Eighty Sermons

SERMON I. PREACHED AT S ^t. PAUL'S, upon Christmas day. 1622.

T HE whole journey of a Christian is in these words; and therefore we were better set out early, then ride too fast; better enter presently into the parts, then be forced to pass thorough them too hastily. First then we consider the Collation and Reference of the Text, and then the Illation, and Inference thereof. For, the Text looks back to all that was said from the twelfth verse. For, the first word of the text, [For] which is a particle of connection, as well as of argumentation, is a seal of all that was said from that place. And then, the Text looks forward to the 23 ver. where all these blessings are sealed to us, with that Condition, If ye continue settled in the Gospel. This is the Collation, the Reference of the text; for the Illation, and Inference, the first clause thereof, [For, it pleased the Father, that in him should all fullness dwell] presents a double Instruction; First, that we are not bound to accept matters of Religion, merely without all reason, and probable inducements; And secondly, with what modesty we are to proceed, and in what bounds we are to limit that inquisition, that search of Reason in matters of that nature. When the Apostle presents to us here, the great mystery of our reconciliation to God, he, in whose power it was not to infuse faith into every reader of his Epistle, proceeds by reason. He tells us, That the Father hath translated us into the Kingdom of his dear Son, the Son of his love. That were well, if we were sure of it; If our consciences did not accuse us, and suggest to us our own unworthiness, and thereby an impossibility of being so translated. Why no, says the Apostle, there is no such impossibility now, For, Now we have Redemption, and forgiveness of sins. Who should procure us that? If a man sin against God, who shall plead for him? What man is able to mediate, and stand in the gap between God and man? You say true, says the Apostle, no man is able to do it; and therefore, He that is the Image of the invisible God, he by whom all things were created, and by whom all things consist, he hath done it. Hath God reconciled me to God; And reconciled me by way of satisfaction? (for, that I know his justice requires) What could God pay for me? What could God suffer? God himself could not; and therefore God hath taken a body that could. And as he is the Head of that body, he is passable, so he may suffer; And, as he is the first born of the dead, he did suffer; so that he was defective in nothing; not in Power, as God, not in passibility, as man; for, Complacuit; It pleased the Father, that in him, All fullness (a full capacity to all purposes) should dwell. Thus far we are to trace the reason of our redemption, intimated in that first word, For. And then, we are to limit and determine our reason in the next, Quia complacuit, because it was his will, his pleasure to proceed so, and no otherwise. Christ himself goes no farther then so, in a case of much strangeness, That God had hid his mysteries from the wise, and revealed them unto babes; This was a strange course, but Ita est, quia, Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. I would fain be able to prove to myself that my redemption is accomplished; and therefore I search the Scriptures; and I grow sure that Christ hath redeemed the world; and I search the Scriptures again, to find what marks are upon them, that are of the participation of that Redemption, and I grow to a religious, and modest assurance, that those marks are upon me. I find reasons to prove to me, that God does love my soul; but why God should love men better then his own Son, or why God should love me better then other men, I must end in the reason of the text, Quia complacuit, and in the reason of Christ himself, Ita est, quia, It is so, O Father, because thy good pleasure was it should be so.

To pass then from the Collation and Reference, by which, the text hath his Cohaerence with the precedent, and subsequent passages, and the Illation and Inference, by which you have seen the general doctrine, That reason is not to be excluded in religion, but yet to be tenderly and modestly pressed, we have here the Person that redeemed us, and his Qualification for that great office, (That all fullness should dwell in him.) And then we have the Pacification, and the Means thereof, (Peace was made through the blood of his Cross) And then, the Effect, the application of all this, to them, for whom it was wrought, (That all things in earth and heaven, might be reconciled to God by him.) In the qualification of the person, we find plenitudinem, fullness, and omnem plenitudinem, all fullness; and omnem plenitudinem inhabitantem, all fullness dwelling, permanent. And yet, even this dwelling fullness, even in this person Christ Jesus, by no title of merit in himself, but only quia complacuit, because it pleased the Father it should be so. In the pacification, (which is our second part) (Peace was made, by the blood of his Cross) we shall see first, quod bellum, what the war was, and then quae pax, what the peace is, and lastly quis modus, how this peace was made, which was strange; per sanguinem, by blood; to save blood, and yet by blood. And per sanguinem ejus, by his blood, his, who was victoriously to triumph in this peace; and per sanguinem Crucis ejus, by the blood of his Cross, that is his death; the blood of his Circumcision, the blood of his Agony, the blood of his scourging was not enough; It must be, and so it was the blood of his Cross; And these pieces constitute our second part, the Pacification: And then in the third, the Application, (That all things might be reconciled to God,) we shall see first, what this Reconciliation is, and then how it extends to all things on earth, (which we might think were not capable of it;) and all things in heaven, (which we might think stood in no need of it.) And in these three parts, The person and his qualification, The thing it self, The Pacification, The effect of this, The Reconciliation, the Application, we shall determine all.

First, In the person that redeems us we find fullness. And there had need be so; for, he found our measure full of sin towards God, and God's measure full of anger towards us; for our parts, as when a River swells, at first it will find out all the channels, or lower parts of the bank, and enter there, but after a while it covers, and overflows the whole field, and all is water without distinction; so, though we be naturally channels of concupiscencies, (for there sin begins, and as water runs naturally in the veins and bowels of the earth, so run concupiscencies naturally in our bowels) yet, when every imagination of the thoughts of our heart, is only evil continually; Then, (as it did there) it induces a flood, a deluge, our concupiscence swells above all channels, and actually overflows all; It hath found an issue at the ear, we delight in the defamation of others; and an issue at the eye, If we see a thief, we run with him; we concur in the plots of supplanting and destroying other men; It hath found an issue in the tongue, Our lips are our own, who is Lord over us? We speak freely; seditious speeches against superiors, obscene and scurrile speeches against one another, profane and blasphemous speeches against God himself, are grown to be good jests, and marks of wit, and arguments of spirit. It finds an issue at our hands, they give way to oppression, by giving bribes; and an issue at our feet, They are swift to shed blood; and so by custom, sin overflows all, Omnia pontus, all our ways are sea, all our works are sin. This is our fullness, original sin filled us, actual sin presses down the measure, and habitual sins heap it up. And then God's measure of anger was full too; from the beginning he was a jealous God, and that should have made us careful of our behavior, that a jealous eye watched over us. But because we see in the world, that jealous persons are oftnest deceived, because that distemper disorders them, so as that they see nothing clearly, and it puts the greater desire in the other, to deceive, because it is some kind of Victory, and Triumph to deceive a jealous, and watchful person, therefore we have hoped to go beyond God too, and his jealousy. But he is jealous of his honor, jealous of his jealousy, he will not have his jealousy despised, nor forgotten, for therefore he visits upon the children, to the third and fourth generation; when therefore the spirit of jealousy was come upon him, and that he had prepared that water of bitterness, which was to rot our bowels, that is, when God had bent all his bows, drawn forth, and whetted all his swords, when he was justly provoked, to execute all the Judgments denounced in all the Prophets, upon all mankind, when man's measure was full of sin, and God's measure full of wrath, then was the fullness of time, and yet then Complacuit, It pleased the Father, that there should be another fullness to overflow all these, in Christ Jesus.

But what fullness is that? Omnis plenitudo, all fullness. And this was only in Christ. Elias had a great portion of the spirit: but, but a portion. Elizaeus sees that that portion will not serve him, and therefore he asks a double portion of that spirit; but still but portions. Stephen is full of faith; a blessed fullness, where there is no corner for Infidelity, nor for doubt, for scruple, nor irresolution. Dorcas is full of good works; a fullness above faith; for there must be faith, before there can be good works; so that they are above faith, as the tree is above the root, and as the fruit is above the tree. The Virgin Mary is full of Grace; and Grace is a fullness above both; above faith and works too, for that is the means to preserve both; That we fall not from our faith, and that dead flies corrupt not our ointment, that worldly mixtures do not vitiate our best works, and the memory of past sins, dead sins, do not beget new sins in us, is the operation of Grace. The seven Deacons were full of the Holy Ghost, and of Wisdom; full of Religion towards God, and full of such wisdom as might advance it towards men; full of zeal, and full of knowledge; full of truth, and full of discretion too. And these were plenitudines, fulnesses, but they were not all, Omnis plenitudo, all fullness. I shall be as full as St. Paul, in heaven; I shall have as full a vessel, but not so full a Cellar; I shall be as full, but I shall not have so much to fill. Christ only hath an infinite content, and capacity, an infinite room and receipt, and then an infinite fullness; omnem capacitatem, and omnem plenitudinem; He would receive as much as could be infused, and there was as much infused, as he could receive.

But what shall we say? Deus adimplendus; was Christ God before, and are these accessory, supplementary, additional fulnesses to be put to him? A fullness to be added to God? To make him a competent person to redeem man, something was to be added to Christ, though he were God; wherein we see to our inexpressible confusion of face, and consternation of spirit, the incomprehensiblenesse of man's sin, that even to God himself, there was required something else then God, before we could be redeemed; there was a fullness to be added to God, for this work, to make it omnem plenitudinem, for Christ was God before; there was that fullness; but God was not Christ before; there lacked that fullness. Not disputing therefore, what other ways God might have taken for our redemption, but giving him all possible thanks for that way which his goodness hath chosen, by the way of satisfying his justice, (for, howsoever I would be glad to be discharged of my debts any way, yet certainly, I should think myself more beholden to that man, who would be content to pay my debt for me, then to him that should entreat my creditor to forgive me my debt) for this work, to make Christ able to pay this debt, there was something to be added to him. First, he must pay it in such money as was lent; in the nature and flesh of man; for man had sinned, and man must pay. And then it was lent in such money as was coined even with the Image of God; man was made according to his Image: That Image being defaced, in a new Mint, in the womb of the Blessed Virgin, there was new money coined; The Image of the invisible God, the second person in the Trinity, was imprinted into the human nature. And then, that there might be omnis plenitudo, all fullness, as God, for the payment of this debt, sent down the Bullion, and the stamp, that is, God to be conceived in man, and as he provided the Mint, the womb of the Blessed Virgin, so hath he provided an Exchequer, where this money is issued; that is his Church, where his merits should be applied to the discharge of particular consciences. So that here is one fullness, that in this person dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Here is another fullness, that this person fulfilled all righteousness, and satisfied the Justice of God by his suffering; non est dolor sicut, there was no sorrow like unto his sorrow; It was so full that it exceeded all others. And then there is a third fullness, the Church, (which is his body, the fullness of him, that filleth all in all) perfect God, there is the fullness of his dignity; perfect man, there is the fullness of his passibility; and a perfect Church, there is the fullness of the distribution of his mercies, and merits to us. And this is omnis plenitudo, all fullness; which yet is farther extended in the next word, Inhabitavit, It pleased the Father, that all fullness should dwell in him.

The Holy Ghost appeared in the Dove, but he did not dwell in it. The Holy Ghost hath dwelt in holy men, but not thus; So, as that ancient Bishop expresses it, Habitavit in Salomone per sapientiam, He dwelt in Solomon, in the spirit of wisdom; in Joseph, in the spirit of chastity; in Moses, in the spirit of meekness; but in Christo, in plenitudine, in Christ, in all fullness. Now this fullness is not fully expressed in the Hypostatical union of the two natures; God and Man in the person of Christ. For, (concerning the divine Nature) here was not a dram of glory in this union. This was a strange fullness, for it was a fullness of emptiness; It was all Humiliation, all exinanition, all evacuation of himself, by his obedience to the death of the Cross. But when it was done, Ne evacuaretur Crux Christi, (as the Apostle speaks in another case) lest the Cross of Christ should be evacuated, and made of none effect, he came to make this fullness perfect, by instituting and establishing a Church; The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, says the Prophet, of Christ. There is a fullness in general, for his qualification; The Spirit of the Lord; but what kind of spirit? It follows, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of Counsel, and Power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; we see, the spirit that must rest upon Christ, is the Spirit in those beams, in those functions, in those operations, as conduce to government, that is, Wisdom, and Counsel, and Power. So that this is Christ's fullness, that he is in a continual administration of his Church; in which he flows over upon us his Ministers; (for, of his fullness have all we received, and grace for grace: that is, power by his grace, to derive grace upon the Congregation;) And so, of his fullness, all the Congregation receives too; and receives in that full measure, That they are filled with all the fullness of God; that is, all the fullness that was in both his natures, united in one person, when the fullness of the Deity dwelt in him bodily, all the merits of that person, are derived upon us, in his Word, Sacraments, in his Church; which Church being to continue to the end, it is most properly said habitavit, in him, (in him, as head of the Church) all fullness, all means of salvation, dwell, and are to be had permanently, constantly, infallibly.

Now how came Christ by all this fullness, this superlative fullness in himself, this derivative fullness upon us? That his merits should be able to build, and furnish such a house, to raise and rectify such a Church, acceptable to God, in which all fullness should dwell to the worlds end? It was only because complacuit, it pleased God (for this personal name of the Father (It pleased the Father) is but added suppletorily by our Translators, and is not in the Original) It pleased God to give him wherewithal, to enable him so far, for, this complacuit, is, (as we say in the School,) vox beneplaciti, it expresses only the good will and love of God, without contemplation or foresight of any goodness in man; nam hac posita plenitudine exorta sunt merita: First, we are to consider this fullness to have been in Christ, and then, from this fullness arose his merits; we can consider no merit in Christ himself before, whereby he should merit this fullness; for, this fullness was in him, before he merited anything; and but for this fullness, he had not so merited. Ille homo, ut in unitatem filii Dei assumeretur, unde meruit? How did that man, (says St. Augustine speaking of Christ, as of the son of man) how did that man merit to be united in one person, with the eternal Son of God? Quid egit ante? Quid credidit? What had he done? nay, what had he believed? Had he either faith, or works, before that union of both natures? If then in Christ Jesus himself, there were no praevisa merita, That God's fore-sight, that he would use this fullness well, did not work in God, as a cause to give him this fullness, but because he had it of the free gift of God, therefore he did use it well, and meritoriously, shall any of us be so frivolous, in so important a matter, as to think that God gave us our measure of grace, or our measure of Sanctification, because he fore-saw that we would heap up that measure, and employ that talent profitably? What canst thou imagine, he could fore-see in thee? A propensnesse, a disposition to goodness, when his grace should come? Either there is no such propensnesse, no such disposition in thee, or, if there be, even that propensnesse and disposition to the good use of grace, is grace, it is an effect of former grace, and his grace wrought, before he saw any such propensnesse, any such disposition; Grace was first, and his grace is his, it is none of thine. To end this point, and this part, non est discipulus supra magistrum; The fullness of Christ himself was rooted in the complacuit, It pleased the Father; (nothing else wrought in the nature of a Cause) and therefore that measure of that fullness, which is derived upon us, from him, (our vocation, our justification, our sanctification) are much more so; we have them, quia complacuit, because it hath pleased him freely to give them; God himself could see nothing in us, till he of his own goodness, put it into us. And so we have gone as far, as our first part carries us, in those two branches, and the fruits which we have gathered from thence; First, those general doctrines, that reason is not to be excluded in matters of religion; and then, that reason in all those cases, is to be limited, with the quia complacuit, merely in the good pleasure of God. In which first part, you have also had, the qualification of the person, that came this day, to establish Redemption for us, that in Him there was fullness, (infinite capacity, and infinite infusion,) and all fullness, defective in nothing, (impassible and yet passable, perfect God, and perfect man) and this fullness dwelling in Him, in Him as he is Head of the Church, that is, visible, sensible means of salvation to every soul in his Church; And so we pass to our second part, from this Qualification of the person, (It pleased the Father that in him all fullness should dwell) to the Pacification it self, for which it pleased the Father to do all this, that Peace might be made through the blood of his Cross.

