Eighty Sermons
And when he hears this voice of this Turtle, these sighs of thy soul, then he puts thy name also into that List, which he gave to his Messenger, (in which Commission this very word of our Text, Anach, is used) Signabis signum super frontibus virorum suspirantium & gementium, Upon all their fore heads, that sigh and groan, imprint my mark; Which is ordinarily conceived by the Ancients to have been the letter Tau; of which though Calvin assign a useful, and a convenient reason, that they were marked with this letter Tau, which is the last letter of the Hebrew Alphabet, in sign, that though they were in estimation of the world, the most abject, and the outcasts thereof, yet God set his mark upon them, with a purpose to raise them; yet S. Jerome, and the Ancients for the most part assign that for the reason, why they were marked with that letter, because that letter had the form of the Cross; Not for any such use, or power, as the Roman Church hath ascribed to that sign, but as in the Persecutions of the Primitive Church, the Martyrs at the stake, when a cry was raised, that they died for Treason, for Rebellion, for Sedition, and could not be heard, for the clamour, to clear themselves, used then in the sight of all, who, though they could not hear them, could see them, to sign themselves with the Cross, not to drive away devils, or to strengthen themselves against temptations by that sign, but by that sign to declare the cause of their death to be the profession of the Christian Religion, and not Treason, nor Sedition. And as we in our Baptism have that Cross imprinted upon us, not as a part of the Sacrament, or any piece of that armor, which we put on of spiritual strength, but as a protestation, whose Soldiers we became: so God imprinted upon them, that sighed, and mourned, that Tau, that letter, which had the form of the Cross, that it might be an evidence, that all their crosses shall be swallowed in his Cross, their sighs in his sighs, and their agonies in his. And therefore, Beloved, these sighs are too spiritual a substance, to be bestowed upon worldly matters; All the love, all the ambitions, all the losses of this world, are not worth a sigh; If they were, yet thou hast none to spare, for all thy sighs are due to thy sins; bestow them there.
Gemit, he sighs, he groans; And then, Laboravit in gemitu, he labored, he travailed, he grew weary, he fainted with sighing. Not to be curious, we meet with a threefold Labor in Scriptures. First there is Labor communis, the Labor which no man may avoid; Man is borne unto travailt, as the sparks fly upward; Where we may note in the Comparison, that it is not a dejection, a diminution, a depressing downward, but a flying upward, the true exaltation of a Man, that he labors duly in a lawful calling; and this is Labor communis; Secondly there is Labor impii, The labor of the wicked, for, They have taught their tongues to speak lies, says David, and take great pains to deal wickedly; As it is also in Job, The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days, And (as our former Translation had it) he is continually as one travailing with Child; Indeed the labor is greater, to do ill, then well; to get hell, then Heaven; Heaven might be had with less pains, then men do bestow upon hell; and this is Labor impiorum. And lastly, there is Labor justorum, The labor of the Righteous, which is, To rise early, to lie down late, and to eat the bread of sorrow; for, though in that place, this seems to be said to be done in vain, It is in vain to rise early, in vain to lie down late, in vain to eat the bread of sorrow, yet it is with the same exception, which is there specified, that is, Except the Lord build, it is in vain to labor, Except the Lord keep the City, it is in vain to watch; So except the Lord give rest to his beloved, it is in vain torise early: In vain to travail, except God give a blessing. But when the Lord hath given thee rest, in the remission of thy sins, then comes this Labor justorum, the labor that a righteous man is bound to, that as God hath given him a good nights rest, so he gives God a good days work, as God hath given him rest and peace of conscience, for that which is past, so he take some pains for that which is to come, for such was David's case, and David's care, and David's labor.
Ephrem, an ancient Deacon, and Expositor in the Christian Church, takes this labor of David, Laboravi in gemitu, to have been in gemitu, but in comprimendo gemitu, that he labored to conceal his penance and mortification, from the sight and knowledge of others; Beloved, this concealing of those things, which we put ourselves to in the ways of godliness, hath always a good use, when it is done, to avoid ostentation, and vain glory, and praise of men; And it hath otherwise, sometimes a good use, to conceal our tribulations and miseries from others, because the wicked often take occasion, from the calamities and pressures of the godly, to insult and triumph over them, and to dishonor and blaspheme their God, and to say, Where is now your God? and therefore it may sometimes concern us to labor to hide our miseries, to swallow our own spittle, as Job speaks, and to spunge up our tears in our brains, and to eat, and smother our sighs in our own bosoms. But this was not David's case now; But as he had opened himself to God, he opened himself to the world too; and as he says in another place, Come and I will tell you, what God hath done for my soul, So here he says, Come, and I will tell you, what I have done against my God. So he sighed, and so he groaned; he labored, he was affected bitterly with it himself; And he declated it, he made it exemplar, and catechisticall, that his dejection in himself, might be an exaltation to others; And then he was not ashamed of it, but as he said of his dancing before the Ark, If this be to be vile, I will be more vile, So here, if this passion be weakness, I will yet be more weak; for this wind brought rain, These sighs brought tears, All the night make I my bed to swim, &c.
The concupiscencies of man, are naturally dry powder, combustible easily, easily apt to take fire; but tears damp them, and give them a little more leisure, and us intermission and consideration. David had labored hard; first Ad ruborem, as Physicians advise, to a redness, to a blushing, to a shame of his sin; And now Ad sudorem, he had labored to a sweat: for Lacrymae sudor animae moerentis, Tears are the sweat of a laboring soul, and that soul that labors as David did, will sweat, as David did, in the tears of contrition; Till then, till tears break out, and find a vent in outward declaration, we pant and struggle in miserable convulsions, and distortions, and distractions, and earthquakes, and irresolutions of the soul; I can believe, that God will have mercy upon me, if I repent, but I cannot believe that is repentance, if I cannot weep, or come to outward declarations. This is the laborious irresolution of the soul; But Lacrymae diluvium, & evehunt animam, These tears carry up our soul, as the flood carried up the Ark, higher then any hills; whether hills of power, and so above the oppression of potent adversaries, or hills of our own pride, and ambition; True holy tears carry us above all. And therefore, when the Angel rebuked the people, for not destroying Idolatry, They wept, says the text, there was their present remedy; and they called the name of the place Bochim, Tears, that there might be a permanent testimony of that expressing of their repentance; that that way they went to God, and in that way God received them; and that their Children might say to one another, Where did God show that great mercy to our Fathers? Here; here, in Bochim, that is, Here in tears. And so when at Samuel's motions, and increpation, the people would testify their repentance, They drew water, says the story, and poured it out before the Lord, and fasted, and said, We have sinned against the Lord. They poured water, Vt esset symbolum lacrymarum, That that might be a type, and figure, in what proportion of tears, they desired to express their repentance. For, such an effusion of tears, David may be well thought to intend, when he says, Effundite coram Deo animam vestram, Pour out your souls before God, pour them out in such an effusion, in a continual, and a contrite weeping. Still the Prophets cry out upon Idols and Idolaters, Vlulate Sculptilia; Howle ye Idols, and Howle ye Idolaters; He hath no hope of their weeping. And so the devil, and the damned are said to howl, but not to weep; or when they are said to weep, it is with a gnashing of teeth, which is a voice of Indignation, even towards God, and not of humiliation under his hand: So also says the Prophet of an impenitent sinner, Induratae super petram facies, They have made their faces harder then stone; wherein? Thou hast stricken them, but they have not wept; not sorrowed. Out of a stone water cannot be drawn, but by miracle, though it be twice stricken; as Moses stroke the Rock twice, yet the water came by the miraculous power of God, and not by Moses second stroke. Though God strike this sinner twice, thrice, he will not weep: though inward terrors strike his conscience, and outward diseases strike his body, and calamities and ruin strike his estate, yet he will not confess by one tear, that these are judgments of God, but natural accidents; or if judgments, that they proceeded not from his sin, but from some decree in God, or some purpose in God, to glorify himself, by thus afflicting him, and that if he had been better, he should have fared never the better, for God's purpose must stand. Therefore says God of such in that place, Surely they are poor, that was plain enough, and they are foolish too, says God there: And God gives the reason of it, for they know not the judgments of God; They know not his judgments to be judgments; They ascribe all calamities to other causes, and so they turn upon other ways, and other plots, and other miserable comforters. But attribute all to the Lord; never say of anything, This falls upon me, but of all, This is laid upon me by the hand of God, and thou wilt come to him in tears. Rain water is better then River water; The water of Heaven, tears for offending thy God, are better then tears for worldly losses; But yet come to tears of any kind, and whatsoever occasion thy tears, Deus absterget omnem lacrymam, there is the largeness of his bounty, He will wipe all tears from thine eyes; But thou must have tears first: first thou must come to this weeping, or else God cannot come to this wiping; God hath not that errand to thee, to wipe tears from thine eyes, if there be none there; If thou do nothing for thyself, God finds nothing to do for thee.
David wept thus, thus vehemently, and he wept thus, thus continually; In the Night, says our Text; Not that he wept not in the day: He says of himself, My tears have been my meat, both day and night, where though he name no fast, you see his diet, how that was attenuated. And so when it is said of Jerusalem, She weepeth continually in the night, it is not that she put off her weeping till night, but that she continued her days weeping to the night, and in the night: Plorando plorabit, says the Original in the place; she does weep already, and she will weep still; she puts it not off dilatorily, (I will weep, but not yet) nor she puts it not over easily, suddenly, (I have wept, and I need no more) but as God promises to his children, the first and later rain, so must his children give to him again both rains, tears of the day, and tears of the night, by washing the sins of the day in the evening, and the sins of the night in the morning. But this was an addition to David's affliction in this night weeping, that whereas the night was made for man to rest in, David could not make that use of the night. When he had proposed so great a part of his happiness to consist in this, That he would lay him down and sleep in peace; we see in the next Psalm but one, he that thought to sleep out the night, come to weep out the night. When the Saints of God have that security, which S. Jerome speaks of, Vt sanctis ipse somnus sit oratio, They sleep securely, for their very sleep is a glorifying of God, who giveth his beloved sleep, yet David could have none of this. But why not he? Noctem letiferam nocte compensat; First, for the place, the sin came in at those windows, at his eyes, and came in, in fire, in lust, And it must go out at those windows too, and go out in water, in the water of repentant tears; And then, for the time, as the night defiled his soul, so the sin must be expiated, and the soul washed in the night too.
And this may be some Emblem, some useful intimation, how hastily Repentance follows sin; David's sin is placed, but in the beginning of the night, in the Evening, (In the evening he rose, and walked upon the Terase, and saw Bathsheba) and in the next part of time, in the night, he falls a weeping: no more between the sweetness of sin, and the bitterness of repentance, then between evening, and night; no morning to either of them, till the Sun of grace arise, and shine out, and proceed to a Meridionall height, and make the repentance upon circumstance, to be a repentance upon the substance, and bring it to be a repentance for the sin it self, which at first was but a repentance upon some calamity, that that sin induced.
He wept then, and wept in the night; in a time, when he could neither receive rest in himself, which all men had, nor receive praise from others, which all men affect. And he wept Omni nocte; which is not only Omnibus noctibus, sometime every night, but it is Tota nocte, clean through the night; And he wept in that abundance, as hath put the Holy Ghost to that Hyperbole in David's pen to express it, Liquefecit stratum, natare fecit stratum, it drowned his bed, surrounded his bed, it dissolved, it macerated, it melted his bed with that brine. Well; Qui rigat stratum, he that washes his bed so with repentant tears, Non potest in cogitationem ejus libidinum pompa subrepere: Tentations take hold of us sometimes after our tears, after our repentance, but seldom or never in the act of our repentance, and in the very shedding of our tears; At least Libidinum pompa, The victory, the triumph of lust breaks not in upon us, in a bed, so dissolved, so surrounded, so macerated with such tears. Thy bed is a figure of thy grave; Such as thy grave receives thee at death, it shall deliver thee up to Judgment at last; Such as thy bed receives thee at night, it shall deliver thee in the morning: If thou sleep without calling thyself to an account, thou wilt wake so, and walk so, and proceed so, without ever calling thyself to an account, till Christ Jesus call thee in the Clouds. It is not intended, that thou shouldest afflict thyself so grievously, as some over-doing Penitents, to put chips, and shells, and splints, and flints, and nails, and rowels of spurs in thy bed, to wound and macerate thy body so. The inventions of men, are not intended here; But here is a precept of God, implied in this precedent and practice of David, That as long as the sense of a former sin, or the inclination to a future oppresses thee, thou must not close thine eyes, thou must not take thy rest, till, as God married thy body and soul together in the Creation, and shall at last crown thy body and soul together in the Resurrection, so they may also rest together here, that as thy body rests in thy bed, thy soul may rest in the peace of thy Conscience, and that thou never say to thy head, Rest upon this pillow, till thou canst say to thy soul, Rest in this repentance, in this peace.
Now as this sorrow of David's continued day and night, (in the day for the better edification of men, and in the night for his better capitulation with God) so there is a farther continuation thereof without any weariness, expressed in the next clause, Turbatus à furore oculus meus, as the Vulgat reads it, and Mine eye is dimmed, for despite or indignation, as our former, or as this last Translation hath it, Mine eye is consumed because of grief; and to speak nearest to the Original, Erosus est oculus, Mine eye is eaten out with Indignation. A word or two shall be enough of each of these words, these three Termes, What the eye, which is the subject, what this consuming, or dimming, which is the effect, and what this Griefe, or Indignation, which is the affection, imports and offers to our application. First, Oculus, the Eye, is ordinarily taken in the Scriptures, Pro aspectu, for the whole face, the looks, the countenance, the air of a man; and this air, and looks, and countenance, declares the whole habitude, and constitution of the man; As he looks, so he is: So that the Eye here, is the whole person; and so this grief had wrought upon the whole frame and constitution of David, and decayed that; though he place it in the eye, yet it had grown over all the body. Since thou wast not able to say to thy sin, The sin shall come to mine eyes, but no farther, I will look, but not lust, I will see, but not covet, thou must not say, My repentance shall come to mine eyes, and no farther, I will shed a few tears, and no more; but (with this Prophet David, and with the Apostle S. Paul ) thou must beat down thy body to that particular purpose, and in that proportion, as thou findest the rebellions thereof to require: Thou couldest not stop the sin at thine eyes; stop not thy repentance there neither, but pursue it in wholesome mortification, through all those parts, in which the sin hath advanced his dominion over thee; and that is our use of the first word, the Eye, the whole frame.
