Commentary on 2 Peter

THe common pretence for the most unbounded licentiousness, hath been liberty. In that nefarious and disloyal conspiracy and murder of Julius Caesar, the general dispensation of their conscience was liberty. Catilines foul treachery was set off with the colors of liberty. When Sheba would invite Israel from a just and lawful subjection, to the bondage of an usurper, he proclaims a liberty; Every man to his Tents, he meant every man to his own Tent. And that people, which had but as yesterday fallen in the design of Absalom, ason of their King; are now again up in arms under Sheba, a subject of their King, a rebel against their King. As Bees when they are up in a swarm, are ready to light on every bough; so the Israelites being stirred by the late commotion, are apt to follow the head of any faction. When the rulers conspire against Christ, they project liberty; Let us break their bands. Laws are bands; for the wild, to cicure and humble them; for the weak to secure and keep them: they that would oppress their inferiors, and never be called in question for it by their betters, would break the bands. Pride, idleness, drunkenness, and all manner of dissoluteness, cannot range their voluptuous chases, till the boundaries be removed: let them dissolve the cords of morality, and then they proclaim liberty. So doth corrupt nature abhor restraint, that it embraceth any doctrine which shall but promise liberty. While they promise them liberty, &c.

The parts of this Text have a chain of dependence. First the main scope is the allurement of the weak, in general. Secondly, the way of this allurement is by Promise. Thirdly, the force of that Promise is Liberty. Fourthly, the conviction of that force, The promisers are bound, Themselves are the servants of corruptions. Fifthly, the proof of that conviction; For of whom a man is overcome, of the same he is brought in bondage.

First, for the main scope, the seducement of the weak. It was Christ's charge to Peter, When thou art converted, convert thy brethren. It is Satan's charge to his agents, now you are confounded, confound your brethren. He that is not cross to Christ, cannot be Antichrist. There be many Antichrists, saith Saint John: there is a mean Antichrist, and a main Antichrist: every false teacher is a mean one, but there is another that is the main Antichrist. The old fox hath abundance of cubbes; and as Christ said to Peter and the Apostles, Feede my lambs; so he to these instruments, Fleece, flay, worrey the Lambes. Christ came to heal the wounded, to bring deliverance to captives: they come to wound the whole, to bring the delivered into captivity. He to call sinners to repentance, they to call the righteous into wickedness. He, to save that which was lost: they, to spill that which might be saved. Such is the implacable enmity of the Prince of darkness against the children of light, that he will rather make his own fire hotter, than not labor to bring them to the participation of his torments.

But O what shall we say to the ring-leaders of this infernal conspiracy? Many sorrows shall be to the wicked; but how infinite is their portion that make men wicked? Let him know, that converteth a sinner from the error of his way, that he saveth a soul from death, and hides a multitude of sins. So let him know, that perverteth the righteous from the truth of his way, that he doth bring a soul unto death, and occasion a multitude of sins. If they that turn men to righteousness, shall shine as the stars in heaven: then they that turn the just to error, shall burn as everlasting coals in the furnace of hell. He that doth ill, and teacheth so, shall be minimus in coelo, but maximus in inferno. Even to pejorate men by bad example, is a mischief intolerable: and corrupt patterns shall find an unanswerable indictment for the filthy copies that have been taken from them; though they neither forced, nor tempted, nor persuaded to them. That which custom hath made honorable, will by great men's refusal grow contemptible. Young Gentlemen in Athens used to play on the Recorder: but when Alcibiades, viewing his face in a glass, as his cheeks were puffed up with blowing the Instrument threw away the pipe with indignation, all the Gallants presently cashierd that kind of music. And when eminent persons take up things contemptible, their followers think them honorable. What was more vile than the office of Scavengers, the charge of scouring the sinks and gutters? Yet when worthy Epaminondas had once borne the office it was sought for among other preferments. Exemplary evils be bad enough, but how deep a place is prepared for them in Tophet, that willfully seduce others to dishonor their Maker? It is dreadful to think, horrible to feel, the bitterness of their damnation.

Secondly, the way of this allurement is by Promise: where we have diverse considerations:

2. Promises are the cheapest things men can part withal, and yet the strongest enchantments. The cheapest; therefore he that is poor in every other thing, can be rich in promises. Of all members, the tongue decays least and last: there is no fear of wearing out that. The legs decay with travel, the arms with labor, all with age; but the tongue holds out, unless the Palsy or such accident seazeth on it. It is commonly two years after we are borne, ere we can speak with it; but it is scarce two hours before we die, that we lose it. Still that little filme or flesh retains the vigor, when the rest languish into impotency, as one clapper will wear out divers Bells. Naphtali giveth goodly words: this is every man's bounty, what a Nabal is that, which will neither hear good words, nor give them? He did not only give David's servants nothing, but that which was worse than nothing, bad language. All Israel knew and honored their deliverer; yet this clown to save his victuals, will needs either make him a man of no merits, or of ill; either an obscure one, or a fugitive. Suppose he feared Saul's revenge, and therefore resolved to shut his hands; yet he might have so tempered his denial, that the repulse might have been free from offense: but now his foul mouth doth not only deny, but revile. It should have been Nabal's glory, that his Tribe yielded such a Successor to the Throne of Israel: now his envy stirs him up to disgrace that man who surpassed him in honor and virtue, more than he was surpassed by him in wealth and ease.

Faire words, we say, never hurt the tongue: they do less hurt the purse. Never man was the worse, or the poorer for good language. Saint James speaks of some verbal benefactors: now to say, Be warmed, doth not cost them one stick from their wood-piles. Be clothed, fetches not one cast garment from their wardrobes: Be filled, derives not a crust from their cupboards: yet such hypocrites are condemned of uncharitableness. How fearful then shall be the account of savage cruelty; that doth gravatis addere gravamina, trampling upon them with scorn, whom God hath humbled with misery; and instead of healing their wounds, set them afresh bleeding by their reproaches? With the same ease men may speak well, that they do speak ill: yea of the two, bad words are commonly the loudest, and put the Organs of speech to more stress: therefore Paul calls maledicentia, a crying. It is a question, whether the flatterer or blasphemer shall have the upper hand in the Kingdom of hell: unless we moderate it thus; that the hypocrites tongue shall be everlastingly bitten with scorpions; and the blasphemers burn in unquenchable flames. By how much easier the Law, by so much sorer the punishment for breaking that law. Now there is nothing easier than to speak fair: as the Beggar told the Bishop, when instead of an alms he gave him his blessing; that if that blessing had been worth a penny, he would not have been so bountiful. They be uncharitable passengers, that will not bless the reapers: like our hide-bound, heart-bound, tongue-bound peevish sectaries; that will not vouchsafe a Good day, or a Good speed to their neighbors. As they delight not in blessing, so it will be far from them.

2 Faire promises are strong snares to entangle fools. Everyone is not a Joab to be fetched home to us with firing his fields; as they say, witches are brought to the house where they have done mischief, by casting some relicts into the fire. The devil did not appear to Christ in a terrible form, threatening the calamities of earth, or torments of hell; but by fair promises, of many kingdoms. How impudent was that presumption; even such as hell it self might well have been ashamed of. A beggarly spirit that hath not an inch of earth, offers the world to the Maker of it, to the Owner of it: God's slave would be adored of his Creator. But let this teach us, that he will not be sparing of false boasts, and unreasonable promises to us, that dares offer him kingdoms, by whom alone are made all Kings. Promises; this was his way at the beginning; Ye shall be as gods, to our first parents: this is the proceeding with all their children; honor, and wealth, and ease, are the proposed rewards of unrighteousness. If the king of Moab promise gold and promotion, the covetous Prophet cannot hold off. Shall not their substance be ours? That promise won the Shechemits to so painful a condition, to so bloody a conclusion. Temptations on the right hand are most dangerous: how many that were hardened with fear, yet have melted with honor? There is no doubt of that soul, that will not bite at the golden hook. Some indeed are so cunning, that they will do more for a small present benefit, than for the promise of a tenfold value. Satan is fain to stop their mouths with ready money: Gehazi shall have the talents, Achan the golden wedge. O that man were but so wary as to say, Timeo Danaos & dona fere • tes. These be the strong lines of Rome, whereby she catcheth so many Trouts and Gudgens, Promises: whereof she is as liberal, as ever was Antigonus, who was called Antigonus daturus. Similes habeant labia lectucas: let such asses have no other provender but promises.

3 It is ill to promise, and to deceive: but it is worse to promise with a purpose to deceive. Even to renew or delay just promises, is faulty: Terminum termino addere, is not only negandi calliditas, but negando pejus. We may safely doubt 〈◊〉 sit beneficium, cujus dilatio cruciat expectantom. Such be the proverbial speeches; Crescente herbâ, moritur equus: and Dum Canis mingit, fugiens Lupus evadis. The God of truth dwells in heaven, he hath made no room there for the children of falsehood. Truth is the columne of commerce, the bond of society, the seal of equity; and where that fails, the very foundation is cast down. Yea, it is the obligation of conscience, to which we set our tongues as hands, and our fidelity as seals: if not an act and deed, yet the first act of a seasonable deed: which he that willfully breaks, shall be in the end as bankerout of credit, as he is already of grace. I know there be some faulty promises, better broken than kept: In malis promissis rescinde fidem. Concerning which a man is in vovend • stult •• , in reddendo impius. But the good man breaks not his promise, though he be damaged by the performance. Vdislaus King of Hungary falsifying his promise and oath, at the earnest instance of two Cardinals, set upon Amurath the Turk unawares: who perceiving his soldiers falling, and victory flying from his side, pulled a copy of the truce out of his bosom, and lifting up his eyes toward heaven, uttered words to this purpose. O Jesus Christ, loe these are the Leagues which thy servants have broken, after confirmation of them by thy Name: if thou be a God, as they say thou art, revenge this injury done to thee and me, by plaguing these perjured miscreants. Scarce had he ended this strange petition, but the success of the battle turned, the King was slain, his army discomfited, and his people pitifully butchered.

This hath been one of Rome's old tricks. John Hus had a promise, and (more) a safe-conduct to the Council of Constance: yet those forsworn persecutors put him to death. A foul fact, not only against the Law of Christians, but of nations: yet how have they blanched it? First, that the safe conduct was not granted by the Concell, but by Sigismund; as if these could be distinguished; in which the fault is not discharged, but translated. Secondly, That it was a protection against unlawful violence, not against lawful execution. How absurd? When he suffered in that very cause, for which he received warrant of security. Thirdly, he had it to come, but not to return: but this is an evasion that may wrest laughter from the spleen of gravity it self: as if where access is promised, recesse were not always included: as if an understanding man would move one foot out of doors upon such weak terms of assurance. Such hath been the conscience of Romish promises: we expect fidelity from Papistry, Sicut Britannia suum Arthurum, sicut Indai n • v •• Messiam. Only we are sure of one thing; if we never trust them, they shall never deceive us. Therefore when the Deputies of the reformed Religion in France, after the Massacre that was on Saint Bartholomew's day, treated with the King and Queen mother, and some other of the Council, for Peace, and both sides were agreed upon the Articles; the sole question was, the security of performance. After some particulars propounded and rejected, the Queen mother said, Why is not the word of a King sufficient security? One of the Deputies answered; No, by Saint Bartholomew, Madame. They that encourage their Proselytes to promise great matters to us, whom they account heretics, and by their Doctrine absolve them from all performance, deserve no better trust or credit than very devils. How like are they to those two sons of Jacob , bloodily breaking their promise to the Shechemites, whose act their own father cursed? To execute rigor upon a submiss offender, was more merciless than just: to inflict a punishment so far exceeding the fault, was cruel. If they had been fit Judges, who were bloody executioners; or if the penalty had been proportionable from another; yet in them that had vowed peace, and promised affinity, it was shamefully injurious. To disappoint the trust of another, to neglect our own word and fidelity for private purposes, adds faithlesnesse to cruelty. They never mean us so deadly a storm, as when they make fair weather, and bear us in hand, all is peace. The Spanish proverb is true in them, C'ome Santo, y caga Diabolo; They have eaten down Saints, and void forth Devils. Alas, how woeful a complaint have I here just cause to take up!

Truth faints and swoons in the street, and nobody will so much as give it a little Aquavitae, to recover it. There is a decay and declination, as of the strength of the world, so of all goodness. We are the dross, the refuse, the fag-end of mankind; upon whom, not the end, but the ends, not of the world, but of worlds and ages fore-passed, are not come, but met together, in an unhappy conjunction. The alacrity and vigor of the whole creature is worn away: Justice draws her breath faint and short; Equity is knocked down with the beams of the Ballance; Charity hath caught an everlasting cold; Conscience is taken with a Lethargy; and Fidelitie, like a little Gold, is so lost in the sophisticate mass of self-love and policy, that when the great Judge comes, he will scarce find it upon earth. This daily defection grows still upon us, which was prophesied above fifteen hundred years ago, That in the last days there should be Promise-breakers. All sin spreads, and like the Plague disperseth it self: thus Pride is gone from the Court to the Country, and Covetousness from the Country to the Court; Swearing from the Gentleman to the Beggar, and Drunkenness from the Beggar to the Gentleman. If some sin be more predominant in some places; as high-mindedness is busy about riches, malice, or private revenge about authority; unfaithfulness fills all places. Rich mizers hoard it up with their Gold, and Poverty makes it her staff to walk withal: the Sycophant lives by it, as his daily bread; and great men do not scorn it, for an advantage: the young learn it for their first Lesson, and the old keep it to the last. This false coare rots us at the heart, while our skins be fair and unblemished. Now quo fonte derivata clade • ? we have broken our promise with God, and how should men trust us?

There is a Book written against them, a flying, a burning Roll, that shall destroy their houses, and themselves. God will one day bring it forth: it may be while the words are in their memory, the Vision may cross their brains, and the wings of this Book flutter over their drowsy consciences; till out of a furious paroxisme, they vent this hideous exclamation, The Book, the Book, amongst the rest of their frantic imaginations. A terrible supposition, may some say: but terrors are no wonders, when God comes to Judgment. Certainly, the guiltiness of this infidelity and willful cozenage, is like a Match laid to fire a trayne of Powder; it burns dimly on, to the appointed time; and then at one fearful Blow it blows up all. A detestable sin, a deprecable punishment!

4. Seducers refuse no way, so they may deceive: Iurant, perjurant; they will say and swear, promise and lie, propose and interpose, to make strong their party. Absalom stood at the Court gates, and having first taken the eyes and tongues of the people with his expensive bravery, lays also snares for their hearts, by liberal promises, and courtly policy; what he would do for them, were he a Judge. His ear is open to all Plaintiffes, all Petitioners: there is no Cause which he flatters not; his hand welcomes every man with a salutation, his lips with a kiss. O courteous, beauteous, bounteous Absalom: this was the common acclamation. Sed promissa tyrannorum finiuntur in ruina credentium. Indeed they have arguments in all moods and figures, but their last is à fasciculis. It is recorded of Cacus, a notorious thief, that when he had stolen beasts, he would drag them into his Cave backward, by their tales; that by the contrary track of their feet he might be freed from the suspicion of theeverie. So to their holes of rapine and mischief they drag backwards, that the Innocents may rather seem to have freely passed from them, than to be surprised by them. Our English Papists, smarting under the hand of Justice, which they call Persecution, some of them seeing both the promises of Rome, and their present fortunes at home failing together, began to totter, and make show of turning to the Gospel. Whereupon the Pope hath been fain more than once to send them a Token, wherein were printed the five wounds of Christ, with this Motto or Poesie, Fili da mihi cor tuum, My son give me thy heart. Thus by maintaining their dissimulation to us, he maintained his own dissimulation to them: or else they were in a wrong Box, for they came to Church by warrant of that Emblem. Ever since they have learned to temporize, having one heart for God, and another for Baal; one for the Prince, and another for the Pope; one for the Communion, and another for the Mass. So that neither Protestants nor Papists can tell whose they be, nor themselves whose they shall be.

