A Century of Sermons

he would recommend St. Jerome 's counsel, Discamus in Terris quorum scientia nobis perseverabit in Coelis, for otherwise all kind of learning in a Minister without good Example and innocence of life was but a jewel of gold in a Swine's snout.

This was his constant advice to his Clergy at Ordinations and Visitations, which he duly held every third year. Visitation of Churches he would maintain was no Filia noctis, started up in a night of darkness and Popery, but an Apostolical Institution, and practiced afterwards by all the Primitive Fathers and Bishops. Herein his Lordship would oftentimes be the Preacher himself, so that in his first Visitation Anno 1665. in his Progress in Shropshire, and at Stafford, from the last of May to the fifteenth of June he preached eight times in the compass of those few days, at Bridgnorth, Salop, Elsmere, Wem, Whitchurch, Drayton, Hodnet and Stafford; and confirmed above five thousand persons, whom he required not to be tumultuarily presented, but with the preexamination of their several Ministers, and was in all places most joyfully received.

So that when he put on his Episcopal Robes, he put not off his Ministerial Labors; no man had reason to say, his Majesty by making him Bishop had spoiled a good Preacher, as it was said of Frier Giles, that the Pope had mar'd a painful Clerk by making him a powerful Cardinal: nor was he like Julius the third, of whom the Historian complains, that he had been formerly a diligent man, but when he came to the Popedom never minded his Study, or the Affairs of the Church more: Our Bishop on the other side professed he found as many cares in his Bishops Rochet, as he believed Antigonus did in his Royal Purple; and if it were not for the glory of God, and good of his Church, had rather throw it away than hang it about his shoulders.

St. Paul very well understood his Office when he called it a good work, not to be discharged without painful study, often preaching, daily hearing and determining Cases of Conscience, judging in Causes Ecclesiastical, repairing or building of Churches. These and so many other things beside he found to do at home, that all absence seemed tedious and intolerable to him abroad, so that he never slept out of his Bishopric in many years, nor was willingly absent from his Flock but upon extraordinary occasions, as in Parliament, &c. and then would often request my Lord Chamberlain to beg the Kings leave to let him go home before the end of the Session, sometimes in frosty Winter weather, to be like the good Pastor among his Sheep, where they might hear his voice at Christmas and the other great Feasts, and accounted silence a Woman's virtue, but not a Bishops, who, if sickness and great Affairs molested not, was still bound to labor in the Word and Doctrine, and held it a mistake to prefer Governing before Preaching, whereas it was ever contrary, as appeared by 1 Tim. 15.17. Let the Elders that rule well be accounted worthy of double honor, especially they who labor in the Word and Doctrine; and therefore the Bishop always preached, and the Presbyter never before him, but when deputed, or in his absence: so that when he was sometimes told by his friends, that he was now Miles emeritus, and might lawfully lay aside his Preaching pains, in his extreme old age, he would by no means consent, but still lay-by his other Studies upon Saturday afternoon, and retire to his preaching Meditations, and for the most part preached once upon Sunday mornings, both to profit others, and to warm himself. Three Sundays at least every Month he would preach up and down his Diocese, and not only in his chief City of Lichfield, or near to his own Cathedral, but like to a benign Star would irradiate all places within his Orb; He would often take Coach and go more than seven miles, sometimes nine or ten upon Sunday morning, and yet be at Church before most of the Parish, and go home again to dinner, and yet always have the full Service of the Church before Sermon, and many times afterwards rectify disorders in Churches, and sometimes differences about Seats or Pews. This Custom he continued till he died, often mentioning the words of Bishop Andrew's, who was wont to institute all his Ministers in curam meam & tuam, and therefore thought he must no more hide his Talent in a Rochet, than they might theirs under a Cassock.

Thus was his diligence equal to any of the Ancients, and his success answerable, reducing multitudes in all places to piety and conformity with the Church of England, almost like another Gregorius Thaumaturgus Bishop of Neocaesarea, a great and populous City, who when he came thither found but seventeen Christians, and when he died gave God thanks he left but seventeen Pagans.

This great success did owe itself not only to his frequent preaching and diligent study, but to his eximious piety and perpetual prayer. Formerly he had taken great pains in the Study of Antiquity, and for Ecclesiastical History especially he was inferior to very few; no man could give a better account of the Travels of the Apostles after the day of Pentecost, and the Conversion of the World by the Primitive Christians; and for the History of the Reformation after the second Pentecost, no man I think could give the like Narrative, how miraculously in all places it was effected: In our own Church there was nothing whereof he was ignorant, all the Councils and passages of the Reformation from the first beginning or Matrix thereof he perfectly understood. But of late years he would say his Studies were not to be more wise and learned, but more holy and good, and therefore laid aside Polemical Divinity wholly, and his principal study were Cases of Conscience, Canon Law, and the Liturgies of the Antient Church, in which he was very skillful; yet would often complain, he found this last an unlearned study, and much against his own nature, who was a lover of Philology and Rationality. But he much wondered that any learned men could, contrary to the practice of the whole Church, lay aside all use of Liturgies, even against the sense of Calvin himself, who wishes there might be in every Church an uniform Liturgy, (for preservation of Unity, and prevention of Vainglory, and other inconveniencies,) from which it should be unlawful for Ministers to depart; but especially in our Church, where so many young men are ordained, he wondered any wise man would be against a set Liturgy, and refer all the Service of God to free Prayer; and would assert that it was more easy to mar than to mend the Book of Common-Prayer, and therefore we ought not to adventure the one for the other; but in regard the Minister of the Parish was permitted to compose a Prayer of his own before his Sermon, he thought no Sectary had cause to complain.

Bidding of Prayer before Sermon he never practiced, and said no more did Dr. Ravis and Dr. Fletcher, Archbishop Whitgift 's Chaplains, afterwards Bishops, who drew up the 55. Canon, whom he knew very well, and often heard preach, and always used a Form of their own, and no Bishops Articles ever examined or found fault with it, and was certainly used by St. Ambrose in Antiquity, and therefore in the Convocation 1640 it was carried for a Form.

And although it was his mind, that all Students were not to be tied up to Canonical hours, but such only whose Devotion need not be interrupted by necessary study and employment; yet he would rarely intermit them himself, unless want of health, or very extraordinary business constrained him.

In a morning he would rarely permit any to visit or disturb him, but held that time was made for God, rather than for men, as the Historian says of Charles the fifth, Mane frequentior cum Deo quàm cum hominibus sermo; therefore the first thing after his sleep was his private Devotion, with reading of the holy Bible, Psalms and Chapters, then gentle walking for health, then Study, then Public Prayer, then Private Prayers again before Dinner; presently after Dinner to his Private Prayers again, and then to his Study, unless Ecclesiastical Affairs or suitable Company prevented him for an hour or so; and of all sorts of Prayer, he would especially abound in thanksgiving, using St. Paul 's words often, In everything give thanks for this is the will of God, and wish that our Common Prayer had more Forms to that purpose, and would sometimes wonder, that when the world had been so cloyed with Religious Orders, Predicants, Humiliats, Oratorians, Mendicants, and many other titles, yet there was never any called Eucharistici, a Congregation appointed to give God thanks for all the good things wherewith this World is replenished. In the Evening of every day, Recount thy own actions, and the divine preservations, was his rule to others, and customary to himself; and to pray for the pardon of the one, and praise God for the receipt of the other: And in all his Prayers day and night he was a continual sollicitor for the peace of the Catholic Church: All his counsels, like Melanchthon 's, were ever moderate, and he often wished such a Form of Prayer were composed that all Christians might join in, being a great Enemy to sharpness and violence in the matters of Religion, and would often use Erasmus his words, Mihi adeo est invisa discordia, ut veritas displiceat seditiosa.

After his Majesty 's return, and restauration of the Church of England, he prayed for nothing more in this World than the downfall of Mahomet, and the resurrection of the Greek Empire and Church again, and would say, he thought in his complexion and Religion both, that he was the greatest Anti-Ottoman in Europe; he was extremely afflicted for poor Hungary, the Antimurale or Bulwark of Christendom, in the last Invasion, and consequently for the horrible division of Christians through the jugglings of the Papacy, for which reason he could not yet foresee which way possible they should unite under one General, who might be able to put an Hook into the jaws of Mahomet, and repulse the Grand Signior into Arabia again, or to his Scythian Cottages; and therefore he never hoped for this happy time till he saw the Papacy fall first, which yet he hoped should never be brought to pass by those Infidels, though he was very much affected with the words of Musculus, spoken above a hundred years ago. Ecclesia Sancti Petri sic aedificatur Romae, ut ad plenum aedificata sit nunquam, citiùsque destruenda sit a Turcis, quàm ad finem structurae perducenda a Romanis.

He took the Pope to be an ill Member of Christendom, yet would have no man desire the Devil should pull him down, viz. the Turk; or Goths and Vandals, viz. German Anabaptists and Socinians, for fear the change should be for the worse: the Italians were a civil people, and lovers of learning, the Anabaptists of Germany more ignorant and bloody far than they. From this civility of his own temper he did not much love to fix the Title of Antichrist upon the Papacy, yet believed that our learned Divines (Mr. Mede and Dr. More especially) had with that great learning in all kinds so charged this crime upon Him, that he admired his Champions, who daily scatter books of all other matters, could permit their supreme Pontife to be so slander'd, (if it were not true) and he thought it frivolous for them to write upon other controversies, before they were able to clear themselves before all the world of this Capital one, and which being true, concluded all other crimes in it.

Though a reconciliation of all Christians were desirable, yet he held it impossible to be effected, as long as the Doctrines of their Churches Infallibility and the Popes Supremacy were so obstinately maintained. The Pope was now become like a Blazing-star, dreadful to all Potentates and Rulers; and therefore whereas his two great Friends, Bishop Usher and Mr. Mede, out of Apocalyptical Principles, were of opinion that there would be a general Apostasy, and Dagon set upon his feet again, he could not believe it: For he never feared Christian Princes would be so forsaken of their own understandings, and other Counsellers, as to resign their own Crowns to adorn a foreign Mitre; especially when both Mr. Selden and Sir Robert Cotton had told him, they could show undoubted testimonies, that all the Princes in Christendom envied Henry the Eighth's Act in this kind, and would gladly have imitated him if they durst: But this he imputed to a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or want of Magnanimity in them who would not endeavor to recover their own rights, in calling Councils, presenting to Churches, and other Flowers of their Crowns unjustly detained from them by the See of Rome, and therefore ever prayed the Kings of England might still retain their own just Supremacy, without giving up their Regalia to any foreign Jurisdiction.

He thought the increase of Popery ought to be strictly watched, not only for the perniciousness of the Tenants of their Heterodox Religion in themselves, as being in his opinion Idolatrous and favoring of Rebellion, but likewise for the cruelty and sanguinary minds of Papists themselves, that whereas all Protestants express a charitable respect towards the souls and bodies of all Papists, abhorring all bloody Persecutions of them; on the other side Designant nos oculis ad mortem; Papists ever bear bloody minds towards us, and want nothing but power and opportunity to make as many Bonfires in England, as they had done formerly; and whereas in their excuse, some say, that the many late Treasons against their Princes were but the private Acts of some particular Papists, then he wondered no Pope should ever think fit to send out his Bull to declare that he abhorred them; or that none of their learned men should print books licensed by authority, wherein they were renounced, which he would have given a great deal of money to read.

The Bishop was an enemy to all separation from the Church of England, of whatsoever Faction or Sect: But their hypocrisy he thought superlative that allowed the Doctrine, and yet would separate for mislike of the Discipline; these men's impudence outwent all preceding Histories; and he would challenge any to show him in all Antiquity for 1500 years where any Christian withdrew from the Churches Communion, much less rose up against lawful Governors, for their imposition of indifferent matters or Ceremonies? though in ancient times they imposed more than we do now; All that were baptized were presented in White Garments, which the Priest charged them to keep white and undefiled to the Coming of the Lord; and they used not only the Sign of the Cross, but praegustatio mellis & lactis, intimating that they were now brought to the Land of Canaan flowing with Milk and Honey: Standing at Prayers was required upon all Lord's-days between Easter and Whitsuntide, and Prayer with their hands extended, after the similitude of a Cross sometimes, which must needs be very tedious; and so many other things in St. Austin 's time, that his complaint is well known, Tolerabilior erat Judaeorum conditio: yet no Separate Churches were then set up for these things: Truth is, he thought the permission of Conventicles did show great irresolution and unsatisfaction in the Truth, administered great temptation to Shopkeepers and sedentary people to be tainted with errors and novelties, of which the English temper is too receptive, people being generally vain and whimsically skeptical, and never to be satisfied, like Him in the Talmud, that would always be questioning why the Sun rose in the East, and set in the West! to whom it was answered, if it should do otherwise he would still complain to know the reason. But above all he held we ought to become wise by former experience, for Conventicles in Corporations were the Seminaries out of which the Warriours against the King and the Church came, and therefore would much admire, that if any man coin'd false money it was counted Treason; if any man cheated a Pupil or an Orphan he was punished, or if he spread false News he was liable to suffer for it; but if any man published false Divinity to the damnation of souls, or perverting the minds of people from their obedience to their Governors, there was little or no regard of it: Beside, he had often heard from credible Witnesses, it was too usual with the discontented at their Meetings to charge the Church of England with those consequences which they did terminis terminantibus deny, as the making of indifferent Ceremonies to be Sacraments, and in kneeling at Sacrament to worship the Bread; and thereupon be so furious against that reverend posture, as though Kneeling were Popery, and Sitting Protestancy, when the Pope himself ever Communicates sitting. These things were only spoken to make our Church odious to ignorant people, and being permitted must needs in time destroy our Foundations again; and therefore he wished that as of old, all Kings and other Christians subscribed to the Conciliary Decrees, so now a Law might pass that all Justices of Peace should do so in England, and then they would be more careful to punish the depravers of Church Orders.

In matter of Doctrine he embraced no private and singular opinions, as many great men delight to do, in vetere viâ novam semitam quaerentes, says the Father, but was in all points a perfect Protestant, according to the Articles of the Church of England, always accounting it a spice of pride and vanity to affect singularity in any opinions, or Expositions of Scripture, without great cause; and withal very dangerous to affect precipices (as Goats use) when they may walk in plain paths.

In the Quinquarticular Controversy he was ever very moderate, but being bred under Bishop Davenant, and Dr. Ward in Cambridge, was addicted to their Sentiments. Bishop Usher would say Davenant understood those Controversies better than ever any man did since St. Austin; but He used to say, he was sure he had three excellent men of his mind in this Controversy. 1. Padre Paulo, whose Letter is extant to Heinsius Anno 1604. 2. Thomas Aquinas. 3. St. Austin; but besides and above them all, he believed in his conscience St. Paul was of the same mind likewise; yet would profess withal, he disliked no Arminian, but such a one as reviled and defamed everyone that was not so, and would often commend Arminius himself for his excellent wit and parts, but only tax his want of reading and knowledge in Antiquity, and ever held it was the foolishest thing in the world to say the Arminians were Papists, when so many Dominicans and Jansenists were no Arminians; and so again to say the Anti-Arminians were Puritans, or Presbyterians, when Ward, and Davenant, and Prideaux, and Brownrig were Anti-Arminians, and also stout Champions for Episcopacy; and Arminius himself was ever a Presbyterian, and therefore much commended the moderation of our Church, which made not any of these nice and doubtful Opinions the resolved Doctrine of the Church; this he judged was the great fault of the Tridentine and late Westminster Assemblies: But our Church was more ingenuous, and left these dark and curious points to the several apprehensions of learned men, and extended equal Communion to both.

