Commentary on 2 Peter
3. Let us consider, that these Seducers help to overthrow us, and cast us down; but what help is there in them to raise us up? There they leave us; in a forlorn condition, as the Priests left Judas after his treason. What is that to us? See thou to that. Or as the old Prophet of Bethel left the Prophet of Judah: He could take the pains to fetch the man of God into sin, but he will not bear him company one foot at his departure. He had been the occasion of his fault, but he was loath to be enwrapped in his judgment. All the kindness he will do for him, is to interre him in his own sepulcher, and to weep over him. It is a cruel courtesy to kill a man, and then help him to his grave; to betray him with our lips, and then to bedew him with our tears: The Prophet had needed no such friend if he had not met with such enemy. So the Romists teach their followers to direct their prayers to Saints: but for themselves, when they come to die, then Christ, and none but Christ. When they have brought their Proselytes whither they would, then let them shift for themselves. The mischievous guides of wickedness leave a man, when they have led him to his bane: as familiar Devils forsake their Witches, when they have brought them once into fetters.
Bewere least you fall from your own steadfastness.] After all these premised particulars, for the better method in handling the summary Doctrine, I will set down certain Theses, conclusions, or grounds; which either are radically in the Text, or naturally without force may be derived from it. First, men may fall from their own steadfastness, or else this Cavete had been in vain: for no man is charged to beware of that which cannot happen. Secondly, there is a proneness in the nature of man to fall: the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak: therefore there is great need of this Caution, Ne excidatis. Thirdly, If any fall away, it is their own fault; they are not compelled, nor thrown down by God, but they fall of themselves: it is by their own weakness, or their own willfulness: Another thing implied in the Cavete: for if the Almighty power should do it, all the Cavete's in the world could not withstand it. Fourthly, If God suffer some to fall, that have stood, yet this is no impeachment to his Justice: because he leaves none without means of standing, or hope of rising. In the Text, they have knowledge granted; therefore they may stand: there be Seducers forewarned of; therefore they may fall: and the fall is not pronounced desperate; thefore they may rise again. Fifthly, Men may fall far; from their own steadfastness, that is, from that measure of stability which for the present they have, yet not totally, so as to have no firmness at all; to lose even the very foundation and principles of truth, or to suffer an utter eradication of grace: Or if so much, so far, so desperately they fall; yet this lapse may not be final: the grace of God is not debarred them, nor the gate of mercy shut against them, nor is the sentence of irrevocable damnation passed upon them. Sixthly, It is dangerous to fall at any time; but then worst, when Chistians have stood sometime in the truth; as these to whom our Apostle writes: To them a Cavete ne excidatis, is especially needful: for the nearer heaven, the greater fall to the earth. Seventhly, Lastly the summary use, the principal scope, the main antidote to prevent all this, is a constant Perseverance unto the end.
1. Men may fall from their own steadfastness. Though it be true; Abundance cautela non nocet: yet there is no need of warning, where is no possibility of danger. Now this falling can be incident to none but Christians: for they that never were up, cannot be said to fall: Qui iacet in terram, non habet unde cadat. Nay not only to Christians at large, in the latitude of all that are baptized: for in that number, we shall find abundance of heretics, no fewer hypocrites, and innumerable ungodly persons: some not informed in their Iudgments, the rest not reformed in their lives: these cannot be said to fall, for they never stood. But we must restrain it to converts, such as are called into Christ, have embraced the Gospel, graced their faith with good works, and conformed their demeanor to piety. Yet that these may fall from their own steadfastness, there is possibility: that they do fall so, it is great pity. Oh that this point were not to be proved by too dear experience. How many have fallen, even with all the helps of standing about them? Judas was continually in the presence of Christ: he heard his Sermons, he saw his miracles, he tasted his bounty, did eat at his table, even that Sacramental bread: yet he fell. Who would think that the devil durst enter into Christ's own College? Or that any of his College should entertain the devil? So in Noah's octonary family, one was a son of Belial: he saw the Judgment of the flood upon all the world: by a miraculous mercy himself escaped: he was at his fathers Sacrifice: yet he fell. In the little family of Lot, one fell off: she was by being Lots wife, incorporated into the house, and made partaker of the blessings of faithful Abraham: she was brought out of the Idolatrous world, kept safe in Egypt, preserved from the sin of Sodom, from the fire of Sodom, delivered from the captivity of the five kings, from the perishing of the five cities: how gracious were all these mercies? what abundant means, and strong helps had she to stand? Yet she fell. She was brought out of Sodom, warned of the ensuing danger; had Angels to go before her, her husband to go with her daughters, to attend and follow her: she was gotten to the entrance of Zoar: Yet that place she made choice of to perish in, which God had picked out to save her. Thus she sinned, in respect of her self, desperately: in respect of the Angels, contemptuously: in respect of her husband and daughters, scandalously: in respect of God and his mercies, unthankfully: and fell away in the wickedness of a willful defection. There were but twelve in Christ's family, and one of them fell away: but eight in Noah's family, and one of them fell away: but four in Lots family, and one of them fell away. Ham was preserved in the Ark yet he fell. Lots wife was reprieved by the Angels, yet she fell: who would not fear, if one may perish in the company of Angels? Yea, Judas was under the Tuition of Christ himself; yet he fell. There is then a possibility of falling.
For use and application, here, it is but having recourse to our Apostles Caution: we may fall, therefore let us look to our standing. We may be led away: the devil will venture to try: therefore let us not budge, not give him one foot of ground: but if he beckons one way, be we sure to take the contrary: There have been some that stood in as little fear of falling, as now they are in hope of rising: Pride and wantonness was the cause of their fall: faith and humility must keep us upright. When we remember what we have been, we have just cause Erubescere, to be a shamed: so when we consider what we may be we have no less cause contremiscere, to be afraid. We know our beginnings, we do not foreknow our endings. We may be certain that thus we are: but that thus we shall be, is above our assurance. We see how much of our way we have past: we see not how much is left, or whether we shall be able to hold out to the end. As we have cause to pray; O God, when we are old, and gray-headed, forsake us not: so to gird up our loins, and redouble our strength, that we may persevere. For it is nothing to begin, unless we continue: nor to continue, unless we do it unto the end.
2. There is a proneness in the nature of man to fall. Not that when we stand, we are held up by force: for God offers no violence to the will of man, but sweetly disposeth it to desire the own good. Yet the Second Adam hath not so far cast out the first, but that the new engraffed siens doth relish of the old stock; and still there is a a tang of original corruption left in us: as a vessel, after much rinsing and cleansing, will smell of the first seasoning. I am carnal, sold under sin. Sold? This is not such a sale, as wherein there is a seller a buyer, a thing sold, and the price: So in Adams selling, Satan was the buyer, Innocence and heaven sold, and the price was an apple. So Ahab sold himself to Satan for a slave, to work wickedness, by his wives instigation, and setting him on to the bargain. Paul was not sold thus: but there be two kinds of slaves: one that selleth himself into captivity, and willingly obeyeth a tyrant: another that is sold into servitude against his will, as Joseph was sold by his brethren: and so was S t . Paul sold. Selling is sometimes taken for a simple tradition, without any price. Ye have have sold yourselves for naught, and ye shall be redeemed without money. But this selling and buying must be understood in a different sense. In the Sale, the price is Nought; but it is naught in respect of God, for he had no honor by it: no gain redounded to him: And yet while they sold themselves, they sold not their own, but God's: and in reason, the owner of the thing sold should have the price. So in the purchase or Redemption, the price is nothing: that is, nothing to them: it cost them nothing: they paid not one penny for their own deliverance. But in respect of God, the price was not nothing: for the redemption of their soul is precious: It cost him much; even as much as it could cost him; the precious blood of his dear Son.
Sinners out of Christ are sold two ways. First, they are sold in the common market of man, when Adam sold himself and all his posterity. Next they have made a new bargain with Satan, and sold themselves over to him again for the pleasures of the flesh. Thus did Ahab, and Judas, and Demas willfully sell themselves, though long ago they repented the match. But Paul does not speak there of himself, as in the person of a natural man: for every man considered in nature, is sold under sin: And there be some that have abandoned and prostituted themselves to sin: so that as Jude calls them Arbores his mortuas, Trees twice dead: so we may call these animas bis venditas, souls twice sold. The buyer hath fine and recovery upon them. But S t . Paul speaks in the person of a regenerate, spiritual, supernatural and sanctified man: meaning that no man upon earth, in what measure so veler holy, can so emancipate himself from that captivity wherein Adam hath inthraulled him, but that he is still enwrapped in sin, and sold under sin. There be two kinds of servitude: Some are slaves because they are so borne, being the children of slaves and bond-parents: Others have sold themselves, and willfully become bondmen. Like to the first are the regenerate, for they are borne servile, being conceived in sin. The unregenerate are like to the other, for they have sold themselves into bondage. Yet may the very regenerate be said to be sold two ways. First, In regard of original corruption; for which they may thank their first parents; if at least it be worth their thanks. Secondly, Because the embers, the spawn, the leaven of that original sin remains in them, and makes them subject to many infirmities: so that they cannot do what they would, but they too often do what they would not.
The conclusion then is plain, that there is still a proclivitie left in our nature to be led away into error. The seed of all sin is within us, therefore even of apostasy. A good scholar, that will ply his book in his Masters presence, yet may fly out when his back is turned. The bird that hath long contented herself with her cage, feeding and singing there; yet if she spies the door open, will whip out, and fly abroad. Our nature is Like a deceitful bow: which when it is bent to the full, except it be followed hard, till it be sure and fast; starts back again, and is as far off as ever. It is called the flesh: and such flesh is it as will Sine sale putrescere: if it be not corned, it will of it self bring forth corruption.
For use of this conclusion: we find here just cause to deplore our miserable estate by nature, and to consider how deeply our first parents have engaged us: so that (not to let go the former metaphor) we are all even sold under sin. We exclaim against any man that hath sold a city, or a country, or an army, to the enemy: but Adam sold the world. He sold his children, and children's children; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: he sold all the Patriarchs, and all the Prophets, and all the Princes of the earth: he sold all the Apostles, Peter and Paul, and both their Regiments, the glorious hemispheres of the world, Jews and Gentiles: he sold all, even the dearest friends that God had among the sons of men: even the Disciple whom the Lord loved, and the mother of the Lord herself, whom all generations call blessed. He sold his wife, yea he sold himself: and if Christ had not provided for himself by a miraculous generation, Adam had sold him too. If Christ had been conceived in original sin, he must have died for himself: nay he could not have died for himself, but must have needed another Savior. Such an unthrift had we to our Father: and we take after him, for in this respect we are all prodigal children.
But now what was the price of us? He sold all; what had he for it? When the Patrimony is at sale, the children look for portions. Alas, he had nothing for us, and nothing could he leave us; but Sin, Shame, and Sorrow: that is; the portion of all the sons of men. We complain now that land will not sell, that the price of it is fallen: that twenty years purchase is come down to sixteen. Yet sure, as cheap as it is now, it was cheaper at first; both land, and Landlord. What was Paradise sold for? What was the whole earth fold for? what was mankind fold for? what had Eve for her part? It could be but a little fruit: so little, that the Scripture will not tell us what kind of fruit it was: yet she had something. What had Adam for his part? Yea, for the whole? Nothing besides a morsel of fruit; except it were any content to him in pleasing his wives humor: as Jerome thinks, he so dearly loved his wife, that he did eat, lest otherwise she should have been discontented. Yet if he had that satisfaction he had something. But now after both these, what had we for our part? He sold our Inheritance as well as his own: it is fit, we should have somewhat for our right. Now what fell to our share? What had we for earth, and heaven too? For Innocence and happiness too? Alas, nothing could accrue to us by this sale, but sin and woe. Adam sinned, and we suffer. Before we had any possession of felicity, or could claim any interest in it, we had (in him) forfeited it. We had a punishment, before we had a being: God was displeased with me, before I was I. I was built up not fifty years ago, in my mothers womb: and I was cast down almost six thousand years ago, in Adams loins. We all here are borne in the last age of the world; yet died in the first. This is that portion left us by our parents; original sin, and a corrupt inclination of our nature to transgress, to be led away into error: and the most holy souls upon earth cannot be quite rid of it. O wretched men that we are, who shall deliver us from the body of this death? We are prone to fall.
3. If any fall away from their own steadfastness, it is their own fault. A Deo est quod statur, à nobis quod ruitur. If God did cast us down, our Cavete would do no good, there were no remedy, we must fall. But seeing there are but three that can do it; the Devil, his engines, or ourselves; the Cavete is requisitely put upon us: and if we do hit it right, it will save us. But if we will fall for want of circumspection, it is in vain for us to blame any but our selves. Saul would have put his transgression upon the people, but it would not do: God would not take that for an excuse. Adam would have discharged his sin upon his wife: but God finds Adam guilty, and so judgeth him. Thy way and thy doings have procured these things unto thee: They be our own, and we must answer to them, and answer for them. We may have leaders into temptation: but it is our fault if we follow them. Nay, to come closer home, do not we tempt ourselves? Satan is not the sole cause of evil. The fowler sets his glass, spreads his net, whistles like the bird: yet cannot all this make the fowl come into his net whether she will or no. If we had not pliable ears, and flexible affections, the Sirens might sing in vain. But there is something within us, that befriends temptation: some combustible matter, which that fire soon takes, and will soon take that fire. If we were pure Crystal glasses, that would endure no poison, it were some security: but naturally Satan is not more ready to offer, than we to receive his infection. So that the Apostles Cavete is of use at every turn: As God hath set Timete upon the very porch of our house, and made it The beginning of all our wisdom. Vis in timore securus esse? Securitatem time. The only way to be secure in fear, is to fear security. So saint Paul helps them out with their Si permanseritis, by this advise; Be not high minded, but fear.
So then there is somewhat intra nos, quod contra nos: we may challenge others for misleading us; but Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust: which is not any one appetite, but the fountain of all corrupt affections. And this remains in the most regenerate: There is a law in our members, warring against the law of our mind. How holy so ever we are: yet Secundum repugnantia principia, repugnantia habemus studia. Our own feet carry us to sin, and we love the journey. Our own affections seduce us, and we run into errors by our own wills. We are not only sold in Adam; there begun the mischief▪ but we have confirmed the sale; by further selling over ourselves unto vanity. By him we are sold to original sin: to actual and habitual sins, by ourselves. We, we have been our own undoers. You have sold yourselves; and your own immortal happiness. Immortality was sold in that first contract between man and sin. We talk of twenty years purchase: but what number of years was the price of immortality: It is our eternity: God hath another manner of Eternity in him, even an whole eternal day: an eternal forenoon, and an eternal afternoon too: for as he never shall have end, so he never had beginning. We have an eternal afternoon, in our immortality: for we shall no more see an end, than God hath seen a beginning. Millions of years, multiplied by millions, make not up a minute to this Eternity. And yet this we sold; we, to witness that the fault is in ourselves. And what did we sell it for? When that tormented worldling in Hell valued one drop of water at so high a rate; what would he have given for a river? How poor a clod of the Earth is a Manor? How poor an inch, a Shire? How poor a span, a Kingdom? How poor a pace, the whole Earth? And yet we have sold our bodies, and souls, and consciences, and Heaven, and Eternity, for a few grains of this dust.
Whom then can we blame for our falling? we have sold ourselves, and all our ability of goodness. Do you ask for what? Our first father sold us cheap: but we sell ourselves cheaper. Our selves, all ourselves: our bodies to lust and intemperance, our souls to pride and malice, our consciences to hypocrisy and unfaithfulness, and all this for nothing. For sin is but a privation, and privations are nothing, What fruit had ye then in those things, whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. That we got by it, is but barrenness, shame, and death. Barrenness is a privation of fruit; shame a privation of innocence, and death a privation of life: For these privations we sell ourselves, and these privations are nothing, positively nothing. But hath not the covetous man gold and riches for his soul? would he sell his conscience for nothing, though he esteem it nothing worth? He may have gold, and want comfort: riches, without the use of them: as the miser's curse is, Penuria in Penaria; hunger in plenty: and what is hunger more than nothing, unless it be worse than nothing? The adulterer satisfies his filthy lust: he hath his pleasure; therefore he sells himself for something. To night indeed sin may look like a purchase, like a treasure: but ask him tomorrow how he likes his bargain: then his awaked conscience will confess, that he hath sold himself for nothing: for weakness in his limbs, for darkness in his understanding, for emptiness in his purse, for absence of grace in his soul. Now weakness, darkness, emptiness and absence, are privations, and privations are nothing. All the name of substance that sin takes, is that it is a heavy and intolerable burden. My iniquities are a burden too heavy for me. All the treasure that is in it, is that Treasure of wrath, against the day of wrath. All the positive reality, that it is a vexation to the conscience. Now vexation doth but deprive us of peace, a burden of ease, and wrath of comfort: And this is a fearful privation, of the grace of God here, and of the face of God hereafter: a privation so much worse than nothing, as that they upon whom it falls, would fain be nothing, and cannot.
The conclusion is clear then, that this falling away is our own fault; and so much our fault, that we sell ourselves to that purpose. Rather than want sins, we are apt to tempt ourselves. He that frequently feels not some secret invasions upon his honesty, as when he is poor, to steal; when he is rich, to be idle; when he is full, to wantonnize; when he is in authority, to be proud; is nearer an Angel than a Man. Nay, how often do we save Satan the labor, and become our own tempters? Concupiscence is in some a flash, in others a flame o • in the former it is soon gone, in the other it burns long: but what man is quite without this fire? This same flesh and blood is a giddy guide: as when the Serpents tail would needs lead the body, there followed mad courses, and desperate precipices. Passions, like Acta • us dogs, when they are once blooded, will devour their own Master. Our affections will be doing, set them on what work you will. Like horses, whether you put them to your perfumed coaches, or to the noisome soil-carts, they will draw. Hence it comes, that l • st in the desire and thought, (contemplative uncleanness) is often more punished than lust in the act: because to the latter we are tempted partly by others, to the former, we wholly tempt ourselves: And he that willfully but wounds a man, is more punishable than he that kills him against his will. The Drunkard hunts after the wine: temptation neeeds not stand like a Tavern-bush in his way, for he invites himself. The Adulterer waits for the •• y-light: the Harlot needs not to attract him with her wanton looks or language: Ipse se allicit. The Movere to f •• i • within us: Satan's Promovere is but a working upon us. In a manner, we are Devils to our own hearts: we push ourselves down, and are the main occasion of our own falling. What a mockery is it to pray, Lead us not into temptation; when as we in the mean while seek temptation? Age quod postulas. Then shall we find, that though Tentat diabolus, sustentat Dominus: for Satan's temptation we shall have, God's sustentation: yea Lord, Deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.