O this heart of man, how deceitful it is upon the weights! How like a close dark Vault, without any crevice to look into it! The Poets fain, that when Jupiter had made man, and was delighted with his own beauteous fabric, he asked Momus, what fault he could espy in that curious Piece, what out of square, or worthy blame. Momus commended the proportion, the complexion, the disposition of the lineaments, the correspondence and dependence of the parts; and in a word, the harmony of the whole. He would see him go, and liked the motion; he would hear him speak, and praised his voice and expression. But at last he found a fault, and asked Jupiter, whereabouts his Heart lay? He told him, within a secret chamber, like a Queen in her privy Lodging; whither they that come, must first pass the Great Chamber, and the Presence. There is the Court of Guard, forces and fortifications to save it, shadows to hide it, that it might not be visible. There then is the fault, saith Momus: thou hast forgotten to make a window into this chamber, that men might look in, and see what the heart is doing; and whether her Recorder, the Tongue, do agree with her meaning. If a window were framed into the breasts of these deceivers, how would the black devices which they contrive in tenebris, be palpably odious; how would the coals of festering malice blister their tongues, and scald their lips! Then we should see how they Packe and Shuffle, and mean in their time to Cut also, or to Deale a poor Game to the Innocent. But that privy chamber hath a window only to God's, not man's or Angels inspection.

I conclude: It is the sweetest thing in the world to be innocent, to be freed from the check of an impartial conscience; which will as surely tell us our unfaithfulness, as ever we durst be unfaithful. There is not the least promise made, but there it is entered: if it be performed, the Book is crossed; if not, it remains upon record, an evidence against us. A man passeth by the poor; promiseth to give them something as he comes back: this promise is written in heaven, and it is not safe to mock God, who in all lawful things binds us to our word. If the good man promise to his own hurt, yet he changeth not. If he be spare in promising, yet he will be sure in performing. Post pactum mala consultatio. How welcome is sleep, when we lay down our heads upon the pillow that bears not the burden of unfaithfulness! Let the cunning men of the world triumph in their riches, overlook all their injuries, make themselves merry with their witty deceivings; this and that we have gotten by cleanly tricks. When they come to die, and their awaked conscience represents all these impostures in their true faces, they would give a thousand worlds for this one testimony, We have wronged no man, we have defrauded no man. I have kept my promise with men, God will keep his promise with me, for salvation in Jesus Christ.

While they promise them liberty] this is the force of their promise. Now liberty is fourfold; Corporal, Conscientiall, Spiritual, and Sensuall.

1. Corporal, which consists in a freedom of action: when men are not sl • ves bound to the mines or galleyes to row (their Lord's in ease) with strokes and stripes: or to dig gold from that earth which scarce yields them sallets. When the feet of Joseph are not hurt in the stocks, neither do his children sweat in the Brick-fornaces. When the mur'd up debtor sits not in a melancholy consideration of his unmerciful creditor. To move only the length of his teddar, or but by the allowance of his keeper, is a man's captivity. Yea, even to be confined to a sick bed, is a miserable thralldom. Those Anchorites that have barked up themselves in hollow trees, or walls, had yet some room. That perverse Cynicke, who barrelled himself up in a Tub, could stand or sit, or enjoy some kind of posture. Scarce any Jail is so close, that it affords not the prisoner two or three steppes. But the Bed of languishing sickness is of a narrow compass. David sware that he would not go up unto his Bed, &c. To go up unto the Bed, denotes strength, promiseth ease. But when God saith of Jezebel, I will cast her into a Bed, he makes his own comment upon that, calling it the Bed of tribulation. Their thralldom i • grievous, whom God hath nailed to their bed: they are not hindered from the Church by a Recusancy, as if they would not come: but as it were by an Excommunication, they cannot come. The sick bed is a solitude: when the Centurions servant lay sick at home, his master was fain to come to Christ, the sick man could not. Their friend lay sick of the palsy, and the four charitable men brought him to Christ; he could not come. Peters wives mother lay sick of a fever, and Christ came to her, she could not come to him. The bonds of mortali • ie are so much the stronger, by being weaker: the ligaments of the arms are • he looser in articulo mortis, yet then they bind the arm from motion, & abridge it of freedom. There was a woman bowed down with a spirit of infirmity: her body was not more a jayle to her soul, than her disease was a Jailor to her body, and Satan to her disease: who had thereby inverted the posture of her creation, and turned that countenance to the earth, which was made to look up toward heaven.

Thi • th • n is a liberty of the body: when neither debts, the diseases of estate; nor dise • se • , the debts of nature do hinder the freedom of action. Even a civil freedom hath been held honorable: how ambitious were the tributaries of Rome to become her denisons? The Burgess confessed that he obtained it with a great sum. The honor of Jerusalem was far greater, therefore so much the grievous or the expulsion. Their banishment & loss of their sweet country, their •• rvitude and loss of their sweet liberty; and the loss of the sweetness of all sw • etn • sses among them that had any spark of religion, the service of God might teach them to hang up their Harps and weep, remembering Zion. Had a Gentile been banished thither, he had not been an exile, but a proselyte; Felix exilium cui locus ill fuit: but for a Jew to be banished from thence, it was lamentable captivity.

2 Conscientiall, when nothing is imposed on us, but that may stand with the persuasion of our rectified mind. That religion which would bind the conscience, where God hath not bound it, retia & laqueos injicit, brings snares and fetters, and takes away due liberty. Indeed those civil laws do bind, that tend to good: as forbidding to frequent tippling houses, for the avoiding of drunkenness; or to wear dangerous weapons, for the preventing of homicides. But those which are for civil orders, whose intention is not obligare ad culpam, sed ad poenam; the breach whereof is sufficiently satisfied with the mulct; do not bind the conscience; nor is the omission of them a moral or mortal sin. But to entangle the soul with a multitude of traditions, ceremonies, and unconcerning rites, is condemned, as taking away the liberty of conscience. Such is celibate to the pamperd flesh, or abstinence to the raging appetite. They may as well put a match to dry powder, and forbid it to take fire.

There is indeed a scrupulous conscience, like a little stone got into the shoe, that gals the foot. This ariseth first from ignorance: the purblind cannot discern of colors, though they be died in grain. Secondly, from that we call Morbum maniacum, the effect of melancholy, or of some tedious sickness; or from melancholy it self, for the mind follows the temperature of the body: and scruples are most incident to crazed brains. Thirdly, from factious teachers, which leave the harmony of the truth, and broach vain janglings; which is indeed to turn the grace of God into wantonness. And it is strange to see, how madly they are affected to such crotchets: like peevish stomachs, which cannot away with solid meat, but love to be picking of bones, or feeding on kickeshawes. Fourthly, from a wrangling disposition, which makes the business of the hand to become only the business of the tongue. Hence it comes, that so many rheumatic pens blot innocent papers, and trouble the world, not for Quid faciendum, what is to be done; but Quid sentiendum, what is to be thought. They come like petulant children into the vineyard to gather grapes; and spying the gaudy butterflies, only run up and down to catch them. These men take away their own liberty, freely give away their freedom, and betray their consciences. But if water had been good to drink with wine, quoth a good fellow, God himself would have put it into the grape: but every simple is best So if such ordinances of men had been good to join with the Word of God, that great Law-giver would not have left them out. But let me obey all God's commandments, and believe all his promises: and for other things, my conscience hath a sweet liberty granted to it by JESUS CHRIST.

3 Spiritual, which frees us from the bondage of the Law, and the everlasting curse of God's wrath. If the Son make you free, you shall be free indeed.

1 Free from the ceremonial Law, which took the mortal wound by the death of Christ: for that death was to the moral Law finis consummans, to the ceremonial finis consumens: to the later, dissolvens: to the former, absolvens. Indeed this dead Law was not presently thrown into the grave: but according to the seemly burial of human bodies, which are not instantly after the souls departure cast forth as stinking carrions; but have their decent funerals, and are brought with solennity to their sepulchers. So to put some difference betwixt God's Institutions, and human inventions, those ceremonies which died with Christ, were honourably brought to the grave. Now he that revives them, shall not be Pius funeris deductor, but Impius sepulturae violator; not a devout solemniser of the funeral, but a profane raker in the grave, and violator of the quiet sepulture.

2 Free from the moral Law; and that both Quoad damnandi vim; for there is no damnation to them that are in Christ: and Quoad dominandi vim, that sin should not reign in our mortal bodies. Our sins are remitted, our imperfect obedience is accepted. They that look to be justified by the works of the Law, are not under grace. Such peremptory travellers, mounted on the back of their own conceited righteousness, will needs post to heaven, and not take Christ along with them. Whereas indeed they are but like oxen, that a great while draw in the yoke for pasture, and are at last for slaughter. Truth is, we are not freed from obedience to the Law: Christ met with none on the Mount in his glory, but Moses and Elias; the Law-giver, and the Law-restorer: to show, that he did not only come to fulfill the Law, and institute the Gospel; but even to reconcile the Law and the Gospel. We must obey what God commanded by Moses, and what we cannot perform, is supplied to us by our belief in Jesus. Saint Augustine makes four states of men; first, ante Legem, before the Law, when non pugnamus, we do not so much as fight or strive against sin at all. Secondly, under the Law, Pugnamus, sed vincimur; we fight, but are overcome. Thirdly, under grace, Pugnamus & vincimus; we fight and conquer. Fourthly, in pace, in the kingdom of heaven, where is no occasion to fight, there being no enemies. We have now two good encouragements to fight: First, Abonitate causae, we take God's part. Secondly, A facilitate victoria, God takes our part.

3 Free from the slavery of sin: before it reigned over us as a tyrant, now it can but dwell in us a Tenant. It never gives us a foil by any act of disobedience, but we give it a mortal wound by the sword of repentance. How sweet is that liberty which avoids the shackles of sin! It is the most common and troublesome guest that belongs to man: it troubles us both in the solicitation of it, and remorse for it. Before the act, it wearies us with importunate violence: after the act, it torments us with fear and the painful gnawings of an accusing conscience. And if it be thus irksome to men, how odious is it to God? He indeed never hated anything but it, and for it anything. It is the happiness of heaven, an immunity from sin: but we must content ourselves with the happiness of grace, a liberty not to be captivated by sin. The body of sin and death goes about with us; but it shall not carry us, though we carry it. It must dwell with us, but with no command, yea with no peace. We grudge to give it house-room, we hate to give it service.

4 Free from all the miserable effects of sin; as the horror of a troubled conscience; which makes a man Cordis sui fugitivum; like one sea-sick, that runs from decke to decke, from the stern to the foreship, from hold to hatches, from the ship to the boat, and last from the boat to the main. Or like those fondly impatient fishes, that leap out of the boiling caldron into the burning flame. Nescis temeraria, nescis quem fugias, ideoque fugis: all these storms are allayed by Christ. Or from the dread of temporal judgments; the sword that destroyeth without, the famine within, or the plague that spareth not, either without or within. Either the Sun of mercy shall shine upon us, and disperse these tempests, or God shall shelter us under the shadow of his wings. Death it self is but a bottom to transport us to the Land of promise: and Satan, our old sworn enemy shall be trampled under our victorious feet; and we shall sing to him that hath given us this liberty, Glory and praise be to the Lamb forever and ever.

4. Sensuall, when the boundaries of God, and laws of man are broken through; and excess knows no limits but the want of power. This indeed is not properly liberty, but licentiousness: an exorbitant, luxurious violence, the greatest slavery of the world: but this discourse I reserve to the due place. Here only note this sum of the Text.

Sensuality and a carnal freedom is the spell that conjures these wild spirits, and brings them in subjection to their heretical Teachers. They may promise them Civil liberty; this they are not sure to perform: or Conscientiall; this they will not perform: or Spiritual; this they cannot perform: but profane excess, riotous intemperance, the uncontrollable swinge of their lusts, this they will endeavor to perform. This is the Lure of wanton souls: Who can wonder, that so many turn to Papistry, when men may be at once Roman Catholics, and human devils? They say, their Religion daily winneth; yet let them not brag of their gain: they neither need, nor can, if they consider how it gets, and whom. How, but by base forgeries, frontlesse untruths, plausible persuasions, and flattering promises; which easily prevail with a pleasure-disposed soul. Whom, but such as are either most unable to resist, or most like to bestead them. Vnsettled heads, in their unseasonable travels, like fond and idle Dinah's, have come ravished home. These Impostors besiege the fiery wits, or the great Heir of some noble Family; whose greatness of example may be perswasorie, and commanding. Malcontents, whom envy makes desirous of a change; loose livers, men necessitous, whose penury of estate and judgment cogit ad turpia: voluptuous Epicures, who for all their filthy uncleanness have a Shift, that is, a Shrift; that having first by their adulteries made work for Confession, now again by Confession prepare for more adulteries. These unclean Birds be laid for by the Nets and Calls of such Fowlers.

But alas for that other Sexe: still the Devil begins with Eve: still his assaults are strongest, where is weakest resistance. How few grand Heretics do we read of, without their Mistresses? Magus had his Helena, Donatus his Lucilla, Apelles his Philumena, Montanus his Prisca, Priscillian his Galla; everyone his Factoresse: as the Jesuits are not without their collapsed Ladies; not only dead Images to worship, but even living Instruments to court and employ. Silly women, laden with sins, and led away with diverse lusts: these must be the Stalls of their spiritual, if not corporal fornication. More political than Balaam; when they could not blow up Religion with Powder into Heaven, they try the old Moabitish Plot, to sink it down to Hell. Such is the public liberty of their dispensations, whether for dissembled Religion, or not unprofitable filthiness.

Here is even a spoil fit for such a conquest, for such Victors: this fetches them in so many whores, so many notoriously dissolute persons. Malefactors, that for horrible misdemeanors are committed to prison, be there wrought upon by these Instruments: and so they that were convicted thieves, robbers, strumpets, homicides, are turned off from the gallows, Roman Catholics. Who can marvel, to see them that lived like Atheists, to die Papists? Drowning m • n catch hold on a Weed, rather than nothing; dying Patients embrace an Empyricke, a Leech, rather than no Physician. They can teach them to be saved • n • moment, if they will but hang as fast upon their foundation, as they must on Tyburne; that is, on the holy Mother, the Church of Rome: which can no more stumble, than a man when both his eyes are out. Who would envy them this purchase? We are the fewer, not the worse. If all our harlots, and thieves, and murderers, and roarers, and hypocrites were theirs, we should not complain: they might be the prouder, not the better. Let them triumph in their conquest, so long as we know we have lost none worth our credit, and they have got none worth their honor. They daily forgo more in a better exchange: the Sea never encroacheth upon our shore, but it loseth elsewhere. Many have we fetched out of their Wasts into the Fold of the Church: and those not Catholic Colliers, and Cobblers; but such as were able to render a reason, both of the just dislike of their Idolatries, and the sincerity of our Doctrine.

I conclude this point. Most men take that liberty which Justice never granted; but Justice did never grant a liberty which men do not greedily take. Nature affects that which is pleasing to Nature; nothing better pleaseth it, than the freedom of the own will. Pauci quaerunt intelligere quid sit licitum, plurimi quid sit placitum. The Poets fable, that Pallas, their goddess of Wisdom, issued out of loves brain; and Bacchus, their god of Wine and dissolute pleasure, was borne out of his thigh: which was thus wittily moralized, He then must break his brains, that knowledge wins; And he that will be drunk, shall break his shinnes. Lord, keep us from such a liberty, as is the running of our own ways, after our transportive fancies, and the baneful allurements of wantonness.

