justified any act of theirs, in advancing their Messias, then expected. Therein he is our pattern; not to preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus; not to preach for admiration, but for edification; not to preach to advance civil ends, without spiritual ends; to promote all the way the peace of all Christian Kingdoms, but to refer all principally to the Kingdom of peace, and the King of peace, the God of heaven. He confessed, and denied not, and said plainly, I am not the Christ; That was his Testimony; we confess, and deny not, and say plainly, That our own parts, our own passions, the purpose of great persons, the purpose of any State, is not Christ; we preach Christ Jesus, and him crucified; and whosoever preaches any other Gospel, or any other thing for Gospel, let him be accursed.

I am not the man, says John the Baptist, for, that man is God too; but yet that man, that God, that Messias consisting of both, is come, though I be not he. There is one amongst you, whom you know not, whose shoe-latchet I am not worthy to loose. In which, he says all this; There is one among you; you need seek no farther; all the promises, and Prophecies, (the Semen mulieris, That the seed of the woman should bruise the Serpents head; the appropriation to Abraham, In semine tuo, In thy seed shall all Nations be blessed: the fixation upon David, Donec Shiloh, till Shiloh come; Isaiah's Virgo concipiet, Behold a Virgin shall conceive; Micah's & tu Bethlehem, that Bethlehem should be the place, Daniel's seventy Hebdomades, that that should be the time,) all promises, all prophecies, all computations are at an end, the Messias is come.

Is he come, and amongst you, and do you not know him? what will make you know him? You believe you need a Messias; you cannot restore yourself. You believe this Messias must come at a certain time, specified by certain marks; were all these marks upon any other? or lacks there any of these in him? Do you thus magnify me, and neglect a person, whose shoe-latchet I am not worthy to loose. John the Baptist was a Prophet, more then a Prophet, The greatest of the sons of women: Who could be so much greater then he, and not the Messias? we must necessarily enwrap all these three in one another, and into one another they do easily and naturally fall: He testifies that he was not the man, (he preaches not himself) he testifies that that man is come; (future expectations are frivolous) and he testifies, that the characters and marks of the expected Messias, can fall upon none but this man, and therefore he delivers him over to them with that confidence, Ecce Agnus Dei, Behold the Lamb of God, there you may see him; and this is his Testimony.

These three, we, we to whom John Baptists Commission is continued, testify too. First, we tell you, what is not Christ; austerity of life, and outward sanctity is not he; John the Baptist had them abundantly, but yet permitted not, that they should have that opinion of him. But yet, much less is chambering and wantonness, and persevering in sin, that Christ, or the way to him. We tell you, stetit in medio, he hath been amongst you, you have heard him preached in your ears; yea ye have heard him knock at your hearts, and for all that, we tell you that you have not known him. Which, though it be the discomfortablest thing in the world, (not to have known Christ in those approaches) yet we tell it you somewhat to your comfort; and to your excuse, for, had you known • it, you would not have crucified the Lord of glory, as we do all, by our daily sins. And though God have winked at these times of ignorance, (pretermitted your former inconsiderations) now, he commandeth all men everywhere to repent. And therefore, that thou mayest know, even thou, (as Christ iterates it) at least in this thy day, the things which belong to thy Peace, we tell you who he is, and where he is; Ecce agnus Dei, Behold the lamb of God, Here, here in this his ordinance he supplicates you, when the Minister, how mean soever, prays you, in his stead, be ye reconciled to God. Here he proclaims, and cries to you, Venite omnes, come all that are weary and heavy laden. Here he bleeds in the Sacrament, here he takes away the sins of the world, in deriving a jurisdiction upon us, to bind and loose upon earth, that which he will bind and loose in heaven. This we testify to you; Do you but receive this testimony. Till you hear that voice of consummation in heaven, Venite benedicti, come ye blessed, you shall never hear a more comfortable Gospel then this, which was preached by Christ himself, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, to preach the Gospel to the poor, to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and the acceptable year of the Lord: for, this was not a deliverance from their brick-making in Egypt, nor from their scorns and contempts in Babylon, but a deliverance from that inexpressible, that inconceivable bondage of sin, and death, not by the hand of a Moses, but a Messias, Opt as dare qui praecipit petere, he that commands us to ask, would fain give: Cupit largiri, qui desider at postulari, he that desires us to pray to him, hath that ready, and a readiness to give that, that he bids us pray for. If the King give a general pardon, will any man be so suspiciously treacherous in his own behalf, as to say, for all this large extent of his mercy, he meant not me, and therefore I will sue out no pardon? If the King cast a donative, at his Coronation, will any man lie still and say, he meant none of that money to me? When the master of the feast sent his servants for guests, had it become those poor, and may • ed, and halt, and blind, to have stood and disputed with the steward, and said, Surely sir, you mistook your Master, your Master did not mean us? Why should any man think that God means not him? When he offers grace, and salvation to all, why not to him? Should God exclude him as a man? Why, God made him good, and, as a man and his creature, he is good still. But, non Deus Esan hominem odit, fed odit Esau peccatorem? God did not hate Esau, as he was a man, but as he was a sinner. Should he exclude him as a sinner? Why then he should receive none, for we are all so; and he came for none but such, but sinners. Perfectiorum est nihil in peccatore odiisse praeter peccata, To hate nothing in a sinner, but his sin, is a great degree of perfection; God is that perfection; he hates nothing in thee but thy sin; and that sin he hath taken upon himself, and sees it not in thee. Should he exclude thee because thou art impenitent, because thou hast not repented? Do it now. Peccasti, paenitere, Hast thou sinned? repent. Millies peccasti? millies poenitere? Hast thou multiplied thy sins by thousands? multiply thy penitent tears so too. Should he exclude thee, because thou art impenitible, thou canst not repent; how knowest thou thou canst not repent? Doest thou try, doest thon endeavor, doest thou strive? why, this, this holy contention of thine is repentance. Discredit not God's evidence; he offers thee Testimonium ab homine, the testimony of man, of the man of God, the Minister, that the promises of the Gospel belong to thee. Judge not against that evidence; confess that there is no other name given under heaven, to be saved, but the name of Jesus, and that that is. And then, when thou hast thus admitted his witnesses to thee, that his preaching hath wrought upon thee, be thou his witness to others, by thy exemplar life, and holy conversation. In this chapter, in the calling of the Apostles some such thing is intimated, when of those two Disciples, which, upon John's testimony, followed Christ, one is named, (Andrew) and the other is not named. No doubt, but the other is also written in the book of life, and long since enjoys the blessed fruit of that his forwardness. But in the testimony of the Gospel, written for posterity, only Andrew is named, who sought out his brother Simon, and drew him in, and so propagated the Church, and spread the Glory of God. They who testify their faith by works, give us the better comfort, and posterity the better example. It will be but Christ's first question at the last day, What hast thou done for me? If we can answer that, he will ask, What hast thou suffered for me? and if we can answer that, he will ask, at last, Whom hast thou won to me, what soul hast thou added to my Kingdom? Our thoughts, our words, our doings, our sufferings, if they bring but ourselves to Heaven, they are not Witnesses; our example brings others; and that is the purpose, and the end of all we have said, John the Baptist was a witness to us, we are so to you, be you so to one another.