4. If God suffer some to fall that have stood, yet this is no impeachment to his Justice: because he leaves none without means of standing, or hope of rising. In the Text it is granted, that there is knowledge in general, and fore-knowledge of these things in particular, in them: therefore they may stand: there be Seducers forewarned of, and a leading away by them is not denied to be unpossible: and a Cavete is given them for that purpose: therefore they may fall: yet being down; their fall is not pronounced desperate; therefore they may rise again. This Conclusion hath two branches: the former vindicates God from Injustice, if we do fall: the other saves us from despair though we are fallen.
1. That Peccatum should be causa peccati: for sin is no Eunuch: it can and will beget children, and that in the own likeness: Or that Peccatum should be Poena peccati, as the brood of the Viper kill their Damme, or as Sennacherib was slain by the issue of his own loins: who can complain of either? Whether God doth deliver us over to punishments for sins; that when the measure of our sin is full, He shall empty the measure of his Judgments upon us: Or to sins for punishments; making future iniquities the scourges of former; there is no Injustice in it. If he shall leave any particular soul that hath left him: or withdraw his Spirit from a whole Church, that hath withdrawn her self from his Truth: this is not done out of any tyrannical willfulness, but out of a punishing Justice: not for for his pleasure, but our deserts. He is not bound to stick unto them that forsake Him. If He opens his bosom when we come to Him, and holds us there so long as we will tarry with Him; it is his Mercy: But when we will fly from his arms, if He lets us go, is it not his Justice? They mis-judge the liberty of our infinite Creator, that imagine Him any ways bound to his Creature. We are obliged to Him, not He to us: we not to offend Him, not He to defend us.
If they will go unto captivity, let them go: yea, if they will needs go, He will send them, and give them up into the hands of their enemies, and deliver them over to punishment for sin, or to sin for punishment. If He takes the sin which He finds within us, and makes it his executioner upon us; so that future sins become the plague of former; still He is just. It is no easy smart we feel, when God lasheth us with punishment for our errors: but to punish one error with another; Peccatum grande, Peccato grandiore; O this is a sore revenge. David had his choice of three Roddes; War, Famine, Pestilence: either of them could sccourge him thoroughly, and fetch blood of his soul: but if all three had been inflicted on him together, they had not been so heavy, as when God gave him over into his own hands, and suffered the sin in his own bosom to become his master. Lust now hath the regiment of David, and that sends him to Adultery, Adultery prompts him to Murder, Murder must be secreted by Hypocrisy, and that produceth Impenitency and a senselessness in sin. After he had fallen one story, into Uncleanness, he stays not there, but falls another story, into Homicide: and from that to another, Dissimulation: till at last he falls to the very bottom, Security and benumbedness of soul; and lower he could not fall. Being there, he had cause to lift up his voice, with De profundis clamavi. Now all these were his own sins: God had no hand in the doing of them. The Adultery was his; he polluted the marriage bed: the Murder was his; he flew Uriah with the sword: Though Uriah fell by the sword of the children of Ammon, yet says Nathan, Thou hast slain him. The Blasphemy was his: it came out of the mouth of the uncircumcised, even of the Lord's enemies; yet because he gave the occasion, it was his Blasphemy. The obduratenesse and persisting a whole year without remorse, was his sin: all his: I acknowledge my transgressions. God had no hand in the doing of them, but God will have a hand in the disposing of them. With an idle wantonness he began: God took his Adultery, and made it his Bailiff to attach David for his idleness: and then He took his Murder, and made it his Bailiff to attach David for his Adultery: and then He took the Gentiles Blasphemy, and made it his Bailiff to attach David for his Murder: and then He took his long deadness of heart and made it his Bailiff to attach David for that Blasphemy: So here was a generation of sins, a race of iniquities; one begetting another, and the last worse than the former.
Beware therefore: for if you be once led away, who knows where you shall stop? Error begets error: and if we once languish or bate of our own steadfastness, still we fall lower: and the less hold we have of God, the more hold Satan hath of us. Let us fall into the hands of God, says that straitened King, for his mercies are great: and not into the hand of man. Between God and man there may be some kind of comparison: But would any sinner say, Let me fall into the hands of the Devil, and not of man? Rather into more sins, than some punishments? It was a most fearful imprecation upon God's enemies: Add iniquity unto their iniquity: that was woeful: But, Let them not come into thy righteousness, into which they can never come, unless they first come into repentance; this is the fatal doom. Among all the phials of wrath, there is none more tetricall and deadly; when men shall be suffered to add sin unto sin, that Finis unius mali sit gradus alterius; and never offer to repent of their past sins, till they are past repentance. This is that reprobate sense, to mistake miseries for mercies, sins for comforts. So many think to asswage the anguish of one sin, by doing another: which is a remedy far worse than the disease.
Prodigality is a gallant sin: but the Prodigal cannot but see that his patrimony wastes: how then shall he maintain his riot? Why, it is but coupling another sin with it; oppression of his Tenants, extortion of sines, and taking of forfeitures; and all shall be well. All well? So the Devil thinks it, but so he shall not find it. If the horror of whoredom and prodigious uncleanness have caused in others a dejection of spirit; how should they remedy this? How? Strait, there is a factor of hell present, that cries; Come, you are melancholy, let us to the Tavern: he can cure all your sadness with a charm of wine. How could the common Strumpet ever sleep, without this incantation of strong drink? Her affrighted conscience would be a worse fury within her, than the severest Marshall could be about her; but that the incessant noise of sin will not let it be heard. The covetous mucke-worm could never digest his legal pillage; but that the hope of the next advantage adjourns the anguish of the former. These sinners take all such carnal satisfactions for medicines: but God sends them for plagues: O madness, to call great plagues peace! To smother sin from the eye of the world, or to shadow it from the eye of our own conscience, by interposing more sins, is a physic prescribed by the devil. Repentance is appointed by God, the only physic for sin; a remorse for the evil we have done: not the adding of more evil to it. As the drunkard is sick in the morning, till he hath qualified the old heat with a new. To cure sin with sin, is but to heal an ulcer by deading the flesh: which indeed doth not make us whole, but insensible of pain. Repentance be our physic: this if we take, we may be cured: this if we continue, we shall be saved.
2. As this clears God, so the other branch of the conclusion comforts us. If we have fallen, let us not conclude upon ourselves that we shall never rise again: for God doth not say so: Not in this Text, not in this Epistle, not in the whole Bible. Far be it from us, to impose upon ourselves a necessity of perishing. There may be a falling off on our part: and there may be a withdrawing of grace on God's part: yet he hath still reserved to himself the power of restitution, in both parts. There be many terms of union between God and us, none of separation, that disioynes us from God, that I ever read of: Of eternal separation none, I am sure, in the Scriptures. Your iniquities have separated between you and your God: this is the nearest to it. And yet that was particularly spoken to the revolting Jews, not indefinitely to all sinners: And it was a commination, that if they persisted in sin, so it would be; rather than a conclusion that so it was: Or it was a Caution, that it might not be so; rather than a commination, that it should be so: Or: it was a complaint, that they had done enough on their part to make it so; rather than a decree on God's part, that it should be so indeed. Or take it in the most strict and literal sense, yet it was not a determination without a condition. Though they were now divided, they might be united: though their sins had put them as-under, yet their repentance might bring them together again.
He is called our Father, and full of pity: what will not a father do, and suffer, to reclaim his son, before he leave him to his own desperate ways? It must be a prodigious offense, that can separate a son from the love of his father. He is compared to a mother: Can a mother forget her child? was God's question to Zion. He stays not her answer, nor assures himself of any good answer from her; but adds to it: Yea, a mother may forget her child, yet I will not forget thee. Can God do it? Did God ever do it? Did he ever cast off without possibility of re-accepting? When? Where? Whom? We neither can show the time, nor the place, nor the persons; to whom God gave such a peremptory repulse, saying, you shall never repent, but you shall perish. That of the Prophet is most comfortable: I will betroth thee unto me forever. The husband and wife are una caro, one flesh: Christ and our soul, by this marriage, unas spiritus, one spirit. The words of the Contract are, Sponsabo te mihi in aeternum. There can be no divorce imagined, where there is no marriage: and if there be a marriage with God, there can be no divorce, neither: for Sponsat in aeternum, Therefore as often as our hearts, upon the doleful consideration of our sins, be afraid of a divorce from our God; let us cheare them up with the comfort of a marriage with our God. So Ambrose sweetly and saftely: Audisti repudium? Crede conjugium. Did God ever take in a favourite, and afterwards utterly reject him? The Crow went out of the Ark, and came no more: the Dove went, and came again, and came with an olive branch. God may absent himself, on purpose that he might be sought: but he comes again, and that with an olive branch of peace. The Jews did indeed put away their wives; not only for the wives fault, but for the husbands frowardness: But we have too good experience of our God's love and patience, ever to charge him with that: we must deny him first, for he cannot deny himself.
To follow this comfortable metaphor of our marriage to God, and to take away all mistrust of a separation: Let us consider for what causes the Jews might put away their wives, and by that precedent examine whether God (our Husband) hath so threatened to put away us. And because in the place where divorce is permitted, those essential circumstances are not set down, which were required in those bills of divorce, and without which they were void: give me leave to borrow so much exemplification from a great light in our Church, as he hath collected for the clearing of this point.
1. This bill of divorce might not be written in private; not in the Husbands bed-chamber; but by a Scribe, a public Notary, or some such authorized officer. Where, ô disconsolate soul, canst thou find such a bill sent thee from the hand of God? There is no looking for it in his Bed-chamber, in his unrevealed decrees, for they are kept private in heaven: but in his public Record • his Scriptures. Now these are books of Covenant, of Contract▪ not of Separation or divorce. In what place hath God said to thy sad soul, get thee gone, I will none of thee? If any clause in that sacred Instrument seems to trouble thee, do not follow the mis-interpretation of thine own brain, but consult the Dispensers of those holy Mysteries: from them thou shalt find comfort.
2. The wife, how guilty soever in her own conscience, might not take herself to be put away, except the husband had expressly given her a bill of divorce. Hath thy Husband, thy God done so to thee? Hath he anywhere set down the peremptory sentence of thy condemnation? As I live, saith the Lord, I would not the death of a sinner, nor the falling away of any soul. If of none, why of thine? He would have all men to be saved: If all, does he except thee?
3. Those bills of divorce were to be testified by witness, and these beyond exception. If thou imagine a bill of reprobation against thee, what witnesses be there to it? Here thou mayst bring in against thyself, the melancholy of a distempered brain, the uncomfortable sadness of a sullen heart, the dejection of a jealous spirit, the distrust of mercy, and diffidence in the promises of the Gospel: But are these witnesses to be heard against God? Yea, against thyself? They have not sanam mentem; their testimony is nothing worth. O but my conscience is a thousand witnesses. It is, that thou hast committed a thousand sins: it is, that thou hast received a thousand blessings. But that there is an eternal decree of reprobation against thee, thy conscience (mis-informed) can be no witness: for thou wast not called to the making of those decrees. God calls heaven and earth to witness, that he hath offered thee thy choice of life or death: but that he hath thrust death upon thee, in heaven or earth there is no witness.
4. Those bills of divorce were to be authentically sealed: but canst thou show any such bill of everlasting separation from God, with his seal to it? He hath given us two fair and broad seals of his mercy, in both the Sacraments: Seals in white, and Seals in red wax: Of white, in the participation of the candor and innocence of his Son, in our Baptism: Of red, in the participation of his Body and Blood, in the holy Supper. But for any seal of reprobation, or of irrevocable divorce from God, thou canst show none: there is none. If thou pretend such a one, because thou hast fallen into sin; know that it is but a counterfeit deed, an instrument of Satan's forging: there is neither God's hand nor seal to it. O but I am plagued more than other men? What of that? Is this a seal of God's anger? It was not to be a seal of God's favor. Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth. For spiritual defects; there may be a scruple in thy Conscience, a perplexity in thy resolution, a darkness in thy understanding; yet who dares call all this, a seal of God's utter dereliction? For temporal sufferings, not a sudden death, not a shameful death, not a stupid death, not a raging death; must be to thyself by the way, or to those that see thine end, an evidence or seal of reprobation, or of final falling from God. That God, who hath unsearchable ways to his unsearchable ends, both bless us from all these in ourselves; and from making any of these, when they fall upon others, seals and tokens of his everlasting wrath.
5. The names of the parties must be set down, and of both the parties parents, and that to the third generation. Is there any such thing in our feigned bill? We may conceive three descents on our husbands side, in the blessed Trinity: First God the Father, then God the Son begotten of the Father; and then God the holy Ghost proceeding from the Son and the Father. The holy Spirit we know to be the God of our consolation: the Son, to be the God of our Redemption: the Father to be the God of our Creation: but can we find a God of Separation, a God of rejection among all these? We may conceive three descents on our own side: first as we are the children of dust, of nothing: next, as we are the children of Adam, reducible to nothing: last, as we are the Children of God in Christ, in whom we are all things. God hath married us in all these estates. First in the house of dust, where he made us good: then in the house of ruin, where he found us lost: and last in the house of peace and grace, where he redeemeth us in Christ. He did not put us from him in our creation, nor utterly reject us in our prevarication: and now in the house of our restitution, in the Church, in the Body of his Son, will he divorce us there? Who can suspect it?
6. Lastly, if the Bill were interlin'd, or blotted, or dropt upon, it was void. Pretend any place of Scripture that may seem to condemn thee; and know that that place is interlin'd; interlin'd by the Spirit of God, with conditions, limitations, provisions and exceptions, If thou repent, if thou return: that interlining cancells the Bill. Look well, and thou shalt find it blotted and dropt upon: the venom of the Setpent is dropt upon it: the worm-wood of thy desperation is dropt upon it: the gall of thy melancholy is dropt upon it: and this voids the bill. And if thy moody and clouded eyes cannot discern these drops; do thou drop upon it thyself. Droppe upon it the tears of true contrition and repentance: that shall void the bill. Droppe upon it the blood of thy Savior; that shall destroy the bill. Through that blood look upon the bill, and thou shalt see that it was nailed to the Cross, when he was nailed; and torn, when his body was torn: and that hath quite cancelled the bill. Now Vbi libellus? Where is the bill of your divorcement? There is none such: never imagine it, for God hath not made it. There is a Book of his Covenant with us in Jesus Christ: to that let us adhere faithfully, and we shall never fall away from his mercy.
5. Men called into the truth, may yet fall far from their own steadfastness: that is, from that measure of stability which for the present they have: Yet not totally, so as to have no firmness at all, to lose even the very foundation and principles of truth, or to suffer an utter eradication of grace: Or if they fall so fearfully, yet this lapse may not be final: the grace of God is not debarred them, nor the gate of mercy shut against them, nor is the sentence of irrevocable damnation passed upon them. Falling must needs include a mutation of state and place: he is not fallen, that is not removed from off the place, or down from the station which he had, and wherein he stood. A man may slip, or stumble, or stoop low: but if he fall, his footing was lost, his hold-fast gone. He is not Vbi erat nor Vti erat: neither Statu, nor Gradu, the same that he was before. There is a consummation, when holiness is crowned with reward in the end: and there is a continuation, which holds out to the end: and there may be an interruption; either by the seducing of others, or falling away of ourselves, in the Text: which yet is not quite secluded from mercy, nor deprived of hope: For after one, moe, many falls, there may be as many recoveries by grace. Multi dantur ad gratiam recessus: He that falleth today, may rise again tomorrow, hold out to the end, receive the reward of righteousness, and be crowned with immortal glory. In this great question, which at this present so exerciseth the studies of the Christian world; whether a man may fall from grace; or if he do fall, whether totally and not finally, or finally and totally, or neither; it were a dangerous boldness for me to determine. Non est nostrae parvitatis dicere: humble Doves, must not presume to see so far as Eagles. That which I purpose to deliver concerning this argument, shall be short, profitable, and comfortable: and all this by way of application and use, in three words: Cavete, Sperate, Confidite; of Caution, Hope, Confidence.
1. Cavete, Beware: that is our Apostles rule here; so he teacheth me: it is my rule; so I desire to teach you: and let it be your rule, so to guide your own hearts. There be four degrees that incline and dispose us to falling; as it were four stairs ere we come to the bottom: Haesitatio, Remissio, Retrospectio, and Alienatio cordis: this Cavete is to be set on the forehead of them all. First, Haesitatio, a wavering: when we begin to doubt, and to question that truth, which we have so long embraced: This is the first step of falling from our own steadfastness. Unbeleefe is the bane of constancy and perseverance: of constancy in the purpose of our mind, of perseverance, in the tenor of our life. When we once come to dally with God's Word, and to regard it by halves, we are in the way to despise it, or not to regard it at all. Let him that standeth, take heed lest he fall: If the Devil can but once get us to stand still, he conceives hope of our falling. His salvation, is like the thief’s; stand and deliver: no sooner stand at a stay in goodness, but presently deliver your innocence. Secondly, Remissio, a fainting; when we grow weary of the walk of righteousness. Fainting is the next step to forsaking: they that keep not their old pace, have a mind to tire. Cavete, beware of both these; Ne sistas, that thou stand not to demure: Ne deficias, that thou languish not in the way. Thirdly, Retrospectio, a looking back: so Lots wife lost herself. Her charge was, Look not back, lest thou die: she would look back, to die for it. Be not weary of well doing: It is ill to buy the ease of our body, with the hazard of our soul: but worse to look back; for that is as much as to say, we have left our heart behind. The first thing that a recreant soldier forsakes, is his courage: and the last thing that forsakes him, is his heels. He that hath but his eye set a running from the spiritual wars, means that his soul and body shall follow after. Fourthly, Alienatio cordis, an estranging of the heart; that is the lower stair: when we come to be glutted with godliness, to loath Manna, and to be weary of our obedienne. So Lots wife was weary of shifting so often; and removing from Vr to Haran, from Haran to Canaan, from Canaan to Egypt, from thence to Canaan again, then to Sodom, and now to Zoar: she takes the conceit of more troubles ensuing still: and therefore even resolves to prefer Sodom and her pleasures, before Zoar and the desolate mountains.