They themselves are the servants of corruption.] All sin is a servitude; and that which flatters men with the greatest opinion of Liberty, makes them the most miserable vassals. They may think, that they have the world at command, and not the world them: as Witches and Conjurers, after their contract made with Hell, think they have power over Satan; whereas indeed Satan hath power over them. They have a secret and insensible Teddar, which that enemy ties to their heels, and holds in his hand: while they run whither he allows them, they shall have scope enough; but if they offer towards goodness, he instantly snatches them up. They think themselves the freest men in the world; and let them be their own Judges, as they will be their own carvers, they are so. No Coards, whether of Law or Conscience, can hold them: Sampson did not more easily break the bonds of the Philistines, than they dissolve the ties of Government. The Common-wealth is a Tabernacle or Tent, pitched up to shelt • r men from wrong, and that they may live happily together. Laws are the Coards of it; break the Coards, the Tent falls. My Tabernacle is spoiled, my Coards are broken. Vines are underpropped and bound up, to make them fruitful; Vessels are hooped, to contain the liquor: so Laws are bonds, to ke • pe the evil in awe, the good in safety. But these Flies will not be caught in such Cobwebs: unruly and headstrong beasts, no Mounds can keep them out, or hold them in. Laws bind all, without exception: I speak not of Princes; Leges Principi nemo scripsit. They do not, like death, Sceptra ligonibus aequare. Yet, as it was said of the blessed Virgin, offering her Legal sacrifice for her Purification, Supra legem fecerat gratia, sub lege humilitas: so of good Princes, their high c • lling • a • es them above the Law, their humility respects it.

But they that dare force and ravish the Law, and make it both the instrument of their revenge, and patronage of their mischi • fes, think they may well plead their liberty. O what a poor slave do they hold the man of a tender conscience? They dare swear and blaspheme; we fear an Oath. They dare spend thei • d • ye • in dalliance, among the Brothels; we dare not make the members of Chr • st the limbs of a harlot. They dare pollute the marriage-bed by adultery, and make it the mirth of the company; we dare not, fearing lest Heaven should be shut • gainst us for the sin, and Hell swallow us for bo • sting of the sin. They dare wager for lying, with that grand-father of lies and liars; why, their tongues are their own: we dare not, though it were to save ourselves, to relieve the poor, to honor God. They dare kill a man in their anger, yea for their pleasure; we dare not deface the Image of our Maker, knowing that no River can w • sh off that blood. They dare drink themselves into beasts; we dare not, lest we should never be recovered again unto men. They dare oppress the poor; we dare not, knowing that thereby we reproach their Maker. They dare revenge all wrongs done them, and carve it with a large measure; we dare not wring God's weapon out of his hand, but remit all vengeance to him. The Devil cannot hurt a good man, without Letters Patent; yet the wicked would harm him, against all Laws and Prohibitions. They dare sin God in the f • ce, and presume upon his patience; we fear him, as a consuming fire. It is all; they dare hazard the breaking of their necks, we would not willingly break our shin • es.

Now, do not these appear the more free and magnanimous? Alas, we are curbed and hamper'd: so many interdictions lie in our way, Thou shalt not do this: so many impositions lie on our backs, Thou shalt do this; that we seem the most miserable servants upon earth. Whereas they know no Law, but the latitude of their will: no limits, but the extremity of their power. Yet for all this, they are no better than slaves, yea the very vassals of the most contemptible masters. He that serves a Papist, yet serves a Christian: he that serves a Turk, yet serves a man. But he that serves the world, serves Natures slave; he that serves the Devil, serves God's slave; he that serves Lust, serves his own slave. Some have served one another by turns, in mutual and reciprocal offices; and that might be a service of love. Some have yielded service to men of meaner degree and quality than themselves: but that might be a service for gain, which were base enough; or for fear, which is baser; or for flattery, which is the basest of all. Some husbands have been too uxorious and serviceable to their wives; and that is a service of dotage. Some masters have come to serve their own apprentices; but that was a woeful Turn of Fortunes Wheel; a necessitous, piteous service. But for a man to serve his Dog, this is wondrous low: his Lusts are his Dogs; as Acteon, given over to his pleasures, was devoured of his own Hounds. Such may be well called here, The servants of corruption.

Is this their liberty? This their magnanimous fortitude? To obey every petty slave, every common soldier in that Campe, whereof themselves are the General? The Dog runs at the masters whistling: but for the master to go at the Dogs commanding, is a preposterous servilitie. If Lust but say, Get me such a Beauty for my delight, the man hath no power to deny it; no means is refused, that makes to this brutish fruition: Is not this to be the servant of corruption? If Covetousness say, Get me such a Commodity; the man instantly obeys, plots, studies, contrives, breaks his peace, his sleeps, his brains, to compass it: though he plough furrows on the backs of the poor, and run through the blood of Orphans; though he ventures his ears, his neck, his soul, he dares not deny his slave, his dog, his devil, Avarice. Call you this freedom, when a man cannot choose but sin? When I may drink Wine, or refuse it, this is my freedom: but to be compelled to drink it, by a dry spirit within; if this be liberty, there is no bondage. Therefore is God Almighty, because he cannot err, nor lie, nor do evil; for these are the works of Impotencie. The Saints in Heaven cannot sin, yet sure they enjoy the fullest liberty. Liberi, quia liberati, delivered from the necessity of sinning, therefore free. If to sin be the only liberty, they have no liberty in Heaven. No: this is the service of corruption a thralldom, not a freedom; the Tyrannie of sin, not the Kingdom of righteousness.

Every man is the servant, quot vitiorum, tot tyrannorum. When Alexander found Diogenes in his Tub, and disputed with him, whether was the freer estate; with Alexander to command the World, or with Diogenes to be confined to a Barrel? the Cynicke answered; Latior tua potestas, non felicior: Thou commandest others, I command myself: I am a servant to the King, the King is a servant to his slave; yea, even to my slave: Tu servus servorum me • rum. Illis cupiditatibus, quibus ego impero, tu mancipium es: I am Emperor over those affections, that exercise a dominion over thee. But as Nabal's servant was weary of so unaffable, uncharitable, unreasonable a Master, the very son of Belial: So we have just cause to abandon that service, which must be obsequious to the vilest, proudest, basest groomes in our family, our own carnal lusts; which are no better (though they dwell with us) than the limbs of Belial. The Acola •• t loathes the service of that Carle, that allowed him no better diet than husks, and thereof not enough to fill his belly: such is the wages of corruption. Therefore let us return with humbled and penitent souls to our Fathers house, where all the servants have Bread, good for the quality: Bread enough, sufficient for the quantity: and to spare, abundant, even to satiety: where the fatted Calf shall feast us; royal apparel, the best Robe of glory shall adorn us; heavenly Music shall cheare us, and eternal peace and mercy shall receive us.

For of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.] The metaphor seems to be taken from War; where the conqueror brings the vanquished into captivity, making them slaves and drudges, imposing on them vile and servile offices. And this misery of the Captive differs, according to the disposition of the Victor: if he be imperious, and given to cruelty, he doth so much the more embitter the slavery. Pharaoh is not content to set Israel possible tasks: so long there was comfort; their diligence might save their backs from stripes. What with conceit of benefit to the commander, and hope of impunity to the laborer, they might take heart to venture on great difficulties. But those tyrants did measure their commands by their own wills, not by the strength of their inferiors. To require more of a beast than he can do, is inhumane: yet Pharaoh exacteth Bricks, where he hath allowed no Straw. This was cruel enough: But what is the swarthy King of Egypt to the black Prince of darkness? his commands are less reasonable, his stripes more unmerciful: The former are not more plausible to the flesh on earth, than the other are terrible to the soul in hell. This is Saint Peters infallible Doctrine; Of whom a man is overcome, &c. Saint Paul's everlasting Rule; Ye are his servants, to whom you obey. Yea, he that was before them, above them, and from whom they spake, pronounced it a firm Lesson out of the School of Heaven; Whosoever committeth sin, is the servant of sin. For method; first, let us view Satan's victory over the wicked, and their slavery under Satan: then, how Christ overcomes the elect, and the freedom of their service under him.

Thrice did the Devil set upon the Son of God, and fashioned his temptations [unspec 1] to this method; the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. To all these the first Adam was tempted, and in all miscarried: the second Adam is tempted to them all, and overcometh. The former Adam was tempted; first, to a carnal appetite, by the forbidden fruit; secondly, to pride, by the suggestion of being as God; thirdly, to covetousness, in the ambitious desire of knowing good and evil. Satan having found all these motions so successful with the first Adam, in his innocent estate, treads the same steps in his temptations of the second: first, the stones must be made Bread; there is the motion to a carnal appetite: secondly, the guard and attendance of Angels must be presumed on; there is the motion to pride: thirdly, the Kingdoms of the earth must be offered, and their glory; there he is moved to covetousness and ambition. In everyone there is an appearance of good, whether of body, mind, or estate. Once and a second time he is repelled, yet again he assaults: Satan is not foiled, when he is resisted. If neither the lust of the flesh, nor lust of the eyes can overcome us, he will try us with the pride of life: as when neither diffidence nor presumption could fasten on Christ, he tempts him with honor. He is a cunning Fencer, expert at all weapons: in vain shall we be skillful in some, if we fail in any. When he makes the Challenge, it is not left to us (as in terms of Duel) to appoint the ground, or the weapon; we must be prepared for all assaults, for all places. They that hold Towers and Forts of Garrison, do not only defend themselves from incursions, but from the Cannon and the Pioner. Still doth this subtle enemy traverse his ground, for an advantage. When the Wilderness speeds not, he hopes for some better luck in the Temple: there failing, he climbs higher, to the top of a Mountain. As foes in pitched fields, strive for the benefit of the Hill, or River, or Wind, or Sun. He doth himself, as he taught his servant Balaam, change places, in hope of prevailing. If the obscure Country cannot move us, he tries what the Court can do; if not our Home, the Tavern; if not the Field, our Closet.

How many hath he wounded in one place, that were fenced in another? He would not only put some evil into all, nor all into some, but all into all. Nec tam vincit potentiâ suâ, quàm negligentiâ nostrâ: therefore as no place is left free from his malice, so no place should be made prejudicial by our carelessness. Some he overcomes with superstition; and they die the death of Galileans: for he like Pilate, will mingle their blood with their own Sacrifices. Some he overcomes with vain-glory; and they die the death of Philistines; killed with the Iaw-bone of an Ass. Some with drunkenness, and they die the death of Nabal; yesterday as beasts, today as stones: then overmerry and light as feathers, in death dull and lumpish. Others with the world; and they fall under their own burden: the world like the Tower in Siloam, falls on them, and quasheth them to pieces. How great is his conquest, when he can set reasonable men to worship a little coloured dirt? Some with filthy lust; and they die the death of Sodomites; if not with fire from heaven, yet with fire from hell. Still this Conqueror proceeds; and some he overcomes with a multitude of small sins: one hair will not hang a man, many will, as Absalom was served. Or with some special dear sin, which is like a conspiratour within, that will betray him the Town. Either he disarmes men of their Sword, the Word of God; and then who can fight without a weapon? Or gets away their Buckler; the shield of Faith, and who can defend himself without a Target? Faith is the foundation of a Christian: that once lost, all is desperate. An enemy after long siege of a city, upon entreaty made, condescended to terms of peace; and this was his condition, that in sign of homage, they should quietly suffer him to take from their City-walls one row of stones round about: to this they yielded; and he laid hands on the lowest row, the foundation, and so left them no walls at all. It is a weak City without walls, there can be no walls without a foundation, City and Walls are feeble without munition: where men have neither the grace, nor the wit, nor the will to resist, it is easy for Satan to overcome.

[unspec 2] But now what is the event of this conquest? Bondage; To him they are brought in bondage.] The unhappiness of which estate appears in these conditions.

1. It is Infamis, an ignominious state; the hang-man's servant is an honor to it. Such was Matthews first condition; a farmer of the miseries of his own nation. Informers, that like Crowes, live upon carrion; and dorres, that pass the meadow or garden to light on a dunghill: or those wing-less flies, that suck a living out of the corrupt blood of uncleanness; all hear ill enough, and are odious in their offices. But to wear the livery of Satan, to be the Pensioner of hell, at the command of that malignant and degenerous Spirit, is the most dishonorable name and shame. Let them be Lord's of the earth, yet their report is fouler than clods of the earth: by the base indulgence to their own lusts, their names stink above ground. Their memory shall rot; yea, it is well, if their memories do rot with their carcases, and their vices be buried with them in their graves. So basely ignoble, so inhumane is it for a man to be the slave of his own affections.

2. Immanis, a hard and troublesome condition. Both for the multitude of business, and not seldom, contariety of commands: as pride asks cost, whereas covetousness denies necessaries: envy makes a sullen face, whereas ambition sets it in the smiling posture of flattery: so the mind is distracted with cross addresses. And for the hardness of their labor; like beasts, they are set to draw in the devils teame; sin with cart-ropes, and iniquity with cords of vanity. Coards are at first twisted of small threads; but once combined, they can bind heavy b •• dens, and hold great ships. Peccata facile veniunt, sed fortiter ligant. They are deceived that think the hests of Satan easy. Sin is no niggard of her pains: seldom ever do we find goodness so industrious. It is not Absal •• beauty and royal attendance that can make strong his party; but he must neglect himself, sit continually at the gate, giving his hand to kiss, and kissing their lips that did it; he must take pains to further his treason.

Unruly affections are like wild horses, that carry us over hills and rocks, till they be breathless. Yea they soon recover breath and speed; and if they be restrained by a sudden violence, they plunge and careere, and cease not till the saddle be empty, and then strike at the prostrate rider. Where sin hath once gotten a dominion, it scorns to be repelled, but hath recourse to the haunt, as humors fall toward their old issue. Iniquity is laborious; the Poet was deceived when he said, Facilis descensus averni. The covetous make their passage through stony rocks of hardship and penury: to rise early, and rest late, and eat the bread of sorrows: I hope this is not easy. The ambitious clambers up steep hills and and craggy mountains, to get a place as tickle and slippery, as the stool of Eli. Shall we say, it sleeps in them? Nay it will not let them sleep. The voluptuous tramples in dirt and mire, besmearing himself with infamy and turpitudes, is not this a molestation? The revengeful breaks through hedges stuck with thorns, which makes him all gore and bloody. The envious walks in dark and shady places, that he may not see another's happiness, Quot bona falicium, tot tormenta invidorum. He wastes his own marrow, and with sullen malice gnaws the flesh from his own bones: is not this aegrum & acre servitium? The drunkard pains his stomach in the devouring, his head in the digesting, his throat and heart in the returning of his over-laden cups. But especially the sin of mischief is a vigilant, painful, indefatigable sin. Judas will be awake, when Peter is asleep: the Tare-sower in the field, when the husbandman is in his bed. In all 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : they that worship the Beast, never rest, day nor night.

3. It is Intolerabilis: we have heard of many poor souls condemned to the gallies, under the merciless tyranny of Turks and Infidels. But what is the Turk to the devil? What a Gally to hell? What the labor of oars to the toile of an afflicting conscience? Of all servants, they are in the worst case that are sold: of those that be sold, they are the worst that must do service in prison: of them in prison, their state is most lamentable that are bound with fetters. Such is the condation of the ungodly: they are the servants of sin, and sold under sin, and chained in prison. The Jail is infidelity, they are shut up under unbelief: the Jailor Satan, so strait and tyrannous, that they cannot so much as lift up their head, or look to heaven for any deliverance. Pride is one chain: though they wear it for an ornament of bravery, they shall find it the ligament of infelicity. Concupiscence is another chain, that binds them faster to the service of Satan, than ever the Virgin was to the rock, to be devoured by the monster. Every sin strives for the regencie: sic certant in me de meipso, cujus potissimam videar: within me they strive about me, whose I should be. Other tyrants have some intermission in their commands; Pharaoh denies not Israel a season to eat, drink, and sleep: but these miserable captives are always in an habitual service, seldom out of actual. They must neither do, nor speak, nor think, but according to their masters injunctions. He labors to snare the children of God in their sleeps; Facit aliquando dormientibus, quod non potest vigilantibus: suggesting unclean thoughts when their wills cannot resist them: how much more doth he turmoile his sl • ves? If Judas's heart be wrought to the treason, he shall not rest till his hand have done it, and undone himself by it. He would not so much as suffer him to eat his supper, but hastened him from that Sacramental bread to his bloody design. Amnon enamored on that incestuous act, melts away till he have committed it. Libido est furiosa domina; lust is not a fair, but a furious mistress, impatient of delay in her service.