SERMON XXXIX.

Preached at Saint Paul's.

T His is one of those places of Scripture, which afford an argument for that, which I find often occasion to say, That there are not so eloquent books in the world, as the Scriptures. For there is not only that non refugit, which Calvin speaketh of in this place, (Non refugit in Organis suis Spiritus Sanctus leporem & facetias, The Holy Ghost in his Instruments, (in those whose tongues or pens he makes use of) doth not forbid, nor decline elegant and cheerful, and delightful expression; but as God gave his Children a bread of Manna, that tasted to every man like that that he liked best, so hath God given us Scriptures, in which the plain and simple man may hear God speaking to him in his own plain and familiar language, and men of larger capacity, and more curiosity, may hear God in that Musique that they love best, in a curious, in an harmonious style, unparalleled by any. For, that also Calvin adds in that place, that there is no secular Author, Qui jucundis vocum allusionibus, & figuris magis abundat, which doth more abound with persuasive figures of Rhetoric, nor with musical cadences and allusions, and assimilations, and conformity, and correspondency of words to one another, then some of the Secretaries of the Holy Ghost, some of the authors of some books of the Bible do. Of this Rule, this Text is an example. These Philippians, amongst whom Saint Paul had planted the Gospel in all sincerity, and impermixt, had admitted certain new men, that preached Traditionall, and Additionall Doctrines, the Law with the Gospel, Moses with Christ, Circumcision with Baptism. To these new Convertites, these new Doctors inculcated often that charm, You are the Circumcision, you are they whom God hath sealed to himself by the Seal of Circumcision; They whom God hath distinguished from all Nations, by the mark of Circumcision; They in whom God hath imprinted, (and that in so high a way, as by a Sacrament ) an internal Circumcision, in an external; and will you break this Seal of Circumcision? will you deface this mark of Circumcision? will you depart from this Sacrament of Circumcision? You are the Circumcision. Now Saint Paul meets with these men upon their haunt; and even in the sound of that word which they so often pressed; he says they press upon you Circumcision, but beware of Concision, of tearing the Church of God, of Schisms, and separations from the Church of God, of aspersions and imputations upon the Church of God, either by imaginary superfluities, or imaginary defectivenesse, in that Church: for, saith the Apostle, We are the Circumcision, we who worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. If therefore they will set up another Circumcision beyond this Circumcision, if they will continue a significative, a relative, a preparative figure, after the substance, the body, Christ Jesus is manifested to us, a legal Circumcision in the flesh, after the spiritual Circumcision in the heart is established by the Gospel, their end is not Circumcision, but Concision: they pretend Reformation, but they intend Destruction, a tearing, a renting, a wounding the body, and frame, and peace of the Church, and by all means, and in all cases Videte Concisionem, Beware of Concision.

First then, we shall from these words consider, the loathness of God to lose us. For, first, he leaves us not without a Law, he bids and he forbids, and then he does not surprise us with obsolete laws, he leaves not his laws without proclamations, he refreshes to our memories, and represents to us our duties, with such commonefactions as these in our Text, Videte, Cavete, this and this I have commanded you, Videte, see that ye do it, this and this will hinder you, Cavete, beware ye do it not, Beware of Concision.

And this, thus derived, and digested into these three branches: first, God's loathness to lose us; and then his way of drawing us to him, by manifestation of his will in a law; and lastly his way of holding us with him, by making that law effectual upon us, by these his frequent commonefactions, Videte, Cavete, look to it, beware of it, this will be our first part. And then our second will be the thing itself that falls under this inhibition, and caution, which is Concision, that is, a tearing, a renting, a shredding in pieces that which should be entire. In which second part, we shall also have, (as we had in the former) three branches; for, we shall consider, first, Concisionem corporis, the shredding of the body of Christ into fragments, by unnecessary wrangling in Doctrinal points; and then, Concisionem vestis, the shredding of the garment of Christ into rags, by unnecessary wrangling in matter of Discipline, and ceremonial points; and lastly, Concisionem spiritus, (which will follow upon the former two) the concision of thine own spirit, and heart, and mind, and soul, and conscience, into perplexities, and into sandy, and incoherent doubts, and scruples, and jealousies, and suspicions of God's purpose upon thee, so as that thou shalt not be able to recollect thyself, nor reconsolidate thyself, upon any assurance, and peace with God, which is only to be had in Christ, and by his Church. Videte Concisionem, beware of tearing the body, the Doctrine; beware of tearing the Garment, the Discipline; beware of tearing thine own spirit, and conscience, from her adhaesion, her agglutination, her cleaving to God, in a holy tranquility, and acquiescence in his promise, and mercy, in the merits of his Son, applied by the holy Ghost, in the Ministry of the Church.

