Works Volume 4

THE EIGHTH, Being a Lent SERMON at Oxford, A. D. 1645.

T HE Words are the Notes taken from a Sermon of St. Paul's ; And the success it met with among the Auditors, the trembling of one heathen Officer that was at it, is entirely the consideration that commended it to me at this time, in hope it might help to perform that strange work, beget a spiritual palsy or soul-quake in the Christian sinner, that wor • er kind of Heathen, at the repetition.

There's matter enough, God knows, of trembling abroad, (though there were never a judgment to come ) to put us all into Belshazzar's paralytick posture (the countenance changed, the thoughts troubled, the joints or the loins loosed, and the knees smiting against one another ) and we bear it with a strange constancy, continue still in as perfect an unconcerned tranquility, as if 'twere but a Scene, a Romance, a News from Germany all this while; the Jonas that is gone down to sleep in the sides of the Ship, and is the cause of all this tempest, must not be awaked after all these billows, our lethargick habits of sin not disturbed, only a few cowardly Mariners may be allowed to pray every man to his God, and that's the utmost that all these prodigies of vengeance can extort from us.

You will therefore give me leave to count it a prize, that I have here found a clap of thunder, that could awake somebody, a Sermon that set one Felix a trembling; I should be too happy, if the repeating of it, might have the same effect on any here present. And as he reasoned of, &c.

In the Words I shall but observe,

1. The matter of St. Paul's Sermon, righteousness and temperance, and judgment to come.

And 2. the form of it by way of reasoning. As for the trembling, that must be God's work on you, while I treat of these.

The matter I must consider, 1. Absolutely; then, as it is here clothed in a double relation, 1. To the Text on which 'twas preached, and that you shall see in the verse precedent, to be the Faith of Christ. 2. In relation to the prime Auditor, Felix, whether as an Officer of Caesar's, or as a Heathen, or as one peculiarly guilty of these sins to which the discourse is accommodated.

I begin first with the matter, considered absolutely, righteousness, &c.

Three grand particulars, which though they are Common places and vulgar themes, may yet have leave to give you divertisements awhile.

The 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , whether justice, or righteousness in the front, (if you had the Fathers wish, to see and hear S. Paul in the Pulpit, a pressing at large what you have here only in brachygraphy) would look very sternly upon the most unrighteous oppressions of the many; that trade of subtlety and intricacy, that hath gotten the inclosure of all not only the wealth and greatness of the world, but of the credit also, the reputation of wisdom, yea and of virtue too; the only honorable handsome quality, that all our respects and estimations are paid to; that new body of morality, that instead of the old out-dated despised rules of justice and uprightness, hath set up that one beloved law of self-preservation, (that other Antipheron in the Rhetoricks, that always seeth his own picture before him, and if health, or security may be acquired, can say to himself, as Paracelsus to his scrupulous Patient, if the cure be wrought, what matter is it whether it be by God, or the Devil?) instead of the comfort of a pure immaculate conscience, the pleasure of satisfaction of having outwitted and over-reached our Brethren; the joy and ravishment, the high taste and sensuality, as it were, of an indirect action, being to him far above the advantage and gain of it; and either of them able to outweigh the mystery of Godliness, the (whether conscience, or) reward of blameless souls.

O! 'tis a fatal character of an accursed rebellious people, when in the Prophets style, he that abstaineth from evil, maketh himself a prey, when all those generous Christian virtues of meekness, and innocence, and charity, and not retaliating to enemies, shall become both undoing and scandalous qualities, a lawful prize for every Harpy to seize on, and ex abundanti, over and above, matter of contumely and reproach to any that shall have so learned to be fools of Christ.

And it were a glorious and a royal design, worthy the gallantry of this Congregation, and that which would bring Christianity into some credit in the heathen world, would give us more hope of Proselytes from thence, than the Apostle of the Indies (Xaverius with his double Gospel, one of Christ, the other of Saint Peter ) ever brought back his Masters; if sincerity, and uprightness, and dove-like innocence (those good natured rarities that our Savior could not behold without loving the owner of them, although he were no Christian, Mar. 10.21.) might be brought in fashion in a Court, or Kingdom; if oppression and the grosser acts of piracy might be driven out like Wolves, and Bears, and beasts of prey; and disguises, and crafts, and cheats, and all kind of artifices and stratagems, have as many names of vermin allotted to them, and all in one herd pursued, and hounded out of the world; if the examples of a Jacob, a David, a Nathaniel, a Christ, might be permitted to rescue the guileless hearts and lips (at least) from reproach, and scorn, if not from the Vultures talons, if it might be esteemed but as infamous and vile to act, as 'tis to suffer injuries, as ungentiemanly a thing to thrive by fraud, as to perish by good conscience. And till this be set afoot among us (this that an heathen Socrates would, if he were alive again, venture another martyrdom to replant among his Athenians ) may this first point of St. Paul's Sermon be forever a ringing in your ears, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , of righteousness, and a thundering judgment to come, for all those that are not edified by that doctrine.

2. For Temperance, or, as the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , both here and elsewhere, more properly signifies, Continence, and command of passions and lusts, the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the mastery over a man's self : One cannot, in charity to Christendom, but stay upon it awhile, and recommend it to men's favor, so far at the least, that it may find the ordinary justice, to be prefer'd (in their judgments, if not their passions) before bestiality and villainy, before the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the infamous affections which nature itself hath reproached and branded, that the preserving our bodies the temples of the holy Ghost, may be but as creditable a thing, as any of those 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , noon-day Devils, in Gregentius phrase, those impudencies, that have put off the veil, that are become so daring and confident, fornication, adultery, uncleanness, i. e. in the New Testament dialect, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , outlared abominable idolatries ; that chastity may be kept in some countenance, not pass either for such a strange, or such a ridiculous, such an impossible, or such a scandalous rarity.

Beloved, there was once a piece of discipline in the Church of God, of sending the Devil into such swine, of delivering up the incontinent to Satan's smart, his real corporeal stripes, and inflictions, in the Apostles Age; and after, this smart was commuted for shame, casting them out of the Church, out of the society of all civil men, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that they might be ashamed.

It seems it was then a more fashionable creditable thing to be a praying in the Church, than a dallying in the Chamber; Continence was recommended to Christians, not only among the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the venerable and the pure, but the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , lovely and commendable, Phil. 4. Embraced by men of quality upon the same motives, on which now all the contrary vices are taken up, in adoration to that great Idol, Civility and Reputation; Virtue was then the more splendid title, the more courtly name; And 'tis none of the meanest sins and plagues, provocations and vengeances of this Kingdom, that the measure of honor and gallantry among us, is taken from fools and mad-men, and by that means, shame so prodigiously transplanted; The chaste man is the only leper to be separated and thrust out from the Camp, Modesty the only scandalous thing; the three degrees of the new-fashioned Excommunication, are denounced and executed, like the Athenian Ostracism, upon the several gradations of that virtue; The purity of the body, the Tongue, the Eye, have a kind of Nidui, Cherem and Scamatha proportioned to them, no man is civil enough for ordinary converse, till he hath renounced such pusillanimous innocencies, and brought forth fruits worthy of that repentance, a whole Knight errantry in that sin, confession with the mouth, glorying of their masculine enterprises (enough to fill a Romance) and even martyrdom itself, and many sad encounters, and real hellish sufferings in that service, and all this penance, of the least to expiate the crime of bashfulness, to reconcile the modest Puny, to make him fit for society with men.

I remember a conceit of Herodotus, when the Greeks besieged Troy, he believes Helena was in Egypt, because otherwise had she been in the City, they would certainly have delivered her up, and saved themselves: so strange did it seem to him and irrational, that men should choose rather to die, than part with a lust, And yet to the shame of us Christians, when God's judgments make such direful approaches to us on this great quarrel for our vile, and reproachful lusts, when a black grim cloud • ngs just over our heads, gathered from the vapors, which this one dung-hill hath exhaled, (as Rome, they say, and others as well as that, is enabled to oppress Countries by the pensions it receives from them) when the voice is come flashing out of that cloud, and the business driven to a close issue, repent or perish irreversibly, (the kingdom used by God at this time, as Antiochus of old by the Roman Ambassadors, put into a circle, as it were, and not suffered to come out, till we shall give our answer) we desert and renounce estates and lives, honors, and souls and all, rather than retrench or abate ought of this accursed superfluity.

And to this unsavory humor and custom of the world, one Use may be brought home from St. Paul's Sermon, though taken in cypher, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , of continence, I beseech you save me the pains, resume and enlarge it to yourselves.

3. For judgment to come, 1. That there is such a thing. 2. That it descends to such mean particulars as justice and continence, I cannot but in passing be your Remembrancer.

1. That there is such a thing.

Injustice and incontinence are two main supplanters of all belief of the judgment to come ; when a man hath once set up that infamous trade of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , 1 Tim. 6. of resolving to be rich in spite of all those objections, and stops, and encumbrances of honesty and direct dealing, when he is come to a contemning that pedantry of justice, of observation of Oaths, that shall interpose so uncivilly to resist his thrift and advancement in the world, believe it, the minae vatum, the news of the judgment to come, in the Preachers mouth, will be under an heavy suspicion of fraud and cheat, and in fine, pass but for fictions and mormo's, too weak to outlook a brave glittering temptation: the Taxes on the Ecclesiastics in Florence, which nobody else dare collect for fear of the Popes thunderbolts; the Jews will exact undauntedly. Now the covetous worldling is that Jew, whose soul being gone down into the bowels of the earth, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in Diodorus his phrase, to an eternal drudgery in the gold-mineral, is out of the reach of sounds from Heaven, out of the awe, or noise of thunderbolts. The Mammonist is in your danger, at your mercy to turn Atheist, whensoever you bid him, whensoever the lure of Gold shall be at leisure to tempt him, ready to renounce all hope, all fear of another world, whensoever your goods are so put within his reach, that an easy perjury will bring them into his Inventory.

And for the lusts of the flesh, 'twas Aristotle's observation, that they are 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , they debauch and corrupt our principles, they send up more heathen fumes into the brain, than any other distemper can do. Saint Cyril tells us of some Idolaters that would have only a day-God, because the night was a time for revelling, and to have a God then, would destroy their game, and therefore they pitched upon the Sun, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that they might be Atheists all night, and then they take it out to purpose, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , (as St. Basil saith of the Gluttons fasts) revenging themselves on their Day-devotions by their Night-revels, never acknowledge a God, when a lust is to be lost by it: and Athenagoras hath given it for a rule, that the denying of the Resurrection, the resolved concluding the world with this life, and believing nothing of another, is the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the only beloved doctrine of the voluptuous. He that hath once transformed himself into that swine, hath his Optick Nerves so changed in his forehead, that (as Plut. observes of that creature) he never sees Heaven again, till he be laid on his back. And, I fear the race of such heathen swine, is likely within a while to prove the prime staple commodity of the land.

We are fallen into peevish times, wherein all God's methods are quite perverted; the powerful'st means that were ever afforded for the casting such Devils out of a Kingdom, are debauched into matter of improvement and heightening of the humor, and even dethroning God, if he will not comply with it; the very Angels that came to Sodom to visit for villainy, are once more assaulted and violated by our lusts; I mean, those judgments from Heaven upon a vicious Generation, that would have inspired a Colony of Scythians with some piety, by a strange kind of Antiperistasis, or contrary working, have made men more profane, and godless, than ever they were before; the storm so close over our heads, that in other Kingdoms they say sets them a ringing bells, shooting guns, lifting up voices to break and dissolve the cloud that threatens them, hath set us upon the same design by oaths and blasphemies, and those accursed 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 the shouts of our Soldiers, have broke the cloud indeed, brought down (not the Dove flying over our heads, as Historians tell us, a shout in an Army once did, and an Army of united prayers may do so again, but) the Eagle to a carcass, the Night-raven to the funeral of a Consumptive Church and Monarchy, an Hell from Heaven upon an abominable people.

〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , could the Tyrant Phalaris say, He that is not made so • er by many sufferings is absolutely insensate. And yet God knows, out of this rock the greatest part of this Age seems to be hewed: The thunder about our ears that could teach the most barbarous Nations to believe and tremble, the breaking in of the Lions that disciplined the Assyrians in Samaria to seek out instruction in the manner of the God of the land, 2 Kings 17. God's using us as the Physician, in the Epigram, did the Lethargick Patient, putting a Lunatick into the same room with him, to dry-beat us, is possible, into sense and life again: His proceeding to that great cure of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , dissolving the habit of the body politick, and to that end, letting blood to a deliquium, which Hippocrates resolves so necessary to abate the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the high, full, athletick health, that is so dangerous in his Aphorisms; the driving out into the field with Nebuchadnezzar, which infused reason into that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , which untransform'd him again, and raised up his eyes to an acknowledgment of him that liveth forever, Dan. 4. have, God knows, wrought the quite contrary on us, wasted the seeds of natural piety within us, erected Academies of Atheism, endowed them with Schools and Professors, where the art of it may be learned at a reasonable rate; a young sinner of an ordinary capacity, may within a few months observation, set up Atheist for himself, profane, scoff at the Clergy, be very keen and witty upon Scripture, have exceptions against the Service of the Church, and all with as good grace as if he had served and Apprenticeship in Italy ; or at the feet of that great Master, that Martyr of Atheism, Vanninus.