Cavete, beware of these dangerous precipices. First, let us think that it is the Devils suggestion; you need not make so much haste: you shall come thither time enough: Heaven will not run away. Secondly, that we forfeit all the fruit of our former well continued course, by a relapse: we have done all in vain. Nay, we have not only lost our own labor; but have caused Christ to loose his labor too; so that all his sorrows and sufferings are in vain, to us. Thirdly, let us think on the folly, Of beginning in the Spirit, and ending in the flesh: of laying a precious foundation of our house, and then finishing it with a covering of thatch. If the righteous man turn, all his righteousness shall be forgotten. Would it not grieve us, by the error of one hour, to make void the perseverance of many years? Fourthly, Let us think on the disgrace, the scandal, the infamy of this recidivation: the disgrace to ourselves, whiles we live: the scandal to others, when we are dead: and the infamy of our names to be enrolled in the Catalogue of The revolters from the faith. Fifthly, Let us think on the difficulty to be reclaimed: when the residence of one wicked spirit is filled up with seven worse. Sixthly, Let us think on God's exemplary judgments upon the relapsed: how Lots wife in the act of her looking back was turned into a pillar of salt. We desire to repent ere we die, she was taken away in the very article of her sin. We desire to die with respite, and from sudden death we pray God to deliver us: hers was sudden: she looked backward, and never looked forward more: it was her last look. We would die the common death of mankind, and be visited after the visitation of other men. Hers was a strange kind of death. Being dead, our wish is to be buried: she remained above ground, the spectacle of God's wrath to posterity. A reed she was, a pillar she is: she was melting water, she is congealed to salt. Seventhly, Consider, that not to continue, shall speed as ill as not to begin. Non ingredientes, and Non progredientes; not to enter the way, and not to keep the way, find but little difference at last. Not to come out of the sta • e of sin, is to perish: and to relapse when we are come out, is to perish too. One and the same end is to the sinner without repentance, and to the righteous without perseverance. Eighthly, Yea lastly, revolting believers shall justify unbelieving sinners: their frossen iniquity shall condemn our melting piety. If they be obdurate in vice, shall not we be constant in virtue? Cavete therefore: you may fall, beware you do not: you may fall very far, God keep you from it.
2. Sperate: when we consider sin in the horrid fowlnes of it, we have great cause of dejection: And to him that will not fall down on his knees in repentance, for falling from his own steadfastness, I dare promise no comfort: no hope of comfort: no more than I can promise fruits to that piece of ground, upon which no moisture falls. We have erred, and so are guilty of weakness: we have erred after knowledge, and so are guilty of wickedness: we have erred after the receipt of many mercies, and so are guilty of unthankfulness: we have erred against many stops and gracious withstandings of our sin, and so are guilty of willfulness. If all this cannot humble us, and break our hearts with remorse, no Sperate: Look not for that at my hands. I dare not, I cannot open the door, when God hath shut it: no more than I can or dare shut the door, when God hath opened it. He that hath the key of David, openeth and no man shutteth, shutteth and no man openeth. He hath opened the door of mercy to repentance, and who dare shut it with a Discedite? Against impenitency he hath barred it, and who can open it with a Sperate? But when on the other side, we consider the infinite mercy of our gracious God; how far our evil comes short of his goodness; how readily he answers to the voice of repentance, how willing he is to lift up those that be down, and that call upon him for help; how able he is to re-advance the dejected: then we proclaim to all them that would stand, and yet do fall; to them that are fallen, and would rise; that are led away, and would return; Sperate, be of good cheer. God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able. I have loved you with an everlasting love. Whom he lov's, to the end he lov's. Though he fall, he shall not utterly he cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand. I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. Every sentence breaths into our fainting hearts a Sperate; sure comfort.
Though you may think in your sorrow, that you have quite left God: yet God in his purpose, hath not quite left you. But it is you say, a common complaint: The Lord hath forsaken us. Thou hast cast off and abhorred. David expostulates; Why hast thou forsaken me? Yet the Son of David came to this; My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me: Yet consider: did God forsake either of them? He might be angry with David his servant, for his grievous sins: more angry with Christ his Son, for the sins of all the world: And in their present sense, that anger might work in them an apprehension of his forsaking them: But he did not forsake them, nor will he forsake thee: thou mayest think so, but God will not do so. Who should occasion such a forsaking? It must be either God, or thyself: Cedo tertium: no devising of a third. Satan is an enemy, and God will not hear him: thou knowest him a liar, do not then believe him. God will not do it, he never forsakes first. If it be done, it must be thy fault: and if thou acknowledge that it is done for thy fault, it is not done: for that acknowledgement implies a free confession: that confession proceeds from a true repentance: repentance procures a pardon: and what is pardoned, is as if it never was committed.
3. Confidite: Let us trust in the Lord's strength, by which alone we may be kept from falling; and in the Lord's mercy, by which alone we may be raised up when we are fallen. So feeble are we without the supportation of grace, that there oftentimes appears very little difference between the righteous and unrighteous. Both are subject to, and the former more exercised with temptations. When a bad motion is suggested, the wicked receive it, and delight in it: and by your favor, so did David as well as Saul: and so do we all too often. The wicked give consent of will to it: so do the other, if grace but a little hide it self. They practice it: so sometimes do the righteous, if the Spirit restrain them not. The ungracious lie in sin: and so do the other, till God raise them. Where then is the difference? Surely, somewhat in the persons: the ungodly are carried into sin without resistance: the other are over-borne with violence, but not without resistance, Malum quod nolo, facio. But the main difference is in the mercy of God: if we escape temptation, it is his mercy: if we stand in temptation, it is his mercy: if our wills consent not, it is his mercy; if we consent and the act be hindered, it is his mercy: if we fall and rise again by repentance, all is his mercy. All our trust stands in his mercy, Not that thereby we should be encouraged to fall; for that were presumption: but being fallen, that thereby we should hope to rise again; and so be kept from desperation. We are nothing in ourselves; we have no way but to trust in JESUS CHRIST.
6. It is dangerous to fall at any time; but then worst, when we have stood some time in the truth. To have steadfastness, and not to hold it; after long standing, then to fall, is deadly. The nearer to heaven, the sorer bruise in falling down to the earth. For the winter brooks, if they dry: for the summer fruits, if they rotte: for the morning clouds, if they scatter: for the shallow-rooted corn, if that wither: for flitting and unstable professors, if they languish: the grief is the less, because there was little better hope of them.
But for men that have embraced the Truth, a long time defended it, suffered many injuries for the defense of it; digested the bitterness of many sorrows, when that shown them their sins; and sucked the sweetness of many comforts, when that assured them of forgiveness: that these men, after all this, should fall from their own steadfastness: Proh dolor! How can it be thought on without tears? Pharaoh could seem religious when the fit took him: every great plague did put him into a fever, and then he was godly on the sudden. O pray for me now. But when the fit was over, Pharaoh was Pharaoh again; as profane as ever. Nine times he began to relent, and nine times again he hardened his heart. But he was never good, egg nor bird: his beginning was naught, his proceeding worse, and who could look for any better at his latter end? Saul kept himself well for two years, Judas for three years, and (as it is storied) Nero for five years: yet all fell into damnable wickedness: scarce three worse in the world.
But most lamentable is the memory of Lots wife: How long did she stand steadfast? By computation of time, from Abraham's going out of Vr, to the destruction of Sodom, it was thirty years; so long did she abide in the family of the faithful, full thirty years. She escaped the superstitions of Egypt, she was not defiled with the sins of Sodom: neither the famine of Canaan, nor the fullness of the cities of the plain, made her fall away: She endured much with Abraham and Lot, in their exile, in their travel, in all their afflictions. Yet she that escaped all these perils on the sea of this world, shipwrackes in the very Haven; at the entry of Zoar: where she should have saved her life, she willfully lost it. How should we tremble at these precedents? what a sensible impression should we take of our own weakness? Let the wicked be like goats; the elder they grow, the worse and more fulsome meat they are: and in their old age, not edible, not indurable. But that men should appear sheep all their days, and in their latter end turn to goats, from pillars in the Church, for their steadfastness; to reeds in the wilderness, for their • evity; is sad news to Heaven and Earth, to Angels and Men: and only welcome tidings to the fiends in Hell. Beware therefore, let us not verefie Nebuchadnezzar's dream, to be golden proselytes, brazen professors, iron polititians, and then to end our old age in clay. Let not our souls turn to clay, before our bodies be turned into clay. But rather in this, let us be like Fame, which vires acquirit eundo; Or let our goodness be a river; which is small at the spring or beginning, but enlargeth it self, gathers in fresh watets, fills the channel, and at last empties it self into the Ocean of mercy.
7. Lastly, the summary use, the principal scope, the main antidote to prevent all this, is Perseverance to the end. When God had created the Light, it is added, He saw that it was good. When he had created and disposed the Heaven, the Earth, the Waters, He saw that it was good. When he had distinguished the lights of Heaven, He saw that it was good. When he had blessed the earth to bring forth Plants, Grass, Herbs, and made the Beasts and Cattle to feed upon it: He saw that it was good. When he had replenished the Air with Fowls, the Water with Fishes; He saw that it was good. He gave them all his approbation, and commended them everyone in the beginning; Vidit quod bonum: each in particular, all in general, very good. But when he came to man, and had made him for whom he made all the rest, he paused upon the matter, and never graced him with the least commendation in the beginning. What might be the reason? Saint Ambrose gives it, Prius probandus, quàm laudandus: he was first to be tried, and respectively to be commended. In Christianis non laudantur initia, sed finis. I will keep thy statutes always, even unto the end. We belong to Christ, if we hold fast the confidence, and rejoicing of hope firm unto the end. We are partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end. Be thou faithful unto the death, and I will give thee a crown of life. To him that keepeth my words unto the end, will I give the morning star. This is the way to be safe while we live, and to be saved when we die. We have many considerations and motives to spurr us on to perseverance.
1. Without this, all our service is a maimed sacrifice. If a sacrifice be offered to God, he likes it not, unless it come entire; cum cauda, with it's latter end. No defective oblation pleaseth: the lame and sick will be refused by the very Governor. It must have horn and hoof: and not want so much as a tail: for the tail-piece (by name) is disposed of in the sacred Rituals. To show that no holy course is accepted, if it be not closed up with a good end. The holy oil which was poured on Aaron's head, ran down to the skirts of his vestiment: In extremis deficere, if God do not find the unction of his grace in the conclusion of our life; if that be dried up in the skirts; we might as well have neither had garment nor oil at all. Perseverance is the sister of patience, the daughter of constancy, the mother of peace, the mistress of concord: Nutrix ad virtutem, mediatrix ad premium. Muria virtutum, saith Gregory: the pickle and preserver of virtues, without which they will putrefy. The Salt of the Covenant, without which the flesh of our sacrifice will take wind and corrupt.
2. Vnstedfastnes is an argument of unsoundnes: they that are not constant, never were sincere. A friend loveth at all times; forever: and he was never a true friend, that ceaseth to be so. He that truly loves Christ, never leaves him. Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations: I, that's the trial: they love him indeed, that love him in his distress. It was a just complaint of that rebellious generation, that their spirit was not steadfast with God; their heart was not right with him. Though it be an argument a Posteriore, yet it holds: if we see men give over their loyalty to God at last, their hearts were never upright with him at the first. God takes up no room in the corporation of man, for his bedchamber, but the heart: He lies at the sign of the Heart. Therefore the voice of constancy is, Paratum cor, my heart is ready: If thou wilt make me a king, paratum cor: if I must continue a shepherd, still paratum cor. So Paul was ready for honor, ready for disgrace; for poverty or riches, for joy or sorrows, for life or death; for all ready. Such a Christian is well shod: he will hold out to the latter end.
3. It is a rule in the civil law: That is as good as nothing, which holdeth not. Nihil dicitur factum, quamdiu aliquid superest ad agendum. A Will unfinished, is no Will: a deed, unless it be signed, sealed, and delivered, is no deed. In the paying of money upon bond, the want of a shilling forfeits a hundred pounds. Nisi totum soluitur, nihil solvitur: nec absolutus est debitor qui multa reddit, sed qui omnia. They that wrought in the vineyard, must labor to the evening, before they have the reward: will any master think his servants days work done, when he goes to bed at noon? Is that house finished, which wants a roof? Concedunt prima postremis: the former part of our life yieldeth unto the latter, and the latter carries it quite away from the former. The sinner that repents, hath his wickedness blotted out: in his present righteousness he shall live: The righteous that relapseth shall not have his righteousness mentioned: in his present sin he shall die. Secundum quod sumus, non quod fuimus, we shall be judged. Mary Magdalene was a sinner at first, at last a Saint: so a Saint she shall be found in Judgment, not a sinner. Herod heard John; good was his beginning: he did many things well; better was his proceeding: but when he concluded with the murder of John, this marred all. His beginning is forgotten, his proceeding not thought on, but his conclusion was his confusion; that sent him to hell. Judas shall not be judged as a Preacher, but as a traitor: not according to his Apostleship, wherein he lived: but according to his treachery, wherein he died. Our first love will do us no good, if we forsake it: nor our beginning in the Spirit, if we end in the flesh. As Gregory the great was said to be the first of the bad Bishops of Rome, and the last of the good ones: The first of the bad, because he brought in Innovations: and the last of the good, because there never came any so good after him. So our standing at a pause in religion, and weighing (with Demas ) the truth of the Gospel in one balance, for which we are so troubled; with the peace of the world in the other balance, by which we may be so enriched, may be called the first of our bad actions, and the last of our good ones. The first of our bad; for he that shall but dare to bring Christ in competition with the world once, hath ingratefully sinned: The last of our good: for to try the spirits, and by examination of the truth to confirm our own faith, may be a good work: but Christ so scorns to be put into the scales with the world, that he justly gives that man over to the world, which durst offer to rank it with Christ.
4. The end of everything is all in all. Terminus ad quem dat appellationem: The end for which a thing is ordained, denominates it. Ante obitum nemo beatus: die well, then blessed. Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord: they that die blessed, are sure to live blessed forever. Blasphemers and secure transgressors were so hedged in with prosperity, that David stood at a maze, wondering what the Lord meant to do with them: at last he was let into the Sanctuary, and suffered to behold, and then he understood their end; which was indeed sudden destruction. But mark the righteous, and the end of that man is peace. The children of this world seeing the righteous so encompassed with troubles; their eyes still wet, their whole life excercised with sufferings, give them for lost men, quite out of God's books: but mark their end: Now they are numbered among the children of God, and their lot is among the Saints: Loe now the wicked are of another mind. We say, All is well that ends well: so the main end of our whole life, should be to make a good end of our life. We may also say; That is ill which ends ill: he that dies a bad man, was never indeed a good one. In show there might be little difference: but the end distinguisheth all, as St. Bernard speaks of Paul and Judas. Judas been coepit, sed male finivit: quamvis Paulus been finivit, male coepit. The bulrush, in the fable, derided the vine, that it must endure such digging, and weeding, such pampination or pruining, and binding, and be vexed with such a deal of trouble, only to yield man a little good liquor: whereas the other without any molestation might enjoy it own happiness. Summer comes, the Sun scorches, yet still the vine flourishes shaded with leaves, and loden with fruits: but the moisture of the bulrush being spent, it hangs down the head, and droopes, and withers; and being trodden upon with beasts, confeeth that the end is all: in vain is it in the beginning to flourish, and in the end to perish.
5. Christ persevered for us: and shall not we persevere for Him? In Him? To Him? He was a Friend indeed; for He loved to the last. To the end, shall I say? Nay more; of his love there is no end. There was no beginning of his love, nor can there be an ending. He is not only the Founder, but the Finisher of our salvation. To signify this, He appeared to Saint John, vestitus podêre, in a long garment down to his lower end. He never rested, till He could triumph in his Consummutum est: till all was done, that was to be done, for the accomplishment of our Redemption. Much He endured, and that much long, even to the last gasp. How strangely was that heavenly Vine pruined upon earth? His honor was pruined cultro Ignominiae: his peace, cultro Inimicitiae: his estate, cultro Paupertatis: his friends, cultro Persecutionis: and yet He held out, till his life was pruined cultro Mortis. Nor was this a common death: but Tristius ipsa Morte genus mortis. My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. Not his scourges, nor his Thorns, nor his nails, made Christ open his mouth; but the sorrow of his soul. Why then did He not give over? All that He was to endure that night and the day following, was presented to his mind, when He said, My soul is heavy even unto death. Why then did He not draw back? Why did He not follow Peters counsel; Hoc tibi non fiat, this shall not be unto thee? No, the love of our souls triumphed over the love of his own life: on He will go, and persevere He will, till his last drop of blood be spent on the Cross for us. Yea, what King ever went so willingly to be crowned, as He to be crucified? Who so gladly from execution, as He to it? What man was ever so desirous to save his life, as Christ was to lose it? Witness that speech; I have a Baptism to be baptized with, and how am I pained till it be accomplished? His mind was in pain, till his body and soul came to it. And to him that dissuaded Him from it, He used no other terms than to the Devil himself; Avoid Satan. So willingly went He to it, so unwillingly would He be kept from it. He went on foot when He was to preach and do good: but He rode for haste, when He was to suffer evil. His willingness was so great, that his blood would not stay the Executioners leisure, but did burst out into a Sweat, a strange Sweat, in his bitter Agony in the Garden.
All this He foresaw before He suffered: and whiles He did foresee, He suffered. This made his soul so heavy: it might arise from three Causes: Ex objectorum gravitate; never sorrow like his sorrow, for never sufferings like his sufferings. Ex patientis susceptibilitate: He was able (through that hypostatical union) to suffer all that God's Justice cold inflict; all the punishments due to all the sins of all men. Ex doloris simplicitate; no relief, no ease, no comfort: He found never a Reuben to say, Let us not kill him, for he is our brother. There was no such clear apprehension of sin as in Him: He saw it in all the foulness. No such perfect detestation of sin as in Him: He hated it with all extremenesse: yet He must suffer for it: The Lord laid on Him the iniquities of us all. He foreknew all this: why did He not prevent it? Why did it not dishearten Him? He was safe enough; who could touch Him? He was at supper among his friends; why did He go into the Garden among his enemies, where the Traitor waited for Him? His Apprehenders fell backward with a word of his mouth: why then did He not leave them? When He had smarted with the scourges, why would He endure the Thorns? Losing so much blood with the Thorns, why would He yield to the nails? O Lord, how little sorrow makes us draw back, and slinke away from Thee? Yet no torments could procure Thee to forsake us? Thus did Christ persevere unto the death, that He might save us: and shall not we persevere all our life in our service to Him? He is Alpha and Omega: not only Alpha, for his happy beginning: but Omega, for his thrice happy ending. He never left us, till He had made it sure that God would never leave us. Now the highest act of Religion, is for the Christian to conform himself unto Christ. He never fell from us: we are basely unthankful, if ever we fall from Him.