For our first consideration, of God's loathness to lose us, this is argument enough • That we are here now, now at the participation of that grace, which God always offers to all such Congregations as these, gathered in his name. For, I pray God there stand any one amongst us here now, that hath not done something since yesterday, that made him unworthy of being here today; and who, if he had been left under the damp, and mist of yesterdayes sin, without the light of new grace, would never have found way hither of himself. If God be weary of me, and would fain be rid of me, he needs not repent that he wrapped me up in the Covenant, and derived me of Christian parents, (though he gave me a great help in that ) nor repent that he bred me in a true Church, (though he afforded me a great assistance in that ) nor repent that he hath brought me hither now, to the participation of his Ordinances, (though thereby also I have a great advantage) for, if God be weary of me, and would be rid of me, he may find enough in me now, and here, to let me perish. A present levity in me that speak, a present formality in you that hear, a present Hypocrisy spread over us all, would justify God; if now, and here, he should forsake us. When our blessed Savior says, When the Son of man comes, shall he find faith upon earth? we need not limit that question so, if he come to a Westminster, to an Exchange, to an Army, to a Court, shall he find faith there? but if he come to a Church, if he come hither, shall he find faith here? If (as Christ speaks in another sense, That Judgment should begin at his own house, ) the great and general judgment should begin now at this his house, and that the first that should be taken up in the clouds, to meet the Lord Jesus, should be we, that are met now in this his house, would we be glad of that acceleration, or would we thank him for that haste? Men of little faith, I fear we would not. There was a day, when the Sons of God presented themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also amongst them; one Satan amongst many Sons of God. Blessed Lord, is not our case far otherwise? do not we, (we, who, as we are but we, are all the Sons of Satan) present ourselves before thee, and yet, thou Lord art amongst us? Is not the spirit of slumber and weariness upon one, and the spirit of detraction, and mis-interpretation upon another; upon one the spirit of impenitence for former sins, and the spirit of recidivation into old, or of facility and opennesse to admit temptations into new upon another? We, as we are but we, are all the Sons of Satan, and thou Lord, the only Son of God, only amongst us. If thou Lord wert weary of me, and wouldest be rid of me, (may many a soul here say) Lord thou knowest, and I know many a midnight, when thou mightest have been rid of me, if thou hadst left me to myself then. But vigilavit Doninus, the Lord vouchsafed to watch over me, and deliciae ejus, the delight of the Lord was to be with me; And what is there in me, but his mercy? but then, what is there in his mercy, that that may not reach to all, as well as to me? The Lord is loath to lose any, the Lord would not the death of any; not of any sinner; much less if he do not see him, nor consider him so; the Lord would not lose him, though a sinner, much less make him a sinner, that he might be lost: Vult omnes, the Lord would have all men come unto him, and be saved, which was our first consideration, and we have done with that, and our second is, The way by which he leads us to him, that he declares and manifests his will unto us, in a Law, he bids, and he forbids.

The laborers in the Vine-yard took it ill at the Stewards hand, and at his Masters too, that those which came late to the labor, were made equal with them, who had borne the heat, and the burden of the day. But if the Steward, or the Master had never meant, or actually never had given anything at all, to them that had borne the heat and the burden of the day, there had been much more cause of complaint, because there had passed a contract between them. So hath there passed a contract between God, and us, Believe, and thou shalt live, Do this and thou shalt live. And in this especially hath God expressed his love to us, and his lothenesse to lose us, that he hath passed such a contract with us, and manifested to us a way, to come to him. We say, every day, in his own prayer, Fiat voluntas tua, thy will be done; that is, done by us, as well as done upon us. But this petition presumes another; the Fiat suposes a Patefiat voluntas, if it must be done, it must be known. If man were put into this world, & under an obligation of doing the will of God, upon damnation, and had no means to know that will which he was bound to do, of all creatures he were the most miserable. That which we read, Lord what is man that thou takest knowledge of him? the Vulgat edition; and the Fathers following the Septuagint, read thus, Quia innotuisti ei, Lord what is man that he should have any knowledge of thee, that thou shouldest make thyself known to him? This is the heighth of the mercy of God, this innotescence, this manifestation of himself to us. Now what is this innotescence, this manifestation of God to us? It is, say our old Expositors, the law. That's that, which is so often called the face of God, and the light of his Countenance; for, facies Dei est, qua nobis innotescit, that's God's face, by which God is known to us, and that's his law, the declaration of his will to me, and my way to him. When Christ reproaches those hard-hearted men, that had not fed him, when he was hungry, nor clothed him, when he was naked, and that they say, Lord when did we see thee naked, or see thee hungry? (inconsiderate men, or men loath to give, the penurious and narrow soul, shall not see an occasion of charity, when it is presented, which is a heavy blindness, and obcaecation, not to see occasions of doing good) yet those men do not say, when did we see thee at all, as though they had never seen him? The blindest man that is, hath the face of God so turned towards him, as that he may be seen by him; even the natural man hath so; for, therefore does the Apostle make him inexcusable, if in the visible work, he do not see the invisible God. But all sight of God, is by the benefit of a law; the natural man sees him by a law written in his heart, the Jew, by a law given by Moses, the Christian, in a clearer glass, for, his law is the Gospel. But there is more mercy, that is, more manifestation in this text, then all this. For, besides the natural man's seeing God, in a law, in the faculties of his own nature, (which we consider to be the work of the whole Trinity, in that Faciamus hominē, Let us make man in our own Image, let us shine out in him, so as that he may be a glass, in which he may see us, in himself) and besides the Jews seeing of God in the law written in the stone tables, (which we consider to be the work of the Father) And besides the Christians seeing of God, in the law written in blood, (in which we consider especially the Son) there is in this text an operation, a manifestation of God, proper to the holy Ghost, and wrought by his holy suggestions and inspirations, That God does not only speak to us, but call upon us; not only give us a Law, but Proclamations upon that law, that he refreshes to our memories, general duties, by such particular warnings, and excitations, and commonefactions, as in this text, Videte, Beware, which is the last branch of this part, though it be the first word of our text, Videte, Beware.