He that at the breaking in of this torrent of misery upon the land, had but walked in the counsel of the • ngodly, was but upon probation and deliberation whether he should be wicked or no; that after some months, when the waters began to turn into blood, was yet advanced to a moderate proficiency, a standing in the way of sinners, and found it but an uneasy wearisome posture, a standing upon thorns or flints; is now fairly sat down in the chair of the Scorner, or profane Atheist; in cathedrâ, as a place of ease or repose, can blaspheme without any regrets of a petulant conscience; in cathedrâ, as a seat of state, profanes with a better grace than he can do anything else, is become a considerable person upon that one account, is valued among Lookers on, by that only excellency; and in cathedrâ again, as a Professors chair, a Doctor of that black faculty, ready to entertain Clients, to gather Disciples, to set up an Independent Church of rational Blasphemers, and (being himself a complete Convert, sufficiently approved to Satan) to confirm and strengthen those puny Brethren, that are not arrived to the accursed measure of that fullness, fit them with Machiavels capacity for vast undertakings, by that excellent quality of being wicked enough, the want of which, saith he, hath been the undoing of the world. And shall not God visit for this? shall he not be avenged on such a Nation as this? A wonderful and horrible thing is wrought in the land, the judgments that were sent to awake, have numni'd and petrefied us, the fire in the bowels of this earth of ours, hath turned us into perfect quarry and mine, and as Diodorus tells us, in Arabia the Ice and Crystal is congeal'd 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , by the power of Divine fire, and not by cold : so are these icy Crystal hearts of ours frozen by that fire from Heaven, that shall one day set the whole Universe a melting.

But besides these Atheists of the first magnitude, other inferior pretenders there are, that cannot shake off all apprehensions of all judgment to come, but yet upon distant tamer principles, can do Satan's business as well; for such trifles as this Text takes notice of, the contraries to justice and continence, they have an 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , like Marcus in Iren. that charnied shield from the Mother of the God's, which shall render them 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , invisible to the Judge ; The judicature erected by Christ, takes not cognizance of such moral breaches as these, there nothing but infidelity proves capital, or if the breaches of the First Table may be brought in collaterally under that head▪ yet for these venial defailances against the Second, this toy of circumventing our brethren, of defiling the flesh, (as its consequent in S. Jude, speaking evil of dignities ) Christ came to make expiation for such, not to receive bills of indictment against them, to be their Priest, but not their Judge. I remember a saying of Picus Mirandula, That a speculative Atheist is the greatest monster but one; and that is the practical Atheist. And yet this is the darling of the carnal Fiduciaries, that can help him to reconcile his grossest sins, his anything with Faith; how well, you will have leisure to see, if you please to descend with me from the absolute to the relative view of the matter of S. Paul's Sermon, and consider first the relation which it hath to the Text on which he preached it, and that you shall see in the former verse, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , concerning the faith on Christ, and that is my next stage.

〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , The faith on Christ, the phrase that some nice Observers have laid such weight on, to denote the special act of justifying faith, as 'tis and affiance on Christ; of a far higher pitch, than either the believing Christ, or believing in Christ; and yet it seems, those so despicable moral virtues, (those that so few think necessary, and some have affirmed, destructive and pernicious to salvation) are here brought in by S. Paul, (I hope not impertinently) under this head, justice, and continence, and judgment to come, parts of a Sermon of the faith on Christ.

So 1 Cor. where St. Paul had fastened his determination, chap. 2. to know nothing among them but Jesus Christ, and him crucified, in the very next chap. he charges them with sins of carnality, strife, envying • , factions ; in the 5. with Fornication or incest; In the 6. with going to law before Infidels : all these, it seems, the prime contrarieties to the faith or knowledge of the crucified Savior. Thus in St. James, you may mark, that works of charity and mercy are called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Religion, ch. 1.27. And being authorized from such great Apostles, I shall not fear to tell you, that the prime part of the knowledge, and faith, and religion of CHRIST, the life and power of Christianity, is the setting up and reigning of these virtues in our hearts: you may see it, Tit. 2.11. The grace of God that bringeth salvation to all men, hath appeared, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Catholic salvifick grace, be it Christ himself, or the Gospel of Christ; and the end of this Epiphany follows, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to discipline, or to teach us, that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously, the very virtues in this Text, with the addition of one transcendent one, and godly, in this present world : A strange catalogue of fundamentals, one would think, for Christ to ascend the cross to preach unto us; We expect other manner of doctrines from him, doctrines of liberty, Jubilee and manumission, (as the merit and acquisition of his sufferings) of security and protection from sin, that a little carnality shall not hurt us, of freeing us from this bondage to obediences, at least, from any judgment to come, for such errors as these, that flesh and blood makes so necessary and incorrigible: We have generally a smoother scheme of Christianity than Salvian dreamed of, in his [ Quid est fides, nisi praeceptis Christi obedire? ] What is is Faith, but obedience to the commands of Christ?] The necessity of purifying, or mortifying of lusts, goes for an heresy of this nicer Age, which must superadd works to faith, our own obedience to the righteousness of Christ, and so in Simon Magus his phrase, homines in servitutem redigere, make slaves of free-born men, have them live as well, as if Christ had never died for them.

The truth is, the doctrine we have now in hand, if believed and obeyed, is so certainly destructive of the Devils kingdom (and none other so certain but this) that you cannot blame Satan and his instruments, to cry it down as the vilest heresy in the world.

He may hope for some tolerable quarter from any other principles, especially from those of the Solifidian and Fiduciary, brave, delicate, inoffensive doctrines, that have nothing in them contrary to passions, and that gets them such zealous Advocates, for by this divinity they have their lusts. And though it pleases God, by the power of his Grace to preserve some men, that have imbibed these principles, from those 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in Epiphaniu • 's phrase, those streams of brimstone, that naturally flow from such mines as these, I mean from the pernicious and poisonous effects of them, though some that conceive obedience unnecessary to justification, live very strict and gracious lives in spite of all those advantages and encouragements to the contrary, yet now God knows, the truth is too grossly discovered; the Gnostics Divinity begins to revive, a great deal of carnal, I am sure of spiritual filthiness, yea all the profaneness and villainy in the world, is now the most natural spawn of those infusions; and to look no further than the glass, and those foul selves which that reflects unto us, The cause of God, and the faith of Christ, of which we are seriously such Champions, is I fear as much dishonored and renounced by our faithless, apostate, atheistical actions, by our hellish oaths and imprecations, (that pultroon sin, that second part of Egyptian plague of frogs and lice, and locusts, the basest that ever had the honor to blast a Royal Army, that casts us into such Epileptick fits, such impure foamings at the mouth, and will not be bound, no not with chains; in a word, by our going on in such sins, against which the denunciation is most punctual, that they which do these things shall never enter into the kingdom of Heaven, and yet flattering ourselves, that we shall not fail to enter, as by all the species of infidelity, all the Judaism, and Mohammedanism, and Barbarism in the world. And therefore as it is the mercy of the Apostle thus to disabuse his besotted Corinthians, [ know ye not ] and [ be not deceived] neither Fornicators, nor any of that bestial crew, shall inherit the kingdom of heaven; in th • si, so is it the justice of his charity to make it a prime ingredient in an Apostolic Sermon; scarce any other Article so necessary to be preached, especially to a Felix, whether as a Commander, or as a Heathen, or as one peculiarly guilty of those sins: and that is the second part of the relative aspect of these words, as they refer to the Auditory, my next particular.

And 1. as Felix was an Eques Romanus, Procurator of Judea, whose power gave him opportunities to be unjust; and his splendid life, temptations to incontinence; no part of Christian Religion, no Article of the Creed is so proper for his turn, as the doctrine of the judgment to come, for such sins as these: that palliate vulgar cure of healing and not searching of wounds, of preaching assurance of present pardon, before reformation is wrought, of solacing but not amending of sinners, is not the method in Saint Paul's, in Christ's dispensatory; 'tis the scandal rather and reproach of Christianity in Julian, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , security, and protection, and place of confidence from Christ to the most polluted villain, the defamation of Constantine in Zosimus, that he turned Christian, because he was guilty of such sins, for which no other Religion allowed expiation; No, the only safe medicinal course is, to apply corrosives and causticks, the terrors of the Lord, and the consuming fire of the Lord, the judgment to come, when any mortified flesh is to be gotten out; and to accept the face of a F • lix in this kind, to withhold those saving medicines in civility to the person to whom they are to be adminis •• ed, and so suffer that sin upon my splendid Neighbor, that my charity requires me to rebuke in any meaner person, this is the unjustest rudeness in the world, the most treacherous senseless compliance, the most barbarous civility, cruel mercy, the telling him in effect, that he is too great to be cured; this, saith Procopius, is the saluting by the way, which Elisha forbids Gehazi, and Christ the Disciples, the one when he went to cure, the other to preach; and 'tis his observation there, that such civilities 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , keep Preachers from working any miracles, the gentle handling of the great man's sins, is many times the damning of him, and debauching all the neighbourhood; The Lord be merciful to our whole Tribe, for our uncharitable omissions in this matter.

And for once I may chance to deserve your pardon, if I do not conceive the flatteringst addresses to you, to be always the friendliest: If in mere charity to some Auditors I imitate my Savior, and tell you of woes even under a Savior, of casting into utter darkness where the worm never dieth, and the fire is not quenched, with all the variations and exchange of accents, three times repeated by our Savior, within four Verses; of an horrendum est, what a fearful thing it is to fall into God's hands, and be ground to powder, by that fall, if I bring out all those Topics of so true, and withal such amazing Rhetoric, with [ who can dwell with everlasting burnings ?] and all little enough to rouse you out of that dead prodigious sleep of sin, to retrench the fury of one riotous lust,

I beseech you tell me, is there ever a judgment to come, ever an account to be given for moral virtues? Do you so much as fear, that for every unclean embrace, or dalliance, every shameless loud riot, for every boisterous rage or execration, that I may not add, for every contumelious rude address to the throne of grace, every base contempt of that majesty that fills this place, God shall one day call you into judgment? if you do, and yet go on in these, believe me, you are the valliantest daringst persons in the world: and if death be not more formidable to you than hell, you are fit for a reserve, or forlorn hope, for the Cannons mouth, for Cuiraisiers, for fiends to duel with: and let me for once set up an infamous trade, read you a Lecture of cowardice, and assure you that a judgment to come may be allowed to set you a trembling ; that it may be reconcilable with Gallantry, to fear him that can cast both body and soul into hell, and put you in mind of that, which perhaps you have not considered, that you are not Atheists enough, to stand out those terrors when they begin to come close up to you, in a death-bed-clap of thunder: Cain that was the first of this Order, was not able to bear that near approach, he went out from the presence of the Lord ; and the Rabbins have a fancy of Absalom, that when he was hanged by his hair in the midst of his rebellion, he durst not cut it, because he saw hell below him, but chose to die rather than adventure to fall into that place of horror, that his attached conscience had prepared for him; They are, believe it, such unreformed Atheistical hights as these, that have made it so indifferent a choice, Whether the kingdom be destroyed, or no; whether it be peopled with Satyrs, or with wilder men, become all desert, or all Bedlam.

This heaviest judgment that ever fell upon a Nation, extreme misery, and extreme fury, is, I confess, a most direful sight, but withal, a more inauspicious prognostic, a sound of a Trumpet to that last more fatal Day, with an Arise thou dementate sinner and come to judgment ; When all our most bloody sufferings and more bloody sins got together into one Akeldama or Tophet, shall prove but an adumbration of that heavier future doom, after which we shall do that to some purpose, which we do now but like beginners, by way of essay, curse God and die, suffer and blaspheme, blaspheme and suffer forever.

But then secondly, this doctrine of justice, and continence, and judgment to come, is most necessary, as to awake the courtly Governor Felix, so in the next place, to convert the unbelieving heathen Felix.

Will you see the first principles of the doctrine of Christ, when they are to be infused into such an one, or as the Original hath it, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Heb. 6.1. the doctrine of the beginning of Christ, the laws of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or initiation of a heathen Convert, the elements of his Catechism, they are in that place, Heb. 6.2. 1. Repentance from dead works. And 2. Faith towards God. 3. Resurrection. And 4. Eternal judgment : and believe me, for him that thus comes unto God out of his animal heathen unregenerate life, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Catalogue of the necessario credenda, is not over large, he must believe that God is, and that he is a rewarder, Heb. 11.6. this, and it seems no more but this, is the minimum quod sic, the sum of the faith, without which 'tis impossible to please him : and therefore perhaps it was, that Ammianus Marcellinus expresses his wonder, that Constantius should call so many Councils, whereas before; Christian Religion was res simplicissima, a plain Religion without contentions or intricacies, and Epiphanius of the primitive times, that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 & 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , divided the Church into its true and erroneous members, Impiety the only Heretic, good life the orthodox professor.

Next the acknowledgment of the one God, and his eternal Son the crucified Messias of the world, and the Holy Ghost, those one and three Authors of our Religion, into which we are baptized (and those few other branches of that faith) the judgment to come, and the practice of Christian virtues in the elevated Christian pitch, is the prime, if not only necessary. And though there be more to be known, fit to exercise his industry, or his curiosity, that hath treasured up these fundamentals in an honest heart; yet sure, not to serve his carnal mind, to purge his spleen, to provoke his choler, to break communions, to dilapidate that peace, that charity, that Christ, beyond all other inheritances, bequeathed to his disciples. Let us but join in that unity of spirit in those things which we all know to be Articles of Faith, and the precise conscientious practice of what we cannot choose but know to be branches of our duty, and I shall never lead you into any confounding depths or mazes, divert you one minute by a walk in the gallery, from that more Christian employment and task in the workhouse: And that will be the improvement of the second particular.

Lastly, as the Felix was guilty of those sins, which those virtues did reproach to him.

This Felix is to be met with in our books, presented to us on a double view of Tacitus and Josephus; Tacitus renders him an Eques Romanus, that Claudius had sent Procurator of Judea, to manage it for a time, and saith, he did it per omnem saevitiam & libidinem, in the most cruel arbitrary manner; and then see the difference of an Apostolic Preacher, from Tertullus the Rhetor, the one at his humble address and acknowledgment of the obligations that the whole Nation had received from this most excellent Felix, ver. 2. But Saint Paul in a pricking close discourse, of justice, and (upon neglect of it) judgment to come.