For the second word, which in our Translations, is, in one dimmed, in the other consumed, and in the Vulgat troubled, a great Master in the Original, renders it well, elegantly, and naturally out of the Original, Verminavit, Tineavit, which is such a deformity, as worms make in wood, or in books; If David's sorrow for his sins brought him to this deformity, what sorrow do they owe to their sins, who being come to a deformity by their own licentiousness, and intemperance, disguise all that by unnatural helps, to the drawing in of others, and the continuation of their former sins? The sin it self was the Devils act in thee; But in the deformity and debility, though it follow upon the sin, God hath a hand; And they that smother and suppress these by paintings, and pamperings, unnatural helps to unlawful ends, do not deliver themselves of the plague, but they hide the marks, and infect others, and wrestle against God's notifications of their former sins.
And then the last of these three words, which is here rendered Griefe, does properly signify, Indignation, and Anger: And therefore S. Augustine upon this place, puts himself to that question, If David's constitution be shaken, if his complexion and countenance be decayed, and withered, Prae indignatione, for Indignation, for Anger, from whom proceeds this Indignation, and this Anger? says that blessed Father. If it proceed from God, says he, it is well that he is but Turbatus, and not Extinctus, that he is but troubled, and not distracted, but shaken, and not overthrown; but overthrown, and not ground to powder, not trodden as flat as dirt in the streets, as the Prophet speaks. For David himself had told us but a few Psalms before, That when the Son is angry, (and when we speak of the Son, we intend a person more sensible, and so more compassionate of our miseries, then when we speak of God, of God considered in the height of his Majesty) and but a little angry, (which amounts not to this provocation of God, which David had fallen into here) we may perish; and perish in the way; perish in a half repentance, before we perfect our Reconciliation: In the way so, before we come to our end; or in the way, in these outward actions of repentance, if they be hypocritically, or occasionally, or fashionally, or perfunctorily performed, and not with a right heart towards God. Though this be the way, we may perish in the way.
Now Aquinas places this fury (as the Vulgat calls it, this indignation ) in Absalom, and not in David; He takes David's sorrow to rise out of his sons rebellion, and furious prosecution thereof; That David was thus vehemently affected for the fault of another: And truly it is a holy tenderness, and an exemplar disposition to be so sensible, and compassionate for the sins of other men; Though Absalom could not have hurt David, David would have grieved for his unnatural attempt to do it. So in Aquinas sense, it is Excandescentia pro inimicis, a sorrow for his enemies; Not for his own danger from them, but for their sin in themselves; But Gregory Nyssen takes it, de excandescentia in inimicos, for an indignation against his enemies: And that David speaks this by way of confession, and accusation of himself, as of a fault, that he was too soon transported to an impatience, and indignation against them, though enemies; And taking that sense, we see, how quickly even the Saints of God put themselves beyond the hability of making that Petition sincerely, Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us; How hard it is even for a good man to forgive an enemy; And how hard it is, Nihil in peccatore odisse nisi peccatum, to sever the sin from the sinner, and to hate the fault, and not the man.
But leaving Thomas and Gregory, Aquinas and Nyssen to that Exposition, in which (I think) they are singularly singular, either that this sorrow in David was a charitable and compassionate sense of others faults, which is Aquinas way, or that it was a confession of uncharitableness in himself towards others, which is Gregory's way, the whole stream (for the most part) of ancient Expositors divide themselves into these two channels; Either that this indignation conceived by David, which withered and decayed him, was a holy scorn and indignation against his own sins, that such wretched things as those should separate him from his God, and from his inheritance, according to that chain of Affections which the Apostle makes, That godly sorrow brings a sinner to a care; He is no longer careless, negligent of his ways; and that care to a clearing of himself, not to clear himself by way of excuse, or disguise, but to clear himself by way of physic, by humble confession; and then that clearing brings him to an indignation, to a kind of holy scorn, and wonder, how that temptation could work so; Such an affection as we conceive to have been in the Spouse, when she said, Lavi pedes, I have washed my feet, how shall I defile them? I have emptied my soul by Confession, is it possible I should charge it with new transgressions? Or else they place this affection, this indignation in God; And then they say, it was an apprehension of the anger of God, to be expressed upon him in the day of Judgment; And against this Vermination, (as the Original denotes) against this gnawing of the worm, that may bore through, and sink the strongest vessel that sails in the seas of this world, there is no other varnish, no other liniment, no other medicament, no other pitch nor rosin against this worm, but the blood of Christ Jesus: And therefore whensoever this worm, this apprehension of God's future indignation, reserved for the Judgment, bites upon thee, be sure to present to it the blood of thy Savior: Never consider the judgment of God for sin alone, but in the company of the mercies of Christ. It is but the hissing of the Serpent, and the whispering of Satan, when he surprises thee in a melancholy midnight of dejection of spirit, and lays thy sins before thee then; Look not upon thy sins so inseparably, that thou canst not see Christ too: Come not to a confession to God, without consideration of the promises of his Gospel; Even the sense and remorse of sin is a dangerous consideration, but when the cup of salvation stands by me, to keep me from fainting. David himself could not get off when he would; but (as he complains there, which is the last act of his sorrow to be considered in this, which is all his part, and all our first part) Inveteravit, He waxed old because of all his enemies.
The difference is not of much importance, whether it be Inveteravi, or Inveteravit; in the first, or in the third person. Whether David's eyes, or David himself be thus decayed, and waxen old, imports little. But yet that which Bellarmine collects, upon this difference, imports much. For, because the Vulgat Edition, and the Septuagint, (such a Septuagint as we have now) read this in the first person of David himself, Inveteravi, and the Hebrew hath it in the third, Inveteravit, Bellarmine will needs think, that the Hebrew, the Original, is falsified and corrupted; still in advancement of that dangerous Position of theirs, That their Translation is to be preferred before the Original; and that is an unsufferable tyranny, and an Idolatrous servility. The Translation is a reverend Translation; A Translation to which the Church of God owes much; but gold will make an Idol as well as wood, and to make any Translation equal, or better then the Original, is an Idolatrous servility. It is true, that that which is said here in the third person, implies the first; And it is David, that after his sighing, and fainting with that, After his weeping, and dissolving with that, After his consuming, and withering with that, foresees no rescue, no escape, Inveteravit, he waxes old amongst his enemies. Who were his enemies, and what was this age that he speaks of? It is of best use to pursue the spiritual sense of this Psalm, and so his enemies were his sins; And David found that he had not got the victory over any one enemy, any one sin; Another's blood did not extinguish the lustful heat of his own, nor the murder of the husband, the adultery with the wife: Change of sin is not an overcoming of sin; He that passes from sin to sin, without repentance, (which was David's case for a time) still leaves an enemy behind him; and though he have no present assault from his former enemy, no temptation to any act of his former sin, yet he is still in the midst of his enemies; under condemnation of his past, as well as of his present sins; as unworthy a receiver of the Sacrament, for the sins of his youth done forty years ago, if those sins were never repented, though so long discontinued, as for his ambition, or covetousness, or indevotion of this present day. These are his enemies; and then this is the age that grows upon him, the age that David complains of, I am waxenold; that is, grown into habits of these sins. There is an old age of our natural condition, We shall wax old as doth a garment; David would not complain of that which all men desire; To wish to be old, and then grudge to be old, when we are come to it, cannot consist with moral constancy. There is an old age expressed in that phrase, The old man, which the Apostle speaks of, which is that natural corruption and disposition to sin, cast upon us by Adam; But that old man was crucified in Christ, says the Apostle; and was not so only from that time when Christ was actually crucified, one thousand six hundred years ago, but from that time that a second Adam was promised to the first, in Paradise; And so that Lamb slain from the beginning of the world, from the beginning delivered all them, to whom the means ordained by God, (as Circumcision to them, Baptism to us) were afforded; and in that respect, David was not under that old age, but was become a new creature. Nor as the Law was called the old Law, which is another age also; for to them who understood that Law aright, the New Law, the Gospel, was enwrapped in the Old; And so David as well as we, might be said to serve God in the newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the Letter; so that this was not the age that oppressed him.
The Age that oppresses the sinner, is that when he is grown old in sin, he is grown weak in strength, and become less able to overcome that sin then, then he was at beginning. Blindness contracted by Age, doth not deliver him from objects of temptations; He sees them, though he be blind; Deafnesse doth not deliver him from discourses of temptation; he hears them, though he be deaf: Nor lameness doth not deliver him from pursuit of temptation; for in his own memory he sees, and hears, and pursues all his former sinful pleasures, and every night, every hour sins over all the sins of many years that are passed. That which waxeth old, is ready to vanish, says the Apostle: If we would let them go, they would go; and whether we will or no, they leave us for the ability of practice; But Thesaurizamus, we treasure them up in our memories, and we treasure up the wrath of God with them, against the day of wrath; And whereas one calling of our sins to our memories by way of confession, would do us good, and serve our turns, this often calling them in a sinful delight, in the memory of them, exceeds the sin it self, when it was committed, because it is more unnatural now, then it was then, and frustrates the pardon of that sin, when it was repented. To end this branch, and this part, So humble was this holy Prophet, and so apprehensive of his own debility, and so far from an imaginary infallibility of falling no more, as that after all his agonies, and exercises, and mortifications, and prayer, and sighs, and weeping, still he finds himself in the midst of enemies, and of his old enemies; for not only temptations to new sins, but even the memory of old, though formerly repented, arise against us, arise in us, and ruin us. And so we pass from these pieces which constitute our first Part, Quid factum, what David upon the sense of his case did, to the other, Quid faciendum, what by his example we are to do, and what is required of us, after we have repented, and God hath remitted the sin.
Out of this passage here in this Psalm, and out of that history, where Nathan says to David, The Lord hath put away thy sin, and yet says after, The child that is borne to thee shall surely die, and out of that story, where David repents earnestly his sin, committed in the numbering of his people, and says; Now, now that I have repented, Now I beseech thee O Lord, take away the iniquity of thy servant, for I have done very foolishly, yet David was to endure one of those three Calamities, of Famine, War, or Pestilence; And out of some other such places as these, some men have imagined a Doctrine, that after our repentance, and after God hath thereupon pardoned our sin, yet he leaves the punishment belonging to that sin unpardoned; though not all the punishment, not the eternal, yet say they, there belongs a temporary punishment too, and that God does not pardon, but exacts, and exacts in the nature of a punishment, and more, by way of satisfaction to his Justice.
Now, Stipendium peccati mors est, There is the punishment for sin, The reward of sin is death. If there remain no death, there remains no punishment: For the reward of sin is death, And death complicated in it self, death wrapped in death; and what is so intricate, so entangling as death? Who ever got out of a winding sheet? It is death aggravated by it self, death weighed down by death: And what is so heavy as death? Who ever threw off his grave stone? It is death multiplied by it self; And what is so infinite as death? Who ever told over the days of death? It is Morte morieris, A Double death, Eternal, and Temporary. Temporal, and Spiritual death. Now, the Temporary, the Natural death, God never takes away from us, he never pardons that punishment, because he never takes away that sin that occasioned it, which is Original sin; To what Sanctification soever a man comes, Original sin lives to his last breath. And therefore, Statutum est, That Decree stands, Semel mori, that every man must die once; but for any Bis mori, for twice dying, for eternal death upon any man, as man, if God consider him not as an impotent sinner, there is no such invariable Decree; for, that death being also the punishment for actual sin, if he take away the cause, the sin, he takes away that effect, that death also; for this death it self, eternal death, we all agree that it is taken away with the sin; And then for other calamities in this life, which we call Morticulas, Little deaths, the children, the issue, the offspring, the propagation of death, if we would speak properly, no Affliction, no Judgment of God in this life, hath in it exactly the nature of a punishment; not only not the nature of satisfaction, but not the nature of a punishment. We call not Coyn, base Coyne, till the Allay be more then the pure Metall: God's Judgments are not punishments, except there be more anger then love, more Justice then Mercy in them; and that is never; for Miserationes ejus super omnia opera, His mercies are above all his works: In his first work, in the Creation, his Spirit, the Holy Ghost, moved upon the face of the waters; and still upon the face of all our waters, (as waters are emblems of tribulation in all the Scriptures) his Spirit, the Spirit of comfort, moves too; and as the waters produced the first creatures in the Creation, so tribulations offer us the first comforts; sooner then prosperity does. God executes no judgment upon man in this life, but in mercy; either in mercy to that person, in his sense thereof, if he be sensible, or at least in mercy to his Church, in the example thereof, if he be not: There is no person to whom we can say, that God's Corrections are Punishments, any otherwise then Medicinal, and such, as he may receive amendment by, that receives them; Neither does it become us in any case, to say God lays this upon him, because he is so ill, but because he may be better.
But here our consideration is only upon the godly, and such as by repentance stand upright in his favor; and even in them, our Adversaries say, that after the remission of their sins, there remains a punishment, and a punishment by way of Satisfaction, to be borne for that sin, which is remitted. But since they themselves tell us, that in Baptism God proceeds otherwise, and pardons there all sin, and all punishment of sin, which should be inflicted in the next world, (for children newly baptized, do not suffer anything in Purgatory) And that this holds not only in Baptismo fluminis, in the Sacrament of Baptism, but in Baptismo sanguinis, in the Baptism of blood too; (for in Martyrdom, as S. Augustine says, Injuriam facit Martyri, He wrongs a Martyr that prays for a Martyr, as though he were not already in Heaven; so he suspects a Martyr, that thinks that Martyr goes to Purgatory) And since they say, that he can do so in the other Sacrament too, and in Repentance, which they call, and justly, Secundam post naufragium tabulam, That whereas Baptism hath once delivered us from shipwreck, in Original sin, this Repentance delivers us after Baptism, from actual sin; Since God can pardon, without reserving any punishment, since God does so in Baptism and Martyrdom, since out of Baptism or Martyrdom, it appears often, that De facto, he hath done so, (for he enjoined no penance to the man sick of the Palsy, when he said, Son be of good comfort, thy sins are forgiven thee, Sins, and punishments too. He intimated no such after reckoning to her, of whom he said, Many sins are forgiven her; Sins, and punishments too. He left no such future Satisfaction in that Parable upon the Publican, that departed to his house justified; Justified from sins, and punishments too. And when he declared Zacchaeus to be the son of Abraham, and said, This day is Salvation come unto thy house. He did not charge this blessed inheritance with any such encumbrance, that he should still be subject to old debts, to make satisfaction by bodily afflictions for former sins) since God can do this, and does so in Baptism, and Martyrdom, and hath done this very often, out of Baptism, or Martyrdom, in Repentance, we had need of clearer evidence then they have offered to preduce yet, that God does otherwise at any time; that at any time he pardons the sin, and retains the punishment, by way of satisfaction. If their Market should fail, that no man would buy Indulgences (as of late years it was brought low, when they vented ten Indulgencies in America for one in Europe; If the fire of Purgatory were quenched, or slackened, that men would not be so prodigal to buy out Fathers or friends souls, from thence; If commutation of penance, were so moderated amongst them, that those penances, and satisfactions, which they make so necessary, were not commuted to money, and brought them in no profit, they would not be perhaps so vehement in maintenance of this Doctrine.