Nothing exalts God's goodness towards us, more then this, that he multiplies the means of his mercy to us, so, as that no man can say, once I remember I might have been saved, once God called unto me, once he opened me a door, a passage into heaven, but I neglected that, went not in then, and God never came more. No doubt, God hath come often to that door since, and knocked, and staid at that door; And if I knew who it were that said this, I should not doubt to make that suspicious soul see, that God is at that door now. God hath spoken once, and twice have I heard him; for the foundation of all. God hath spoken but once, in his Scriptures. Therefore doth Saint Jude call that fidem semel traditam, the faith once delivered to the Saints; once, that is, at once; not at once so, all at one time, or in one man's age; the Scriptures were not delivered so; for, God spoke by the mouth of the Prophets, that have been, since the world began; But, at once, that is, by one way, by writing, by Scriptures; so, as that after that was done, after God had declared his whole will, in the Law, and the Prophets, and the Gospel, there was no more to be added. God hath spoken once, in his Scriptures, and we have heard him twice, at home, in our own readings, and again and again here, in his Ordinances. This is the heighth of God's goodness, that he gives us his Law, and a Comment upon that Law, Proclamations, declarations upon that Law. For, without these subsequent helps, even the law it self might be mistaken; as you see it was, when Christ was put to rectify them, with his Audiistis, and Audiistis, this you have heard, and this hath been told you, Ego autem dico, but this I say, ab initio, from the beginning it was not so, the foundations were not thus laid, and upon the foundations laid by God in the Scriptures, and not upon the superedifications of men, in traditional additions, must we build. In storms and tempests at sea men come sometimes to cut down Galleries, and tear up Cabins, and cast them overboard to ease the ship, and sometimes to hew down the Mast it self, though without that Mast the ship can make no way; but no soul weather can make them tear out the keele of the ship, upon which the ship is built. In cases of necessity, the Church may forbear her Galleries, and Cabinets, means of ease and conveniency; yea, and her Mast too, means of her growth, and propagation, and enlarging of her self, and be content to hull it out, and consist in her present, or a worse state, during the storm. But to the keele of the ship, to the fundamental articles of Religion, may no violence, in any case, be offered.

God multiplies his mercies to us, in his divers ways of speaking to us. Caeli enarrant, says David, The heavens declare the glory of God; and not only by showing, but by saying; there is a language in the heavens; for it is enarrant, a verbal declaration; and, as it follows literally, Day unto day uttereth speech. This is the true harmony of the Spheres, which every man may hear. Though he understand no tongue but his own, he may hear God in the motions of the same, in the seasons of the year, in the vicissitudes and revolutions of Church, and State, in the voice of Thunder, and lightnings, and other declarations of his power. This is God's English to thee, and his French, and his Latin, and Greek, and Hebrew to others. God once confounded languages; that conspiring men might not understand one another, but never so, as that all men might not understand him. When the holy Ghost fell upon the Apostles, they spoke so, as that all men understood them, in their own tongues. When the holy Ghost fell upon the waters, in the Creation, God spoke so, in his language of Works, as that all men may understand them. For, in this language, the language of works, the Eye is the ear, seeing is hearing. How often does the holy Ghost call upon us, in the Scriptures, Ecce, quia os Domini locutum, Behold, the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it? he calls us to behold, (which is the office of the eye ) and that that we are to behold, is the voice of God, belonging to the ear; seeing is hearing, in God's first language, the language of works. But then God translates himself, in particular works; nationally, he speaks in particular judgments, or deliverances to one nation; &, domestically, he speaks that language to a particular family; & so personally too; he speaks to every particular soul. God will speak unto me, in that voice, and in that way, which I am most delighted with, & hearken most to. If I be covetous, God will tell me that heaven is a pearl, a treasure. If cheerful and affected with mirth, that heaven is all Joy. If ambitious, and hungry of preferment, that it is all Glory. If sociable, and conversable, that it is a communion of Saints. God will make a Fever speak to me, and tell me his mind, that there is no health but in him, God will make the disfavour, and frowns of him I depend upon, speak to me, and tell me his mind, that there is no safe dependence, no assurance but in him; God will make a storm at Sea, or a fire by land, speak to me, and tell me his mind, that there is no perpetuity, no possession but in him; nay, God will make my sin speak to me, and tell me his mind; even my sin shall be a Sermon, and a Catechism to me; God shall suffer me me to fall into some such sin, as that by some circumstances in the sin, or consequences from the sin, I shall be drawn to hearken unto him; and whether I hear Hosannaes, acclamations, and commendations, or Crucifiges, exclamations and condemnations from the world, I shall still find the voice and tongue of God, though in the mouth of the Devil, and his instruments. God is a declaratory God. The whole year, is, to his Saints, a continual Epiphany, one day of manifestation. In every minute that strikes upon the Bell, is a syllable, nay a syllogism from God. And, and in my last Bell, God shall speak too; that Bell, when it tolls, shall tell me I am going, and when it rings out, shall tell you I am gone into the hands of that God, who is the God of the living and not of the dead, for, they die not that depart in him. Dives pressed Abraham to send a preacher from the dead, to his brethren. This was to put God to a new language, when he had spoken sufficiently by Moses, and the Prophets. And yet, even in this language, the tongue of the dead, hath God spoken too. Saint Jerome says, that that Prophet Jonah, who was sent to Nineveh, was the same man, whom, being then a child, and dead in his mothers house, the widow of Zarepta's house, Elias the Prophet raised to life again; and so, God spoke to Nineveh in that language, in the tongue of the dead. But be that but Problematicall, wrapped up in a Traditionall, and Historical faith, this is Dogmatical, and irrefragable, that God hath spoken to the whole world in the tongue of the dead, in his Son Christ Jesus, the Lord of life, and yet the first borne of the dead. God is loath to lose us, at worst, and therefore, did not, surely, reject us, before we were ill, (And that was our first) God hath drawn us to him, by manifesting his will, and our way in a law, and therefore, will not judge us at last, by anything never revealed to us, (And that was our second) God holds us to him by these remembrances, these common manifestations in our text, Videte, Cavete, and therefore let no man that does not hear God speaking to him, in this present voice, despair that he shall never hear him, but hearken still, and in one language or other, perchance a sickness, perchance a sin, he shall hear him, for these are several Dialects in God's language, several instruments in God's Consort; And this is our third consideration, and the end of this first part, the Prohibition, the Commonefaction, Videte, Cavete; And we pass to our second general part, and the three branches of that, that that falls under this Prohibition, Videte Concisionem, Beware the Concision.