O that men would free themselves from this intolerable burden; where alius servus est libidini, alius ambitioni, alius timori. Sin is a cowardly thing; Eve had no sooner offended, but she sought out a fellow and companion. When Cain was stained with his brothers blood, how he trembled and quaked, there being none in the world to see him but his parents and sisters; yet in every bush he suspects an ambush. Satan is so cruel a master, and so niggardly a rewarder, that all his servants be timorous. Men of honest conscience, observers of order, as they are fearful to offend, so most courageous in a just cause: the servants of God are bold as Lions. But guitinesse and conspiracy is of so ugly a shape, and horrid a representation, that the offender never dares look upon himself single, and alone, but still runs as a Deere to the heard.

4. It is inutilis, no good comes of it. It is both coactus, a servile compulsory labor; and improbus, a dishonest unjustifiable labor: and stultus, idle, fruitless, a mere labor in vain. What fruit had ye then of those things whereof ye are now ashamed? The root is sin, the stock blame, the fruit shame, the end death, to be cut up and cast into the fire. There be some that sin and shame not; Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they had gotten a meretricious front; the look of an impudent and putrefied strumpet; for even a fresh harlot will be put to the blush. There be some that shame, and amend not; As the thief is ashamed when he is found. Being taken in the manner, he is more ashamed of his apprehension, than of his transgression: he loseth all that modesty when he gains secrecy; and ceaseth not to be a thief. It is good when shame for sin is joined with sorrow, and sorrow with amendment of life.

This is one discommodity of such service; a shame before men; but there is a worse behind, even a shame before all the Angels of God. But is there no benefit by it? Doth not the covetous store up gold? The voluptuous please his wanton flesh? The ambitious mount to honor? As Satan said, Doth Job serve God for naught? So do these serve Satan for naught? They do; and as witches take apparitions for substances; are promised golden mountains, yet remain beggarly wretches: so these embrace a cloud instead of Juno, a dream for reality, a childes baby made of clouts, and are in all their glory like a fool in a comedy, crowned with a coronet of painted paper, a bable for a scepter, a table spread with counterfeit cheare, and when the play is done, he may go seek his supper. It was never in any condition so true, as here; a young serving-man, an old beggar.

5. It is inextricabilis, sold to sin with small hope of recovery. That powerful tyrant will keep his captives, till a stronger than he comes to ransom them. Some may haply have their faint reluctations against this bondage; and Satan's commands are so foul, that it grudgeth their conscience to fulfill them: as the servant wearied with justifying his masters untruths, told him that if he did not couch his lies closer together, and make them more cleanely, he would no longer undertake to avouch them. To pollute the marriage-bed of their friend, is a morsel that grumbles in their stomach before it can be digested. To do injury, where they have received courtesy, to fight in an unconcerning quarrel, to shed blood where they may have money to spare it; doth a little stumble them: and they have some languide wishes, O that we were free! But while they seek not constantly the means of their release, their captivity is the sorer, as the Jailor lays more irons upon him that hath attempted to break prison. Lycurgus could say, that often assaulting the enemy without conquest, would at last encourage them to set upon us. They are presumptuous fools that think they can repent at pleasure; as if the weathercocke could turn the wind, and not the wind the weathercock: as if because man can tame birds and beasts, therefore he could also tame himself. Yea, as if a piece of clay fashioned to the picture of a man, could make it self living, and inanimate that lump with a reasonable soul. They are deceived; sin never made such a bargain with them, as to be turned off at an hours warning, or to be discharged with a miserere mei. No, that Landlord will hold his own, except he comes that hath a stronger power, and a better title: and when it must out, it will rend the heart, as Satan tore the child, and do what he can to make the house untenantable. Faciliùs excludere, quàm expellere. They will say with Pharaoh, Why have we done thus, to let Israel go from serving us?

6. It is miserabilis, the grief of every Christian. Even such a temporary condition may well move compassion. Stood we upon an high mountain, and had as clear eyes to behold this large valley of tears and miseries, as our Savior had to see the glory of kingdoms. Did we perceive the lamentable cries of the famished for want of bread, the distressed shifts of the poor for want of harbor, the tortures and rackings of sensible limbs, both by the hand of Justice and of Injustice; the disconsolate sorrows of parents for their children, widows for their husbands, friends for all relations: or the exigence of besieged cities, the sound of trumpets, noise of drummes, roaring of cannons, the pitiful groans of the dying and wallowing in their bloods, or swooning in the streets of famine, women re-inwombing their own children; fathers and husbands mourning for the barbarous ravishment of their wives and daughters. Or their anguish that are condemned to row in gallies, turn in mills, work in minerals; how they eat nothing but the bread of sorrow by weight, and drink nothing but the water of affliction by measure; their unpitied cries at the smart of their unmerciful lashings. Surely tears were the poorest obsequies we could spend at these woeful funerals. The cheeks that are now dimpled with laughter, would change their position; the resty souls that sing now nothing but peace, would change their disposition, at these sad spectacles.

But now, by how much the soul is more dear than the body, more precious, more eternal; let our bowels yearn for these spiritual calamities. All outward sufferings are determined by death; as when it was told Anaxagoras, the Athenians have condemned you to die; said again, And nature them. But the intolerable service of sin, the works of darkness, commanded by the Prince of darkness, in the place of darkness; the gashes of a wounded conscience, fresh bleeding hurts plaisterd with corrosives, overburdened souls, neither able nor willing to ease themselves; if we have not sucked the breasts of Tigers, these things will make us mourn and pray, Lord have mercy on such miserable sinners.

O that men would consider, what they have been, what they are, what they hope to be. First, what they were; the Images of God; that is their original glory. Princeps creaturarum constitutus es, & dignitatem naturae tuae projicis. Thou that shouldest rule overall beasts about thee, art overruled by those beasts that are within thee. Secondly, what they are, at least in invitation: the Son of God offers to make us free, and to restore all our forfeited privileges; and shall we neglect so fair an occasion? Shew this favor to the captives at Argier, and see if they will refuse it. When Cyrus king of Persia proclaimed liberty to the Jews, only those went from Babel, the place of their captivity, to Jerusalem the city of their ancient liberty, whose spirits God had raised up. Christ came to proclaim freedom to captives, yet none follow this gracious call, but only they whose spirits the Spirit of God raiseth up. Thirdly, what they hope to be, even kings in heaven; and will they be slaves on earth? Is not the kingdom above, began below? Is not the suburbs of grace, the way to the city of glory? Doth the kingdom of sin reign in our mortal bodies, and shall the kingdom of rest be given to our immortal souls? Have we the promise of Canaan, and of God's arm to conquer it, and do we stick at the sons of Anak. Sperare non potest regnum coelorum, qui non dominabitur viribus membrorum. Certainly, if through grace we do not prepare ourselves for that heavenly kingdom, we can never say with a warrant that God hath prepared that heavenly kingdom for us.

7. It is Exitialis; the end of every service is wages, and this is a wages without end, even everlasting pain. O horrible reward, to sow trouble, and reap vexation; still to bring fuel unto that fire, which must burn themselves; to plow with rods, and eat with Scorpions; to be wearied in the ways of sin, and then to be worried with plagues of sin. The wages of sin is death: a toilsome service, an irksome wages. Sin when it is finished brings forth death. He that was the tempter, becomes the tormentor: then he promised pleasures, now he inflicts tortures. First, he enticeth men to sin, and then accuseth them to God for the sins they have done by his enticement. Be assured of this, he that without cessation doth tempt thee to sin, will without intermission torment thee because thou hast sinned. Still the reprobates shall serve under their old master, but their work shall be changed, and the place: here they work actively, there passively: here Satan works by them, there he works upon them: here they are in a free air, with light and delight; there in a dungeon with sores and sorrows. As Charles king of Swede, a great enemy of the Jesuits, when he took any of their colleges, would first hang up the old Jesuits, and then put the rest into his mines; saying, that since they had wrought so hard above ground, he would try how they could work under ground. So when the wicked have done the devil what service they could on earth, he will confine them to his dark vaults in hell. O Lord come down, cast out this Tyrant and Usurper, repossesse thine own kingdom, erect a Throne to thyself in all our hearts, that thou mayest here reign in us as our King, and we may at last reign with thee in thy Kingdom, Amen.

Of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.] The service of Satan is so full of troubles and perplexities, so destitute of comforts and relavations, that there is no wonder if it be tedious to the sufferer, when it displeaseth the hearer or looker on. Therefore as they that have visited Spittles and Hospitals, and smelt the offensive ulcers of Lazars and Leapers, are glad of a sweet air and healthful society. So after the view of that incurable slavery, the bondage of sin and Satan, now let us refresh ourselves with the liberty of the servants of God. For we cannot deny God, (in so general a proposition) to have his victory also. Let not Satan bear away the glory as if there was no King, no Conqueror but he: for this Master of slaves is but a slave to a higher Master: and as he can exercise no dominion over his servants but by God's permission, so God holds him in the strongest subjection, so hamper'd with invincible chains of servitude that he cannot touch one of his servants, not one limb of their bodies, not one hair of their heads, not one beast of their herds, till God hath given him leave, and he will never give him leave to hurt their souls. You have seen the carriage of an inhumane Tyran over his slaves; come now to the Court of a King, and see the usage of his free servants: yea, see a court of Kings, for all God's servants be no less than Princes. Where we have two general occurrences. First, The conquest of some that stand out. Secondly, The happiness of them that are overcome.

[unspec 1] God is sure to be Victor, for what force can withstand him? But he frames the manner of his victories to the nature of his enemies: them that resist, he overcomes by subversion: them that yield, by conversion. His conquest here is not by fury, but by mercy. Furie is not in me, the briars and thorns shall be consumed in his flame: but they that lay hold on his arm, shall hold back his arm; humble and faithful prostration shall make their peace. This war on his part, is all of love: the intention is Studium pacis. Gratia praeveniens, so the war is undertaken; Gratia operans, so the battle is begun: Gratia perficiens, so the victory is gotten. When God gives us repentance, he hath then overcome us. We were rebels by nature, and enemies to the grace of God, we must be vanquished, or we cannot be saved. They are led by the Spirit of God. So gentle is this conquering, that it is called a leading; ducendo vincimur, vincendo ducimur. Led by a superior instinct, not furiously but familiarly; non ut rei ad supplicium, sed ut amici ad palatium. Nor is this conquest a necessitating of our salvation; as Qui agitur, agere quid ipse minus intelligitur: Imo, & ageris, & agis: a Deo aguntur, ut agant. God gives the first motion or inclination, and so we begin: and by his continual help we follow on. We are not willing before we be overcome, but in the very conquest we are made willing to be overcome. Acta fit activa voluntas.

1. This conquest is not Subita, sudden: man's heart is naturally stubborn; this Jericho will not be won under seven days siege, and then the walls must down too, worldly forces must fail us. Not seldom it holds out longer than Ostend or Troy; God is many years assaulting it with his spiritual weapons, his Word, Ordinances, Favors, Frownes, Stripes before it yields. Few are converted in an hour, or can tell that hour wherein they were converted. It is not here, venire & vincere, to come and overcome. God doth weaken us before he vanquish us, taking from corruption here a fort, and there a bulwark, now a trench, then a mine, together with the victuals and provision, even the magasine whereon sin feeds and lives. When the unthrift had no provant left, he must yield and humble himself to his Father.

2. It is not Hostilis, as nation against nation with a deadly feud, but with terms of love. There is a dry wounding, a conquest without blows. Thou hast wounded me with one of thine eyes. And Turn away thine eyes, for they overcome me. Of all victories, love is the greatest, to overcome evil with good. This is to be like God, whose image we bear in our creation, and to whose Image we are restored in our redemption. Christus nihil praecepit, quod non facit. If he had not overcome all our malice with kindness, he would never have charged us with such a practice. Saul hunts for the life of David, David hath a way to the life of Saul, and spares it. Such a feeling oratory did Saul find in the lips of David, and lap of his garment; that it lies not in the power of his envy, ill nature, and cursed heart, to hold out from tears. He whose harp had wont to quiet Saul's frenzy, now by his kindness doth calm his fury: so that now he sheds tears instead of blood. Here was a victory gotten, and no blow stricken. Phocion that noble Athenian, being condemned to die, and lifting the deadly cup to his lips, was asked by his friends, what message he would send to his Son; he answered, Mando ei hoc, ut obliviscatur potus hujus, I charge him never to revenge this draught upon the Athenians. Baldwin King of Jerusalem, having spoiled the Arabian Saracens; and put them to flight, found in his return homewards a woman ready to travel, wife unto a chief Prince of the Arabians, left behind in the pursuit: whom he covered with his own mantle, appointing both attendance and sustenance. This kindness was not lost; for afterward being besieged by the same Arabians, and put to great distress, he was delivered by that Captain, whose wife he had preserved. Yea, take an example nearer home: A malefactor, in birth and person a comely Gentleman, was sentenced by a Judge deformed in body. Hereupon he turned all his prayers to Heaven, into curses and revilings of the Judge, calling him a stigmaticall and bloody man. The patient Judge for that time reprieved him: still he continued in the same language of invectives and blasphemies against him. The next Session being produced, the Judge asked him if his choler were anything boiled away and spent: but then he redoubled his railings: yet he reprieved him again, as loath to let him die in so uncharitable and desperate a condition of soul. Before the third Assizes, he sent for him to his chamber in London, and asked him if he were yet more pacified: still nothing came from him but words of inveterate rancor. Whereupon said the Judge, God forgive thee, I do; and withal threw him his pardon. Whereat he was so astonied, that being but hardly recovered from his swoon; he refused the Queens pardon for his life, unless the Judge would both pardon his malice, and admit him into his service. He did so, and found him so faithful, that dying he gave him the greatest part of his estate. Here was extreme evil overcome with extraordinary goodness. The Judge of all the world deals yet more mercifully with us: the Law hath condemned us to die, we daily provoke him: he could presently sentence us, but he spares us: still we anger him: he feeds, finds us, gives us all we have; yet still we rebel against him. At last, to overcome us by the gentlest war that ever was heard of, he seals us our pardon in Jesus Christ, through whom he accepts us into his service, and makes us his own heirs. Loe, then he overcomes us.

3. It is not violenta, he useth no boisterous forces against us. Indeed his Ordnance be his Ordinances, his Cannons be his Canons and Laws: But against what does he plant them? Not against ourselves, but against our sins: As if he would not fight with us, but fight with our enemies for us. We have no foes, but our faults: upon these he plays with his Shot, and batters them down before us. He knows, that unless these die, we cannot live. He hath his Sword, a two-edged one, keen on both sides: with this he wounds, not our spirit, but our flesh; not our flesh, but the lusts of our flesh: yea, not so much our lusts, as the corruption of our lusts; lancing the Vlcer that would kill us. He hath his Mines; but to blow up our pride, vain-glory, ambition, and such piles of vanities. He hath his fire-works; but to burn up our rotten affections, of covetousness and uncleanness. This strict siege, is but to famish our riot, intemperance, drunkenness, and all those Perdues, soldiers that deserve no pay, the forlorn Tatterdemallion of our sins. His Ambuscado's serve but to resist our excursions, flyings out, ramblings, and such extravagances of disobedience. Here is no boisterous turbulency in this War; all the violence is on our side: the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, not offers it. No man is saved against his will: but even in the act of our overcoming, we are willing to be overcome. We feel pain in the resistance, nothing but peace and sweetness in the conquest. I had rather thus be conquered of the Lord, than be conqueror of all the world. O poor Caesar's, poor Alexanders, poor Tamerlaines, that won so many victories, and lost the best, in not being overcome by God's mercies. Thus God overcomes us, by overcoming them that captived us.