In this Part, St. Chrysostom hath made our steps, our branches. It is much, says he, that God would admit any peace; magis, per sanguinem, more, that for peace he should require effusion of blood; magis, quod per ejus, more, that it must be His blood, his that was injured, his that was to triumph; Et adhuc magis, quod per sanguinem Crucis ejus; That it must be by the blood of his Cross, his heart blood, his death; and yet this was the case; He made Peace through the blood of his Cross. There was then a war before, and a heavy war; for, the Lord of hosts was our enemy; and what can all our musters come to, if the Lord of Hosts, of all Hosts have raised his forces against us? There was a heavy war denounced in the Inimicitias ponam, when God raised a war between the Devil, and us. For, if we could consider God to stand neutral in that war, and meddle with neither side, yet we were in a desperate case, to be put to fight against Powers and Principalities, against the Devil. How much more, when God, the Lord of Hosts, is the Lord even of that Host too? when God presses the Devil, and makes the Devil his Soldier, to fight his battles, and directs his arrows, and his bullets, and makes his approaches, and his attempts effectual upon us. That which is fallen upon the Jews now, for their sin against Christ, that there is not in all the world, a Soldier of their race, not a Jew in the world that bears arms, is true of all mankind for their sin against God; there is not a Soldier amongst them, able to hurt his spiritual enemy or defend himself. It is a strange war, where there are not two sides; and yet that is our case; for, God uses the Devil against us, and the Devil uses us against one another; nay, he uses everyone of us, against ourselves; so that God, and the Devil, and we, are all in one Army, and all for our destruction; we have a war, and yet there is but one Army, and we only are the Country that is fed upon, and wasted; From God to the Devil we have not one friend, and yet, as though we lacked enemies, we fight with one another in inhumane Duels; Vbi morimur homicidae, (as St. Bernard expresses it powerfully and elegantly) that in those Duels and Combats, he that is murdered dies a murderer, because he would have been one; Occisor laethaliter peccat, occisus aeternaliter perit; He that comes alive out of the field comes a dead man, because he comes a deadly sinner, and he that remains dead in the field, is gone into an everlasting death. So that by this inhumane effusion of one another's blood, we maintain a war against God himself, and we provoke him to that which he expresses in Isaiah, My sword shall be bathed in heaven; Inebriabitur sanguine, The sword of the Lord shall be made drunk with blood; Their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. The same quarrel, which God hath against particular men, and particular Nations, for particular sins, God hath against all Mankind, for Adams sin. And there is the war. But what is the peace, and how are we included in that? That is our second and next disquisition, That peace might be made.

A man must not presently think himself included in this peace, because he feels no effects of this war. If God draw none of his swords of war, or famine, or pestilence, upon thee, (no outward war,) If God raise not a rebellion in thyself, nor fight against thee with thine own affections, in colluctations between the flesh, and the spirit; The war may last, for all this. Induciarum tempore, bellum manet, licet pugna cesset; Though there be no blow stricken, the war remains in the time of Truce. But thy case is not so good; here is no Truce, no cessation, but a continual preparation to a fiercer war. All this while that thou enjoyest this imaginary security, the Enemy digges insensibly under ground, all this while he undermines thee, and will blow thee up at last more irrecoverably, then if he had battered thee with outward calamities all that time. So any State may be abused with a false peace present, or with a fruitless expectation of a future peace. But in this text, there is true peace, and peace already made; present peace, and and safe peace. Pax non promissa, sed missa, (says St. Bernard, in his musical and harmonious cadences,) not promised, but already sent; non dilata, sed data, not treated, but concluded; Non prophetata, sed praesentata, not prophesied, but actually established. There is the presentnesse thereof; And then, made by him, who lacked nothing for the making of a safe peace; For, after his Names of Counselor, and of the Mighty God; he is called, for the consummation of all, princeps pacis; A Counselor, There is his wisdom, A mighty God, There is his Power: and this Counselor, This Mighty God, this wise, and this powerful Prince, hath undertaken to make our peace; But how, that is next, per sanguinem, Peace being made by blood.

Is effusion of blood the way of peace? effusion of blood may make them from whom blood is so abundantly drawn, glad of peace, because they are thereby reduced to a weakness. But in our wars, such a weakness puts us farther off from peace, and puts more fierceness in the Enemy. But here, mercy and truth are met together; God would be true to his own Justice, (blood was forfeited, and he would have blood) and God would be merciful to us, he would make us the stronger by drawing blood, and by drawing our best blood, the blood of Christ Jesus. Simeon and Levi, when they meditated their revenge for the rape committed upon their sister, when they pretended peace, yet they required a little blood: They would have the Shechemites circumcised: but when they had opened a vein, they made them bleed to death; when they were under the sorenesse of Circumcision, they slew them all. God's justice required blood, but that blood is not spilled, but poured from that head to our hearts, into the veins, and wounds of our own souls: There was blood shed, but no blood lost. Before the Law was thoroughly established, when Moses came down from God, and deprehended the people, in that Idolatry to the Calf, before he would present himself as a Mediator between God and them, for that sin, he prepares a sacrifice of blood, in the execution of three thousand of those Idolaters, and after that he came to his vehement prayer, in their behalf. And in the strength of the Law, all things were purged with blood, and without blood there is no remission. Whether we place the reason of this in God's Justice, which required blood, or whether we place it in the conveniency, that blood being ordinarily received to be sedes animae, the seat and residence of the soul; The soul, for which, that expiation was to be, could not be better represented, nor purified, then in the state, and seat of the soul, in blood; or whether we shut up ourselves in an humble sobriety, to inquire into the reasons of God's actions, thus we see it was, no peace, no remission, but in blood. Nor is that so strange, as that which follows in the next place, per sanguinem ejus, by his blood.

Before, under the Law, it was in sanguine hircorum, & vitulorum; In the blood of Goats, and Bullocks; here it is in sanguine ejus, in his blood. Not his, as he claims all the beasts of the forest, all the cattle upon a thousand hills, and all the fowls of the mountains to be his; not his, as he says of Gold and Silver, The Silver is mine, and the Gold is mine; not his, as he is Lord, and proprietary of all, by Creation; so all blood is his; no nor his, as the blood of all the Martyrs was his blood, (which is a near relation and consanguinity) but his so, as it was the precious blood of his body, the seat of his soul, the matter of his spirits, the knot of his life, This blood he shed for me; and I have blood to shed for him too, though he call me not to the trial, nor to the glory of Martyrdom. Sanguis animae meae voluntas mea, The blood of my soul is my will; Scindatur vena ferro compunctionis, open a vein with that knife, remorse, compunction, ut si non sensus, certe consensus peccati effluat, That though thou canst not bleed out all motions to sin, thou mayest all consent thereunto. Noli esse nimium justus; noli sapere plus quam oportet; St. Bernard makes this use of those Counsels, Be not righteous overmuch, nor be not overwise, Cui putas venae parcendum, si justitia & sapientia egent minutione, what vein mayest thou spare, if thou must open those two veins, righteousness, and wisdom? If they may be superfluously abundant, if thou must bleed out some of thy Righteousness, and some of thy wisdom, cui venae parcendum, at what vein must thou not bleed? Now in all sacrifices, where blood was to be offered, the fat was to be offered to. If thou wilt sacrifice the blood of thy soul, (as St. Bernard calls the will) sacrifice the fat too; If thou give over thy purpose of continuing in thy sin, give over the memory of it, and give over all that thou possessest unjustly, and corruptly got by that sin; else thou keepest the fat from God, though thou give him the blood. If God had given over at his second days work, we had had no sun, no seasons; If at his fifth, we had had no being; If at the sixth, no Sabbath; but by proceeding to the seventh, we are all, and we have all. Naaman, who was out of the covenant, yet, by washing in Jordan seven times, was cured of his leprosy; seven times did it even in him, but less did not. The Priest in the Law used a seven-fold sprinkling of blood upon the Altar; and we observe a seven-fold shedding of blood in Christ; In his Circumcision, and in his Agony, in his fulfilling of that Prophesy; gen as vellicantibus, I gave my cheeks to them, that plucked off the hair, and in his scourging; in his crowning, and in his nailing, and lastly, in the piercing of his side. These seven channels hath the blood of thy Savior found. Pour out the blood of thy soul, sacrifice thy stubborn and rebellious will seven times too; seven times, that is, every day; and seven times every day; for so often a just man falleth; And then, how low must that man lie at last, if he fall so often, and never rise upon any fall? and therefore raise thyself as often, and as soon as thou fallest. Jericho would not fall, but by being compassed seven days, and seven times in one day. Compass thyself, comprehend thyself, seven times, many times, and thou shalt have thy loss of blood supplied with better blood, with a true sense of that peace, which he hath already made, and made by blood, and by his own blood, and by the blood of his Cross, which is the last branch of this second part.

Greater love hath no man, then to lay down his life for his friend, yet he that said so, did more then so, more then lay down his life, (for he exposed it to violences, and torments) and all that for his enemies. But doth not the necessity diminish the love? where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator: was there then a necessity in Christ's dying? simply a necessity of coaction there was not; such as is in the death of other men, natural, or violent by the hand of Justice. There was nothing more arbitrary, more voluntary, more spontaneous then all that Christ did for man. And if you could consider a time, before the contract between the Father, and him, had passed, for the redemption of man by his death, we might say, that then there was no necessity upon Christ, that he must die; But because that contract was from all eternity, supposing that contract, that this peace was to be made by his death, there entered the oportuit pati, That Christ ought to suffer all these things, and to enter into his glory. And so, as for his death, so for the manner of his death, (by the Cross) it was not of absolute necessity, and yet it was not by casualty neither, not because he was to suffer in that Nation, which did ordinarily punish such Malefactors, (such as he was accused to be) seditious persons, with that manner of death, but all this proceeded ex pacto, thus the contract led it, to this he was obedient, obedient unto death, and unto the death of the Cross. By blood, and not only by coming into this world, and assuming our nature, (which humiliation was an act of infinite value) and not by the blood of his Circumcision or Agony, but blood to death, and by no gentler, nor nobler death, then the death of the Cross, was this peace to be made by him. Though then one drop of his blood had been enough to have redeemed infinite worlds, if it had been so contracted, and so applied, yet he gave us, a morning shower of his blood in his Circumcision, and an evening shower at his passion, and a shower after Sunset, in the piercing of his side. And though any death had been an incomprehensible ransom, for the Lord of life to have given, for the children of death, yet he refused not the death of the Cross; The Cross, to which a bitter curse was nailed by Moses, from the beginning, he that is hanged, is, (not only accursed of God, as our Translation hath it,) but he is the curse of God, (as it is in the Original) not accursed, but a curse; not a simple curse, but the curse of God. And by the Cross, which besides the Infamy, was so painful a death, as that many men languished many days upon it, before they died: And by his blood of this torture, and this shame, this painful, and this ignominious death, was this peace made. In our great work of crucifying ourselves to the world too, it is not enough to bleed the drops of a Circumcision, that is, to cut off some excessive, and notorious practice of sin; nor to bleed the drops of an Agony, to enter into a conflict and colluctation of the flesh and the spirit, whether we were not better trust in God's mercy, for our continuance in that sin, then lose all that pleasure and profit, which that sin brings us; nor enough to bleed the drops of scourging, to be lashed with viperous, and venomous tongues by contumelies, and slanders; nor to bleed the drops of Thorns, to have Thorns and scruples enter into our consciences, with spiritual afflictions; but we must be content to bleed the streams of naylings to those Crosses, to continue in them all our lives, if God see that necessary for our confirmation; and, if men will pierce and wound us after our deaths in our good name, yea, if they will slander our Resurrection, (as they did Christ's) if they will say, that it is impossible God should have mercy upon such a man, impossible that a man of so bad life, and so sad and comfortless a death, should have a joyful Resurrection, here is our comfort, as that piercing of Christ's side was after the Consummatum est, after his passion ended, and therefore put him to no pain, as that slander of his Resurrection, was after that glorious triumph; He was risen and had shown himself before, and therefore it diminished not his power: so all these posthume wounds, and slanders after my death, after my God and my Soul shall have passed that Dialogue, Veni Domine Jesus, and euge bone serve, That I shall have said upon my death-bed, Come Lord Jesu, come quickly, and he shall have said, Well done good and faithful servant, enter into thy Masters joy, when I shall have said to him, In manus tuas Domine, Into thy hands O Lord I commend my spirit, And he to me, Hodie mecum eris in paradiso, This day, this minute thou shalt be, now thou art with me in Paradise, when this shall be my state, God shall hear their slanders and maledictions, and write them all down, but not in my book, but in theirs, and there they shall meet them at Judgment, amongst their own sins, to their everlasting confusion, and find me in possession of that peace, made by blood, made by his blood, made by the blood of his Cross, which were all the pieces laid out for this second part, with which we have done; and pass from the qualification of the person, (It pleased the Father that in him all fullness should dwell) which was our first part, and the Pacification, and the way thereof, (by the blood of his Cross to make peace) which was our second, to the Reconciliation it self, and the Application thereof to all to whom that Reconciliation appertains, That all things, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven, might be reconciled unto him.