To leave such imaginations with their Authors; We see David did enjoin himself penance, and impose upon himself heavy afflictions after he had asked, and no doubt, received assurance of the mercy of God, in the remission of his sins. Why did he so? S. Augustine observes out of the words of this Text, that because some of David's afflictions are expressed in the Preter tense, as things already past, and some in the Future, as things to come, (for it is Laboravi, I have mourned, and it is Natare faciam, I will wash my bed with tears) so that something David confesses he had done, and something he professes that he will do, therefore David hath a special regard to his future state, and he proceeds with God, not only by that way of holy worship, by way of confession, what he had done, but by another religious worship of God too, by way of vow, what he would do. David understood his own conscience well; and was willing to husband it, to manure, and cultivate it well; He knew what ploughing, what harrowing, what weeding, and watering, and pruning it needed, and so perhaps might be trusted with himself, and he his own spiritual Physician. This is not every ones case. Those that are not so perfect in the knowledge of their own estate, (as it is certain the most are not) the Church ever took into her care; and therefore it is true, that in the Primitive Church, there were heavy penitential Canons, and there were public penances enjoined to sinners: Either Ad explorationem, when the Church had cause to be jealous, and to suspect the hearty repentance of the party, They made this trial of their obedience, to submit them to that heavy penance; Or else Ad aedificationem, to satisfy the Church which was scandalized by their sins before; Or Ad Exercitationem, to keep them in continual practice, the better to resist future temptations, and relapses; for to them this penance was an Unction, as to one that was to wrestle with himself, and as the buckling on of an Armor upon one that was to fight God's Battells, in his own bowels.
If from some of the Fathers, there have fain sometimes, some phrases which may have seemed to some, to attribute something more to man's works, to his after-afflictions, and post-penances, some power of satisfaction to the Justice of God, Bellarmine himself hath given us one good Caution, That we must be very wary in understanding those phrases; for he finds it very inconvenient, to accept all that the Fathers have said, in their manner of expressing themselves in that point. We will add thus much more, for the better understanding of repentance in the root, and the fruits of repentance, that there is such an indissoluble knot, such an individual marriage between those parts of repentance, which we call Partes constitutivas, Essentiall parts of repentance, and those parts, which we call Consecutivas, which do infallibly concur, or immediately follow upon repentance, these two are so inseparable; There is not only such a contiguity, but such a continuity in them, not only such a vicinity, but such an identity, between repentance, and the fruits of repentance, that many reverend persons, in their Expositions, and Meditations have presented, and named one for the other, and have called those subsequent, and subsidiary things, by the name of Repentance it self. Hence it comes, that whereas repentance is only Cogversio, a turning, and this conversion, this turning hath only Terminum à quo, Something to turn from, and that is sin, and Terminum ad quem, Something to turn to, and that is God, Those things which are indeed but helps to hold us in that station, and in that posture when we are turned from sin upon God, they have called by the names of Repentance it self, as parts of it; And so these bodily afflictions, which we speak of, being indeed to be embraced for that use, to maintain us in that good disposition, to which our repentance hath brought us, have sometimes been called parts of repentance, even by godly, and learned Expositors; and by occasion of that easiness in them, in calling these things thus, in after-times, salvation it self, which God gives upon repentance, hath been attributed to these post-penances, and after-afflictions, which because they do always accompany repentance, have sometimes been called repentance.
The meaning of ancient and later men too therein, hath been to impose a necessity of taking these medicinal Physicks, these after-afflictions, for that use of holding us in that state, to which we are brought; but their meaning hath ever been too, to exclude satisfaction, properly so termed. Poenitentia est, mala praeterita plaengere, This is repentance says that Father, to lament and bewail our former sins; But, this is not all that he requires, but he adds, Plangenda iterum non committere, This belongs to repentance too, not to return to those sins, which we have bewailed. For, Repentance is Vindicta semper puniens, quod dolet se commisisse, says another also; a man truly penitent is a daily executioner upon himself, and punishes after, the sins which he hath committed before. Here we see that both these blessed Fathers, S. Augustine, and S. Ambrose, attribute these after-afflictions, and post-penances to Repentance, and call them by that name, Repentance. But yet, not to leave these blessed Fathers, under the danger of mis-interpretation, and ill application of words well intended, We confider the same Fathers in other places too; Lacrymas Petri lego, satisfactionem non lego, I read of Peters tears, not of his satisfaction. So if these post-penances had the nature of punishments, yet these punishments had not the nature of satisfaction. But Calamitates ante remissionem sunt supplicia, post remissionem exercitationes, says the other of those Fathers: Till God be pacified by our Repentance, his corrections have more of the nature of punishments, because considered so, we are in the state of enemies, and he may justly punish; But after God hath remitted the sin, the after-afflictions are but from a Physician, not from an executioner, and intended to keep us in our station, and not to throw us lower; So that they are neither properly satisfactions, nor punishments. For, for satisfaction to the justice of God, Nec si te excories, satis facere possis, If thou flea thyself with hair-clothes, and whips, it is nothing towards satisfaction of that infinite Majesty, which thou hast violated, and wounded by thy sin; And then for the other, that is, punishment after remission, Vbi misericordia, poenae locus non est, They are incompatible things, If God have reserved a disposition and purpose to punish, he hath not pardoned.
So that howsoever something said by them, may seem to make these after-afflictions to be necessary to repentance, and, in a large sense, parts of repentance, yet neither did they put that value upon man's act, That man should be able to satisfy God, nor that delusion upon God's act, That God should pretend to pardon, and yet punish. We are not disposed to wrangle about words, and names; The School may admit that exercise, but not the Pulpit. If upon admittance, that these after-afflictions might be called punishments, they had not inferred a satisfaction, and thereupon super-induced a satisfaction after this life, and so a Purgatory, and so Indulgencies, and carried their Babel so many stories high, We to advance the doctrine of a necessity of these disciplines, and mortifications, even after God hath sealed to our consciences the remission of our sin, would not abhor, nor decline the name, we would not be afraid to call them Penances, nor Punishments, nor Satisfactions; for when S. Chrysostom in his time, had no occasion to be afraid of such a mis-interpretation, he was not afraid to call them so; Non remisit supplicium, says he; God hath not forgiven the punishment; And imponit poenam, God exacts a punishment at thy hands: But yet, though S. Chrysostom suspected no such mis-interpretations, the Holy Ghost who foresaw that they would come, prevents all dangerous mis-constructions, and directs S. Chrysostom's pen, thus, God does all this, says he, Non exigens supplicium de peccatis, sed corrigens ad futurum; whatsoever I have said of punishments; it is not, that in that punishment, God hath any relation to the former, but to the future sin, not to our lapse, but to our relapse, not to that which he hath seen, but to that which he foresees would fall upon us, if he did not, if we did not prevent it with these medicinal assistances: And, as long as it is but so, call them what ye will, yet here is no foundation laid, no materials, no stone brought to the building of the Roman Satisfaction, or Purgatory, or Indulgencies.
Howsoever therefore you exclude dangerous names, do not upon color of that, exclude necessary things: Howsoever you have delivered yourselves to the mercy of God, and he hath delivered a seal of his mercy to you, inwardly in his Spirit, outwardly in his Sacrament, yet there are Amarae sagittae ex dulci manu Dei, (as Nazianzen calls afflictions after repentance) Sharp arrows out of the sweet hand of God; Corrections, by which God intends to establish us in that spiritual health, to which our repentance, by his grace, hath brought us: Remember still, that this which David did for the present, and that which he promised be would do for the future, both together made up the reason of his prayer to God, by which he desired God in the former verses, to return to him, to deliver his soul, and to save him; He had had no reason, no ground of his prayer, though he had done something already, if he had not proposed to himself something more to be done: There is a preparation before, and there is a preservation after required at our hands, if we study a perfect recovery, and cure of our souls. And as S. Gregory notes well, there is a great deal of force in David's Possessive, in his word of appropriation, Meus, lectus meus, and Oculus meus, It is his bed that he washed, and they are his eyes that washed it: He bore the affliction himself, and trusted not to that which others had suffered by way of Supererogation. Sometimes, when the children of great persons offend at School, another person is whipped for them, and that affects them, and works upon a good nature; but if that person should take Physic for them in a sickness, it would do them no good: God's corrections upon others, may work by way of example upon thee; but because thou art sick for physic, take it thyself. Trust not to the treasure of the Church; neither the imaginary treasure of the Church of Rome, which pretends an inexhaustible mine of the works of other men, to distribute and bestow; No, nor to the true treasure of the true Church, that is, Absolution, upon Confession, and Repentance; No, trust not to the merits of Christ himself, in their application to thee, without a Lectus tuus, and an Oculus tuus, except thou remember thy sins in thy bed, and pour out thy tears from thine eyes, and fulfill the sufferings of Christ in thyself. Nothing can be added to Christ's merits; that is true: but something must be added to thee; a disposition in thee, for the application of that which is his: Not, that thou canst begin this disposition in thyself, till God offer it, but that thou mayest resist it, now it is offered, and reject it again, after it is received. Trust not in others, not in the Church, nor in Christ himself, so, as to do nothing for thyself; Nor trust not in that, which thou doest for thyself, so, as at any time to think, thou hast done enough and needest do no more: But when thou hast past the signet, that thou hast found the signature of God's hand and seal, in a manifestation, that the marks of his Grace are upon thee, when thou hast past his privy Seal, That his Spirit bears witness with thy spirit, that thy repentance hath been accepted by him, When thou hast past the great Seal, in the holy and blessed Sacrament publicly administered, do not suspect the goodness of God, as though all were not done that were necessary for thy salvation, if thou wert to have thy transmigration out of this world this hour; but yet, as long as thou continuest in the vale of temptations, continue in the vale of tears too; and though thou have the seal of Reconciliation, plead that seal to the Church, (which is God's Tribunal, and judgment seat upon earth) in a holy life, and works of example to others, and look daily, look hourly upon the Ita quod of that pardon, upon the Covenants and Conditions, with which it is given, That if by neglecting those medicinal helps, those auxiliary forces, those subsidies of the kingdom of Heaven, those after-afflictions, (choose whether you will call them by the name of Penance, or no) you relapse into former sins, your present repentance, and your present seal of that Repentance, the Sacrament, shall rise up against you at the last day, and to that sentence (you did not feed, you did not clothe, you did not harbor me in the poor) shall this be added, as the aggravation of all, you did Repent, and you did receive the Seal, but you did not pursue that repentance, nor perform the conditions required at your hands.
But we are here met, by God's gracious goodness, in a better disposition; with a sincere repentance of all our former sins, and with a deliberate purpose, as those Israelites made their pouring out of water, a testimony of dissolving themselves into holy tears, to make this fast from bodily sustenance, an inchoation of a spiritual fast, in abstinence from all that may exasperate our God against us; That so, though not for that, yet thereby our prayers may be the more acceptable to our glorious God, in our gracious Savior, To him that sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb, first, that as he is the King of Kings, he will establish, and prosper that Crown, which he hath set upon the head of his Anointed over us here, and hereafter Crown that Crown with another Crown, a better Crown, a Crown of immarcescible glory in the Kingdom of Heaven, and in the mean time, make him his Bulwark, and his Rampart, against all those powers, which seek to multiply Miters, or Crowns, to the disquiet and prejudice of Christendom: And then, That as he is the Lord of Lord's, he will inspire them, to whom he hath given Lordship over others in this world, with a due consideration, that they also have a Lord over them, even in this world; and that he, and they, and we have one Lord over us all, in the other world: That as he is the Bishop and high Priest over our Souls, he vouchsafe to continue in our Bishops, a holy will, and a competent power to super-intend faithfully over his Church, that they for their parts, when they depart from hence, may deliver it back into his hands, in the same form, and frame, in which his blessed Spirit delivered it into their hands, in their predecessors, in the Primitive institution thereof: That as he is the Angel of the great Counsayle, he vouchsafe to direct the great Counsayle of this Kingdom, to consider still, that as he works in this world, by means, So it concerns his glory, that they expedite the supply of such means as may do his work, and may carry home the testimony of good Consciences now, and in their posterity have the thanks of posterity, for their behavior in this Parliament: That as he is the God of peace, he will restore peace to Christendom; That as he is the Lord of Hosts, he will fight our battayls, who have no other end in our wars, but his peace; and that after this fast, which in the bodily and ghostly part too, we perform today, and vow and promise for our whole lives, he will bring us to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, in that Kingdom which our Savior Christ Jesus hath purchased for us, with the inestimable price of his incorruptible blood. Amen.
SERM. LV. Preached upon the Penitentiall Psalms.
PSAL. 6.8, 9, 10.
T His is David's profligation and discomfiture of his enemies; this is an act of true honor, a true victory, a true triumph, to keep the field, to make good one station, and yet put the enemy to flight. A man may perchance be safe in a Retrait, but the honor, the victory, the triumph lies in enforcing the enemy to fly. To that is David come here, to such a thankful sense of a victory; in which we shall first confider David's thankfulness, that is, his manner of declaring God's mercy, and his security in that mercy; which manner is, that he durst come to an open defiance, and protestation, and hostility, without modifications, or disguises, Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity. And then, secondly, we shall see his reason, upon which he grounded this confidence, and this spiritual exultation, which was a pregnant reason, a reason that produced another reason; The Lord hath heard my supplication, the Lord will hear my prayer; upon no premises doth any conclusion follow, so Logically, so sincerely, so powerfully, so imperiously, so undeniably, as upon this, The Lord hath, and therefore the Lord will. But then what was this prayer? that we may know, whether it were a prayer to be drawn into practice, and imitation, or no. It is not argument enough, that it was so, because God heard it then; for we are not bound, nay, we are not allowed to pray all such prayers, as good men have prayed, and as God hath heard. But here the prayer was this, Let all mine enemies be ashamed, and sore vexed, let them return, and be ashamed suddenly. But this is a malediction, an imprecation of mischief upon others; and will good men pray so? or will God hear that? Because that is an holy problem, and an useful intergatory, we shall make it a third part, or a conclusion rather, to inquire into the nature, and into the avowablenesse, and exemplarinesse of this, in which David seems to have been transported with some passion.
So that our parts will be three, the building it self, David's thanksgiving in his exultation, and declaration, Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity; and then the foundation of this building, For God hath heard, and therefore God will hear; and lastly, the prospect of this building, David contemplates and looks over again the prayer that he had made, and in a clear understanding, and in a rectified Conscience, he finds that he may persist in that prayer, and he doth so: Let all mine enemies be ashamed, and sore vexed, let them return, and be ashamed suddenly.