4. It is not crudelis, not bloody; like Saul's charge for Amalek, or Israel's execution upon Benjamin: there none were left alive, here all are preserved from slaughter. As he said, Perieram nisi periissem: so we had been butchered, if we had not been conquered. If we had escaped from the Captain of Mercy, we had fallen upon the Captain of Crueltie. For they that will not be overcome of God, shall be overcome of Satan. The Lord goes through every street, here he sets his mark upon a house, there upon a person: these be his, he hath fairly won them, and they consent to be his subjects: the rest he leaves to the destroyer. Those he hath conquered, he hath saved: and they that yield not to so gracious a subduer, perish by a pitiless destroyer. As a man seeing a tumult or quarrel, where enraged swords make gashing wounds, and through those breaches let out souls; spies one in this hurlyburly whom he loves, lays hold on him, and being stronger than he, bears him to his house, and locks him up fast as in ward, till all be quiet. So doth God snatch his chosen out of the broils of sin, binds them with the cords of obedience; and though they struggle for liberty, keeps them sure till this mutiny be over-past. Or as the Shepherd in a tempest, finds a Lamb, catcheth it in his arms, and shelters it, till the storm be blown over. The Lamb strives, and thinks it self going to death, while indeed from death it is preserved.

So graciously doth this Conqueror deal with us: we kick at his precepts, fret at our restraint, and are impatient of our sufferings; whereas we are chastened of the Lord, that we might not be condemned with the world. Two had appointed to meet in the field of blood; the quarrel was bad, the prosecution worse: the friend of one of them not being able to persuade him by reason, caused him to be arrested into prison: better a short bondage, than unredeemable death. This was a merciful cruelty, the other had been a cruel mercy. It is happy if a sickness can keep us from sin. When a wild Horse hath got the head of his rider, and runs him with fury into deadly dangers; he does him no wrong, that kills the Horse, to save the man. They are the beasts, our lusts, that draw us in the Coach of licentiousness, headlong to Hell, as Pharaohs Chariot drew him into the red Sea, against which God is severe and cruel; and when there is no other remedy, he will spill those beasts to save our souls. Here be then no lamentable cries, no merciless blows, no gaping wounds, no channels streaming with blood, in this conquest. No blood is shed here, but the blood of Jesus Christ. All the blood and life this victory cost, was spilled on the Victors part, not on the conquered. If God were cruel to any, it was to himself. To spare our blood, he did shed the blood of his own dear Son.

Their happiness that be thus overcome, is seen in these two privileges: [unspec 2]

1. They are the only free-men in the world: this Bondage is the most royal liberty. This stands both, first, in the deliverance from evil; that neither the bond of the Law to bring perfect obedience in our own person, obligeth us; nor the breach of that Law, for want of that righteousness, condemneth us. When the King hath signed a transgressor his pardon, all his malicious enemies and accusers may go whistle. Secondly, and in the ability to good, even to serve the Lord without fear. It is true indeed, still we sin, and alas, that we must! We are made free from the Law of sin and death: not simply from sin and death, but from the Law of sin and death. Not so delivered, that we can neither sin nor die: but that neither sin shall captive us, nor death confound us. Indeed we sigh, and fight, and fain would be delivered from all assaults of sin: but beggars must not choose their alms; we must be contented with our measure: we have this to humble us, not to condemn us. It is comfort sufficient, though sin disturb us, it shall never destroy us. We abhor a Snake, for the nature of it; to touch it, is our fear: and it is but our fear, when all the malignity and venom is gone. Sin doth hiss at us, but cannot harm us: blessed be God, the fear is more than the hurt. Our life lies in our Head: if this Serpent with all his sting could not hurt the Head, it shall never kill any member.

Indeed where it domineeres, it damns. If a man sick on his bed, burning of a Fever, fetching his breath with straitness and shortness, looking like earth; say he is well in health, we do not believe him: So if we see men swelling with pride, flaming with lust, looking earthie with covetousness, and yet flattering themselves with hope of salvation; we cannot credit them, all the world cannot save them. Here the Condition is not kept, therefore the Obligation is in force; they do not serve God, they are not free. But where is an endeavor to obey him, and a faith in Christ to supply the defects of that obedience; there the Covenant is kept, the Bond is void. Sin offers many assaults; but still we stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. Death shall wholly quit us from these solicitations; Mors est sepultura vitiorum. It is not so much the death of the man, as the death of sin in the man. As the worm bred in the tree, at last consumes the tree: so death is bred by sin, and sin shall be destroyed by death. This is the full accomplishment of our freedom, when that filthy flux of sin is dried up in an instant. Whatsoever depraved nature suggests, it is not in vain to serve the Lord, for we are made Kings by this service. We may better say of Heaven, than of that City, all her Merchants are Princes; all God's subjects be Kings: not reges nati, but renati; not of a piece of Earth, but of Heaven; not of a mortal Principalitie, but of an immortal Kingdom. Courtiers may fail of preferment; they may be near high places, and Offices, and miss them: one compared them to fasting-days; they were next the holy-days, but in themselves the most meager and leanest days of the week: but God's servants are sure. Below men rise to honors and places by the death of others; these by their own deaths ascend to the glory of Heaven.

But Christianity seems to afford very small liberty: Is it not a yoke, and a burden? Take my yoke upon you. Tollite jugum, there's the condition of humanity; labor. Tollite jugum meum, there's the condition of Christianity; an especial labor. And Super vos, which implies both patience, willingly; and obedience, servingly: not to touch it with one finger, but to bear it on our shoulders; submit all our actions and affections to it. Pride and ambition are Super jugum, and tread that under their heels, which they should bear upon their necks. Indeed this is true: but still it is onus leve, and jugum suave; an easy yoke, a light burden. First, this yoke is not made of green wood, then it would be heavy; but of dry, therefore it is portable and easy. Secondly, it is not a new yoke, but hath been borne and worn before by Christ himself, to make it easy for us. Thirdly, it is oiled and lined with sweet comforts; Vnguntur cruces, à quo inferuntur: God hath so softened it with pillows of mercy, that it cannot offend us. Fourthly, we draw in it with patience: Oxen that struggle and be unruly with their yokes, put themselves to pain: God hath given us the shoulders of patience, before he puts on the yoke of obedience. Fifthly, we do not draw alone, nor does the weight of the load lie upon our backs; we should then sink and shrink under it. But a yoke is made for two, and Christ is one of the two; his omnipotence assists our weakness; the greatest burden lies upon him. Sixthly, and lastly, it is not perpetual; we draw it but during a short life. And if it be painful for the day, we are unyoked at night, when we go to bed, in death. But the wicked have a sorer yoke for the present, whereof the wood is green and ponderous; all sin is heavy. And though it seem qualified with pleasure and content, and is commonly drawn with a companion; as the Broker and Usurer both in a yoke, drunkard and drunkard both in a yoke, adulterer and strumpet both in a yoke: and where a yoke-fellow fails, as the proud man loves no partner, no partner loves him; here the Devil puts in a shoulder, to ease him and help it on. Yet still they draw with tyranny, pain, impatience, and feel many a prick of Satan's Goad, that Auriga of Hell, to set them forward. And last of all, at night, when they should put off one yoke, another, a heavier, a sorer is put on them, which they must bear forever. But when the faithful shall be uncoupled from the yoke, there is ease and eternal rest. The mouth of the Ox that draws in the yoke, is not muzzled on earth, and the soul shall find everlasting reward in Heaven.

I do not exempt Christianity from all difficulty; it is no easy labor to serve God: yea, they that do it best, feel it hardest, and complain that they can do it no better. There be hot encounters, potent adversaries, and many adversities, against them that would go to Heaven. Malicious and subtle spirits, an alluring world, a vicious and stubborn nature: sometimes we see them not, and complain of feeling them too late: sometimes we see them with amazement, fear them, and are ready to fly from them with an Israelitish cowardice: Who is able to stand before the sons of Anak? Another time we stand, and resist as well as we can, but are foiled with indignation and shame. Up we get again, take heart, and renew the combat; yea, even prevail, and triumph. O how glad we are, if either we have not been thrown down by the temptation, or recovered ourselves from the fall, by compunction. In the height of this joy, we are again surprised with a sudden assault; whereof as we had no warning, we have no power of resisting. Thus are we hurried into sin, over-ruled to displease our Maker: yea, sometimes we can hardly struggle out of the snare for some hours or days; and when we escape, not without many wounds and bruises: so that coming to the Chirurgery of Repentance, we find a bleeding conscience. We look not that God should strew carpets for our nice feet to walk into our heaven; or make that way smooth for us, which all Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Confessors, Christ himself, have found rugged and bloody; or to fare better than all the Saints. Yet still we will not change conditions with the worldly: Paul was happier in his chain of iron, than Agrippa in his chain of gold. One rag of a Saint is worth the whole wardrobe of a sinner: and that for the next privilege.

2. Their reward is infinite. We may well contemn the difficulty, when we respect the advantage. We serve a good Master, who not only pays, but gives; not after the proportion of our earnings, but of his own mercies. Hell cannot touch us, death cannot hurt us; if any evil do assault us, it presently brings us more good. Besides this freedom, how large is our possession? all good things are ours, to challenge, to enjoy: we cannot look beyond our own, nor beside it: we have right to the things we see, and no less to the things we see not. The heaven that roles so gloriously over our heads, is ours: those celestial spirits, the better part of that high creation, are ours; they watch us in our beds, guard us in our ways, shelter us from dangers, comfort us in troubles; and as living they have kept, so dying, they gladly receive our souls. Yea above all, the God of Spirits is ours; and by a sweet and secret union, we are become heirs of his glory, and as it were Limbes of himself. How incomprehensible is this blessedness? when we look to the reward, we could not wish the work easier. If every pain we suffer were a death, and every cross an hell, we have amends enough. It were injurious to complain of the service, when we acknowledge the recompense. What thou wilt, O Lord, so I may be thine, what thou wilt: though I should buy it dearer, I would be thy servant, a Christian.

Our light affliction which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. Where we have a threefold opposition: Light and weighty, momentary and eternal, affliction and glory. What comparison, what proportion of the recompense to the service? I may justly be out of love with myself, nothing shall make me out of love with my profession; herein alone are we safe, herein blessed. God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of Jesus Christ: if we should prefer any worldly joys before it, we were unworthy of it. Gold may make a man the richer, not the better: honor may make him the higher, not the happier: and all temporal pleasures are but flowers, they have but their month, and are gone: this morning in the bosom, the next to the besom: All flesh is grass, and the glory of man as the flower. Grace is like the Sun, which shines comfortably in this world, shall shine sevenfold more gloriously in the world to come; an honor not clouded, not envied, not exceeded, and Such honor have all the Saints?

To conclude with the sum of the verse. Deceitfull promises are the bane; both of the forger and of the believer. They promise others liberty, while themselves are the servants, &c. As if a malefactor, that is himself chained in the dungeon, should promise his fellow to open him the prison-door, and let him out. Faire promises are the devils bait, and it must be our wisdom to discern betwixt the deceit of sin present, and the fruit of sin to come. What a liberty did Satan promise our first parents that they should have; and so indeed stole from them the liberty that they had. As Laban promised Jacob beautiful Rachel, but in the dark gave him blear-ey'd Leah. Or as Hamor promised the Shechemites, that by their circumcision all the goods of the house of Israel should be theirs, whereas indeed the goods of the Shechemites fell to the house of Israel. Diabolus mentitur ut fallat; vitam pollicetur ut perimat. The wages that Satan promiseth, and the sinner would have, he shall not get: but the wages that God threateneth, and man would not have, this shall be assuredly paid him. Illud propter quod peccant, hic dimittunt; & ipsa peccata secum portant. The gain they sin for, they shall leave behind them; but their sins they shall carry with them. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof you are now ashamed? for the end of these things is death. Surely there is no fruit but shame and death to be gathered from the forbidden tree. False promisers and vainglorious boasters are the children of Satan, this is the top of their pedigree: yea the devil doth borrow the use of their tongues for a time. But faithful is He that hath promised, who will also do it. Fidelity and truth is the issue of heaven.

IT is not the least happiness in this world, not to be taken with the happiness of this world. Pliny the younger could say, Capio hinc aliquam voluptatem, quod voluptate hac non capior. To walk daily through this garden of temptations, and pluck none of the forbidden fruits or flowers, is a temperance so far above nature, that no man, but He that was more than man, ever attained it. If a mere stranger passeth alone through the streets of a populous City, and follows his affairs close; he may return uninfected, because unsaluted. But for a known Citizen to do so, to blanch all his acquaintance with prejudice, to deny all those friends that offer their cruel courtesies at the next Tavern, to refuse all the invitations of profit or pleasure, requires a well resolved abstinence. Christ was a stranger upon earth, so should every Christian be: but this is the country wherein we are borne, (though it benot the country whereto we are borne) and it is hard for a man to deny his country. Mundus allicit, afficit, inficit: and though we pretend for heaven, yet still we bear about us a tang of our native country. Even they that would fain get out of the world, yet cannot get the world quite out of them. They purpose well; and if those thoughts (not theirs) begin to lift them up from their earth; presently he that rules in the air, stoops upon them with his powerful temptations, or the world pulls them down again with a sweet violence: so as they know not whether they be compelled or persuaded to yield. There is in the best such a deal of infirmity, but a great deal more of treachery. How willing are we to be deceived, how loath to be altered? Si t •• tum valet mundus in extraneos, quale imperium exercet in suos? But now when a man is pulled out of these briars and thorns with a bleeding skin, and made sensible of those wounds which he hath received in this forest, and is in time healed of those hurts; if he rush again into that dangerous wilderness, and hazard new mischiefs; he falls (almost unpitied) into the hands of robbers and murderers, destitute of both rescue and resistance. To be recovered from the ways of death, to walk awhile in the ways of life; and after all this, to turn from the land of the living to the Golgotha of the dead, from the forsaking of sin, to the sin of forsaking religion and goodness; this is the fearful condition of the Apostates in my Text, whose latter end is worse than their beginning.

We have three general parts: A

• Proposition, They have escaped, &c.
• Supposition, If again they be entangled.
• Conclusion, Their latter end is worse.

In the proposition are three particulars; First, Quid, they have escaped. Secondly, Vnde, or a quo, from the pollutions of the world. Thirdly, Quomodo, by the knowledge of Christ In the Supposition observe two particulars; First, Facilitatem intricandi, the easiness of falling back; If again; it may be so, it is no ways impossible. Secondly, Difficultatem extricandi, the hardness of recovering them, which appears by the two phrases: Intangled; it will cost labor to unsnare them: overcome; it will cost a price to redeem them; neither of both which is afforded them. But lastly, the Conclusion follows, The latter end with them is worse than the beginning. The Text begins with hope; They have escaped: goes on with fear They are again entangled: and concludes in despair, Their latter end is worse than their beginning.