All this was done; He, in whom it pleased the Father, that this fullness should dwell, had made this peace by the blood of his Cross, and yet, after all this, the Apostle comes upon that Ambassage, We pray ye, in Christ's stead, that ye be reconciled to God; So that this Reconciliation in the Text, is a subsequent thing to this peace. The general peace is made by Christ's death, as a general pardon is given at the Kings coming; The Application of this peace is in the Church, as the suing out of the pardon, is in the Office. Joab made Absalom's peace with his Father; Bring the young man again, says David to Joab; but yet he was not reconciled to him, so as that he saw his face in two year. God hath sounded a Retreat to the Battle, As I live, saith the Lord, I would not the death of a sinner; He hath said to the destroyer, It is enough, stay now thy hand; He is pacified in Christ; and he hath bound the enemy in chains. Now let us labor for our Reconciliation; for all things are reconciled to him, in Christ, that is, offered a way of reconciliation. All things in heaven and earth, says the Apostle. And that is so large, as that Origen needed not to have extended it to Hell too, and conceive out of this place, a possibility, that the Devils themselves shall come to a Reconciliation with God. But to all in Heaven and Earth it appertains. Consider we how.

First then, there is a reconciliation of them in heaven to God, and then of them on earth to God, and then of them in heaven, and them in earth, to one another, by the blood of his Cross. If we consider them in heaven, to be those who are gone up to heaven from this world by death, they had the same reconciliation as we; either by reaching the hand of faith forward, to lay hold upon Christ before he came, (which was the case of all under the Law;) or by reaching back that hand, to lay hold upon all that he had done and suffered, when he was come, (which is the case of those that are dead before us in the profession of the Gospel.) All that are in heaven, and were upon earth, are reconciled one way, by application of Christ in the Church; so that, though they be now in heaven, yet they had their reconciliation here upon earth. But if we consider those who are in heaven, and have been so from the first minute of their creation, Angels, why have they, or how have they any reconciliation? How needed they any, and then, how is this of Christ applied unto them? They needed a confirmation; for the Angels were created in blessedness, but not in perfect blessedness; They might fall, they did fall. To those that fell, can appertain no reconciliation; no more then to those that die in their sins; for Quod homini mors, Angels casus; The fall of the Angels wrought upon them, as the death of a man does upon him; They are both equally incapable of change to better. But to those Angels that stood, their standing being of grace, and their confirmation being not one transient act in God done at once, but a continual succession, and emanation of daily grace, belongs this reconciliation by Christ, because all matter of grace, and where any deficiency is to be supplied, whether by way of reparation, as in man, or by way of confirmation, as in Angels, proceeds from the Cross, from the Merits of Christ. They are so reconciled then, as that they are extra lapsus periculum, out of the danger of falling; but yet this stability, this infallibility is not yet indelibly imprinted in their natures; yet the Angels might fall, if this reconciler did not sustain them; for, if those words reperit in Angels iniquitatem, that God found folly, (weakness, infirmity) in his Angels, be to be understood of the good Angels, that stand confirmed, (as procul dubio de diabolo intelligi non potest, without all doubt they cannot be understood of the ill Angels) the best service of the best Angels, devested of that successive grace, that supports them, if God should exacta rigorous account of it, could not be acceptable in the sight of God; So the Angels have a pacification, and a reconciliation, lest they should fall.

Thus things in heaven are reconciled to God by Christ; and things on earth too. First the creature, as S. Paul speaks; that is, other creatures then men. For, at the general resurrection, (which is rooted in the resurrection of Christ, and so hath relation to him) the creature shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children of God; for which, the whole creation groans, and travels in pain yet. This deliverance then from this bondage, the whole creature hath by Christ, and that is their reconciliation. And then are we reconciled by the blood of his Cross, when having crucified ourselves by a true repentance, we receive the seal of reconciliation, in his blood in the Sacrament. But the most proper, and most literal sense of these words, is, that all things in heaven and earth, be reconciled to God, (that is, to his glory, to a fitter disposition to glorify him) by being reconciled to another, in Christ; that in him, as head of the Church, they in heaven, and we upon earth, be united together as one body in the Communion of Saints. For, this text hath a conformity, and a harmony with that to the Ephesians, and in sense, as well as in words, is the same, That God might gather together in one, all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth, even in him; where the word which we translate (to gather) doth properly signify recapitulare, to bring all things to their first head, to God's first purpose; which was, that Angels, and men, united in Christ Jesus, might glorify him eternally in the Kingdom of heaven. Then are things in heaven restored and reconciled, (says S. Augustine ) Cum quod ex Angels lapsum est, ex hominibus redditur, when good men have repaired the ruin of the bad Angels, and filled their places. And then are things on earth restored, and reconciled, Cum praedestinati à corruptionis vetustate renovantur, when God's elect children are delivered from the corruptions of this world, to which, even they are subject here. Cum humiliati homines redeunt, unde Apostatae superbiendo ceciderunt, when men by humility are exalted, to those places from which Angels fell by pride, then are all things in heaven and earth reconciled in Christ.

The blood of the sacrifices was brought by the high priest, in sanctum sanctorum, into the place of greatest holiness; but it was brought but once, in festo expiationis, in the feast of expiation; but, in the other parts of the Temple, it was sprinkled every day. The blood of the Cross of Christ Jesus hath had his effect in sancto sanctorum, even in the highest heavens, in supplying their places that fell, in confirming them that stood, and in uniting us and them, in himself, as Head of all. In the other parts of the Temple it is to be sprinkled daily. Here, in the militant Church upon earth, there is still a reconciliation to be made; not only toward one another, in the band of charity, but in ourselves. In ourselves we may find things in heaven, and things on earth to reconcile. There is a heavenly zeal, but if it be not reconciled to discretion, there is a heavenly purity, but if it be not reconciled to the bearing of one another's infirmities, there is a heavenly liberty, but if it be not reconciled to a care, for the prevention of scandal, All things in our heaven, and our earth are not reconciled in Christ. In a word, till the flesh and the spirit be reconciled, this reconciliation is not accomplished. For, neither spirit, nor flesh must be destroyed in us; a spiritual man is not all spirit, he is a man still. But then is flesh and spirit reconciled in Christ, when in all the faculties of the soul, and all the organs of the body we glorify him in this world; for then, in the next world we shall be glorified by him, and with him, in soul, and in body too, where we shall be thoroughly reconciled to one another, no suits, no controversies; and thoroughly to the Angels; when we shall not only be sieut Angeli, as the Angels in someone property, but aequales Angels, equal to the Angels in all, for, Non erunt duae societates Angelorum & hominum, Men and Angels shall not make two companies, sed omnium beatitudo erit, uni adhaerere Deo, this shall be the blessedness of them both, to be united in one head, Christ Jesus.

And these reconcilings are reconcilings enow; for these are all that are in heaven and earth. If you will reconcile things in heaven, and earth, with things in hell, that is a reconciling out of this Text. If you will mingle the service of God, and the service of this world, there is no reconciling of God and Mammon in this Text. If you will mingle a true religion, and a false religion, there is no reconciling of God and Belial in this Text. For the adhering of persons born within the Church of Rome, to the Church of Rome, our law says nothing to them if they come; But for reconciling to the Church of Rome, by persons born within the Allegeance of the King, or for persuading of men to be so reconciled, our law hath called by an infamous and Capitall name of Treason, and yet every Tavern, and Ordinary is full of such Traitors. Every place from jest to earnest is filled with them; from the very stage to the death-bed; At a Comedy they will persuade you, as you sit, as you laugh, And in your sickness they will persuade you, as you lie, as you die. And not only in the bed of sickness, but in the bed of wantonness they persuade too; and there may be examples of women, that have thought it a fit way to gain a soul, by prostituting themselves, and by entertaining unlawful love, with a purpose to convert a servant, which is somewhat a strange Topique, to draw arguments of religion from. Let me see a Dominican and a Jesuit reconciled, in doctrinal papistry, for freewill and predestination, Let me see a French papist and an Italian papist reconciled in State-papistry, for the Popes jurisdiction, Let me see the Jesuits, and the secular priests reconciled in England, and when they are reconciled to one another, let them press reconciliation to their Church. To end all, Those men have their bodies from the earth, and they have their souls from heaven; and so all things in earth and heaven are reconciled: but they have their Doctrine from the Devil; and for things in hell, there is no peace made, and with things in hell, there is no reconciliation to be had by the blood of his Cross, except we will tread that blood under our feet, and make a mock of Christ Jesus, and crucify the Lord of Life again.

SERMON II. Preached at Paul's, upon Christmas Day, in the Evening. 1624.

S Aint Bernard spent his consideration upon three remarkable conjunctions, this Day. First, a Conjunction of God, and Man in one person, Christ Jesus; Then a conjunction of the incompatible Titles, Maid and Mother, in one blessed woman, the blessed Virgin Mary: And thirdly a conjunction of Faith, and the Reason of man, that so believes, and comprehends those two conjunctions. Let us accompany these three with another strange conjunction, in the first word of this Text, Propterea, Therefore; for that joins the anger of God, and his mercy together. God chides and rebukes the King Achaz by the Prophet, he is angry with him, and Therefore, says the Text, because he is angry he will give him a sign, a seal of mercy, Therefore the Lord shall give you a sign, Behold, a Virgin, &c. This Therefore, shall therefore be a first part of this Exercise, That God takes any occasion to show mercy; And a second shall be, The particular way of his mercy, declared here, The Lord shall give you a sign; And then a third and last, what this sign was, Behold, a Virgin, &c.

In these three parts, we shall walk by these steps; Having made our entrance into the first, with that general consideration, that God's mercy is always in season, upon that station, upon that height we shall look into the particular occasions of God's mercy here, what this King Achaz had done to alien God, and to avert his mercy, and in those two branches we shall determine that part. In the second, we shall also first make this general entrance, That God persists in his own ways, goes forward with his own purposes, And then what his way, and his purpose here was, he would give them a sign: and farther we shall not extend that second part. In the third we have more steps to make; First, what this sign is in general, it is, that there is a Redeemer given. And then how, thus; First, Virgo concipiet, a Virgin shall conceive, she shall be a Virgin then; And Virgo pariet, a Virgin shall bring forth, she shall be a Virgin then; And Pariet filium, she shall bear a Son, and therefore he is of her substance, not only man, but man of her; And this Virgin shall call this Son Immanuel, God with us, that is, God and Man in one person. Though the Angel at the Conception tell Joseph, That he shall call his name Jesus, and tell Mary her self, that she shall call his name Jesus, yet the blessed Virgin her self shall have a further reach, a clearer illustration, She shall call his name Immanuel, God with us: Others were called Jesus, Joshua was so, divers others were so; but, in the Scriptures there was never any but Christ called Immanuel. Though Jesus signify a Savior, Joseph was able to call this child Jesus, upon a more peculiar reason, and way of salvation then others who had that name, because they had saved the people from present calamities, and imminent dangers; for, the Angel told Joseph, that he should therefore be called Jesus, because he should save the people from their sins; and so, no Joshua, no other Jesus was a Jesus. But the blessed Virgin saw more then this; not only that he should be such a Jesus as should save them from their sins, but she saw the manner how, that he should be Immanuel, God with us, God and man in one person; That so, being Man, he might suffer, and being God, that should give an infinite value to his sufferings, according to the contract passed between the Father and him; and so he should be Jesus, a Savior, a Savior from sin, and this by this way and means. And then that all this should be established, and declared by an infallible sign, with this Ecce, Behold; That whosoever can call upon God by that name Immanuel, that is, confess Christ to be come in the flesh, that Man shall have an Ecce, a light, a sign, a token, an assurance that this Immanuel, this Jesus, this Savior belongs unto him, and he shall be able to say, Ecce, Behold, mine eyes have seen thy salvation.