First then we consider David's thankfulness: But why is it so long before David leads us to that consideration? Why hath he deferred so primary a duty, to so late a place, to so low a room, to the end of the Psalm? The Psalm hath a Deprecatory part, that God would forbear him, and a Postulatory part, that God would hear him, and grant some things to him, and a Gratulatory part, a sacrifice of thanksgiving. Now the Deprecatory part is placed in the first place, Vers. 1. For if it were not so, if we should not first ground that, That God should not rebuke us in his anger, nor chasten us in his hot displeasure, but leave ourselves open to his indignation, and his judgments, we could not live to come to a second petition; our sins, and judgments due to our sins, require our first consideration; therefore David begins with the deprecatory prayer, That first God's anger may be removed: but then, that deprecatory prayer, wherein he desired God to forbear him, spends but one verse of the Psalm; David would not insist upon that long: When I have penitently confessed my sins, I may say with Job, My flesh is not brass, nor my bones stones, that I can bear the wrath of the Lord; but yet I must say with Job too, If the Lord kill me, yet will I trust in him. God hath not asked me, What shall I do for thee, but of himself he hath done more, then I could have proposed to myself in a wish, or to him in a prayer. Nor will I ask God, Quousque, how long shall my foes increase? how long wilt thou fight on their side against me? but surrender myself entirely, in an adveniat regnum, and a fiat voluntas, thy kingdom come, and thy will be done. David makes it his first work, to stay God's anger in a deprecatory prayer, but he stays not upon that long, he will not prescribe his Physician, what he shall prescribe to him, but leaves God to his own medicines, and to his own method. But then the Postulatory prayer, what he begs of God, employs six verses: as well to show us, that our necessities are many; as also that if God do not answer us, at the beginning of our prayer, our duty is still to pursue that way, to continue in prayer. And then the third part of the Psalm, which is the Gratulatory part, his giving of thanks, is, shall we say deferred, or rather reserved to the end of the Psalm, and exercises only those three verses which are our Text. Not that the duty of thanksgiving is less then that of prayer; for if we could compare them, it is rather greater; because it contributes more to God's glory, to acknowledge by thanks, that God hath given, then to acknowledge by prayer, that God can give. But therefore might David be later and shorter here, in expressing that duty of thanks, first, because being reserved to the end, and close of the Psalm, it leaves the best impression in the memory. And therefore it is easy to observe, that in all Metricall compositions, of which kind the book of Psalms is, the force of the whole piece, is for the most part left to the shutting up; the whole frame of the Poem is a beating out of a piece of gold, but the last clause is as the impression of the stamp, and that is it that makes it currant. And then also, because out of his abundant manner of expressing his thankfulness to God, in every other place thereof, his whole book of Psalms is called, Sepher tehillim, a book of praise and thanksgiving, he might reserve his thanks here to the last place; And lastly, because natural and moral men are better acquainted with the duty of gratitude, of thanksgiving, before they come to the Scriptures, then they are with the other duty of repentance, which belongs to Prayer; for in all Solomon's books, you shall not find half so much of the duty of thankfulness, as you shall in Seneca and in Plutarch. No book of Ethics, of moral doctrine, is come to us, wherein there is not, almost in every leaf, some detestation, some Anathema against ingratitude; but of repentance, not a word amongst them all. And therefore in that duty of prayer, which presumes repentance, (for he must stand Rectus in curia that will pray) David hath insisted longest; and because he would enter, and establish a man, upon a confidence in God, he begins with a deprecation of his anger; for but upon that ground, no man can stand; and because he would dismiss him with that which concerns him most, he chooseth to end in a Thanksgiving.
Therefore at last he comes to his thanks. Now this is so poor a duty, if we proportion it to the infiniteness of God's love unto us, our thanks, as we may justly call it nothing at all. But Amor Dei affectus, non contractus, The love of God is not a contract, a bargain, he looks for nothing again, and yet he looks for thanks, for that is nothing, because there is nothing done in it, it is but speaking; Gratias dicere, est gratias agere, To utter our thanks to God, is all our performance of thankfulness. It is not so amongst us; Vix, aut nunquam apud nos purum, & merum beneficium; Every man that gives, gives out of design, and as it conduces to his ends: Donat in hamo, There is a hook in every benefit, that sticks in his jaws that takes that benefit, and draws him whither the Benefactor will. God looks for nothing, nothing to be done in the way of exact recompense, but yet, as he that makes a Clock, bestows all that labor upon the several wheels, that thereby the Bell might give a sound, and that thereby the hand might give knowledge to others how the time passes; so this is the principal part of that thankfulness, which God requires from us, that we make open declarations of his mercies, to the winning and confirming of others.
This David does in this noble and ingenuous publication, and protestation, I have strength enough, and company enough, power enough, and pleasure enough, joy enough, and treasure enough, honor enough, and recompense enough in my God alone, in him I shall surely have all which all you can pretend to give, and therefore Discedite à me, Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity; Here is then first, a valediction, a parting with his old company, but it is a valediction, with a malediction, with an imprecation of God's Justice, upon their contempts and injuries. There was in the mouth of Christ, sometimes, such a Discede, such an Abito, as that farewell was a welcome; as when he said to the Ruler, Abito, Go thy way, thy son liveth; And when he said to the woman, Go in peace, thy saith hath saved thee. This going was a staying with him still; Here the Abite, and Venite was all one. He that goes about his worldly business, and goes about them in God's name, in the fear and favor of God, remains in God's presence still. When the Angels of God are sent to visit his children, in the midst of Sodom, or where they lie, and languish in sordid and nasty corners, and in the loathsomeness of corrupt and infectious diseases, or where they faint in miserable dungeons, this Commission, this Discedite, go to that Sodom, to that Spittle, to that Dungeon, puts not those Angels out of the presence of God. No descent into hell, of what kind soever you conceive that descent into hell to have been, put the Son of God out of heaven, by descending into hell; no Discede, no Leave, no Commandment that God gives us, to do the works of our calling here, excludes us from him; but as the Saints of God shall follow the Lamb, wheresoever he goes in heaven, so the Lamb of God shall follow his Saints, wheresoever they go upon earth, if they walk sincerely. Christ uses not then as yet, as long as we are in this world, this Discede of David, to bid any man, any sinner to depart from him: But there shall come a time, when Christ shall take David's Discede, the words of this Text into his mouth, with as much and more bitterness then David does here, Nescivi nos, I never knew ye, and therefore Depart from me ye workers of iniquity.
So have you his Protestation, his Proclamation, They must avoid; but who? Who be these that David dismisses here? Take them to be those of his own house, his Servants, and Officers in near places, whose service he had used to ill purposes, (as David's Person, and Rank, and History directs us upon that Consideration) and we shall find all such persons, wrapped up in this danger, that they dare not discharge themselves, they dare not displace, nor disgrace those men, to whom by such employments, they have given that advantage over themselves, as that it is not safe to them, to offend such a servant. Naturâ nec hostem habet, nec amicum rex, says a wise Statesman; In nature, (that is, in the nature of greatness, and, as great) great persons consider no man to be so much a friend, nor to be so much an enemy, but that they will fall out with that friend, and be reconciled to that enemy, to serve their own turn, says that Statesman. But yet when great Persons trust servants with such secret actions, as may bring them into contempt at home, or danger abroad, by those vices, if they should be published, they cannot come when they would, to this Discedite, Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity.
We have this evidently, and unavoidably, we cannot but see it, and say it, in this example which is before us, even in King David. He had employed Joab in such services, as that he stood in fear of him, and endured at his hands that behavior, and that language, Thou hast shamed this day the faces of all thy servants that have saved thy life, and thy sons, and daughters, and wives, and concubines, thou regardest neither thy Princes, nor servants; but come out, and speak comfortably unto them, for I swear by the Lord, except thou do come out, there will not tarry one man with thee this night. David endured all this, for he knew that Joab had that letter in his Cabbinet, which he writ to him for the murder of Uriah, and he never came to this Discedite, to remove Joab from him in his life, but gave it in Commandment to his Son, Let not Joab's hoary head go down to the grave in peace: Here is the misery of David, he cannot discharge himself of that servant when he will, and here the misery of that servant, that at one time or other he will; and he is a short lived man, whose ruin a jealous Prince studies. Because the Text invited us, commanded, and constrained us to do so, we put this example in a Court, but we need not dazzle ourselves with that height; every man in his own house may find it, that to those servants, which have served him in ill actions, he dares not say, Discedite, Depart from me ye workers of iniquity.
Thus then it is; if those whom David dismisses here, were his own servants, it was an expressing of his thankfulness to God, and a duty that lay upon him, to deliver himself of such servants. But other Expositors take these men, to be men of another sort, men that came to triumph over him in his misery, men that Persecuted him whom God had smitten, and added to the sorrow of him whom God had wounded, as himself complains; men that pretended to visit him, yet when they came, They spoke lies, their hearts gathered iniquity to themselves, and when they went abroad they told it; Men that said to one another, When shall he die, and his name perish? Here also was a Declaration of the powerfulness of God's Spirit in him, that he could triumph over the Triumpher, and exorcise those evil spirits, and command them away, whose coming was to dishonor God, in his dishonor; and to argue and conclude out of his ruin, that either his God was a weak God, or a cruel God, that he could not, or would not deliver his servants from destruction.
That David could command them away, whose errand was to blaspheme God, and whose staying in a longer conversation, might have given him occasion of new sins, either in distrusting God's mercy towards himself, or in murmuring at God's patience towards them, or perchance in being uncharitably offended with them, and expressing it with some bitterness, but that in respect of himself, and not of God's glory only, this Discedite, Depart from me all such men as do sin in yourselves, and may make me sin too, was an act of an heavenly courage, and a thankful testimony of God's gracious visiting his soul, enabling him so resolutely to tear himself from such persons, as might lead him into temptation.
Neither is this separation of David, and this company, partial; he does not banish those that incline him to one sin, a sin that perchance he is a weary of, or grown unable to proceed in, and retained them that concur with him in some fresh sin, to which he hath a new appetite. David doth not banish them that sucked his Subjects blood, or their money, and retained them that solicit, and corrupt their wives, and daughters; he doth not displace them, who served the vices of his predecessor, and supply those places with instruments of new vices of his own, but it is Discedite omnes, Depart all ye workers of iniquity. Now beloved, when God begins so high as in Kings, he makes this duty the easier to thee; to banish from thee, All the workers of iniquity. It is not a Discede, that will serve to banish one, and retain the rest, Nor a Discedite, to banish the rest, and retain one, but Discedite omnes, Depart all, for that sin stays in state, that stays alone, and hath the venom, and the malignity of all the rest contracted in it. It is nothing for a sick man that hath lost his taste, to say, Discedat gula, Depart voluptuousness; nothing in a consumption to say, Discedat luxuria, Depart wantonness; nothing for a Client in Formapauperis, to say, Discedat corruptio, I will not bribe; but Discedant omnes, Depart all, and all together ye workers of iniquity.
But yet David's general discharge had, and ours must have, a restriction, a limitation; it is not (as S. Jerome notes upon this place) Omnes qui operati, but Omnes operantes, not all that have wrought iniquity, but all that continue in doing so still. David was not inexorable towards those that had offended; what an example should he have given God against himself, if he had been so? we must not despise, nor defame men, because they have committed some sin. When the mercy of God hath wrought upon their sin in the remission thereof, that leprosy of Naaman cleaves to us, their sin is but transferred to us, if we will not forgive that which God hath forgiven, for it is but Omnes operantes, all they that continue in their evil ways. All these must depart: how far? first, they must be avoided, Declinate, saith S. Paul, I beseech you brethren, mark them diligently which cause division and offenses, and avoid them. And this corrects our desire in running after such men, as come with their own inventions, Schismaticall Separatists, Declinate, avoid them; if he be no such, but amongst ourselves, a brother, but yet a worker of iniquity, If any one that is called a brother, be a Fornicator, or covetous, with such a one eat not. If we cannot starve him out, we must thrust him out; Put away from among you, that wicked man. No conversation at all is allowed to us, with such a man, as is obstinate in his sin, and incorrigible; no not to bid him God speed, For he that bid. death him God speed, is partaker of his evil deeds. In this divorce, both the generality, and the distance is best expressed by Christ himself, If thine eye, thine hand, thy foot offend thee, amputandi & projiciendi, with what anguish or remorse soever it be done, they must be cut off, and being cut off, cast away; it is a divorce and no super-induction, it is a separating, and no redintegration. Though thou couldest be content to go to Heaven with both eyes, (thyself, and thy companion) yet better to go into Heaven with one, thyself alone, then to endanger thyself to be left out for thy companions sake.
To conclude this first part, David does not say, Discedam, but Discedite, he does not say, that he will depart from them, but he commands them to depart from him. We must not think to depart from the offices of society, and duties of a calling, and hide ourselves in Monasteries, or in retired lives, for fear of temptations; but when a temptation attempts us, to come with that authority, and that powerful exorcism of Nazianzen, Fuge, recede, ne te cruce Christi, ad quam omnia contremiscunt, feriam, Depart from me, lest the Cross of Christ, in my hand, overthrow you. For a sober life, and a Christian mortification, and discreet discipline, are crosses derived from the Cross of Christ Jesus, and animated by it, and may be always in a readiness to cross such temptations. In the former descriptions of the manner of our behavior towards workers of iniquity, there is one Declinate, one word that implies a withdrawing of ourselves; for that must be done, not out of the world, but out of that ill air, we must not put ourselves in danger, nor in distance of a temptation; but all the other words, are words of a more active vehemence, Amputate, and Projicite; it is Discedite, and not Discedam, a driving away, and not a running away.
We proceed now in our second part, to the reasons of David's confidence, and his opennesse, and his public declaration; why David was content to be rid of all his company; and it was, because he had better; he says, The Lord had heard him; and first, He had heard, vocem fletus, the voice of his weeping. Here is an admirable readiness in God, that hears a voice in that, which hath none. They have described God by saying he is all eye, an universal eye, that pierceth into every dark corner; but in dark corners, there is something for him to see; but he is all ear too, and hears even the silent, and speechless man, and hears that in that man, that makes no sound, histeares. When Hezekiah wept, he was turned to the wall, (perchance, because he would not be seen) and yet God bad the Prophet Isaiah tell him, Vidi lacrymam; though the text say, Hezekiah weptsore, yet Vidit lacrymam, God saw every single tear, his first tear, and was affected with that. But yet this is more strange; God heard his tears. And therefore the weeping of a penitent sinner, is not improperly called, Legatio lacrymarum, An embassage of tears; To Ambassadors belongs an audience, and to these Embassages God gives a gracious audience; Abyssus abyssum invocat, One depth calls upon another; And so doth one kind of tears call upon one another. Tears of sorrow call upon tears of joy, and all call upon God, and bring him to that ready hearing which is implied in the words of this text, Shamang; a word of that largeness in the Scriptures, that sometimes in the Translation of the Septuagint, it signifies hearing, Shamang, is audit, God gives ear to our tears; sometimes it is believing, Shamang, is Credit, God gives faith, and credit to our tears; sometimes it is Affecting, Shamang, is Miseretur, God hath mercy upon us for our tears; sometimes it is Effecting, Shamang, is Respondet, God answers the petition of our tears; and sometimes it is Publication, Shamang, is Divulgat, God declares and manifests to others, by his blessings upon us, the pleasure that he takes in our holy and repentant tears. And therefore Lacrymae foenus, says S. Basil, Tears are that usury, by which the joys of Heaven are multiplied unto us; the preventing Grace, and the free mercy of God, is our stock, and principal; but the Acts of obedience, and mortification, fasting, and praying, and weeping, are Foenus, (says that blessed Father) the interest, and the increase of our holy joy.