Saint Paul embraces here, that elegancy of language familiar to the holy Ghost, They pretend Circumcision, they intend Concision; there is a certain elegant and holy delicacy, a certain holy juvenility in Saint Paul's choosing these words of this musical cadence and agnomination, Circumcision, and Concision; But then this delicacy, and juvenility presents matter of gravity and soundness. Language must wait upon matter, and words upon things. In this case, (which indeed makes it a strange case) the matter is the form; The matter, that is, the doctrine that we preach, is the form, that is, the Soul, the Essence; the language and words we preach in, is but the Body, but the existence. Therefore, Saint Paul, who would not allow Legal figures, not Typicall figures, not Sacramental figures, not Circumcision it self, after the body, Christ Jesus, was once exhibited, does not certainly allow Rhetorical figures, nor Poetical figures, in the preaching, or hearing of Christ preached, so, as that that should be the principal leader of hearer, or speaker. But this Saint Paul authorizeth in his own practice, and the holy Ghost in him, That in elegant language, he incorporates, and invests sound and important Doctrine; for, though he choose words of musical sound, Circumcision and Concision, yet it is a matter of weighty consideration that he intends in this Concision. Saint Chrysostom, and Saint Jerome both agree in this interpretation, That whereas Circumcision is an orderly, a useful, a medicinal, a beneficial pruning and paring off, that which is superfluous, Conciditur quod temere, & inutiliter decerpitur, Concision is a hasty and a rash plucking up, or cutting down, and an unprofitable tearing, and renting into shreds and fragments, such, as the Prophet speaks of, The breaking of a Potters vessel, that cannot be made up again. Concision is, at best, Solutio Continui, The severing of that, which should be kept entire. In the State, the aliening of the head from the body, or of the body from the head, is Concision; and videte, it is a fearful thing to be guilty of that. In the Church, (which Church is not a Monarchy, otherwise then as she is united in her head, Christ Jesus) to constitute a Monarchy, an universal head of the Church, to the dis-inherison, and to the tearing of the Crowns of Princes, who are heads of the Churches in their Dominions, this is Concision; and videte, it is a fearful thing to be guilty of that, to advance a foreign Prelate. In the family, where God hath made man and wife, one, to divide with others, is Concision; and videte, it is a fearful thing to be guilty of that. Generally, the tearing of that in pieces, which God intended should be kept entire, is this Concision, and falls under this Commonefaction, which implies an increpation, videte, beware. But because thus, Concision would receive a concision into infinite branches, we determined this consideration, at first, into these three; first, Concisio Corporis, the concision of the body, dis-union in Doctrinal things; and Concisio vestis, the Concision of the garment, dis-union in Ceremonial things; and then Concisio Spiritus, the Concision of the Spirit, dis-union, irresolution, unsettledness, diffidence, and distrust in thine own mind and conscience.