We begin with that which is elder then our beginning, and shall over-live our end, The mercy of God. I will sing of thy mercy and judgment, says David; when we fixe ourselves upon the meditation and modulation of the mercy of God, even his judgments cannot put us out of tune, but we shall sing, and be cheerful, even in them. As God made grass for beasts, before he made beasts, and beasts for man, before he made man: As in that first generation, the Creation, so in the regeneration, our re-creating, he begins with that which was necessary for that which follows, Mercy before Judgment. Nay, to say that mercy was first, is but to post-date mercy; to prefer mercy but so, is to diminish mercy; The names of first or last derogate from it, for first and last are but rags of time, and his mercy hath no relation to time, no limitation in time, it is not first, nor last, but eternal, everlasting; Let the Devil make me so far desperate as to conceive a time whē there was no mercy, and he hath made me so far an Atheist, as to conceive a time when there was no God; if I despoile him of his mercy, any one minute, and say, now God hath no mercy, for that minute I discontinue his very Godhead, and his being. Later Grammarians have wrung the name of mercy out of misery; Misericordia praesumit miseriam, say these, there could be no subsequent mercy, if there were no precedent misery; But the true root of the word mercy, through all the Prophets, is Racham, and Racham is diligere, to love; as long as there hath been love (and God is love ) there hath been mercy: And mercy considered externally, and in the practice and in the effect, began not at the helping of man, when man was fallen and become miserable, but at the making of man, when man was nothing. So then, here we consider not mercy as it is radically in God, and an essential attribute of his, but productively in us, as it is an action, a working upon us, and that more especially, as God takes all occasions to exercise that action, and to shed that mercy upon us: for particular mercies are feathers of his wings, and that prayer, Lord let thy mercy lighten upon us, as our trust is in thee, is our birdlime; particular mercies are that cloud of Quails which hovered over the host of Israel, and that prayer, Lord let thy mercy lighten upon us, is our net to catch, our Gomer to fill of those Quails. The air is not so full of Moats, of Atoms, as the Church is of Mercies; and as we can suck in no part of air, but we take in those Moats, those Atoms; so here in the Congregation we cannot suck in a word from the preacher, we cannot speak, we cannot sigh a prayer to God, but that that whole breath and air is made of mercy. But we call not upon you from this Text, to consider God's ordinary mercy, that which he exhibites to all in the ministry of his Church; nor his miraculous mercy, his extraordinary deliverances of States and Churches; but we call upon particular Consciences, by occasion of this Text, to call to mind God's occasional mercies to them; such mercies as a regenerate man will call mercies, though a natural man would call them accidents, or occurrences, or contingencies; A man wakes at mid-night full of unclean thoughts, and he hears a passing Bell; this is an occasional mercy, if he call that his own knell, and consider how unfit he was to be called out of the world then, how unready to receive that voice, Fool, this night they shall fetch away thy soul. The adulterer, whose eye waits for the twy-light, goes forth, and casts his eyes upon forbidden houses, and would enter, and sees a Lord have mercy upon us upon the door; this is an occasional mercy, if this bring him to know that they who lie sick of the plague within, pass through a furnace, but by God's grace, to heaven; and he without, carries his own furnace to hell, his lustful loins to everlasting perdition. What an occasional mercy had Balaam, when his Ass Catechized him? What an occasional mercy had one Thief, when the other catechized him so, Art not thou afraid being under the same condemnation? What an occasional mercy had all they that saw that, when the Devil himself fought for the name of Jesus, and wounded the sons of Sceva for exorcising in the name of Jesus, with that indignation, with that increpation, Jesus we know, and Paul we know, but who are ye? If I should declare what God hath done (done occasionally) for my soul, where he instructed me for fear of falling, where he raised me when I was fallen, perchance you would rather fixe your thoughts upon my illness, and wonder at that, then at God's goodness, and glorify him in that; rather wonder at my sins, then at his mercies, rather consider how ill a man I was, then how good a God he is. If I should inquire upon what occasion God elected me, and writ my name in the book of Life, I should sooner be afraid that it were not so, then find a reason why it should be so. God made Sun and Moon to distinguish seasons, and day, and night, and we cannot have the fruits of the earth but in their seasons: But God hath made no decree to distinguish the seasons of his mercies; In paradise, the fruits were ripe, the first minute, and in heaven it is always Autumn, his mercies are ever in their maturity. We ask panem quetidianum, our daily bread, and God never says you should have come yesterday, he never says you must again tomorrow, but today if you will hear his voice, today he will hear you. If some King of the earth have so large an extent of Dominion, in North, and South, as that he hath Winter and Summer together in his Dominions, so large an extent East and West, as that he hath day and night together in his Dominions, much more hath God mercy and judgment together: He brought light out of darkness, not out of a lesser light; he can bring thy Summer out of Winter, though thou have no Spring; though in the ways of fortune, or understanding, or conscience, thou have been benighted till now, wintred and frozen, clouded and eclypsed, damped and benumbed, smothered and stupefied till now, now God comes to thee, not as in the dawning of the day, not as in the bud of the spring, but as the Sun at noon to illustrate all shadows, as the sheaves in harvest, to fill all penuries, all occasions invite his mercies, and all times are his seasons.

If it were not thus in general, it would never have been so in this particular, in our case, in the Text, in King Achaz; If God did not seek occasion to do good to all, he would never have found occasion to do good to King Achaz. Subjects are to look upon the faults of Princes, with the spectacles of obedience, and reverence, to their place, and persons; little and dark spectacles, and so their faults, and errors are to appear little, and excusable to them; God's perspective glass, his spectacle is the whole world; he looks not upon the Sun, in his sphere only, but as he works upon the whole earth: And he looks upon Kings, not only what harm they do at home, but what harm they occasion abroad; & through that spectacle, the faults of Princes, in God's eye, are multiplied, far above those of private men. Achaz had such faults, and yet God sought occasion of Mercy. Jotham, his Father, is called a good King, and yet all Idolatry was not removed in his time, and he was a good King, for all that. Achaz is called ill, both because himself sacrificed Idolatrously, (And the King was a commanding person) And because he made the Priest Uriah to do so, (And the Priest was an exemplar person) And because he made his Son commit the abominations of the heathen; (And the actions of the Kings Son pierce far in leading others.) Achaz had these faults, and yet God fought occasion of mercy. If the evening sky be red, you promise yourselves a fair day, says Christ; you would not do so if the evening were black and cloudy: when you see the fields white with corn, you say harvest is ready; you would not do so if they were white with frost. If ye consent, and obey, you shall eat the good things of the Land, says God in the Prophet; shall ye do so if you refuse, and rebel? Achaz did, and yet God sought occasion of mercy. There arise diseases for which there is no probatum est, in all the books of Physicians; There is scarce any sin of which we have not had experiments of God's mercies; He concludes with no sin, excludes no occasion, precludes no person: And so we have done with our first part, God's general disposition, for the Rule, declared in Achaz case for the example.

Our second part consists of a Rule, and an Example too: The Rule, That God goes forward in his own ways, proceeds, as he begun, in mercy; The Example, what his proceeding, what his subsequent mercy to Achaz was. One of the most convenient Hieroglyphics of God, is a Circle; and a Circle is endless; whom God loves, he loves to the end: and not only to their own end, to their death, but to his end, and his end is, that he might love them still. His hailstones, and his thunder-bolts, and his showers of blood (emblems and instruments of his Judgments) fall down in a direct line, and affect and strike someone person, or place: His Sun, and Moon, and Stars, (Emblemes and Instruments of his Blessings) move circularly, and communicate themselves to all. His Church is his chariot; in that, he moves more gloriously, then in the Sun; as much more, as his begotten Son exceeds his created Sun, and his Son of glory, and of his right hand, the Sun of the firmament; and this Church, his chariot, moves in that communicable motion, circularly; It began in the East, it came to us, and is passing now, shining out now, in the farthest West. As the Sun does not set to any Nation, but withdraw it self, and return again; God, in the exercise of his mercy, does not set to thy soul, though he benight it with an affliction. Remember that our Savior Christ himself, in many actions and passions of our human nature, and infirmities, smothered that Divinity, and suffered it not to work, but yet it was always in him, and wrought most powerfully in the deepest danger; when he was absolutely dead, it raised him again: If Christ slumbered the God-head in himself, The mercy of God may be slumbered, it may be hidden from his servants, but it cannot be taken away, and in the greatest necessities, it shall break out. The Blessed Virgin was overshadowed, but it was with the Holy Ghost that overshadowed her: Thine understanding, thy conscience may be so too, and yet it may be the work of the Holy Ghost, who moves in thy darkness, and will bring light even out of that, knowledge out of thine ignorance, clearness out of thy scruples, and consolation out of thy Dejection of Spirit. God is thy portion, says David; David does not speak so narrowly, so penuriously, as to say, God hath given thee thy portion, and thou must look for no more; but, God is thy portion, and as long as he is God, he hath more to give, and as long as thou art his, thou hast more to receive. Thou canst not have so good a Title, to a subsequent blessing, as a former blessing; where thou art an ancient tenant, thou wilt look to be preferred before a stranger; and that is thy title to God's future mercies, if thou have been formerly accustomed to them. The Sun is not weary with six thousand years shining; God cannot be weary of doing good; And therefore never say, God hath given me these and these temporal things, and I have scattered them wastefully, surely he will give me no more; These and these spiritual graces, and I have neglected them, abused them, surely he will give me no more; For, for things created, we have instruments to measure them; we know the compass of a Meridian, and the depth of a Diameter of the Earth, and we know this, even of the uppermost sphere in the heavens: But when we come to the Throne of God himself, the Orbe of the Saints, and Angels that see his face, and the virtues, and powers that flow from thence, we have no balance to weigh them, no instruments to measure them, no hearts to conceive them: So, for temporal things, we know the most that man can have; for we know all the world; but for God's mercy, and his spiritual graces, as that language in which God spake, the Hebrew, hath no superlative, so, that which he promises, in all that he hath spoken, his mercy hath no superlative; he shows no mercy, which you can call his Greatest Mercy, his Mercy is never at the highest; whatsoever he hath done for thy soul, or for any other, in applying himself to it, he can exceed that. Only he can raise a Tower, whose top shall reach to heaven: The Basis of the highest building is but the Earth; But though thou be but a Tabernacle of Earth, God shall raise thee piece by piece, into a spiritual building; And after one Story of Creation, and another of Vocation, and another of Sanctification, he shall bring thee up, to meet thyself, in the bosom of thy God, where thou wast at first, in an eternal election: God is a circle himself, and he will make thee one; Go not thou about to square either circle, to bring that which is equal in it self, to Angles, and Corners, into dark and sad suspicions of God, or of thyself, that God can give, or that thou canst receive no more Mercy, then thou hast had already.

This then is the course of God's mercy, He proceeds as he begun, which was the first branch of this second part; It is always in motion, and always moving towards All, always perpendicular, right over everyone of us, and always circular, always communicable to all; And then the particular beam of this Mercy, shed upon Achaz here in our Text, is, Dabit signum, The Lord shall give you a sign. It is a great Degree of Mercy, that he affords us signs. A natural man is not made of Reason alone, but of Reason, and Sense: A Regenerate man is not made of Faith alone, but of Faith and Reason; and Signs, external things, assist us all.

In the Creation, it was part of the office of the Sun and Moon, to be significative; he created them for signs, as well as for seasons: he directed the Jews to Christ, by signs, by sacrifices, and Sacraments, and ceremonies; and he entertains us with Christ, by the same means to; we know where to find Christ; In his House, in his Church; And we know at what sign he dwells; where the Word is rightly Preached, and the Sacraments duly administered. It is truly, and wisely said, Sic habenda fides verbo Dei, ut subsidia minime contemnamus; We must so far satisfy ourselves, with the word of God, as that we despise not those other subsidiary helps, which God in his Church hath afforded us: which is true (as of Sacraments especially) so of other Sacramental, and Ritual, and Ceremonial things, which assist the working of the Sacraments, though they infuse no power into the Sacraments. For, therefore does the Prophet say, when Achaz refused a sign, Is it a small thing to weary (or disobey) men, but that you will weary (disobey) God himself? He disobeyes God, in the way of contumacy, who refuses his signs, his outward assistances, his ceremonies which are induced by his authority, derived from him, upon men, in his Church, and so made a part, or a help, of his ordinary service, as Sacraments, and Sacramental things are.

There are signs of another sort, not fixed by God's Ordinance, but signs which particular men, have sometimes desired at God's hand, for a farther manifestation of God's will, in which, it is not, otherwise, already fully manifested, and revealed. For, to seek such signs, in things which are sufficiently declared by God, or to seek them, with a resolution, That I will leave a duty undone, except I receive a sign, this is to tempt God, and to seek a way to excuse myself, for not doing that, which I was bound to do, by the strength of an old commandment, and ought not to look for a new sign. But the greatest fault in this kind, is, that if God, of his abundant goodness, do give me a sign, for my clearer directions, and I resist that sign, I dispute against that sign, I turn it another way, upon nature, upon fortune, upon mistaking, that so I may go mine own way, and not be bound, by believing that sign to be from God, to go that way, to which God by that sign calls me. And this was Achaz case; God spoke unto him, and said, Ask a sign (that he would deliver him, from the enemy, that besieged Jerusalem) and he said, I will not ask a sign, nor tempt God; For, though St. Augustine, and some with him, ascribe this refusal of Achaz, to a religious modesty, yet St. Jerome, and with him, the greatest party, justly impute this, for a fault to Achaz: both because the sign was offered him from God, and not sought by himself, (which is the case that is most subject to error) And because the Prophet, who understood God's mind, and the Kings mind to, takes knowledge of it, as of a great fault, In this, thou hast contemned, and wearied, not Man but God. For, though there be but a few cases, in which we may put God to give a sign, (for Christ calls the Pharisees an evil, and an adulterous generation, therefore, because they sought a sign ) yet God gave Moses a sign, of a Rod changed into a Serpent, and a sign of good flesh changed into leprous, and leprous into good, unasked: And after, Abraham asks a sign, whereby shall I know, that I shall inherit the land? and God gave him a sign. So Gideon, in a modest timorousness asks a sign, and presses God to a second sign: First, he would have all the dew upon the fleece, and then, none of the dew upon the fleece. God does give signs, and when he does so, he gives also irradiations, illustrations of the understanding, that they may be discerned to be his signs; and when they are so, it is but a pretended modesty, to say, we will not tempt God to ask a sign, we will not trouble God to tell us whether this be a sign or no, but against all significations from God, go on, as though all were but natural accidents.

God gives signs recte petentibus, to them that ask them upon due grounds, (so to Abraham, so to Gideon ) And it is too long for this time, to put cases, when a man may or may not put God to a sign; He gives signs also Non petentibus, without being asked, to illustrate the case, and to confirm the person, and so he did to Moses. Both these are high expressions of his mercy; for what binds God, to begin with man, and give him a sign before he ask; or to wait upon man, and give it him, when he asks? But the highest of all, is, to persevere in his mercy so far, as to give a sign, though upon the offer thereof, it be refused; And that is Achaz case: Ask ye, says God, And, I will not, says Achaz, and then, It is not Quamvis, for all that, though thou refuse, but it is Propterea, Therefore, because thou refusest, The Lord himself shall give thee a sign. His fault is carried thus high: Because he had treasure to pay an army, because he had contracted with the Assyrians to assist him with men, therefore he refuses the assistance offered by the Prophet from God, and would fain go his own ways, and yet would have a religious pretext, He will not tempt God. Nay his fault is carried thus much higher, That which we read, Non tentabo, I will not tempt, is in the Original, Nasas; and Nasas is non Extollam, non glorificabo, I will not glorify God so much, that is, I will not be beholden to God for this victory, I will not take him into the league for this action, I will do it of myself: And yet, (and then, who shall doubt of the largeness of God's mercy?) God proceeds in his purpose: Ask a sign, will ye not? Therefore the Lord shall give you a sign: Because you will do nothing for yourself, the Lord shall do all; which is so transcendent a mercy, as that, howsoever God afforded it to Achaz here, we can promise it to no man hereafter.