That which we intend in all this, is, that when our heart is well disposed toward God, God sees our prayers, as they are coming in the way, before they have any voice, in our words. When Christ came to Lazarus house, before Mary had asked anything at his hands, as soon as she had wept, Christ was affected, He groaned in the spirit, he was troubled, and he wept too; and he proceeded to the raising of Lazarus, before she asked him; her eyes were his glass, and he saw her desire in her tears. There is a kind of simplicity in tears, which God harkens to, and believes. We know not what we should pray for as we ought. Quid? nescimus orationem dominicam? Can we not say the Lord's Prayer, says S. Augustine? Yes, we can say that; but Nescimus tribulationem prodesse, says he, we do not know the benefit, that is to be made of tribulation, and temptation, Et petimus liberari ab omni malo, we pray to be delivered from all evil, and we mean all tribulation, and all temptation, as though all they were always evil; but in that there may be much error: The sons of Zebedee prayed, but ambitionsly, and were not heard; S. Paul prayed for the taking away of the provocation of the flesh, but inconsiderately, and mist; the Apostles made a request, for fire against the Samaritans, but uncharitably, and were reproved. But when Jehoshaphat was come to that perplexity by the Moabites, that he knew not what to do, nor what to say, Hoc solum residui habemus, says he, ut oculos nostros dirigamus ad te, This we can do, and we need do no more, we can turn our eyes to thee. Now whether he directed those eyes in looking to him, or in weeping to him, God hears the voice of our looks, God hears the voice of our tears, sometimes better then the voice of our words, for it is the Spirit it self that makes intercession for us, Gemitibus inenarrabilibus, In those groans, and so in those tears, which we cannot utter; Ineloquacibus, as Tertullian reads that place, devout, and simple tears, which cannot speak, speak aloud in the ears of God; nay, tears which we cannot utter; not only not utter the force of the tears, but not utter the very tears themselves. As God sees the water in the spring in the veins of the earth, before it bubble upon the face of the earth; so God sees tears in the heart of a man, before they blubber his face; God hears the tears of that sorrowful soul, which for sorrow cannot shed tears.
From this casting up of the eyes, and pouring out the sorrow of the heart at the eyes, at least, opening God a window, through which he may see a wet heart through a dry eye; from these overtures of repentance, which are as those imperfect sounds of words, which Parents delight in, in their Children, before they speak plain, a penitent sinner comes to a verbal, and a more express prayer. To these prayers, these vocal and verbal prayers from David, God had given ear, and from this hearing of those prayers was David come to this thankful confidence, The Lord hath heard, the Lord will hear. Now, Beloved, this prayer which David speaks of here, which our first translation calls a Petition, is very properly rendered in our second translation, a Supplication; for Supplications were à Suppliciis; Supplications amongst the Gentiles were such sacrifices, as were made to the gods, out of confiscations, out of the goods of those men, upon whom the State had inflicted any pecuniary or capital punishment. Supplicationes, à Suppliciis; and therefore this prayer which David made to God, when his hand was upon him, in that heavy correction, and calamity, which occasioned this Psalm, is truly and properly called a Supplication, that is, a Prayer, or Petition, that proceeds from suffering.
And if God have heard his supplication, if God have regarded him then, when he was in his displeasure, if God have turned to him, when he was turned from him, and stroakt him with the same hand that struck him, God will much more perfect his own work, and grant his prayer after; if God would endure to look upon him in his deformity, he will delight to look upon him then, when he hath shed the light and the loveliness of his own countenance upon him: It is the Apostles argument, as well as David's, If when we were enemies, we were reconeiled to God, by the death of his Son, much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. When David found, that God had heard his Supplications, the voice of his suffering, of his punishment, he was sure he would hear his Prayer, the voice of his thankfulness too.
And this was David's second reason, for his alacrity, and confidence, that God would never be weary of hearing, he had heard him, and he would hear him still, he had heard the Supplication, and he would hear his Prayer; for this word, which signifies Prayer here, is derived from Palal, which signifies properly Separare: As his Supplication was acceptable, which proceeded à Suppliciis, from a sense of his afflictions; so this Prayer, which came Post separationem, after he had separated, and divorced himself from his former company, after his Discedite, his discharging of all the workers of iniquity, must necessarily be better accepted at God's hand. He that hears a Suppliant, that is, a man in misery, and does some small matter for the present ease of that man, and proceeds no farther, Ipsum quod dedit, perit, That which he gave is lost, it is drowned by that flood of misery that overflows and surrounds that wretched man, he is not the better tomorrow for to days alms, Et vitam producit ad miseriam, that very alms prolongs his miserable life still; without to days alms, he should not have had a tomorrow to be miserable in. Now, Christ only is the Samaritan which perfected his cure upon the wounded man: He saw him, says the text, so did the rest that passed by him; but, He had compassion on him; so he might, and yet actually have done him no good; but, He went to him; so he might too, and then out of a delicatenesse or fastidiousnesse, have gone from him again; but (to contract) he bound up his wounds, he poured in oil and wine, he put him upon his own beast, he brought him to an Inn, made provision for him, gave the Host money beforehand, gave him charge to have a care of him, and (which is the perfection of all, the greatest testimony of our Samaritans love to us) he promised to come again, and at that coming, he does not say, He will pay, but He will recompense, which is a more abundant expressing of his bounty. Christ loves not but in the way of marriage; if he begin to love thee, he tells thee, Sponsabo te mihi, I will marry thee unto me, and Sponsabo in aeternum, I will marry thee forever. For it is a marriage that prevents all mistakings, and excludes all impediments, I will marry thee in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving kindness, and in mercies, and in faithfulness; many, and great assurances. And as it is added, Seminabo te mihi, which is a strange expressing of God's love to us, I will sow thee unto me in the carth; when I have taken thee into my husbandry, thou shalt increase, and multiply, Seminabo te, and all that thou doest produce, shall be directed upon me, Seminabo te mihi, I will sow thee to myself: therefore thy soul may be bold to join with David in that thankful confidence, He hath heard my supplication, and therefore He will hear my prayer; He looked upon me in the dust of the earth, much more will he do so, having now laid me upon Carpets; he looked upon me in my sores, sores of mine enemies malice, and sores of mine own sins, much more will he do so now, when he hath imprinted in me the wounds of his own Son; for those that were so many wounds upon him, are so many stars upon me; He looked upon me, may David say, when I followed the Ewes great with young, much more will he do so now, now when by his directions, I lead out his people, great with enterprises, and victories against his enemies. First David comes to that holy nobleness, he dares cast off ill instruments, and is not afraid of conspiracy; he dares divorce himself from dangerous company, and is not afraid of melancholy; he dares love God, and is not afraid of that jealousy, that he is too religious to be employed, too tender conscienced to be put upon business; he dares reprehend them that are under his charge, and is not afraid of a recrimination; he dares observe a Sabbath, he dares startle at a blasphemy, he dares forbear countenancing a profane or a scurrill jest with his praise, he dares be an honest man; which holy confidence constituted our first part, Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity; And then he grounds this confidence upon an undeceivable Rock, upon God's seal, God hath heard me, therefore God will hear me. And when God hears, God speaks too, and when God speaks, God does too, and therefore I may safely proceed as I do, which was our second Consideration. And then the third, which remains, is, that upon this, he returns to the consideration, what that was, that he had done; he had either imprecated, or denounced, at least, heavy judgments upon his enemies; and he finds it avowable, and justifiable to have done so; and therefore persists in it, Let all mine enemies be ashamed, and sore vexed; let them return, and be ashamed suddenly.
All clean beasts had both these marks, they divided the hoof, and they chewed the cud: All good resolutions, which pass our prayer, must have these two marks too, they must divide the hoof, they must make a double impression, they must be directed upon God's glory, and upon our good, and they must pass a rumination, a chawing of the cud, a second examination, whether that prayer were so conditioned or no. We pray sometimes out of sudden and indigested apprehensions; we pray sometimes out of custom, and communion with others; we pray sometimes out of a present sense of pain, or imminent danger; and this prayer may divide the hoof; It may look towards God's glory, and towards our good; but it does not chew the cud too; that is, if I have not considered, not examined, whether it do so or no, it is not a prayer that God will call a sacrifice. You see Christ brought his own Prayer, Si possibile, If it be possible &c. through such a rumination, Veruntamen, yet not my will &c. As many a man swears, and if he be surprised, and asked, what did you say, he does not remember his own oath, not what he swore; so many a man prays, and does not remember his own prayer. As a Clock gives a warning before it strikes, and then there remains a sound, and a tingling of the bell after it hath stricken: so a precedent meditation, and a subsequent rumination, make the prayer a prayer; I must think before, what I will ask, and consider again, what I have asked; and upon this dividing the hoof, and chewing the cud, David avows to his own conscience his whole action, even to this consummation thereof, Let mine enemies be ashamed &c.
Now these words, whether we consider the natural signification of the words, or the authority of those men, who have been Expositors upon them, may be understood either way, either to be Imprecatoria, words of Imprecation, that David in the Spirit of anguish wishes that these things might fall upon his enemies, or else Praedictoria, words of Prediction, that David in the spirit of Prophecy pronounces that these things shall fall upon them.
If they be Imprecatoria, words spoken out of his wish, and desire, then they have in them the nature of a curse: And because Lyra takes them to be so, a curse, he refers the words Ad Daemones, To the Devil: That herein David seconds God's malediction upon the Serpent, and curses the Devil, as the occasioner and first mover of all these calamities; and says of them, Let all our enemies be ashamed, and sore vexed &c. Others refer these words to the first Christian times, and the persecutions then, and so to be a malediction, a curse upon the Jews, and upon the Romans, who persecuted the Primitive Church then, Let them be ashamed &c. And then Gregory Nyssen refers these words to more domestical and intrinsicke enemies, to David's own concupiscences, and the rebellions of his own lusts, Let those enemies be ashamed &c. For all those who understand these words to be a curse, a malediction, are loath to admit that David did curse his enemies, merely out of a respect of those calamities which they had inflicted upon him. And that is a safe ground; no man may curse another, in contemplation of himself only, if only himself be concerned in the case. And when it concerns the glory of God, our imprecations, our maledictions upon the persons, must not have their principal relation, as to God's enemies, but as to God's glory; our end must be, that God may have his glory, not that they may have their punishment. And therefore how vehement soever David seem in this Imprecation, and though he be more vehement in another place, Let them be confounded, and troubled forever, yea, let them be put to shame, and perish, yet that perishing is but a perishing of their purposes, let their plots perish, let their malignity against thy Church be frustrated; for so he expresses himself in the verse immediately before, Fill their faces with shame; but why? and how? That they may seek thy Name, O Lord; that was David's end, even in the curse; David wishes them no ill, but for their good; no worse to God's enemies, but that they might become his friends. The rule is good, which out of his moderation S. Augustine gives, that in all Inquisitions, and Executions in matters of Religion, (when it is merely for Religion without sedition) Sint qui poeniteant, Let the men remain alive, or else how can they repent? So in all Imprecations, in all hard wishes, even upon God's enemies, Sint qui convertantur, Let the men remain, that they may be capable of conversion; wish them not so ill, as that God can show no mercy to them; for so the ill wish falls upon God himself, if it preclude his way of mercy upon that ill man. In no case must the curse be directed upon the person; for when in the next Psalm to this, David seems passionate, when he asks that of God there, which he desires God to forbear in the beginning of this Psalm, when his Ne arguas in ira, O Lord rebuke not in thine anger, is turned to a Surge Domine in ira, Arise O Lord in thine anger; S. Augustine begins to wonder, Quid? illum, quem perfectum dicimus, ad iram provocat Deum? Would David provoke God, who is all sweetness, and mildness, to anger against any man? No, not against any man; but Diaboli possessio peccator, Every sinner is a slave to his beloved sin; and therefore, Misericors or at, adver sus cum, quitanque or at, How bitterly soever I curse that sin, yet I pray for that sinner. David would have God angry with the Tyran, not with the Slave that is oppressed; with the sin, not with the soul that is inthralled to it. And so, as the words may be a curse, a malediction in David's mouth, we may take them into our mouth too, and say, Let those enemies be ashamed, &c.
If this then were an Imprecation, a malediction, yet it was Medicinal, and had Rationem boni, a charitable tincture, and nature in it; he wished the men no harm, as men. But it is rather Pradictorium, a Prophetical vehemence, that if they will take no knowledge of God's declaring himself in the protection of his servants, if they would not consider that God had heard, and would hear, had rescued, and would rescue his children, but would continue their opposition against him, heavy judgments would certainly fall upon them; Their punishment should be certain, but the effect should be uncertain; for God only knows, whether his correction shall work upon his enemies, to their mollifying, or to their obduration. Those bitter, and weighty imprecations which David hath heaped together against Judas, seem to be direct imprecations; and yet S. Peter himself calls them Prophesies; Oportet impleri Scripturam; They were done, says he, that the Scripture might be fulfilled; Not that David in his own heart did wish all that upon Judas; but only so, as fore-seeing in the Spirit of Prophesying, that those things should fall upon him, he concurred with the purpose of God therein, and so far as he saw it to be the will of God, he made it his will, and his wish. And so have all those judgments, which we denounce upon sinners, the nature of Prophesies in them; when we read in the Church, that Commination, Cursed is the Idolater, This may fall upon some of our own kindred; and Cursed is he that curseth Father or Mother, This may fall upon some of our own children; and Cursed is he that perverteth judgment, This may fall upon some powerful Persons, that we may have a dependence upon; and upon these we do not wish that God's vengeance should fall; yet we Prophesy, and denounce justly, that upon such, such vengeances will fall; and then, all Prophesies of that kind are always conditional; they are conditional, if we consider any Decree in God; they must be conditional in all our denunciations; if you repent, they shall not fall upon you, if not, Oportet impleri Scripturam, The Scripture must be fulfilled; We do not wish them, we do but Prophesy them; no, nor we do not prophesy them; but the Scriptures have preprophesied them before; they will fall upon you, as upon Judas, in condemnation, and perchance, as upon Judas, in desperation too.