There is another Controversy that hath been much vexed in our times concerning the case of Divorce and Marriage afterwards; in which it is confessed our Bishop did dislike all those Churches or Polities that were facile to allow separation in Marriage, and much more Marriage after; yet allowed the question was intricate, and such a one as the Pharisees sought to entangle our Savior withal, and that the Church of England had doctrinally determined neither way, but for practice only judged it better that neither party should marry again after Divorce, while the other lived, and therefore in the Canons of Queen Elizabeth Anno 97; and in 107 Canon of King James Anno 1604. required Caution by sufficient Sureties to that purpose: He condemned not other Churches that allowed it otherwise, but preferred our own Caution before them, and for this he wanted not many more reasons, than were wrote in a hasty Letter to a Gentleman his Neighbor, and published (without leave) after his death, together with his own Answer; but it is no credit to conquer the dead, says the old Proverb.

While living He would urge for the indissolubleness of Wedlock, the Authority of Divine Institution, how God was pleased to make them Male and Female, and first one, and then two out of one, and then again two to become one, by a Divine Institution, saying, Whom God hath once joined, let no man put asunder. 2. The Dignity of Marriage, which represents the mystical Union that is betwixt Christ and his Church, and His Union with our human nature, both which are indissoluble and perpetual. 3. The excellency of that love that one ought to bear to the other in Marriage, For this cause shall a man leave his Father and Mother and cleave to his Wife; therefore it is a stronger relation then between Father and Son; but the Son while his Father lives can never cease to be a Son, much more while the Wife lives can the Husband cease to be an Husband, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , he shall cleave to his Wife, signifying a glutinous conjunction, that will sooner break anywhere than be parted there. 4. The manner of the conjunction, one flesh, that is according to the Hebrew Idiom, one Man, which supposes the Woman to be the Body, and the Man to be the Soul; so that none can part these, but He alone that can part Soul and Body. 5. And therefore though he conceived Eve did Adam a far greater injury, than when a loathed Strumpet does defile the Bed of Marriage, yet God nor Adam thought of no rupture in the case, but God only pronounced her future sorrow in Conception: indeed Paludanus and Navar, Roman Casuists, maintain if one party be endangered to be drawn into mortal sin by the other, it is sufficient occasion to separate, and therefore probably would have cited Eve into their Courts, and proceeded accordingly against her; but from the beginning it was not so. 6. In the New Testament he observed our Savior 's answer seemed strange to his own Disciples, insomuch that they replied; If the case were so, it were better not marry at all, which shows how they understood him. 7. To be sure St. Paul would not allow it in a Bishop, but strictly required him to be the Husband of one Wife, that is having repudiated one to take no other without exception of any case. 8. He was sure he had in the New Testament six places of his side to one against him, one only carrying an outward face for it, Matth. 19.9. Whosoever shall put away his Wife except it be for fornication, and marrieth another committeth adultery: But Matth. 5. & 32. Mark 10.11. Luke 16.18. all sound another way; Whosoever putteth away his Wife and marrieth another committeth adultery. Rom. 7.2. The Woman that hath an Husband is bound as long as her Husband lives. 1 Cor. 7.10. Let not the Wife depart from her Husband, and if she depart let her remain unmarried: and again the 27. verse; Art thou bound to a Wife, seek not to be loosed: he held it safer to hold with six places than with one: some only say St. Matthew has that which others have not, and he must expound them; yea but one Evangelist is not false without the supplement of another, and St. Mark 's Gospel was in some places where St. Matthew 's was not. 9. This would have given great scandal in the Heathen World, who a long time used no Divorces; the Romans none for 500 years, Spurius Carbilius Gema was the first that broke the hedge, a great shame for God's people to be more sensual than the Heathen, that they should exceed them in chastity and integrity. 10. We plight our faith in the face of the Church to hold till death us do part, not till Adultery or any other scandalous cause, which promise ought to be altered if we do not think meet to perform it. Upon these and many like considerations which he would repeat (but I cannot readily remember) I know he held it more safe to bear with a private inconvenience than alter the ancient strictness according to the looseness of our later times, and since ancient Writers tell us the Turtle is pudica & univira, would often wish God would please that the voice of the Turtle might be again heard in our Land.

Indeed he was a Prelate of venerable strictness and purity, who would much bewail the unruly and horrid licentiousness of our times, which he conceived grew great by the lessening of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction: the Sword of Excommunication was locked up in the Sheath, and the Church had not the Key of it; but men of vicious and lewd lives, who formerly would have been thrust out for seven years, were admitted without censure to the comfort of the Sacraments; and so instead of godly sorrow too many exult in their sins, jest and droll upon them in all Companies, chant their Crimes to Music, and sing them sometimes in the high places of the Streets.

Our holy Bishop had a very chaste ear, and would never permit the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or tongue-fornications of any, but would presently reprove them wheresoever he was: and he was once at a public Table, where he could not presently allay that profane merriment, so that he put back his Chair, and resolved like Cato, to be gone, till the Company became sorry, and promised to preserve his Episcopal reverence and gravity.

At a Table no man more cheerful and pleasant, yet ever wisely and inoffensively facete, and would often call upon the company as Plato to the rough Xenocrates, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to sacrifice to the Graces to obtain hilarity. But according to his own Motto, Inservi Deo & laetare, Serve God and be cheerful. His Salt was ever candid and white, not bitter and biting, without all Sarcasms or Ironies, saying mirth was too good a creature to be abused with any affrontive jeasts, scurrility, or bawdry. He loved innocuos sine dente sales, so as to make everybody smile, and nobody blush: Impudence and drolling upon Divine things he would not allow to be wit, but want of wit; on the other side, God Almighty never forbad lawful pleasures, and they are not more religious and spiritual who are more austere and morose than others. Christ Jesus refused not cheerful meetings, but condemned the sad countenances and sullenness of the Pharisees: and melancholy of all humors he held was fit to make a Bath for the Devil.

Chearfulness and innocent pleasure preserves our Mind from rust, and the Body from putrifying with dullness and distempers; and therefore would sometimes cheerfully say, he did not love to look upon a sour man at dinner, and if his Guests were pleased and merry within, would bid them hang out the white Flag in their countenance.

In his Entertainments he was ever very Hospitable, and held where Divines wanted a competency of Means, besides necessary provision for a Family, to be hospitable to others, it was the fault of the State; but where Divines had good Livings, and did not keep Hospitality, the Governors of the Church were in fault if they did not exact it of them: Yet if he found in his Visitation an evil Churchman that spent vainly and riotously upon himself, he would tell him he was guilty of Sacrilege, and bound to make restitution to the Poor.

But in all his own Entertainments his Lordship was as free and communicative of his Discourse as of his Chear; the Mind had the principal share there, for he gave ever such excellent Sawce with his Meat, so many witty Apophthegms and other ingenious sallies of wit, as made everybody eat with a better appetite. He loved to be a rational Feeder, not as at a Manger, but a Table, not much caring what his Provender was, for such was all kind of food without talk, Prandium Boum & Asinorum: and his discourse was not only cheerful and pleasant, but most learned and profitable, full of recondite and polite learning, that whoever heard presently became all ear, and was not only better the next day, but forever. I have heard many affirm, that they never heard more learning from any man than from him, sometimes at the close of a Dinner, at a Table, or in his Arbour afterwards; and though he was very splendid in the Entertainment of his Friends, yet very sparing in the entertainment of himself; for himself he chose rather to have a Table replenished from an Orchard or a Dairy than from the Butchers Shambles. To eat flesh he thought lawful from the beginning of the World, but never used by Seth 's Posterity (the Line of the Church ) before the Flood, and still recommended to all Scholars a plain Diet, to which, as Socrates said, hunger and thirst was the best sauce; and for his own part whenever he dined with any other Haugoust he lost the afternoon, and therefore drank so little wine, as to be almost abstemious, and always of a very small sort, and diluted with water for fear of fumes, that hindered his Studies and Prayers, saying withal that whoever eats and drinks temperately sacrifices to his own bodily health, and good temper of mind; but whoever eats and drinks otherwise, must needs have a gross body and a foggy brain.

After he was made Bishop, it made no change of his former sweetness and affability, still he knew us, and we knew him, like a Star in the Firmament, quo altior eo minor, he rather seemed less to himself for being raised higher: Who ever once discovered insolency in him, or that he bore himself with a big carriage to any man? Humility with honor, and urbanity with high dignity were never more really conjoined, he would still instantly condescend to speak with any Scholar, though never so poor or young. Once when he lay in Channel-row during his Attendance upon Parliament, he rose at midnight and baptized a dying Child at a Neighbor's house, when the Curate of the Parish could not be found; and ever deemed humility was the infallible cognizance or mark to distinguish Apostolical Bishops from others, according to the old Story of Austin the Monk, who came into England in the time of King Æthelred 600 years after Christ, and pressed the West Britain's of this Island to receive him as their Master and Governor, because he was sent by the Bishop of Rome. A learned Abbot of Bangor having no fancy to his Message, consulted with an Hermit what they should think of this man, and his Message from Rome; hearken (says the Hermit ) the next time you and your Brethren meet to attend this Austin in Synod, observe if he show any reverence or carry himself humbly when he comes before you; but if he salute not, and bear himself disdainfully, receive him not, for he is no Apostle of Christ. At the next Synod the jolly Prelat entered among the Monks, with a braving courage, never stooped nor veiled his head, but usurped the highest place in the Congregation, as the Roman Legate: at this the Britain's disliked his Arrogancy, and would not receive his Message.

Yet our good Bishop 's humility appeared not only in his outward demeanour, and verbal salutation, which he knew were often forced, and more then was required, and that Rivers were not deepest where they overflow but in their own Channels: but in paying all due respect to the deserts of others without reflecting upon his own perfections; therefore it was not his fashion to undervalue other men's learning, or magnify his own. Upon frequent occasions he would confess his want of Eastern Languages, but in such studies wherein he was conversant, would by private letters give great help to many writers of books, who have confessed in their returns to him that the books were not theirs, but his, and thereupon would have had him to have owned them, or at least to have suffered an honorable mention of himself in those books which he would in no sort permit, that as Camerarius said of Melanchthon, he was like a Nightingale, that with his singing sweetly affected all others, but would not endure to hear of it himself.

Notwithstanding this great civility and sweetness of temper towards all people generally, we must acknowledge a vanity and defect in all human accomplishments and perfections; it being not possible that almost 80 years should be spent in this Age of human infirmity, and that any man's actions should be all fine flour, without mixture of coarser Meal and Bran; to say so, were not to commend, but to flatter, not truly to represent, but to daub; our Bishop would often severely censure himself (and said he best knew his own heart) to be of sinners the chief, most unthankful to God for many Divine Talents conferred upon Him, and most wanting especially in many grains of meekness and forbearance to his Neighbors. Indeed he was by nature 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 (as most great wits are) irritable and subject to great eruptions of anger oftentimes, especially if he had met with bold and arrogant, but slow parts. St. Jerome acknowledges the like harsh disposition in himself, and compares himself to an angry horn'd Beast, and says that all the strict Discipline of Bethlehem and Watchings of Arabia could not mortify this indecent passion in him. God Almighty permitting these most holy and learned men sometimes to betray themselves in such palpable weaknesses, does sufficiently convince us, that human infirmity cleaves to human nature, and absolute perfection belongs only to the Divine.

Yet I will add, that as he was very irritable and apt to be offended, so he was exceeding placable and ready to be appeased; too generous he was to be vindicative, and therefore though he would chide earnestly, yet he ever censured mildly; like the Apostles who had fiery tongues, but gentle hands; besides it was his judgment, that if any man asked unreasonable things, it was much better to chide him away from his house for his fault, than give him good words and afterwards not do it: minus negatur qui negatur celeriter, and would always advise other people, if anything troubled them to speak it out, and never to retain a dry discontent, and for the most part made his passion subservient to virtuous ends; by his great natural inclination to anger, becoming far more active and zealous in the carrying on his great projectments for piety and charity.

For any other censures of being illiberal and covetous, which are so frequently and unduly cast upon Divines, examine his life, and few men will appear more incontaminat and free. In bad times when he had lost his best Incoms, and like the Widow of Sarepta, had but an handful of Meal and a Cruze of Oil left for himself and his Family, yet he then thought Elias was worthy of one Cake out of it, and accordingly has given a distressed friend twenty pounds at a time, and would always argue, that Times of persecution were the most proper seasons of charity, and that charity was oftentimes the happy means to preserve us from suffering; for Tyrants more commonly oppress the rich than their inopious Enemies; as the Historian observed in the days of Nero, Alium Thermae, alium Horti trucidarunt, many men might have fared better, but for delicious Gardens and sweet Baths; no man was safe that had a sumptuous Building, or an envied Possession; and therefore he believed it a prudent, as well as a religious act in the Primitive Church at Jerusalem, to surrender their Estates to the holy Apostles for pious uses, rather than to leave them to a violent extension of profane persons in a short time afterwards.

When he was made a Bishop no man was less lucripetous, he desired to hold nothing in Commendam, he renewed all his Leases for years, and not for lives, and upon very moderate Fines, and spent a very considerable share thereof upon the repairs of his Cathedral, often applying to the Church what the Orator said of the Common-wealth, Non minori mihi est curae qualis futura sit Respublica quam qualis est hodie; while he lived, besides his constant charity to the poor of Lichfield City, he inquired out distressed Cavaliers in his Diocese, and lent them 50 or 100 l. for a year or two upon their own Bill or Bond, and afterwards frequently gave it to them: And thus he did sometimes to persons of a differing Religion, with whom he held no Christian Communion but in this one thing of giving, and never looking to receive again. He reckoned that charitable Expences left to the power and management of Executors were more theirs than the Founders, and therefore was resolved to dispense his own in his life time, and not be like the Whale, that affords no Oil till she die and must disgorge it.

To several Colleges in Cambridge he gave liberal sums of money, to Clare-Hall fifty pounds, to St. John's fifty pounds, to Trinity College he added a peculiar building called Bishops Hostle, which cost him 1200 l. and appointed, that with the yearly Rents of those Chambers Books should be bought into the College Library; and to the University Library he bequeathed by Will all his own Books, which cost him about 1500 l.