First, for this Concision of the body, of the body of Divinity, in Doctrinal things, since still Concision is Solutio continui, the breaking of that which should be entire, consider we first, what this Continuum, this that should be kept entire, is; and it is, says the Apostle, Jesus himself. Omnis spiritus qui solvit Iesum, (so the Ancients read that place) Every spirit which dissolveth Jesus, that breaks Jesus in pieces, that makes Religion serve turns, that admits so much Gospel as may promove and advance present businesses, every such spirit is not of God. Not to profess the whole Gospel, Totum Iesum, not to believe all the Articles of faith, this is Solutio continui, a breaking of that which should be entire; and this is truly concision. Now with concision in this kind, our greatest adversaries, they of the Roman heresy, and mis-persuasion, do not charge us. They do not charge us that we deny any article of any ancient Creed: nor may they deny, that there is not enough for salvation in those ancient Creeds. This is Continuitas universalis, a continuity, an entireness that goes through the whole Church; a skin that covers the whole body; the whole Church is bound to believe all the articles of faith. But then, there is Continuitas particularis, Continuitas modi, a continuity, a harmony, an entireness, that does not go through the whole Church; the whole Church does not always agree in the manner of explication of all the articles of faith; but this may be a skin that covers some particular limb of the body, and not another; one Church may expound an article thus, and some other some other way, as, in particular, the Lutheran Church expounds the article of Christ's descent into hell, one way, and the Calvinist another. Now, in cases, where neither exposition destroys the article, in the substance thereof, it is Concision, that is, Solutio continui, a breaking of that which should be kept entire, for any man to break the peace of that Church, in which he hath received his baptism, and hath his station, by advancing the exposition of any other Church, in that. And as this is Concision, Solutio continui, a breaking of that which is entire, to break the peace of the Church, where we were baptized, by teaching otherwise then that Church teaches, in these things De modo, of the manner of expounding such or such articles of faith, so is there another dangerous Concision too. For, to inoculate a foreign bud, or to engraffe a foreign bough, is concision, as well as the cutting off an arm from the tree; to inoculate, cleaves the rind, the bark; and to engraffe, cleaves the tree: it severs that which should be entire. So, when a particular Church, in a holy, and discreet modesty, hath abstained from declaring herself in the exposition of some particular Articles, or of some Doctrines, by fair consequence deducible from those Articles, and contented herself with those general things which are necessary to salvation, (As the Church of England hath, in the Article of Christ's descent into Hell ) it is Concision, it is solution Continui, a breaking of that which should be entire, to inoculate a new sense, or engraffe a new exposition, which howsoever it may be true in it self, it cannot be truly said, to be the sense of that Church; not perchance because that Church was not of that mind, but because that Church finding the thing itself to be no fundamental thing, thought it unnecessary to descend to particular declarations, when as in such declarations she must have departed from some other Church of the Reformation, that thought otherwise, and in keeping herself within those general terms that were necessary, and sufficient, with a good conscience she conserved peace and unity with all. David, in the person of every member of the Church, submits himself to that increpation, Let my right hand forget her cunning, and let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I prefer not Jerusalem before my chiefest joy. Our chiefest joy, is, for the most part, our own opinions, especially when they concur with other learned and good men too. But then, Jerusalem is our love of the peace of the Church; and in such things as do not violate foundations, let us prefer Jerusalem before our chiefest Joy, love of peace before our own opinions, though concurrent with others. For, this is that, that hath misled many men, that the common opinion in the Church is necessarily the opinion of the Church. It is not so; not so in the Roman Church : There the common opinion is, That the blessed Virgin Mary was conceived without original sin: But cannot be said to be the opinion of that Church; nor may it be safely concluded in any Church : Most Writers in the Church have declared themselves this way, therefore the Church hath declared her self, for the declarations of the Church are done publicly, & orderly, and at once. And when a Church hath declared herself so, in all things necessary and sufficient, let us possess our souls in peace, and not say that that Church hath, or press that that Church would proceed to further declarations in less necessary particulars. When we are sure we have believed & practiced, all that the Church hath recōmended to us, in these generals, then, and not till then, let us call for more declarations; but in the mean time prefer Jerusalem before our chiefest joy, love of peace by a general forbearance on all sides, rather then victory by wrangling, and uncharitableness. And let our right hand forget her cunning, (let us never set pen to paper to write) Let our tongue cleave to the roof of our mouth, (let us never open our mouth to speak of those things) in which Silence was an Act of Discretion, and Charity before, but now is also an Act of Obedience, and of Allegiance and Loyaltie. But that which David said to the Lord, ( Psalm 65. 1.) Let us also accommodate to the Lord's anointed, Tibi laus silentium, our best sacrifice to both, is to be silent in those things. So then, this is Concisio corporis, that Concision of the body, which you are to beware in Doctrinal things, first, non solvere Iesum, not to dissolve, not to break Jesus in pieces, not to depart, in any respect, with any fundamental Article of faith, for that is a skin that covers the whole body, an obligation that lies upon the whole Church, and then for that particular Church, in which you have your station, first, to conform yourself to all that, in which she had evidently declared herself, and then not to impute to her, not to call such articles hers, as she never avowd. And our next consideration is Concisio vestis, the tearing of the garment, matter of discipline, and government.

To a Circumcision of the garment, that is, to a pa • ing, and taking away such Ceremonies, as were superstitious, or superfluous, of an ill use, or of no use, our Church came in the beginning of the Reformation. To a Circūcision we came; but those Churches that came to a Concision of the garment, to an absolute taking away of all ceremonies, neither provided so safely for the Church itself in the substance thereof, nor for the exaltation of Devotion in the Church. Divide the law of the Jews into 2 halfs, and the Ceremonial will be the greater; we cannot cal the Moral law, the Jews law; that was ours as well as their, peculiar to none; but of that law w ^ch is peculiar to the Jews▪ judicial & Ceremonial, the Ceremonial is far the greater part. So great a care had God, of those thing, which though they be not of the revenue of Religion, yet are of the subsidy of Religion, and, though they be not the soul of the Church, yet are they those Spirits that unite soul and body together. H's man did but shave the beards of David's servants, he did not cut off their heads; He did not cut their clothes so, as that he stripped them naked. Yet, for that that he did, (says that story) he stank in David's sight, (which is a phrase of high indignation in that language) and so much, as that it cost him forty thousand of his horsemen in one battle. And therefore as this Apostle enters this Caveat in another place, If ye bite one another, cavete, take heed ye be not consumed of one another, so cavete, take heed of this concision of the garment, lest if the garment be torn off, the body wither, and perish. A shadow is nothing, yet, if the rising or falling Sun shine out, and there be no shadow, I will pronounce there is nobody in that place neither. Ceremonies are nothing; but where there are no Ceremonies, order, and uniformity, and obedience, and at last, (and quickly) Religion it self will vanish. And therefore videte concisionem, beware of tearing the body, or of tearing the garment, which will induce the other, and both will induce the third, concisionem spiritus, the tearing of thine own spirit, from that rest which it should receive in God; for, when thou hast lost thy hold of all those handles which God reaches out to thee, in the Ministry of his Church, and that thou hast no means to apply the promises of God in Christ to thy soul, which are only applied by God's Ordinances in his Church, when anything falls upon thee, that overcomes thy moral constancy (which moral constancy, God knows, is soon spent, if we have lost our recourse to God) thou wilt soon sink into an irrecoverable desperation, which is the fearfullest concision of all; and videte, beware of this concision.