David's purpose then being in these words to work to their amendment, and not their final destruction, we may easily and usefully discern in the particular words, a milder sense then the words seem at first to present. And first give me leave by the way, only in passing, by occasion of those words which are here rendered, Convertentur, & Erubescent, and which in the Original are Iashabu, and Ieboshu, which have a musical, and harmonious sound, and agnomination in them, let me note thus much, even in that, that the Holy Ghost in penning the Scriptures delights himself, not only with a propriety, but with a delicacy, and harmony, and melody of language; with height of Metaphors, and other figures, which may work greater impressions upon the Readers, and not with barbarous, or trivial, or market, or homely language: It is true, that when the Grecians, and the Romans, and S. Augustine himself, undervalued and despised the Scriptures, because of the poor and beggarly phrase, that they seemed to be written in, the Christians could say little against it, but turned still upon the other safer way, we consider the matter, and not the phrase, because for the most part, they had read the Scriptures only in Translations, which could not maintain the Majesty, nor preserve the elegancies of the Original.
Their case was somewhat like ours, at the beginning of the Reformation; when, because most of those men who labored in that Reformation, came out of the Roman Church, and there had never read the body of the Fathers at large; but only such rags and fragments of those Fathers, as were patched together in their Decretat's, and Decretals, and other such Common placers, for their purpose, and to serve their turn, therefore they were loath at first to come to that issue, to try controversies by the Fathers. But as soon as our men that in braced the Reformation, had had time to read the Fathers, they were ready enough to join with the Adversary in that issue: and still we protest, that we accept that evidence, the testimony of the Fathers, and resuse nothing, which the Fathers unanimly delivered, for matter of faith; and howsoever at the beginning some men were a little ombrageous, and startling at the name of the Fathers, yet since the Fathers have been well studied, for more then threescore years, we have behaved ourselves with more reverence to wards the Fathers, and more confidence in the Fathers, then they of the Roman persuasion have done, and been less apt to suspect or quarrel their Books, or to reprove their Doctrines, then our Adversaries have been. So, howsoever the Christians at first were fain to sink a little under that imputation, that their Scriptures have no Majesty, no eloquence, because these embellishments could not appear in Translations, nor they then read Originalls, yet now, that a perfect knowledge of those languages hath brought us to see the beauty and the glory of those Books, we are able to reply to them, that there are not in all the world so eloquent Books as the Scriptures; and that nothing is more demonstrable, then that if we would take all those Figures, and Tropes, which are collected out of secular Poets, and Orators, we may give higher, and livelier examples, of everyone of those Figures, out of the Scriptures, then out of all the Greek and Latin Poets, and Orators; and they mistake it much, that think, that the Holy Ghost hath rather chosen a low, and barbarous, and homely style, then an eloquent, and powerful manner of expressing himself.
To return and to cast a glance upon these words in David's prediction, upon his enemies, what hardness is in the first, Erubescent, Let them be ashamed: for the word imports no more, our last Translation says no more, neither did our first Translators intend anymore, by their word, Confounded; for that is, confounded with shame in themselves. This is Virga desoiplinae, says S. Bernard; as long as we are ashamed of sin, we are not grown up, and hardened in it; we are under correction; the correction of a remorse. As soon as Adam came to be ashamed of his nakedness, he presently thought of some remedy; if one should come and tell thee, that he looked through the door, that he stood in a window over against thine, and saw thee do such or such a sin, this would put thee to a shame, and thou wouldest not do that sin, till thou wert fure he could not see thee. O, if thou wouldest not sin, till thou couldst think that God saw thee not, this shame had wrought well upon thee. There are complexions that cannot blush; there grows a blackness, a sootinesse upon the soul, by custom in sin, which overcomes all blushing, all tend ernesse. White alone is paleness, and God loves not a pale soul, a soul possessed with a horror, affrighted with a diffidence, and distrusting his mercy. Rednesse alone is anger, and vehemency, and distemper, and God loves not such a red soul, a soul that sweats in sin, that quarrels for sin, that revenges in sin. But that whiteness that preserves it self, not only from being died all over in any foul color, from contracting the name of any habitual sin, and so to be called such or such a sinner, but from taking any spot, from coming within distance of a temptation, or of a suspicion, is that whiteness, which God means, when he says, Thou art all fair my Love, and there is no spot in thee. Indifferent looking, equal and easy conversation, appliablenesse to wanton discourses, and notions, and motions, are the Devils single money, and many pieces of these make up an Adultery. As light a thing as a Spangle is, a Spangle is silver; and Leafe gold, that is blown away, is gold; and sand that hath no strength, no coherence, yet knits the building; so do approaches to sin, become sin, and fixe sin. To avoid these spots, is that whiteness that God loves in the soul. But there is a redness that God loves too; which is this Erubescence that we speak of; an aptness in the soul to blush, when any of these spots do fall upon it.
God is the universal Confessor, the general Penitentiary of all the world, and all die in the guilt of their sin, that go not to Confession to him. And there are sins of such weight to the soul, and such entangling, and perplexity to the conscience, in some circumstances of the sin, as that certainly a soul may receive much ease in such cases, by confessing it self to man. In this holy shamefastness, which we intend in this outward blushing of the face, the soul goes to confession too. And it is one of the principal arguments against Confessions by Letter, (which some went about to set up in the Roman Church) that that took away one of the greatest evidences, and testimonies of their repentance, which is this Erubescence, this blushing, this shame after sin; if they should not be put to speak it face to face, but to write it, that would remove the shame, which is a part of the repentance. But that soul that goes not to confession to it self, that hath not an internal blushing after a sin committed, is a pale soul, even in the paleness of death, and senselessness, and a red soul, red in the defiance of God. And that whiteness, to avoid approaches to sin, and that redness, to blush upon a sin, which does attempt us, is the complexion of the soul, which God loves, and which the Holy Ghost testifies, when he says, My Beloved is white and ruddy. And when these men that David speaks of here, had lost that whiteness, their innocence, for David to wish that they might come to a redness, a shame, a blushing, a remorse, a sense of sin, may have been no such great malediction, or imprecation in the mouth of David, but that a man may wish it to his best friend, which should be his own soul, and say, Erubescam, not let mine enemies, but let me be ashamed with such a shame.
In the second word, Let them be sore vexed, he wishes his enemies no worse then himself had been: For he had used the same word of himself before, Ossa turbata, My bones are vexed, and Anima turbata, My soul is vexed; and considering, that David had found this vexation to be his way to God, it was no malicious imprecation, to wish that enemy the same Physic that he had taken, who was more sick of the same disease then he was. For this is like a troubled Sea after a tempest; the danger is past, but yet the billow is great still: The danger was in the calm, in the security, or in the tempest, by mis-interpreting God's corrections to our obduration, and to a remorseless stupefaction; but when a man is come to this holy vexation, to be troubled, to be shaken with a sense of the indignation of God, the storm is past, and the indignation of God is blown over. That soul is in a fair and near way, of being restored to a calmness, and to reposed security of conscience, that is come to this holy vexation.
In a flat Map, there goes no more, to make West East, though they be distant in an extremity, but to paste that flat Map upon a round body, and then West and East are all one. In a flat soul, in a dejected conscience, in a troubled spirit, there goes no more to the making of that trouble, peace, then to apply that trouble to the body of the Merits, to the body of the Gospel of Christ Jesus, and conform thee to him, and thy West is East, thy Trouble of spirit is Tranquillity of spirit. The name of Christ is Oriens, The East; And yet Lucifer himself is called Filius Orientis, The Son of the East. If thou beest fallen by Lucifer, fallen to Lucifer, and not fallen as Lucifer, to a senselessness of thy fall, and an impenitiblenesse therein, but to a troubled spirit, still thy Prospect is the East, still thy Climate is heaven, still thy Haven is Jerusalem; for, in our lowest dejection of all, even in the dust of the grave, we are so composed, so laid down, as that we look to the East; If I could believe that Trajan, or Tecla, could look East-ward, that is, towards Christ, in hell, I could believe with them of Rome, that Trajan and Tecla were redeemed by prayer out of hell. God had accepted sacrifices before; but no sacrifice is call Odor quiet is, It is not said, That God smelt a savor of rest, in any sacrifice, but that which Noah offered, after he had been variously tossed and tumbled, in the long hulling of the Ark upon the waters. A troublesome spirit, and a quiet spirit, are far asunder; But a troubled spirit, and a quiet spirit, are near neighbors. And therefore David means them no great harm, when he says, Let them be troubled; For, Let the wind be as high as it will, so I sail before the wind, Let the trouble of my soul be as great as it will, so it direct me upon God, and I have calm enough.
And this peace, this calm is implied in the next word, Convertantur, which is not, Let them be overthrown, but Let them return, let them be forced to return; he prays, that God would do something to cross their purposes; because as they are against God, so they are against their own souls. In that way where they are, he sees there is no remedy; and therefore he desires that they might be Turned into another way; What is that way? This. Turn us O Lord, and we shall be turned; That is, turned the right way; Towards God. And as there was a promise from God, to hear his people, not only when they came to him in the Temple, but when they turned towards that Temple, in what distance soever they were, so it is always accompanied with a blessing, occasionally to turn towards God; But this prayer, Turn us, that we may be turned, is, that we may be, that is, remain turned, that we may continue fixed in that posture. Lots Wife turned her self, and remained an everlasting monument of God's anger; God so turn us always into right ways, as that we be not able to turn ourselves out of them. For God hath Viam rectam, & bonam, as himself speaks in the Prophet, A right way, and then a good way, which yet is not the right way, that is, not the way which God of himself would go. For his right way is, that we should still keep in his way; His good way is, to beat us into his right way again, by his medicinal corrections, when we put ourselves out of his right way. And that, and that only David wishes, and we wish, That you may Turn, and Be turned; stand in that holy posture, all the year, all the years of your lives, That your Christmas may be as holy as your Easter, even your Recreations as innocent as your Devotions, and every room in the house as free free from profaneness as the Sanctuary. And this he ends as he begun, with another Erubescant, Let them be ashamed, and that Valde volociter, Suddenly: for David saw, that if a sinner came not to a shame of sin quickly, he would quickly come to a shamelesnesse, to an impudence, to a searednesse, to an obduration in it.
Now beloved, this is the worst curse that comes out of a holy man's mouth, even towards his enemy, that God would correct him to his amendment. And this is the worst harm that we mean to you, when we denounce the judgments of God against sin and sinners, Vt erubescatis, that we might see blood in your faces, the blood of your Savior working in that shame for sin. That that question of the Prophet might not confound you, Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? nay, they were not ashamed; Erubescere nesciebāt, they were never used to shame, they knew not how to be ashamed. Therefore, says he, they shall fall amongst them that fall, they shall do as the world does, sin as their neighbors sin, and fall as they fall, irrepentantly here, and hereafter irrecoverably. And then, Vt conturbati sitis, that you may be troubled in your hearts, and not cry Peace, Peace, where there is no peace, and flatter yourselves, because you are in a true Religion, and in the right way; for a Child may drown in a Font, and a Man may be poisoned in the Sacrament, much more perish, though in a true Church. And also Vt revertamini, that you may return again to the Lord, return to that state of pureness, which God gave you in Baptism, to that state, which God gave you the last time you received his body and blood so as became you. And then lastly, Vt erubescatis velociter, that you may come to the beginning of this, and to all this quickly, and not to defer it, because God defers the judgment. For to end this with S. Augustine's words, upon this word Velociter, Quandocun{que} venit, celerrime venit, quod desperatur esse venturum: How late soever it come, that comes quickly, if it come at all, which we believed would never come. How long soever it be, before that judgment come, yet it comes quickly, if it come before thou look for it, or be ready for it. Whosoever labors to sleep out the thought of that day, His damnation sleepeth not, says the Apostle. It is not only, that his damnation is not dead, that there shall never be any such day, but that it is no day asleep: every midnight shall be a day of judgment to him, and keep him awake; and when consternation, and lassitude lend him, or conterfait to him a sleep, as S. Basil says of the righteous, Etiam somnia justorum preces sunt, That even their Dreams are prayers, so this incorrigible sinners Dreams shall be, not only presages of his future, but acts of his present condemnation.
SERM. LVI. Preached upon the Penitentiall Psalms.
PSAL. 32.1, 2.
Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered; Blessed is the man, unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.
T His that I have read to you, can scarce be called all the Text; I proposed for the Text, the first and second verses, and there belongs more to the first, then I have delivered in it; for, in all those Translators, and Expositors, who apply themselves exactly to the Original, to the Hebrew, the Title of the Psalm, is part of the first verse of the Psalm. S. Augustine gives somewhat a strange reason, why the Book of Enoch, cited by S. Jude in his Epistle, and some other such ancient Books, as that, were never received into the body of Canonical Scriptures, Vt in Authoritate apud nos non essent, nimia fecit eorum Antiquitas, The Church suspected them, because they were too Ancient, says S. Augustine. But that reason alone, is so far from being enough to exclude anything from being part of the Scriptures, as that we make it justly an argument, for the receiving the Titles of the Psalms into the Body of Canonical Scriptures, that they are as ancient as the Psalms themselves. So then the Title of this Psalm enters into our Text, as a part of the first verse. And the Title is Davidis Erudiens; where we need not insert (as our Translators in all languages and Editions have conceived a necessity to do) any word, for the clearing of the Text, more then is in the Text it self, (And therefore Tremellius hath inserted that word, An Ode of David, we, A Psalm of David, others, others) for the words themselves yield a perfect sense in themselves, Le David Maschil, is Davidis Erudiens, that is, Davidis Eruditio, David's Institution, David's Catechism; And so our Text, which is the first and second verse, taking in all the first verse, in all accounts, is now David's Catechism; Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven &c.
In these words, our parts shall be these; first, That so great a Master as David, proceeded by way of Catechism, of instruction in fundamental things, and Doctrines of edification. Secondly, That the foundation of this Building, the first lesson in this Art, the first letter in this Alphabet, is Blessedness; for, Primus actus voluntatis est Amor; Man is not man, till he have produced some acts of the faculties of that soul, that makes him man; till he understand something, and will something, Till he know, and till he would have something, he is no man; Now, The first Act of the will is love; and no man can love anything, but in the likeness, and in the notion of Happiness, of Blessedness, or of some degree thereof; and therefore David proposes that for the foundation of his Catechism, Blessedness; The Catechism of David, Blessed is the Man. But then, in a third Consideration, we lay hold upon S. Augustine's Aphorism, Amare nisi nota non possumus, We cannot truly love anything, but that we know; And therefore David being to proceed Catechistically, and for Instruction, proposes this Blessedness, which as it is in Heaven, and reserved for our possession there, is in-intelligible, (as Tertullian speaks) inconceivable, he purposes it in such notions, and by such lights, as may enable us to see it, and know it in this life. And those lights are in this Text, Three; for, The forgiveness of Transgressions, And then, The Covering of sins, And lastly, The not imputing of Iniquity, which three David proposes here, are not a threefold repeating of one and the same thing; But this Blessedness consisting in our Reconciliation to God, (for we were created in a state of friendship with God, our rebellion put us into a state of hostility, and now we need a Reconciliation, because we are not able to maintain a war against God, no, nor against any other enemy of man, without God) this Blessedness David doth not deliver us all at once, in three expressings of the same thing, but he gives us one light thereof, in the knowledge that there is a Forgiving of Transgressions, another, in the Covering of sins, and a third, in the not Imputing of Iniquity. But then, (that which will constitute a fourth Consideration) when God hath presented himself, and offered his peace, in all these, there is also something to be done on our part; for though the Forgiving of Transgression, The Covering of sin, The not Imputing of Iniquity, proceed only from God, yet God affords these to none but him, In whose spirit there is no guile. And so you have all that belongs to the Master, and his manner of teaching, David Catechising; And all that belongs to the Doctrine and the Catechism, Blessedness, That is Reconciliation to God, notified in those three acts of his mercy; And all that belongs to the Disciple, that is to be Catechized, A docile, an humble, a sincere heart, In whose spirit there is no guile; And to these particulars, in their order thus proposed, we shall now pass.