Josephus he looks nearer into his actions, and finds him a tyrannical usurper of another man's wife, Drusilla seduced to his bed from her husband Azys the King of the Emess • ni. And then the Sermon of the faith on Christ presently lets loose at this adulterous couple; and so you have the seasonableness of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 too, of chastity to the unchaste Felix, and of judgment to come on such wasting sins.

This will certainly teach the Preacher, the combatant of the Lord, the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the regular manner of his duelling with sin, not the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , wounding the empty air, lashing those sins or sinners, that are out of reach of his stripes, but the closer, nearer encounter, the directing his blows at those crimes that are present to him, most culpable and visible in his Auditory; and thus grasping with the Goliath of Gath, the tallest Philistine in the company.

There is a wide distance betwixt reproaching of present, and absent sinners, the same that betwixt reproof, and backbiting, the boldness and courage of a champion, and the detractions and whispers of a villain; the first, is an indication of spirit; the second, of gall; the first, that a man dares attempt the loving, and saving of his brother, when he shall endanger being cursed and hat • d for it, sacrifice your opinion to your health, your kindness to your souls; the second, is a character of a Solicitor fee'd on none but Satan's errand, an Orator to set you a railing, but not a trembling, one that can write Satyrs, on condition they shall do you no good, incense, but not reform, that if it shall be possible for hell to lose by his Sermon, will never preach more; The one meaneth to transform his Auditory into converts and Saints, the other into Broylers and Devils; the one hath all the charity, the other all the mean malice and treachery in his design.

And having such a copy before our eyes, suppose a man should divert a little to transcribe it, and instead of prudence, and tempering and reviling of those that are out of our reach, reason a while of one branch of justice, yea, and of the faith of Christ, in which 'tis possible we may some of us be concerned; and inquire, Whether there be not a piece of Turkish Divinity stole out of their Quran into our Creed; that of Prosperum & felix scelus virtus vocatur, whether the great laws of Virtue and Vice, be not by some Politici, taken out of the Ephemerides, nothing decreed honest, but what we can prognosticate succesful, the [ victa Catoni ] the liking that cause which the heavens do not smile on, is a piece of Philosophical sullenness, which we have not yet learned of Christ; What is this, but as Saint Bernard complains in his time, that those images had the most hearty adorations performed to them, which had most of the gold and gems about them; the God obliged to the Image, and the Image to the dress, for all the Votaries it met with; Have the Romanists marks of the Church so convinced us, that we must presently forsake a Savior, because we see him in danger of crucifying, tear our Gospels, and run out with horror, as soon as we come to the 26. of Mat. The multitude with swords and staves for to take him ? Was the Cause of God worth the charge and pains of killing men formerly, and is it not worth the patience and constancy of suffering now? Is there any condition in the world so hugely desirable, as that of suffering for or with Christ? 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , [ Behold, we count them happy that suffer, ] was Gospel in Saint James his days, Chap. 5.11. (the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 denotes the state of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the dead Saints in their country of Vision, as you know Saint Steven at the minute of his sufferings saw the glory of God, and Jesus sitting ) the state of suffering is a state of bliss, I may add a superior degree of a glorified state, a more than 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a dignity above that Orbe that the Angels move in; For, they for want of Bodies are deprived of the honor of suffering, all that they aspire to, is but to be our Seconds, our Assistants in this combat; only Christ and we have the enclosure of that vast preferment. And if there be any need to heighten it yet further, is there any prize more worthy that masculine valor, than that venerable sacred name Jerusalem the Mother of us all, that brought us forth unto Christ, begot us to all our hope of bliss, and now, for no other crime but that, is a struggling under the pangs and agonies of a bitter combat with the ungrateful'st children under Heaven? the Church of England, I mean, which whosoever hath learning and temper enough to understand, knows to be the brightest image of primitive purity, the most perfect conjuncture of the most ancient and most holy Faith, that for these twelve hundred years any man ever had the honor of defending, or suffering for. And should the provocations of an ungracious people the not valuing or not walking worthy of the treasures here reserved, the rude continued iniquities of our holy things, tempt God to deliver it up, as he did once his Ark to the Philistines, his Christ to the Pharisees and the Soldiers, the zeal of the one, and the fury of the other; yet sure this would not be the confuting of what now I say, 'twould not, I must hope, be an argument of God's renouncing that Ark, and that Christ, which he did not thus deliver. The Turks having conquered and torn out of the Christians hands the places of the Birth and passion of Christ, did after this way of Logic, infer that God had judged the cause for Mahomet against Christ; and Trajan could ask the primitive Martyr Ignatius, Et nos non tibi videmur 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , &c. Have not we as much of God in us as you, who prosper by the help of our deities against our enemies? Let me purloin or borrow this heathen piece out of your hands, and I shall be able to give you an antienter piece in exchange for it, a thorough Christian Resolution of abiding by God, of approving ourselves to Heaven, and to our own breasts, whatsoever it costs us, of venturing the Ermins fate (the very Hunters hand, rather than foul her body) the pati, & mori posse, the passive as well as the active courage, which will bear us up through all difficulties, bring us days of refreshment here, or else provide us anthems in the midst of flames, a paradise of comfort here, and of joys hereafter. and let this serve for the exemplifying the point in hand, the fitness of our Apostles discourse to Felix 's state.

I might do it again by telling you of the dreadful majesty that dwells in this house, the designation of it to be a house of Prayer to all people, a place of crying mightily to the Lord at such times as these: should I let loose a whole hour on this theme in this place, 'twould be but too perfect a parallel of Saint Paul's discourse of chastity before Felix, which in any reason ought to set many of my Auditors a trembling, but it seems we have not yet sufferings enough to do so: and there is one particular behind that will rescue you from this uneasy subject, the manner of Saint Paul's handling this theme, by way of reasoning. And when he reasoned, &c.

The importance of this reasoning I shall but name to you, which I conceive to be, 1. The proposing to a very Heathens consideration, the equity and reasonableness that there should be a judgment to come, to recompense the unjust and incontinent person. And 2. the charging home to each sinners heart, the extreme unreasonableness, that for so poor advantages as either of those sins bring in to any man, he should think fit to venture that dismal payment in another world.

And now my Brethren, to conclude this reasoning, and your task of patience together; when you are likely to have so little excuse in perishing, so no color of reason for so wild an option, of choosing death in the error of your ways, when you must be so out of countenance when you come to that place of darkness, so unable to give an account to any fiend that meets you, why you should cast away all the treasures in the world for that so sad a purchase, and act that really which the Rabbins feign of the Child Moses, prefer the coal of fire before the ingot of gold, chop it into your mouths and so singe your tongue, not to make you stammer with him, but howl with Dives forever after, and not get one drop to quench the tip of that tongue, which is so sadly tormented in those flames; when, I say, you are likely to come so excuseless to your torments, so unpitied, and so scorned, so without all honor in your sufferings, as having but your petitions granted you, advanced to your vengeance as to your preferment, optantibus ipsis, whilst Heaven was looked on as a troublesome impertinent suitor, and you would not be happy, only because you would not; O remember then the Disciples farewell, when they gave over the Jews, and turned to the Gentiles, Behold you despisers, and wonder, and perish ; But before you do so, if it be possible give one vital spring, and if but for Pythagoras's [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] for the reverence, (if not the charity) for the honor and awe you owe to your own souls, if not to save them, yet to save your credits in the world, to manifest that you are not such abject fools, retract your choice, call back the hostages you have given to Satan, and set out on a more rational, more justifiable voyage. You have heard of the rich Spaniard that had put all his estate into jewels, how he was ready to run mad with the fancy of thinking what a condition he should be in, if all men next morning should awake wise, that he should become not only the arrantest Beggar, but the most ridiculous Fool. And believe it, that last Trump when it begins to sound, will have the faculty thus to make all men wise, to disabuse, and inspire the whole world with a new sense : Those that are in the flames before you, will reproach your madness, count you but Bedlams to come thither; Poor Dives, if he had but a Messenger, would long since have sent you a hideous report and admonition, that whatever it cost you, you should not venture coming to that place of torments; O let Saint Paul's reasoning do it to us here, that we make not such piteous bargains, pay not so sad a price for so pure a nothing. Let us be wise now, that we may be happy eternally; which wisdom the only way to that happiness, God of his infinite mercy grant us all: to whom, &c.

The NINTH, Being An Easter SERMON at S. Mary's in Oxford, A. D. 1644.

T WERE but a cold unequal oblation to so blessed, so glorious a festivity, to entertain you with the story of the Day, to fetch out the napkin and the grave-clothes, to give you that now for news, that every seventh day for sixteen hundred years, hath so constantly preached unto you. 'It is true indeed what Aristotle observes in his 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that the every-day wonders are the greatest, the perfectest miracles those that by their commonness have lost all their veneration; he speaks it of a circle, which is of all things most common, and yet of all things most strange, made up of all contraries, and so the mother of all prodigies in art, of all the engines and machines in the world. And the same might be resolved of this yearly, this weekly revolution, the greatest, but common'st festival in the Christians Calendar, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Queen-day, as S. Chry. calls it, I, and that Queen, all glorious within, a many saving miracles enclosed in it, and yet this Queen of most familiar condescendings, is content to be our every weeks prospect, and after all this, as glorious still as ever, no gluts, no satieties in such beholdings.

But supposing this, I must yet tell you, one precious gemm there is in this jewel, one part of the great business of this day, which is not so commonly taken notice of, and that is the blessing saving office of the day to us, the benign aspect, the special influence of the rising of Christ on the poor Sinners soul, the use, the benefit of the Resurrection ; and to discover this unto you, let me with confidence assure you, there is not a vein in this whole mine, a beam in this whole treasure of light, a plume of those healing wings of the Sun of righteousness, a Text in this whole Book of God, able to stand you in more stead, than this close of S. Peters Sermon: That our justification is more dependent on his resurrection, than his death itself, is sometimes clearly affirmed by S. Paul, he was delivered up for our offenses, and raised again for our justification, Rom. 4.25. It is God that justifieth, who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather that is risen again, Rom. 8.34. and so, for salvation itself, And being made perfect, he became the Author of eternal salvation, Heb. 5.9. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , being consummate and crowned, (as 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , is the crowning of Martyrs) or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , being consecrated to his great Melchizedek-priestly office (as the context enforceth, and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the Septuagint imports) in either sense a denotation of the resurrection of Christ peculiarly; and in this capacity considered, he became the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Author of our salvation. But for all this compacted together, and the distinct explication of the manner how all this is wrought by Christ's resurrection, this is a felicity reserved, the peculiar prerogative of this Text, brought out now and prepared for you, if you can but have patience till you see it opened. God having raised up his son Jesus, sent him to bless, &c.

In these words, one fundamental difficulty there is, the clearing of which, will be the first part of my task, and ground-work of my future discourse; and that is, to inquire what is meant by sending Christ to bless, which when we have opened, there will remain but two particulars behind, The time of this sending, and the interpretation of this blessing ; the time of this sending, after his resurrection, God having raised up, sent him. The interpretation of this blessing, or wherein it consists, In turning everyone, &c.

I begin with the first of these, To clear the fundamental difficulty, or explain what is meant by sending to bless.

All sorts of Arts and Sciences have their 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , their peculiar phrases and words of art, which cannot be interpreted fully, but by the critical observing their importance among those Artists. Casaubon, I remember, observes it among the Deipnosophists, that they had their 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that none but Athenaeus can interpret to us: and certainly the Book of God and Christ that spake as never man spake, must not be denied this privilege; Among the many that might be refer'd to this head, two here we are fallen on together, the matter of our present enquiry, sending, and blessing. The word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to send, and the Gre • k parallel to it, if we look it in common Dictionaries, and in many places of the Scripture itself, is a word of most vulgar obvious notion, but if you will ask the Scripture-Critick, you shall find in it sometimes a rich, weighty, precious importance, To design, or destine, to instal, or consecrate, to give commission for some great office, [How shall they preach, unless they be sent? ] and a hundred the like. Thus we hear of the sending of Kings, Judges, Prophets ; but especially, of our spiritual Rulers, under the Gospel : No other title assigned them, but that of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the missi, the sent or the Messengers of Christ, (the more shame for those that contemn this mission, lay violent hands on that sacred function, the meanest and lowest of the people, (to make one parallel more betwixt Jeroboams Kingdom, and ours) those 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in Ignatius phrase, brass Coines of their own impressing, so contrary to the royal prerogative of heaven, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in S. Peters agonistical style, that run without any watch-word of God's to start them; yea, and run like Ahimaaz, out-run all others that were truly sent ) The defect in our tongue for the expressing of this, is a little repaired by the use of the word Sent, and so read it thus, God having raised up his son Jesus, gave him commission to bless us, you will somewhat discern and remember the importance of this first phrase.

And so again, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to bless, and the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in the Text, so fully answerable to it, though it be a vulgar style in all Authors, yet a propriety it hath in this place, and in some others of Scripture, noting the Office of a Priest, to whom it peculiarly belongs to pronounce, and pray for blessings, i. e. in this eminent sense, to bless others.