It was his judgment that a Bishop was bound by ancient Canons to dispend his Episcopal Revenues in Acts of charity, and therefore no year passed without some eminent actions of that kind, which were never written in any Book upon Earth, the more certain that they are in Heaven. To the several Prisons in London he sent oftentimes good relief by a Friend, whom he ever straitly charged to conceal from whence it came. When the Plague was in London he collected from his poor Diocese 351 l. by November Anno 65. for the City in that woeful time, besides what he sent particularly and bountifully to his old Parish of Holbourn from himself: And all this he did without being burthensome to his Clergy, ever giving them quick dispatch when they repaired to him for Institution, and gave in charge to dismiss them with very small Fees: Whenever he gave any of them preferment he was as clear from Simony as from Witchcraft, which he detested above all sins, and ever accounted it among the fatal Prognostics of a dying Church: When Jason outbid Onias, and Menelaus outbid Jason 300 Talents, it is set down as a prodigious token of the destruction of Jerusalem, and joined with the fiery Horsemen that appeared in the next Chapter to the same affrighting purpose. Truth is, in his poor Church he had but few preferments to give, otherwise he would say, he would never suffer good Scholars to sit close in their Studies unpreferred, while others who less deserved sharkt them away. To give the best Preferments to the worst men was in his opinion to set the Goats on the right hand and the Sheep on the left, which would certainly hasten the Divine Judgment, which would decree righteousness. I will only add further upon this Head, that wherever any object commendable and deserving was represented to him, there needed not much speaking, his charity was Distillatio Favi, like the dropping of an Honeycomb, you need not press it, it would drop of itself, without straining: But for such as were Validi mendicants, Vagabonds and sturdy Beggars, who had both health and limbs, and yet sought to eat their bread by the sweat of others, our Bishop never would encourage them; for by long acquaintance with Judges, he had heard they were generally Atheists, Libertines living in promiscuous lust, Pilferers, evil Servants to God, unprofitable to the King and Common-wealth, dishonorers of the Christian Name, and therefore sometimes was of the mind to go from the Church to the Quarter Sessions, and complain there that God's heavy Judgments would fall upon that Kingdom where these were permitted.

There never was a greater Enemy to idleness than this diligent and painful Bishop, who would seldom spare an afternoon; but nothing could divert him from his Morning study to his last, and say, he was then like a French-man, primo impetu acerrimus, best in a Morning, and that Aurora was the Mother of Honey-dews and Pearls, which dropt from Scholars Pens upon their Papers, and ever reckoned that he had great advantage of some great Divines, Dr. Holdsworth and Jeffries, his dear Friends, whom for their late watchings he called Noctuae Londinenses. But by a constant study he had searched into all kinds of learning; he had been a great enquirer into the knowledge of Nature, and made many peculiar observations of very many Creatures, especially Bees, Spiders, Snails, and of all sorts of Husbandry, and would often merrily say, since Husbandry was turned over to Swains and mean persons, the Earth disdained to give so luxuriant a Crop, as when it was turned up laureato vomere & triumphali aratro, by a laureat Plowman, and one that had triumphed in the Capitol, and that it was much easier to be great and rich, than wise and learned; and if it were not below his Profession he would undertake to grow rich by Hops, having strange skill in the weather, and in the nature of the Plant, so that he had an extraordinary foresight when they were likely to take or not: as Aristotle reports of Thales the wise man, that one year he bought up all the Oil before hand, when he foresaw the scarcity of the next; but the Bishop intended nothing but Philosophy, and therein the contemplation of the Creator of all things; asserting that the least creature beneath us was worthy the contemplation of our whole life, and yet would not be thoroughly understood, and that David worthily made a Choir of all Creatures to praise God from the greatest Angel in the Host of Heaven to the smallest Flake of Snow.

In his younger time he had been much addicted to School-learning, being then much used in the University, but afterwards grew weary of it, and professed he found more shadows and names than solid juice and substance in it, and would much mislike their horrid and barbarous terms more proper for Incantation than Divinity, and became perfectly of B. Rhenanus his mind, that the Schoolmen were rather to be reckoned Philosophers than Divines; but if any pleased to account them such, he had much rather with St. John Chrysostom be styled a pious Divine, than an invincible or irrefragable one with T. Aquinas, or our own Countryman Alex. Hales.

For knowledge in the Tongues, he would confess, he could never fix upon Arabian learning, the place was siticulosa regio, a dry and barren land where no water is, and had been discouraged in his younger years by such as had plodded most in it, and often quarrelled his great friend Salmasius for saying, he accounted no man solidly learned without skill in Arabic, and other Eastern Languages, our Bishop declared his mind otherwise, and bewailed that many good Wits of late years prosecuted the Eastern Languages so much as to neglect the Western learning and discretion too sometimes; Mr. Selden and Bishop Creitton had both affirmed to him, that they should often read ten Pages for one line of sense, and one word of moment, and did confess there was no learning like to what Scholars may find in Greek Authors, as Plato, Plutarch, &c. and himself could never discern but that many of their quotations and proofs from them were in his own words, incerta, inexplorata, & 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 .

After all this I would detein the Reader no longer in things of less concern, especially knowing it to be against his mind to permit any Picture of himself that could not represent him within, as well as without, approving what Plotinus said, that the other was only the Image of an Image, and in thirty years commonly out of fashion, and then grew ridiculous, and served only to make people laugh: yet he had one taken by stealth, to which I will add only a touch or two (as is usual) quia me juvat ire per omnem Heroa.

He was of bodily stature small and slender, in all parts clean and well shapen, of a very serene and comely countenance, vivid eyes, with a rare alacrity and suavity of aspect, representing the inward candour and serenity of his mind: the temper of his body was rather delicate than strong, yet through temperance and custom, grown patient of long sitting and hard study: His voice was ever wonderful sweet and clear, so that Dr. Collins would say, he had the finest Bell in the University, and in one of his Speeches termed him 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , i. e. Canora Cicada: His behavior was most gentile and civil, no Courtier carried a better meen, nor better understood the Art of behavior, which though fortuitous and contingent to him, yet much became him in all company. His Apparel was ever plain, not morose or careless, but would never endure to be costly upon himself, either in Habit or Diet, often quoting that of St. Austin, Profecto de pretiosa vest erubesco, he was as much ashamed of a rich Garment as others of a poor one, and thought that they were fitter for a Roman Consul than a Christian Praesul, and accordingly never put on a silk Cassock but at a great Festival, or a Wedding of some near Friend, holding that a glittering Prelate without inward Ornaments was but the Paraphrase of a painted Wall; and on the other side, if the Graces of the Mind could be seen, the Beauties of the Body would seem but deformities, nothing being so fair, and to be admired, as the luster of Divine knowledge, the eye of the soul attended with a fair hand of suitable practice. These two were like Tabor and Hermon, the two stately tops of the Soul, that reach to Heaven itself: And indeed though he had great comeliness and elegance of body, his Divine Soul within was fairer than the lodging without.

When he was young he had a most lively and acute wit, which rendered him acceptable to all companies, but ever tempered with wisdom and learning, that rendered him more acceptable to the Best; and with it he had a prodigious and immortal memory, whereby he ever bore about him a constant Chronicle of all occurrences, that he was able to give a present account of whatsoever he had at any time read, heard, or seen; even all remarkable alterations and changes of weather that had been in his time were as present to his memory, as if he had seen them written in the Air before his eyes; yet all these no man valued less than he in comparison of his higher accomplishments. He abounded not barely with great learning, acute wit, excellent judgment and memory, but with an incomparable integrity, prudence, justice, piety, charity, constancy to God and to his Friend in adversity, and in his friendship was most industrious and painful to fulfil it with good offices, and withal so ready and able upon all occasions to give good counsel, that he to whomsoever God gave that Favor of his Lordship had a blessing scarce valuable.

Yet notwithstanding all these Endowments King Solomon's words are true in regard of the body, There is one event to the righteous and to the wicked, and wise men must also die as well as the ignorant and foolish; and the time was now come that this wise and good Bishop must die. He had finished both Church and Choir, which he beautified with most comely Stals of exquisite workmanship, and had likewise set up an excellent Organ, the whole Appartements about it, Pipes, Gilding, Wainscot-case, &c. cost above 600 l. being a great lover of Church-Music, and would much bewail the people's ignorance and fierceness, who loved Guns more than Organs; or else their lasciviousness, that would pull them out of Churches, and set them up in Taverns, and choose rather to sing in Babylon than in Zion. And the last of his Lordships cares for that Church was for the Bells; he had contracted with very able Founders for six excellent Bells fitting for a Cathedral, which his Executor set up, though three only were cast before his death, and only one (viz.) the Tenor hanged up, which had not been hung so soon, but that his Lordship called upon the Workmen to do it. The first time it was rung his Lordship was very weak, yet he went out of his own Bedchamber into the next Room to hear it, and seemed very well pleased with the sound, and blessed God that had favor'd him with life to hear it, but withal concluded it would be his own Passing Bell, and so retired to his Chamber, and never came out till he was carried to his Grave.

He had done his work, and he must depart to the Church Triumphant. He often said by a kind of presage many years before his death, that some odd October would part us, he felt his body more weak at that Autumnal season then any other, and could not have held out so long, but that he was forced to fly to Physic and Diet to corroborate, or rather keep him from sinking every Spring and fall. Accordingly he sickned upon St. Luke's day October 18. and died upon St. Simon and Jude's day following, aged 78 years, the just time of Athanasius and St. Jerome of old, according to Baronius.

Within a fortnight before his death he remitted nothing of his former studies; when he was first taken sick he did not conceive it to be mortal, and therefore sent the week before he died to a Friend in London to send him down the new Books from abroad or at home: But being ever upon his Watch-Tower, when he perceived God beckoned Him to come away, then he laid aside his Books, and all Communication or thoughts concerning any temporal matter; his heart was fixed, and not to be removed, from the great Object of Eternal life. He would say to his Visitants, he was a decaying old man, and desire them to avoid the Room; where in confession of his sins he was ever most humble, in godly sorrow most contrite, in prayer most assiduous, in faith most steadfast, in suffering his sickness most patient, in desiring to be uncloath'd of the Body most joyful and content: He shown no fear of death, not the least sign of any perturbation of mind for his aproaching end; but rather rejoiced that the day of the Lord was come, which he had so often desired; and as G. Nazianzen in his Funeral Sermon for St. Basil, rejoices that he died 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , with godly sayings in his mouth, in like manner did our godly Bishop so conclude his days in this world as he looked to begin them in the next, that the end of this life should be suitable to the beginning of the other, and that his last words he breathed forth here should have a good connection with his first addresses when he saw God face to face there: therefore being in perfect sense he sent for one of his Prebendaries to come and pray with him, who after some holy conference, read the Office appointed for the Sick; after that his Lordship desired him to add two Collects, naming first that for the second Sunday in Lent, and then afterward that for the first Sunday after Trinity ( both most pertinent to that great occasion) and then to give the Blessing: which being done he thanked him heartily with a faltring speech, whereby the Company plainly perceived, that with the end of his Prayers he drew near the end of his mortal life, and desired to be left alone; and so all departed the Room save a couple of Servants, who within half a quarter of an hour gave notice of his placid departure, with as gentle a transmigration to happiness as I think was ever heard of.

Thus I have declared sincerely the Life, the Sickness, the Departure of this worthy Christian Prelate, who lived as good men desire to live, and as many men, that are but shadows, appear to live; and then departed with as easy an 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 as any man could desire to die.

His Funerals only remain, which were performed by the Reverend and Learned Dr. Scattergood his Lordships Chaplain, in the Cathedral Church, where He was interred near the Body of his Predecessor Bishop Langthon, as old people said, both great Benefactors to that Church, under a fair Tomb erected by the Piety of the most accomplisht Sir Andrew Hacket his Eldest Son and Heir both of his Estate and Virtues.

He was attended thither by multitudes of the Loyal Gentry and sorrowful Clergy of his Diocese, all desirous to pay the utmost dues and rights they were able to his Memory, thinking no Flowers too sweet for his Herse, and no Box of Ointment too costly for his Burial, all admiring his past Diligence, sage Government, admirable Ministrations, and bewailing the great and universal loss by his Death;

O Diocese of Lichfield, what a Father hast thou lost! O University of Cambridge, what a Friend! O House of Aaron, what an Ornament! O Church of England, what a Saint! Sic ora ferebant.

But we will no more deplore his Death, or repine that He is taken from us, but rather rejoice and give God thanks that we ever had Him, and that He lived so long with us.

This World was not worthy of Him, who was fitter Company for Angels and Stars of Heaven, then Clods of dust and blood below; and therefore God took Him from this Dunghil to stand before his Throne; Where we leave thee (blessed Soul) among the Angelical Choir, joyful in the illumination of the holy Trinity, and ravished with thy contemplation of the Divine and inconceivable glory.

We will endeavor not only to read and admire, but practice all thy holy Counsels, which now sound more loud from thy Books and Writings, then they formerly did from thy rare Discourses and Preachings.

We ascribe the glory of all to God, and will compose ourselves to imitate thy Graces and Virtues (O Divine Hacket ) whose Name is renowned, and Memory forever blessed.

And will hereafter listen with patience for the voice of the Arch-Angel and Trump of God, for the Resurrection of the Dead, the Renovation of the World, the Creation of the New Heaven and New Earth at the glorious appearing of Christ Jesus with all his holy Angels and Saints; and then in the Number of godly Prelates and faithful Doctors of the Christian Church I shall see again my Bishop and Father, and hope to be seen of Him in Glory. AMEN.

THE FIRST SERMON UPON THE INCARNATION.

T His is a part of that joyful news which God did impart at first unto the Angels, which the Angels in the twelfth ver. did reveal unto the Shepherds, which the Shepherds in the seventeenth verse made known abroad, and thereby at first, perchance, it came to St. Luke, which St. Luke made known in this Gospel to the Church; which the Church from time to time hath delivered unto us; which I at this day deliver unto you, and which you must tell unto your Children, that one Generation may comfort another with it unto the ends of the World. I am in love with my Text; but how shall I open and dilate my joy upon it? No, that most venerable name Mary, the blessed Mother of our Lord, knew not how to do it. For although when Gabriel brought tidings unto her, that she should conceive, then she could come out with a strange word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , as if her spirit friskt and danc'd within for gladness; yet upon the birth no 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 would serve the turn, the joy was too big for the Language of man to deliver. How shall we then express ourselves for the honor of the day? Preaching is our present business; but words were too little, and therefore the Angels turned Musicians and sung it; Music was not enough, and therefore Wise men brought Gifts unto the Cradle; Neither were Gifts the way, for you may see by the cratch and the swaddling clouts that He affected Poverty. The Tongues of men, that is Preaching and Prayer; the Tongues of Angels, that is Music and Singing; the courteous Gifts of the Eastern men, Gold, Myrrh, and Frankincense, all are fit for the solemnity of these twelve days, but not all sufficient.

This happy day made an end of the woeful Captivity of the Sons of men under sin and Satan. See how far David went, when none but the Tribe of Judah came back from the Captivity of Babylon, When the Lord turned the Captivity of Zion, then were we like to them that dream. This is the greatest strain of joy, as we may interpret it. I do not mean that we should doubt whether we were verily preserved from the captivity of Sin by the birth of Christ, whether it were so indeed, or but a dream, like the Poets amorous fancy, Credimus? an qui amant, ipsi sibi somnia fingunt? or as Livy said of the Grecians when the Romans sent them unexpected liberty after their hard thralldom, Mirabundi velut somni speciem arbitrabantur, they were amazed as if they were not awake, but sleeping: but I would have your Soul transported as it were with an Extasie of devotion, as if Zeal and the Love of Jesus Christ put you in a dream; imagine strongly that this day is not the Anniversary to be celebrated after many years, but the very day itself of Christ's Nativity. Cannot you think that this Church is the Cratch that received the Babe? O cui cuncta possunt invidere marmora. Cannot you think yourselves to be those Shepherds whom the Angels sent of the good Errand, to look out a Savior? Who had not rather be one of them Shepherds than any King in the world? Then strongly possess your souls that you see the Son of God; that you stand over him and behold him, as he is wrapped in swaddling clouts, lying in a Manger. O that we could so deeply persuade our Soul that this Text is no report, but a vision before our eyes. So we must do, or else it is not full Christmas joy, it is no true Angelical devotion.