That then which constitutes our first part, is this, That David, then whom this world never had a greater Master for the next, amongst the sons of men, delivers himself, by way of Catechising, of fundamental and easy teaching. As we say justly, and confidently, That of all Rhetorical and Poetical figures, that fall into any Art, we are able to produce higher strains, and livelier examples, out of the Scriptures, then out of all the Orators, and Poets in the world, yet we read not, we preach not the Scriptures for that use, to magnify their Eloquence; So in David's Psalms we find abundant impressions, and testimonies of his knowledge in all arts, and all kinds of learning, but that is not it which he proposes to us. David's last words are, and in that David's holy glory was placed, That he was not only the sweet Psalmist, That he had an harmonious, a melodious, a charming, a powerful way of entering into the soul, and working upon the affections of men, but he was the sweet Psalmist of Israel, He employed his faculties for the conveying of the God of Israel, into the Israel of God; The spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue; Not the spirit of Rhetoric, nor the spirit of Poetry, nor the spirit of Mathematiques, and Demonstration, But, The spirit of the Lord, the Rock of Israel spake by me, says he; He boasts not that he had delivered himself in strong, or deep, or mysterious Arts, that was not his Rock; but his Rock was the Rock of Israel, His way was to establish the Church of God upon fundamental Doctrines. Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, says Stephen. Likely to be so, because being adopted by the Kings daughter, he had an extraordinary education; And likely also, because he brought so good natural faculties, for his Masters to work upon, Vt Reminisci potiùs videretur, quàm discere, That whatsoever any Master proposed unto him, he rather seemed to remember it then, then to learn it but then; And yet in Moses books, we meet no great testimonies, or deep impressions of these learnings in Moses: He had (as S. Ambrose notes well) more occasions to speak of Natural philosophy, in the Creation of the world, and of the more secret, and reserved, and remote corners of Nature, in those counterfeitings of Miracles in Pharaohs Court, then he hath laid hold of. So Nebuchadnezzar appointed his Officers, that they should furnish his Court, with some young Gentlemen, of good blood and families of the Jews; And (as it is added there) well favored youths, in whom there was no blemish, skillful in all wisdom, and cunning in knowledge, and understanding science; And then farther, To be taught the tongue, and the learning of the Chaldeans. And Daniel was one of these, and, no doubt, a great Proficient in all these; and yet Daniel seems not to make any great show of these learnings in his writings. S. Paul was in a higher Pedagogy, and another manner of University then all this; Caught up into the third heavens, into Paradise, as he says; and there he learnt much; but (as he says too) such things as it was not lawful to utter; That is, It fell not within the laws of preaching to publish them. So that not only some learning in humanity, (as in Moses and Daniel's case) but some points of Divinity, (as in S. Paul's case) may be unfit to be preached. Not that a Divine should be ignorant of either; either ornaments of human, or mysteries of divine knowledge. For, says S. Augustine, Every man that comes from Egypt, must bring some of the Egyptians goods with him. Quanto auro exivit suffarcinatus Cyprianus, says he, How much of the Egyptian gold and goods brought Cyprian, and Lactantius, and Optatus, and Hilary out of Egypt? That is, what a treasure of learning, gathered when they were of the Gentiles, brought they from thence, to the advancing of Christianity, when they applied themselves to it? S. Augustine confesses, that the reading of Cicero's Hortensius, Mutavit affectum meum, began in him a Conversion from the world, Et ad teipsum, Domine, mutavit preces meas, That book, says he, converted me to more fervent prayers to thee, my God; Et surgere jam coeperam ut ad te redirem, By that help I rose, and came towards thee. And so Justin Martyr had his Initiation, and beginning of his Conversion, from reading some passages in Plato. S. Basil expresses it well; They that will die a perfect color, dip it in some less perfect color before. To be a good Divine, requires human knowledge; and so does it of all the Mysteries of Divinity too; because, as there are Devils that will not be cast out but by Fasting and Prayer, so there are humors that undervalue men, that lack these helps. But our Congregations are not made of such persons; not of mere natural men, that must be converted out of Aristotle, and by Cicero's words, nor of Arians that require new proofs for the Trinity, nor Pelagians that must be pressed with new discoveries of God's Predestination; but persons embracing, with a thankful acquiescence therein, Doctrines necessary for the salvation of their souls in the world to come, and the exaltation of their Devotion in this. This way David calls his, a Catechism. And let not the greatest Doctor think it unworthy of him to Catechize thus, nor the learnedest hearer to be thus catechized; Christ enwraps the greatest Doctors in his Person, and in his practice, when he says, Sinite parvulos, Suffer little children to come unto me; and we do not suffer them to come unto us, if when they come, we do not speak to their understanding, and to their edification, for that is but an absent presence, when they hear, and profit not; And Christ enwraps the learnedest hearers, in the persons of his own Disciples, when he says, Except ye become as these little children, ye cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven; Except you nourish yourselves with Catechisticall, and Fundamental Doctrines, you are not in a wholesome diet. Now in this Catechism, the first stone that David lays, (and that that supports all) the first object that David presents, (and that that directs to all) is Blessedness; David's Catechism; Blessed is the man.
Philosophers could never bring us to the knowledge, what this Summum bonum, this Happiness, this Blessedness was. For they considered only some particular fruits thereof; and it is much easier, how high soever a tree be, to come to a taste of some of the fruits, then to dignity to the root of that tree: They satisfied themselves with a little taste of Health, and Pleasure, and Riches, and Honor, and never considered that all these must have their root in heaven, and must have a relation to Christ Jesus, who is the root of all. And as these Philosophers could never tell us, what this blessedness was, so Divines themselves, and those who are best exercised in the language of the Holy Ghost, the Original tongue of this Text, cannot give us a clear Grammatical understanding, of this first word, in which David expresses this Blessedness, Ashrei, which is here Translated Blessed. They cannot tell, whether it be an Adverb, (And then it is Bene viro, Well is it for that man, A pathetique, a vehement acclamation, Happily, Blessedly is that man provided for) Or whether it be a Plural Noun, (and then it is Beatitudines, such a Blessedness as includes many, all blessednesses in it) And one of these two it must necessarily be in the Rules of their Construction; That either David enters with an Admiration, O how happily is that man provided for! Or with a Protestation, That there is no particular Blessedness, which that man wants, that hath this, This Reconciliation to God.
Eusebius observes out of Plato, that he enjoined the Poets, and the Writers in his State, to describe no man to be happy, but the good men; none to be miserable, but the wicked. And his Scholar Aristotle enters into his Book of Ethiques, and Moral Doctrine, with that Contemplation first of all, That every man hath naturally a disposition to affect, and desire happiness. David who is elder then they, begins his Book of Psalms so; The first word of the first Psalm, is the first word of this Text, Blessed is the man. He comprehends all that belongs to man's knowledge, and all that belongs to man's practice, in those two, first in understanding true Blessedness, and then, in praising God for it: David's Alpha is Beatus vir, O the Blessedness of righteous men! And David's Omega is Laudate Dominum, O that men would therefore bless the Lord! And therefore, as he begins this Book with God's blessing of man, so he ends it with man's praising of God: For, where the last stroke upon this Psaltery, the last verse of the last Psalm, is, Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord, Yet he adds one note more to us in particular, Praise ye the Lord; and there is the end of all. And so also our Savior Christ himself, in his own preaching, observed that Method; He begun his great Sermon in the Mount with that, Blessed are the poor inspirit, Blessed are they that mourn, Blessed are the pure in heart; Blessedness alone was an abundant recompense for all. And so the subject of John Baptists Commission before, and of his Disciples Commission after, was still the same, to preach this Blessedness, That the Kingdom of God, that is, Reconciliation to God in his Visible Church, was at hand, was forthwith to be established amongst them.
Though then the Consummation of this Blessedness be that Visio Dei, That sight of God, which in our glorified state we shall have in heaven, yet, because there is an inchoation thereof in this world, which is that which we call Reconciliation, it behooves us to consider the disposition requisite for that. It is a lamentable perverseness in us, that we are so contentiously busy, in inquiring into the Nature, and Essence, and Attributes of God, things which are reserved to our end, when we shall know at once, and without study, all that, of which all our lives study can teach us nothing; And that here, where we are upon the way, we are so negligent and lazy, in inquiring of things, which belong to the way. Those things we learn in no School so well as in adversity. As the body of man, and consequently health, is best understood, and best advanced by Dissections, and Anatomies, when the hand and knife of the Surgeon hath passed upon every part of the body, and laid it open: so when the hand and sword of God hath pierced our soul, we are brought to a better knowledge of ourselves, then any degree of prosperity would have raised us to.
All creatures were brought to Adam, and, because he understood the natures of all those creatures, he gave them names accordingly. In that he gave no name to himself, it may be by some perhaps argued, that he understood himself less then he did other creatures. If Adam be our example, in the time and School of nature, how hard a thing the knowledge of ourselves is, till we feel the direction of adversity, David is also another example in the time of the Law, who first said in his prosperity, He should never be moved; But, When, says he, Thou hidest thy face from me, I was troubled, and then I cried unto thee O Lord, and I prayed unto my God; Then; but not till then. The same Art, the same Grammar lasts still; and Peter is an example of the same Rule, in the time of grace, who was at first so confident, as to come to that, Si omnes scandalizati, if all forsook him, Si mori oportuit, If he must die with him, or die for him, he was ready, and yet without any terror from an armed Magistrate, without any surprisal of a subtle Examiner, upon the question of a poor Maid he denied his Master: But then, the bitterness of his soul taught him another temper, and moderation; when Christ asked him after, Amas me? Lovest thou me? not to pronounce upon an infallible confidence, I have loved, and I do, and I will do till death, but, Domine tu scis, Lord thou knowest that I love thee; My love to thee is but the effect of thy love to me, and therefore Lord continue thine, that mine may continue. No study is so necessary as to know ourselves; no School-master is so diligent, so vigilant, so assiduous, as Adversity: And the end of knowing ourselves, is to know how we are disposed for that which is our end, that is this Blessedness; which, though it be well collected and summed by S. Augustine, Beatus qui habet quicquid vult, & nihil mali vult, He only is blessed, that desires nothing but that which is good for him, and hath all that, we must pursue, in those particulars, which here, in David's Catechism, constitute this Blessedness, and constitute our third Part, and are delivered in three Branches, first, The forgiving of our transgressions, And then, The covering of our sins, And thirdly, The not imputing of our iniquities.
First then, that in this third Part, we may see in the first Branch, the first notification of this Blessedness, we consider the two terms, in which it is expressed, what this is, which is translated Transgression, and then what this Forgiving imports. The Original word is Pashang, and that signifies sin in all extensions, The highest, the deepest, the weightiest sin; It is a malicious, and a forcible opposition to God: It is when this Herod, and this Pilate (this Body, and this soul of ours) are made friends and agreed, that they may concur to the Crucifying of Christ. When not only the members of our bodies, but the faculties of our soul, our will and understanding are bent upon sin: when we do not only sin strongly, and hungerly, and thirstily, (which appertain to the body) but we sin rationally, we find reasons, (and those reasons, even in God's long patience) why we should sin: We sin wittily, we invent new sins, and we think it an ignorant, a dull, and an unsociable thing, not to sin; yea we sin wisely, and make our sin, our way to preferment. Then is this word used by the Holy Ghost, when he expresses both the vehemence, and the weight, and the largeness, and the continuance, all extensions, all dimensions of the sins of Damascus; Thus saith the Lord, for three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn to it, because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of Iron; So then, we consider sin here, not as a stain, such as Original sin may be, nor as a wound, such as every actual sin may be, but as a burden, a complication, a packing up of many sins, in an habitual practice thereof. This is that weight that sunk the whole world under water, in the first flood, and shall press down the fire it self, to consume it a second time. It is a weight that stupifies and benums him that bears it, so, as that the sinner feels not the oppression of his own sins; Et quid miserius miscro non miserante seipsum? What misery can be greater, then when a miserable man hath not sense to commiserate his own misery? Our first errors are out of Levity, and S. Augustine hath taught us a proper ballast and weight for that, Amor Dei pondus animae, The love of God would carry us evenly, and steadily, if we would embarke that: But as in great tradings, they come to ballast with Merchandise, ballast and freight is all one, so in this habitual sinner, all is sin, plots and preparations before the act, gladness and glory in the act, sometimes disguises, sometimes justifications after the act, make up one body, one freight of sin. So then Transgression in this place, in the natural signification of the word, is a weight, a burden, and carrying it, as the word requires, to the greatest extension, it is the sin of the whole World; And that sin is forgiven; which is the second Terme.
The Prophet does not say here, Blessed is that man that hath no transgression, for that were to say, Blessed is that man that is no man. All people, all Nations, did ever in Nature acknowledge not only a guiltiness of sin, but some means of reconciliation to their God's in the Remission of sins: for they had all some formal, and Ceremonial Sacrifices, and Expiations, and Lustrations, by which they thought their sins to be purged, and washed away. Whosoever acknowledges a God, acknowledges a Remission of sins, and whosoever acknowledges a Remission of sins, acknowledges a God. And therefore in this first place, David does not mention God at all; he does not say, Blessed is he whose transgression the Lord hath forgiven; for he presumes it to be an impossible temptation to take hold of any man, that there can be any Remission of sin, from any other person, or by any other means, then from and by God himself; and therefore Remission of sins includes an Act of God; But what kind of Act, is more particularly designed in the Original word, which is Nasa, then our word, forgiving, reaches to; for the word does not only signify Auferre, but ferre; not only to take away sin, by way of pardon, but to take the sin upon himself, and so to bear the sin, and the punishment of the sin, in his own person. And so Christ is the Lamb of God, Qui tollit, not only that takes away, but that takes upon himself, the sins of the world. Tulit, portavit, Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; Those griefs, those sorrows which we should, he hath borne, and carried in his own person. So that, as it is all one, never to have come in debt, and to have discharged the debt; So the whole world, all mankind, considered in Christ, is as innocent as if Adam had never sinned. And so this is the first beam of Blessedness that shines upon my soul, That I believe that the justice of God is fully satisfied in the death of Christ, and that there is enough given, and accepted in the treasure of his blood, for the Remission of all Transgressions. And then the second beam of this Blessedness, is in The covering of sins.