We are come to our third part, which is more peculiar to this Day: It is, first, what the sign is in general, And then, some more particular circumstances, Behold a Virgin shall conceive, &c. In general then, the sign that God gives Achaz and his company, is, That there shall be a Messias, a Redeemer given. Now, how is this future thing, (There shall be a Messias) a sign of their present deliverance from that siege? First, In the notion of the Prophet, it was not a future thing; for, as in God's own sight, so in their sight, to whom he opens himself, future things are present. So this Prophet says, Puer datus, filius natus, unto us a child is borne, unto us a Son is given: He was not given, he was not borne in six hundred years after that; but such is the clearness of a Prophets sight, such is the infallibility of God's declared purpose. So then, if the Prophet could have made the King believe, with such an assurednesse, as if he had seen it done, that God would give a deliverance, to all mankind, by a Messias, that had been sign enough, evidence enough to have argued thereupon, That God who had done so much a greater work, would also give him a deliverance from that enemy, that pressed him then: If I can fixe myself, with the strength of faith, upon that which God hath done for man; I cannot doubt of his mercy, in any distress: If I lack a sign, I seek no other but this, That God was made man for me; which the Church and Church-writers, have well expressed by the word Incarnation, for that acknowledges, and denotes, that God was made my flesh: It were not so strange, that he who is spirit, should be made my spirit, my soul, but he was made my flesh: Therefore have the Fathers delighted themselves, in the variation of that word; so far, as that Hilary calls it Corporationem, That God assumed my Body; And Damascene calls it Inhumanationem, That God became this man, soul and body; And Irenaeus calls it Adunationem, and Nysen Contemperationem, A mingling, says one, an uniting, says the other, of two, of God and man, in one person. Shall I ask, what needs all this? what needed God to have put himself to this? I may say with S. Augustine, Alio modo poterat Deus nos liberare, sed si aliter faceret, similiter vestrae stultitiae displiceret: What other way soever God had taken for our salvation, our curiosity would no more have been satisfied in that way, than in this: But God having chosen the way of Redemption, which was the way of Justice, God could do no otherwise: Si homo non vicisset inimicum hominis, non juste victus esset inimicus, says Irenaeus; As, if a man should get a battle by the power of the Devil, without fighting, this were not a just victory; so, if God, in man's behalf, had conquered the devil, without man, without dying, it had not been a just conquest. I must not ask why God took this way, to Incarnate his Son; And shall I ask how this was done? I do not ask how Rheubarb, or how Aloes came by this, or this virtue, to purge this, or this humor in my body: In talibus rebus, tota ratio facti, est potentia facientis: Even in natural things, all the reason of all that is done, is the power, and the will of him, who infused that virtue into that creature. And therefore much more, when we come to these supernatural points, such as this birth of Christ, we embrace S. Basils modesty, and abstinence, Nativitas ista silentio honoretur, This mystery is not so well celebrated, with our words, and discourse, as with a holy silence, and meditation: Immo potius ne cogitationibus permittatur, Nay, (says that Father) there may be danger in giving ourselves leave, to think or study too much of it. Ne dixer is quando, says he, praeteri hanc interrogationem: Ask not thyself overcuriously, when this mystery was accomplished; be not over-vehement, over-peremptory, (so far, as to the perplexing of thine own reason and understanding, or so far, as to the despising of the reasons of other men) in calculating the time, the day or hour of this nativity: Praeteri hanc interrogationem, pass over this question, in good time, and with convenient satisfaction, Quando, when Christ was borne; But noli inquirere Quomodo, (says S. Basil still) never come to that question, how it was done, cum ad hoc nihil sit quod responderi possit, for God hath given us no faculties to comprehend it, no way to answer it. That's enough, which we have in S. John, Every spirit, that confesses, that Jesus is come in the flesh, is of God: for, since it was a coming of Jesus, Jesus was before; so he was God; and since he came in the flesh, he is now made man; And, that God and Man, are so met, is a sign to me, that God, and I, shall never be parted.

This is the sign in general; That God hath had such a care of all men, is a sign to me, That he hath a care of me: But then there are signs of this sign; Divers; All these; A Virgin shall conceive, A Virgin shall bring forth, Bring forth a Son, And (whatsoever have been prophesied before) she shall call his name Immanuel.

First, a Virgin shall be a mother, which is a very particular sign, and was seen but once. That which Gellius, and Pliny say, that a Virgin had a child, almost 200. years before Christ, that which Genebrard says, that the like fell out in France, in his time, are not within our faith, and they are without our reason; our faith stoops not down to them, and our Reason reaches not up to them; of this Virgin in our text, If that be true, which Aquinas cites out of the Roman story, that in the times of Constantine and Irene, upon a dead body found in a sepulcher, there was found this inscription, in a plate of gold, Christus nascetur ex Virgin, & ego credo in eum, Christ shall be borne of a Virgin, and I believe in that Christ, with this addition, in that inscription, O Sol, sub Irenae, & Constantini temporibus, iterum me videbis, Though I be now buried from the sight of the sun, yet in Constantine's time, the sun shall see me again; If this be true, yet our ground is not upon such testimony; If God had not said it, I would never have believed it. And therefore I must have leave to doubt of that which some of the Roman Casuists have delivered, That a Virgin may continue a virgin upon earth, and receive the particular dignity of a Virgin in Heaven, and yet have a child, by the insinuation and practice of the Devil; so that there shall be a father, and a mother, and yet both they Virgins. That this Mother, in our text, was a Virgin, is a peculiar, a singular sign, given, as such, by God; never done but then; and it is a singular testimony, how acceptable to God, that state of virginity is; He does not dishonor physic, that magnifies health; nor does he dishonor marriage, that praises Virginity; let them embrace that state, that can; and certainly, many more might do it, then do, if they would try whether they could, or no; and if they would follow S. Cyprians way, Virgo non tantum esse, sed & intelligi esse debet, & credi: It is not enough for a virgin to be a virgin in her own knowledge, but she must govern her self so, as that others may see, that she is one, and see, that she hath a desire, and a disposition, to continue so still; Ita, ut nemo, cum virginem viderit, dubitet an sit virgo, says that Father, She must appear in such garments, in such language, and in such motions, (for, as a wife may wear other clothes, so she may speak other words, then a virgin may do) as they that see her, may not question, nor dispute, whether she be a maid or no. The word in the Text, is derived à latendo, from retiring, from privatenesse: And Tertullian, who makes the note, notes withal, that Ipsa concupiscentia non latendi, non est pudica, The very concupiscence of conversation, and visits, is not chaste: Studium placendi, publicatione sui, periclitatur, says the same Author: Curious dressings are for public eyes; and the Virgin that desires to publish her self, is weary of that state: It is usefully added by him, Dum percutitur oculis alienis, frons duratur, & pudor teritur, the eyes of others, that strike upon her, (if she be willing to stand out that battery) dry up that blood, that should blush, and wear out that chastity, which should be preserved. So precious is virginity in God's eye, as that he looks upon that, with a more jealous eye, than upon other states.

This blessed Mother of God, in our text, was a Virgin: when? Virgo concipiet, says our Text, A Virgin shall conceive, when she conceived, she was a Virgin. There are three Heresies; all noted by S. Augustine that impeach the virginity of this most blessed Woman: The Cerinthians said she conceived by ordinary generation; Iovinian said, she was delivered by ordinary means; And Helvidius said, she had children after: All against all the world besides themselves, and against one another. For the first, that is enough which S. Basil says, that if the word Virgin in our text signified no more but adolescentulam, a young woman (as they pretend) it had been an impertinent, an absurd thing for the Prophet to have made that a sign, and a wonder, that a young woman should have a child. This is enough, but that is abundantly enough, that S. Matthew, who spoke with the same spirit that Isaiah did, says in a word, which can admit no mis-interpretation, That that was fulfilled which Isaiah had said, A Virgin shall conceive; S. Matthews word without question, is a Virgin, and not a young woman, and S. Matthew took Esaies word to be so too; and S. Matthew (at least he that spake in S. Matthew ) did not, could not mistake, and mistake himself, for it was one and the same Holy Ghost that spake both. Christ says therefore of himself, vermis sum, I am a worm, but says S. Ambrose, vermis de Manna, a worm out of a pure substance, a holy Man, from a blessed Virgin; Virgo concepit, she was a Virgin then, then when she had conceived.

She was so to, In partu, then when she was delivered; Iovinian denied that: A better then he (Tertullian) denied it: Virgo quantum à viro, non quantum à partu, says he, she was such a Virgin as knew no man, not such a Virgin as needed no midwife: Virgo concepit, says he, in partu nupsit, a Virgin in her conception, but a wife in the deliverance of her Son. Let that be wrapped up amongst Tertullian's errors, he had many; The text clears it, A virgin shall conceive, a virgin shall bear a Son: The Apostles Creed clears it, says S. August: when it says, Born of the Virgin Mary; and S. Ambrose clears it, when he says, with such indignation, De via iniquitat is produntur dicere, virgo cōcepit, sed non virgo generavit, It is said, that there are some men so impious, as to deny that she remained a Virgin at the birth of her Son: S. Ambrose wondered there should be, scarce believed it to be any other then a rumour, or a slander, that there could be any so impious, as to deny that: And yet there have been some so impious, as to charge Calvin, with that impiety, with denying her to be a Virgin then; It is true, he makes it not a matter of faith, to defend her perpetual virginity; but that's not this case, of her Virginity in her Deliverance: And even of that, (of her perpetual virginity) he says thus, Nemo unquam quaestionem movebit, nisi curiofus, nemo pertinaciter insistet, nisi contentiosus rixator; He is over-curious, that will make any doubt of it; but no man will persist in the denial of it, but a contentious wrangler; And in that very point, S. Basil says fully as much, as Calvin. But, at his birth, and after his birth, there is evidence enough in this text, A Virgin shall conceive, A Virgin shall bring forth, A Virgin shall call him Immanuel, In all those future, and subsequent Acts, still it is the same person, and in the same condition.

Pariet, & pariet filium, She shall bring forth a Son; If a Son, then of the substance of his Mother; that the Anabaptists deny; But had it not been so, Christ had not been true Man, and then, man were yet unredeemed. He is her Son, but not her ward; his Father cannot die: Her Son, but yet he asked her no leave, to stay at Jerusalem, nor to dispute with the Doctors, nor to go about his Fathers work: His settling of Religion, his governing the Church, his dispensing of his graces, is not by warrant from her: They that call upon the Bishop of Rome, in that voice, Impera Regibus, command Kings and Emperors, admit of that voice, Imperafilio, to her, that she should command her Sonno. The natural obedience of children to Parents, holds not in such civil things, as are public; A woman may be a Queen-Dowager, and yet a subject; The blessed Virgin Mary may be in a high rank, and yet no Sovereign; Blessed art thou amongst women, says the Angel to her; Amongst women, above women; but not above any person of the Trinity, that she should command her Son. Luther was awake, and risen, but he was not ready; He had seen light, and looked toward it, but yet saw not so clearly by it, then, when he said, That the blessed Virgin was of a middle condition, between Christ, and man; that man hath his conception, and his quickening (by the infusion of the soul) in original sin; that Christ had it in neither, no sin in his conception, none in his inanimation, in the infusion of his soul; But, says Luther, howsoever it were at the conception, certainly at the inanimation, at the quickening, she was preserved from original sin. Now, what needs this? may I not say, that I had rather be redeemed by Christ Jesus then be innocent? rather be beholden to Christ's death, for my salvation, then to Adams standing in his innocence. Epiphanius said enough, Par detrimentum afferunt religioni, they hurt Religion as much, that ascribe too little, to the blessed Virgin, as they who ascribe too much; much is due to her, and this amongst the rest, That she had so clear notions, above all others, what kind of person, her Son was, that as Adam gave names, according to natures, so the Prophet here leaves it to her, to name her Son, according to his office, She shall call his name Immanuel.

We told you at first, that both Joseph and Mary, were told by the Angel, that his name was to be Jesus, and we told you also, that others, besides him, had been called by that name of Jesus: but, as, though others were called Jesus, (for Joshua is called so, Heb. 4.8. If Jesus had given them rest; that is, If Joshua had &c. And the son of Iosedech is called so, throughout the Prophet Aggai ) yet there is observed a difference in the pointing, and founding of those names, from this our Jesus: so though other women were called Mary, as well as the blessed Virgin, yet the Evangelists, evermore make a difference, between her name, and the other Mary's; for Her they call Mariam, and the rest Maria. Now this Jesus, in this person, is a real, an actual Savior, he that hath already really, and actually accomplished our salvation; But the blessed Virgin had a clearer illustration, then all that; for she only knew, or she knew best, the capacity, in which he could be a Savior, that is, as he is Immanuel, God with us; for she, and she only knew, that he was the Son of God, and not of natural generation by man. How much is enwrapped in this name Immanuel, and how little time to unfold it? I am afraid none at all; A minute will serve to repeat that which S. Bernard says, and a day, a life will not serve to comprehend it; (for to comprehend is not to know a thing, as far as I can know it, but to know it as far, as that thing can be known; and so only God, can comprehend God.) Immanuel est verbuminfans, says the Father; He is the ancient of days, and yet in minority; he is the Word it self, and yet speechless; he that is All, that all the Prophets spoke of, cannot speak: He adds more, He is Puer sapiens, but a child, and yet wiser then the elders, wiser in the Cradle, then they in the Chair: He is more, Deus lactens, God, at whose breasts all creatures suck, sucking at his Mothers breast, and such a Mother, as is a maid. Immanuel is God with us; it is not we with God: God seeks us, comes to us, before we to him: And it is God with us, in that notion, in that termination, El, which is Deus fortis, The powerful God; not only i • infirmity, as when he died in our nature, but as he is Deus fortis, able and ready to assist, and deliver us, in all encumbrances; so he is with us; And with us, usque ad consummationem, till the end of the world, in his Word, and in the Sacraments: for, though I may not say, as some have said, That by the word of Consecration, in the administration of the Sacrament, Christ is so infallibly produced, as that, if Christ had never been incarnate before, yet, at the pronouncing of those words of consecration, he must necessarily be incarnate then, yet I may say, that God is as effectually present, with every worthy receiver, as that he is not more effectually present with the Saints in Heaven.