And then you shall see in this verse Mary laid of her Child: O the passing exaltation for flesh and blood to be such a Mother, and the Child laid in a Manger. O the wonderful humiliation of the eternal God to be such a Son! But that every part of the Text may be handled apart by itself in his own order I will insist upon these five things: 1. Here is the strange condition of the Mother, Et illa peperit, and she brought forth a Son, who by nature was no bearer, for she was a Virgin. 2. The strange condition of the Babe, ejus primogenitus, the first begotten of God was the first born Son of flesh and blood. 3. The strange condition of the Birth, that it was without the curse of woman, without the pangs of travail; the Fathers collect it from hence, that as soon as the Babe was born she could wrap him in swaddling clouts, a manifest sign that there was no debility or weakness in her. 4. The strange condition of the place of the Nativity, She laid him in a Manger. Lastly, the strange condition of men, that there was no room in the Inn for Jesus and Mary; these are the parts of my Text: With great reverence be it spoken, I may call them the swaddling clouts wherewith I must wrap my Savior.

First, Let us consider the strange condition of a maiden Mother, Et illa peperit, and she brought forth a Son, who by nature was no bearer, for she was a Virgin. A Doctrine which the Heathen and Pagan men will not admit, and which the Incredulous Jew to this day after his manner derides. The Heathen were so confident that a Virgin could not bring forth, that as Orosius reports, when Augustus Caesar had rest round about from all his enemies, He shut up the Gates of Janus his Temple, and called it the Temple of peace; and enquiring from their Oracles of Sorcery how long it should stand shut; it was answered, Quousque Virgo pariet, until the time that a Virgin brings forth a Son. The Messengers thought this answer to be, as if he had said, it should stand shut forever: and so they wrote upon the Gates, Templum pacis aeternum, The Temple of peace was eternal. Let me dispute the case with a mere natural man, How doth the harvest of the field enrich the Husbandman? It is answered, By the Seed which was sown in the ground. Say again, How came Seed into the world to sow the ground? Surely you must confess, that the first Seed had a Maker, who did not derive it from the Ears of Wheat, but made it of nothing by the power of his own hand; Qui sine seminibus operatur semina, &c. says St. Austin, then God could make a man without the Seed of man in the Virgins womb, who made Seed for the corn before ever there was earing or harvest. Nay, there is an instance for it in the little Bees, as the Poet doth Philosophize, they do not bring forth their young ones, as other Creatures do, by the help of Male and Female together; but they gather the seed which begets the young ones from the dew of leaves, and herbs, and flowers, and so they bring them forth. Nec concubitu indulgent nec corpora segnes in Venerem solvunt, and therefore the Be by some is called the Emblem of Virginity.

And as for the unbelieving Jew, the darkness and blindness of his heart cannot put out the light of Isaiah's Prophesy, Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son; for what though the word in the Original signify not only a Virgin, but any woman of a young and tender age? Yet in that place, as St. Jerome says very well, it must be nomen integritatis non aetatis, a name of Virginal integrity, and not of young age, or else you drown the astonishment which the Prophet doth so much exaggerate and amplify. I will give you a Sign; why, what sign is it for a young woman to bear a Child? No extraordinary one I am sure. Nay, says he, Ecce Virgo, behold and wonder at it. Behold a Miracle which shall never be wrought but once in the world. This was Virga Aaron florida, nec humectata; Aaron's Rod which was not watered, and yet being a dry stick, which had the help of no sap to make it fruitful, it flourished and put out, and brought forth fruit: So this maiden Mother knew no man, she did not conceive after the manner of women, but by the power of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost shall over-shadow thee, says Gabriel. Bene dictum est obumbrabit, says Gregory, Umbra enim a lumine formatur & corpore, i. e. A Deo & Virgin. The world is full of expression, which says the Holy Ghost shall over-shadow her; for a shadow is caused by the resplendency of Light, and the opacity of a gross body standing between: So Christ, who is the shadow of our refuge, under which we stand to couch ourselves from the scorching anger of God's wrath, he was conceived in the womb of the blessed Virgin, that was the body, the Light of Heaven, and the Holy Ghost reflecting upon it. Uerbum fuit pater ejus & auditus mater, says Fulgentius; Upon the word of the Salutation of the Angel, and by the Ear of Mary that heard the word, between these two alone he was made man, and they were unto him like as a Father, and a Mother.

St. Austin says very sweetly that this admirable Creature Mary the Mother of our Lord is in this verse like unto the Church of Christ; the Church is often called a Virgin, the Virgin the Daughter of Zion. I, but since so many faithful Sons are born unto the Church by the Preaching of the Gospel, how can they be the Sons of the Church, or the Church their Mother, if she be still a Virgin? Very fitly and conveniently as he answers, Virgo est & parit, Mariam imitatur quae Dominum peperit; the Church is a Virgin, and yet fruitful of Children; for she is like the Mother of our Lord, who was a Virgin Mother. Why God did make this choice, I mean why he chose this Blessed Virgin of the line of David to carry her own Redeemer and ours in her Womb before all the daughters of women, ask in God's name, and seek the reason; but let this be the ground upon which you build, Sapientia aedificavit sibi domum, Prov. 9.1. Wisdom did build herself an house, God did befit himself with so clean a vessel as there was not a more heavenly creature upon earth, neither since nor before her: and such a Virgin was the purest casket which might be found wherein to lay up the gem of the world. The very body of Christ without the soul was laid up in a tomb, wherein never Corps were laid before, in a new Tomb, and reason good; for though the soul was flitted away, yet the union between the Body and the Divine Nature was not dissolved: and therefore his Sepulcher was a new Sepulcher which was never seasoned with man before. O then when the living Body and the Godhead were united into one person, very meet and requisite it was that no Child should ever take up that Womb before the Son of God; the son of a sinner was not first to possess that place which was ordained for the Son of God. Moreover as the Woman Mary did bring forth the Son who bruised the Serpents head, which brought sin into the world by the woman Eve, so the Virgin Mary was the occasion of Grace, as the Virgin Eve was the cause of Damnation: Eve had not known Adam as yet when she was beguiled, and seduced the man; so Mary had not known Joseph, Et illa peperit, and she brought forth her first born Son. And thus you see Sapientia adificavit sibi domum, wisdom did build herself an house.

To make some use of this point unto ourselves, we see how well the Womb of the Virgin Mary did fit the Birth of Christ: but will you know what manner of house wisdom doth build unto herself, even unto this day? Our Savior was so well pleased with a Virgin -dwelling for once, that ever since he loves to abide and dwell in a Virgin, and unpolluted heart. Cor simplex est cor Virgineum, a plain dealing heart, such a one as Jacob's was: a charitable well-meaning heart is a single heart that hath no guile; such a one is in travel with Christ. Cor duplex est cor adulterum, an hypocrites heart that hath two faces and speaks with two tongues, he conceives mischief, and brings forth ungodliness; this is an adulterous heart: and as concerning the heart of the hypocrite, and malicious, if any man say, loe here is Christ, or loe there is Christ, believe them not. Beloved you see how curiously every feathered Fowl makes a nest to lay her young one, art and reason are not able to make such a work, as the ingenuity of Nature doth; wherefore let it not irk you once again to hearken how to prepare a nest wherein to lay your Savior; Grace is more choice and curious than either Art or Nature. Still I am resolved it must be a Virgins breast that is fruitful to bring forth Christ; but in my sense Zacchaeus was a Virgin; and perchance living in the state of Wedlock. Nay Mary Magdalene was a Virgin in this acception, though sometimes a Sinner given to the flesh: yet Anna the ancient Widow may pass for this Virgin without a Paradox: For as a Virgin is at the dispose of her Father to be given and betrothed, so is the virgin soul altogether into the will of God: and surely in a sort Christ himself is there, for it hath conceived by the Holy Ghost.

Nothing is wanting that this soul so formed into obedience should be answerable unto Mary; but as we read of her, it must be of the house and lineage of David. Saint Chrysostom said of David 's heart, it was volumen charitatis, a volume of love and charity, always chanting and singing zeal and devotion, to let your heart say according to the tune of his heart, My heart is fixed O God, my heart is fixed, I will sing and give praise, as if it could not be removed from God nor God from it; and then it is of the house and lineage of David. I have said enough I think to show what is in some competent sort proportionable in a good Christian to the virginity of Mary, that his soul may be made fit to bring forth Christ. St. Bernard calls me back a little, Respexit Dominus humilitatem Mariae non virginitatem, Mary confessed herself that God regarded her lowliness, and not her virginity. Et illa peperit, and the lowly hand-maid brought forth the Babe of exceeding glory. Hail thou that art highly favored, says the Angel: yea but thrice hail thou that art lowly minded: Etiam in coelo stare non potuit superba sublimitas, if we will not beware of pride by the fall of men whose examples are often seen, why take heed of it by the fall of Angels. Heaven would not let pride be unpunished in Lucifer but threw it lower than the earth. Christ would not let great humility be unrewarded in Mary, but exalted it I may say above the heavens; for so you shall perceive by the second part of my Text the strange condition of the child. Et illa peperit promigenitum, &c.

It was Nicodemus his problem which he propounded to our Savior, Iterum potest homo nasci? Can a man be born again, or the second time? that which is impossible to Nicodemus is true in the person of our Savior; for he that was the first begotten of God before all worlds, is Ejus primogenitus, at a second birth he is become the first born Son of Mary: De victo genere sumsit hominem per quem generis humani vinceret inimicum, says St. Austin. The Devil thought that at one skirmish in the Garden of Eden he had made a perfect conquest over the poor nature of man, flesh and blood could never rise up again to take arms against him: His malice was like Caligula 's, that wisht all the subjects of the Roman Empire had but one head upon their shoulders, that at one blow he might destroy the whole generation; but de Victo genere, as the Father said, Christ mannageth the quarrel between us and Satan, so fairly and indifferently, that he took upon him not the substance of Angels, but even the flesh which was overcome, that in the same Nature he might destroy our enemies. The Potter may make what vessels do like him best out of his own clay. But how strangely was the wheel turned about when the Clay did make the Potter; was it not enough to make man after the image of God, but moreover to make God after the image and likeness of man? was it not enough that the breath of the Lord should be made a living soul for man, but that the eternal word of God should be made Flesh; Utinam sicut verbum caro factum est, ita cor nostrum fiat carneum, O that as the word was made flesh, so our stony hearts, as the Prophet says, may be made flesh, that we may believe and glorify this wonderful generation; but the manner of this generation is a secret of God, within the rail, and I will not touch it.

Let it suffice us to know concerning her first-born. 1. That he was never called the Son of the Holy Ghost, though he were conceived by him. 2. That among all those of the genealogy from whom he descended, especially he is called the Son of David and Abraham: But 3. by the nearest interest he was Ejus primogenitus the first-born Son of Mary. Touching the first, it is an Article of our Creed, that the Holy Ghost was the active principle of the generation of Christ; and why then was he not called his Father? because to be the father of another thing is not enough to be the active principle of it: for even the Sun is the active cause that produceth Worms and Flies, and all those which are called insecta animalia, and yet it is not called the father of those creatures; but a father must beget a thing according to his own kind and species; and therefore Christ was born after the species and nature of the Woman, whereby he is called not the Son of the Holy Ghost, but the Son of Mary.

Again, as for the next thine observed in the Preface of St. Matthew 's Gospel among all those that belong to the line of our Savior's Parentage, the persons especially picked out are David and Abraham; which was the Son of David, which was the Son of Abraham, and that for this reason, though Christ came from the loins of many others. St. Luke counts 77 descents between Adam and Christ, yet the words of promise benedicentur in semine tuo, it was only spoke unto Abraham and David, that in their seed, that is in Christ all the Kingdoms of the earth should be blessed: And therefore Abraham and David were known by name above others: It was in every man's mouth that the Messias should come out of their stock; the Oath which he swore to our fore-father Abraham says Zacharias in his Song; and blind men and beggars had it at their fingers end, Son of David have mercy on us. The more to illustrate this, you must know that there was a twofold root or foundation of the Children of Israel for their temporal being: Abraham was the root of the people; the Kingdom was rent from Saul, and therefore David was the root of the Kingdom; among all the Kings in the Pedigree none but He hath the name, and Jesse begat David the King, and David the King begat Solomon; and therefore so often as God did profess to spare the people, though He were angry, He says he would do it for Abraham's sake: So often as He professeth to spare the Kingdom of Judah, He says he would do it for his Servant David's sake. So that ration radicis, as Abraham and David are roots of the People and Kingdom, especially Christ is called the Son of David, the Son of Abraham; and to say no more, their Faith in the Incarnation of Christ is of some moment in this point. David having obtained the name to be called the Prophet 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , because he doth so fully express the Birth and Passion of our Savior; and Abraham's faith is most notable in that one instance says Fulgentius, when He made Eleezer his Steward, put his hand under his thigh, and take an oath in the name of the Lord, not that he thought there was any connection between his own flesh and the God of heaven, Sed ut ostenderet Deum coeli ex eâ carne nasciturum, but to show that the blessed Babe of Mary should descend lineally from his Loins.

Who in the third place by the nearest interest, is called Ejus primogenitus, the first-born Son of Mary. Non quod post eum alius, sed quod ante eum nemo, says St. Austin: not called the first-born Son as the eldest of them Sons that followed, but as being the first fruits of a Virgin-womb that had none before nor after; here is Isaiah's Prophesy, Puer natus nobis, a Child born unto us; Natus est non sibi Christus, sed mihi, for He was born not for himself, but for me, and for all the Faithful. Here is Jeremiah's Prophesy, Mulier circundabit virum, that a woman shall compass a man; Jer. 31.22. The Lord hath created a new thing in the earth, a woman shall compass a man. For Isaiah's Child is called a Man in Jeremiah, Insinuans, ei nunquam defuisse virtutem, because in the very swaddling clouts he came forth, not as a weak Infant, but full of power and virtue, as a Giant to run his course. He grew on indeed, says St. Austin, from an infant to a man, but never to be an old man, Crescat & fides tua robur inveniat, vetustatem nesciat. So let thy faith wax more and more; let it come to perfection, and maturity, but never unto old age, as if it droopt and were declining.

I come to the third strange condition of the Birth, it was without travel, or the pangs of woman, as I will show you out of these words, Fasciis involvit, that she wrapped him in swaddling clouts, and laid him in a Manger. Ipsa genitrix, fuit & obstetrix, says St. Cyprian, Mary was both the Mother and the Midwife of the Child; far be it from us to think that the weak hand of the woman could facilitate the work which was guided only by the miraculous hand of God. The Virgin conceived our Lord without the Lusts of the flesh, and therefore she had not the pangs and travel of women upon her, she brought him forth without the curse of the flesh. These be the Fathers comparisons, As Bees draw honey from the flower without offending it, as Eve was taken out of Adams side without any grief to him, as a sprig issues out of the bark of the tree, as the sparkling light from the brightness of the Star, such ease was it to Mary to bring forth her first-born Son; and therefore having no weakness in her body, feeling no want of Vigour, she did not deliver him to any profane hand to be dressed, but by a special ability, above all that are newly delivered, she wrapped him in swaddling clouts. Gravida, sed non gravabatur, she had a burden in her womb, before she was delivered, and yet she was not burdened: for her journey which she took so instantly, before the time of the Childs birth from Nazareth to Bethlehem was above forty miles, and yet she suffered it without weariness or complaint, for such was the power of the Babe, that rather he did support the Mothers weakness than was supported; and as he lightened his Mothers travel by the way from Nazareth to Bethlehem that it was not tedious to her tender age, so he took away all her dolour and imbecility from her travel in Child-birth, and therefore she wrapped him in swaddling clouts.