For there being two sorts of Priests in the Pentateuch, or if you will, two acts of the same Divine function, the one of blessing, the other of sacrificing, the one observable in the Fathers of every Family, in Gen. (who therefore use solemnly to bless their children ) and after the enlarging of Families into Kingdoms, belonging to Kings, and eminently and signally notified in Melchizedek, Gen. 14.19. the other more conspicuous in Aaron, and his Successors in the Jewish Priesthood : Both these are most eminently remarkable in our Christ, the one in his death, the other ever since his resurrection. The sacrificing part most clearly a shadow of that one great oblation on the Altar of the Cross for us, and in spite of Socinus, such a Priest once was Christ, though but once, in spite of the Papists: Once, when he offered that one precious oblation of himself, the same person both Priest, and Sacrifice ; and but once, no longer Priest thus, than he was thus a sacrificing; this is his 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Heb. 7.23. a Priesthood not suffered to continue, the same minute determined his mortal life and mortal Priesthood, buried the Aaronical rites and the Priest together. But for the Melchizedek Priesthood, that of blessing in my Text, that of intercession, powerful intercession, i. e. giving of grace sufficient to turn us; this is the Office, that now still belongs unto Christ, the peculiar grand Office, to which that notion of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 (to which Christ's durable unction ) belongs, by which he was 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , consecrate for evermore, Heb. 7. ult. parallel to that so frequent style of his, A Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek ; not that Melchizedek was a Priest forever, and Christ like him in that, but that Christ was to continue forever such a Priest as Melchizedek in Gen. was; or, that his Aaronical Priesthood had an end, one sacrifice, and no more, but his other Melchizedek priesthood was to last forever; which you will more discern, if you proceed to the second particular, the date of this sending, the time of his instalment into his Priesthood, after his resurrection: God having raised up, sent, &c.

That the resurrection instal'd Christ to his eternal Priestly office, (or to that part of it, which was to endure forever, ) is a truth that nothing but inadvertence hath made men question; There's nothing more frequently insinuated in the Scripture; were not my Text demonstrative enough, first [ raised up ] and then thus [ sent ] or instal'd, the 5. and 7. to the Heb. would more than prove it: so in that fundamental grand prophecy, to which all that is said there, refers, that in the 110. Psal. the Priesthood of Christ is ushered in with a [ Sit thou at my right hand ] ver. 1. ruling in the midst of enemies, ver. 2. the day of his power, ver. 3. all these certain evidences of his resurrection ; and then, and not till then, ver. 4. [ The Lord hath sworn, &c. thou art a Priest forever :] a mortal, dying, determinable Priest he was before in his death, but now after his resurrection from that death, a Priest forever. Once more, Heb. 7.15. perhaps there may be some Emphasis in the [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , ariseth] there ariseth another Priest, or he ariseth another, an Aaronical Priest in his death, but 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a Melchizedek, (i. e. another kind of) Priest in his resurrection. Add to this, that the Melchizedek-Priest must be like the type, a King as well as a Priest, (which Christ as Man was not, till after his resurrection ) and so that other famous type of our Jesus, Zach. 6.13. Joshua the son of Josedek the High Priest, he shall be a Priest upon the throne, and the counsel of peace (that grand consultation of reconciling sinners to God) shall be betwixt them both, in the union of that Sceptre and that Ephod, that Mitre and that Crown, the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the Regal and Sacerdotal Office of Christ ; and as one, so the other, both dated alike from after the resurrection ; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the thing that by this accumulation of Scripture-testimonies, it was necessary to demonstrate. For the clearing of which truth, and reconciling or preventing all difficulties about it, please you to take it in these few Propositions.

1. That the Crucifixion of Christ was a Sacrifice truly propitiatory and satisfactory for the sins of the whole world, (and there's nothing further from this Text, or our present Explication of it, than to derogate from the legality, the amplitude, extent, or precious value of this sacrifice.)

Yea and 2. that Christ himself thus willingly offering, delivering up himself for us, may in this be said a Priest, or to have exercised in his death a grand act of Priesthood.

But then 3. this is an act of Aaronical Priesthood, which Christ was never to exercise again, having done it once, Heb. 7.27. and so far distant from his eternal Priesthood. Or, to speak more clearly, an act of Christ this, as of a second Adam, a common person, ordered by the wisdom of God to bear the chastisement of our peace, the Scape-goat to carry all our sins on his head into the wilderness, into a land not inhabited, Deut. 16.22. the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in our Creed, to which he went; and so, though it were typified by all the sacrifices of the Priests, and though in it that whole body of rites were determined, (no more Aaronical Priests seasonable after this one sacrifice ) yet still this is no part of the eternal regal Melchizedek-priesthood, that of powerful intercession, that of blessing us in the Text; for though the death of Christ tend mightily toward the blessing of us, though there were a wonderful act of intercession on the Cross, [Father forgive them ] yet that powerful intercession, that for grace to make us capable of mercy, that blessing in this Text, the power of conferring what he prays for, this 'twas to which the resurrection instal'd him.

4. If all this will not satisfy, why then one way of clearing this truth farther, I shall be able to allow you that the death of Christ considered as a sacrifice, may under that notion pass, not for an act of a Priest in facto esse, but for a ceremony of his inauguration in fieri ; thus in the 8. of Levite. at the consecrating of Aaron and his sons, you shall find sacrifices used, the Ram, the Ram of consecration, ver. 22. and apportion'd to that, this Lamb of God, that by dying taketh away the sins of the world, may pass for a Lamb of consecration, the true critical importance of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Heb. 2.10. that the Captain of our salvation was to be consecrated by sufferings. This death of his, that looks so like an act of Aaronical-Priesthood, is the preparative rite of consecrating him to that great eternal Priesthood after the order of Melchizedek, and this preparative most absolutely necessary both in respect of Christ and us, of Christ who was to drink of the brook of the way, before his head should be lifted up, humbled to death, &c. Phil. 2. wherefore God hath also highly exalted him, for that suffering, crowned him; Yea, and in respect of us too, Heb. 2.9. who were to be ransomed by his death, before we could be blessed by his resurrection, delivered from the captivity of Hell, before capable of that grace which must help us to heaven, which seems to me to be the descant of that plain song, Heb. 2.17, 18. Wherefore in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren, i. e. as the 18. verse explains it, to suffer being tempted, to undergo the infirmities and mortality of our flesh, that he might be a merciful and faithful high Priest, &c. his infirmities and effusion of his blood are not this Priesthood of itself, but the qualifying of the second person in the Trinity, to become a high Priest, and that a merciful and faithful one, merciful to pardon slips, and faithful to uphold from falling, and so a Priest such as it is most for our interest to have. And so once more the dream is out that Artemidorus mentions of one; he dreamed he was crucified, and the consequent was, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , he was taken up to be a Priest of Diospolis ; And by the way, let me tell my Clergy Brethren, if that shall prove the consequent of our Priesthood, which was the presage of Christ's, the pains, the contumelies, yea and death of that Cross; what is this, but a blessed lot, that hath brought us so near our Christ, and a means to consecrate us too to our 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to be Kings and Priests forever in Heaven?

I have thus far labor'd to clear this doctrine, calculated the time of Christ's enstalment to his eternal Priesthood, and found it exactly the same with the aera here in this Text, not till after the resurrection, to which I shall only add one final grand proof of all, which will sum up all that hath been hitherto said, That parting speech of Christ's, Mat. ult. [All power is given unto me both in heaven and earth, ] that, you know, was after the resurrection, and so from thence that power was dated, and that commission of blessing, that here we speak of; The act of his eternal Priesthood is his intercession, that his powerful intercession, that his giving of that grace which he intercedes for, that the blessing in this Text; and so the commission of blessing was given him, not till after the resurrection. And believe it, though it look all this while like a rough sapless speculation, there is yet somewhat in it, that may prove very useful and ordinable to practice, a hint if not a means of removing one of the harmful'st scandals, and impediments of good life, that is to be met with. We are Christians all, and by that claim, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , on rank, and on march toward eternal life ; and yet many of us live like so many Mohammedans or China -infidels, quite out of all form of obedience to the commands of Christ, we do not reverence him so much, as to pretend toward serving him, not advance so far as but to be hypocrites in that matter, live in all the sensuality and vileness in the world, and yet live confidently, resolve we have done what is required of us by Christ, can justify our state for such as God is pleased with; And if we be called to account, the anchor of all this unreasonable false hope of ours, is most constantly this, that Christ our Priest hath propitiated for us, we fly to our City of refuge till our Priest be dead, and then we are quit by proclamation, out of the reach of the avenger of blood. 'It is the death of Christ we depend on, to do all our task for us, his priestly, not regal office, we are resolved to be beholding to; In that we have Christ the Sacrificer, Christ the Reconciler, Christ the Satisfier, and these are Christ's enough to keep us safe, without the aid of Christ the King, that Judaical unedifying notion of a reigning Messias ; and then, quis separabit ? what sin, what devils, what legion, what act, what habit, what custom, what indulgence in sin, i. e. what Tophet, what Hell shall be able to separate us from the love, the favor, the heaven of God ?

He that hath Christ the Priest, hath all; he that believes in the sufferings, hath Christ the Priest, though not the King ; hath the faith, though not the works, i. e. the righteousness, though not the Heathenish morality ; the Protestant, Orthodox part, though not the Popery, the Antichristianism of a Christian, and so, is but the richer for that want, hath the greater portion in the sufferings of Christ, by the abundance of those sins he suffered for; the more of the Priest is ours, by how much the less of the King is discernible in us. Having driven our unchristian lives to this principle, this solemn conceit of ours, that the Priestly office of Christ (to which, if rightly understood, we owe all our salvation) is nothing but the death of that Christ, methinks 'twere now possible to convince the secure Fiduciary of the error and sophistry of his former way, to rob him of his beloved cheat, now that we have proved so clear, that Christ commenc'd his eternal Priesthood (that on which all our blessedness depends) from the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , not till after his resurrection. For Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, and mourneth, and bleedeth for in secret, thou carnal confident, that hast wearied thyself in the greatness of thy way, thy profane wild-goose chase of sin, and yet hast not said, there is no hope, thou that wilt profane and be saved too, riot and be saved too, reconcile faction, rebellion, sacrilege, oppression, oaths, carnality, all the unchristian practices in the world, (the confutation of the whole Gospel) with salvation; Tell me, I say, what Christ it is, thou wilt be tried, or saved by; by Christ the King ? I am confident thou wert never so impudent, to venture thy rebellions to that cognizance: Well, it is Christ the Priest thou so dependest on; and • y Christ the Priest? Why? because he hath sacrificed himself for thee. Now let me tell thee, 1. That some have guest shrewdly, that though Christ died for all the sinners and sins in the world, yet his sufferings being but finite in duration, though infinite in respect of the person of the sufferer, will not prove a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a proportionable ransom for thy sins; I mean, the impenitent sinners sins, in duration infinite, being, as they are, undetermin'd, uncut off by repentance. Thou must return, reform, confess and forsake, or else thou hast out-sin'd the very sufferings of Christ, out-spent that vast ransom, out damned salvation itself: that may be a conviction ad hominem perhaps, and therefore I mentioned it in the first place. But then, 2. Thou art, it seems, all this while mistaken in thy Priest, thou art, it seems, all for the Aaronical, and hast not yet thought of the Melchizedek-Priest ; thou art all for the sacrificer, and never dream'st of the blesser. Thou layest all thy weight on the Cross of Christ, and art ready to press it down to hell with thee, with leaning only, but not crucifying one lust on it; never thinkest of being risen with Christ, the condition so indispensably necessary to give us claim to the benefit of his death, and so in effect, thou leavest Christ in the grave, and thyself in that mournful case of the despairing Disciples, speraveramus, we had hoped, but never look'st after a resurrection. 'Twas Saint Paul's saying, [ If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we were of all men most miserable ] I suppose it is, in this life only, not of us, but of Christ on this earth; for it is brought to prove Christ's resurrection, there, and it follows immediately, but now is Christ raised, 1 Cor. 15.20. and if that be the sense of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 there, the [ this life of Christ ] contains also his death under it, for both those together it is, that must make up the opposite to the resurrection. And then I shall enlarge the Apostles words, though not sense, If in the earthly life and death of Christ we had hope only, a sad life, and a contumelious death, if there were no such thing as a resurrection to help bless us, we were of all men the most miserable ; hadst thou no other Priest, but the Sacrificer, the mortal finite Aaronical-Priest, nothing but the ransom of Christ's death (which though it be never so high a price, is yet finally unavailable to many for whom it was paid, he bought them that are damned for denying him, 2 Pet. 2.1. the willful sinner treads underfoot the Son of God, profanes the blood of the covenant by which he is sanctified, Heb. 10.29. and so there's destruction enough still behind for the impenitent wretch, after all that Christ hath suffered for thee) what forms of ejulation and lamentation were enough for thee, Alas my Brother! ah Lord! or ah his glory! what mourning or wailing were thy portion? Tell me, wilt thou be content to leave thy Father before he hath blessed thee? Jacob would not do so with the Angel, but would wrestle his thigh out of joint, rather than thus part with him, and even the profane Esau will run and weep bitterly for it; and then art thou more nice and tender than that smooth Jacob, wretchless than that profane Esau, if thou content'st thyself only to have brought Christ to the grave, that state of curse, and never look'st out for the blessing provided for thee in the resurrection : Mistake me not, I would not drive you from this Cross of Christ, discourage you from that most necessary act of faith, the apprehending the crucified Savior ; No, if my lot had fallen on a Good-friday, I would have spent my whole hour on that one theme, and known nothing among you but Jesus Christ and him crucified: Only my desire is, that you will not allow one act of faith to turn Projector, to get all the custom from the rest, that you will permit Christ to live in you, as well as to die for you, to bless as well as to satisfy, to rise again for your justification, as well as to be delivered up for your offenses, that you will attend him at Galilee as well as at Golgotha, think of the triumphant as well as the crucified Savior, the Melchizedek as well as the mortal Aaron-Priest. And not only to think of his rising, I must tell you, but count of a work, a mighty important necessary work, that of turning, in this Text, to be wrought on us, and in us by that resurrection now, after the pardon impetrated by his passion ; I say, not only to think of and believe him risen, the Devil hath as much of that thought, as frequent repeated acts of that belief as you, and there is not such magic in that faith, or fancy, as to bear you to Heaven by meditating on his journey thither, to elevate you, by gazing on his ascension. No, that faith must be in our hearts too, that principle of action, and practice, they must open to him as the Tulip to the rising Sun, or as the everlasting doors to that King of glory, give him an alacrious hospitable reception, as the friend to the friend, as the diseased to the Physician, deliver themselves up most willing Patients to all his blessing warming influences, to all his medicinal saving methods, that he may sanctify, and reform, bless and turn, live and reign in our hearts by faith, and prove a Shlloh in the Critics notion of the word, from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 fortunatus est, the work of the Lord, for which he raised him, thrive and prosper in his hands. We must rise with Christ as well as die with him, do as the bodies of the Saints that slept, Mat. 28.53. arise and come out of our graves of sin, go into the holy City and appear to many. Our resurgere must be attended with an ire, (an ire of obedience, Go, and he goeth ; an ire of motion too, an active stirring vital life, not sit only or creep, but go and walk, and run the way of God's commandments ) and then 2. we must have a term for that motion, a matter for that obedience, an ubi for that ire, and that [ civitatem sanctam, ] 1. the City, and then the holy ; the life of the man, the Citizen, the Common-wealths man, risen with Christ, in every of these capacities; and then the sanctam, a superaddition of all sanctity, of all that's Christian ; and in all these notions we must ire, and praire, go before as a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , and so do that great act of charity, attract others after us by exemplary lightsome actions, apparere multis, conduct the stray multitude to heaven. That this is the benefit of Christ's resurrection, and that there is no faith, or belief in this article to be counted of, but that is thus improved, thus evidenced, is the special thing that I meant to persuade you from these words, which I shall endeavor to do, by reserving the remainder of the time for the third and last particular, the interpretation of this Priestly office of Christ, to which the resurrection instal'd him, or wherein this blessing consists, In turning, &c.