And this is that, which is intimated in that word, which we seposed at first, for the last of all, Ecce, Behold; Behold, a Virgin shall conceive &c. God does not furnish a room, and leave it dark; he sets up lights in it; his first care was, that his benefits should be seen; he made light first, and then creatures, to be seen by that light: He sheds himself from my mouth, upon the whole auditory here; he pours himself from my hand, to all the Communicants at the table; I can say to you all here, The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you, and remain with you all; I can say to them all there, The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given for you, preserve you to everlasting life: I can bring it so near; but only the worthy hearer, and the worthy receiver, can call this Lord, this Jesus, this Christ, Immanuel, God with us; only that Virgin soul, devirginated in the blood of Adam, but restored in the blood of the Lamb, hath this Ecce, this testimony, this assurance, that God is with him; they that have this Ecce, this testimony, in a rectified conscience, are Godfathers to this child Jesus, and may call him Immanuel, God with us; for, as no man can deceive God, so God can deceive no man; God cannot live in the dark himself, neither can he leave those, who are his, in the dark: If he be with thee, he will make thee see, that he is with thee; and never go out of thy sight, till he have brought thee, where thou canst never go out of his.

SERMON III. Preached upon Christmas day, at S. Paul's, 1625.

W EE are met here to celebrate the generation of Christ Jesus; but Generationem ejus quis enarrabit, says the Prophet, who shall declare his generation, his age? For, for his essential generation, be which he is the Son of God, the Angels, who are almost 6000. years elder then we, are no nearer to that generation of his, then if they had been made but yesterday: Eternity hath no such distinctions, no limits, no periods, no seasons, no months, no years, no days; Methuselah, who was so long lived, was no elder in respect of eternity, then David's son by Berseba, that died the first week. The first Fiat in the Creation of Adam, and the last note of the blowing of the Trumpets to judgment, (though there be between these (as it is ordinarily received) 2000. years of nature, between the Creation, and the giving of the Law by Moses, and 2000. years of the Law between that, and the coming of Christ, and 2000. years of Grace and Gospel between Christ first, and his second coming) yet this Creation and this Judgment are not a minute asunder in respect of eternity, which hath no minutes. Whence then arises all our vexation and labor, all our anxieties and anguishes, all our suits and pleadings, for long leases, for many lives, for many years purchase in this world, when, if we be in our way to the eternal King of the eternal kingdom, Christ Jesus, all we are not yet, all the world shall never be a minute old; Generationem ejus quis enarrabit, what tongue can declare, what heart can conceive his generation which was so long before any heart or tongue was made? But we come not now to consider that eternal generation, not Christ merely as the Son of God, but the Son of Mary too: And that generation the Holy Ghost hath told us, was in the fullness of time: When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth, &c.

In which words, we have these three considerations; First, the time of Christ's coming, and that was the fullness of time; And then, the manner of his coming, which is expressed in two degrees of humiliation, one, that he was made of a woman, the other, that he was made under the Law; And then, the third part is the purpose of his coming, which also was twofold; for first, he came to redeem them who were under the Law, All; And secondly he came, that we (we the elect of God in him) might receive adoption; When the fullness of time was come, &c.

For the full consideration of this fullness of time, we shall first consider this fullness in respect of the Jews, and then in respect of all Nations, and lastly in respect of ourselves: The Jews might have seen the fullness of time, the Gentiles did (in some measure) see it, and we must (if we will have any benefit by it) see it too. It is an observation of S. Cyril, That none of the Saints of God, nor such as were noted to be exemplarily religious, and sanctified men did ever celebrate with any festival solemnity, their own birth-day. Pharaoh celebrated his own Nativity, but who would make Pharaoh his example? and besides, he polluted that festival with the blood of one of his servants. Herod celebrated his Nativity, but who would think it an honor to be like Herod? and besides, he polluted that festival with the blood of John the Baptist. But the just contemplation of the miseries and calamities of this life, into which our birth-day is the door, and the entrance, is so far from giving any just occasion of a festival, as it hath often transported the best disposed Saints and servants of God to a distemper, to a malediction, and cursing of their birth-day. Cursed be the day wherein I was born, and let not that day wherein my mother bare me be blessed. Let the day perish wherein I was born, let that day be darkness, and let not God regard it from above. How much misery is presaged to us, when we come so generally weeping into the world, that, perchance, in the whole body of history we read but of one child, Zoroaster, that laughed at his birth: What miserable revolutions and changes, what downfals, what break-necks, and precipitations may we justly think ourselves ordained to, if we consider, that in our coming into this world out of our mothers womb, we do not make account that a child comes right, except it come with the head forward, and thereby prefigure that headlong falling into calamities which it must suffer after? Though therefore the days of the Martyrs, which are for our example celebrated in the Christian Church, be ordinarily called natalitia Martyrum, the birth-day of the Martyrs, yet that is not intended of their birth in this world, but of their birth in the next; when, by death their souls were new delivered of their prisons here, and they newly born into the kingdom of heaven; that day, upon that reason, the day of their death was called their birth-day, and celebrated in the Church by that name. Only to Christ Jesus, the fullness of time was at his birth; not because he also had not a painful life to pass through, but because the work of our redemption was an entire work, and all that Christ said, or did, or suffered, concurred to our salvation, as well his mothers swathing him in little clouts, as Joseph's shrowding him in a funeral sheet; as well his cold lying in the Manger, as his cold dying upon the Cross; as well the pure natus, as the consummatum est; as well his birth, as his death is said to have been the fullness of time.

First we consider it to have been so to the Jews; for this was that fullness, in which all the prophecies concerning the Messias, were exactly fulfilled; That he must come whilst the Monarchy of Rome flourished; And before the Temple of Jerusalem was destroyed; That he must be born in Bethlehem; That he must be born of a Virgin; His person, his actions, his passion so distinctly prophesied, so exactly accomplished, as no word being left unfulfilled, this must necessarily be a fullness of time. So fully was the time of the Messias coming, come, that though some of the Jews say now, that there is no certain time revealed in the Scriptures when the Messias shall come, and others of them say, that there was a time determined, and revealed, and that this time was the time, but by reason of their great sins he did not come at his time, yet when they examine their own supputations, they are so convinced with that evidence, that this was that fullness of time, that now they express a kind of conditional acknowledgement of it, by this barbarous and inhumane custom of theirs, that they always keep in readiness the blood of some Christian, with which they anoint the body of any that dies amongst them, with these words, if Jesus Christ were the Messias, then may the blood of this Christian avail thee to salvation: So that by their doubt, and their implied consent, in this action, this was the fullness of time, when Christ Jesus did come, that the Messias should come.

It was so to the Jews, and it was so to the Gentiles too; It filled those wise men which dwelt so far in the East, that they followed the star from thence to Jerusalem. Herod was so full of it, that he filled the Country with streams of innocent blood, and lest he should spare that one innocent child, killed all. The two Emperors of Rome, Vespasian and Domitian were so full of it, that in jealousy of a Messias to come then, from that race, they took special care for the destruction of all, of the posterity of David. All the whole people were so full of it, that divers false-Messiahs, Barcocab, and Moses of Crete, and others rose up, and drew, and deceived the people, as if they had been the Messiah, because that was ordinarily known, and received to be the time of his coming. And the Devil himself was so full of it, as that in his Oracles he gave that answer, That an Hebrew child should be God over all gods, and brought the Emperor to erect an Altar, to this Messiah Christ Jesus, though he knew not what he did. This was the fullness that filled Jew and Gentile, Kings and Philosophers, strangers and inhabitants, counterfaits and devils to the expectation of a Messiah; and when comes this fullness of time to us, that we feel this Messiah born in ourselves?

In this fullness, in this coming of our Savior into us, we should find a threefold fullness in ourselves; we should find a fullness of nature (because not only of spiritual, but of natural and temporal things, all the right which we have in this world, is in, and for, and by Christ, for so we end all our prayers of all sorts, with that clause, per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum, Grant this O Lord, for our Lord and Savior Christ Jesus sake. ) And we should find a fullness of grace, a daily sense of improvement growth in grace, a filling of all former vacuities, a supplying of all emptinesses in our souls, till we came to Stephens fullness, Full of the holy Ghost and wisdom, and full of the holy Ghost and Faith, and full of faith and power: And so we should come to find a fullness of glory, that is an apprehension and inchoation of heaven in this life; for the glory of the next world, is not in the measure of that glory, but in the measure of my capacity; it is not that I shall have as much as any soul hath, but that I shall have as much as my soul can receive; it is not in an equality with the rest, but in a fullness in myself; And so, as I shall have a fullness of nature, that is, such an ability and such a use of natural faculties, and such a portion of the natural things of this world as shall serve to fill up God's purpose in me: And as I shall have a fullness of grace, that is, such a measure of grace as shall make me discern a temptation, and resist a temptation, or at least repent it, if I have not effectually resisted it, so even here, I shall have a fullness of glory, that is, as much of that glory as a way-faring soul is capable of in this world; All these fulnesses I shall have, if I can find and feel in myself this birth of Christ. His eternal birth in heaven is inexpressible, where he was born without a mother; His birth on earth is inexpressible too, where he was born without a father; but thou shalt feel the joy of his third birth in thy soul, most inexpressible this day, where he is born this day (if thou wilt) without father or mother; that is, without any former, or any other reason then his own mere goodness that should beget that love in him towards thee, and without any matter or merit in thee which should enable thee to conceive him. He had a heavenly birth, by which he was the eternal Son of God, and without that he had not been a person able to redeem thee; He had a human birth, by which he was the Son of Mary, and without that he had not been sensible in himself of thine infirmities, and necessities; but, this day (if thou wilt) he hath a spiritual birth in thy soul, without which, both his divine, and his human birth are utterly unprofitable to thee, and thou art no better then if there had never been Son of God in heaven, nor Son of Mary upon earth. Even the Stork in the air knoweth her appointed time, and the Turtle, and the Crane, and the Swallow observe the time of their coming, but my people knoweth not the judgments of the Lord. For, if you do know your time, you know that now is your fullness of time; This is your particular Christmas-day; when, if you be but as careful to cleanse your souls, as you are your houses, if you will but follow that counsel of S. Augustine, Quicquid non vis inveniri in domo tua, non inveniat Deus in anima tua, That uncleanness which you would be loath your neighbor should find in your houses, let not God nor his Angels find in your souls, Christ Jesus is certainly born. and will as certainly grow up in your souls.

We pass from this, to our second part, The manner of his coming; where we proposed two degrees of Christ's humiliation, That he was made of a woman, and made under the Law. In the first alone, are two degrees too, that he takes the name of the Son of a woman, and wanes the glorious name of the Son of God; And then, that he takes the name of the son of a woman, and wanes the miraculous name of the son of a Virgin. For the first; Christ ever refers himself to his Father; As he says, The Father which sent me, gave me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak, so, for all that which he did or suffered, he says, My meat is to do his will that sent me, and to finish his work: And so, though he say, I am come out from the Father, and am come into the world; yet, be where he will, still, Ego & pater unum sumus, He and his Father were all one. But devesting that glory, or slumbering it in his flesh, till the Father glorify him again with that glory, which he had with him from the beginning, in his Ascension, he humbles himself here to that addition, The Son of a woman, made of a woman.

Christ waned the glorious Name of Son of God, and the miraculous Name of Son of a Virgin to; which is not omitted to draw into doubt, the perpetual Virginity of the Blessed Virgin, the Mother of Christ; she is not called a woman, as though she were not a Maid; when it is said, Joseph knew her not, donec peperit, till she brought forth her Son, this did not imply his knowledge of her after, no more, then when God says to Christ, donec ponam, sit at my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool, that imports, that Christ should remove from his right hand after: For, here is a perpetual donec in both places; for evermore the ancient Expositors have understood that place of Ezekiel, to be intended of the perpetual Virginitie of Mary, This gate shall be shut, and shall not be opened, and no man shall enter by it. Solomon hath an exclamation, Is there any thing whereof a man may say, Behold this is new? and he answers himself immediately before, There is no new thing under the Sun. But behold here is a greater then Solomon, and he says now in action, by being borne of a Virgin, as he had said, long before, in Prophesy, The Lord hath created a new thing upon earth, a woman shall compass a man. If this had been spoken of such a woman, as were no Maid, this had been no new thing: As it was, it was without example, and without natural reason; si ratio reddi posset, (says St. Bernard ) non esset mirabile, si exempla haberemus, non esset singular; If there were reason for it, it were no miracle, if there were precedents for it, it were not singular; and God intended both, that it should be a miracle, and that it should be done but once; we see in Nature, trees do bud out, and there is an emission, and emanation of flowers, and fruits, without any help of man, or any act done by him, to that tree; we read in Genesis, That the earth had produced all plants and herbs, before either any rain fell upon it, or any man tilled it. And these are good helps, and illustrations to us, after we have believed that a Virgin brought forth a Son; but nothing deduced out of nature, could prove this at first, to any man, except he believed it before. And therefore blessed be God, that hath given us that strength, which the Egyptian Mid-wives said the women of Israel had, that they brought forth children, without the help of Mid-wives: That we can humbly believe these mysteries of our religion, by faith, without the hand, and help of Reason; Si nondum men's idonea, abstrusa investigare, sine haesitatione credantur, says St. Augustine, In things which are not subject to any faculty of ours, to be discerned by reason, there is a present exercise of our faith. As we know it to be true, that the bush, in which God spake to Moses, was full of fire, and did burn, but not consume, because God hath said so, in his book, but yet we do not know, how that was done: so we know, (by the same evidence) that the Mother of our Savior, was a Virgin; but for the manner of this Mystery, we rest upon Epiphanius Rule, Quaecunque dicit Deus, credamus quod sint; quomodo, Soli Deo cognitum: whatsoever God, in his word, says, was done, let us believe it to be done; how it was done, as we know that God knows, so we are content not to inquire more then it hath been his pleasure to communicate to us.