They have escaped.] Next to the finding an unexpected benefit, it is a great happiness to scape an unsuspected danger: yea the scaping of a great danger, is more joy, than the receiving of an ordinary benefit. David did not so much bless Abigail for relieving the hunger of his body, as for preventing the sin of his soul. She saved him from spilling the blood of another, he thanks her as much as if she had hindered another from spilling his blood. Nabal did not more rejoice in escaping death, than David in that he was kept from being the author of it. Never was good man delivered from a known peril, but he blessed his deliverer. Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare; the snare is broken, and we are escaped: the Church doubles the memory of that mercy: there it was but twice. Psal. 118. He speaks thrice of compassing, of dangers, of enemies, of multitudes, like swarms of Bees: still he blessed God for escaping, even with the destruction of his foes: there it is thrice. How worthy is he to perish in the next danger, that is not thankful for escaping the former? They that are delivered from the noise of the Archers in the places of drawing water, there shall they rehearse the the righteous acts of the Lord. They had set a song of thanksgiving for that deliverance. My soul is escaped from the Lions, saith David, therefore will I praise thee. In that bloody peragration of Egypt, when every house had a carcase in it, and that of the first borne, Israel escaped: and shall the remembrance of this mercy vanish? No, every year they shall keep that day holy to the Lord, with the great feast of their Passover. That treason which should have been done with a match: that matchless conspiracy; whereof the scene was laid at Westminster, the stage was the Parliament house, the plot contrived at Rome, the intention was the confusion of a whole State; Aras & focos, regalia, sacra, veiusta: yet betwixt the fire and the powder, that short intervallum, we escaped. Shall that deliverance escape without our thanks? No, unblest shall be that year, where the fifth of November is not rubrick'd in the Kalendar, where our escaping is not acknowledged with thankful hearts. Our late King of happy memory, escaping the danger of a conspiracy in Scotland, contented not himself with a commemoration of it once a year: his subjects had the fifth of August; himself kep • one day every week. He that escapeth a peril, without thankful acknowledgment, is indebted for his deliverance. Now there is no danger like sin; for there could have been no danger but for sin: and the greater the danger the greater praise belongs to the deliverance. Daniel was among the Lions; they could but have torn his flesh, and sent his soul to heaven through those painful breaches. But to escape from that roaring Lion, whose teeth water at men's souls, as being too dainty to feed on flesh; how great is this happiness! Three servants of God were cast into that seven times heated furnace: all those flames could not scorch their souls, whatsoever they had done to their bodies. But the fire of hell hath a secret and supernatural property to torment the soul: I am tormented in this flame, saith the rich Churl; that [I] must be his soul, his body was in the grave: and that with a fervor not less violent than everlasting. To escape that, may well challenge thanks from either men or Angels.

If we escape a dangerous sickness, and do not bless God with heart, voice, and life for our recovery; we rise from our beds, and owe for our physic. Hath God's Angel forbore to sheath his sword in our bowels, when thousands have fallen under his impartial hand? Let us be humbly thankful; otherwise there is a worse plague left behind for us, yea in us. Argue with all the world, they will conclude; there is no vice like to ingratitude. Thou art made whole, sin no more, lest a worse thing happen unto thee. We commit new sins, while we are thankless for escaping the punishment of our old ones. God justly for the first sin, had concluded all the world under sin: some through his grace in Christ are escaped from this condemnation: shall they tear the instrument of their pardon? No, we see it done, let us kiss the seal, and confess his mercy. We were overwhelmed with sin and ignorance: God hath called us out of darkness into his marvelous light: shall we put out the lamp whereby we are escaped? No, we must be thankful.

We make vows to God in our dangers; shall we not pay them after our dangers? Our obedience is a debt, though we had never revowed it: shall we forfeit all these bonds? Thou owest thy service to God for escaping sin and hell; pay, pay. Thou hast received all, thou owest all; think of payment. They are infamous that get the goods of others into their hands, and then break. The subject that is entrusted by his Prince with keeping of a fort, and shall give it up to the enemy, is a desperate traitor. Our tongues, eyes, hands, bodies and souls, are delivered from the Prince of darkness, by the Son of righteousness, and deposited to our keeping: if we yield them back to their old usurper, by blasphemy, pride, uncleanness, we shall die the death of traitors. Thou slightest an offended neighbor; I care not for him, I owe him nothing: sure we owe the devil nothing, but our detestation; why then should we do him any service? We owe all to God, both for escaping hell, and for our hope of heaven: What shall we render to him for all? Thankfulness and obedience are our vows, and we will pay our vows unto him.

But we say, alas, non habemus unde; we have not wherewithal. Men that are run far in debt, and pay, and pay, yet see small hope of coming out, often grow desperate. Not so: we owe an infinite sum; and we have an infinite sum to pay it withal; the infinite obedience and merit of Jesus Christ: this is able to discharge all, were the debt greater. For our own actual obedience, let us pay so far as we can. This is the difference between debts owing to God, and to men. The more of our debts we pay unto men, the less we have remaining of our own: but the more we pay to God, the more we have, and are the better able to pay. God hath delivered us from the bondage of Satan, to whom (by reason of sin) we ow'd our souls: Christ hath discharged that debt, and we are escaped: yet still we are debtors: this debt is not cancelled, but translated: every benefit is a new obligation. Only we are delivered from those scattering debts to that merciless creditor, Satan: and God hath taken it into his own hand: now all that we owe, is to him. The principal we pay him in his own coin, the blood of his Son: the interest is our thankful service and obedience. We are escaped from the captivity of that Tyrant; Christ hath paid our ransom: only we will pay him our praises, our service, ourselves.

[unspec 2] The pollutions of the world.] Delivered from the world? Perhaps this was none of their hearts desire. They found no danger in it: and he that should promise them eternal riches, taking away the present possession of these temporals, they would think did them to loss. They are so far from contending to scape the world, that the world shall not scape them. They court it as their chief Paragon, the mistress of their affections. Tell them of any blemishes or defects in it; as the cares, thorns, stings, treachery, and a thousand such inconveniences, which are nourished in the heart of this strumpet; no matter, they will take her with all faults. Sampson will have his Philistian cockatrice, though he lose both his eyes.

It is true indeed, the world it self doth no harm: for he made it, and all things in it, that could make nothing amiss. And that the valde bona there, is turned into inquinamenta here, it may blame sin, and sin may blame man, and man may blame woman, and woman may blame the devil. Nor yet does it defile us materialiter, as pitch defiles the handler: but occasionaliter, as an unskillful Mechannicke cuts his fingers with good and useful tools. The pollutions of the world be even a world of pollutions: they contend for number with the very creatures. There is scarce anything made for man, whereby man doth not mar himself. Who would think that a spider should fetch venom out of a rose? Woman was made an helper for man; what a multitude of men have fallen by woman? Bread and sustenance is necessary for the preservation of life; yet how many have made their table a snare? Here is field-room enough, and it were hard not to expatiate: for it may be said of this Land, as it was of Carthage; It is as full of pollutions, as of people: or as Augustine of Lazarus; Tot ora, quot ulcera: so many sores, so many mouths, crying out for redress. But I reduce all unto three.

1. The pollutions which we contract from the riches of the world: not that riches are noxious in themselves, for then no good man would not have renounced them. Charge them that be rich in this world. As Saint John distinguisheth of being in the Church, and being of the Church: so men may be rich in the world, yet innocent and happy: for while their estates are below, their hearts are above. But those are rich of the world, that are worldlings in heart, as well as in estate. Whose affections have devoured so much of the world as they can, and are sorry that they cannot swallow it all. The rich of the world are in it, but the rich in the world are not of it. The world is in men's ears, the world is in their hearts; and they are not in it only, but of it. And there can be nothing in them that are of the world, but enmity to God, and that which God repayes with enmity: so as there is no way for them but perishing with the world. It is not for nothing, that the same word in the Hebrew signifies both riches and unrighteousness. Psalm. 52. The man that strengthened himself in his wickedness, or in his substance: so closely doth wickedness cleave to many men's substance.

There be too many that sell the poor to slaughter, and yet thank God for the price; but God will never thank them for it. Those butchers say, Blessed be God, for I am rich. This is a pollution that will hardly ever be washed off: no not expiated with building of an alms-house; for God will not be bribed with an Hospital. There is not a penny got by such unjust courses, but it sticks a foul spot on the soul: therefore the Apostle calls it filthy lucre; and Zephaniah for this cried out against Jerusalem; Woe to the filthy and polluted city. Many Prophets have denounced the same woe to this City: they meant the men more than the walls, though peradventure the walls did as much observe them. Were your Thames ten Iordans, it could not wash off this Leprosy. The covetous ride through plashes and puddles, through bogs and sloughs, and quagmires: it is impossible they should scape the badges of their travel, the aspersions of mire. With what delight soever they hunt after riches, I am sure they have but a dirty way of it. At last they fall into the quick-sand of all swallowing death; and then they vainly wish, that they were to begin a new Pilgrimage; on condition, they had lost all the pleasure of their former journey.

Is not the life better than meat? Nonne anima praestantior esca? Yea, is not the soul better than dirt, that for dirt they pollute the soul? But alas, they are so rooted in the earth, that they are quite turned into the nature of the soil. Others may have a tang, a dash of the foul earth, by travelling through it to their home: but worldlings are rooted in the earth, and therefore not to be plucked up without violence. The devil shown Christ the Crowns of the earth, but not the thorns of those Crowns: so the covetous show their cumulos, and tumulos pecuniae, but not their stimulos conscientiae. It is the honor of the holy, Omnis decor ab intùs, they are all glorious within, what outward wants soever would disgrace them. It is the disgrace of the worldly, Omnis faetor ab intùs, they are all filthy within, what outward abundance soever doth honor them. God requires truth in the inward parts: but alas, we may say too truly of these, that Their inward parts are very wickedness. The rheumatic and spawling Cynicke, when he was entreated by the dainty mistress of the house, where he was entertained, that he would spit in the foulest part of the house; did hereupon unmannerly choose to spit in the mistresses own face, because that in his opinion was the foulest. So when God sees the rich man's house kept neat and clean, the floors swept, the walls hung, the vessels scoured, his apparel brushed, his body adorned, all curiously highted; only his heart filthy and polluted: certainly he will spit his contempt upon that heart. Therefore wash thy heart from iniquity, O Jerusalem, that thou mayest be saved.

2. The pollutions we derive from the honors and dignities of the world. Pride here challengeth the first place; and let her have it: even to be the Queen of all sordid filthiness. This not only lifts men up above others, but above themselves. Nor is it any wonder, that they should not know their neighbors, that have forgotten themselves. This is a coagulated ulcer, spreading over the whole soul; like a cloth that is taken from a Leper; stiff indeed, but only stiff with corruption. The bush that hangs out, shows what we may look for within; a plaster'd face argues a defiled heart. Every color that art lays on the cheeks, sizeth into the soul, and dies that in grain; quite of another hew than God ever made, or will own. For surely he will never acknowledge that face he never made, nor that hair he never made theirs, nor that body that is ashamed of the maker, nor that soul that disguises the body. Let me tell them one thing which perhaps they never noted before. The first painted woman we read of in the Scriptures, was a witch and a whore. So Jehu told Joram of the whoredoms and the witchcrafts of his mother Jezebel. And the first painted woman we read of in profane stories, was a whore and a witch too; Medea: the end of them both was destruction, and a destruction without end; for the terror of all their proud followers. From hence ariseth the boil of burning malice, the carbuncle of envy, the plague-tokens of raging madness; yea even the horrid and frightful aspersions of blood-guiltiness; a sin that thunders in the ears of justice. The homicide, through a killing favor, is pardoned, and granted his life: God draws his sword, and by his plague spils a thousand lives for it. Water comes down to moisten the earth, but blood flies upward to bedew heaven.

It is the misery of greatness, to be lawless: how many had been good, if they never had been great? All the soot in the house, is to be found in the chimnies. It was a grave and smart answer of a great Statesman in the Land, when he was consulted by the Queen about the lawfulness of monopoly licences; Licentiâ omnes deteriores sumus; we are all the worse for a Licence. Place gives a license to do ill: and in evil, the best condition is Non velle, no will to it: the next, Non posse, no ability to do it. Nor do they admit of reproof: when that wind riseth, we may well look for a tempest. Touch the mountains, and they will smoke, saith the Psalmist. Great men are like mountains; when the Word of God touches them, they presently smoke with passion. Alas, who shall show them their pollutions? Their own eyes cannot tell them, and the eyes of their Parasites will not tell them. They have Glasses to see all the disorders of their external habits; even to the ruffling of a Purle, or the misplacing of a hair. But there is another Glass which they seldom use, the Word of God, that alone shows the spots of conscience. Therefore as it was said of Naaman; that he was Captain of the King of Syria's Host, a great man with his Master, honorable for his many achievements, and a mighty man in valor: but he was a Leper. Here were divers noble privileges, but one thing dishonored all the rest: But he was a Leper. There may be great dignities, powerful offices, high commands, popularitie, and applause; yea, even policy, and some good acts to the country. But if there be a stench of inward pollutions, a false heart to Religion and innocence; this is a But, a bar in their Arms, a blemish in their noble Scutchions, an indelible Motto, Sed erat leprosus, But he was a Leper.

3. The pollutions we deduce from the pleasures of the world. O what a torrent of turpitudes here stream in upon us! Immoderate diet, or rather surfeit: all the varieties and delicacies of nature, cook'd with the most studious art, stand on our Tables, like the goodly buildings of a fortified City. To this we lay fiery siege: where our sensual appetite is the great General, and our teeth the common soldiers: here we skale the walls, there we rase the foundations: our knives are the weapons, and the Instruments of War are the Instruments of Music; Boules of Wine the Colours, innocent creatures the spoil, and Songs of wantonness crown the triumphant victory. All which concludes in sleep, if that be not prevented by uncleanness. The people of Israel required meat for their lust, and the people of England nourish lust for their meat. Ebriety is a fellow-devil to the former; both are sins ambitious to prevent the day of Judgment; for then God will destroy both meat and the belly: these will not stay so long, but beforehand destroy both the belly and meat. The honor of man is the Image of God; but this vice flies at the very face of this Image, and scratcheth it out of the soul. The drunkard is a certain thing that hath been a man; but now most prodigiously he hath swallowed down himself through his throat. So he lies intombed, with the drink in his own bowels; and that doth bury him, which is buried in him.

Both these pollutions prepare for a third: the blood that is fired with Bacchus, must be cooled with Venus. The Devil should forget both his office and malice, if he did not play the Pandar to Concupiscence. Idleness makes way for loose company, loose company makes way for Wine, Wine makes work for Lust, and Lust makes work for the Devil. No marvel if the Poets called it a Pegasus; for it is a winged Horse, whereon many ride post to Hell. Our Climate, and therefore our natural constitution, is not so hot, that it needs the Popish Indulgence to the flesh, the erection of Stews; unless this artificial heat were unnaturally added to it. It is intemperance that prepares fuel for the fire of vengeance. O that our luxurious Strumpetiers could read in their diseased bodies the estate of their leprous souls.

But the tongue of the soul is Conscience, the voice with which she is best acquainted: this (when all the doors are shut to the voices of men) speaks within; and that with a language loud enough to be heard, easy enough to be understood. But the common course of such dissolute sinners, is to drown her voice with a louder: as he that was troubled with a scolding Wife, made way to his quiet, by out-scolding her. Who shall tell the family of their faults, when the Monitor is dumb? They have stop'd the mouth, and taken away the voice of their conscience, by loud and roaring excess: and who is left to reprove? John the Baptist was called the voice of Christ; Vox clamantis, The voice of him that cries in the Wilderness. Herod did cut off his head. Now Christ spake not many words to his apprehenders, and accusers; not many to the High Priest, nor to the Judge, Pilate: but when he came before Herod, he spake never a word at all. Among other reasons, this is wittily given; he spake not a word to Herod, because Herod had taken away his Voice, in beheading John: and how should he speak without a voice? There may be a voice without speech, there cannot be speech without a voice. So they have tongue-tied their conscience, taken away her voice; and who shall control them? But when God shall untie those strings, and unmuzzle their conscience, she will be heard; and ten Consorts of Music shall not drown her clamorous cries. Now their conscience is bound, and they are loose: but in the day of trouble, themselves shall be bound, and God shall let loose their conscience. It shall be hard for them, with that frantic Musician, to fall a tuning their Vials, when their house is on fire about their ears: ô then rather, one drop of mercy, yea floods of pity, to cool the flame, and mitigate their sorrows.