For the equal dealing with which, I conceive myself obliged to show you these three things:

• 1. What is meant by turning away everyone from his iniquities.
• 2. What the dependence is betwixt this and the resurrection of Christ.
• 3. How this turning is an interpretation of blessing, God having raised up his son Jesus, sent him to bless us, in turning, &c.

For the first, every syllable will be a hint of direction for this matter, 1. Turn ] that one syllable is the best description of the great saving grace of repentance, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in Athanasius's phrase, the inverting, the transposing, or the turning of the soul, and less than that, w ••• not prove sufficient; humbling, and confessing, and grieving, and hating, will not serve the turn, these are but initial preparatives to that last hand, but dull lines, but lifeless monagrams, which that vital pencil in this Text, that of turning, must fill up; The want of this one accomplishment, is the ruining of all, makes that vast Chasm, as wide as that betwixt Dives and Abraham's bosom ; the sorrowing, confessing, self-hating, (if unreformed) sinner may fry in Hell, when none but the returning Prodigal can find admission to Heaven ; and that for the [ turning. ] The manner of which, will be worth the observing also; the word [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ,] here is common to Christ and us, but in a different power and sense, he by way of efficience, we of non-resistance, active in Christ, and but neutral in us, he to turn us, and then we to turn, not to resist that power of his grace, not to go on, when he turns : So in other phrases of Scripture, he to draw, and then we to run after him ; God to work in us both to will and to do, and then we to work out our own salvation ; he to knock, and we to open ; he to rouse the sleeper, and we to awake, and rise from the dead ; we to obey his grace, but his grace most necessary thus to turn us: or yet more plainly, Christ to use all the means of turning us, that can belong to God, dealing with reasonable creatures, and such as he means to crown, or punish ; his call, his promise, his threats, his grace, preventing, exciting, assisting, in a word, all but violence, and coaction, (which is destructive of all judgment to come ) and we not to resist, to grieve, to quench those blessing methods, to turn when he will have us turn. Then [ everyone of you ] the extent of that grace, consequent to that resurrection, He is gone up on high, hath led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men, men indefinitely there, and all flesh in the other prophecy ( I will pour out my spirit on all flesh ) and here everyone of you, i. e. primarily everyone of you Jews, [unto you first] in the beginning of the Verse, but then from them diffusively to all others▪ The 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Tit. 2.11. hath appeared unto all men, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , &c. taking them all into the school of discipline, teaching them to live soberly, and justly, and piously in this world ; and again [ everyone ] this turning is indispensably necessary, and therefore to every self flatterer, O be not deceived, &c. and bring forth fruit, &c. and think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham, &c. There is no dispensation for Abraham's Children, for the elect, for men of such and such persuasions, no special privilege for Favorites, no Postern-gate, or back stairs for some choice privado's, all their prerogative is the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , earlier grace, or more grace, and consequently so much the more obligation, but then except you repent, and return, you shall all perish. 3. [ From his iniquities] Iniquities, first, and then [ his ] Iniquities; not the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , every legal breach, or declination, the resurrection and grace of Christ will not thus return us to a Paradise on earth, will not thus sublime us quite out of our frail sinner-state, till our mortality be swallowed up with life, but the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , villainies and wickednesses of the carnal man, the wasting acts, and noisome habits of an unsanctified life, from these, Christ died and rose, that he might turn us. There is not a more noxious mistake, a more fatal piece of Stoicism amongst Christians, than not to observe the different degrees and elevations of sin, one of the first, another of the second magnitude, one ignis fatuus or false star differing from another in dishonor, though not in glory, some spots that are spots of sons, that by a general repentance, without particular victory over them, by an habitual resolution to amend all that is amiss, without actual getting out of these frailties, are capable of God's mercy in Christ, reconcilable with a regenerate estate, such are our 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , our weaknesses, ignorances, and the like; and some that are not the spots of sons, they which do them, shall not without actual reformation, and victory, and forsaking, enter, or inherit the kingdom of God, after all that Christ hath done, and suffered for them; such our deliberate acts, and habits against light, against grace, the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in the Text; and let me tell you, the not pondering these differences, not observing the grains, and scruples of sin, how far the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , extend, and when they are overgrown into 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , is the ground (that I say no more) of a deal of desperate profaneness; We cannot keep from all sin, and therefore count it lost labor to endeavor to abstain from any ; having demonstrated ourselves men, by the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , we make no scruple to evidence ourselves Devils too, by the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; the desperation of perfect sinlessness, makes us secure in all vileness ; and being engaged in weakness, we advance to madness ; either hope to be saved with our greatest sins, or fear to be damned for our least; and having resolved it impossible to do all, resolve securely to do none; our infirmities may damn us, and our rebellions can do no more; our prayers, our alms have sin in them, and our murders and sacrileges can be but sinful : and so if the Devil or our interests will take the pains to solicit it, the deadliest sin shall pass for as innocent a creature, as tame, a stingless Serpent, as the fairest Christian virtue; and all this, upon the not observing the weight of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 here, which Christ rose from the grave on purpose to turn us from, and from which whosoever is not turned, shall never rise unto life. Add unto this, the [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] the [ his ] iniquities, as it refers to the author of them, and this is the bill of challenge and claim to those accursed possessions of ours, nothing is so truly, so peculiarly ours, as our sins ; and of those, as our 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; Our frailties, our lapses, our ignorances, the diseases, and infelicities of our nature, which may insensibly fall from us, vix ea nostra voco ; but our wasting, willful acts, and indulged habits, those great Vultures and Tygres of the soul, they are most perfectly our own, the natural'st brats, and truest progeny, that ever came from our loins, nor 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , nor 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , nor 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in Agamemnons phrase, nor God, nor Fate, nor Fiend, are any way chargeable with them: The first were blasphemy, the second Stoicism and folly to boot, the third a bearing false witness against the devil himself, robbing him of his great fundamental title of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Calumniator, and proving those, that thus charge him, the greatest Devils of the twain; and all this, is but one part of the [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] here, the [ his ] &c. as it refers to the Author. And [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] again, the [ his ] as it is a note of eminence, his peculiar, prime, reigning sins, that all others, like the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or commonalty are fain to be subject to, sometimes a monarch-dictator-single- sin, a [ the plague in his own heart ] a principality of ambition, of pride, of lust, of covetousness, that all others at their distance administer unto; sometimes an optimacy of a few, all prime coequal in their power; and sometimes a democracy, or popular state, a whole Egypt full of locusts in one breast, a Gad, a troop or shole of sins, all leading us captive to their shambles ; and thus our Sovereign sins, as different as our tempers, and every o • e the [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] here, every man from his iniquities. The sum of this first prospect is briefly this, Th • • urning everyone from his iniquities, wherein Christ's blessing us consists, is his giving of grace sufficient to work an universal, sincere, impartial, thorough-change of every sinner, from all his reigning, willful sins ; The sincerity, though not perfection of the new creature; And the dependence betwixt this and the resurrection of Christ, is the second, or next enquiry.

The resurrection of Christ in the Scripture-style, signifies not always the act of rising from the dead, but the consequent state after that rising, by the same proportion that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the new creation, and the being regenerate or born of God, signify the state of Sonship, and not the act of begetting only; So that in brief, the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 here, the raising up of Jesus, signifies the new state, to which Christ was inaugurate at his resurrection, and contains under it all the severals, of ascension, of sitting at the right hand of power, of the mission of the Holy Ghost, and his powerful intercession for us in Heaven ever since, and to the end of the world; And this is the notion of the resurrection of Christ, which is the blesser, which hath that influence on our turning ; 'twill not be amiss to show you how.

And here I shall not mention that moral influence of his resurrection upon ours; by the example of his powerful rising out of the grave, to preach to us the necessity of our shaking off the grave-cloths, that cadaverous, chill, noisome estate of sin, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to rise again with him; This is the blessing in the Text; but this, the example of Christ might preach long enough to dead souls, before it would be hearkened unto, although the truth is, the ancient Church by their setting apart these Holy-days for the baptizing of all that were baptized, and the whole space betwixt this and Pentecost, and every Dominical in the year, for the gesture of standing in all their services, that no man might come near the earth, at the time that Christ rose from it, did certainly desire to enforce this moral on us, that our souls might now turn, and be blessed, rise and be conformed to the image of Christ's resurrection; Blessed Lord! that it might be thus exemplary to us at this time. But to omit this, the special particulars wherein the resurrection of Christ, as our blesser, hath its influence on our turning, are briefly these three:

1. The bestowing on us some part of that Spirit, by which Christ was raised out of the grave Consider Rom. 8. verse 11. and 'tis all that I shall say to you of that first particular. If the Spirit of him that raised up Christ from the dead, dwell in you, he that raised up Christ, shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you, that Spirit of power by which Christ was raised out of the grave, is the very efficient of our turning, our new birth, the Author of our present blessedness, and the pledge of our future immortality; God having raised his Son by his Spirit, anointed him with that Spirit, to work the like miracles daily on our souls, in blessing, in turning everyone, &c. and that is the first thing.

2. Christ's resurrection hath a hand in blessing, in turning from iniquity, in respect to that solemn mission of the Holy Ghost promised before, and performed immediately after his ascension. This not person, I mean, but office of the Holy Ghost, in settling a Pastorage in the Church, and to it the consequent power, and necessity of preaching, administering Sacraments, governing, censuring, all which were the effects of the Holy Ghosts descending, and the direct interpretation of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , then, and ever since then: To which if you please to add the promise of the annexion of the Spirit, and the invisible grace of God to the orderly use of these, so far that the preaching of the Gospel (not only that manner of preaching among us, that hath gotten the monopoly of all the service of God into its Patent, the only thing that many of us pay all our devotion to; but any other way of making known the Gospel of Christ, the doctrine of the second Covenant) is called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , 2 Cor. 3.8. the adminstration, or means of dispensing the Spirit to us, and the Sacrament 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the communication of the blood of Christ, yea and the censures, no carnal, weak, blunt weapons of our warfare, 2 Cor. 10.4. but mighty through God, &c. you have then a second energy of his resurrection toward our turning, so great, that he that holds out against this method of power and grace, and will not turn nor understand after all this, shall never be capable of any other means of blessing, of working that great work for him: and so you see the second ground of dependence, between the resurrection, and blessing, or turning. O that it might work its design upon us, that today we would hear the voice, that cries so loud to us out of heaven, the last perhaps numerically, I am sure the last in specie or kind, the last artifice, this of the Word, and Sacraments, that is ever to be hoped for to this end, to bless us, to turn us everyone from our, &c.