6. God Himself is eternal, who expects our service. Now what hath levity and inconstancy to do with eternity? When doth God give overfeeding, and protecting, and blessing of us; that we should give over serving of Him? In youth? No, Thou hast upholden me ever since I was borne. In old age? No, I am feeble and gray-headed; but thou art my comforter. In my joy? No, For thou makest my cup to overflow. In my sorrow? No, For in the multitude of the sorrows in my heart, thy comforts refresh my soul. At any other time? No, For thou wilt never leave me, nor forsake me. Is there any time then for us us to forget Him in? In our jollity? No, I will remember thee in my mirth. In our sorrows? No, In trouble we will visit thee, and pray when thy chastening is upon us. In youth? No, then we must remember our Creator. In our old age? No, let Asa's example forewarn us of that. The Lord takes charge of us so long as we have any being: therefore so long as we have any being, let us look to the charge of the Lord. If God blesseth thee, O Christian, in aeterno suo: He looks that thou shouldest serve Him in aeterno tuo. His love lasts longer than our service: yet let our service last as long as our life: this is all we can do, and our gracious Maker asks no more.
7. The reward of our service is eternal; why should not our service be so? Why should not God require a long lasting obedience, for an everlasting recompense? Why not, holiness unto the end, for a blessing in the end, which shall be without end? Gaudium in fine, sed gaudium sine fine. Indeed it is base, merely to serve for the reward. That is causa impulsiva, not causa constituens or efficiens: for the good man would be good, were there no Heaven. The Heathens called virtue, Bonum Theatrale: as if a man would not be virtuous, if he had no spectators, to take notice of him. But it is false: for virtue will be as clear in solitudine, as in Theatro; though not so conspicuous: only it may grow more strong by the observation and applause of others, as an heat that is doubled by the reflection. Of two Horses, the one will go well without the spurr, the other will go better with the spurr: Shall we say of this latter, Tush the life of this Horse lies but in the spurr? No, for the spurr is no matter of impediment, but an ordinary instrument. So the reward, which is glory, and honor and eternal life, are but the spurs to righteousness and good works; which would often lagge and languish without them: and these are ever ready to attend upon goodness. So though we would run well without a reward, yet the consideration of this reward may make us amend our pace. The Lord and Giver of life did not refuse the proposed reward. Who for the joy that was set before him, endured the Cross. Though he were the fountain of joy, and had it infinitely in himself; yet the better to bear out his sorrowess in the way, he propounded to himself the joy in the end. I know that verus amor non sumit vires de spe; it loveth without hope of benefit: yet to quicken our love, which is so apt to faint, let us remember the reward. The foreheads of the righteous are marked with Tau: which (as Omega in the Greek) is the the last letter in the Hebrew Alphabet; and the sign of Consummatum est, among them. Now these Titles are inseparable to the reward. It is not only a life, but a Life everlasting: not only an Inheritance, but an Inheritance incorruptible: Not only a Kingdom, but a Kingdom that cannot be shaken: Not only a Crown, but a Crown of Immortality. These be the attributes that belong to the reward; and must not the like belong to the service? Aeternitatis Imago Perseverantia. All that we can do, is to serve God whiles we live: and all that we can wish, is to reign with God when we die. O then let us fixe our eyes on the prize, and gather up our feet to the race, and still tendere in anteriora: forgetting the things behind, and pressing toward the mark, for the price of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
8. As Perseverance is the Queen of all virtues, Quia ea sola coronatur. so it is also, Quia Satanas ei soli insidiatur: the devil is ever fighting against the latter end. As the king of Syria charged his captains, to fight neither with small nor great, save only with the king of Israel: So the Prince of darkness commands his commanders, the leaders of his troupes, and those that stand at the head of his companies, his master-temptations; not to fight against any virtue, small or great, but only against Perseverance in goodness: Quam solam novit coronari, upon whose head he knows the Crown must full. He bestirs himself; not only because he knows his own time to be short, but because he perceives our time to be short. Therefore he redoubles his forces, as if he still meant to make the last conflict the sorest: resolving to set all at that stake, and either now to win, or to sit down with loss and despair. The most fiery dart in his quiver, he reserveth to our death bed: if we can quench that, the enemy is hopeless. Good cause have we then to make much of Perseverance, which the devil would so fain get from us. Eternal life is not given to all, for then we would all presume: nor to none, for then we would all despair: but vincenti dabitur, it is given to him that overcometh. Fight therefore to the last minute: the eye of thy Savior is upon thee; if thou faint, to cheare thee; if thou fight, to second thee; if thou conquer, to crown thee. So that no combat, no conquest: no conquest, no triumph. Continuance is the crown of all other graces, and heaven shall be the crown of continuance.
9. The wicked are constant in their sins: why are not we so in holiness? They labor hard for that which shall confound them, and shall we think any pains too much for that which shall save us? They will not be persuaded to break off their sins by repentance: and shall we be tempted to break off our repentance by sin? If they will know no period of their rebellion, till they sink down into hell: for shame let us know no date of our obedience, till we come up into heaven. Wickedness, like the sea, hath bounds: God by his blessed providence, hath limited the raging waves of them both: but goodness knows no limitation. They cannot be so evil as they would, we have liberty to be so good as we can. The children of grace, and the children of disobedience, have their several races: they set out together: heaven is the jail of the former, hell of the other: indeed the wicked may sooner and more easily get to their Iourneys end; for facilis descenses: it is but tumbling down the hill: yet though we cannot be in heaven so soon as they are in hell, we may be as sure of the joys of the one, as they are of the pains of the other, if we hold on our journey. Though our salvation be with more difficulty wrought up, than their perdition; yet grace, time, and diligence may work it up in due season. You find none of them hankering in the ways of sin: the drunkard will hold out till he have lost his eyes: the incontinent, till he hath wasted his loins: the contentious, till he hath beggared his purse. Quis pudor, quod infaelix populus Dei non tantam habent perseverantiam in bono, quantam mali in malo? If ever they turn from sin, it is God's especial grace that gives them repentance: but when we fall from our steadfastness, it is through the defect of our own perseverance. The Lord make the former good, and the other better unto the end!
10. Lastly, it is Perseverance alone that carrieth away the crown. Finis, non pugna, coronat. Patience and perseverance are fellow-laborers in God's harvest: they work together, they sweat together: they suffer together: and if either of them be compelled to bear the heavier lode, it is Patience: yet though Patience endure the burden, Perseverance goes away with the blessing. The Lord blessed the latter end of Job: yet he was blessed very well in the beginning: For he had seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred she asses: and for the heirs of all this substance, seven sons and three daughters. But his extraordinary blessing came at the last, when all his temptations were past: in the latter end of his book, and the latter end of his patience: God blessed the latter end of Job. The main matter is not In quo medio, sed in quibus extremis. Men are either cursed or blessed, not as they suffer in the middle, but as they speed in the end. Job might have some blessings in the beginning, sure he had many troubles in the midst, but his end made amends for all: God blessed the latter end of Job. Christianity is compared to a race: now in a race, all that run, win not: only one receiveth the price. He gets the garland, that first gets the jail. But in this spiritual race it is otherwise: Not he that cometh first, but everyone that holds out to the last, is crowned. Non qui primus venerit, sed qui cunque pervenerit. I deny not, but we must also make hast and not only strive to out-run them that run with us, but even to out-run ourselves. Let this days pace mend yesterdayes, and to morrows exceed them both. Old age, in secular races, is the more unwieldy disposition: but in this, the more vigorous, as being near the end of the course, and almost having the prize in hand.
The Schoolmen make of this Perseverance, not any one particular virtue, but Conditionem annexam cuilibet virtuti, a condition implied in every virtue. I is Dei donum, quo coetera servantur dona: God's rare and especial gift; the maintainer and preserver of all his other gifts. Without this, faith would languish into diffidence, hope give over her expectation, patience sink under her burden, and charity be weary of well-doing. Perseverance to virtue, is like the lungs to the heart; which keeps it in breath, and encourageth it to the end of the race. He that endureth unto the end, shall be saved: and he that doth not, shall lose all that he hath done. Comming but a foot short, may make a man miss the prize, and lose the wager he ran for. As in travel to a city, he loseth all his pains in the way, that gets not to his journeys end. True it is, that every good and perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights. The virtues that adorn a Christian soul, do everyone of them claim kindred of almighty God: Et Deus est in vtroque parente: they descend from him in the one, and the other line. Yet Perseverance is vnica filia, his only daughter and heir, which carries away all the Patrimony. Cùm enim omnes virtutes currant in stadio, sola Perseverantia accipit bravium. Patience, repentance, temperance, all run well: only Perseverance to the end gets the Cup; the cup of God's blessing: as God blessed the latter end of Job. Our blessed Savior once provided a Table on earth, for the people, who had continued with him three days: not because they heard him, and a little followed him; but Quia perseverarunt, because they continued with him. And he hath promised a Table in heaven; Ye shall eat and drink at my table in my kingdom: but to whom? Not to those that only heard him with some attention, and followed him with some admiration: but to them only Qui permanserunt, that continued with him. Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations. To teach us, that both these Tables, the blessings of earth, and the blessings of heaven too, are provided only for them, which persevere in their righteousness unto the end.
All those graces which the holy Ghost hath wrought in us, must be cherished and continued to the latter end; for of those the Lord only blesseth the latter end. Patience is an excellent grace, but without Perseverance it would often be to seek: as when an unwonted blow comes, the Fencer is put from his ward. Repentance is a happy and necessary grace, yet without Perseverance it would be dashed out of countenance, and be jeered for a sullen melancholy: Lacrymâ nihil citius arescit: nothing dries up faster than a tear: it seldom continues moist a whole day. Obedience it self would lose the reward by coming short, but for Perseverance: for no virtue can expect those eternal blessings, but that which holds out to the latter end. Nothing but Eternity can look to be rewarded with eternity. Per nostrum aeternum consequimur Dei aeternum. If we look for a happiness that shall continue as long as God's being, we must continue in a holiness which shall last as long as our being; I mean our mortal being on earth. So that no grace can lay claim to that blessedness, which is in the eternity of God; but Perseverance to the end, which is the eternity of man. We would be happy upon earth, but especially we desire to be blessed in heaven: we cannot rise from the one to the other, but Per scansum: Jacob's ladder is our way. Let us begin at the foot, which is grace here below: and so get up to the top, which is glory there above. But still remembering the state and condition of that Ladder: there were Angels descending, and Angels ascending: but none sitting, none standing still. If we desire to have our faith blessed with vision, our hope changed into fruition, our repentance comforted with pardon, our charity crowned with glory, and all our service rewarded with eternal life; let us keep these graces in breath and motion, ever in the ascendent, climbing higher and higher, till they come to the top of Immortality. And as when rivers toward their end, approach near unto the sea, then the tide comes and meets them: So when the course of our piety draweth near to the end of our life, God comes and meets us; comforts us with a taste of heaven before our death, and gives us, after death, the everlasting possession of it through Jesus Christ.
We see (by this time) the manifold dangers, and manifest ruins, which follow upon the falling away from our own steadfastness: But Quid ista proderit praenosse, si non contingat evadere? Take therefore some short rules, to keep you constant in the way.
1. Begin with resolution: forecast the worst, and prepare for it. Et aequissimum spera, & ad iniquissimum te para. Son professors are but like those that go to sea upon pleasure: they purpose to sails no further, than they see the way clear before them: if the sea begin to work, or they to be sick, back again with all hast to the shore. But the right Christian is bound for heaven, as the merchant is for his Port: storms and tempests cannot affright them: on they go, through fair or fowl, till they arrive at the desire of their own hearts. Resolve to continue, or never begin.
2. Fortifie thy heart with sincerity: be that within, which thou wouldst appear without. Nihil fictum, diuturnum. A false gloss disgraceth the stuff. Caduca sunt, quaecunque fucata sunt. Counterfeit pearls will not hold their luster. If our heart be not right, we cannot be steadfast: the seed among stones will not prosper: hollow-hearted, and shallow-rooted, soon gone. Whereas the firm plant Sole ardent nutritur & virescit, non arescit. As Jehu to Iehonadab, Is thine heart right? Then come up into my chariot: Come up; no descending, but all ascending and rising then. Some have a form of godliness, but deny the power thereof: all because they are not sound at the heart, A man is what he is, when he is tried: the times of peace show no difference: every man then thinks himself good, but knows not whether he be so or not. Persecution is the touchstone: then many of the forward slinke away; and they that made the least show of religion, stick closest to it. The outward profession of some is a blaze; the inward holiness of others a spark: persecution is the bellows, which blows the spark into a flame, the blaze into nothing; to the wonder of all men.
3. Keep a good conscience in all things, and thy faith from shipwreck. Conscience is the Bark, and Faith the commodity embarked: if the Bark miscarry, what shall become of the commodity? Sins against conscience make fowl breaches in this ship: Repentance indeed is the Calker, to stop the leaks: but it is better to prevent the making of a breach, than put it to the remedy of stopping. We deal with our conscience, as with our apparel: when we have got on a new suite, fresh and fair, we are very chary of abusing it: we take heed where we sit, what we touch, or against what we lean: but when it once grows a little old, soiled and sullied, we have no such regard of it: we little pass what we do with it, nor mind where we cast it, So the uxorious husband at the first Idolizeth his wife: no noise must disturb her, the cold wind must not blow upon her, the Sun must be shaded from her beauty, her feet must scarce touch the Earth; nothing must offend her: she commands all: her will is a law. The sinner that is suddenly turned zealous professor, is no less tender over his conscience: not a word must pass his lips, nor a thought be admitted into his heart, without her strict examination and approbation. But full soon doth that dotard grow sick of his wife, and this zealot grow weary of his conscience: their loves will languish, and if they do not fall into the other extreme, of abusing their wives; yet they could both be content to become widdowers. The new suite is brushed, and carefully looked to: the wife at first is tenderly regarded: and the conscience for a while is kept most pure. But ere long, the suite will grow old, the wife stale, and the conscience troublesome; and there is no more respect had of them: so little duration there is in extreemes.
4. Encourage thy heart to perseverance, by considering how short a time is set down for thy laboriousnesse. So we to God Remember how short my time is: So God returns it to us; yea O man, remember this thyself, and be not weary of thy pains. Punctum est quod vivimus: and what can be long in that, which is so short of it self? Be faithful unto death; no longer is required: it is a note of stint, as well as of extent, there. Not that our fidelity to Christ shall then cease, but then it shall be out of the danger of ceasing. Do but hold out to that day, and then thou art sure forever. It is but for a spurt, for a brunt, that we serve and suffer: and who would not for a short brunt or spurt endure any hardness, to live at hearts ease forever after? We would serve a hard and unkind master upon such terms: much more a Lord so kind and liberal, that came to serve for us, ere he required this service of us. It is not long, but light, which is exacted of us, in respect of that which is expected by us, and promised to us. Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.
2 PET. 3.18.
But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ: To him be glory both now and forever. Amen.
THose things that God intended not for multiplication, were made perfect in their first being. Perfect in nature, there needed no completion: Perfect in number, there needed no addition: Perfect in order: there needed no mutation: Perfect in measure, there needed no augmentation: Perfect in degree, there needed no melioration. The stars do not propagate: one star does not beget another: therefore God in the Creation made as many stars, as he purposed there should be. The Angels do not multiply: one Angel cannot beget another: therefore at first they were made in an abundant number. Nor needs there any accession of goodness or happiness to their being, for they are perfectly good, absolutely happy, according to their condition. But for the things of this world, their blessing was a Crescite: and therefore their number was but small at the beginning, because they were made capable of a propagation. So mankind began with two, in the Creation: and the world was replenished by eight, in that restitution after the deluge. From those first two, how many millions have been and shall be derived? The Earth is full, Heaven shall be full, and it is to be feared that Hell will be full too; and all of persons sprung from their loins. Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth. This had been an infinite blessing, if Adam had stood in his innocence, and begot such as himself was Statu primo: but alas, he begat such as himself was Statu lapso. The bitterness whereof he tasted in his first borne son Cain▪ who was a fratricide and a reprobate. It is worth our observation: the first man that died, went to Heaven: the first man that was borne went to Hell. Death is a punishment; yet though it seized on Abel, he was saved. Primogeniture was an honor; especially to be (though not the first man, yet) the first borne of mankind: Cain had this honor, and yet perished. Adam and Eve begat children in their own likeness; but they could not beget them in the likeness of God. They were created in his image, but in his image they could propagate none. By nature we increase our kind, but it must be by grace, if any of our kind be blessed.