When God hath made himself one body with me, by his assuming this nature, and made me one spirit with himself, and that by so high a way, as making me partaker of the divine nature, so that now, in Christ Jesus, he and I are one, this were solutio Jesus, a tearing in pieces, a dissolving of Jesus, in the worst kind that could be imagined, if I should tear myself from Jesus, or by any jealousy or suspicion of his mercy, or any horror in my own sins, come to think myself to be none of his, none of him. Who ever comes into a Church to denounce an excommunication against himself? And shall any sad soul come hither, to gather arguments, from our preaching, to excommunicate it self, or to pronounce an impossibility upon her own salvation? God did a new thing, Says Moses, a strange thing, a thing never done before, when the earth opened her mouth (and Dathan, and Abiram went down quick into the pit. Wilt thou do a stranger thing then that? To tear open the jaws of Earth, and Hell, and cast thyself actually and really into it, out of mis-imagination, that God hath cast thee into it before? Wilt thou force God to second thy irreligious melancholy, and to condemn thee at last, because thou hadst precondemned thyself, and renounced his mercy? Wilt thou say with Cain, My sin is greater then can be pardoned? This is Concisio potestatis, a cutting off the power of God, and Treason against the Father, whose Attribute is Power. Wilt thou say, God never meant to save me? this is Concisio Sapientiae, a cutting off the Wisdom of God, to think, that God intended himself glory in a kingdom, and would not have that kingdom peopled, and this is Treason against the Son whose Attribute is wisdoms? Wilt thou say, I shall never find comfort in Praying, in Preaching, in Receiving? This is Concisio consolationis, the cutting off consolation, and treason against the holy Ghost, whose office is comfort. No man violates the Power of the Father, the Wisdom of the Son, the Goodness of the holy Ghost, so much as he, who thinks himself out of their reach, or the latitude of their working. Rachel wept for her children, and would not be comforted; but why? Because they were not. If her children had been but gone for a time from her, or but sick with her, Rachel would have been comforted; but, they were not. Is that thy case? Is not thy soul, a soul still? It may have gone from thee, in sins of inconsideration; it may be sick within thee, in sins of habit and custom; but is not thy soul, a soul still? And hath God made any species larger then himself? is there more soul, then there is God, more sin then mercy? Truly Origen was more excusable, more pardonable, if he did believe, that the Devil might possibly be saved, then that man, that believes that himself must necessarily be damned. And therefore, videte concisionem, beware of cutting off thy spirit from this spirit of comfort, take heed of shreading God's general promises; into so narrow propositions, as that they will not reach home to thee, cover thee, invest thee; beware of such distinctions, & such subdivisiōs, as may make the way to heaven too narrow for thee, or thegate of heaven too strait for thee. 'It is true, one drop of my Savior's blood would save me, if I had but that, one tear from my Savior's eye, if I had but that; but he hath none that hath not all; A drop, a tear, would wash away an Adultery, a murder, but less then the whole sea of both, will not wash away a wanton look, an angry word. God would have all, and gives all to all. And for God's sake, let God be as good as he will; as merciful, and as large, as liberal, and as general as he will. Christ came to save sinners; thou are sure thou art one of them; At what time soever a sinner repents, he shall be heard; be sure to be one of them too. Believe that God in Christ proposes conditions to thee; endeavor the performing, repent the not performing of those conditions, and be that the issue between God and thy soul; And lest thou end in this concision, the concision of the Spirit, beware of the other two concisions, of the body, and of the garment, by which only, all heavenly succors are appliable to thee.

SERMON XL.

Preached at Saint Paul's.

I N bestowing of Benefits, there are some Circumstances, that vitiate and deprave the nature of the benefit (as when a man gives only in contemplation of Retribution, for then he is not Dator, but Mercator, this is not a giving, but a Merchandising, a permutation, or when he is Cyminibilis Dator, (as our Canons speak) one that gives Mint and Cumin, so small things, and in so small proportions, as only keeps him alive that receives, and so Ipsum quod dat, perit, & vitam producit ad miseriam, that that is given is lost, and he that receives it, is but continued in misery, and so the benefit, hath almost the nature of an injury, because but for that poor benefit, he might have got out of this life. And then there are circumstances, that do absolutely annihilate a benefit, amongst which, one is, if the giver take so express, so direct, so public knowledge of the wants of the receiver, as that he shall be more ashamed by it, then refreshed with it; for in many courses of life, it does more deject a man, in his own heart, and in the opinion of others too, and more retard him in any preferment, to be known to be poor, then to be so indeed; And he that gives so, does not only make him that receives, his Debtor, but his Prisoner, for he takes away his liberty of applying himself to others, who might be more beneficial to him, the he that captivated, and ensnared him, with that small benefit. And therefore many times in the Scripture, the phrase is such in doing a courtesy, as though the receiver had done it, in accepting it; so when Jacob made a present to his brother Esau, I beseech thee, says he, to take my blessing that I may find favor in thy sight; so he compelled him to take it. So when Christ recommends here to his people, the great, and inestimable benefit in our text, Reconciliation to God, he delivers that benefit of all those accidents, or circumstances, that might vitiate it; and amongst those, of this, that we should not be confounded with the notice taken of our poverty, and indigence; for he proceeds with man, as though man might be of some use to him, and with whom it were fit for him to hold good correspondence, he sends to him by Ambassadors, (as it is in the words immediately before the text) and by those Ambassadors he prays him, that he would accept the benefit of Reconciliation. To us, who are his Creatures, and therefore might be turned and wound by his general providence, without employment of any particular messengers, he sends particular messengers; to us that are his enemies, and fitter to receive denunciations of a war, by a Herald, then a Message, by Ambassadors, he sends Ambassadors, to us, who are indeed Rebells, and not enemies, and therefore rather to be reduced and reclaimed by Executioners, then by Commissioners, he sends Commissioners, not to article, not to capitulate, but to pray, and to entreat, and not to entreat us to accept God's reconciliation to us, but, as though God needed us, to entreat us to be reconciled to him; We pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God.