3. The Resurrection hath to do in blessing, and turning, in respect of Christ's Intercession, that prime act of his Melchizedek-priesthood, his powerful intercession, i. e. in effect, conferring of grace on us; thus Rom. 8▪ 34. where that weighty business of justifying is laid more on the Resurrection, than Death of Christ, (It is Christ that died, yea rather that is risen again.) 'It is thus enlarged in the next words, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us ; his intercession, powerful intercession at the right hand of God, (a consequent of God's raising up his Son Jesus ) hath a main influence on turning first, and then justifying the ungodly: and so Heb. 7.25. Wherefore he is able to save them to the uttermost, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to save them for good and all, deliver them from all kind of assailants, from sin, from themselves, from wrath, from hell, though not absolutely all, yet those that come unto God by him, those that turn when he will have them turn, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. Will you see this more clearly? Why then thus. There are three degrees of grace, preventing, exciting, assisting: the first for conversion, the second for sanctifying, the third for perseverance. And two acts of turning, being already premised, for the beginning of that blessing work, 1. By the power of that Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead ; Then 2. By the descent of the holy Ghost ; (the first as the seed sown, the second as the rain and Sun-shine to bring it up) there is yet a third required for the earing and hardening of the corn, that of God's giving increase, for the consummating this weighty affair, for the confirming and establishing those that are initially blest and turned into a kind of Angelical state of perseverance : And to this it is, that Christ's continual intercession belongs, for that is peculiarly for Disciples, for those that are Believers, Christians already, that they may be preserved and kept in that state (as for Saint Peter in the time of shock, of tempest, when Satan is at his [ expetivit ]) that if we be permitted to be tempted, yet our faith may not fail, Luke 22.32. Another copy of this intercession you have John 17. the whole chapter is a prescript form of it, a platform of what he now daily performs in heaven. Look in the 11. verse, Holy Father, keep through thine own name, own power, those whom thou hast given me, those that are believers already: and in the 15. I pray not, that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil one ; not for immunity from temptations, for an impeccable state, but for a sufficiency of grace to keep, to sustain them in time of temptation, that they may be able to stand. So that this Intercession of Christ, is apportion'd and adequate to the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , proficience, those that are Believers already, Disciples, (or others to come, that shall be such, and when they are prayed for, are considered under that notion, as 'tis clear ver. 20. Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also that shall believe on me through their word ) a direct notation, who they are, that this daily intercession for keeping, for perseverance, belongs to, the believers, faithful disciples, and none others, I pray for them, I pray not for the world, ver. 9. Other prayers he can allow for the world, the veriest incarnate devils in it, the very crucifiers, Father forgive them ; but this prayer for perseverance, for keeping, is only for the [ them ] the believers there: The impenitent unbeliever cannot have his portion in that, unless he would have Christ pray to damn him irreversibly, to keep him in his impenitence, to seal him up unto the day of perdition : You see from hence by way of result or corollary, what 'tis that our perseverance in the faith and favor of God, is imputable to, not any fatal contrivance for some special confidents, that their sins shall not be able to separate them, not any such 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , as Marcus his Scholars in Irenaeus, pretended to, that by it they were 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , naturally spiritual, that all the debaucheries in the world could no more vitiate them, than the • un-beams are profaned by the dunghill which they shine on, or the gold by the • luttery it may be mixed with, that by the shield of the mother of heaven, what ever they did, they were 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , invisible to the Judge. No such comforts and hopes as these, of perseverance in sin, and favor with God at once, of making good our union with God, when we are in the gall of bitterness, of being justified, when we are not sanctified ; that magical spell, that fastens us in a circle, (and then what ever we do there, the devil cannot approach us) is the very hope of the hypocrite in Job, and that hope as hypocritical as himself, perisheth, and vanisheth, when he hath most rest to set upon it, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , saith Aristotle, the debauchit young man can entertain himself with such daring courageous hopes as these, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , but old age and death-beds are not of so good assurance. There is but one principle, I say, of our perseverance to be depended on, that of Christ's daily intercession for the true humble disciple, that his faith may not fail, and that Intercession an act of power in Christ, to give what he thus prays for, All power is given unto me, and so in effect, a doing, and giving, what ever is required on God's part to the working of this blessed work upon our souls, a concurrence, an actual donation of minutely assistance to them that humbly wait and beg for it, and that, secondly, receive it, and make use of it when 'tis given. That double condition is indispensably required on our parts, to the obtaining of this grace, as you may see it in the Habenti dabitur, the parable of the talent: and Heb. 7.25. He is able to save them that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them: the ability to save and deliver out of the tempters hand, to give perseverance, is explained by his continual intercession, but that only to those that come unto God by him, the pious disciple, and true Christian, the worshipper of God that doth his will, that 1. begs, and then, doth not resist, and grieve that Spirit of his, (as Heb. 5.9. he is author of salvation, to whom? to all those that obey him ) he is [ able to save them ] as if Christ were not able to save any others, to give any other perseverance, ( as he could not do miracles in his own country, because of their unbelief. ) The truth is, his decree and oath hath mani • le • him, no • to work such miracles of mercies, prodigies of perseverance, for the profane impenitent, the either spiritual or carnal presumer. You see now the dependence betwixt the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , on one side, and the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 & 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , on toother, the rising on one side, and the blessing and turning on toother: I pr • ceed to my last particular, that the turning is but a periphrasis of blessing, To bless us in turning, &c.

And I would it were in my power, instead of demonstrating to your brain, to preach 〈◊〉 home to your affections, to persuade you, and convince you of this great truth, the belief of which, your felicity here, and eternity hereafter, so much depends on; could you but acknowledge the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that there is any such thing as blessedness in a regenerate life, discern this mystery of godliness, the present joyous estate, that lies folded up in the new creature, 'tis impossible you should be any longer in love with perishing. There may be perhaps, some smooth, pleasant parts in sin, that the beast about you may delight in, some entertainment for that carnal brute ; but what a poor acquisition is that delight, to tempt thee out of blessedness, to rob thee of such inestimable treasures? A piteous exchange this, make the best of it: but when that moment any joy is not to be had neither, when there is so little, so nothing even of transitory carnal pleasure in it, then Return, O Shunamite, return, let not the Prodigal out-wit thee, out-thrive thee, rise up in judgment against thee, and condemn thee ; He, after the exhausting not only of his patrimony, but of his flesh, a crest-fallen degenerous Prodigal, a kind of Lycanthropos Nebuchadnezzar, (but in worse company) driven from men to swine, which of all other creatures are unfittest to preach returning (their ocular nerves, saith Plutarch, are so placed, that they can never come to see Heaven, 'till they are laid upon their backs ) yet even (this guest of swine) Prodigal can at last think fit to return to his Father ; O let this Prodigal turn Preacher, (as such sometimes, when they have run out of all, are wont to do) I shall give him the Text, on which I shall be confident he will be very rhetorical, Return unto thy rest, O my soul.

Again, consider the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , what blessedness is, and that may possibly work upon you; Other excellencies there are, that may set you out in the eyes of men, generosity, obligingness, wisdom, learning, courage, &c. and every of these can be thought fit to be some sober man's Idol. And yet the utmost that can belong to these, is to be praise-worthy : And then, what proportion is there betwixt all these, and one such heroic excellency, of which the Philosopher can say, praise is too poor a reward for them, we count them blessed.

O then, if there be any consolation in Christ, any virtue, any praise, if any so noble a quality as ambition be left in you, if any spark of that Vestal flame, any aspiring to that which will ennoble and sublime your natures, any design on blessedness, behold and remember the turning in this Text; nay, if you are but so well-natured as to wish a poor piteous accursed kingdom out of the jaws of so many hells, and capable of some return toward blessedness again, fulfil you my joy. Away with those objections and prejudices we have to repentance, that 'tis a rugged, thorny, galling way, a dull, melancholy, joyless state, what ever you can miss, what ever quarrel in it, 'twill be abundantly repaired and satisfied in this one of blessedness ; send me all the torments and miseries of this malicious Age, the inventions of wit, and cruelty, all the diseases, that the Heathens fear had deified, and in the midst of these, a present, instant blessedness, and I shall certainly defy them all; give me blessedness upon the rack, upon the wheel, and if you will suppose it possible, in hell itself, and I will never ask Father Abraham's favor or allay to those flames, I shall not doubt but to enjoy that anything, that hath blessedness in it. The very Heathens, saith Saint Augustine, had a great design upon one treasure that they found they had lost, used all means they could think would contribute toward the recovery of it; and in that quest went at last, saith he, and gave their souls to the Devil, to get purity for those souls. 'Twere then but reason that you would give your souls unto God, to purchase it, that you would set a turning, a purifying, when the same compendium renders you pure, and blest together, when the being happier than you were before, is all that you pay to be so forever.

I have tired you with preaching that, that would have been more seasonable to have prayed for you, that God, having, as on this day, raised up his Son Jesus, will vouchsafe to send him into every of our hearts, to bless us, to bless this accursed, miserable Kingdom, this shaking, palsy Church, this broken State, this unhappy Nation, this every poor sinner soul, by turning all, and everyone from his iniquities, by giving us all, that only matter of our peace, and serenity here, and pledge of our eternal felicity hereafter; Which God of his infinite mercy grant us all, for his Son Jesus sake whom he hath thus raised. To whom with the Father, and the Holy Ghost be ascribed, as our only tribute, the honor, &c.

The X. SERMON, Prepared at Carisbrook -Castle, but not Preach'd.

I T is a heavy complaint of God's, and though expressed without much noise, yet in a deep melting hearty passion, not only in the verse next before my Text, with heaven and earth called to be witnesses of the complaint, but with a little varying of the expression, everywhere else, throughout the Prophets, that Israel doth not know, God's people doth not consider. All the arts of discipline and pedagogy had been used to teach them knowledge, and consideration, i. e. to bring them to a sight, and sense of their estate, Lectures, warnings, chidings, blows, shaking, and rousing, and hazening them, if it were possible, to awake them out of that lethargick, senseless condition. The whole people used like that proud King of Babylon, driven from men, set to live and converse with the beasts of the field, (such were the Chaldeans, whither they were carried captive) if so be, as it fared with him, so it might possibly succeed with them, the Field be a more gainful School than the Palace had been, that by that means at least they might lift up their eyes to heaven, and their understanding return to them, Dan. 4. Turn'd from men into Beasts, that that stranger Metamorphosis might be wrought on them, a transformation from men into men, from ignorant brutish, into prudent considering men, nay delivered up even unto Satan by way of discipline, that Satan might teach them sense; The plagues of Egypt, of Sodom, of Hell let loose upon them, to try whether like the rubbing and the smarting of the Fishes gall, it might restore these blind Tobits to their eyes and souls again. To work the same work, if it be possible, upon us, is, I profess, my business, and only errand at this time; There hath been a great deal of pains taken by God to this purpose, doctrine and discipline, instructions and corrections, and all utterly cast away upon us hitherto, the whole head sick, and the whole heart faint, in the words next after my Text, which you must not understand, as ordinarily men do, of the sins of that people, that those were the wounds, and bruises, and purified sores, (give me leave to tell you, that is a mistake, for want of considering the context) but of judgments, heavy judgments, diseases, piteous diseases, both on head and heart, Epilepsies, wracking pains in the head, the whole Kingdom may complain in the language of the Shunamites Child, O my head, my head! nay, in the Prophets, the crown is fallen from our head, the crown of our head torn and fallen from our head, and the heart in terrible fainting fits, every foot ready to overcome; From the sole of the foot to the crown of the head, from one extreme part of the Nation to another, nothing but distress or oppression, suffering, or acting direful Tragedies, misery or impiety, (the latter the more fatal symptom, the greater distress of the two) and yet no man layeth it to heart, England will not know, will not consider.

The truth is, the deformities which are in ourselves, we are such partial self-parasites, that there is no seeing in a direct line, no coming to that prospect, but by reflection; shall we therefore bring the Elephant to the water, and there show him and amaze him with the sight and ugliness of his proboscis ? the state of the Jews is that water, where we may see the image of this present Kingdom most perfectly delineated in every limb and feature, its prosperity, its pride, its warnings, its provocations, its captivities, its contumelious using of the Prophets, scorning the Messengers from God that came to reprieve them, at length its fatal presages, the deadly feuds, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 & 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Zealots and Brothers of the sword, plowing it up to be sowed with salt and brimstone, and all this chargable culture and discipline cast away upon them uttterly, mortifying (instead of sins and impieties) nothing but the relics of piety, and civility and ingenuous nature; a strange pestilential fever, feising upon their very spirits and souls; and now nothing but a Roman Eagle, or a Hell, a Titus, or a fiend, left behind to work any reformation on them. Thus all God's thunderbolts being exhausted, his methods of discipline pozed, and nonplus'd, and frustrated, there is nothing behind, but calling in and retracting those rods, the no longer vouchsafing those thunderbolts; a news that perhaps you would be glad to hear of, a respite of punishments, but that the most ominous direful of all others, the most formidable of all God's denouncings, the last and worst kind of desertion; Why should you be (not embraced and dandled, but scourged and) smitten anymore? You will revolt more, and more.

These words will afford you these four fields of plain and useful meditation:

• 1. God's custom of striking sinners, and increasing stripes on them, in order to their reformation.
• 2. The prime proper seasons for such striking: 1. In case of revolt. 2. In case of revolting more.
• 3. The one only case in which striking becomes uncharitable, when the more and the more God smites, the more and the more the sinner revolts.
• 4. And lastly, the pitiful estate of the sinner when he comes to this, when in this case God removes smiting, for though it be an act of mercy in God, yet 'tis that which bodes very ill, 'tis an indication of the most desperate estate of the Patient. Why should you be stricken anymore ?

I begin first with the First, (which lies not so visible and distinguishable in the Text, but is the foundation, that is supposed under it, and on which all that is visible is superstructed) and that is God's pious and charitable design in smiting sinners, and increasing stripes on them ; though now, on more prudential considerations, they shall not be anymore smitten.