Thus we still multiply, nor shall there be a cessation of this increase, till God puts a stop into the wheels of time, and sets a period to all things. But this is not the full extent of that Crescite: There is a vegetative life in the body, whereby it grows in stature: and there is a quickening Spirit in the soul, whereby it grows in goodness. The tree bears a seed, by which it may bring forth other trees of the kind; and yet withal, the same tree may grow in it self, both in respect of bulk, talnesse, and fruits. There is a Crescere in the one, and a Multiplicare in the other. If the body may grow in his capacity, why not the soul, in her capacity? The body may grow in quantity, till it become greater and taller: Why may not the soul grow in grace till it become holier; and grow in knowledge, till it become wiser, than it was before? The Stars are at their highest, the Angels are at their happiest: they cannot grow more bright or glorious. But men may grow from sinners to Saints, by repentance; and from Saints (as it were) to Angels, by holiness. We come not immediately from our mothers wombs so perfect men, nor immediately from the sacred Font so perfect Christians, but that we may admit a time of growing. We have the parts, but not the degrees of perfection. He that was perfection it self, yet would yield to the course of nature, and order and regulate his life by the direction of that. Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and Men. In him dwelt the fullness of the Godhead bodily: He was the wisdom of God, and the only beloved of God: yet would he increase in all these, in wisdom, and stature, and favor with God and man. So must we Grow till we come to a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
But grow in grace, and in the knowledge, &c.] We read of two Trumpets which Moses was commanded to make of silver. So we have here two Trumpets: one sounding from Heaven to Earth, Cressite in gratia, grow in grace: the other resounding from the Earth to Heaven, Christo sit gloria, to Jesus be glory. The former soundeth forth a point of Theology; the latter, a point of Doxology. The sound from Heaven, is a point of Theology or Divinity, summoning us to an increase of Grace. The sound from Earth, is a point of Doxology, or thanksgiving: returning to God praise and glory. When God gave the Law, it was delivered with the sound of Trumpets: when he requires the Law, it shall be with the sound of Trumpets: in tuba novissima. In both the Angels are the Ministers: in both, the instruments are Trumpets. So after a metaphorical sense in the Gospel, both in respect of what comes from Christ, and what is returned to Cbrist; here is a Trumpet, and a Trumpet: The one for proclamation, the other for acclamation: the proclamation of Grace, the acclamation of Glory: Grace proffered by him, Glory ascribed to him. I will take the cup of salvation, and praise the Name of the Lord. So here is Sumam calicem, in the one: and Laudabo nomen, in the other.
In the sound of the former Trumpet, two things are remarkable. 1. The ground of the lesson; the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. 2. The descant upon it, and elongation of the note; Grow in this grace and knowledge. In the sound of the other Trumpet, there are three notes. 1. Quid what; Glory. 2. Cui, to whom: to Christ Jesus. 3. Quamdiu, how long: now and forever. There is a time when this Trumpet from Heaven shall cease: The Angelical Trumpet shall put an end to the Evangelical Trumpet. There can be no time of proffering or receiving grace, when time it self shall be no more. No growing, then, for the harvest is come. No increasing then; for all they that are not full, shall be sent away empty. But the latter Trumpet shall sound always: glory to God, is the song of the Church militant, unto the end: and the song of the Church triumphant, after the end, without end. All the Saints and Angels shall sound this Trumpet, and sing this ditty forever: Blessing, honor and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth on the Throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever.
The Text begins as the World began, with a Crescite: and ends as the Bible ends, with an Amen. There is Fiat in either of them: that we may grow in grace; there needs God's Fiat to that: that we may set forth his glory; there is required our Fiat to this. This Amen is an echo, the answer to both these Trumpets, and hath relation to both the Corollaries. Christ wisheth grace to us, and we say Amen to this: we wish glory to Christ, and add again Amen to that. That his grace may be increased in us; Amen to that: That his glory may be advanced by us; Amen to that too. In regard of God's favor, and man's thankfulness; to them both, Amen. Thus the root of the tree is the Grace of God, and the top of the tree is the Glory of God. Grace in the foundation, Glory in the roof of the building. Blessing in the beginning, and blessing in the end: It begins with God's blessing of us, it ends with our blessing of God; who is blessed forever. Amen.
In the sound that comes from heaven, which is an hortatory persuasion, there be two principal things to be observed. Fundamentum, and Incrementum: Grace, and Growth. Radix arboris, and Accretio arboris. No growing without a root, and no live root from which there is no growing. Christ is the Roote, Grace the sap, and knowledge the fruits: for so we shall find it to be, Cognitio practica; which consists merely in the production of good works. Christ is the Roote that supporteth us, Grace is the sap which he communicates to us, and knowledge or obedience is the fruit he expects from us. Grace hath the first room in the Text, and so it shall have in my discourse. Wherein two circumstances sum up all. 1. What it is. 2. Of what valve it is.
1. What it is. The poets took Grace pro venustate: with them, beauty in the face, was a grace: comelynes in their carriage, a grace: handsomenes in wearing their garments, a grace: pleasantness in their discourse, a grade: bravery in their actions, a grace: but by their leaves, it was but a Poetical grace. We have those that take Grace in a worse sense; even for that which is most ungracious; Sin: He that wantonly can court his mistress, is said to do it with a grace. He that justifies an untrueth, and bears it out with a smooth impudence, is said to come off with a grace. When a gallant mannageth a fowl quarrel, his abettors will not stick to say, that he carries it with a grace. Yea of the very desperate blasphemer, his parasites will not be ashamed to report, that he swears with a grace. But if this be a grace, certainly it is a diabolical grace; it came from hell. The poets grace owes much to nature and education: the sinners grace is indebted to the devil and corruption: The former may pass, the latter is intolerable. God forbid that we should grow in such grace.
Divine Grace is another thing: as it springs from a higher generation, so it is of a nobler disposition. As there be diverse acceptions of it in the Scripture, so infinite distinctions of it in the School. There is Gratia increata, the free love and favor of God, which is called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : so to Mary, Invenisti gratiam cum Deo: Thou hast found favor with God. And Gratia creata or Infusa; which are the gifts of the first Grace, called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : so every good gift, natural, moral, or spiritual, is Grace. Some would have 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to signify only saving Grace: and Charismata, such common graces as may be in the wicked. All grace is God's gift; nor will he give it to those that will not receive it. Non est dare nisi Dei: non est accipere nisi hominis. The grace of God is without our will, but it is not within us without our will. The Papists speak in the dialect of that harlot to Solomon: Nec mihi, nec illi, sed dividatur: Neither all to God, nor all to man, but let it be divided betwixt grace and free will. This is false and injurious to God: for all goodness is from grace. It is either Gratia praeveniens, that converteth: or Gratia subsequens, that confirmeth. So St. Augustine: Gratia pravenit, ut velimus: Gratia subsequitur, ne frustra velimus. The cause of God's grace to us, is merely in himself: the internal motive is his own free love: the external impulsive is the merit of Christ, The effects of it are either Eternal, in our election: or temporal, in our vocation, and sanctification. The gifts of grace are either common to all, or peculiar to the elect. There is gratia Privativa, that keeps us from evil: and Positiva, that plants us with good. As for that of Gratia operans, and cooperans; it must be qualified; as that Acta fit activa voluntas, the will being first moved by grace, is not idle: or else it will cross that infallible position, It is God that worketh in us both the will and the deed. And for that old one, of Gratia gratis data, and Gratia gratum faciens; just exception might be taken against it: for when they speak of one kind of grace that is freely given, what do they but insinuate that there are other graces which are not freely given? But this is a distinction which hath so many gray hairs upon it, that I am loath to discredit it. Some, on the other side, are so young and abortive, that they would not be mentioned.
In a word, Grace is either taken actively, for that love and favor of God whereby we are accepted in Jesus Christ: or passively, for the several gifts wrought in us by the holy Spirit, and that improvement of our talents, whereby we bring forth acceptable fruits. The first grace is the cause, the other graces are the effects: the first is without us, the rest within us: the first is the original grace in God, the other are graces created and infused into us. In the former consists our Justification, our sanctification in the latter. Our Rooting is in the first, our growth in the other. When our faith waxeth stronger, our charity hotter, our patience meeker, our obedience more conscionable, our conscience more sincere; this is to grow in grace. And the more we grow in goodness, which is the latter grace, our Sanctification: the more assured we grow of the former, even the favor of God in Christ, which is our Justification. Still the more holy, the more happy. It is true that our Justification admits no latitude: we can be no more than just and righteous: but that grace is without us; no growing in that. But our Sanctification admits of degrees and measure, and is within us; so that we may grow in that. We cannot be more just today than we were yesterday, in respect of God: we may be more holy, in regard of ourselves. And if we be not more beloved than we were; yet we shall feel ourselves more beloved and blessed than we were. We are all equal, every believer of us, in gratia remittente; but not in gratia inhaerente: all equal in the grace that justifies us, not in the grace that sanctifies us: in this latter let us be growing. In the Old Testament we do not read of grace, but as it is taken for God's favor, or man's favor: never for an inherent habit. The law given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
Grow in grace;] that is in the improvement of the holy seed with in us, and brining forth the works of grace: then shall the first grace, which is the favor of God, enlarge his beams of mercy upon us. Thus our Apostle began his Epistle; Grace and peace be multiplied unto you: that was his apprecation: So he concludes here in the end; Grow in grace▪ this is his exhortation. Peter only joined peace with grace, in his salutation: Paul used also to put in mercy: Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father, and Jesus Christ our Lord. We might look upon them; Qualia, Quota, Quomodo; What they are, how many, and how ranked. Tria sunt omnia: all good things are referred to these three heads: a Trinity of blessings, as it were from the Trinity of Persons. Mercy from God the Father, Grace from God the Son, and Peace from God the holy Ghost. Yet as Grace never comes alone; mercy and peace come with it: so it never comes hindmost; it hath always the first place. But you will say, Mercy is the cause of grace; why then is it placed after the effect? S t . Paul went a notiore ad ignotum: for we had never known mercy but by Grace: as he that would go to sea, must take a river by the hand. Mercy in the remission of sins, Grace in the sanctification of life, Peace in the eternal blessedness of heaven. But still Grace hath the priority of place: and indeed, under God, it is all in all: we have no good, we do no good, but we must thank Grace for it. Therefore in our common ejaculations, upon all occasions, when we hear others wish for diverse temporal things; we sum up all in this one vote; God send us his grace, we ask no more. And surely we need not: for all blessings wait upon Grace, as maids of honor upon the Queen: Grace, or nothing: Grace, and everything. This makes us equal to the Angels; and without this we are miserable and forlorn wretches, worse than beasts: Praestat non nasci quàm sine gratia mori: which is my transition to the next point.
2. Of what value it is. But alas, who can value it? What Gold can buy this Pearl? What Indies can purchase it, where it is not; or redeem it, when it is lost? What would not the reprobate Angels give, what would they not suffer, for one dram of grace? Though in their malice they hate it, yet for their case they would fain have it. We cannot better tell how to value it, than by way of comparison. Put it into the balance with temporal things, and that will help us a little to know the worth of it.
1. Grace comes from the best Fountain; the Mercy of God in Christ. You will say, all temporal things come from the same Fountain of goodness: Every good gift is from above. But though the Spring be the same, Solomon distinguisheth them in the stream or current: Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left hand riches and honor. Temporal things are Dona sinistra, the gifts of God's left hand: Grace is Donum dextrae; the gift of his right hand: this He gives to his chosen, as Joseph laid his right hand upon the head of Ephraim. Temporal things do not make the Possessor happy; Grace does: yea, they make his account greater; Grace makes it less.
2. Grace serves for the good of the noblest part of man, his soul: other things do but nourish or delight his mortal body. This moving coffin of the soul is but earth, and will crumble to earth: from that womb it proceeded, and to the same tomb it shall be gathered: dust to dust. But sancta anima c • lum est, the gracious soul is a Heaven; Habens pro Sole intellectum, pro firmamento Fidem, pro influentia charitatem, pro motu spem, pro Movente Spiritum sanctum, pro astris excercitus virtutum: having for a Sun understanding, for a firmament faith, for influence charity, for motion hope; the holy Ghost for our Mover, and an army of virtues instead of stars. Such is the honor of Grace.
3. Nothing but Grace can satisfy the soul. The proud Self-lover will have all his apparel sit in print; and though he be in pain, yet will he not complain that his shoe wrings him. The Worldling hath all things commodious about him; yet there is a little fury within that wrings him; a froward conscience that troubles him. Could he swallow the earth that swallows all; it might choke him, not satisfy him. But give him Grace, and then he goes away springing like Joseph, and singing like David; The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places, and I have a goodly heritage.
4. Temporal things have no Charter of continuance: Vel viventem deserunt, vel à moriente deseruntur: they are sometimes gone from a man before he dies, but they will never tarry with him longer than he lives. Yea, worse; for Viventem si non abcundo relinquunt, manendo vexant. They will either work his discontent in leaving him, or his vexation in staying with him. Like a bad wife, that either will be gadding abroad, or scolding at home. Did you never see a Porter troubled with his burden, though all that he carried were his own? The abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep. Quo major sonus, minor somnus: the more noise, the less sleep. While they do tarry, nihil qutetis, no tranquility: of their tarrying nihil certitudinis, there is no certainty. At my first answer no man stood with me, but all forsook me. As Saint Paul at his first answer, so we speed at our last answer; no temporal things will stand with us, but all forsake us. If we look on this hand for riches, they are gone: if on the other hand for pleasures, they are gone: if behind us, for friends; or before us, for honors; or under us for our lands and possessions; all gone. Only Luke is with me: only Grace is left us; nothing but Grace tarries with us. Grace stands out for eternity, and nothing else.
For Bona naturae, some beasts exceed us: for Bona fortunae, many wicked men go beyond us: but we have Bona Gratiae; this makes us blessed, when the former are not, and the latter had better not be. What Solomon was among the Prophets, and John among the Apostles, such is Grace among the virtues; even the especially Beloved of God. Solomon had his dream, and John had his vision: wisdom rested in the bosom of Solomon, and John leaned on the bosom of Wisdom: Grace is now comforted with the Presence of God, and Grace shall be hereafter blessed with the Vision of God. Christ now dwells with her: even in the bosom of Grace: and she shall dwell with him, even in the bosom of glory. This is the beauty of the soul, the strength of the spirit, the peace of the mind, and comfort of the conscience. It makes the body a cabinet of immortal Treasure, cleareth the eyes, fortifieth the hands, directs the feet, composeth the gesture: And when this body must fall to the grave, Grace covers it with comfortable dust, unto the hope of a better resurrection, and leaves it in a quiet sleep. At our dissolution, Grace is both our physic and our Physician: a cordial that never fails: it doth qualify the sorrows, mitigate the bitterness and pangs of death: it stamps the Devil underfoot: it throws allo •• sins into the bottom of the sea; or buries them under Christ's Cross, without possibility of ever rising again to witness against us. It takes the soul out of her wearisome tabernacle, and delivers it as a precious charge into the hands of an Angel, and still keeps it inseparable company. The Angels bear it up unto Christ, and Christ presents it spotless to God the Father, where it remains blessed forever and ever.
Grow in Grace] There be divers means of acceleration, in plants and vegetables; wherein art is used to help nature: And for the procerity and stature of man's body, much is attributed to nourishment, something to the air, and not a little to education. But what is there that can make us grow in Grace? Surely nothing but Grace: the plantation, and the accretion is by the same hand. Qui dat esse, dabit & crescere. When God had made all living creatures, He breathed on them a Crescite: the former act gave them a being, the latter a blessing. One fiat was enough for both: to make the world when it was not, and to make it more numerous than it was; not in generibus singulorum, but in singulis generum: not in new kinds, but in new individuals. Yet the former is called a Creation, the other a Benediction. There was a Bene in both: in the making, for there all things were very good: in the blessing, for there they were so much the better by increasing their kind. Howsoeuver God foresaw the decay that would follow upon sin, and the death that would follow upon the decay: yet He gave this blessing of multiplication, before that either sin, decay or death were entered into the world. So that as then out of the same mouth came both the fiant, and the crescant: so here from the same hand proceeds both the Grace, and the Growth. Both the Esse, and the Melius esse, know no other but one and the same Author.
The Growth of any plant is improved principally by three helps: the secundity of the ground wherein it grows: the kindly heat of the Sun, cheering it up with his influence: and the contribution of the clouds towards it, with their dews and showers descending upon it. The ground wherein we are planted, is the Church,; and she, like a kind and indulgent mother, accommodates us withal her helps: Her Doctrine to direct us, that we may do well: her Discipline to correct us, when we do amiss: her Sacraments, which are Cordials to our heart, like springs, veins, and channels of Grace to the root: her prayers to Heaven, for a blessing upon that she gives, and for a blessing which she cannot give. In commune erat, in commune operatur. The rain that continually falls upon us, to make us shoot up in goodness, is a frequent distillation of the Word preached. If those holy dews do not soake into our hearts, we shall be Dwarfes in Grace. For this purpose Christ sends Apostles, and Pastors, and Teachers: those be the clouds, and from those clouds come rain and showers: the effect should be, that we may grow up to the stature of Christ: there is our growth by it. The Sun that ripens us, and is the principal cause of this accretion, is Christ Himself; that Sol Iustitiae; all our Growth is merely beholding to his beams and saving Influence. He blesseth the ground that bears us: He filleth, and emptieth the clouds upon us. Thus there is Gratia acta, wrought in us: and Gratia auct • , increased in us. As Grace is not given Nolenti, to him that would none of it: so nor is it increased Negligenti, to him that does not labor to improve it. We are not only living, but reasonable and holy plants: and must both labor for our own sustenance, and mature and further our own accrescence. The Grace that is in us, is perfect: for the least Grace is Grace, as a spark of fire is fire, If men see but a little, so little that they think themselves blind; yet they do see: but they may be brought to see better. We know, there is a double perfection; of parts and degrees: The Grace that is infused to us at the first, is perfect in regard of the parts: as a child is so far a perfect man, because it hath all the parts of a man: but it is not perfect in regard of degrees; for we may grow up in Grace, as a child does instature. In our conversion, when we first receive this saving Grace, we are but Infants in Christ: yet Infants may be tall men in time. Desire we to know whether we be grow •• in grace, or not? As by the growing of one plant, we may give a guess at all the rest: so here let us make a trial.
1. For faith and charity. Is our faith stronger? As our salvation is now nearer than when we first believed so is our faith in that salvation stronger than when we first were converted? Is our charity grown from an Issope on the wall, to a Cedar in Libanus? From the love of a few, and those our friends, and those very sparingly, and this with limitation and provision, that our love cost us little: is it grown to the sincere love, of many, of all, even to our damage, even to our death?
2. Consider we our Humility; how do we thrive in that? At the first we thought some worse than ourselves: do we not now think all better? Indeed of all Graces in us, Humility grows cross to the rest. Other virtues aspire upwards, humility looks downwards. We say of the rest, the higher they grow, the better: but Humility is the best at the lowest. Faith, Hope, and Devotion have an holy ambition: they disdain to look lower than Heaven: nothing can content them but an immortal Crown. But Humility pleaseth herself in a low dejection: you shall find her (with Job ) in the dust, in that school of mortality, disputing and conferring with worms and rottenness. Yet even there she grows; and that in the favor of God and his Angels. The deeper she roots, the higher she sprouts: The lower her Humiliavit se, on earth: the higher her Exaltavit Deus, in Heaven.