All wise men affect the conclusion to be best: to ride two or three miles of fair way, and to have a hundred deep and foul ones to pass afterward, is uncomfortable; especially when the end is worse than the way. But let the beginning be troublesome, the progress somewhat more easy, and the journeys end happy, and there is fair amends. Mark the upright man, and behold the just; for the end of that man is peace. Mark him in the setting out, he hath many oppositions; mark him in the journey, he is full of tribulations: but mark him in the conclusion, and the end of that man is peace.

By the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.] Wherein I desire to touch upon these four observations or conclusions. First, that there is no knowledge to do good in corrupted nature and filthiness of the flesh. Secondly, there is no escaping out of this filthiness and corruption, but by knowledge. Thirdly, no knowledge can deliver us, but that of our Savior Christ. Fourthly, no knowledge of our Savior can effect this, but that which is sanctified with faith and repentance.

First, miserable is the estate of man, before he hath escaped from the world. As Adams body was cast out of Paradise, to seek his fortune in the wide and wild earth; or as Nebuchadnezzar was turned off, from being a King among men, to become a companion of beasts: so by the corruption of nature, man is debarred the society of God, and put out of the several into the Commons, to shift for himself in the broad world, where sins and sorrows strive for number. This was the Poets meaning by their Pandora; a beautiful woman, framed by Vulcan: to whose making up, every god and goddess gave a contribution. They put into the hand of this fair Inchantresse a goodly Box, fraught and stuffed with all woes and miseries; only in the bottom of it they placed Hope. It was presented to Prometheus, but Providence refused it; then to Epimetheus, and Afterwits accepted it. Which he no sooner rashly opened, but there came out a swarm of calamities, fluttering about his ears. This he perceiving, clapp'd on the Cover with all possible speed; and so with much ado saved Hope, sitting alone in the bottom. Such an army of miseries, like the troupe issuing from the Wombe of the Troian Horse, invaded the world, by opening the Box of Pandora, by tasting the Apple of Eve; that if the mercy of God had not left us Hope, Solam solantem Spem, in the bottom, we had all perished. The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine Gold, whose Nazarites were purer than Snow, whiter than Milk, and more ruddy than Rubies, and their polishing of Saphyre; now have visages blacker than Coals. The Body, that is made of Earth, can stand upright, and look toward Heaven; the Soul, that came from Heaven, is become crooked, and looks toward Earth.

All are miserable, only some know it, and others know it not. As Socrates put from himself the repute of wisdom which the D • lphicke Oracle had ascribed to him; saying that here was all the difference betwixt him and others; He was not wise, and knew it: others were not wise, and knew it not. He that is escaped from the world, knows their unhappiness that be entangled with it, because he was so. But they that are entangled with it, know not the happiness of him that hath escaped it, because they never were so. Such were ye, but ye are sanctified.

2. The way to escape the worlds filthiness, is through knowledge. There is nothing in the world both more esteemed, and disesteemed, than knowledge: valued by them that have some, vilipended by them that have none. When the Cynicke Philosopher was asked in a kind of scorn, what was the reason that Philosophers haunted rich men, and not rich men Philosophers: he answered, because the one knew what they wanted, the other did not. Wise men want wealth, and feel it: rich men want wisdom, and are not sensible of it. Yet knowledge hath their well wishes, and faint desires, though not their endeavors. Wisdom is justified of her children; yea even of the children of folly. So a Pharaoh could say, Come let us work wisely. Even fools would pretend wisdom, and have their cunning absurdities pass for mature prudence, and the success for happiness. Herein Satan is subtler than they, who lays the plot to make them fools, by mistaking villainy for virtue. There is no poverty of estate, or consumption of body, to a lean starved soul; which neither knows, nor cares to know.

The small love which the world bears to wisdom, appears by their usage of the children of wisdom. Vt diligunt artifices, ita intelligent arts. They will give more to a Rider for breaking their horses, or to a Dancer for teaching them the measures; than to any professor of learning for informing their souls. So Aristippus answered him, that wondered why men should rather give to the poor, than to scholars; because they think themselves may come to be poor, never to be scholars. Of all the wants in the world, fewest complain the want of knowledge. The opinion of having enough, is one of the greatest causes of having so little. Yet the very Philosophers, by that knowledge of the world which they got from the light of nature, learned to contemn it: yea they despised him that did not despise it. They did not videre & invidere, envy the rich and potent, nor covet abundance. But rather Cernunt & spernunt, they saw enough to hate this world though they saw not where to find a better.

3. Indeed no knowledge can do this, but only that of our Lord Jesus Christ. I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. Paul was enriched with all manner of knowledge; he knew as much as the most learned Jew or Pagan; nothing could deliver him from the pollutions of the world, till he became a Christian. Alas, the reason of man doth but flowt the wisdom of God. Mocking the Apostles, they said, These men are full of new wine: which Peter confutes by affirming it to be but the third hour of the day; It was too early to be drunk. Yet that's not all: for fullness of wine doth take away speech and disable the tongue: we have known it spoil men of the use of their mother tongue, we never knew it teach men to speak languages which they never learned. Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle travelled and sought into every corner of the world, to confer with learned men: we never read that they went into Jury; yet there the best knowledge was to be had. They knew not that, how could they? The wandering sheep do not seek the shepherd, but the shepherd them. The lost goat did not seek the woman, but the woman it. Paul indeed was seeking for Christ; but how? to persecute him, not to believe on him. Christ must reveal himself to us, before we can set ourselves to seek him. And till that High Sheriff of the King of heaven comes with a writ of Ejection the world will hold his possession. The hands defiled with raking in the kennel of this world, cannot be cleansed but by washing them in the laver of regeneration. Nor can we wash in Christ's fountain till we know where he dwells, where that fountain runs. This is the only means of escaping the pollutions of the world; through the knowledge of Christ: he must wash us. If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. God hath ever shown himself a lover of cleanliness, as it appears by all those legal ablutions. He never shown it so much as when he vouchsafed to wash us himself, with his own royal hands; the bath being his own royal Blood. This, and nothing but this could get out the long contracted stains of our souls. Corruption had so sized into the very grain of our natures and whole compositions; that it must be blood, and warm blood, and the warm blood not of a mere man, but of him that is also God, that could fetch it out. None would wash us, we were so loathsome: none could purgeus, we were so leprous; but only Christ. Elisha bad Naaman, Go and wash: Christ came himself to wash us.

Here then we learn that only means, whereby we can escape inquinamenta mundi, the filthiness of sin; the sole fountain of the Lamb of God. Not all the mysteries of nature, not all the secretaries, the philosophers of the world, with their best Principles of Moralitie, could do this cure. No knowledge can purge the soul, but the knowledge of the Lord Jesus. Go wash in Jordan seven times, and thou shalt be clean. How did this appear to that natural Syrian as a mere scorn and mockery? Go wash? alas, what can water do? It can cleanse from foulness, not from leprosy. And why in Jordan? what differs that from other streams? And why just seven times? What virtue is either in that channel, or in that number? In what a chafe did he fling from the Prophets door? Am I come thus far to fetch a flowt? Could the Prophet find no man to play upon but me? Thus doth the reason of man fight against the ordinances of God. What is Baptism to purge the conscience? What is the sprinkling of a few drops on the face, to wash away corruption from the soul? One hath shed guiltless blood with his hands, let him wash those hands ten times a day in fresh waters, will it get out that murderous tincture from his conscience? Thus carnal minds despise the foolishness of preaching, the simplicity of the Sacraments, the homeliness of ceremonies, the seeming inefficacie of censures: they look upon Jordan with Syrian eyes. So Naaman goes on; If water would do it, what needed I to come so far for this remedy? Have I not often done this in vain? Have we not better streams at home, than any can be afforded in Israel? Are not Abana and Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of waters of Israel? Abana and Pharphar; two for one: Rivers, not waters: Of Damascus, a stately and incomparable City: they are, who dares deny it? Better, not as good: than the waters, not the rivers: All the waters, Jordan and all the rest: Of Israel, a beggarly region to Damascus. Alas, how wretched be the devices of men to the Institutions of God? How odious and damnable is it to make any comparison between them? One drop of Jordan, set apart by divine ordination, hath more virtue than all the streams of the world. Indeed Naaman might have washed there long enough in vain, if the Prophet had not sent him. Many a leper had bathed in that stream, and come forth no less unclean than he went in. It is the Word, the Ordinance of God that puts efficacy into those means, which of themselves could do nothing. Ista non tribuunt, quod per ista tribuitur. His institution hath put that virtue into the Sacramental Font; that it shall not more wash the face, than purge the soul.

Let us therefore get the knowledge of Christ, if we would be happy; and wash off our sins in his blood, that we may be holy. He that knows Christ, knows that the pardon of sins, the ablution of uncleanness, the perfection of righteousness, the peace of conscience, and the heavenly Inheritance come along with him: he cannot dote on the world, that knows Christ. Can we unfeignedly say with Peter, Lord Jesus, we have forsaken all and followed thee? We need not ask, what shall we have therefore? For God tells us, that he hath given us his Son, and with him all things. How sweetly do those Scriptures answer and satisfy one another, and both satisfy the heart of a Christian? Christ never comes alone, never empty, but his reward is with him. The shadow doth not more inseparably follow the body, than all blessings follow Christ. First, seek the kingdom of God, and these things shall be added to you: like an & caetera in the end of a sentence. Yet alas, though we know this, we do not seek Christ in the first and chiefest place. In this drought, one seeks rain in the new Moon, another in the turning of the wind, a third in this or that sign; none almost seek it in Christ; therefore God hath confounded all our signs and observations. Men may have temporal good things without Christ; but as the thief hath the true man's purse, or dogs the bread of the children. But we can want nothing, if we want not Christ: the prodigal doubteth not of Bread enough, if he can regain his father. John of Alexandria, surnamed the Almoner, did use yearly to make even with his revenues, and when he had distributed all to the poor, he thanked God that he had now nothing left him but his Lord and master Jesus Christ; to whom he longed to fly with unlimed and unentangled wings. When Alexander the great passed into Asia, he gave large donatives to his Captains and men of merit; insomuch that Permenion asked him; Sir, what do you keep for yourself? He answered; Hope. Crosses, calamities, poverty may take from us all the goods of this world; or our charity may give them away: the worldlings ask us what we have left for ourselves; we answer, only Jesus Christ.

4. That knowledge of Christ which is not joined with faith and obedience, repentance and amendment of life, cannot deliver us from perishing with the world. If it were enough to know, the devil would lose abundance of clients and customers. There is a floating knowledge swimming in the brain, like a piece of corke on the top of the water. Wicked men understand good things per alienam speciem, not in their true forms: Scientiâ disciplinariâ, not intuitivâ. They are sent them as Pharaohs dream, which they shall never be able to understand. The mysteries of Religion appear to them like a dim taper, whereof they are still disputing, picking out problems and paradoxes and subtleties: and so darken the Truth by discoursing of it, like a man that puts out the candle with snuffing it. They read and mind not, or mind and understand not, or understand and remember not, or remember and practice not. There be some whose speeches be witty, while their carriage is weak: whose deeds are incongruities, while their words are apothegmes. It is not worth the name of knowledge, that may be heard only, and not seen. Good discourse is but the froth of wisdom: the pure and solid substance of it is in well framed actions. These things if ye know, happy are ye if ye do them. Knowledge is but a pre-requisite to the main of obedience, a stair to the turret of happiness. That was Christ's farewell-close, with a deep impression driving home his former counsels: like the last strong and loud knole of a bell, that puts an end to all the foregoing peals: a Sermon that did put life into all his other Sermons; urging the life and practice of them: like that Blessed are they that hear the Word of God, and keep it; with which we commonly conclude our Sermons. We say of Statutes and Proclamations, there is a multitude of them: but there should be one Statute, one Proclamation made, to enforce the keeping of all the rest: so that one Text binds us to the observation of all others. Therefore he washed the Disciples feet, and shown them an example of doing: as if there was not so much need of teaching them what they knew not, as of pressing them to do what they knew. Because knowledge would not serve the turn, he first does the things, and then expresseth his intent. These things it is not enough to know, but to do.

Knowledge and practice together bless a Christian, both in his cardinal virtues, and arch-mysteries of faith; far more than the knowing and doing of all the natural, moral, or manual sciences in the world. Knowledge separated from obedience, doth but enflame a man's reckoning, and help him to a greater measure of condemnation. If I had not come and spoken to them, they had not b • d sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin. Ignorance may seem to be a cloke for errors: but knowledge takes away that cloke, and leaves them naked of all excuses. Not that ignorance can acquit men; Excusat à tanto, non à toto. It will not justify me, to say I did not know that I did sin; when I sinned in neglecting to know. Ignorantia mollit, non tollit rationem peccati. Antecedent ignorance will not save a man; much more will consequent ignorance condemn him. God will not favor a man, because he hath studied hard, and known much: but rather the more punish him, because he hath known good, and done evil.

I deny not that many sins are committed after knowledge: the lusts of the flesh, like the vapors of a replete stomach rising up and damping the brain, often obscure the beams of knowledge: during which violence and distemper, David and Peter fall into fearful sins. But the willing practice of known sins, and repentance, can never stand together; no more than fire and water can agree in the same subject. As a hot liver commonly makes a cold stomach: so the unnatural heat of continued sins, makes but a cold repentance. There is a deep well in the yard: shall a man therefore willfully set his house on fire, because he knows where to fetch water to quench it? Alas, the fire suddenly takes, and ragingly goes on: but the Well is deep, or the bucket is small, and can bring up a little at once. The well of thy heart is deep, it is a great way to fetch it: the skrew or pulley is unwieldy, there is much labor to draw it. Yea, God must both put water into the well, sorrow into the heart; and help thee to pump it out, extract tears from thine eyes; as he did supply David and Peter from his infinite springs of grace; or this burning will not be quenched.

Rather let us labor to avoid sin by our knowledge, than venture to sin upon the conceit of repentance. No wise man will make himself sick, though he knows he hath a very good medicine. They be desperate Mountebankes that wound their own flesh, to advance the sale of their balsams. Alas, that men should be skillful in the history of Christ, and willful in their rebellions against Christ: that they should have the Bible in their brains, and blasphemy in their lips. Like Posts, that bring truth in their letters, and lies in their mouths. Alas, that men should frequent the Temples, and flock to sermons, and yet be never the better in their lives: as boys go into the water, to play and paddle there only, not to wash and be clean. But let all them that have the knowledge of Christ, give obedience to him, that they may be saved by him.

If they are again entangled.] This is the Supposition; where I considered, Facilitatem relabendi: If; it is no impossible thing. Yea, the commonness proves it too easy. How many have given up their names to Christ, and slunke away from his service? How many be Satan's subjects, and yet God's pensioners? How many have taken his press-money, and revolted to the enemy? Demas had been with Paul, professed with Paul, labored with Paul, yet for this present world he forsook Paul, and Gospel, and Christ himself. Indeed he that loves God for himself, and goodness because it is goodness: can never turn from that goodness, from that fountain of goodness, God. Turn him loose into the world, trust him in the throng of temptations; his heart is so filled with Christ, that there is no room for a strange love to enter. But they that loved God only for his temporal blessings, fail him, when those blessings fail them. Mutinous soldiers; no longer pay, no longer fight; as that desperate mercenary said, he came not to fight for his country, he came to fight for his money. Like the Law, Logic, and the Swiss; they are for his service, that gives them the best ready wages. Here Satan takes his hint, to usurp upon the children of perdition. Religion bring crosses; Ecclesia est haeres Crucis: they find their devotion answered with tribulation; and cannot be quiet, because they seem to be good. Now steps in the Devil: Why should you buy misery with want; when as you may want misery? Why will you embrace certain cares, in hope of uncertain comforts? Why do you take pains to be poor, when you may be rich with ease? Here they that have not the grace, nor the face, to give the Devil the Lye, throw the Plough into the hedge, and will not wait till Harvest; but lay hold on these new offers of the world, and for a Messe of Pottage sell their Patrimony.