Now these clouts here mentioned which were not worth the taking up, but that we find them in this Text, are more to be esteemed than the Robes of Solomon in all his Royalty; yea, more valuable than the beauty of the Lily, or any Flower of the field or garden, which did surpass all the Royalty of Solomon. I may say they are the Pride of Poverty, for I know not in what thing poverty may better boast and glory than in the rags of Christ. His tears are no comfort to them that laugh; his Crach in the Manger is no comfort to them that affect the highest rooms in the Synagogues; his want is no comfort to them that are rich; his mean apparel is no comfort to our costly garments: but this is a comfort to them that want clothing to cover their Nakedness, that Christ himself was wrapped in swaddling clouts. He triumphed over poverty in this poor and base Array, says St. Austin, as truly and verily as he triumphed over death. Now death was conquered by Christ, not that we should not die at all, but that we should vanquish death by the Resurrection: So Poverty was thus led captive, and overcome, Non ut omnino essugeamus, sed ut majori letitia toleremus; not that we should never sustain it, but that we should sustain it cheerfully, and with patience. This was but the beginning of sorrow, to be tenderly bound up in warm cloths, there is a worse binding to come when the high Priests Servants shall find him in the Garden, and lead him away bound like a Malefactor; Feret aspera grandior aetas vincula cum palmam clavus utramque premet, says a Christian Poet; his hands will be straiter bound when they are pinned to the Cross with Nails and Iron; for as the blood which he spent at Circumcision was but an earnest of those drops which he should shed at his Passion: So this wrapping and swaddling of his Arms and Legs was but a representation how he should yield up all his Limbs to be bound unto the Cross.

O behold this thing, you that think it no Christmas without bravery upon your backs, these were our Savior's clothes for this good time, he had no other gaudy Garments; but take up the fringe of your own Coats, look upon the Ornaments you wear, and tell me what Savior it is you imitate; you lay all you can upon your backs to celebrate his first coming into the world, which was in baseness and poverty. I pray you what would you be willing to put on when you shall meet him at his second coming in the clouds? O then our mortal shall be swallowed up of immortality: and as holy Nazianzen says 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , nakedness is all the clothing we shall put on at the day of the great Resurrection. Blessed Mary, says St. Austin, began betimes to let her Babe see nothing but modesty about him. Nunc mulieres cum lacte in cunis superbiam infantibus instillant; Now adays, says he, our women do so nuzzle their little Imps in their Cradle, that they suck in vanity as soon as they take the dug; and for the most part (let men be so base to follow it if they will) all our gay fashions come from some she inventrix, as Synesius says of the Wife of Triphon, that it was all her ambition, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to have the name of the curious Lady, and that all fashions were warranted by her invention; when by their leaves I think it is as little for their reputation, as it was for Anak to find out Mules.

Thus I have followed the stream, not departing from the common adnotation upon this place, which says that Christ did consecrate, and as it were sanctify Poverty by this instance, that he was wrapped in swaddling clouts: which is not so to be understood, I think, as if the first Linnen Ephod, which was so happy to apparel the great High Priest of the Church, had been some base or wragged piece of cloth. For beloved, to do all due right to the ever blessed Virgin, she was not ignorant what a heavenly burden she bore, she knew that after the custom of women the time of her deliverance was at hand; she understood the Scriptures as well as the high Priests and Scribes that Christ must be born in Bethlehem of Judah, the place to which she went to be taxed with Joseph her husband. Can we then imagine but that this most religious Mother had made preparation for such a Child, and had furnished herself against their journey, Cum lineis pannis purissimis, utpote partus conscia, with the purest fine linen cloths, because she knew the hour of the most happy Nativity was at hand? 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , says the Greek Text; in one word, she swaddled him up, but sure with all observance, and reverent decency.

But the poor and abject estate into which this Kingly Babe was cast as soon as he was born will appear most clearly by the fourth circumstance of the Text, the strange condition of the place of his Nativity, She laid him in a Manger. And will the Lord dwell upon earth, says Solomon when he had dedicated unto his name the most augustious Temple in the world; Was a question made concerning such a Magnificent house, whether it were fit for the Lord? Then what say you to this grot? This Manger of the Stable? As Seneca said of Gaius Marius, when he was turned abroad to seek his lodging among the flags of the Fens, Quis eum fuisse consulem aut futurum crederet? Who would ever think that a man who shrouded his head in so mean a place had been the great Consul of Rome before, or should be Consul again? So he that should find Christ in such a despicable corner of a Room where beasts did feed, who could think that it was that God that created the World before, or should judge the World hereafter? But to say the truth, was he not safer among the beasts than he could be elsewhere in all the Town of Bethlehem? His enemies perchance would say unto him as Jael did to Sisera, Turn in, turn in my Lord, when she purposed to kill him; as the men of Keilah made a fair show to give David all courteous hospitality, but the issue would prove, if God had not blessed him, that they mean to deliver him into the hands of Saul that sought his blood. So there was no trusting of the Bethlehemites, who knows but that they would have prevented Judas, and betrayed him for thirty pieces of Silver unto Herod? More humanity is to be expected from the beasts than from some men, and therefore she laid him in a Manger.

Do not your bowels yearn, Beloved, to make Christ some amends for this poor entertainment? Do not you persuade yourselves if you had been in Bethlehem it should not have been so as it was? Your Zeal is good, and there is no time lost to do it yet. Non erat ei nisi angustia in terris, ut tu ei locum cordis tui proprium dilatares. Christ was straightened for room in the Inn, and thrust into the Stable, that you might open your heart wide, and enlarge it, to give him an habitation to content him. The heart of an Heretic, the heart of a profane person is more loathsome, more unfit for Christ than any Manger in the world; between such a polluted sink of iniquity, and this Manger as it was adorned, there was no comparison. It was the recreation which the old Friers had in their Monastical Cells, to write lies; Legends are for the most part fabulous, and I had as lieve believe the dreams of a sick man as believe all the story of our Savior's birth which goes under the name of St. Bridget: Yet I am altogether inclined to think, that the Stable wherein Christ was born was so beautified for the time with the light of heaven, which did shine in the place, that a Palace of beaten gold could not seem to be half so rich and precious; my reason is, that if the glory of the Lord did shine about the Shepherds in the field with such an heavenly luster, when the Angels came to sing their Carol, most likely it is, that the same glory seven fold brighter did cast celestial beams upon this place, where this Child was laid in a Manger: But no such beams of Heaven ever did shine upon the heart of a profligate sinner, and therefore I have good reason to say that a Manger amongst beasts was fitter for our Savior.

O praesepe splendidum in quo panis inventus est Angelorum: O holy and venerable Cratch which was the repository to receive the bread of Angels. Reclinavit is the strangest word to me in all the Text, that Mary could part with him out of her arms, and lay him aside in the Manger. I did ever think old Simeon much indebted to her for that favor that he was permitted to take him up in his arms; but what, did the Stable and Cratch deserve to be the Throne of the Son of God? Surely, if Jacob understood that there was a Mystery in it, when he laid his head upon a stone to sleep, then it cannot be without many Mysteries that this Infant was laid in a Manger. I will separate all the Meditations which the Fathers raise upon it that he was born in an Inn, and confine myself only to express why this homely Room was lent him in a Stable.

First, Beloved, Periculosum est inter delicias poni; 'tis full of peril to rest among pleasures and delights; It is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting, Eccl. 7.2. Adam had his habitation among the sweet savors and most delightful recreations of the Garden of Eden; his senses were so filled with objects of pleasures, that he forgot the Lord: Therefore Jesus Christ the Second Adam, who came to restore all that was lost, pitched upon the worst corner of the house, where there were no delights at all to move temptation. Shall I tell you a paradox which St. Chrysostom held? He said, he had rather be cast into Prison with St. Paul, into the house of affliction, than be wrapped up with him into the third Heavens. Kings houses, and well furnished Mansions have their occasions of Lewdness, but she laid her Son in a Manger.

Secondly, Omnis caro sicut foenum, all flesh is grass, and our beauty is as a flower of the field, this caused the flesh of Christ to be laid in the part of the Stable, where the grass is cut down and withered; Corruption sorts with Corruption; the Saints that are in glory, and can die no more, their dwellings are in the highest heavens, which are free from change and alteration, but the Son of man hath put on mortality, and to signify that his body is like unto ours, which shall wither like grass; Reclinavit in praesepi, he was laid in a Manger.

Thirdly, Learn from hence to condescend unto the Humility of Christ if you mean to ascend unto his glory; for as the custom of those Regions was, this Manger was 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a Vault cut out of a Rock, as low a place as he could cast himself into; but no man projects so wisely to raise up a mighty building as he that lays a low foundation: It is reported of Sixtus Quintus, how he was so far from shame that he was born in a poor Cottage, that he would sport with his own fortune, and say, he was Familiâ illustri natus, born in a bright resplendent Family, because the Sun looked in at every cranny of the house; it is not the meanness of the place that can justly turn to any man's scorn, nor doth a magnificent Palace build up any man's reputation. Holofernes had a costly Tent to cover him, and yet was never the honester; and it was a pretty objection of Plutarch’s against the vain consumption of cost upon the decking of our houses. Quare homines in auratis lectis somnum capiunt quem Dii gratis dederunt: What do we mean, says he, to be at such cost to deck our Chambers? Why will we pay so dear for our sleep, when God, if you please, hath given you that for nothing? the slenderest place served our Savior to cover his head, Reclinavit in praesepi, She laid him in a Manger.

Fourthly, and lastly, God provided the Virgins womb for our Savior before he was born, man provided a Manger after he was born, that you may see that God is ever worse provided for by man than he provides for himself. Let him provide for himself the manner of an Ark, or inspire the heart of Solomon what Temple should be built unto him, and the world had never such a piece of work for beauty and magnificence. Let him trust to the benevolence of men, I praise God I am not in the place now where I need to complain, but more eyes have seen such Churches, especially such Chancels which our Zealous Lay Parsons of the Kingdom have sacrilegiously unroof'd, and uncas'd the Lead, and left them thatch and straw for a covering, and scarce that too. O God I shame to speak it, surely by all description of ancient Writers, our Savior was better provided when He was laid in a Manger.

Their unworthiness deserves to be paralleled with those men of strange condition in the last part of my Text, that kept possession against Christ himself, and shut him out of doors, for there was no room for him in the Inn, nor for his Mother Mary. Was there no Obadiah that would receive a Prophet? No Obededom that would take the Ark of God into his house? Some say, that because the whole City of David was so ungrateful to their new-born King, therefore the Angel of purpose shunned all the Inhabitants, and went into the field to find out Shepherds, and sent them first to behold their Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Others say, because Bethlehem was so pittiless to this Babe, therefore God raised up the fury of Herod, which had no pity of their Babes, but slew all their Children from two years old and under. Surely we all see how the Roman Conquerors carried them away captive from their own Country, neither man nor child hath room to inhabit Bethlehem this day, neither is there such a Town as Bethlehem standing, because there was no room for Christ. You know the Parable of the good Samaritan, that took the wounded man and carried him to his Inn, and left him safe there, and paid his charges. The sense of the Parable is reduced by many of the Fathers unto Christ himself; He is the good Samaritan that would not let our wounds bleed abroad, but house'd us, and lodged us in his own Inn, that is, the Church, to upbraid the incivility of men by the Letter of the Parable, that we gave no hospitality to the Son of God.

The reasons given why Joseph and Mary were thus excluded are three:

The first is false, nay, indeed calumnious, that they came tardy, and after all other company to pay their Tribute money: No, Beloved, such an hasty Couple, so forward to give unto God that which is God's, would never be slack to give unto Caesar that which is Caesar's. Besides, if she brought forth her first-born Son upon the first day of the week, upon Sunday, as some cast it out, then the whole day before she was in Bethlehem, for upon the Saturday, or Sabbath she must not travel; perchance they had been longer in the City, and, as we say, danced attendance, being poor persons, before the Officers of the Tribute would dispatch them; and yet all this while no room was made in the Inn, nor in any charitable house for the Nativity of Christ. The indignation against this were able to make us, like Jacob, live under the dew and frost of Heaven; as the Prophet protested, never to climb up to our bed because Christ was so disappointed. Or as Uriah said unto David, The Ark abides in Tents, my Lord Joab is encampt in the open field, and shall I go up into mine own house. The glory of Israel was laid in a Cratch, the Salvation of the world was turned into a Stable, and dost thou permit us to live in ceiled houses?

But the second and true reason why the Inn afforded them no room was this: Augustus Caesar's Tax had drawn multitudes unto Bethlehem that filled every corner; the true use of it was, that there might be more attendance about the King of Glory to do him reverence and homage; but the greater multitude, the fouler was the neglect, the more inexcusable the disobedience. They that glory in multitudes as a great testimony to prove the verity of their Church are as wise as them that should prove their Harvest to be plentiful because it hath abundance of Thistles. A multitude flocked after Christ in the Wilderness, verily it is to eat of the Loaves and Fishes, not for the Doctrines sake. A multitude followed him into the High Priests Hall, and the whole Rabble cried out, Let him be crucified; A troupe of Soldiers watched his Sepulcher, and belied his Resurrection; a multitude was in Bethlehem at his Nativity, and there was no room for him in the Inn.

But thirdly, We may suppose the multitudes had not so pestered the Town but that one Lodging might be spared, if there were horse-room in the Stable, as it appears there was, because Christ lay in the Manger, then it cannot sound in my ear but there might be room made for men in the Inn. Yes, but Lazarus is poor, and therefore he must not come over the Threshold, but lie at the rich Gluttons door; and though the fish of the Sea were so liberal to pay our Savior's Tribute, the beasts of the Stable so obedient to leave space for his birth, yet reasonable men stood upon it that they would not entertain him for nothing. Booz was a rare example, that took Ruth into his house when she went a begging: Booz was a Bethlemite, but it seems he had left none behind him, for Mary and Joseph were poor, and there was no room for them in the Inn. I know not how it came to pass, but for the credit of Poverty, which was thus despised, not many rich, but many poor in the days of our Savior did receive the Gospel. As dry wood, says Bernard, sooner taketh fire than that which is green and flourishing: So the poor did embrace the glad tidings of Salvation without resistance, when the Nobles of the world, that flourished in their wealth, refused it.

O but let Bethlehem be ten times more populous for multitude, were Mary of the poorest of the people, which could not be, admitting that she and Joseph paid Subsidies to Caesar; nay, were she a Samaritan, with whom the Jew hated to commerce, yet Barbarians would take her in, and cherish her in the time of Childbirth. Beloved, it is a kind of churlishness that can admit no Apology. This is all that I can say, since men had left their civility to be men, to wipe away that foul ignominy God took our nature upon him, and was made man, even He of whom it is said in my Text, She brought forth, &c. It is a sign of very bad times when we lose pity and humanity to men, and reverence to God.