In these words, our parts will be three: Our Office towards you; yours towards us; and the Negotiation itself, Reconciliation to God. In each of these three, there is a rederivation into three branches: for, in the two first (besides the matter) there are two kinds of persons, we and you, The Priest and the People (we pray you. ) And in the last there are two kinds of persons too, you and God; Be ye reconciled to God. But because all these kinds of persons, God, and we, and you, fall frequently into our consideration, there is the less necessity laid upon us to handle them, as distinct branches, otherwise then as they fall into the Negotiation itself. Therefore we shall determine our selves in these three: First, our office towards you, and our stipulation and contract with you, We pray you; we come not as Lord's or Commanders over you, but in humble, in submissive manner, We pray you. And then your respect to us, because in what manner soever we come, we come in Christ's stead, and though dimly, yet represent him. And lastly, the blessed effect of this our humility to you, and this your respect to us, Reconciliation to God. Humility in us, because we are sent to the poorest soul; respect in you, because we are sent to represent the highest King, work in you this reconciliation to God, and it is a Text well handled; practice makes any Sermon a good Sermon.

First, then, for our office towards you, because you may be apt to say, You take too much upon you, you sons of Levi; We the sons of Levi, open unto you our Commission, and we pursue but that we profess, that we are sent but to pray, but to entreat you; and we accompany it with an outward declaration, we stand bare, and you sit covered. When greater power seems to be given us, of treading upon Dragons and Scorpions, of binding and loosing, of casting out Devils, and the like, we confess these are powers over sins, over Devils that do, or endeavor to possess you, not over you, for to you we are sent to pray and entreat you. Though God sent Jeremiah with that large Commission, Behold this day, I have set thee over the Nations, and over the Kingdoms, to pluck up, and to rout out, to destroy and to throw down; and though many of the Prophets had their Commissions drawn by that precedent, we claim not that, we distinguish between the extraordinary Commission of the Prophet, and the ordinary Commission of the Priest, we admit a great difference between them, and are far from taking upon us, all that the Prophet might have done; which is an error, of which the Church of Rome, and some other over-zealous Congregations have been equally guilty, and equally opposed Monarchy and Sovereignty, by assuming to themselves, in an ordinary power, whatsoever God, upon extraordinary occasions, was pleased to give for the present, to his extraordinary Instruments the Prophets; our Commission is to • pray, and to entreat you. Though upon those words, Ascendunt salvatores in Montem Zion, there shall arise Savior's in Mount Zion, in the Church of God, Saint Jerome saith, That as Christ being the light of the world, called his Apostles the light of the world too; so, Ipse Salvator Apostolas voluit esse Salvatores, The Savior of the world communicates to us the name of Savior's of the world too, yet howsoever instrumentally and ministerially that glorious name of Savior may be afforded to us, though to a high hill, though to that Mount Zion, we are led by a low way, by the example of our blessed Savior himself; and since there was an Oportuit pati, laid upon him, there may well be an Op • rte • Obsecrare laid upon us; since his way was to be dumb, ours may well be to utter no other voice but Prayers; since he bled, we may well sweat in his service, for the salva • ion of your souls. If therefore ourselves, who are sent, be under contempt, or under persecution, if the sword of the Tongue, or the sword of the Tyrant be drawn against us, against all these, Arma nostra, preces & fletus, we defend with no other shield, we return with no other sword, but Tears and Prayers, and blessing of them that curse us. Yea, if he that sent us suffer in us, if we see you denounce a war against him, nay, triumph over him, and provoke him to anger, and because he shows no anger, conclude our of his patience, an impotency, that because he doth not, he cannot, when you scourge him, and scoff him, and spit in his face, and crucify him, and practice every day all the Jews did to him once, as though that were your pattern, and your business were to exceed your pattern, and crucify your Savior worse then they did, by tearing & mangling his body, now glorified, by your blasphemous oaths, and execrable imprecations, when we see all this, Arma nostra preces & fletus, we can defend ourselves, nor him, no other way, we present to you our tears, and our prayers, his tears, and his prayers that sent us, and if you will not be reduced with these, our Commission is at an end. I bring not a Starchamber with me up into the Pulpit, to punish a forgery, if you counterfeit a zeal in coming hither now; nor an Exchequer, to punish usurious contracts, though made in the Church; nor a high Commission, to punish incontinencies, if they be promoted by wanton interchange of looks, in this place. Only by my prayers, which he hath promised to accompany and prosper in his service, I can diffuse his overshadowing Spirit over all the corners of this Congregation, and pray that Publican, that stands below afar off, and dares not lift up his eyes to heaven, to receive a cheerful confidence, that his sins are forgiven him; and pray that Pharisee, that stands above, and only thanks God, that he is not like other men, to believe himself to be, if not a rebellious, yet an unprofitable servant. I can only tell them, that neither of them is in the right way of reconciliation to God, Nec qui impugnant gratiam, nec qui superbe gratias agunt, neither he who by a diffidence hinders the working of God's grace, nor he that thanks God in such a fashion, as though all that he had received, were not of mere mercy, but between a debt and a benefit, and that he had either merited before, or paid God after, in pious works, for all, and for more then he hath received at God's hand.

Scarce anywhere hath the Holy Ghost taken a word of larger signification, then here; for, as though it were hard, even to him, to express the humility which we are to use, rather then lose any soul for which Christ hath died, he hath taught us this obsecration, this praying, this entreating in our Text, in a word, by which the Septuagint, the first Translators into Greek, express divers affections, and all within the compass of this Obsecramus, We pray you. Some of them we shall present to you.

Those Translators use that word for Napal. Napal