She was then, and she was always a Virgin; but because this Text is of his Humiliation, he leaves that Name that proceeds from miracle, and descends to that lower name of nature, Made of a woman. The Spirit of God fore-saw, that the issue between the Church, and the Heretics would not be Virgin or no Virgin, but whether Christ were made of a woman. Some Heretics did question the first; The Helvidians denied her perpetual Virginitie: But that Heresy, and some others that opposed her Virginitie, vanished in a short time. But the Manichees, that lasted long, and spread far in the old times, and the Anabaptists, which abound yet, deny that Christ was made of a woman; They say, that Christ passed through her, as water through a Pipe, but took nothing of her substance; and then, if he took not the nature of mankind, he hath not redeemed mankind. And therefore in that Prophesy of Jeremiah, that Christ should be borne, and in this Gospel, in our Text, that Christ was borne, the Holy Ghost mainttaines and continues that phrase, Made of a woman: And where he begins to express his Divinity in miracles, at the marriage in Cana, there Christ himself calls her, by no other name, Woman, what have I to do with thee? And when he had drawn all his miracles to a glorious consummatum est, upon the Cross, he calls her there, by that name too, Woman, behold thy Son. Here then was no such curious insisting upon Styles and Titles, and names of Dignities, no unkindness, no displeasure taken; if one should leave out a Right Honorable, or Right Worshipful, or an addition of an Office or Dignity; The powerfulness of Christ's birth, consists in this, That he is made of God; The miraculousnesse of Christ's birth, consisted in this, that he was made of a Virgin, and yet the Prophet and the Apostle, two principal Secretaries of the Holy Ghost, present him with this addition, made of a woman. Christ had one privilege in his birth, which never any Prince had, or shall have, that is, that he chose what Mother he would have, and might have been borne of what woman he would have chosen. And in this large and universal chovce, though he chose a woman full of grace to be his Mother, yet that he might give spiritual comfort to all sorts of women, first to those, who should be unjustly suspected, and insimulated of sin and incontinency, when indeed they were innocent, he was content to come of a Mother, who should be subject to that suspicion, and whom her husband should think to be with child, before he married her, and thereupon purpose to put her away; And then, to fill those women, who had been guilty of that sin, with relief in their consciences against the wrath of God, and with reparation of their reputation and good name in the world, it was his unsearchable will and pleasure, that in all that Genealogy, and pedigree, which he, and his spirit hath inspired the Evangelists to record of his Ancestors, there is not one woman named, of whom Christ is descended, who is not dangerously noted in the Scriptures, to have had some aspersion of incontinence upon her; as both St. Jerome, and St. Ambrose, and St. Chrysostom observes, of Tamar, of Berseba, and of Ruth also.

So then, Christ Jesus who came only for the relief of sinners, is content to be known to have come, not only of poor parents, but of a sinful race; and though he exempted his Blessed Mother, more then any, from sin, yet he is now content to be born again of sinful Mothers: In that soul, that accuses itself most of sin; In that soul, that calls now to mind, (with remorse, and not with delight) the several times, and places, and ways, wherein she hath offended God; In that soul that acknowledgeth itself to have been a sink of uncleanness, a Tabernacle, a Synagogue of Satan; In that soul, that hath been as it were possessed with Mary Magdalens seven Devils, yea with him, whose name was Legion, with all Devils; In that sinful soul would Christ Jesus fain be born, this day, and make that soul, his Mother, that he might be a regeneration to that soul. We cannot afford Christ, such a birth in us, as he had, to be born of a Virgin; for everyone of us well-nigh hath married himself to some particular sin, some beloved sin, that he can hardly divorce himself from; nay, no man keeps his faith, to that one sin, that he hath married himself to, but mingles himself with other sins also. Though Covetousness, whom he loves, as the wife of his bosom, have made him rich, yet he will commit adultery with another sin, with Ambition; and he will part, even with those riches, for Honor: Though Ambition be his wife, his married sin, yet he will commit adultery with another sin, with Licentiousness, and he will endanger his Honor, to fulfill his Lust; Ambition may be his wife, but Lust is his Concubine. We abandon all spiritual chastity; all virginity, we marry our particular sins, and then we divide our loves with other sins too: Thou hast multiplied thy fornications, and yet art not satisfied, is a complaint, that reaches us all, in spiritual fornications, and goes very far, in carnal. And yet, for all this, we are capable of this Conception, Christ may be borne in us, for all this: As God said unto the Prophet, Take thee a wife of fornications, and children of fornications; so is Christ Jesus content to take our souls, though too often mothers of fornications: As long as we are united, and incorporated in his beloved Spouse, the Church, conform ourselves to her, grow up in her, hearken to his word in her, feed upon his Sacraments in her, acknowledge a seal of reconciliation, by the absolution of the Minister in her, so long, (how unclean soever we have been, if we abhor and forsake our uncleanness now) we participate of the chastity of that Spouse of his, the Church, and in her, are made capable of this conception of Christ Jesus, and so, it is as true this hour of us, as it was when the Apostle spoke these words, This is the fullness of time, when God sent his Son, &c.

Now you remember, that in this second part, (the manner of Christ's coming) we proposed two degrees of humiliation; One which we have handled, in a double respect, as he is made, filius mulieris, non Dei, the son of a woman, and not the Son of God; the other, as he is filius mulieris, non Virginis, The son of a woman, and not called the son of a Virgin.

The second remains, that he was sub lege, under the law; now, this phrase, to be under the law, is not always so narrowly limited in the Scriptures, as to signify only the law of Moses; for, so, only the Jews were under the law, and so, Christ's coming for them, who were under the law, his Death, and Merits should belong only to the Jews. But St. Augustine observes, that when Christ sent the message of his birth, to the wise men, in the East, by a star, and to the shepherds, about Bethlehem, by an Angel, In pastoribus, Iudaei; in magis, Gentes vocatae; The Jews had their calling in that manifestation to the shepherds, and the Gentiles in that, to the wise men in the East. But besides that Christ did submit himself, to all the weight even of the Ceremonial law of Moses, he was under a heavier law, then that, under that lex decreti, the contract and covenant with God the Father, under that oportuit pati, This he ought to suffer, before he could enter into glory. So that his being under the law, may be accounted not a part of his Humiliation, as his being made of a woman was, but rather the whole history, and frame of his humiliation, All that concerns his obedience, even to that law, which the Father had laid upon him; for, the life and death of Christ, from the Ave Maria, to the consummatum est, from his coming into this World, in his Conception, to his transmigration upon the Cross, was all under this law, heavier then any law, that any man is under, the law of the contract, and covenant between the Father, and him.

Though therefore we may think, judging by the law of reason, that since Christ came to gather a Church, and to draw the world to him, it would more have advanced that purpose of his, to have been borne at Rome, where the seat of the Empire, and the confluence of all Nations, was, then in Jury, and (if he would offer the Gospel first to the Jews) better to have been borne at Jerusalem, where all the outward, public, solemn worship of the Jews was, then at obscure Bethlehem, and in Bethlehem, in some better place then in an Inn, in a Stable, in a Manger; though we may think thus, in the law of reason, yet, non cogitations meae cogitations vestrae, says God in the Prophet, My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor my laws your laws, for I am sub lege decreti, under another manner of law, then falls within your reading, under an obedience to that covenant, which hath passed between my Father, and me, and by those Degrees, and no other way, was my humiliation, for your Redemption, to be expressed. Though we may think in the law of Reason, that his work of propagating the Gospel, would have gone better forward, if he had taken for his Apostles, some Tullius, or Hortensii, or Seneca's, great, and persuading Orators, instead of his Peter, and John, and Matthew, and those Fishermen, and tent-makers, and toll-gatherers; Though we might think in reason, and in piety too, that when he would humble himself to take our salvation into his care, it had been enough, to have been under the law of Moses, to live innocently, and righteously, without shedding of his blood; If he would shed blood, it might have been enough to have done so in the Circumcision, and scourging, without dying; If he would die, it might have been enough to have died some less accursed, and less ignominious death, then the death of the Cross; though we might reasonably enough, and piously enough, think thus, yet, non cogitations vestrae, cogitations meae, says the Lord, your way is not my way, your law is not my law; for, Christ was sub lege decreti, and thus, as he did, and no other way, it became him to fulfill all righteousness, that is, all that Decree of God, which he had accepted, and acknowledged as Righteous. He was so much under Moses law, as he would be: so much under that law, as that he suffered that law, to be wrested against him, and to be pretended to be broken by him, and to be endited, and condemned by that law. The Jews pressed that law, non sines veneficū vivere, Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live, when they attributed all his glorious miracles, to the power of the devil: and the Romans were incensed against him, for treason, and sedition, as though he aliened and withdrew the people from Caesar. But he was under a heavier law, then Jews or Romans, the Law of his Father, and his own eternal Decree, so far, as that he came to that sense of the weight thereof, Eli, Eli, My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? and was never delivered from the burden of this law, till he pleaded the performance of all conditions between his Father, and him, and delivered up all the evidence thereof, in those words, In manus tuas, Into thy hands, O Lord I give my spirit, and so presented both the righteousness of his soul, which had fulfilled the law, and the soul it self, which was under the law. He died in Execution, and so discharged all; And so we have done with our second part, The manner of his coming.

We are come now, in our Order, to our third part, The purpose of Christ's coming; and in that we consider two objects, that Christ had, and two subjects to work upon, two kinds of work, and two kinds of persons; First, to Redeem, and then to Adopt; Those are his works, his objects; And then, To redeem those that were under the law, that is, all, but to Adopt those whom he had chosen, us; And those are the persons, the subjects, that he works upon, by his coming.

First then, (to begin with the persons) those of the first kind, those that were under the Law: for them, (as we told you before) the law must not be so narrowly restrained here, as to be intended only of Moses Law, for Christ's purpose was not only upon the Jews; for else, Naaman the Syrian, by whom God fought great battles, before he was cured of his leprosy, and who, when he was cured, was so zealous of the worship of the true God, that he would needs carry holy earth, to make Altars of, from the place, where the Prophet dwelt: And else, Job, who though he were of the land of Hus, hath good testimony of being an upright and just man, and one that feared God; And else, the Widow of Sarepta, whose meal, and oil God preserved unwasted, and whose dead son, God raised again, at the prayer of Elijah; All these, and all others, whom the searching Spirit of God, seals to his service, in all the corners of the earth, because they are strangers in the land of Israel, should not be under the Law, and so should have no profit by Christ's being made under the Law, if the Law should be understood, only of the Law of Moses. And therefore to be under the Law, signifies here, thus much, To be a debtor to the law of nature, to have a testimony in our hearts and consciences, that there lies a law upon us, which we have no power in ourselves to perform; that to those laws, To love God with all our powers, and to love our neighbor as ourselves, and to do, as we would be done to, we find ourselves naturally bound, and yet we find ourselves naturally unable to perform them, and so to need the assistance of another, which must be Christ Jesus, to perform them for us; And so, all men, Jews and Gentiles are under the Law, because naturally they feel a law upon them, which they break. And therefore wheresoever our power becomes defective, in the performance of this law, if our will be not defective too, if we come not to say, God hath given us an impossible Law, and therefore it is lost labor, to go about to perform it, or God hath given us another to perform this Law for us, and therefore nothing is required at our hands; If we abstain from these quarrels to the law, and these murmurings at our own infirmity, we shall find, that the fullness of time is this day come, this day Christ is come to all that are under the Law, that is, to all mankind; to all, because all are unable to perform that Law, which they all see, by the light of nature to lie upon them.

These then be the persons of the first kind, All, all the world; Dilexit mundum, God so loved the world, that he gave his Son for it, for all the world; And, accordingly, venit salvare mundum, the obedience of the Son, was as large as the love of the Father, He came to save all the world, and he did save all the world; God would have all men, and Christ did save all men. It is therefore fearfully (and scarce allowably said) that Christ did contrary to his Fathers will, when he called those to grace, of whom he knew his Fathers pleasure to be, that they should have no grace; It is fearfully and dangerously said, Absurdum non esse, Deum interdum falsa loqui, & falsum loquenti credendum, that it is not absurd to say, (that is, that it may truly be said) that God does sometimes speak untruly, and that we are bound to believe God, when he does so: for, if we consider the sovereign balm of our souls, the blood of Christ Jesus, there is enough for all the world, if we consider the application of this physic, by the Ministers of Christ Jesus in the Church, he hath given us that spreading Commission, To go and preach to every creature, we are bid to offer, to apply, to minister this to all the world: Christ hath excommunicated no Nation, no shire, no house, no man: He gives none of his Ministers leave to say to any man, thou art not Redeemed, he gives no wounded nor afflicted conscience leave, to say to it self, I am not Redeemed. There may be meat enough brought into the house, for all the house, though some be so weak, as they cannot, (which is the case of the Gentiles) some so stubborn, as they will not eat, (which is the case of the carnal man, though in the Christian Church.)

He came to all, There are the persons, and to Redeem all, there is his errand; but how to Redeem? S. Jerome says, Gentes non Redimuntur, sed emuntur: The Gentiles, says he, are not properly Christ's, by way of Redeeming, but by an absolute purchase: To which purpose those words are also applied, which the Apostle says to the Corinthians, Ye are bought with a price, S. Jerome's meaning therein, is, that if we compare the Jews and the Gentiles, though God permitted the Jews, in punishment of their rebellions, to be captivated by the devil in Idolatries, yet the Jews were but as in a mortgage, for they had been God's peculiar people before; But the Gentiles were as the devils inheritance, for God had never claimed them, nor owned them for his; and therefore God says to Christ, Postula à me, Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance; as though they were not his yet, or not his by that title, as the Jews were. So that, in S. Jerome's construction, the Jews, which were God's people before, were properly Redeemed, the Gentiles, to whom God made no title before, are rather bought, then redeemed. But, Nullum tempus occurrit Regi, against the King of Kings there runs no prescription; no man can devest his Allegeance to his Prince, and say he will be subject no longer; And therefore, since the Gentiles, were his by his first title of Creation, (for, it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves, nor the devil neither) when all we, by our general revolt, and prevarication, (as we were all collectively in Adams loins) came to be under that law, morte morieris, Thou shalt die the death, when Christ came in the fullness of time, and delivered us from the sharpest, and heaviest clause of that Law, which is the second death, then he Redeemed us properly, because, (though not by the same title of Covenant, as the Jews were) yet we were his, and sold over to his enemy. These then were the persons, All, (none can say that he did not need him, none can say, that he may not have him) And this was his first work, to Redeem, to vindicate them from the usurper, to deliver them from the intruder, to emancipate them from the tyrant, to cancel the covenant between hell, and them, and restore them so far to their liberty, as that they might come to their first Master, if they would; this was Redeeming.