THE SECOND SERMON UPON THE INCARNATION.

A Year is past since I began to handle this part of St. Luke's Gospel, containing the most full and exact History of the Nativity of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Me thinks I am privy to your memory, that you call to mind summarily what then was said upon the former Verse: 1. The strange condition of the Mother, that she brought forth a Son, who by nature was no bearer, for she was a Virgin. 2. The strange condition of the Babe, the first begotten Son of God was the first-born Son of flesh and blood. 3. The strange condition of the place, that she laid him in a Manger. Lastly, The strange condition of men, that there was no room in the Inn for Jesus and Mary. In his name who hath given us leave and life to meet this year also in his holy Temple, and for his honor, and to glorify his Son we are come again to the same place, and to the same portion of Scripture, to celebrate this blessed and most auspicious day of our Savior's Incarnation. They that consult with the wisdom of flesh and blood, may marvel that no room of state was made ready for his birth, no place taken up to receive such an Infant and his Mother; or whatsoever the dwelling were, any place rather than a Cratch and a Manger: but there is little amends made in my Text for this humiliation and poverty. For see what Stage the Angel hath chosen to declare and annunciate him unto the world; the City was too rich, the Temple too stately, the Synagogues had too much of the Pharisees in them, Kings Courts were too voluptuous, therefore he assembles those together whom he found in the fields and desolate places. But as mean as their condition was, since an Angel from Heaven entertained conference with them, we may justly employ the exercise of this hour upon them, according as they are mentioned in my Text, There were in the same Country Shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night, and as it followeth.

In which Text I see no less than seven goodly ears of corn growing upon one Stalk according to the prosperous part of Pharaohs dream. For the place in which the Angel chose to publish the Incarnation here are two circumstances: 1. It was in the same Country. 2. It was in the Field. For the time, which is the third circumstance, it was in the night. For the persons, two more: They were Shepherds, that's the fourth part; They were many, so many as made a Plural number, that's the fifth. Then there are two circumstances of their Office and diligence, they watched; that's not all, they watched over their Flocks, and so we are ascended to the number which I propounded, the Text is distributed into seven branches. Pastores in eadem regione, Shepherds in the same Country; at the circumstance we begin.

There is no place upon earth to which God descended, or to which his Angels approached in holy Scripture, but it is significative and mystical, wherefore names were given to such places by the Patriarchs and Prophets, as when the voice for Heaven with held Abraham from sacrificing Isaac, it was called Jehovah jireth, the Lord shall be seen in the Mount. From whence I deduce how these words cannot be empty of some pithy observation, in eâdem Regione, that the Angel appeared unto the Shepherds in the same Country. It was a place between Bethlehem and Jerusalem, the same parcel of Ground, as most agree, when Jacob slept, and in his sleep saw Angels ascending and descending upon the Ladder, and when he awoke he built an Altar, and called it Bethel, the house of God. Now where could the first news of Christ's Nativity arrive more properly than in the same place where it was first seen in a Vision? Where could it be published more aptly, than where it was promised to the Patriarchs? There Jacob poured oil upon the top of the stone, the first anointing with oil that we read of in holy Scripture: Upon that parcel of Ground, not by chance, but out of providence, he was proclaimed, who is called Christus Domini, the Christ, or the anointed of the Lord. There stood the Altar which was called Bethel, the first Altar that ever was called the Church of God: and from whence should the news of a Savior issue, but from the holy place which is consecrated and blest to be called the house of God? It was long indeed (for so the yearning and the desire of the world might think) before our Savior took flesh of the Virgin Mary; yet it was not unmindfulness in the Almighty, He remembered the oath which he swore to Abraham; nay, He remembered the desolate place when he appeared to Jacob in eâdem Regione, in the same Country.

The further I look into this apparition (Brethren) I see more wonder and mystery in it; for the whole Country of the Jews was in the same distress and misery at this time, into which poor wandering Jacob was cast, when he slept by the way-side upon the hard stones for his pillow. Esau hated Jacob, and compelled him to abandon his Fathers house, and to retire into desert places; so the overflowing Romans had made themselves Lord's of the Land of Jury, and brought all Israel under the thralldom of their Dominion: But behold, as in the pinch of Jacob's extremity his soul saw the Vision of a Savior, so after the same proportion of mercy, in the pinch of Israel's extremity, when the Romans were Lord's over them, their eyes saw, and their ears heard the Annunciation of a Savior; each parcel of comfort landed jump, as God would have it, in the same model of Ground, in the same Country that the Shepherds kept watch over their flocks by night.

Yet methinks I see another mystery, Beloved: for the Incarnation of our Lord stands as thick with wonders as the Heaven with Stars, and it is this: Was not this glorious Babe born at Bethlehem? Why are not the first news of his birth carried to the same City where he was born? It is our discretion to suspect that news, and very justly, which comes not from the place where the thing was done. For answer, This is the secret of providence, I guess, which is hidden under it. You know that Christ was conceived at Nazareth, and born at Bethlehem; Lived much at Capernaum, but died at Jerusalem. These Towns of Nazareth and Capernaum, were vulgarly at this day called Galilee of the Gentiles. The truth is, they were given to the Gentiles to dwell in, and by them inhabited in former times; they were destined to the Tribes of Israel, for upon the Captivity of ten Tribes carried quite away by Salmanezar, only Judah and Benjamin were left behind, not able for their small number to fill the whole Land of Canaan; whereupon that part wherein Nazareth and Capernaum did stand was called Galilee of the Gentiles. Mark here the equity and indifferency of the Son of God both to Jew and to Barbarian; He was conceived among the Gentiles at Nazareth, brought forth into the world among the Jews at Bethlehem; Lived at Galilee of the Nations, but died at Jerusalem. So in this Gospel, his Mother brought him forth within the Walls of the City, that was proper to the Jew, but the tidings were heard abroad without the Walls in the Country, that was proper to the Gentiles.

The Collection is not violent, but natural; for so St. Paul argues, that Christ belonged unto us aliens from the Covenant, who were not of the Jews that served at the Tabernacle, for Jesus also that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the Gate. The benefit of our Savior's life and death was communicated to all people, not only to the Seed of David, passus extra Jerusalem. He suffered not within, but without Jerusalem, because the fruit of his death lay open to all: Ascendens e monte Oliveti extra Bethaniam; Ascended into Heaven upon the mount of Olives without the Town of Bethany, because he opened the Kingdom of Heaven for all believers. But hear what follows in the Jesuit Salmeron, natus in Speluncâ extra Bethlehem, born in a Grote or Cave, for so he calls the Manger, without the Town of Bethlehem, because the benefit of his Incarnation was open and public to all. Here his observation sticks and is erroneous, although he hath the judgment of Cajetan to favor him, and the conjecture of Baronius almost concurring with him, for he says, the Stable was in Suburbiis Bethlehem, not within, but without the Gates, in the Suburbs of Bethlehem. And, what more manifest to convince their fancy than the eleventh verse of this Chapter, This day is born unto you a Savior in the City of David. The Moral therefore is more fitly made up, as I told you before, that He came first into the world in the City of Bethlehem, by which deed he doth intimate that He was made flesh for the Salvation of the Jew, but the tidings were heard abroad at the first publication in the same Country, whereby it appears he was made man also for the salvation of the Gentile.

Another circumstance of place is in the Text, that the Angel chose the open fields to annunciate the Messias of the world; and who can deem but that they were fitly chosen for the purpose? The Priests of the Temple would not be glad to hear of him that cut off their Types and Ceremonies; they that inhabit the City would not relish such a Prophet, that will say unto them, Sell all, and give it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven. The pleading places of Justice would laugh at his prescription, He that taketh away thy Coat, let him have thy Cloak also. The Seas had heard of nothing but Neptune and Thetis, and the titles of false God's, all their ships were called by the names of Idols; but the plain Fields had no such prejudicate opinion against a Savior which is Christ the Lord. Upon their pleasant fruitfulness, the happy news are showered down, as if the dawning of this bright day should change all the Earth into another Paradise. Mystically thus much may be collected, as all increase and abundance wherewith we are fed is brought out of the field, so the Incarnation of Christ should fill the world with the plenty and abundance of Salvation. I will not say, according to the Letter of the Miracle in the Gospel, that the fishermen labored hard all night and took nothing; so in the darkness of the Law (which may not unfitly be called the night) nothing at all was taken; yes, there was a number of those that believed, but a very small one, here a berry, and there a berry, says the Prophet, upon the top of a bow. The Pharisees compassed Sea and Land to gain one Proselyte, and scarce glean'd up one in all their travel; but since the Church writes itself not Jew, but Christian. Since the day spring from on high hath visited us, the number of the fishes is so great which the Apostles drew into the Ship, that the nets were ready to break because of the multitude.

As the Widows oil filled every vessel which she could borrow of her neighbors, so the faith of our Redeemer hath filled all Nations in the world. As Job said by Allegory, Petra mihi effundit rivos olei; Rivers of oil trickled down from the rock, and the rock was Christ. During the time of Moses Law what a paucity there was of those that spent their industry to interpret the Canon of the Scriptures; How few are reckoned that shed their blood for the maintenance of the truth? Not any almost that made themselves Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven; many Ages yielded small store of Saints. But see what the Gospel hath brought forth like a fruiful field, many Penmen of holy Writings; many Virgins unspotted touching the flesh; thousand thousands of Martyrs. They that have gone about to cast up the number, think that as many have lost their lives for the profession of righteousness in the time of the Gospel, as there were beasts in the old Law slain for Sacrifice before the Altar. Et nunc omnis ager, nunc omnis parturit arbor. Now the trees of the Lord are full of sap, now the Temples of the Lord are thronged with those that believe, as the fields stand thick with Corn in Harvest. This is the good will of him that was born in Bethlehem, prefigured to give increase and abundance, because the Angel did annunciate him in the fields, where fruit grows up for the use of man.

The errors of men are captious, and catch at any occasion to argue for their own defense, and why may not this Text be distorted by some to prove, that fields and deserts are fit receptacles for Congregations of Christians? But for Churches and Chapels they may be demolished, or else neglected. It was an Heresy of the Massilians, as Damascene oserved, that God might be worshipped as well in the Woods or vast Mountains, in any place unhallowed, as in those Oratories that are dedicated to his honor; I would they had left none of their brood behind them; but the first broacher of that corrupt Doctrine (as I have told you once before) in my conceit was Jeroboam, for he made a rent in the Kingdom of Israel, alienating ten Tribes from their Allegiance due to their lawful Prince Rehoboam. But one thing troubled him, that according to the Law all the Tribes must go up once a year to worship at Jerusalem, which was the imperial City of the King of Judah. This was it that cut the very nerves of his conspiracy; therefore you shall find him thus speaking to the people in Josephus: Country-men, says he, you know the Law, and are not ignorant that God is in every place as well at Dan and Bethel as at Jerusalem. Ubique vota exaudit, ubique cultores suos respicit; his ear is everywhere to hear your Prayers, his eye is everywhere to see your Worship, and therefore there is no such necessity as the Priests talk of to go up yearly to the Temple at Jerusalem. This is Jeroboams Divinity, in one act both an Heretic and a Traitor, he took away the Crown from God's anointed by violence, and would take away the throne dedicated to God himself by fraudulence.

Beloved, every Religion knew this, that one house or more, as the worship required, was to be built unto the God before whom they prayed, and in whose name they took an Oath before the Altar. Dagon the Idol of the Philistines had his Temples, and so had the rest; and shall the Assemblies gathered in the name of Christ, shall they only worship in the Mountains and in desert places? The Angel hovered from above over the fields where the Shepherds abode; because he was a Messenger of Heaven, and therefore proclaimed the Christ under the open heaven; but men that have their habitation upon earth must not so preach Christ as if they had dropt out of the skies; the presence of an Angel did consecrate the waste plains upon which the flocks were feeding, any place was holy for that time where an Angel spoke: but corruptible and sinful man must not think that it is his privilege to do the like, unless the place be set apart for God's service by a lawful solemnity of dedication. Philo the Jew makes mention of some that worshipped God with most fervent devotion in Egypt, and the parts of Alexandria, frequent in Prayers and Watchings, and it appears to some they were Christians, and they, says Philo, had their 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , religious buildings full of reverence and Majesty to praise the Lord. This that Philo speaks of was in the reign of Claudius the Emperor, twelve years and no more after our Savior's Ascension into Heaven. The Primitive Church flourishing, the Apostles all living, these 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , these Oratories and Chapels were built, so ancient is the practice to call upon God in such stately buildings as were appropriated to be the houses of Prayer; and the Reverend Council of Gangra past this Canon against Eustachius an enemy to Church buildings; If any man shall say the house of God is contemptible, and the Assemblies vain, let him be an Anathema. And of the two circumstances of the place that the Angel appeared in the field before the Shepherds, so much and no more.

Thirdly, I observed for the time, that it was night when the Angel came unto them, I dispute not what time of the night it was. The night was distributed into four watches, assigning the space of three hours to a Watch, to this end, that he who could not endure the tediousness of a whole night to lie abroad under the open air might be relieved at the end of a watch by him that took his place; and it is not improbable that this occasion fell out towards the last watch of the night: For to Premonstrate, that Christ came to bring light, to enlighten every man that came into the world; he was annunciated by the Angel both at the increase of the year, and at the increase of the day. Oriente Salvatore non solum humani generis salus, sed etiam solis ipsius claritas innovatur. says St. Ambrose, at this day Salvation shined upon the soul of man, which had been in the darkness of condemnation, even as our Savior was born toward the dawning of the morning, when the Sun was peeping out of the darkness of the night. Nay, the same Father goes further. You would think his fancy were Rhetorical, or rather Poetical, but he delivers it for a Doctrine which he did verily believe that it was late at night when the Angel came into the field, Cum sol festinans ob dominicae nativitatis obsequium, &c. When the Sun, in homage to our Savior's Nativity, posted, as it were, and (before the Stars had run their courses cut short the night) shined upon the world many hours before the day expected him, and thus he reasons, if the Sun stood still in the day for the Prayers of Joshua, why might not he shorten the night to behold our Savior's Nativity? Wherefore at night this Babe of Glory was born that he might turn the night into day.

A meditation of St. Gregory's may supply us with another reason, the Sun-shine of the day is the great Oracle of manifestation, the smallest Atoms then appear, and whatsoever lay in obscurity is clearly discerned: now we have no clear apprehension of the mysteries of faith in this life as if they lay naked before us, Sancti quamdiu in hác vitâ sunt divinae naturae Secreta quasi sub quadam imaginatione conspiciunt; The Saints in this world behold the secrets of the Divine Nature as if it were in the imagination of a dream, as men think they see Visions when they sleep in the night. I do not go about therefore to span those things which cannot be measured, how that which is infinite and finite are one in personal Union how he was conceived by the Holy Ghost. What perfection of knowledge and grace there was in his Infancy, if you look into the Ark with the Bethlehemites you may forfeit your eyes. It is modesty to say these things are incomprehensible, for the Angel did reveal them in the night. They that raise questions, and dispute about those depths concerning our Savior which cannot be sounded look for thanks because they are industrious, whereas their curiosity seems to me to use him no better than if they crowned him with thorns. We must believe without appoizing the Articles of our Faith to the balance of reason, and then though we see darkly in a glass we are children of the day: But if we will scan the secrets of God by the scruples of human wisdom, then is our day turned into night. One day telleth another, and one night certifieth another, Psal. 19.2. That is, says Bernard, the day told unto the day, when the Angel came unto the modest Virgin Mary; the night certified the night, that is, the Serpent conferred with Eve when she was fond and curious.