3. Our Repentance hath such another kind of growing too. She grows from a spring to a brook, from a brook to a river, from a river to a great sea. This is a Grace that does not only grow herself; but waters all other Graces, and makes them grow faster in us. It is our own contribution of moisture, besides that of the clouds, that they young plants, which we have almost eradicated and withered by our sins, may be caused to grow again by our tears. As the morning dew is a pawn of the evening fatness: so our penitent tears put a fruitfulness into all our Graces. When for that sin, which cost us at first but a sigh, we now fetch many deep groans: and for that which cost us but groans and prayers, we now spend floods of tears; and if it were possible, we would weep tears of blood. This is to grow in that Grace, which moistens all our plants, all our virtues: and destroys all the weeds, all the sins in our garden; happy Repentance.
4. Patience hath her growth, in our better hability to bear crosses. It may be at first, that we scarce durst wade through a foord of troubles: now we can swim in a sea of sorrows. Then a slight wrong molested us, now we can bear a lode of injuries. Then we were provoked with words, now we can endure wounds, without minding revenge. Then we were angry with our persecutors, now we pray for them. Then we would have retaliated, and could not: now we can, and will not. Then we thought all suffering a punishment, now we judge it a preferment. As Queen Anne Boleyn, the mother of the blessed Queen Elisabeth, when she was to be beheaded in the Tower, thus remembered her thanks to the King. From a private gentlewoman he made me a Marquisse, from a Marquisse a Queen; and now he hath left no higher degree of earthly honor for me, he hath made me a Martyr. This is indeed to let patience have her perfect work, and to come up to her full growth; when for Christ's sake, and his Gospel's, persecution shall be held an honor, and misery a dignity; Ipsamque erudem coronam. Here is the patience of the Saints.
5. Contentation must have her growth too: It was the fault of the Israelites, never to be content: when they had water, they murmur for bread: when they had bread, they complain for flesh: As if they had boorded with God, and he were to provide them diet, and they (good men) honestly paid for what they took. But Jacob their Father, of whom they were called Israel, was of another mind: If God will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on: he asks no more. So Paul; having food and raiment, let us be therewith content. Are we more moderate in our desires now, than we were at first? Worldlings, quaseniores, eo cupidiores: but if in our age we are less desirous of the world, it is an argument that we are more satisfied with the Lord. One special means of the melioration of a tree, is a baring of the root, and throwing away the earth from about it. If these earthly things, riches, honors, pleasures be taken from us, and the world hath left us naked and destitute of his vain succors, we adhere faster to God. We do not covet them, we are content either with or without them: satisfying our hearts with this, that Christ is all in all unto us.
6. Summarily, we may know our own growth in grace, by our bringing forth the fruits of grace. All trees are not frugiferous, Christians are. That which brings forth no fruit, how shall we know it is a tree, and no logge? There is little difference between a dead stock, and a barren tree: one brings forth as much fruit as the other. I know that boughs, buds, and blossoms, are indications of a trees growth but there is no proof of a Christians growth without fruits Bring forth fruits meet for repentance, saith St. John: he stays at nothing till he comes to fruits. For that was the tree planted, for that watered, for that manured, and succoured from earth and heaven: not to make materials, nor to give shadows; not for the green boughs, or gay blossoms; but for the fruits. The tree is for the fruit, and but for the fruit there had been no tree. Fruit is the thing for which it was first set, and still is suffered to grow: and when there is no longer any hope of that, Cut it down, why cumbers it the ground? Then comes the axe to the root: down it goes, into the fire it must: if it will not serve for fruit, it must for fuel.
There is no evident knowledge of our growth, either by our leaves or blossoms. Our leaves that so ruffle with the winds, are but our hearing of Sermons: and of this we are very prodigal,: and for this we look to be esteemed good Christians: as if all godliness consisted in the hearing of a Sermon. Is all turned to hearing? where be the other senses? Is the whole body an ear? What is become of the other members? The Papists stand much upon their Auricular Confession: but do not too many among us stand too much upon Auricular Profession? There is an auricular confession, the religion of Papists: and an auricular profession, the main religion of our pure hypocrites. All the Jewels of their goodness hang at their ears: and but for their ear-mark, no man would take them to be Christians. The thorny ground is near a curse: but the fruitless fig-tree had a curse. Hearing the word of grace, is no sufficient proof of our growing in the works of grace. You hear us, and you praise us; and then think you have done enough: You hear our Sermons, we hear of your commendations: Teleramus illas, & tremimus inter illas: we suffer it, but with trembling hearts. All this is but leaves, and we ask for fruits: and not fructus oris, but fructus operis. Faire words do no more prove your growing, than the large leaves of Jonah's gourd was an argument of the lasting: Quickly they both fade: one day green, the next dry. It is no good sign in a tree, when all the sap goes up into the leaves, and is spent that way: nor in a Christian, when all his grace shoots up into words: a verbal goodness; no reality at all.
Leaves come of the kernel, as well as fruits: so doth chaff of the seed, as well as good grain: yet do we not plant for leaves, nor do we sow for chaff: we make small account of either. Quid paleae ad triticum? What is the chaff to the wheat? Quid foliis ad fructum? What are the leaves to the fruit? Rather give us fruit on a shrub, than a tree that can reach the Clouds, with nothing but leaves. There may be some fruit, without much growth: but growth is nothing worth without fruit. Saul was higher by the head, than all the rest of Israel: many in Israel were better than Saul at the heart. The procerity and cedarly tallness of trees, with a glorious flourish of leaves, is goodly to the eye: but the kindly fruits of the lower plant is more acceptable to the taste. The eminence of some notoriously zealous professors, may make them much admired: but the good fruits of mercy in men silent and less notable, makes them more beloved. The former may grow in applause, but the latter grow in grace: and this growth O Lord, give me!
We have heard the two fundamental grounds: first, what grace is, with the value of it: next what it is to grow in grace, with 〈◊〉 happiness belonging to it. For application to ourselves; two main uses 〈…〉 to your charge: Quaerere, and Crescere. First, a labor to obtain gra •• 〈…〉 , an endeavor to grow in grace. The acquisition, and the accretio • 〈◊〉 • nis germinatio praesupponit plantationem: that cannot grow, which is not. It must have a being, before it have an increase. God gives the seed, first: then Paul must plant, and Apollos must water, before there comes an increase. First give it essentiam, a being, then look for Incrementum, a growing. The grace of God in me was not in vain: saith Paul. See first that you have grace; and then that the grace you have be not in vain. In vain it cannot be, if it be in the Lord. His grace shall not be in vain, in you: nor shall your labor be in vain, in him. For the obtaining of grace, diverse duties are requireable.
1. Concursus ad orbem gratia. Seeing it is so precious, that life without it is but death, or worse: Let us creep into the Sunshine, and live within the sphere and compass of Grace. Ye are not under the Law, but under grace. There is no small benefit, to live within the precincts of grace. I do not say, that all who are Sub gratia, are therefore necessarily In gratia. Plants and stones lie under the same beams of the Sun, and are wet with the same moisture of the Clouds: The Plants spring and grow, yet there is no alteration of the stones. But to live within the verge of the Court, gives some hope that the king may one day cast a favorable eye upon us. We cannot come into the room where they make perfumes, but we must carry away some of the sweetness on our clothes. Nor can we walk in a garden of Roses and Violets, without participation of their pleasant odors. Which if either our superstitious Recusants, that refuse the Church in state and pride: or our wanton Recusants, that refuse it for delicacy and pleasure: or our worldly Recusants, that refuse it for the love of their Mammon; rightly understood: they and the Temple would be better acquainted. Thomas was not with the Apostles, when Jesus first appeared to them: and to his absence some have imputed his incredulity. It is ill to take, but worse to make occasions of our absence. God hath appointed a day in a week, the Church an hour in the day, and the State a place for both. To neglect that day, that hour, and that place, is no less than to disobey the commandment of the State, of the 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Church, and of our God himself. If Peter be out of the ship, he may sink: If Shimei be out of Jerusalem, he may die for it. Out of the Temple, when we should be there, we may perish; if God not as merciful to us, as Christ was to Peter; and more merciful, than Solomon was to Shimei; what business soever we pretend.
What be the common occasions that detain us? Playing or sleeping, or drinking, or evening of accounts, or visiting of friends. Think on it: when you play, and are at your sport, what if God should come to you in earnest? What if death should make a gamester among you? He throws at all: and would he not swoope all the stakes, to your terror and most unrepairable loss? Had it not been better for you, that he had found you praying, than playing? When you sleep, why may not that stern Serjeant take you napping? Why may not a palsy, or an apoplexy, or a lethargy, put you into your last sleep? You would not rise to serve God at the Church; why should God arise to preserve you at home? Drinking, that is the common hindrance: O how many hundreds about this city, doth the Tavern and Tap-house rob the Church of? With such an Host, gain is godliness; and with such guests; the health of their souls is drowned in healths to their mistresses. One hour spent in praying, is tedious to them: ten hours in drinking seem nothing, so merrily the time passeth with such tos-pots. Think seriously, with the cup in thy hand: why may not that draught be thy last! Some Merchants and Tradesmen make bold with that holy time to set even their accounts: but how if God at that very time should call them to an account? It is to be feared, that no cheerful account could be then rendered. Others have their friends to visit: but how if God should then visit them, and smite them with some mortal sickness? It would be small comfort to their souls, that the Church was then forsaken of their bodies. These judgments may fall upon men, in their wanton or willful absence from the congregation: they have no supersede as against them. Let us therefore keep the orbe of Grace, and the God of all Grace will keep us.
2. Apparatus ad vocem gratiae. Faith comes by hearing, and by hearing comes all other grace too. The holy Ghost is the Fountain, Preaching the pipe, our Eare the channel, and our Heart the cistern for this water of life. Receive not the grace of God in vain. In vain it is to us, when either it is tendered, and not accepted; or accepted and not improved. Stir up the gift of God which is in thee. The sparks will not be kindled in our souls without hearing, and they will die in their own ashes without stirring. Hearing is the light that kindles them, Prayer the tongues to stir them up, and meditation the bellows to make them burn. The Word of the Gospel is compared to a feast; and the hearers are the guests: but there is some difference in the carriage of the business. First, to a feast we are bidden, and we come: one invitation is enough: To the Word we are invited often; but instead of ourselves; we send our excuses: we have no need of it, no stomach to it. Secondly, in a feast we are glad to have the best morsels carved to us, and let the courser dishes pass by: But in hearing of the Word, when the best counsel is offered us, we are so mannerly as to commend it to our neighbors: That reprehension toucheth such a one, not me. Thirdly, at a feast we desire to be Primi the first: but in God's house we are well content to be Postremi, the last. Fourthly, a Sermon is still thought too long; when will he make an end? At a feast, we look for a second or third course, and seldom call to take away. Fifthly, we make reasonable election of nourishment for our bodies: but we are bad choosers of the diet for our souls. That pleaseth us which is sweet to the sense, not that which is wholesome to the conscience. By nature we have no more skill in our own diet, than in our own Physic. We shrink in our profession, and sink in our dignity, in respect of very mean creatures; that are their own physicians, their own caters and carvers. They write that the Harte being pursued, and wounded, knows an herb, which being eaten, throws of the arrow: a strange kind of vomit! The dog is subject to sickness, but he knows the grass that recovers him. It may be true, that the drugs are as near to us as to other creatures: it may be that obvious and common simples, easy to be had, would cure us. But we have not that innate instinct, to apply those natural medicines to our present dangers, which these inferior creatures have: we are not our own apothecaries, not our own physicians, as they are. Thus ignorant are we for our bodies, and naturally worse choosers for our souls. If we knew the valve of the word of Grace, nothing could keep us from the hearing of it. As Diogenes being repelled of Antisthenes lifting up his staff to drive him away, replied: Do, beat me: yet thou shalt never drive me from thee, so long as I can learn any good by thee. As meat does not enter the body, but by the mouth: so grace does not pass into the soul, but through the ear.
3. Affectus ad fontem gratia. The Spirit of God is the fountain of grace, let us please him, as we desire to be made gracious by him. Grieve not the holy Spirit of God, by whom you are sealed unto the day of redemption. He is the high God; let us not grieve him for his dignities sake: he seals us up in grace; let us not grieve him for his benefits sake. Because of his Greatness, and because of his Goodness: Greatness in himself, Goodness to us: for either of these, or for both of these, we should be so respective to him, as not to grieve him. The Apostle might have said; Yield him all cause of joy and contentment: it had been but reason, so. But not to give him any cause of grievance; what could he say less. Grieve him not for his own sake; if not for his own, yet for his Seals sake, for his Graces sake. Si rem grandem mandâsset, say the Servants of Naaman to their Master: If the Prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it. So si rem grandem dixisset, If the Apostle had imposed some great piece of service upon us, yet we should not have thought much of it. But he only chargeth us not to grieve him; which is no positive or actual service, of pains or peril: only a prohibition of dis-service; as little as can be required. Hath he made his own sacred bed in the chamber of thy heart? O then trouble him not. Let not the noise of vain words disquiet him, nor the stench of carnal lusts offend him, nor the sluttish heaps of worldly desires make him weary of his abode: Melliter in tenero praesta requiescere lecto. If thou find that glorious king in thy poor cottage, bow thyself with Abraham to the ground, and say; My Lord, if I have found favor in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant. There be two sorts of persons whom we would not willingly offend: the Great, and the Good. Not the Great in regard of their power: they may do us a displeasure: which is the motive of fear. Not the Good, in regard of their bounty: we may be the better for them; which is the motive of hope. If he be great, though he give us nothing; yet there is no wisdom to displease him. If he be good, and ready to do us good, though his power be not mighty; yet in honesty we should not anger him. But if he be great and good, able and willing to pleasure us; then far be it from us to grieve him: which is the motive of love; and of such love as we always carry about us; love to ourselves. For all these respects, let us grieve the Spirit of grace no ways: for his Greatness, ne noceat: for his goodness, vt benefaciat: and for our own sakes, Quos signavit. If we desire Grace in our Cistern, let us dearly love the fountain.
4. Respectus ad honorem Gratiae. It honors us, we have good cause to honor it. As Theodosius the Emperor preferred the title of Membrum Ecclesiae, to that of Caput Imperij: professing that he had rather be a Saint and no king, than a King and no Saint. Them that honor me, I will honor: and shall not we honorare honorantem? S t . Paul chargeth us to adorn the doctrine of our Savior in all things: a good life adorns grace; scandalous sins cast disgrace upon it. We begin to storm at this challenge; what, dishonor grace? In our brave and lofty style, we scorn the imputation: what, We to discredit the Gospel? We that profess it, and love it, and live in it, and are ready to die for it; We to dishonor it. I would it were not true: yet the Apostle begs but an easy request of them that were, and (possible) thought themselves very famous Christians; Grieve not the holy Spirit: Not for an Honorare, nor a Laetificare nor a Glorificare; you will not advance, nor credit, nor defend the Gospel of grace; yet at least do but thus much for it, as not to disgrace it. Let not the Name of God, and his doctrine be blasphemed. God's Name? say we in our ruffe and heat: what do we but glorify it, and make it famous and renowned everywhere. Ye say well; but hear you? In the mean time I would his Name might not be evil spoken of by your means. Dishonor Grace? Why it is our life, our soul: the very life of our life, and the salvation of our soul: we will never do it. But is there not such a thing, as turning the grace of God into wantonness? What do you call this? Is it not a dishonoring of Grace?
When we shall abuse either the promises of Grace, which are the covenants: or the Pledges of Grace, which are the Sacraments; by deriving an encouragement to evil from that merciful indulgence: is not this a turning of grace into wantonness? And is not that a discredit done to the honor of grace? If from the Sermon which forbiddeth such a sin, we shall immediately run into the sin forbidden by the Sermon; do we not disparage the house of grace, the time of grace, the word of grace, the very God of grace? Is it not a discredit to them all? When the Pagan beheld Christians receiving the blessed Sacrament, and observed with what reverence and devotion they demeaned themselves in that holy business; he was inquisitive what that action meant. It was answered him by one of them; That God having first emptied their hearts of all their sins, as pride, envy, covetousness, contention, luxury, and the rest; did now enter into them himself, with a purpose to dwell there. He was silent for the present: but followed and watched them whom he saw to be communicants in that action, for two days together: And perceiving some of them to fall into quarrels, uncleanness, rapacity and drunkenness so soon, he declared his censure of them with this exclamation: I confess that your religion may be good, your devotion good, your profession good; but (sure) your hospitality is stark naught, Apud quos ne Deus quidem biduo commorari permittitur. Are you so unhospitable; that you will not let your God dwell with you for two days together? This is the shame of Christians, this, the disparagement of grace; when it is forced, against the nature of it to encourage lewdness: I may take this bribe, put up this Interest, admit this uncleanness, drink this quantity: why? O! God is gracious: nay, therefore do it not, because thy God is gracious. Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. Will any sober man wound himself, to try the skill and love of his Surgeon? God forbid it; and the thankfulness for his mercies, the remorse of our own hearts, the tenderness of our own consciences, and the love of our own souls, forever forbid it. Our God is a consuming fire. Even our God, the God of grace, is a consuming fire. If we will dare to presume; he will not spare to consume. keep back thy servant from presumptuous sins; let not them have dominion over me. In many things we sin all: but let not the presumption of pardon induce us. Though God's grace be an inexhaustible treasure; yet we may spend so much of our own stock, till we become mere bankerouts. Let grace be the desire of our hearts, grace the prayer of our lips, grace the direction of our lives, grace the protection of our bodies, and grace the salvation of our souls.
Thus we have found out the way to get it; now we must seek out the means to improve it; Grow in grace. This is done first by prescribing the Furtherances, and next by removing the hindrances: both which I might make distinct passages: But I will knit them together, and set down certain Rules which may direct us how to grow.