If my children forsake my Law, &c. I will visit their offenses with the rod, and their sin • with scourges, saith God by the Psalmist. God hath his visits for distempered children, not only like that of St. Paul's, in the spirit of meekness, but also 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , with the rod : and if that single engine of discipline will not do it, there are sharper and more behind, the flagella, or scourges, in the Plural. And this by the way of prudent medicinal process, of solemn deliberate dispensation, according to rules of Art : You will presently discern it, if you but look into the nature, and causes, and process of the disease : I shall give you but one way of judging of these, by remembering you, that all sin is founded in bono jucundo, in the pleasing, or delighting of the carnal faculty: Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed, when his carnal pleasurable faculty 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , draws him out of his road of piety, by an amiable pleasurable lure or bait : Of this kind, if you will look into the retail, you shall find every sin in the world to be, some law of the members, some dictate of the flesh, which is all for sensitive pleasure, a warring, a contending, arguing, and pleading before the will, against the adversary law of the mind, against the dictates of honest, or virtuous, of the rational, or Christian, which is a pretending and contending on the other side. Three representations there were of the apple in the first sin, and every of those under this notion of pleasure : The woman saw, 1. That 'twas good for food, pleasurable to the taste: 2. A desire (as 'tis in the Heb. ) which we render again, pleasant to the eyes : And 3 that 'twas to be desired to make one wise, i. e. according to the same Heb. notion, pleasurable in this, that it would make them know more than they did before, a kind of satisfaction, and so pleasure to the understanding, (as you know, knowledge, though it be but of trifles and news, is a most pleasurable thing.) And, so generally every sin is begotten after the image and likeness of that first; the pleasures of lust, the pleasures of revenge, (that huge high Epicurism ) the pleasures of pride, (the greatest that Aristotle, or the Author 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 conceived that the old Heathen gods could pretend to, in their recesses, their not vouchsafing to see or hear anything, but by Perspectives and Otacousticks) or again, the pleasures of heresy, of schism, which he that is guilty of, saith the Apostle, is he not carnal? the pleasures of singularity, and being head of a Faction, they say, the hugest sensuality, and voluptuousness, the most bewitching ravishment of any: And even covetousness, and ambition, the sins which seem to be particularly fastened on two other notions of the forbidden fruit, the profit and honor, the wealth and greatness, the baits of the world, and not of the flesh, (and may have smitings of God proportioned to them, on our estates, and honors, as well as on our flesh ) yet, I say, even these would certainly never be able to work upon us, if there were not a notion of pleasure in them: and therefore one of them is called the lust of the eye, and the worldly pomp, and greatness, the object of the other, (as that in Moses, of the honor of being called the son of Pharaohs daughter ) is distinctly styled the pleasures of sin, in the plural, Heb. 11.25. And indeed the matter is clear and demonstrable, there being but two contrary faculties about us, the rational, and the carnal principle, the inward and the outward man, as every virtuous and Christian thought and action is a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Rom. 7.22. a complacency and delight of the upper nobler spiritual faculty in the law of God, the object apportion'd to that, so is every sin that is ever committed, a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a complacency, or conjunction in liking, a being pleased with the law of the members, a choosing of that which may be most agreeable and proportionable to the designs of the flesh, i. e. most desirable and pleasurable to that.

Having given you the character of the disease, the distinct nature of sin, the propriety of the distemper, that some either true or false sensual pleasure, something that is really delectable to the flesh, or that either by a false glass of passion, or custom, or else by an imperfect half light, appears to be pleasurable, is the foundation and matter of every sin, (never any revolts from God, but when we hope to enjoy ourselves better in some other company, some revenue or income of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or joy to the flesh expected, and aimed at in every extravagance or out-lying) you cannot now choose but acknowledge the propriety of the Physic, which we have here before us, the usefulness of the strokes, or smitings for this recovery. When a man is in the pursuit of a mere pleasurable object, which he confesses to value for nothing else, but that it is sweet to taste, could he but discern or espy the whole sweetness and pleasurableness of it secretly let out, or spilled upon the ground, or evaporate before his eyes, or but a scourge held over his head, or a Vial of gall or wormwood imbibed, that for every dram of pleasure shall give him a terrible proportion of bitterness at the present, of instant pain and smart: 'tis not imaginable that any man in his senses should advance one step further in this pursuit; the more sensual and carnal man he is, the more he must abhor such marches as these, which are so treacherous and malicious to the very flesh ; he that can satisfy himself with the empty name of sin, though 〈◊〉 taste never so sour or loathsome, that will not in this case compremise, and compound with innocence, take purity on Christ's terms, rather than venture on present racks and torments, had need be a sublime, aereal, spiritual sinner indeed, like Lucifer himself, who we know, is all Spirit, he must have nothing left of sense or flesh about him; Were but the thousandth part of that Hell which expects the indulgent sinner in another world, mixed in the very cup of his pleasurablest sin here, the least present whip instead of all those future scorpions, it would be almost impossible for the most magnanimous sinner to venture so deep for that empty honor, the bare opinion, or fancy or credit of having assaulted and rebelled against Heaven, and gained nothing by it, to pay so dear for that which is not bread, hath nothing of substance or satisfaction in it; And therefore this is the design of God's rod, his smitings, his punishments, to give us a little of that Hell before hand, (which our infidel senses apprehend nothing of, as long as 'tis future ) to help us to some disrelish to sin at the present, to give us some part of its portion, (of the odiousness & bitterness of it) in the very mouth, that we may not have any joy in chewing, or swallowing down so abhorred a mixture, which hath such a certain arrear of horror, and bitternest in the stomach, to rain down some fire and brimstone into our throats, whensoever we are gaping after that forbidden Tree; thus to discourage, if not to allay our h • dropick thirst, to incumber and traf • us in our violent furious marches, to pluck off the wheels of our Egyptian chariots, that they may drive more heavily, that finding the most pleasurable sin such a sad 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a compost of more bitter than sweet at the very instant, we should never be such blind obedient Votaries of Satan, never so perfectly renounce and deny ourselves, our own ease, our own all kind of interests and advantages, never be such professed enemies and tyrants against our own flesh, as to go on in such chargeable ways of sin, when we see and feel so sadly, how without and before the certain cures of a chill'd old age, by this charitable anticipation of God's smiting hand, the days are come upon sin, that we can truly say that we have no pleasure in it. And so you see the grounds of this medicinal method, the charity and piety of God's design in smiting, my first observable; I proceed briefly to the prime proper seasons of this charity, this smiting, 1. In case of revolt, 2. Of revolting more, my second particular.

God's first season of punishing is instantly upon revolt, at the first breaking off, or aversion, or departure from God; And sure he that is not suffered by God to enjoy one easy or comfortable hour in sin, that is presently called to discipline, taught what a jealous God he hath provoked, that is roused and awaked at the first nod, watched over by the most vigilant Monitor, (that he cannot move out of his posture of piety, but presently God in heaven is a calling out to him to reduce him to his rank again) cannot choose but acknowledge himself a prime part of God's care and solicitude. The first day of going out into the field, as in God's, so in Satan's service, is generally a nice and a critical day; according to the successes or discouragements we meet with then, we have more or less mind to the trade forever after; should but our beginnings of revolt from God, our first treacherous intentions against him prove lucky, and smooth, and prosperous, 'twere easy and prone (and not at all improbable) for us to glide insensibly into all rebellions and impieties, to swear fealty to Satan, that hath entertained us so hospitably, and suddenly to engage so deep under his colors, that there would be no retiring with honor, no returning to God without being infamous, without undergoing the brand of Apostates from Satan, of a kind of Foedi-fragi▪ Covenant-breakers and Desertors; Our repentance would go for the more scandalous thing, our reduction to our allegiance to Heaven, would be the forfeiting of a trust, and within a while appear the more ill-favor'd, reproachful revolt of the two; Whereas if we meet with some checks and discouragements betimes, some rousing brushes at the first entrance into the service, 'tis possible we may discern our error; especially, if it were the flesh that helped to seduce us, if the hope of advantage that brought us into it, because the wicked goes unpunished, therefore the heart of man is wholly set to do evil, saith Solomon, and therefore, that God may not be thought to desert them presently at the first revolt, to deliver up that heart of theirs to that hell upon earth upon this first single provocation, God is concerned in faithfulness to cause them to be troubled, not to lead them into this temptation, to profane continuance in sin, but to give them this grace, this gift of punishment, to reduce and recall them presently, as soon as they are revolted, to let Satan or his instruments loose, to disease and awake this drowsy servant of his, who therefore to such purposes though he be cast out of heaven, from being God's menial servant, is still 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , God's officer, and minister, retains so much of his old angelical title, of being a ministering spirit, and that, if we be not wanting to ourselves, to the greates • advantage of our souls, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , not 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a piece of edifying, not sanguinary discipline. And let me tell you my opinion, that for that which is called punitive justice, severity or revenge on sin, that part of the Magistrates office among men, to be 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , an avenger for wrath, were it not in mere necessary charity to them that are punished, or to them that are warned by others punishment, there were no reason for any man to inflict it upon another, 'twere wholly to be left to God's tribunal.

From this hint, two things I desire to commend to my Auditory, by way of Application.

1. The care that they are to have, to take special notice of every the softest degree of smiting that ever befalls them in their lives; be it sickness, or a miscarriage, a thousand to one, it is an application of God's to some special distemper of thine, to some degree of revolt from him: This I will not say is perpetually true, because I know there be other uses of smitings, for the exercise of many Christian virtues, (which would rust and fully and come to little, and so Christ lose all the glory and renown, and we all the reward of them, if we had not such occasions to exercise them) but I say, the odds is so great, when the rod of God comes, that it comes for some such revolt of thine, that certainly it is thy duty, so far to distrust thine own excellencies, as to doubt that it comes not to thee merely as to an athleta, or combatant, or perfect Christian, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , by way of trial only, but as to one guilty of some kind of revolt, and so 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , for punishment and reformation: And though I cannot be confident it is so, yet believe me, thou hast so much reason to suspect thyself, that it will be worth thy pains to examine, upon every stroke on thy body, thy estate, nay on thy reputation, every cursing of a Shimei, eve • approach, or terror, brandishing the rod, or sword against thee, that 'tis some present sin of thine, some degree of instant revolt that hath brought this stroke upon thee. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , saith S. James, If any man be sick, &c. The whole Text supposeth it strongly probable, that he that is thus visited, hath committed some act of revolt, either of greater or lesser moment, either against God, or his brother, to which that sickness hath some relation; and there is a notable place, Ecclus. 18.21. Humble thyself before thou be sick and in the time of sins, show repentance, supposing the time of sins to be the forerunner of sickness ; and he that would but thus examine himself, whensoever he hath any such bitter potion sent him from God, ask his own conscience (his best adviser) the question, to what former disease it is, to which God 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , not as an enemy, but a Physician, hath accommodated this application, he might perhaps forty years hence thank me for this admonition, and be able to tell me that from this day to that, he hath experimented the truth of the observation, never received a corrosive plaster from God, but upon enquiry, he found a piece of dead flesh in himself, to which it clearly belonged; I doubt not but a few good memories might presently bring me in a catalogue of proofs to my observation, I desire you will be your own Confessors, and do it to yourselves; and then do the duty that in such case belongs to you. And that is, (in the second place) not only to acknowledge the disease before God most freely, and apply his physic and our diligence to the cure of it, but withal to look upon these strokes, as the sovereign'st mercies, so many beams of mere grace, Sermons from Heaven, the very [bath Col] the voice from heaven of old, that seldom came but with a clap of thunder along with it, methods of God's restraining, and exciting Spirit, and thank God as heartily for them, as for the richest boons, the warmest sunshines, that you ever received from the sun of righteousness ; and being once made whole, rescued (upon thy return) from one such first smiting, it concerns thee nearly forever after, to go, sin no more, lest a far worse thing happen unto thee.

For so I told you, there is a second season of smiting, and that, of doubling the blows, viz. upon our revolting more. God doth not presently upon the first recidivation, or relapse, give up the sinner for desperate; he concludes indeed most justly and deliberately, that the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or disaffection is the stronger, when it breaks forth again, the leprosy more dangerous, that it spreads in the flesh, after it hath been looked on by the Priest, that the former Physic, if 'twere sufficient to set him on his legs again, was not yet able to make him a hail sound man, some venomous humor was left behind, and in all probability, a stronger physic is now necessary, perhaps a whole course of steel : A physic, God knows, that this Kingdom hath been under five or six years, I would I could say, the Patient prospered under it; nay, that it had not grown far worse, gone backward in all auspicious symptoms ever since, as if that steel, not sufficiently prepared, were turned into the habit of the body, and now wanted some higher chymical preparations to work it out again. If this be the case, as God knows its too suspicious it is, I am then fallen on my third general, the only case wherein this sharp physic becomes unseasonable, when the more and more God strikes, the more and more the sinner revolts ; and to that I must now hasten. Why, &c.

A nice subtle question and dispute there hath been among Divines, which may in par • have its decision from hence, concerning a peculiar middle third kind of knowledge in God; as whether, on supposition that such a thing should come to pass, which never shall, God knows what will follow by way of consequence. To this purpose many notable passages of Scripture there are: the Oracle, that David received about the men of Keilah, the assurance that they would deliver him up, if he entrusted himself to them; though the truth is, he never made the trial of their sincerity, but believed God the searcher of their hearts, without that more costly experiment. So when Christ affirms of Tyre and Sidon, that, if the miracles done in Bethsaida, had been done among them, they had infallibly repented. And so St. Paul in his voyage by sea, that told the Mariners how certainly they should be cast away, if any went out of the ship, though they neither went out, nor lost one life. And so here, where God by the Prophet foretells, that in case he now should smite them anymore, they would revolt more and more, and therefore resolves to give over smiting. To enter into any part of that subtle debate, is not my design, as remembering that of Greg. Naz. that the Ammonites and the Moabites were not permitted to enter into the Church of God, i. e. saith he 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , curious and subtle discourses, which are not very apt to minister grace, or edification to the hearers : the utmost that will be of use or profit to us, is, to observe this positive aphorism of God's methods of discipline, of his gracious oeconomies, seldom or never to send punishments on any, but when they are probable to do some good, to work reformations on them. Two cases there are in Physic, when the Physician in all reason withdraws his hand and his drugs, 1. When the Patient is desperate, and the Physic of an high nature; for then such costly drugs should neither be poured out, nor defamed, neither lose their virtue, nor adventure their reputation on the desperate patient ; as long as there is hope, they must be placed, (be it never so chargeable or painful) even to cupping and scarifying, even skin after skin, (as those words in Job would be rendered, those things that are nearest to us one after another) and all that he hath will he give for his life ; and when there is no hope, some easy Physic, some indifferent, tame cordials may be allowed, till the last gasp; but the nobler drugs must not be thus riotously dealt with; and so in like manner to the desperate revolter, the sun may shine, and the rain may fall on him, as well as on the most hopeful, some indifferent ordinary ways of cure, such are prosperity, affluence of Fortune, and the like; but for the magistrals of nature and art, such are God's smitings and punishments, which cost God dear, as it were, he is fain to fetch them from far, to go out of his place for them, in the Prophets style, God will not be so prodigal of these, but when there is hope that they may prove successful.