I am yet under this pillar of Cloud, I mean under this circumstance of time, that the Angel Gabriel addrest unto the Shepherds by night. Captivities that be famous in Scripture are three: Under Pharaoh in Egypt, under Cyrus in Babylon, and under the Devil in the thralldom of sin. Mark what issue everyone of these had to obtain liberty: 1. The Children of Israel arose at midnight, and departed out of Egypt: 2. Nehemiah and those few, the first that went out of Babylon to repair Jerusalem arose in the night and went their way, Nehem. 2.12. And thirdly, the great Redeemer, who should pluck us out of the mire, and draw us out of the bondage of Sin, his fame is spread abroad when the Shepherds kept watch over their Flocks by night. Nay, almost no work of extraordinary worth and efficacy toward and after the time of the Passion but it fell out when darkness was upon the face of the earth. To let his Birth alone, and to say no more than my Text doth, Excubarunt noctu, the poor men heard of it that lay abroad in the night. His Agony in the Garden took hold on him by night, when the world was in a dead sleep, his own Disciples drowsy, and could not watch with him one hour. He suffered when the Sun was darkened, and the Stars gave no light. Finally, He arose out of the Sepulcher before anybody was stirring in the morning. What is the meaning of this? Even to show that we were dumb and still passives in all the work of our Redemption; we slept, and thought not of help and succor when it was plentifully supplied for our salvation; when no soul awoke to think of blessing, in the dark night of Ignorance Christ was born. We are supine in our sins like men stretched upon their bed, when he sweat drops of blood. We regarded not his Passion when he suffered; we were careless when he arose for our justification. But of the time let this suffice to be spoken.

That which made up the fourth and fifth parts of my Text is concerning the persons they were Shepherds, and they were many Shepherds, so many as made a Plural number, And there were in the same Country Shepherds, &c. The heathen make much ado, and relate it not without admiration; by what mean and almost despised persons the deep knowledge of Philosophy was first found out and brought to light? As Protagoras earning his living by bearing burdens of wood; and Cleanthes no better than a Gibeonite fain to draw water for his liberty. Chrysippus and Epictetus mere vassals to great men for their maintenance, yet these had the honor to find out the riches of knowledge for the recompense of their Poverty; but the day shall come that these Philosophers will wonder that they found out no more than they did, and be astonished that silly Shepherds were first deputed to find out one thing more needful than all the World beside, even Jesus Christ. Tiberius propounded his mind to the Senate of Rome, that Christ, the great Prophet in Jury, should be had in the same honor with the other God's which they worshipped in the Capitol. The motion did not please them, says Eusebius, and this was all the fault, because he was a God, not of their own, but of Tiberius invention: So lest great men, and Rulers of the earth should disdain at a Savior which was not of their own discovery, but found out by servants that kept their flocks, I will make it good by reason that the Angel picked out very choice persons for the business, the Shepherds of the Field.

It is truly and modestly observed by Tolet, Causa cur pastores visitantur est Dei beneplacitum, multae autem congruentiae: Why shepherds were visited by the Angel rather than men of another trade or calling; and in particular, why these Shepherds rather than all besides of the same Vocation, no cause can be assigned, but the mere will and favor of God: but his pleasure having done the deed, much may be said to approve it why it is fit and convenient. To be a Shepherd is a life of great servitude and poverty, as Job says, they spend their time desolate and solitary in the Wilderness, and for vile company they are set with the dogs of the flocks: and these were fit to be the first partakers of the Gospel, because it is powerful in Spirit, but base and contemptible according to the Flesh, A sapientibus non quaerit testimonium qui parvulis se revelat, he baulks the Pharisees and Princes of the people, and seeks the testimony of Shepherds, because he reveals himself unto those that are lowly in their own eyes, and poor in Spirit: none more unlikely than they to do a message for Almighty God. When Samuel came to Jesse, and asked for his Sons, that he might pick out the man whom the Lord had chosen, Jesse presented the most likely, as he thought, indeed all but one; There is one more, says he, in the field that keepeth sheep. O, says Samuel, let that David be sent for from following the Ews great with young. Surely thinks the Prophet, because he hath been despised and neglected, he is the man whom God hath in store to govern Israel. Weak and impotent means are the fittest for the Lord's choice, that men of action and authority may not attribute that unto themselves which is only the doing of the Lord. Praevalet imperitia in rusticitate Pastorum, says S. Austin. When such ignaroes as these were sent abroad, to tell in the City what they had heard and seen, the world could not say they were enticed by Eloquence; the enemies of the Faith could not say that crafty Philosophy got ground upon the simple: but as the Devil chose a Serpent, a wise creature above all the Beasts of the field, and all that are in the water, to destroy the world by subtlety; so Christ chose Shepherds out of the Field, and Fishermen out of the Water, as the chief means to repair the world by innocence and simplicity. 1 Cor. 1.26. Brethren, says St. Paul, you see your calling: for so Erasmus will read 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the present tense, because the thing was open to all men's knowledge, and perspicuous: but what did they see so plainly? not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called, but foolish things were chosen to confound the wise, &c.

Two things are to be drawn from hence; first, that we distort not the Scripture as if it pronounced nothing but confusion to the rulers of the earth; let not the honorable person hang down his head, as if power, and wisdom, and noble blood, and dignity were causes of rejection before God; no beloved, Isaiah foretold that Kings should be nursing Fathers, and Queens should be nursing Mothers of the Church: but it is often seen that the benignity of nature and the liberality of fortune are made impediments to a better life; and therefore Nobles and Princes are more frequently threatened with judgment. I adjoin moreover that the Scriptures speak more flatly against illustrious Magistrates, than the common sort: for if God had left it to men, whose tongues are prostituted to flattery, they had scarce been told that their abominable sins would bring damnation. 2. The comfort of the poor is never to be forgotten in this point: the servile life of a poor Shepherd is as fortunate as great exaltation, when it is made up with this blessing, that Christ is before his eyes; a little that the righteous hath is better than great riches of the ungodly: every small estate with the fear of God is plentiful enough. For thus I reason, if you do not serve God with zeal and charity, and a conscience undefiled, it were pity you should have more than you have; though you were less than the most abject vassal upon earth you had too much. If you be the child of God, strong in Faith, full of the consolation of Hope, operative in Charity, would you wish a better portion than that? do you know whether they that are admired for rich and honorable have so much? Who had not rather be one of these silly Swains, so blessed as to have an Angel appear before them, and to sing the triumphing day of Christ's Nativity in their ears, than to be the Master of the whole Flock who slept at home under his Canopy of Gold, and heard no such matter? In fine, to end this point, a poor birth required no better than poor Shepherds to come and visit in the Manger of a Stable: Wherefore as S. Austin hath it, Let us learn to be rich in him, who for our sakes was made poor. Let us be no more the servants of sin, because he took upon him the shape of a servant. Qui propter nos de terra ortus est in illo coelum possiàcamus, Let us live to inherit heaven through him, who for our sakes was abased to inherit earth.

Secondly, The good Shepherd that giveth his life for his sheep, would first be manifested to those good Shepherds, that watched over their sheep: Palamque fit pastoribus pastor creator omnium, says the ancient Hymn. Methinks I see his promise revealed to Moses, to Jacob, to all those Patriarchs, whose vocation it was to keep sheep, in this one act, that Shepherds are his choice, and before all others, to whom the triumph of his Birth is chanted. Who was the first man that ever found God in Heaven? it was the righteous and innocent Abel, a faithful Shepherd as we read it, Gen. 4. semblably who were the first men that ever found out God upon earth? Why the Angels will suffer none to find him out before the Shepherds have had a sight of him. Inquire likewise of your forefathers, what God did in their days, and in the time of old, and you shall find that the greatest deliverances that ever happened were wrought by Shepherds. I have touched upon it before in another strain: Israel was delivered from bondage out of the Land of Egypt, the very type of Hell, and that was effected by Moses who kept the sheep of his Father Jethro. Judah was delivered out of Babylon, another type of Hell, at the command of Cyrus, who then was a mighty Prince, but once an exposed infant, and trained up to be Shepherd, as we find it in profane stories: but the true deliverance was first communicated to these in my Text, that it might be spread abroad by the Shepherds.

The point is full of observation, so that I cannot dwell long upon one thing; but this I add; who deserved these joyful news before the Priests in the Temple, and the Shepherds in the field? Marvail not that I join them together, the Temple and the Field being so far asunder: but might Zacharias say, Lord we have often offered up the Lamb at morning, and the Lamb at evening, twice a day have we looked for the salvation of the world to come in the flesh when we dressed the Sacrifice. And might the Shepherd say, Lord we have fed our flocks with carefulness, both in the heat of the day and in the frost of the night, not so much for the wool and profit, but that these might be offerings to be slain upon thine Altar. Yet those Beasts are but shadows of him that is to suffer for the sins of the world: When will he come that is substance of these types? Illius aram saepe tener nostris ab ovilibus imbuet agnus; why to satisfy this just expostulation, loe, Gabriel appears to Zacharias the Priest, and the thrones of Heaven did congratulate those Shepherds with the news, as who should say, leave the Fields, give over your Flocks and Lambs, there is no further use of burnt Offerings and Sacrifice; go and see the Babe that from henceforth will save the poor Beasts from slaughter, and will save the world from their sins.

Surely these Shepherds had heavenly meditations in their minds, and were most religiously prepared, when this Embassador of heaven did approach unto them. And you my beloved, I speak to one with another, if that innocence and harmlessness were in you that was in them, you would think many a time, that a divine Beam did shine upon your soul, and that you had your conversation with Angels. They had no State Stratagems in their brain, no projections to profit themselves and to wrong the Commonwealth, no undermining insinuations: do you think they were in Law, and cast about to make their suit endless, and never come to trial? or how to cast a fair gloss upon deceitful merchandize? or how to live by the spoil and oppression of others? no such thing I warrant you: But if the Angel had any joyful tidings to bring in these days, where should he find a man that is harmless and innocent?

Thirdly, says a late Writer, Non magnatibus res innotuit ne ad Herodis aures perveniret, the Rulers and Magistrates were not acquainted at first with these news, because God would have his Son concealed from bloody Herod: for had there been great men as honest and religious, nay, better than these Shepherds, which I can believe and prove too (if need require) yet somewhat there was in way of Christian policy, which did enable the Shepherds with more trust, to sound out, and to publish Christ: For might it not have been suspected that faction and division was a breeding against Caesar, if some of the principal men had spread abroad that a mighty Prince was born to redeem his people. I say, it would have put the Romans in doubt of Rebellion: that then which had been Treason in the mouths of Potentates, was Gospel from the lips of Shepherds.

Fourthly (and I will spare all that may be multiplied beside in this point) Pastoribus rationalium Ovium ante alios divina mysteria annuntiantur: There are Shepherds that feed the reasonable flock, whose pains and industry are devoted to watch over your souls; of these you must be persuaded, that the divine Mysteries of Christ's Evangel, are especially revealed unto them. Knowledge is or should be preserved in the lips of the Priest, and you must not think that every man is the Son of a Prophet, to preach Christ, and to teach a Congregation: It is the brain-sick fancy of the Brownists, who, while they attribute a sacred Priestly authority to everyone of the Sect, they have left themselves none that was fit for the Function. What, you will say, was not Christ first published by poor lay Shepherds, and afterward preached unto the world by Fisher-men; and then his Resurrection testified by Mary Magdalene and other Women? why do we debar them of that now, which Christ vouchsafed them before? I answer, Relation is one thing, Revelation is another; to teach a Doctrine is one thing, to testify an act is another: if Christ be born, if he be risen again, to declare this fact and story honest plain dealing Shepherds and silly Women were fittest instruments, and most unlikely to deceive; but in matters of Revelation, yea, or in matter of Doctrine it is otherwise. Moses was a Shepherd, but never undertook to teach Israel, until God marked him out for the business, and inspired him. David was a Shepherd, but undertook not to teach divine Psalms, and instruct the Church, until God instructed him. The Apostles were Fishermen, but never made the Doctors of the world, until the Spirit lighted on them: And they that can show either lawful calling, or revelation that the Spirit hath pointed them out, let them prosper in the work that they undertake, otherwise I must say for the instance of these Shepherds in my Text, that they were but faithful relators and witnesses of what they had heard and seen, but not Ministers of the Gospel of Christ.

Of their personality thus far: now of their plurality, that they were Pastores, Shepherds in the Plural, at least more than one. As some Fathers compute the number of the Wisemen that came out of the East, that they were three, neither more nor less; because three gifts were presented to the Child in his Cradle, Gold, Myrrh, and Frankincense; so these audacious Textmen are bold to say, that there were three Shepherds to whom the Angel came, neither more nor less: and what conjecture moves them to this opinion, but because that heavenly Carol which was sung this day from above, consists of three parts, Glory to God, Peace on Earth, Good will towards men; but whether two or whether twenty, it is known only to the Holy Ghost: This we read and no more. Pastores in eadem regione, they were Shepherds in the same Country. It is a point of care indeed, very circumspectly observed in the birth of Kings, to have witnesses of good credit and report in the place, Ne quis falsus pro vero Rege supponatur, lest a supposititious Child should be jugled in for the Heir of the Crown: So Shepherds were called to come to the place where they should find Mary and the Babe, that the testimony of good men without exception might stand firm against all those that should oppose it: And what testimony could be more valid and strong in every part? let the Jews cavil as they will; they which talk of that which is done afar off, may easily be mistaken; but these came from the nearest parts to Bethlehem, even in the same Country. 2. Active and experienced men are more dangerous to trust, but the Education of Shepherds is without guile or devices. 3. Do not tax their report, that it was a sleepy apparition or a dream, for my Text avoucheth they were watching over their flocks. 4. Lest all the credit of the tidings should lean upon one man's voice, Pastores, many Shepherds and many Tongues would bear record, that they saw in the City of David a Savior which was Christ the Lord.

Now began the Vine, that is the Church, to stretch forth her branches, and all the Husbandmen that could be hir'd were called to labor in the Vineyard: the time was when one single Dove returned into the Ark. One David sat alone like a Sparrow upon the house top. One Elias that was zealous for the Lord, wandered solitary by himself in the Wilderness: now they did increase into troops and into multitudes. Many wise men drew to Bethlehem to adore the Lord, many Shepherds to visit him. Peter and Andrew, Philip and Nathanael, James and John were called together; the Church brought forth no less than twins at once to show her fruitfulness: a true sign that they belonged to the Land of Canaan, when they hang together full and thick like the Grapes of Eschol in their clusters. A lesson for them that affect singularity, and think they are in tune, when they sing discord flat against all the world. He that is one by himself is little better than one beside himself, and hath no more cause to boast then a Leper had, who dwelt alone, and was cast out of the Congregation of Israel. Esto gutta in imbre grandinis, make a drop in a shower that pours down from Heaven. Christ accepts not of the testimony of one alone, but of many, Uni testi ne Catoni quidem standum, a shaft divided from the Quiver, may be knapt in sunder; when it is in the bundel it is not easily broken. I have done with their pluralities, now I come to the two last circumstances concerning their office and diligence, they watched, that's not all, but they watched over their flocks, that is the sum of all.