1. I begin at Prayer; and where better? Qui fecit vivere, docuit & orare, Hannah prayed to have a child, Monica prayed to save a child. Let us pray that we may have Grace, and pray that we may save Grace, and that Grace may save us. Prayer is requisite, that we may be new borne in Grace: and that being so borne, we may grow in Grace, Prayer must not be left out. They are all gone aside: Why? They call not upon the Lord. Prayer is a Key, to open the Gate of Heaven, and let Grace out: and Prayer is a Locke, to fasten our hearts, and keep Grace in. Prayer is a Messenger to fetch that holy seed out of the Garner above: and Prayer is the former and latter rain, to make it grow beneath. Prayer woos it to come, and Prayer wins it to tarry. Prayer is the Invitation of that noble Guest to our house, and Prayer provides for the entertainment of it. Prayer procures it a being in us, and Prayer supplies it with a blessing. Fundatur precibus, precibus firmatur: therefore Pray continuaelly, if thou wouldst grow continually. Yea, there is a growth in Prayer, as there is in the Grace we pray for. Our Prayers may grow in zeal, in confidence, in penitence, in humility. Some Censers may be fuller of Incense than others: and the higher our Invocations rise up in fervency, the more do Graces come down in plenty. Therefore as they put some water into the pump, that thereby they may fetch up more: so let us pray, that we may pray better. When the mill is set a going, an easy wind keeps it so, and a stronger increaseth the motion: If the Spirit blow upon us, this sets us a praying: but a more powerful gale of Grace and Inspiration, adds vigor to our Devotion. In vain do we expect that alms of Grace, for which we do not so much as beg.
2. A jealous suspicion of our own strength. We say, He that teacheth him self, hath a fool to his master: so he that relieth upon himself, hath a reed for his upholder: either he will fall quickly, or is already down. Confidence in God doth only support us: we cannot put too much trust in Him, nor too little in ourselves. It was Peters over-venturousnesse, that tripp'd up his own heels: Though all men should be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended. Bravely promised: but Peter sware, I know not the man: cowardly answered. I know not the man? He knew well enough what his Master was, but he knew not what himself was. Multos impedit à firmitate, praesumptio firmitatis. Many had stood, if they had not made themselves sure of standing. Therefore is Peters fall recorded; Vt ruina majorum, sit cautela minorum. Every error of theirs, is a catechism to us: their lapses are our cautions. Those Judgments happened to them for ensamples: Ex cinere Iudaorum, lixivium Christianorum: the ashes of the Jews will serve to make a Lie for Christians; to wash and scour us from impiety. That which is upon Record to their disgrace, can neither give courage nor comfort to us in the imitation of it. Scriptae sunt etiam ruinae priorum, ad cautelam posteriorum. If thou stand upon thine own bottom, Remember Lots wife: remember her that fell before thee. If thou beest confident of thine own standing, remember Peter: he fell that was most confident. There are two sorts of Memento's set upon all stories: If the example be good, Memento & fac, Go and do thou likewise: If bad, Memento & fuge, Do not thou likewise. Think upon Lots progress, and coming safe to Zoar; Memento & fac: Think upon his wives retardation and retrospection; Memento & fuge. We are like to sick men; who when they have had a good day or two, think themselves presently well again: so they make bold to put off their kerchiefes, to put on thinner garments, and to venture into the fresh air: whereupon follow unrecoverable relapses. Let us only be confident in Jesus Christ.
3. An holy fear of falling must still possess us. I will put my fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from me. In the former part of that Verse, there is an everlasting promise of God not to depart from us: yet still fear is placed in us of purpose, that we may not depart from Him. It generally granted, that no man truly engraffed into Christ, can either totally or finally fall away from Grace: And that Peter did not so fall, because Christ prayed for him, that his faith would not fail. To say, it might deficere re, non tempore, is absurd: for can a thing perish, and yet remain in time? What time can be given to that which is not? Nor is it enough to say, that faith lost may be restored again: For then Christ prayed not at all for that faith which Peter had, but for that faith which he should have. Yet there can be no fall without great danger. Sin is a fall: we have taken up the term ourselves, in calling Adams sin, Adams Fall. A fall indeed; for it fowls us as a fall, it bruiseth us as a fall, it bringeth down as a fall: down from the state of Paradise, down to the dust of death, down to the bar of Judgment, down to the pit of hell. Yet all falls do not harm us alike: there is in sin, the fall, the relapse, the wallow, and the not rising again: this latter, the not repenting, damneth.
There may be Lapsus, a grievous sin: and Relapsus, those Recidiva peccati, worse: and a lying still, Volutabrum peccati, the wallow; worse than that: But if it once comes to impenitency, that they fall, and not rise; this not only makes it most culpable, but leaves it most inexcusable. To prevent this, let us fear always. Fear is but a cowardly passion, yet it is set to watch the chief Citadel; the very heart: As in a Town of Garrison, the most white liver'd Soldier may serve to ring the Alarm-bell: yea, he is fittest for the purpose: for the fear of his own danger will make him vigilant to give warning to the rest. God doth give us fear for a ballast, to carry us steadily in all weathers: but yet He doth ballast us with such sand as hath Gold in it; with that fear which is his fear. For The fear of the Lord is his Treasure. The Father says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: the Son repeats it: he that collects both, calls it The root of wisdom: and that it might embrace all, Wisdom it self. Therefore A wise man will fear in everything: he is never without it, never without the excercise of it; not only in heavy and calamitous times, but even in good and cheerful days too. Noah being moved with fear, prepared the Ark; to the saving of his house: though he had assurance of his deliverance, yet he provides the means of it with an holy fear. Though we can pretend to no other degree of wisdom, yet let us be abundantly rich in this; that we are possessed with a fear of sinning. Let us fear all stops, all impediments, all obstacles that may cross or retard our growing in Grace: so shall our fear be turned into joy, and that joy be crowned with glory.
4. Next to the Timete, let us place a Cavete: as we fear a dwarfing or growing downward, so let us beware of a stunting or not growing at all. That fear was a necessary caution, and this caution is no less necessary a fear. If we fear God, we will beware of displeasing Him; shun the least act, the least word, the least thought of disloyalty towards Him. Qui operatur ut accedamus, idem operatur ne discedamus. It is good and safe therefore to fear Him. The Devil could never have prevailed upon Eve, to withdraw her from God, but by working this fear out of her: Be not afaid; Ye shall not surely die. To one kind of fear, faith is opposed: Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? With another kind of fear, faith is accompanied: Thou standest by faith; Be not high minded, but fear. In the former, the more fear, the less faith: in the latter, the stronger faith, the more jealous fear. Fides facit formidinem, formido facit sollicitudinem, sollicitudo parit perseverantiam. This fear if it be fresh in us, will make us stick close to God, without stirring (as we say) an inch from Him. Let us not more frequently brush our clothes, than our fear; that it may always be kept fresh in our souls.
Then take heed of standing still: flatter not thyself, that because thou hast run thus long, thou mayest now make a stop; nor because thou hast gotten thus far, thou mayest now sit down and blow. One of these two must be chosen; Aut semper proficere, aut prorfus deficere. No growing, some decaying: while we are not making onwards, we are going back a-main. In rowing up a river, that runs with a strong current, if we rest our oars, we fall down the stream. Between mending and pairing there is no medium: while we neglect to gain, we do but spend on the stock. So one sin opens the door to another: and while sins come in at the foredore, graces will out at the postern. What communion hath light with darkness? They will not keep company together. The Ark would not stay with the Philistines, nor will the grace of God tarry with sinners. Virtues drop from such a tree, like leaves and fruits in a great wind. The idle servant might have had as many talents as the rest, if he had been a good husband: but he buried that he had, stood at a stay, did neither good nor harm with it: therefore his Lord would trust him with no more, lest he should hide them too. Reuben's non-proficiency is remembered in Jacob's Will, when he bequeaths Legacies. Thou shalt not be excellent. So we try our cask; first with water: and if they hold that, then we trust them with wine. Habenti dabitur: there is a seed in our heart, which if it lives, and is fostered, we sprowte, grow, and prosper: but if it die, farewell all spiritual life. For if one virtue be offended, she lureth away all her fellows, as many of Ishbosheths friends shrunk away with Abner.
5. We must be wary not only to shun sin in the action, but in the very occasion. Saepe occasio peccati, voluntatem facit peccandi. How many that meant not to sin, are won by the very opportunity? In the way wherein I walked, have they privily laid a snare for me. Man in his innocence was not free from this. Paradise was made for man, yet there behold the serpent. Who can wonder if our corruption find him in our clossets, at our boards, in our beds, in our garments, in our lawful recreations, when our holy parents found him in Paradise? And thither he no sooner came, than he fell to work: he can no more be idle, than he can be harmless. And mark his cunning: there were many trees in the garden, he meddles with none of them: only you find him at the forbidden. This he suggested to Eve, that she might look upon the fruit though she did not taste it: Non est interdictum, ne videam, sed ne comedam. By looking, she came to liking of it: by liking, to longing for it: and so tasted it in her heart, ere it came to her hand. Thus hausit virus peritura, & perituros paritura? She lost us all.
He that would have the trees in his garden grow, must do what he can to keep them from all noxious things. If occasion be not sin, yet it is a friend to sin: Et iudicium est commissae, & causa committendae. There be sparks in a flint, which being let alone are quiet, and appear not: but beat it with a steel, then you shall see them come out, and be able to kindle a great fire. The sparks of sin are raked up in the embers of our affections: let them not be stirred with occasion, they are quiet: but when opportunity blows them, there is the danger. It was a fearful curse upon trees and plants; What the Palmer-worm hath left, the Locust hath eaten, &c. It is appliable to our purpose. Conceive by the Palmer-worm, the suggestions of sin: which are infinite, as that is called Multipeda, of many feet: this eats off a part of our tree. The Palmer-worm gives way to the Locust; which is a pendulous liking of the motion: suggestion delivers us over to approbation. The Locust resigns to the Canker, to idleness; which devours another part of our tree: approbation of evil delivers us over to sloth. The canker yields place to the Caterpillar, to lewd company; which consumes the residue of our tree: sloth delivers us over to wicked society. But as they that live in a pure air, shut their gates against those that come from infected ••• ies. Or as the Bees in winter keep their hives, and will not expose themselves to the bleak air, sharp winds, cold rains, and bitter frosts: so if we desire to grow in grace, we must shun all these dangerous infections. How worthy, is he to miscarry, that will put to sea in a storm? If a man have a professed enemy he does not only watch to avoid him, but all his faction and adherents: we must suspect all the occasions of sin, if we desire that our growth in grace may not be hindered.
6. Go on in humility and learn to Walk humbly with thy God. If we take any pride in our growing, we are near a fall. Paul could not deny but that he had done much, and gone far: I was not a whit behind the very chiefest Apostles: yea more; I labored more abundantly than they all: From Jerusalem, round about to Illyricum, I have fully preached the Gospel: from Syria to Sclavenia: yet I forgot the things that are behind: As if all that is past were nothing, he looks to that is to come. They that run well in a race, do not eftsoons look back, to mark how far they have run, and how many they have out-run: But they still keep their eyes forwards, upon the ground before them, and upon those that have got ground of them. Though our tree did spread the branches, and flourish with leaves, and stand loden with fruits: yet pride is an unluckie wind, able to blast all. Two marks are usually given of our growing; Obedience and Humility. Obedience; Know you not that you are his servants, to whom you obey? Know you not this? The works of obedience are an infallible testimony: if thy conscience can testify these fruits, then know that both the witness, and the thing witnessed, are graces. Humility: For judgment am I come into this world, that they that see not, might see; and they which see, might be made blind. How shall we understand this? Scripture can best interpret Scripture. God resists the proud: they that see, shall be made blind: He gives grace to the humble; they that see not, shall see.
Men look up to the hills, but they love to dwell in the valleys: God may behold a far off the proud height of the lofty, but he plants his grace in the low vale of an humble heart. The woman bowed down with a spirit of infirmity, may be an emblem of humility: the humble shall be lifted up. Pride in the soul, is like the spleen in the body: when that swelleth, all the other parts languish. It is poison at the root of the tree, which corrupts the sap: and if the sap be corrupted, what will become of the tree? It is so dangerous a poison, that of another poison there was confected a counter-poison, to preserve Saint Paul from it. God would rather suffer him to fall into some infirmity, than to be proud of his singular privileges. Least I should be exalted above measure, through abundance of Revelations: there was the poison of pride insinuating it self: I had a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me: there was the counter-poison or antidote which did at once make him both sick and whole. We are never more in danger of pride, than when we have made the greatest progress in the practice of godliness. It groweth fastest upon us, when other evils decay: and out of their decay sucketh matter wherewith to feed and foster it self. Principium atatis nostrae occupat, finem obsidet: It is always busy, but then most eager, when we are most holy. If thou beest ringed about with friends and comforts, beware of high-mindedness then. The Tares may out-grow the Wheat, according to that proverb; an ill weed grows apace: but let the humble wheat be ripe and ready by harvest, and that shall be had into the barn, whiles the rest are cast into the fire.
7. Think no sin so contemptible, that thou shouldst make light of the admitting of it. In small matters the decay of grace first discovereth it self: as the decay of a tree first appeareth in the washie boughs or twigges, and by little and little goes on further into the bigger arms, and at length pierceth into the main body. He that is not faithful in a little, will be unfaithful in much. He that corrupts his conscience for a little, will at last mak bold with it in a greater matter. That which is a mote in comparison of another sin, is a great beam considered in it self. There is no sin that is not in it self mortal: the sting of death is in everyone: and who dares play with the sting of a living Serpent? But the worst mischief of small sins is, that they make way for greater. To omit that, Quaeque minus laedunt singula multa nocent: To fall by one Goliath, or by the whole army of the Philistines: to be killed with many small shot, or with great Ordnance, what is the difference? But as huntsmen make use of their little beagles: first they ply the Deere with them, till he be heated and blown; and then they set on their great Buck-hounds, that will pull him down, and pluck out his throat: so the Devil employeth our little sins. Little sin is that little boy put in at the window, that opens the door for the great thief. A long thread of iniquity may be let in with a small needle. We have seen by experience, what hurt a little worm will do at the root of a tree.
8. Think on the comfort that comes by this growing in grace Every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth, that it may bring forth more fruits. So are we dressed, that all comes not at once: But as the blade follows the seed, and the ear the blade, and the corn the ear; so grace first shows it self in good desires, then proceeds to good speeches, and without fail grows up to good works. Faith calls to love, and love to obedience, and obedience to constancy; and one grace fore-runs another. Whom God predestinates, them he calleth: and whom he calls, he justifieth: and whom he justifies, he glorifieth: there is no defect on his part. Let us grow up into him in all things, which is the Head, even Christ. Let there be none in ours. As the rich grow easily richer, so the good grow quickly better. See here is water, says that noble Eunuch, What doth hinder me to be baptized? Nothing, if thou believest, answers Philip. If we desire to grow in grace, what hinders us to be loved? what hinders us to be blessed? what hinders us to be saved? Christ calls them to receive his Word and Grace, that hunger for it: now that very hunger is Grace: for Incipit infundi, ut incipiat posci. When the seed is in the ground, the holy Spirit waters it, that it may spring up to a blade, he waters it in the blade, till it put forth an ear: he waters it in the ear, till it be ripe for the harvest. His charge to us, is to give them that need; his own practice, is to give them that have. Temporal things are given egentibus, spiritual habentibus. Not that for the good preparation of nature, God ads the gift of grace. That habenti should be meant of nature, and dabitur of grace, is false logic, and fit for the school of Rome, which would have something in nature, to merit something of grace. But how stands this with the Justice of God, to enrich the wealthy, and suffer the poor to starve? Yes, for He gives but his own, and so hath free election of the object of his bounty: Is it not lawful for him to do what He will with his own? But how stands it with, the Truth of God? He hath filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he hath sent empty away. Yes, for that very hunger is grace; and if they had not first tasted the sweetness of it, they would not have had such an appetite to it. Besides the rich think that they have a sufficiency of grace: the hungry confess their own emptiness, therefore it is fit that they should be filled.
Indeed we are all either full or empty, rising or falling, getting or spending winning or losing, growing or fading, till we come to Heaven or Hell. Paul turns an Apostle, Judas an apostate: the Gentiles become believers, the Jews Infidels: Zacchaeus turns from the world, and Demas turns to the world. One grace opens the door for another: for God is not weary of blessing, where he hath once begun: yea, one gift is a kind of obligation upon him, to give more. Therefore are his mercies called infinite, because they are above number: and everlasting, because they have no end. First he moves Solomon to pray for wisdom, & then bestows it on him. If Cornelius be a praying, Peter is sent to instruct him. If the son be coming homwards, you see the father running to embrace him. First, you have the Eunuch with a good mind reading; then by Philip's help understanding, then by the grace of the Spirit believing, and lastly taken into the Covenant by Baptism. Believest thou for this? saith our Savior to Nathanael: thou shalt see greater things. So repentest thou for this example? thou shalt see more. Lovest thou Christ for this benefit? thou shalt receive more. If thou be meek, like Moses, God willl make thee wise, like Solomon: if wise, he will make thee righteous, as Abraham: if righteous, then patient, as Job: if so, then penitent as Peter, and thankful as David. Every instruction shall make thee careful, every benefit grateful; and thou wilt never be well, but when thou art doing good. Thus as a traveler passeth from town to town, till he come to his home: so a Christian from grace to grace, till he comes to Heaven.
9. Lastly, let us be ever meditating on that royal reward, which is promised to Perseverance. So Moses had respect to the recompense of the reward. Be faithful unto death, and I will give thee the crown of life. I will give, who am able to do it: I will give, who am faithful to perform it: I will give, it is his free bounty, we cannot earn it. We owe unto him all the good we do; he oweth us not so much as thanks for it. Doth the Master thank that servant, because he did what he was commanded? Yet his free goodness will not suffer us to go unrewarded. What will he give? A Crown: who would not strive hard for a Crown? The kings of this world have Crowns, which cannot keep their heads from aking, nor their hearts from vexation: They may die, they do die, for all their Crowns, and return to their dust. But this is a Crown of life; that giveth life, and keepeth life, to them that wear it. But this very life will decay, and spend it self into the grave: yes, but that is an eternal and everlasting life; a Crown of Immortality. Who would not seek by all means to grow in grace, that he might win a Crown of Glory?
And in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.] There is nothing more pleasant to man's nature, nor more winning upon it than knowledge. For the hope of this gain, a super-addition of knowledge, Eve sold her husband, Adam sold himself, and all his posterity, even all the world. Let me have leave by the way of induction, to set down two preparatives to the subsequent matter. The argument is knowledge; concerning which I desire to observe. First, the pleasure which rational men take in it. Secondly, The strange properties of it.