But in his other work, which is Adoption, and where the persons were more particular, not all, but we, Christ hath taken us to him, in a straiter and more peculiar title, then Redeeming. For, A servando Servi, men who were, by another man's valor, saved and redeemed from the enemy, or from present death, they became thereby, servants to him that saved and redeemed them: Redemption makes us (who were but subjects before, for all are so, by creation) servants; but it is but servants; but Adoption makes us, who are thus made servants by Redemption, sons 〈◊〉 for, Adoption is verbum forense, though it be a word which the Holy Ghost takes, yet he takes it from a civil use, and signification, in which, it expresses in divers circumstances, our Adoption into the state of God's children. First, he that adopted another, must by that law, be a man, who had no children of his own; And this was God's case towards us; He had no children of his own, we were all filii irae, The children of wrath, not one of us could be said to be the child of God, by nature, if we had not had this Adoption in Christ. Secondly, he, who, by that law, might Adopt, must be a Man, who had had, or naturally might have had children; for an Infant under years, or a man, who by nature was disabled from having children, could not Adopt another; And this was God's case towards us too; for God had had children without Adoption; for by our creation in Innocence, we were the sons of God till we died all in one transgression, and lost all right, and all life, and all means of regaining it, but by this way of Adoption in Christ Jesus. Again, no man might adopt an elder man then himself; and so, our Father by Adoption, is not only Antiquus dierum, The ancient of Daies, but Antiquior diebus ancienter then any Daies, before Time was; he is (as Damascene forces himself to express it) Super-principale principium, the Beginning, and the first Beginning, and before the first beginning; He is, says he, aeternus, and prae-aeternus, Eternal, and elder then any eternity, that we can take into our imagination. So likewise no man might adopt a man of better quality then himself, and here, we are so far from comparing, as that we cannot comprehend his greatness, and his goodness, of whom, and to whom, S. Augustine says well, Quid mihi es? If I shall go about to declare thy goodness, not to the world in general, but Quid mihi es, how good thou art to me, Miserere ut loquar, says he, I must have more of thy goodness, to be able to tell thy former goodness, Be merciful unto me again, that I may be thereby able to declare how merciful thou wast to me before, except thou speak in me, I cannot declare what thou hast done for me. Lastly, no man might be adopted, into any other degree of kindred, but into the name, and right of a son; he could not be an adopted Brother, nor cosin, nor nephew: And this is especially our dignity; we have the Spirit of Adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father. So that, as here is a fullness of time in the text, so there is a fullness of persons, All, and a fullness of the work belonging to them, Redeeming, Emancipation, delivering from the chains of Satan, (we were his by Creation, we sold ourselves for nothing, and he redeemed us, without money, that is, without any cost of ours) but because for all this general Redemption, we may turn from him, and submit ourselves to other services, therefore he hath Adopted us, drawn into his family and into his more especial care, those who are chosen by him, to be his. Now that Redemption reached to all, there was enough for all; this dispensation of that Redemption, this Adoption reaches only to us, all this is done, That we might receive the Adoption of Sons.

But who are this We? why, they are the elect of God. But who are they, who are these elect? Qui timide rogat, docet negare: If a man ask me with a diffidence, Can I be the adopted son of God, that have rebelled against him, in all my affections, that have trodden upon his Commandments, in all mine actions, that have divorced myself from him, in preferring the love of his creatures before himself, that have murmured at his corrections, and thought them too much, that have undervalued his benefits, and thought them too little, that have abandoned, and prostituted my body, his Temple, to all uncleanness, and my spirit to indevotion, and contempt of his Ordinances; can I be the adopted son of God, that have done this? Ne timide roges, ask me not this, with a diffidence and distrust in God's mercy, as if thou thoughtest with Cain thy iniquities were greater then could be forgiven; But ask me with that holy confidence, which belongs to a true convert, Am not I, who, though I am never without sin, yet am never without hearty remorse and repentance for my sins; though the weakness of my flesh sometimes betray me, the strength of his Spirit still recovers me; though my body be under the paw of that lion, that seeks whom he may devour, yet the lion of Judah raises again and upholds my soul; though I wound my Savior with many sins, yet all these, be they never so many, I strive against, I lament, confess, and forsake as far as I am able. Am not I the child of God, and his adopted son in this state? Roga fidenter, ask me with a holy confidence in thine and my God, & doces affirmare, thy very question gives me mine answer to thee, thou teachest me to say, thou art; God himself teaches me to say so, by his Apostle, The foundation of God is sure, and this is the Seal, God knoweth who are his, and let them that call upon his name, depart from all iniquity: He that departs so far, as to repent former sins, and shut up the ways, which he knows in his conscience, do lead him into temptations, he is of this quorum, one of us, one of them, who are adopted by Christ, to be the sons of God. I am of this quorum, if I preach the Gospel sincerely, and live thereafter, (for he preaches twice a day, that follows his own doctrine, and does as he says) And you are of this quorum, if you preach over the Sermons which you hear, to your own souls in your meditation, to your families in your relation, to the world in your conversation. If you come to this place, to meet the Spirit of God, and not to meet one another, If you have sat in this place, with a delight in the Word of God, and not in the words of any speaker, If you go out of this place, in such a disposition, as that, if you should meet the last Trumpets at the gates, and Christ Jesus in the clouds, you would not entreat him to go back, and stay another year: To enwrap all in one, if you have a religious and sober assurance, that you are his, and walk according to your belief, you are his, and, as the fullness of time, so the fullness of grace is come upon you, and you are not only within the first commission, of those who were under the Law, and so Redeemed, but of this quorum who are selected out of them, the adopted sons of that God, who never disinherits those that forsake not him.

SERMON IV. Preached at S. Paul's upon Christmas day. 1626.

T He whole life of Christ was a continual Passion; others die Martyrs, but Christ was born a Martyr. He found a Golgatha, (where he was crucified) even in Bethlehem, where he was born; For, to his tenderness then, the staws were almost as sharp as the thorns after; and the Manger as uneasy at first, as his Cross at last. His birth and his death were but one continual act, and his Christmas-day and his Good Friday, are but the evening and morning of one and the same day. And as even his birth, is his death, so every action and passage that manifests Christ to us, is his birth; for, Epiphany is manifestation; And therefore, though the Church do now call Twelf-day Epiphany, because upon that day Christ was manifested to the Gentiles, in those Wise men who came then to worship him, yet the Ancient Church called this day, (the day of Christ's birth) the Epiphany, because this day Christ was manifested to the world, by being born this day. Every manifestation of Christ to the world, to the Church, to a particular soul, is an Epiphany, a Christmas-day. Now there is nowhere a more evident manifestation of Christ, then in that which induced this text, Lord now lettest thou thy servant, &c.

It had been revealed to Simeon (whose words these are) that he should see Christ before he died; And actually, and really, substantially, essentially, bodily, presentially, personally he does see him; so it is Simeon's Epiphany, Simeon's Christmas-day. So also this day, in which we commemorate and celebrate the general Epiphany, the manifestation of Christ to the whole world in his birth, all we, we, who besides our interest in the universal Epiphany and manifestation implied in the very day, have this day received the Body and Blood of Christ in his holy and blessed Sacrament, have had another Epiphany, another Christmas-day, another manifestation and application of Christ to ourselves; And as the Church prepares our devotion before Christmas-day, with four Sundays in Advent, which brings Christ nearer and nearer unto us, and remembers us that he is coming, and then continues that remembrance again, with the celebration of other festivals with it, and after it, as S. Stephen, S. John, and the rest that follow; so for this birth of Christ, in your particular souls, for this Epiphany, this Christmas-day, this manifestation of Christ which you have had in the most blessed Sacrament this day, as you were prepared before by that which was said before, so it belongs to the through celebration of the day, and to the dignity of that mysterious act, and to the blessedness of worthy, and the danger of unworthy Receivers, to press that evidence in your behalf, and to enable you by a farther examination of yourselves, to depart in peace, because your eyes have seen his salvation.

To be able to conclude to you selves, that because you have had a Christmas-day, a manifestation of Christ's birth in your souls, by the Sacrament, you shall have a whole Good-Friday, a crucifying, and a consummatum est, a measure of corrections, and joy in those corrections, temptations, and the issue with the temptation; And that you shall have a Resurrection, and an Ascension, an inchoation, and an unremovable possession of heaven itself in this world. Make good your Christmas day, that Christ by a worthy receiving of the Sacrament, be born in you, and he that died for you, will live with you all the year, and all the years of your lives, and inspire into you, and receive from you at the last gasp, this blessed acclamation, Lord now lettest thou thy servant, &c.

The end of all digestions, and concoctions is assimilation, that that meat may become our body. The end of all consideration of all the actions of such leading and exemplar men, as Simeon was, is assimilation too; That we may be like that man. Therefore we shall make it a first part, to take a picture, to give a character of this man, to consider how Simeon was qualified and prepared, matured and disposed to that confidence, that he could desire to depart in peace, intimated in that first word, Now; now, that all that I look for is accomplished; And farther expressed in the first word of the other clause, For, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation; Now, now the time is fulfilled; For, for mine eyes have seen. And then enters the second part, what is the greatest happiness that can be well wished in this world, by a man well prepared, is, that he may depart in peace; Lord now lettest thou, &c. And all the way, in every step that we make, in his light, (in Simeon's light) we shall see light; we shall consider, that that preparation, and disposition, and acquiescence, which Simeon had in his Epiphany, in his visible seeing of Christ then, is offered to us in this Epiphany, in this manifestation and application of Christ in the Sacrament; And that therefore every penitent, and devout, and reverent, and worthy receiver, hath had in that holy action his Now, there are all things accomplished to him, and his For, for his eyes have seen his salvation; and so may be content, nay glad to depart in peace.

In the first part then, in which we collect some marks, and qualities in Simeon which prepared him to a quiet death, qualities appliable to us in that capacity, as we are •• tread for the Sacrament, (for in that way only, we shall walk throughout this exercise) we consider first, the action itself, what was done at this time. At this time our Savior Christ, according to the Law, by which all the first born were to be presented to God in the Temple, at a certain time after their birth, was presented to God in the Temple, and there acknowledged to be his; And then, bought of him again by his parents, at a certain price prescribed in the Law. A Lord could not exhibit his Son to his Tenants, and say, this is your Land-lord; nor a King his Son to his Subjects, and say, this is your Prince; but first he was to be tendered to God; his they were all; He that is not God's first, is not truly his Kings, nor his own. And then God does not sell him back again to his parents, at a racked, at an improved price; He sels a Lord, or a King back again to the world, as cheap as a Yeoman, he takes one and the same price for all; God made all Mankind of one blood, and with one blood, the blood of his Son, he bought all Mankind again: At one price, and upon the same conditions, he hath delivered over all into this world; Tantummodo creed, and then fac hoc, & vives, is the price of all; Believe, and live well: More he asks not, less he takes not for any man, upon any pretence of any unconditioned decree.

At the time of this presentation, there were to be offered a pair of Turtles, or a pair of Pigeons. The Sacrifice was indifferent; Turtles that live solitarily, and Pigeons, that live sociably, were all one to God. God in Christ may be had in an active, and sociable life, denoted in the Pigeon, and in the solitary and contemplative life, denoted in the Turtle; Let not Westminster despise the Church, nor the Church the Exchange, nor the Exchange and trade despise Arms; God in Christ may be had in every lawful calling. And then, the Pigeon was an emblem of fecundity, and fruitfulness in marriage; And the Turtle may be an Emblem of chaste widowhood; for, I think we find no Bigamy in the Turtle. But in these Sacrifices we find no Emblem of a natural, or of a vowed barrenness: Nothing that countenances a vowed virginity, to the dishonor or undervaluing of marriage. Thus was our Savior presented to God; And in this especially was that fulfilled, The glory of the later house shall be greater then the glory of the former; The later Temple exceeded the former in this, that the Lord, the God of this house, was in the house bodily, as one of the congregation; And the little body of a sucking child, was a Chapel in that Temple, infinitely more glorious then the Temple it self. How was the joy of Noah at the return of the Dove into the Ark, multiplied upon Simeon at the bringing of this Dove into the Temple? At how cheap a price was Christ tumbled up and down in this world? It does almost take off our pious scorn of the low price, at which Judas sold him, to consider that his Father sold him to the world for nothing; and then, when he had him again, by this new title of primogeniture and presentation, he sold him to the world again, if not for a Turtle, or for a Pigeon, yet at most for 5. shekels, which at most is but 10. shillings.

And yet you have had him cheaper then that, today in the Sacrament: whom hath Christ cost 5. shekels there? As Christ was presented to God in the Temple, so is he presented to God in the Sacrament; not sucking, but bleeding. And God gives him back again to thee. And at what price? upon this exchange; Take his first born, Christ Jesus, and give him thine. Who is thine? Cor primogenitum, says S. August: The heart is the first part of the body that lives; Give him that; And then, as it is in nature, it shall be in grace too, the last part that dies; for it shall never die; If a man eat the bread that cometh down from heaven, he shall not die, says Christ. If a man in exchange of his heart receive Christ Jesus himself, he can no more die then Christ Jesus himself can die. That which Eschines said to Socrates, admits a fair accommodation here; He saw everybody give Socrates some present, and he said, Because I have nothing else to give, I will give thee myself. Do so, says Socrates, and I will give thee back again to thyself, better then when I received thee. If thou have truly given thyself to him in the Sacrament, God hath given thee thyself back, so much mended, as that thou hast received thyself and him too; Thy self, in a holy liberty, to walk in the world in a calling, and himself, in giving a blessing upon all the works of thy calling, and imprinting in thee a holy desire to do all those works to his glory. And so having thus far made this profit of these circumstances in the action itself, appliable to us as receivers of the Sacrament, that as the child Jesus was first presented to God in the Temple, so for your children, (the children of your bodies, and the children of your minds, and the children of your hands, all your actions, and intentions) that you direct them first upon God, and God in the Temple, that is, God manifested in the Church, before you assign them, or determine them upon any other worldly courses, and then, that as God returned Christ as all other children, at a certain price, so God delivers man upon certain, and upon the same conditions: He comes not into the world, nor he comes not to the Sacrament, as to a Lottery, where perchance he may draw Salvation, but it is ten to one he misses, but upon these few and easy conditions, Believe, & Love, he may be sure: And then also, that the Sacrifice, Pigeons, or Turtles was indifferent, so it were offered to God, for any honest calling, is acceptable to God, if God's glory be intended in it; That of marriage and of widowhood we have some typical intimations in the Law, in the Pigeon, and in the Turtle, but of a vow of virginity, begun in the parents for their temporal ends, and forced upon their children, for those ends, we have no shadow at all; That Christ who was sold after by Judas for a little money, was sold in this presentation by his Father, for less, and yet for less then that to us, this day in the Sacrament. Having made these uses of these circumstances in the action it self, we passeion now, to the consideration of some such qualities, and dispositions of this person,