There are two sorts of persons noted for finding out Christ more eminently than others, the Shepherds before all others after he was born, and Mary Magdalene the first of all men and women, as far as we read after his Resurrection. The Shepherds were vouchsafed their blessing, because they watched by night. Vigilaverunt multum, a hard task if you consider the time of the year; and Mary was so prosperous because she rose very early in the morning to seek her Lord, Vigilavit multum. It is hard to say whether ever she slept one wink for care and grief, since the Passion of our Savior; and God knows who shall be the first that finds him at his second coming in Glory, when he shall come also like a thief in the night: but whosoever he be, this I am sure of, Vigilabit multum, he must be none of them that sleep in gluttony, that are heavy with surfeiting and drunkenness, with chambering and wantonness, he must watch or be fit to waken to find the Lord. The enemies of our soul are mighty and many in number, our temptations steal upon us as closely as they that come to rob in a mist, or in the dark of the night. David you know chid with Abner, because he watched no better about Saul his Master: The thing is not good that thou hast done, as the Lord liveth you are worthy to die because you have not kept your Master the Lord's anointed. So shall we be rebuked if we do not set watch and guard about our soul; we deserve to die because we neglected to sense our soul from the incursion of those evil thoughts that will destroy it.

Slothfulness and idleness are all one, as if you took your ease and slept upon your bed; it is Vigilantia somno similima, a kind of watching that is no better than if you snorted like a sluggard. He that will not waken out of this spiritual sleep of sin for the voice of preaching, and for good admonition, he will be wakened with a mischief: never any so sleepy and sluggish but God's wrath, or the hour of death, or the final day of Judgment will start them out of their lethargy, and then they shall awake, as Sampson did that shook himself, when he lifted up his head from Delilah's lap; but the Lord was departed from him. I have multiplied many precepts upon former occasions, that you should be like watchful Shepherds, expecting the coming of Christ: one thing which I do not remember was then delivered shall serve at this time instead of many points of caution. A man that cannot hold up his eyes, and awake when need requires, must be shaken and pinched; violence must be offered to his drowziness. So lest we sleep in sin, Excitandus e somno, & Vellicandus est animus; you must prick and gourd your own conscience with the terror of judgment, with the menaces of damnation. Suffer not your eye-lids to shut, but sift and shake your own heart; examine yourself, remember what a blessing it is to be a watchful Shepherd, that an Angel of comfort may come and sing salvation unto you.

Watchfulness as it is only a restraint from bodily sleep is not that which I urge and enforce; this is a season wherein I know its much in use, to sit up late; they that intend games and revels, and pastimes are watchful enough, though they turn the night into day, and the day like heavy sluggards into night: The luxury and voluptuousness of our Feasts in many Families do reach to midnight, and then we think we have kept Christmas, when we sit down to eat and drink, and rise up to play. Perchance excess and surfeiting do so distemper us, that it is well when we have eat and drunk if we can rise up to play. Some relaxation and triumphs of mirth were ever allowed to our Savior's Nativity, as Mordecai said of the days Purim, that they were days of feasting and joy, and sending portions one to another, and gifts to the poor; but the Devil envying our gladness hath turned it into riot, and the very madness of luxury: The careful progenitors made it many days work to labor hard, and to leave a fair inheritance to their posterity; and my dissolute heir makes it some few nights play to lose and consume it; as if the day were not long enough: he borrows the best part of the night to make riddance of his patrimony. Great difference between such unlucky night ravens, and these Shepherds in my Text, that watch over their flocks by night.

I know the application runs in a right line upon the Priests of God, but this is not a place for those instructions: this I will not omit, a certain postilling Frier, that preferred his Monastery before the Pulpit, knowing our labor and his own ease, did thus observe upon the former verse, that Christ was born in a Manger, ut Anchoritarum caenobia solaretur to patronize the solitary Cells of Hermits and Anchorites, an exact pattern of Solitariness I wiss to be born in a troublesome Inn: nay, in the Stable therefore which is common for all men, and at such a time when Town and Country were gathered into Bethlehem. Every house full of Strangers to pay their Subsidies to Caesar, in the midst of this throng. Is not our Frier much mistaken to put us in mind of a Monastery? but rather we may note, that the blessing of Christ's Birth was first annuntiated not to slothful Monks, but to Shepherds that watch over their flocks. Our Savior is diversely called both a Shepherd and a Lamb, Ut Agnus apud greges annuntiatur. Christ the Lamb is revealed unto Shepherds; it is fit they should first hear of the yeaning of a Lamb. Christ the Shepherd is revealed among the flocks: it is fit the flocks should be comforted, that the Prince of Shepherds was born. I add Christ the head of the Church, under whom all Shepherds have their charge, it is fit he should be notified to Shepherds that attend their charge, that watch over their flocks.

To include you all, every man and woman in the application, suppose you are no bodies keeper but your own: Vigila saltem super animam tuam, why be watchful and prudent over the safety of your own soul; and when I have spoke that word, your soul, I perceive instantly that you have a whole flock to look to, and it is all your own, the affections and passions of your mind; them I mean, if you bridle their lust and wantonness, if they do you reasonable service, you have a rich flock, sheep that shall stand upon the right hand of God: if they usurp and fill you full of uncleanness, they are a flock of goats, that shall be condemned unto the left. What says Cato of our affections? they are to be governed like a flock of sheep, you may rule them altogether so long as they follow and keep good order, but single one out alone, and it will be unruly and offend you: as who should say all our affections, must be sanctified to God, the whole flock; let one passion have leave to straggle and all will follow it to destruction. Many sit up late and eat the bread of carefulness for the increase of riches; but those are the thorns that choke the seed. Let the watchfulness of the heart especially be fixed upon this flock, the desires, the passions over all that issues out of the soul, as the Star cast his beams directly upon the place where Christ was born. Dei secreta non cognoscimus si in terrenis desideriis vigilemus, we shall not find out the secret of God, that is his Son, if we watch over fleshly and earthly things. Finally, all the providence of our watch will be in vain, as David says, not sufficient to give repulse to the wolf that lies in wait, unless the eye of God keep sentinel over us. Our custody is weak unless the Lord send his Angels, as he did unto these Shepherds, to pitch their pavilions round about us: Wherefore pray we that the Watchman of Israel may be always about our paths, and about our beds, who neither slumbers nor sleeps; to whom be Glory and Honor, &c. Amen.

THE THIRD SERMON UPON THE INCARNATION.

N O Scripture more fertile of wonders, or fuller of variety touching the Incarnation of our blessed Savior than this Gospel, and therefore I continue in this story year by year upon this glorious occasion. And you may discern how we go up by stairs and degrees in every verse till at last we make the highest pitch that the eloquence of man can fly to. We began with a Treatise of a most humble style, a Babe wrapped in swaddling clouts, lying in a Manger; from thence we are lead to place and persons of a little better condition, to shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night: from the shepherds by a manifest ascent to the Apparition of an Angel, the Angel of the Lord; from one Angel to a multitude, which is much better, a multitude of the heavenly Host; from that noble Army to him who is greater than all the Angels, a Savior which is Christ the Lord; And lastly, from that Savior on earth to his most excellent dominion in heaven, Gloria in excelsis, glory be to God on high. And as in our Church Service we do or should shut up every Psalm with that devout Doxology, Glory be to the Father, &c. as if that were it which gave every Psalm his tune and relish, so glory be to God on high is a verse which may most fitly be said or sung to every circumstance which belongs to the birth of Christ. He was laid in a Manger, glory be to God on high for that humility: proclaimed by Angels, glory be to God on high for their attendance and ministry: manifested to Shepherds, glory be to God on high for instructing their simplicity: finally, to comfort our hearts that night and darkness are dispelled, a glorious beam of light made the earth glister where they stood, and therefore glory be to God on high for the comfort of that heavenly illumination and glory.

The Text which I have read unto you contains those particulars which are most natural to heaven and most proper to earth, things most truly celestial are Angels, and Light, and glory, all these did join together to solemnize this great Nativity when tidings came unto the Shepherds; and that which properly savors of earth is fear, especially 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 great fear, and shepherds not able suddenly to entertain heavenly visions were sore afraid. If you will fully know how and in what triumphant manner these tidings were declared from heaven, and withal with what astonishment they did possess the earth, lend me your attention to these four parts in general: 1. Here is God's Minister employed to divulge the Incarnation, Loe the Angel of the Lord. 2. The pomp and solemnity which the Angel brought with him, the glory of the Lord did shine round about. 3. Here are the persons, though I have spoke largely of them heretofore: I say the persons honored both with that messenger and that solemnity, the Angel came to them, the glory shone round about them, they were Shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night. 4. How this Angel, and that shining glory did affect these poor men, they were sore afraid: And for your parts dearly beloved, so prepare your souls so to meditate upon Christ's Birth, that when you promise yourselves after your dissolution the joy of Angels, and glory shining round about you, remember to temper presumption with the Shepherds fear and reverence; and again, when weakness and little faith are sore afraid, be mindful that Christ was born to bring us to that light which knows no darkness, and to everlasting glory: So knit them into your heart, as they are most divinely woven into my Text, And loe the Angel of the Lord came upon them, &c.

And first, be ready to hear how God's Mnister was employed to divulge the Incarnation, Loe the Angel of the Lord came upon them; touching whose Apparition five interrogatories must be answered: Quis? what Angel this was of all the heavenly Hierarchy 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , it should seem one of conspicuous glory, the Angel of the Lord. 2. Quando? when he came, I believe instantly after Mary was delivered; Ecce; loe he came, that note demonstrative expresseth the celerity. 3. Quomodo? the true substance of an Angel is not visible and apparitive to men, he came in some fashion altered from himself: ecce, it was wonderful, loe, an Angel. 4. Quo situ? how he did apply himself to the Shepherd, de coelo supervenit, says one Translation, he stood above them, astitit juxta illos, says another, he stood near unto them, we say, he came upon them. 5. Quare? why men were not accepted to do this office to manifest the Birth of Jesus, but, loe an Angel of the Lord.

1. Quis? and who was this Angel of all the heavenly Hierarchy? modest ignorance is better than presumptuous knowledge: doubtless the Holy Spirit had given him his Name in this place, if it had concerned our edification: yet he was no novice; but St. Cyprian himself that ventured to call him Gabriel, Veniunt in Bethlehem quam praedixit Gabriel, & invenitur Immanuel, that is, the Shepherds came to Bethlehem as Gabriel had taught them, and there they found Immanuel, who is God with us. Surely so Divine a Father would not bolt out without a mark to aim at, and I discern some color for that conjecture out of a Grammatical Article. Zacharias was visited by a messenger from heaven, as he was doing his office in the Temple, Luke 1.11. There appeared unto him an Angel of the Lord; but verse 26. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Angel Gabriel was sent to the Blessed Virgin in the City of Nazareth, and as if he were to be known from that holy Spirit who came to Zacharias, by this emphatical Article being once named Gabriel; from thenceforth he is spoken of according to his office, the Angel of the Lord. Surely he was one of the most glorious attendants of heaven, one of those principal Seraphim that stand always before the throne of God; the business about which he came was of the highest nature that ever was sent from Heaven to Earth; and therefore who should undertake it but as great a creature as the Heaven and Earth afforded? But the School Doctors say otherwise, who build upon the groundless curiosities of their adulterate Dionysius; list to their speculation forsooth, that Cherubims and Seraphim, Thrones, Principalities, and Dominions are virtues of the highest rank and order, always resident in the Orbs of Heaven, never giving attendance to the Militant Church beneath: But that commonly styled Archangels and Angels (in which degrees they place this Gabriel ) they have intercourse and messages as God appoints them to the world below: A brave president if you mark it for their lazy Cardinal Prelates, that the active Angels, such as proclaim and preach Christ should be the underlings to the rest, and to pretend that there are others of no such troublesome office and employment, that are the superior principalities. Well, as it is probable with St. Cyprian to say this welcome Messenger was Gabriel, so it is more probable to hold against Dionysius his conjectures, that this glorious Herald who came to publish a Savior to the world was one of the mightiest and chief of the Cherubims, loe the Angel of the Lord.

1. The next interrogatory is quando? at what time and season the Angel came. Ecce venit, surely he made no stay, but came with great expedition after Christ was born; if it were not in the same minute or hour, yet it was in a short space after: for he tells them in his Message, This day is born unto you in the City of David a Savior which is Christ the Lord. When God was to destroy a people, he thought it fit to make it known unto Abraham, shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do, Gen. 18.17. much more when he was to save a people he would immediately reveal the thing in hand, and loe the Angel of the Lord, as who should say, shall I hide from these religious careful Shepherds the thing which I have done for their salvation. Let us compare in a word Christ manifested to the Shepherds, to the Wisemen of the East, to Simeon and Anna in the Temple: to the Shepherds he was made known the same day that his Mother brought him forth, to the Magi of the East, as the most ancient do collect, twelve days after upon the Feast of the Epiphany, to Simeon and Anna forty days after he was born, when Mary according to the Law came to the Temple to be Purified. The Shepherds were Jews, and he was made known incontinently to them, prefiguring that the first-fruits of the Gospel should be preached before them at Jerusalem, the bread of life should first be broken to the Children before the dogs had the Crums which fell under the Table. Those Easterlings that brought gifts to his Cradle of Gold, Myrrh, and Frankincense, they were Gentiles, and the Apostles were sent to them in a little distance of time after the Feast of Pentecost, when it was illustrious that all Tongues and Nations should praise the Lord in their own Language. Yet again there shall be another Revelation of the Gospel to the Jews, after forty days, numerus certus pro incerto, when the Gentiles have had their part, Simeon and Anna shall enjoy them, that is, in the fullness of time, and in an hour that we do not think of; a remnant shall be collected, God will gather together the outcasts of Israel, and the dispersions of Zion. Once it was, ecce Angelus, God's Minister stood in the midst of them in this Text pointing the Messias with his finger, who then was in the City of David; now after much attendance, after many an ecce, many a long look the glory of Israel shall be revealed unto them. So much for the time of this Apparition.

3. Loe, or behold an Angel! soft a while, and let us ask in the third circumstance, quomodo? how we should behold him? a Spirit hath not flesh to be seen, or bones to be felt; in what fashion therefore did he alter himself? surely it well deserves Ecce Angelus, a note of Admiration; for the manner was wonderful. Beloved if the Eternal Son of God did not abhor the Virgins Womb, those ministering Spirits whom he commands could not abhor the shapes of men; they appeared every way in the same form and fashion wherein we walk upon earth. Yet thus we distinguish them from ourselves, our bodies are begotten, theirs were created; our flesh propagated from the loins of Adam, their substance made extraordinarily, not according to nature, but by the finger of God; our soul quickens the flesh which it possesseth, and makes it live; their bodies which they assumed had not vivification by the breath of life, but only served them for motion and representation: our bodies have the instruments of outward senses to convey sensible things to the fancy, and so to the understanding; they had eyes, and ears, and other sensible organs, non ut sentiant sed ut corpus perfect representent, says the great Schoolman,