For the former; Knowledge is so fair a virgin, that every clear eye is in love with her: it is a pearl, despised of none but swine. They that care not for one dram of goodness, would yet have a full weight of knowledge. Though they never mind to do good, yet there is no good which they would not know. Among all the trees of the garden, none so pleaseth them as the tree of knowledge. Conceive, by way of Apologue, that a mere natural man is by God's permission, let into his own Treasury or Storehouse, where all his graces lie reserved: he is allowed to take his choice, of some, or of all, or of what likes him best. He poiseth these precious Jewels in his hand, and judgeth of them only by the weight: that which is most portable, and easyest to carry away, he resolves to make choice of. He first makes assay of Charity: and perceives that this Grace would much abridge him of his old liberty; binding him to love his enemies, to pray for his Injurers, to do good for evil, and to supply the wants of the needful out of his own store: therefore he lets it alone, as being too heavy for him. Then he tries Temperance; and considers that this grace would restrain his appetite, cut the throat of his sensual pleasure; that it would keep him from feasts, and revells, and the fruition of merry company: this is also too heavy for him. He lays hand upon Humility, to see if this were any lighter: but observes that this Grace doth delight to dwell in the dust: she is not for the honor of courts, nor for the favor of Princes, nor for secular glory: but teacheth him to make his bed on God's cold earth, to dwell in obscurity, and never to think himself lowly enough: He likes not this; it is too melancholy, too heavy for him. He comes now to Patience; but that, of all, least pleaseth him: for then he must suffer wrongs with silence, revenge his adversaries with prayers, digest losses with thankfullnes, and be content with all impositions: By no means can he endure this: it is by far too heavy for him.
He removes to Obedience, and makes experiment of that: but this confines his extravagant inclinations too severely: There is a law ordained, and he must be tied to the observation of it: Oh, the ten Commandments are ten strict rules: his disposition is quite contrary to those Canons. As it was Satyrically spoken of old; that the law, Thou shall not kill, troubles the Physician: and that other, Thou shall not steal, angers the Lawyer: so we may truly say, that the law not to offend, offends the corrupt nature of us all. It is so much the more harsh to us, as it goes against the grain of our affections. Besides, it is a glass, which presents to us our own deformities; which though we will not forgo, we cannot endure to see. He thinks this virtue no better than manicles to his hands, and shackles to his feet, far too heavy for him. Then Simplicitie presents herself to him; a virgin fair without art, rich without a dowry: not more modest than amiable. He cannot but like her complexion, but her condition is the rub he sticks at. He considers that he is to live in this cunning world, where words and deeds are cut out of several pieces; where not to dissemble, is to invite a coozsenage. Therefore in this he deals plainly, by telling that plain dealing is not for his turn. She would keep from him much gain, and expose him to much loss; she is too heavy for him. Lastly, having balanced and refused all the rest, he lights upon Repentance: She sits at the very door of his egress; and seeing him to under-valve her elder sisters, she solicits him to make choice of her. This Grace if he could affect, it would also make him in love with all the rest. He would woo them all, if he were once won with repentance. But alas, he does not like her countenance: she is always weeping, and what should he do with so sad a consort, with so melancholy a mistress? He loves fair weather, and would not have every day rain. A merry heart is health and life: why should his jollity be sl • bberd with tears? She would ever and anon be calling him to mourning and lamentation; and of all lessons, he hath no mind to madrigalls. Songs, not sighs, are for him. If the Lord says, Turn; he turns. Unto sin: so he makes a Metathesis, whiles he keeps the word, and turns the meaning: But God will make a fearful Metathesis upon him; turning both the words and the meaning; Vertentur & confundentur; he shall be confounded and turned back: All these are too heavy for him.
After he was departed from the royal Presence of those heavenly Graces, peculiar to the elect, and the pledges of salvation; he passeth through the common hall, where sat abundance of virtues, but of a lower degree, and less honor than the former: gifts, which God communicates to men of all sortes, even to reprobates. He also weighs these in his hand, and many of them seemed too heavy for him. Amongst these he happens upon knowledge; and finding her so portable, and easy to be borne away, without trouble; he makes his election of her, and settles his heart upon her: This is his love. Indeed we use to speak so proverbially; that knowledge is no burden. Could a man know never so much, it would be no trouble to him. To plot, devise, project, study, and invent; may be wearisome to the Fantasy: Excogitation is a trouble. To call to mind stories of old, actions and accidents forepassed, with all their circumstances; may be wearisome to the Memory: Recollection is a trouble. To arbitrate, resolve, and decide doubts and difficulties, questions and controversies, problemes and disputable Tenants; may be wearisome to the Judgment: Determination is a trouble. But to know, is no trouble: could we comprehend a world of learning, all the learning in the world, we should find no trouble in that. There may be trouble in the means of getting knowledge, none in the possession of it. If it could be infused into us; either the same way that Adam's was, by creation; or that Solomon's was by Inspiration; we should never think it a trouble: no man groans under this weight, no man complains of this burden. To apply it.
Knowledge we all strive to get, but who labors for virtue? Knowledge is light, and if we rightly weigh it, virtue is not heavy. My yoke is easy, and my burden light, saith our blessed Savior. You never heard Abraham complain of his faith, nor David of his obedience, nor Job of his patience; no more than Solovon did of his wisdom. The end is always more noble than the means: the end of knowledge is to do well: the means to do well, is to know how. If we only seek to know, and there stop: we shall come so far as to see heaven, but never enjoy it: as Dives saw Abraham's bosom, but could not come at it. Knowledge is laudable, while he is in celibate: but never happy till he be married. Virtue is ordained a wife for knowledge: where these two join, there will proceed from them a noble progeny, a generation of good works. He that spends his time only in the accumulation of knowledge, and contemplation of virtue, without the fruition and exercise of it; is like a curious limner, that having betrothed himself to a fair and chaste maiden, busieth himself only in drawing her picture, and is exquisitely punctual in every dimension and lineament: no colors are held good enough, no posture expressive enough, no art sufficient to set forth her beauty: with this picture and dead counterfeit he is so taken, that he forgets the living principal, and the fruition of her to whom he is contracted: So the other can paint you virtue to the life, but he hath no mind to marry her, nor to beget a posterity of good works by her. Thus knowledge loseth his consort: together with her beauty, which is fairen than the skies; with her society, which is as pleasant as the Angels; with her dowry, which is no less rich and ample than the kingdom of heaven. Thou pretendest that thou hast knowledge, and hast possessed it a long time: thou hast known Christ, as Timothy knew the Scriptures, from a child: But still thy knowledge is a Bachelor: it is high time to marry him: God hath appointed a wife for him, Grace: marry thy knowledge to Grace: no creature shall forbid, or hinder those happy nuptialls: there is no precontract with sin, but may be disanulled, and made void by repentance. Grace is willing: let the same forwardness and alacrity be in thy knowledge. At this wedding, heaven and earth, Saints and Angels will rejoice. Frst then let us know, without which there can be no truth of goodness: and then let us do good, without which there can be no hope of blessedness. These things if ye know, happy are ye if you do them. This couple are married on earth, but both they and their issue shall be crowned in Heaven.
For the latter; knowledge hath two properties, not common or obvious; but both remarkable.
1. It is not desirable to them that never tasted it. As rich and precious as it is, yet of this wealth millions are not covetous. What do the ruder sort care for knowledge? If the waterman can discern the wind and tide, keep his boat right, take in and land his fare; what cares he for more knowledge? If the Carreman can drive on his luggage, and rule his horse; if one beast can guide another, though it be without all fear of doing mischief; what cares he for more knowledge? If the husbandman be capable of his tillage, and can distinguish the seasons; or if the artificer be cunning in his trade and manufactures: or if they usurer be perfect in the art of his bonds; and can see to tell his moneys; what care all these for more knowledge? They are of Festus his mind, that much learning will make a man mad. As for the mystery of Godliness, and knowledge of salvation, they are so modest and mannerly that thy leave that dish for their betters: not knowing, that in refusing knowledge, they refuse heaven and all blessedness. But alas, how should they like the food, which they never tasted? Taste and see that the Lord is good: Taste first, then ye (that despise knowledge ) will be of another mind. One morsel of this divine food, would put such an alteration into your appetites, that you will still cry for more: Lord, evermore give us this bread. Then should you see them run by troupes into the school of knowledge, that heretofore passed by those gates with scorn. Lord, dost thou wash my feet? What was the reason of this question? we read of no scruple made by the rest: and, to the vexation of Rome, in this great honor Peter was not the first. Why then does he only except against it? His Lord shows both him and us the reason: What I do, thou knowest not now: Nondum sciebat. For want of this knowledge, he gives his master a peremptory denial, Thou shalt never wash my feet: Never? tarry but a little, and you shall hear him recant, and change his note, upon Christ's Si non te lavero; Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Carnal men will not allow one corner of their soul for divine knowledge: yet me thinks when they hear Christ say, If you will not know me, I will not know you; Depart from me, nescio vos; they should be of Peters mind, and not proffer their feet to the washing, one corner only; but even their whole soul to the entertainment of saving knowledge. As the rural man dwelling in an obscure valley, would never be persuaded to ascend the adjoining hill, what company so ever offered to lead the way: at last being overcome, he went up; and then was so taken with the goodly prospect, that he could not be kept down. So if worldly men would be persuaded once to climb up the hill of knowledge, and there to contemplate the glory of Heaven, and the blessedness of immortality; they would so scorn this base region of sin and darkness, that (with Paul ) they would long for a dissolution. Let this prevail with you to accept of a taste of knowledge, and then blame us, if you do not like it.
2. Another strange property it hath; that they who have it, exceedingly feel the want of it: whereas they are insensible of any such defect that want it. For these latter; a man without knowledge is scarce a man: he lacks his eyes, the chamber of his understanding is empty. And as vacuū is not in natura, so gratia is not in vacuo: no grace with emptiness. He is a very beast; howsoever he scorns the comparison, yet the wisdom of heaven puts it upon him: Understand ye brutish among the people. Therefore he desires not knowledge, no more than a beast calls for a book. He is asleep: and do men while they are asleep, cal for a light, or complain of the suns absence? nay, he is dead; and dead men feel not the want of meat or clothes. Ask thousands that pass by, what they lack: and scarce one of 1000. will tell you that he lacks knowledge. Vbi non habetur, nec desideratur. For the other, they never have enough, There is an unnatural appetite in the body, the effect of disease; that the more men drink, the drier they are. There is an unnatural affection in the mind, a mere spiritual distēper, that the richer men are the more covetous. In the soul there is an infinite desire of knowledge; but it is natural: we would be wiser than our equals, wiser than our teachers, wiser than all others, and yet (after all this) wiser than ourselves: no Philosopher did see so far into the secrets of nature, no Astronomer was so well acquainted with the motion & influence of the stars, no Poet ever sung such transporting raptures, no Physician had such skil in the composure of medicins, no Linguist was so well seen in the languages, no Canonist in the laws, no Politician in states, no Divine in the scriptures, as we would be in them all. What speak I of these? Solomon had not a clearer knowledge by inspiration, nor Adam by his creation, than we would wish to have, whether by acquisition or infusion. Nay, what do I speak of men, our Progenitors? we would be as wise as the Angels: as the widow of Tekoah collogued with David; my Lord the King is an Angel of God to discern good and evil. Nay, we will scarce stick there, so long as the tempter hath an eritis sicut dii for us: the wisdom of men, of saints, of angels would not content us: we must be as gods: wherein? In knowing good and evil. There can be no higher, no greater measure of knowledge: otherwise our insatiate souls would aspire to it.
〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉O the mellifluous sweetness of knowledge! How doth it inchaunt the sons of men? He that left all the Graces behind him, yet would take knowledge along with him. It is so indeed; many men neglect Grace, that would fain have knowledge. But to see the unluckinesse of it! They refuse what they might have with ease; and choose what after much difficulty they cannot obtain. They would be wise, and cannot: they might be holy, and will not. A man may love knowledge very much, and yet want it: but if so heartily he love goodness, he shall be sure of it. Indeed he that is grossly ignorant, does not affect knowledge: nor does he that is notoriously impious, affect goodness. But here is the difference: many a one desires knowledge, that proves none of the wisest: but a man is made good by the very desire of goodness. Quanto amplius Iustitiam dilexeris, tanto justior eris. Yet as we cannot see the light but by the light; so if it were not for knowledge, we would not be so desirous of knowledge. It was Solomon's option; Give thy servant an understanding heart: his request in a dream, but his wish in most serious deliberation. The night follows the temper of the day: and as our hearts are waking, so they use to be disposed in our sleep. If the thoughts of Solomon had not been intent upon wisdom by day, he had not made it his suite in the night: Now without any competition, he fastens on that Grace which he longed for: Give me an understanding heart. If Solomon had not been wise before, he had not known the worth of wisdom, nor preferred it in his desires. It is the love and admiration of knowledge, forestalling our hearts, that makes us so thirsty of this Spring; which thousands pass by, and never drink of. The dunghill Cockes of this world know not the price of this Pearl, the worth of this Jewel: They that have it, know that all other excellencies are but trash and rubbish to it. That famous Queen of the South comes a great journey to that more famous King of the East; the Queen of Sheba, to the King of Israel. What was her errand? To learn Wisdom. She had what she came for: and in a short time, so well had this studious Lady profited by the Lectures of that exquisite Master; that she envies none; she magnifies none, but them that live within the air of Solomon's wisdom: Happy are they that stand continually before thee. O then how great a blessing is it to live within the Orbe of the Gospel; and to hear a wiser, a nobler, a greater than Solomon? She was a woman, most of you here be of a stronger sex: she came from far, you have Christ at home: she left her kingdom, you are in your own country: she only heard of wisdom by report, you have continual experience of it: she brought rich gifts, you will scarce give thanks: she desired to purchase it, you will hardly accept of it: she came to a mere man, you to Him that is God and Man: So far as Christ is greater than Solomon, shall her holy care judge our neglect with just condemnation. For Application.
It cannot be denied, but we live under the Sun-shine of knowledge: the saving beams, and comfortable influence of that heavenly blessing replenisheth our Orbe: It is perpetual day with us, and there is no night, unless it be in our own breasts. If our tree of knowledge does not grow for all this, what will become of us? Yes, we flatter ourselves with a Crescimus; but then God replies, Vbi fructus? Where be our works? The Egyptians in their palpable darkness could do nothing but sit still: it were a shame for the Israelites, in the light of Goshen, to do so. They could see to follow their business, the other could see no business to follow. We have work to do, and day-light to do it in: Let us beware least night come upon us before it be done. Common knowledge will not serve for the dispatch of this work: they must have a clear light, and a clear sight too, that can see to work up their salvation. Masons or Carpenters can see to work by a candle: the contexture of their labors is easily discernible. But to cut a Signet, or make a Watch, or do such curious manufactures, there needs a clear light: they cannot work but by day. For the dispatch of our secular affairs, an easy portion of Knowledge will serve the turn: a rational man, especially helped with experience, will go roundly through with them. But our Salvation is spun up of a finer thread; and will ask a greater measure of Illumination to perfect it. There may come a time of darkness, or we may be removed to a place of darkness, or (for our neglect of the light) we may be oppressed with the power of darkness. Now the Sun shines, the Gospel flourishes; the word of Grace is preached, the Seals of grace are administered, all the treasures of heaven, and comforts of mercy are offered to us: Now let Salvation be our work on earth, and then Salvation shall be our reward in heaven.
In the knowledge of our Lord.] The second sound of this heavenly Trumpet summons us to an increase in knowledge: for there must be no dead or barren trees in God's garden: all fruitful, all growing. But here 3. questions may be moved.
1. Why Grace is set before Knowledge, when as in order, Knowledge is before grace: Illumination properly precedes sanctification: we must be wise, ere we can be holy: Among all the Virtues, Wisdom hath the first place. Why then first Grow in grace, and then in knowledge? We answer. 1. That they are infused together: In the act of our conversion, all graces (in their measure) are wrought in us. There is not a Prius and Posterius in their donation: as Princes give preferments, raising up their favorites by degrees. We have not patience put into us today, and temperance tomorrow, and repentance next week, and charity at another time: but they are given all at once: Our eyes are opened, our hearts softened, our affections rectified, all our faculties changed and sanctified at once. Indeed this renovation is not perfect at the first; that is left to our growing: but it hath at first a perfect being. The seeds of all graces are then sown in our hearts: not one left out. As Joseph's advancement was entire, and his honors came all together: For Pharaoh did set him Super horrea totius Aegipti, made him warden of his granaries: Super domum Regis, made him Lord Controller of his house: Super milites, made him Lord Martial and Lieutenant over his armies in the time of war: Super totum populum, Lord President over all his subjects. So our graces come at once, quod essentiam; by degrees, quoad incrementum. Holy knowledge therefore could have no priority of Grace. 2. Grace is the general favor of God, Knowledge but a particular grace: Grace the main river, Knowledge but a creeke: Grace the tree, Knowledge but the fruit: Grace the Mistress, Knowledge but the waiting woman, the attendant: Grace the mother, the honor of knowledge is to be the daughter: Grace hath many children, knowledge can be but one of them. Now it is fit, that the tree should be set before the fruit; the Lady before her servant, the mother before the daughter, Grace before Knowledge. Thirdly, Grace can save us without Knowledge, but what will become of Knowledge without Grace? Little Infants, the children of the faithful, die washed in the holy Laver, the blood of Christ, and are eternally saved: yet what Knowledge had they? They know not what others do unto them, what God hath done for them: they know not that they are baptized, they know not that they are borne: yet they are saved by Grace, without Knowledge. But who was ever saved by Knowledge, without Grace. It is orderly then, that Grace should be preferred before Knowledge; which gives life unto it, and without which it would perish. For Knowledge without Grace, will but sink men lower into hell: but Grace, without the help of Knowledge, will advance us to heaven, and crown us with glory.
2. The object of this Knowledge is Jesus Christ: why is the Second Person only mentioned? Why not the other two, the Father and the holy Spirit? Is it enough to know Christ without the rest? No; but we had never known the rest to our comfort, without Christ. If you object that, This is eternal life, to know God, and Jesus Christ: first the Father, and then the Son, by no means leaving out the holy Ghost: for Know you not that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? Knowledge is wrought in us by the Spirit, and shall not we know the Spirit that works it? Yes, God forbid otherwise: But in knowing Christ, we know them both. First the Father: If you know me, you know the Father also. He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father also. The Son is the express Image of his Fathers Person: therefore they that know the one, cannot but know the other. And for the holy Spirit; No man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the holy Ghost.