And so again, secondly, when the condition is more hopeful, yet in case the kind of physic is become too familiar with the body, when it ceases to be physic, and proves diet, turns into nourishment and increase of the disease, 'tis then more than time to change the bills, to set the Patient to some new course; and this is the case in the Text again; and I heartily wish to God, it were not the very case of the Kingdom: I will not say, 'tis a desperate patient, that no method of God's could possibly work good on us, (no, I will hope and pray yet against our wickedness, and do it on this very score; For although some part of the Nation have had, for a long time, little of this bitter physic administered to them by God; yet sure some of us are still under this cure of the rod, have not all our caustick plasters torn off from us, from whence I think I may conclude, that God is still a wrestling with our disease, hath not yet given us quite over unto death ) but this I am afraid, I may too truly say, that of those that are still under this sharp and sovereign course of Physic, this of punishments, it is become too familiar with most of us, we look not on our afflictions as on medicines sent us immediately out of the special dispensatory of Heaven, but as the ordinary diet and portion of mortal mutable Men; I wish I could not add, that our malady hath most highly thrived, and prospered under our Physic, more new kinds, and varieties of sinning, from all the Nations about us, nay from Hell itself taken in, incorporate and naturaliz'd among us, in a few years of God's sword being drawn, his thunderbolts scattered among us, a greater progress toward Atheism made generally in this Nation under this preaching of the rod, than in many Ages before had been observable among us; Let it be considered with some sadness, and it will certainly appear to the eternal shame of a provoking people that to every degree of oppression and injustice, that this Nation was formerly guilty of, the thousand-fold were now a very moderate proportion; to every oath, that was formerly darted against Heaven, there are now whole vollies of perjuries, never did so course and sturdy, so plain, and boisterous a sin, so perfect a Camel go down so glib, and go over so easily. To omit that prodigy of lying and slandering (a vapor that came visibly out of Hell, as soon as it was there resolved that innocence must suffer) some sins as wasting as any in the whole inventory, have of late grown so frequent, and fashionable in the world, that they have quite put off the nature of sin, by being our daily food, digested and converted into other shapes, as if swallowed by a pious man (who, God knows, must answer the dearest for his revolts) they should turn into his substance, become acts of piety, of the highest size, one such metamorphos'd, transfigured sin is become able to commute, and expiate for a hundred more, that have not had the luck of that disguise; and, in a word, our revolts are so prodigiously increased, improved into such a mountainous vastness, such a colony of none but gyantly shapes, that though I cannot undertake to foretell our fate, or affirm that we are those very men come to that very crisis, upon which God by the purport of the doom in my Text, will soon give over smiting anymore, (which perhaps some might be so mad as to think an happy news, if they could but hear of it, and would be content to venture any hazard that this could bring on them) yet this I shall from hence be able to pronounce dogmatically, that should such a fate befall us, (either the Nation in general, or any of us in particular) should there be a respite of the rod, before any laying down of the sins that called for it, a cessation of arms betwixt heaven and earth, before a cessation of hostilities between earth and heaven, this were as the last, so the worst of evils, a calm to be dreaded beyond all the loudest tempests, which will be the better evidenced and demonstrated to you, if we proceed to the fourth and last particular, the pitiful estate of the sinner, when in this case God removes smiting, Why, &c.

To discern the sadness, and deplorableness of this estate, I shall need give you no sharper character of it, than only this, that 'tis a condition that forceth God to forsake us in mere mercy, to give over all thoughts of kindness to us, and that the only degree of kindness left, whereof we are capable: In plain terms, to that man or people, that is the worse for stripes, these two most irreconcilable contraries are most sadly true:

The removing of these stripes is the greatest judgment imaginable.

And yet 2. That greatest judgment is the only remaining mercy also.

Consider these two apart, and you will see the truth of them.

1. The removing the physic before it hath done the work, is the greatest judgment, even subtraction of all grace, downright desertion, and nothing more fatal than that, to him that cannot recover, or repent of himself, without the assistance of that physic ; strokes are not sent by God, but as a last, and necessary reserve, when a long peace and prosperity have been tried, and not been able to make any impression on sin; nay perhaps, have gone over to the enemies side, taken part with sin, proved its prime friend, furnished it with weapons, and ammunition, enabled it to riot, and grow luxurious, and to think of being final Conqueror over the Spirit of God, which had it been kept low, it could not have done; and in this case, the weight and fortune of the whole battle lies on stripes, and if those be commanded away by God, if recalled upon a first or second repulse; if all God's thunderbolts, the only remaining hope, have the retreat sounded to them, what a destitute, routed, forlorn, estate is the Soul then left in? Had sin been wounded or worsted in the fight, brought to some visible declination, yet this withdrawing of those forces that gave this lusty assault, would presently restore it to some heart and courage again, would give it space to rally and recover strength; and so oft it falls out, that when afflictions have done their work, mortified our excesses, and so march home again to God, in triumph over the enemy, yet within a while (after the smart is forgotten) the very vanquished lust returns, and gets strength again, and, as 'tis oft in Thucydides story, by that time the trophies are set up, the baffled enemy regains the field and victory: But when on the other side, sin after the combat with God's rod, comes off unwounded, and hail, and the bruised and battered rod is seen to have retired also, then this is the greatest fleshing of sin imaginable, a perfect bloudless victory over grace, over God's merciful Spirit, striving with us; and nothing but haughtiness, and triumph, and obduration is to be looked for, after such successes; And this is that sad state of desertion I told you of, a leaving the poor soul, like him that had fallen among thieves, wounded, and half dead ; and not so much as one good Samaritan near to bind up, or pour in the least drop of oil, into the wounds, (for 'tis not imaginable, that ease, or peace, so calm, so soft, so pusillanimous a creature, as affluence or prosperity is, should ever come in to the rescue, should do such valiant acts, when so much stouter, sterner instruments have been so utterly repulsed) And yet in this sad case, the matter is not yet at the highest; but, (which was the second part of the true, but doleful Paradox) this very desertion is the only tolerable mercy now behind. Should God continue stripes, and they still make the sinner more Atheistical, this, I say, would but increase the load in hell; Every improsperous stroke on the steeled anvil heart, will but add to the tale of oppositions, and affronts, and resistances, and so to the catalogue of guilts and woes, that sad arrear which another world will see paid distinctly; and so the calling off, or intercepting of these strokes, (i. e. these our unhappy advantages and opportunities of enhansing our score, or reckoning) is a kind of mercy still, though but a pitiful one; and if God do not think fit to afford us this mercy, if God do not give over smiting in this case, this is then his greater severity yet.

And so I conceive the impenitents state brought to an extraordsnary issue, that whatsoever God deal out to us, the consequence is of a nature most exquisitely miserable; If he take off his punishments, we are in a desperate estate, there's nothing left, in any degree probable to do any good on us; and if he do not take them off, they do but accumulate, and heighten our future torments; the mercy is a cruel mercy, and the severity a cruel severity; the first leaves us in a palsy or lethargy, a dead stupid mortified state, and the second increases the Feaver, adds fuel to the flames: If he strike not, we lie dead in sin, as so many trunks and carcasses before him; if he strike on, he awakes us into oaths and blasphemies, and so still more direful provocations.

And so, as we are wont to say of an erroneous Conscience, in case the commands are lawful, which that thinks unlawful, it sins which way soever it moves; by disobedience, against the duty of the fifth Commandment; and by obedience, against the dictate of conscience (a sad exigence, no way in the world to be avoided, but by getting out of the prime fundamental infelicity, getting the erroneous Conscience informed and rectified:) so is it, in a manner, with God towards this unhappy creature of his, that hath not, nor is like to edify under stripes, he wounds it mortally, whatsoever he designeth toward it; his desertion is cruel, and his not deserting is cruel too. Lay but the scene of this Kingdom at this time, (of which I may say, 'tis a stubborn unnurtur'd scholar of God's, a very ill proficient under stripes; far worse, and more hopeless now, than when first it came under this discipline) and I shall challenge the prudentest Diviner under Heaven, to tell me rationally, what 'twere but tolerably charitable to wish, or pray for it, in respect of the removal of God's judgments: should we be respited, before we be in any degree reformed, th ••• t out of God's School, now we are at the wildest? This were a woeful change, removing of Canaanites, and delivering us up to the beasts of the field, breaking down the inclosure, and letting us out into the wilderness, rescuing us out of purgatory, and casting us into hell, and never any Orate pro animâ, prayer for deliverance out of those Poetic flames, was so impious, so unkind as this. And whilst I have this prospect before me, methinks I am obliged in very charity to pray, Lord keep us in this Limbo still, these but transitory afflictions of this life, which in comparison with spiritual desertion, or delivering up to ourselves, is a very cheerful and comfortable condition: And yet should God thus hearken to that prayer, continue us under this discipline longer, provide a new stock of Artillery, and empty another Heaven, another Magazine, and Armory upon us, and all prove but bruta fulmina still, another seven years of judgments thrive no better with us, than the last sad apprenticeship hath done; O what an enhansement would this be of our reckoning? What a sad score of aggravations, (that is, of so many mercies and graces, so many wrestlings of his spirit with sin, all grieved and repel'd by us) and consequently, what a pile of guilts toward the accumulating of our flames? what is the natural and the only salvo to this intricacy, I suppose 'tis prone to any man to divine; why to reform the fundamental error, which can no otherwise be repaired after; to begin, if it be but now, to edify, and to be the better for stripes, to set every man to this one late, but necessary resolution, and not to be content to have done somewhat at home in private, every man in mending one, as they say, (though if that were done uniformly, 'twould serve the turn) but every man, whose heart the Lord hath stricken, to be a convert-humble-mourner for the iniquity of his people, (for the provocations of this Church, and Kingdom, and for the plague of his own heart ) to go out, and call all the idle by-standers in the field, to draw as many more, as 'tis possible, into that engagement, and in this sense to bring into the service a whole army of Covenanters and Reformers, every man vowing hostility against those wasting sins of his, that have thus long kept a tortured broken Kingdom, and Church upon the wheel, which can never get off, till we come whole sholes of suppliants, and auxiliaries to its rescue; nay, till the sins that first brought it to this execution, become the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , be delivered up cheerfully to suffer in the stead. That this work be at length begun in some earnest, you will surely give God and his Angels, and your friends leave to expect with some impatience; and 'twere even pity they should any longer be frustrated: If they may at last be so favor'd by us, our state will be as great a riddle of mercy and of bliss, as 'twas even now of sadness and horror: Let God do what he please to us for the turning, or for the continuing our Captivity, 'twill be matter of infinite advantage, and joy to us; If he continue us still upon the cross, after the consummatum est, after the work is done, after it is a reformed, purifi'd Nation: O that is a super-angelical state, a laying a foundation in that deep, for the higher and more glorious superstructure of joy and bliss in another world; Nay, if he should sweep us away in one akeldama, this were to the true Penitent, but the richer boon, a transplantation only, a sending us out a triumphant (not captive) colony to heaven. Or if we be then taken down from the Cross, and put into the quiet chambers, or dormitories, if there be seasons of rest and peace yet behind upon this earth in these our days, O they will be rich seasons of opportunity to bring forth glorious proportionable fruits of such repentance, a whole harvest of affiance and faithful dependence upon Heaven, a daily continual growth in grace, in all that is truly Christian: In a word, of rendering us a kingdom of angelical Christians here, and of Saints hereafter; Which whether it be by the way of the Wilderness, or of the Red-sea, by all the sufferings that a Villanous world can design, or a gracious Father permit and convert to our greatest good, God of his infinite mercy grant us all, even for his son Jesus Christ his sake, To whom with the Father, &c.

The XI. SERMON. Preach'd to the Clergy of the Deanery of Shorham in Kent, at the Visitation between Easter and Whitsuntide, A.D. 1639. held at S. Mary-Cray.

T His Text hath somewhat in it seasonable both for the assembly, and the times I speak in; For the first, It is the word, or Motto of an Apostle, Non vestra sed vos, not yours but you, transmitted to us with his Apostleship, to be transcribed not into our rings, or seals of Orders, but our hearts, there, if you please, to be engraven with a diamond, set as the stones in our Ephod, the jewels in our breast-plate, gloriously legible to all that behold us. And for the second, consider but the occasion, that extorted from our humble Saint, this so magnificent elogie of himself, you shall find it that which is no small part of the infelicity of his successors at this time, the contempt and vileness of his ministry, a sad, joyless subject of an Epistle, which would have been all spent in superstruction of heavenly doctrine upon that precious foundation formerly laid, in dressing of those noble plants, that generous vine Isa. 5. that had cost him so much care to plant, but is fain to divert from that, to a comfortless 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a parenthesis of two or three chapters long, to vindicate himself from present danger of being despised, and that, even by his own children, whom he had begotten in the Gospel, but other pseudo's made up all of lying, and depraving, had debauched out of all respect to his doctrine or estimation to his person. I should have given a S. Paul leave to have hoped for better returns from his Corinthians, and now he finds it otherwise, to have expressed that sense in a sharper strain of passion, and indignation, than Tully could do against Antony, when on the same exacerbation he brake out into that stout piece of eloquence, quid putem? contemptumne me? non video quid sit in moribus aut vitâ meâ, quod despicere possit Antonius. But there was another consideration, which as it composes our Apostles style, so it enlarges it with arguments, all that he can invent, to ingratiate himself unto them, because this contempt of their Apostle, was a most heinous provoking sin, and withal, that which was sure to make his Apostleship succesless among them; And then, though he can contemn reputation, respect, anything that is his own, yet he cannot the quaero vos, seeking of them, that office that is entrusted him by Christ, of bringing Corinthians to heaven ; Though he can absolutely expose his credit to all the