There be some to whom God doth not so much as give an Evangelical Call, and they never look toward Heaven. For where he takes away the Key, it is a sign that he never means to open the door. There be some that have been called, and answered that Call, and made a show of following it, bearing up towards the celestial Kingdom; when on a sudden the world whistles, shows them their old Love, newly dressed and painted and trick'd up with fresh colors. Back the fool runs, flings by Counsaile, treads upon Conscience, trips up the feet of Reason, and shows Religion his heels, if he does not kick at it with contempt. Wherefore let him that thinks he standeth, take heed lest he fall. Some think they stand, but do not; they look to be saved, and scarce can tell who should save them. They examine their conscience, as a favorable Judge doth the malefactor whom he means to acquit; his very questions are so indulgent, that they teach him an answer: and then he concludes; I find no fault in this man, let him pay his Fees, and be gone. Thus they are like a man in a dream, that thinks he is travelling abroad, doing this or that business; but waking, he finds himself fast in his bed. We all dwell in a house ready to fall, sail in a ship full of leaks. Perhaps we do not stand; or have stood, and are fallen; are fallen, and know not how to rise; rise, and are ready to fall again. Am I a Dog, that I should do thus, saith Hazael to the Prophet? As if he would never do it while he continued man; count him a Dog, when it comes to that. Yet by his leave, whether man or Dog, he did it. None know what they shall be, few know what they are. There is no Salt, but may lose his savor; no Flower, but may lose his sent; no Beauty, but may be defaced; no Fruit, but may be blasted; no Light, but may be eclipsed; no State, but may be changed; no Soul, but may be corrupted.

Man goes forth in the morning weak and unarmed, to encounter with Powers and Principalities. To fight this combat, he takes a Second with him, and that's his Flesh; a familiar enemy, a friendly traitor: the Devil comes against him with his Second too, and that's the World. Soone doth the flesh revolt to the world, and both stick to Satan: so here is terrible odds; Three to One. Besides all this, the enemy hath gotten all the advantages; as the Hill, the Sun, the Wind. The Hill; for man is climbing upwards to Heaven, and Satan comes down upon him with the stronger violence. The Sun; for all the glorious beams of honor, pleasure, wealth, are on his side, dazzling the eyes of man. The Wind; storms and blasts of raging Persecution march under his Banner; all against poor man. Now if he have no other succor but himself, he is surprised in an instant, and the adversary gets the day. But he that truly knoweth Christ, comes not into the field without this Captain: and then, If God be with us, who can be against us? Besides, he hath a Shield that is, armor of proof, darts of fire cannot pierce it; an invincible Faith: if he do but lie under this Target, he is safe. Divers cannot cunningly handle the Sword, yet they can hold up the Buckler. If thou be not able to give Satan blow for blow, yet hold up thy Shield; that shall ward all his blows. But when a man is besieged in an impregnable Fort, where he hath enough both of provision to subsist, and munition and furniture to defend: yet if through a coward pusillanimitie, he shall leave his Hold, and think to save himself by flight; he worthily falls into their hands, who otherwise had fallen under his. He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler. That is a Fort sure enough: he that forsakes it, deserves to be forsaken of it.

I conclude: If we forsake not Christ, he will never forsake us: it can never be shown by any observation, that he fell off first. Prior in amore, posterior in odio. But that it is easy to forsake him, for the present sweetness of gain and pleasure in this world, too lamentable experience proves it. Thousands for scores follow after temporals, with neglect of eternal things: and souls that came from heaven, that should return to heaven, are incurvate to the earth. As if Nature were become preposterous, the world turned upside down, and Satan had got the day of Christ. This Diogenes unhappily expressed, when he was asked how he would be buried: he answered, with his face downward: for within a while, he said, the world would be turned upside down, and then he should lie right. Let it be our endeavor to turn the right side upward again, to set our souls in the due position, trampling the world under the feet of disdain, and lifting up our spirits to heaven, which was made to receive all those that seek and love the Lord Jesus.

The difficulty of recovering them, after their relapse, follows; and is expressed by two Metaphors, Implicantur, Superantur: They are entangled, and overcome.

[unspec 1] They are entangled:] As Birds are caught in an evil Net; where the more they struggle to get out, the faster they stick. Or be taken with Lime-bushes; where those feathers ensnare their bodies, which before did carry their bodies: nor can they save their lives, but by losing their feathers. The world sticks fast to men's hearts, and by embracing, imprisons them: the Lime that holds them, is Satan's temptation; the feathers by which it holds them, are their own covetous affections. These loose wings betray their souls: and if ever they save their souls, it must be by parting with their feathers, by being stripped of their riches. Give all thou hast to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven. Alas, his feathers were limed, his soul so entangled with the world, that he could not possibly mount up so high. I have married a Wife, and I cannot come: No wonder; he was wedded to the world, tied in the conjugal bonds of affection to sin, the strongest contract on earth; he cannot come. You may as well call a Deere out of his Toyle, a prisoner out of his Jail, yea, a dead man out of his Grave; he cannot come.

Satan hath several tyes for several sinners. The adulterer is tied by the eye, his mistresses looks enchant him. The drunkard is tied by the throat, he cannot come till he have his load; and then he is so loaden, that he cannot come. The swearer is tied by the tongue: it were well if he were tongue-tied. The Epicure is tied by the teeth: a disease he had from his grandmother. The slothful is tied by the foot: the lazy Gout hath bound him to the Chair of wickedness. The covetous is tied by the Purse-strings: and he would hate even Pleasure it self, if he should find it a Cut-purse. The superstitious Imageworshipper is tied by the knees, and he cannot rise from his Pupper-Deities. The treacherous Jesuit is tied by the neck with a Romish chain: it were well if his neck were tied to the due place. The voluptuous is tied with a twinethred of vanity, as a Natural is tied with a Rush, and thinks himself in durance. Satan hath entangled these with the world, that you may as well bid mountains remove, or bid them remove mountains, as forsake worldliness: they cannot come. The Devil tyes worldly things to the affections, which are the feet of the soul: as the Faulconer, when he hath mann'd his Hawk to his service, hangs Bells at her legs, th • t whithersoever they fly out, he may know whe •• to find them again: it is but casting up his Lure, and they stoop to his fi • t he presently hath them. I have bought five yoke of Oxen, and I go to prove them: as if himself had been one of the Teame, tied up in the Geeres of his Ox • n; he must be excused. It is Saint Gregory's counsel; Sic teneas quae mundi sun • , ut per ca quae mundi sunt non tenearis. Good men will not bind the world to themselves, and b • d men bind themselves to the world. Terrena res possideatur, non possideat: sint temporalia in usu, aeterna in desiderio: illa in itinere, haec ut in termino. Gehazi's soul is bound up in the bags of Naaman's money: But what followed? Gehazi's flesh shall be bound up in the scurfe of Naaman's Leprosy. The sinner hath travel, labor, sorrow, and care; these be the strings of his Purse, and he keeps them: but for the Purse it self, the Riches he hath gathered, these God will give to another; even the Purse it self.

Bonaventure compares him to the Mole, in four respects. First, he is black, as a Mole: White is the color of Innocence; the faithful have white garments: Black is the contrary, even the color of iniquity. Secondly, he is blind, as a Mole; Ignorance hath deprived him of his sight. In a contrariety to God, who sees clearly in all places: The darkness and the light are both alike to him: night and day are all one, for he sees in neither. Thirdly, he is buried, as a Mole: all his hoards and heaps of wealth are so many sepulchers to his soul, wherein he digs his own grave. Fourthly, he is preposterous, as a Mole: which is still cast ng up the earth, that it may fall on her back, and cover her from the Sun. So h • lays himself under his riches, and interposeth the earth betwixt his soul and heaven: all his goods are so many strong Tarryers to him. When the Serpent catcheth his prey, he so clasps and winds about it with his flexile and folding body, that he holds it sure. Satan, that old Serpent, so twines himself • bout the world-addicted soul, and his spirits like a Bed of Snakes so entangle it, that nothing but Thunder can dissolve them. There is no evasion out of this Labyrinth, except the Spirit of God give us the Clew of grace. With pleasure • nd e • se sinners come in; but no pains, no industry, no wisdom of man can find the way out.

The poor sheep follows her pasture, and suspects no danger: but on the s • dden she is so entangled with the briars and brambles, that she is glad with some l • sse of her wool, yea scratches of her skin, to be gone; and not seldom cannot do so, without the help of the shepherd. It is happy for us, if with loss of our fl • ece, of our flesh, we can be extricated from these temptations, and fo • lish Lusts, which drown so many in perdition. The Israelites were set by Pharaoh • o gather Straw for themselves, but not to make Bricks for themselves: and when they had done their best, were beaten for not doing better. So Satan, that merciless Tyran, and swarthy Egyptian, employs his slaves to gather Straw • nd Thatch, the Trash of this world; with all which they shall never build a house of rest or harbor for themselves, and at last be scourged with impartial torments. A great fish devours a less; a greater, him; and he again becomes food for the greatest: yet at last this greatest is caught, with Hooke or Net. They be fools, that sacrifice to their own Nets, with which they have caught others: but they are mad men, that sacrifice to the Nets of others, with which they are caught themselves. Yet these desperate prisoners love their bondage, and find such sweetness in their entangling, that they desire not to be delivered. Only when ought of their sensual delights is taken from them, they mourn and blubber; and bestow that sorrow upon their shame, which they should have ••• nt on their sin. I have heard, that when a man is wounded with • Sword, look what medicine is proper to the Patient, if it be applied to the Sword, it sh •• l care him: anoint the weapon, and heal the wound. (I will not rack my Faith, to believe it.) The weapon that hath wounded us, is the world; the medicine that can only cure it, is hearty sorrow. Shall we grieve for worldly losses? This were to apply the medicine to the wrong place; barely to anoint the weapon, whiles the wound rankles to death: for worldly sorrow causeth death. Not let us apply it to our heart, mourn for our sin, detest and abandon the world, and fixe our confidence in God; then shall we be healed through Jesus Christ.

[unspec 2] And overcome.] Some may say, this Theme of Intangling hath almost entangled me, as if I could not tell how to get you out of this argument: loe, now we are delivered. And yet me thinks I am not sooner got out of this Forest, but presently I see a Lion, even that roaring Lion, with extended jaws, ready to devour; a malicious and merciless enemy marching forward, to the conquest of souls: and my very next step falls upon that conquest, Arma virumque cano: with the subversion of worldlings, They are overcome.

That which puts a man from the use of his Reason, or a Christian from his exercise of Religion, overcomes him. So we say of the Drunkard, he is overcome with Wine, when it shall get the better and upper hand of his wit. The doting Lover is overcome with fancy, when it hath blinded his Reason. The ambitious are overcome with the desire of honor; so that they are not their own men. Of all, the worldlings are basely overcome: for they think they have the world in a string, when the world hath them in a strong chain. This worse than beastly appetite (for not many beasts desire more than will serve their turns) is like a violent stream, which beginning from a small current, vires acquirit eundo, takes in many emergent waters by the way, till it become a mighty torrent, bearing down all before it; yet at last it self is swallowed up into the Sea. No man that warreth, entangleth himself with the affairs of this life. For implicando se involvitur, involvendo detinetur, & detinendo superatur. No wonder, if he that is entangled, be soon overcome. David being to encounter with Goliath, in that unequal combat, is arrayed with the warlike habit of a King: thus furnished, he might look upon himself, and think his outside glorious. But when he offered to walk and move, he found these Arms not so strong as unweildie, more for show than use, that they rather hindered than advantaged him. Off he puts those accoutrements of honor, and craves pardon to go in no clothes but his own: he had rather be a homely Conqueror, than a glorious Spoile. He takes his Staff instead of the Spear, his Shepherds Scrip for a Brigandine; i • stead of the Sword, he takes his Sling; and for Darts and Iavelines, five smooth stones out of the Brooke: thus got he the victory. So the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty, through God. Not the policy, the succors, the abundance of earthly things; these do but entangle us, and rather disable our resistance, than help us to the conquest. But the wisdom, the comfort, the powerful grace of the holy Spirit, these be our Arms; with these we shall beat down our enemies.

Cyrus said, that his poor soldiers were his best soldiers; for they had nothing to lose, but there was something they hoped to gain. Wealth is the rich man's strong Castle, yet that Castle will not hold out a long siege; death will demolish it, if it be not done to his hands before he comes. Hezekiah shown the Ambassadors of Babylon his treasure: what came of it? Behold, all shall be carried away. It was the incredible wealth which Cleopatra shown Caesar, whereby she thought to overcome him, that brought Caesar into Egypt, to make himself master of it. As when Croesus, for his glory, shown Solon his huge mass of Gold; Solon told him, If another come that hath better iron than you, he will be master of all this Gold. Any man that travels toward Jericho, may fall among thieves: yea how should he avoid them? Poverty is a thief, to steal away wealth; sickness is a thief, to steal away health; death is a thief, to steal away life; the world it self is a thief, to steal away the world. But we must thank God for that which so overcomes us, that it overcomes the love of the world in us.

There be some that profess an utter abdication of the world, as if it and they were not cater-cosins; ignorant Votaries, and patch'd Cistertians; who do so want holiness, that they place holiness in want. Yet the receivers of their rents, revenues, and in-comes, know full well they are no beggars. Jesuits indeed profess no willful poverty; yea their main end is, next being mischievous, to be rich. Insomuch that one of their own Church adviseth the good Capuchine, whensoever he is to carry a Jesuit over a brook, to examine his pockets before he take him on his back, lest he break his rule in carrying coin about him; and be forced against the charity that was in Saint Francis; for saving his vow, to slip him down into the water. It is their indignation, that they cannot persuade all men to abjure all earthly felicity, that they might engross it to themselves. They have gulled many rich men out of their estates, many Nobles out of their honors, many wise men out of their wits; yea they have attempted to persuade Princes out of their royalties; they would be kings themselves: but they have not yet prevailed with them. Greatly may Religion sway a Prince, yet not so as to leave a Crown. We read of divers that have transgressed, yea left all Religion for a Crown; but of very few that have left a Crown for Religion. Yea most Princes hold it a point of Religion, never to leave a Crown, till a Crown leaves them. Such devout beggars be these mortified Papists, that they would beggar all the world.

Intangled and overcome,] put them both together. It is the depth of misery to fall under the curse of Cham, a servant of servants. Divitis servi, maxim servi. We remember how Israel blessed Issachar; comparing him to a strong Ass. When one wished the child like the father; Cato replied, is this a blessing, or a curse? So was this of Jacob, a blessing or a curse? Some Hebrews understand it of their great labor and study in the Law: but we find few such asses among our Lawyers. Others thus, they saw they dwelt in a fat soil, without lack of pleasures, and therefore like Asses only plied with provender, without minding their burdens. Such Asses be they that are overcome with the world; they refuse no burden that Satan can lay on their backs, not the most unreasonable sins, so he do not abridge them of their provender, the unbounded swinge of their sensual appetites. It is true indeed, that Satan doth too often even win the godly to commit sin, but never to love sin: and when he hath done but that, he may put all his gains in his eye. For their very falls make them afterward stand the surer: and their yielding to one assault, for scorn and indignation of the foil, redoubles their valor to the resisting of a thousand: so that at once, he is grown weaker, and they stronger. That which was sent and suborned by our spiritual adversaries to betray us, in an happy change fights for us; and is driven rather to rebel, than wrong us.