Now to benefit ourselves by this part of David's Catechism, we must (as we did before) consider the two terms, of which this part of this Blessedness consists, sin, and covering. Sin in this place is not so heavy a word, as Transgression was in the former; for that was sin in all extensions, sin in all forms, all sin of all men, of all times, of all places, the sin of all the world upon the shoulders of the Savior of the world. In this place, (the word is Catah, and by the derivation thereof from Nata, which is to Decline, to step aside, or to be withdrawn, and Kut, which is filum, a thread, or a line) that which we call sin here, signifies Transilire lineam, To depart, or by any temptation to be withdrawn from the direct duties, and the exact straightness which is required of us in this world, for the attaining of the next: So that the word imports sins of infirmity, such sins as do fall upon God's best servants, such sins as rather induce a cofession of our weakness, and an acknowledgement of our continual need of pardon for something passed, and strength against future invasions, then that induce any devastation, or obduration of the conscience, which, Transgression, in the former branch implied. For so this word, Catah, hath that signification (as in many other places) there, where it is said, That there were seven hundred left-handed Benjamits, which would sling stones at a hairs breadth, and not fail; that is, not miss the mark a hairs breadth. And therefore when this word Catah, sin, is used in Scripture, to express any weighty, heinous, enormous sin, it hath an addition, Peccatum magnum peccaverunt, says Moses, when the people were become Idolaters, These people have sinned a great sin; otherwise it signifies such sin, as destroys not the foundation, such as in the nature thereof, does not wholly extinguish Grace, nor grieve the Spirit of God in us. And such sins God covers, says David here. Now what is his way of covering these sins?
As Sin in this notion, is not so deep a wound upon God, as Transgression in the other, so Covering here extends not so far, as Forgiving did there. There forgiving was a taking away of sin, by taking that way, That Christ should bear all our sins, it was a suffering, a dying, it was a penal part, and a part of God's justice, executed upon his one and only Son; here it is a part of God's mercy, in spreading, and applying the merits and satisfaction of Christ, upon all them, whom God by the Holy Ghost hath gathered in the profession of Christ, and so called to the apprehending and embracing of this mantle, this garment, this covering, the righteousness of Christ in the Christian Christ; In which Church, and by his visible Ordinances therein, the Word, and Sacraments, God covers, hides, conceals, even from the inquisition of his own justice, those smaller sins, which his servants commit, and does not turn them out of his service, for those sins. So the word (the word is Casah, which we translate Covering ) is used, A wise man concealeth knowledge; that is, Does not pretend to know so much as indeed he does: So, our merciful God, when he sees us under this mantle, this covering, Christ spread upon his Church, conceals his knowledge of our sins, and suffers them not to reflect upon our consciences, in a consternation thereof. So then, as the Forgiving was Auferre ferendo, a taking away of sin, by taking all sin upon his own person, So this Covering is Tegere attingendo, To cover sin, by coming to it, by applying himself to our sinful consciences, in the means instituted by him in his Church: for they have in that language another word, Sacac, which signifies Tegere obumbrando, To cover by overshadowing, by refreshing. This is Tegere obumbrando, To cover by shadowing, when I defend mine eye from the offense of the Sun, by interposing my hand between the Sun and mine eye, at this distance, a far off: But Tegere attingendo, is when thus I lay my hand upon mine eye, and cover it close, by that touching. In the knowledge that Christ hath taken all the sins of all the world upon himself, that there is enough done for the salvation of all mankind, I have a shadowing, a refreshing; But because I can have no testimony, that this general redemption belongs to me, who am still a sinner, except there pass some act between God and me, some seal, some investiture, some acquittance of my debts, my sins, therefore this second beam of David's Blessedness, in this his Catechism, shines upon me in this, That God hath not only sowed and planted herbs, and Simples in the world, medicinal for all diseases of the world, but God hath gathered, and prepared those Simples, and presented them, so prepared, to me, for my recovery from my disease: God hath not only received a full satisfaction for all sin in Christ, but Christ, in his Ordinances in his Church, offers me an application of all that for myself, and covers my sin, from the eye of his Father, not only obumbrando, as he hath spread himself as a Cloud refreshing the whole World, in the value of the satisfaction, but Attingendo, by coming to me, by spreading himself upon me, as the Prophet did upon the dead Child, Mouth to mouth, Hand to hand; In the mouth of his Minister, he speaks to me; In the hand of the Minister, he delivers himself to me; and so by these visible acts, and seals of my Reconciliation, Tegit attingendo, He covers me by touching me; He touches my conscience, with a sense and remorse of my sins, in his Word; and he touches my soul, with a faith of having received him, and all the benefit of his Death, in the Sacrament. And so he covers sin; that is, keeps our sins of infirmity, and all such sins, as do not in their nature quench the light of his grace, from coming into his Fathers presence, or calling for vengeance there. Forgiving of transgressions is the general satisfaction for all the world, and restoring the world to a possibility of salvation in the Death of Christ; Covering of sin, is the benefit of discharging and easing the conscience, by those blessed helps which God hath afforded to those, whom he hath gathered in the bosom, and quickened in the womb of the Christian Church. And this is the second beam of Blessedness, cast out by David here; and then the third is, The not imputing of iniquity, Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity.
In this also, (as in the two former we did) we consider this Imputing, and then this Iniquity, in the root and Original signification of the two words. When in this place the Lord is said, not to impute sin, it is meant, That the Lord shall not suffer me to impute sin to myself. The word is Cashab, and Cashab imports such a thinking, such a surmising, as may be subject to error, and mistaking. To that purpose we find the word, where Hannah was praying, and Eli the Priest, who saw her lips move, and heard no prayer come from her, thought she had been drunk, Imputed drunkenness unto her, and said, How long wilt thou be drunk? put away thy wine: So that this Imputing, is such an Imputing of ours as may be erroneous, that is, an Imputing from ourselves, in a diffidence, and jealousy, and suspicion of God's goodness towards us. To which purpose, we consider also, that this word, which we translate here Iniquity, Gnavah, is oftentimes in the Scripture used for punishment, as well as for sin: and so indifferently for both, as that if we will compare Translation with Translation, and Exposition with Exposition, it will be hard for us to say, whether Cain said, Mine iniquity is greater then can be pardoned, or, My punishment is greater then I can bear; and our last Translation, which seems to have been most careful of the Original, takes it rather so, My punishment, in the Text, and lays the other, My sin, aside in the Margin. So then, this Imputing, being an Imputing which arises from ourselves, and so may be accompanied with error, and mistaking, that we Impute that to ourselves, which God doth not impute, And this mis-imputing of God's anger to ourselves, arising out of his punishments, and his corrections inflicted upon us, That because we have crosses in the world, we cannot believe, that we stand well in the sight of God, or that the forgiving of Transgressions, or Covering of sins appertains unto us, we justly conceive, that this not Imputing of Iniquity, is that Serenitas Conscientiae, That brightness, that clearness, that peace, and tranquility, that calm and serenity, that acquiescence, and security of the Conscience, in which I am delivered from all scruples, and all timorousness, that my Transgressions are not forgiven, or my sins not covered. In the first Act, we consider God the Father to have wrought; He proposed, he decreed, he accepted too a sacrifice for all mankind in the death of Christ. In the second, The Covering of sins, we consider God the Son to work, Incubare Ecclesiae, He sits upon his Church, as a Hen upon her Eggs, He covers all our sins, whom he hath gathered into that body, with spreading himself and his merits upon us all there. In this third, The not Imputing of Iniquity, we consider God the Holy Ghost to work, and, as the Spirit of Consolation, to blow away all scruples, all diffidences, and to establish an assurance in the Conscience. The Lord imputes not, that is, the Spirit of the Lord, The Lord the Spirit, The Holy Ghost, suffers not me to impute to myself those sins, which I have truly repented. The over-tenderness of a bruised and a faint conscience may impute sin to it self, when it is discharged; And a seared and obdurate Conscience may impute none, when it abounds; If the Holy Ghost work, he rectifies both; and, if God do inflict punishments, (according to the signification of this word Gnavah ) after our Repentance, and the seals of our Reconciliation, yet he suffers us not to impute those sins to ourselves, or to repute those corrections, punishments, as though he had not forgiven them, or, as though he came to an execution after a pardon, but that they are laid upon us medicinally, and by way of prevention, and precaution against his future displeasure. This is that Pax Conscientiae, The peace of Conscience, when there is not one sword drawn: This is that Serenitas Conscientiae, The Meridionall brightness of the Conscience, when there is not one Cloud in our sky. I shall not hope, that Original sin shall not be imputed, but fear, that Actual sin may: not hope that my dumb sins shall not, but my crying sins may; not hope that my apparent sins, which have therefore induced in me a particular sense of them, shall not, but my secret sins, sins that I am not able to return and represent to mine own memory, may: for this Non Imputabit, hath no limitation; God shall suffer the Conscience thus rectified, to terrify it self with nothing; which is also farther extended in the Original, where it is not Non Imputat, but Non Imputabit; Though after all this we do fall into the same, or other sins, yet we shall know our way, and evermore have our Consolation in this, That as God hath forgiven our transgression, in taking the sins of all mankind upon himself, for he hath redeemed us, and left out Angels, And as he hath covered our sin, that is, provided us the Word, and Sacraments, and cast off the Jews, and left out the Heathen, So he will never Impute mine Iniquity, never suffer it to terrify my Conscience; Not now, when his Judgments, denounced by his Minister, call me to him here; Nor hereafter, when the last bell shall call me to him, into the grave; Nor at last, when the Angels Trumpets shall call me to him, from the dust, in the Resurrection. But that, as all mankind hath a Blessedness, in Christ's taking our sins, (which was the first Article in this Catechism) And all the Christian Church a Blessedness, in covering our sins, (which was the second) So I may find this Blessedness, in this work of the Holy Ghost, not to Impute, that is, not to suspect, that God imputes any repented sin unto me, or reserves anything to lay to my charge at the last day, which I have prayed may be, and therefore hoped hath been forgiven before. But then, after these three parts, which we have now, in our Order proposed at first, passed through, That David applies himself to us, in the most convenient way, by the way of Catechism, and instruction in fundamental things; And then, that he lays for his foundation of all Beatitude, Blessedness, Happiness, which cannot be had, in the consummation, and perfection thereof, but in the next world; But yet, in the third place, gives us an inchoation, an earnest, an evidence of this future and consummate Blessedness, in bringing us faithfully to believe, That Christ died sufficiently for all the world, That Christ offers the application of all this, to all the Christian Church, That the Holy Ghost seals an assurance thereof, to every particular Conscience well rectified; After all this done thus largely on God's part, there remains something to be done on ours, that may make all this effectual upon us, Vt non sit dolus in spiritu, That there be no guile in our spirit, which is our fourth part, and Conclusion of all.
Of all these fruits of this Blessedness, there is no other root but the goodness of God himself; but yet they grow in no other ground, then in that man, In cujus spiritu non est dolus. The Comment and interpretation of S. Paul, hath made the sense and meaning of this place clear: To him that worketh, the reward is of debt, but to him that believeth, and worketh not, his faith is counted for righteousness, Even as David describeth the blessedness of Man, says the Apostle there, and so proceeds with the very words of this Text. Doth the Apostle then, in this Text, exclude the Co-operation of Man? Differs this proposition, That the man in whom God imprints these beams of Blessedness, must be without guile in his spirit, from those other propositions, Si vis ingredi, If thou wilt enter into life, keep the Commandments; And, Maledictus qui non, Cursed is he that performs not all? Grows not the Blessedness of this Text, from the same root, as the Blessedness in the 119. Psal. ver. 1. Blessed are they, who walk in the way of the Lord? Or doth Saint Paul take David to speak of any other Blessedness in our Text, then himself speaks of, If through the Spirit ye mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live? Doth S. Paul require nothing, nothing out of this Text, to be done by man? Surely he does; And these propositions are truly all one, Tantùm credideris, Only believe, and you shall be saved; And, Fac hoc & vives, Do this, and you shall be saved; As it is truly all one purpose, to say, If you live you may walk, and to say, If you stretch out your legs, you may walk. To say, Eat of this Tree, and you shall recover, and to say, Eat of this fruit, and you shall recover, is all one; To attribute an action to the next Cause, or to the Cause of that Cause, is, to this purpose, all one. And therefore, as God gave a Reformation to his Church, in prospering that Doctrine, That Justification was by faith only: so God give an unity to his Church, in this Doctrine, That no man is justified, that works not; for, without works, how much soever he magnify his faith, there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile in his spirit.
As then the Prophet David's principal purpose in this Text, is, according to the Interpretation of S. Paul, to derive all the Blessedness of man from God: so is it also to put some conditions in man, comprehended in this, That there be no guile in his spirit. For, in this repentant sinner, that shall be partaker of these degrees of Blessedness, of this Forgiving, of this Covering, of this Not Imputing, there is required Integrapoenitentia, A perfect, and entire repentance; And to the making up of that, howsoever the words and terms may have been mis-used, and defamed, we acknowledge, that there belongs a Contrition, a Confession, and a Satisfaction; And all these (howsoever our Adversaries slander us, with a Doctrine of ease, and a Religion of liberty) we require with more exactness, and severity, then they do. For, for Contrition, we do not, we dare not say, as some of them, That Attrition is sufficient; that it is sufficient to have such a sorrow for sin, as a natural sense, and fear of torment doth imprint in us, without any motion of the fear of God: We know no measure of sorrow great enough for the violating of the infinite Majesty of God, by our transgression. And then for Confession, we deny not a necessity to confess to man; There may be many cases of scruple, of perplexity, where it were an exposing ourselves to farther occasions of sin, not to confess to man; And in Confession, we require a particular detestation of that sin which we confess, which they require not. And lastly, for Satisfaction, we embrace that Rule, Condigna satisfactio male facta corrigere, Our best Satisfaction is, to be better in the amendment of our lives: And dispositions to particular sins, we correct in our bodies by Discipline, and Mortifications; And we teach, that no man hath done truly that part of Repentance, which he is bound to do, if he have not given Satisfaction, that is, Restitution, to every person damnified by him. If that which we teach, for this entireness of Repentance, be practiced, in Contrition, and Confession, and Satisfaction, they cannot calumniate our Doctrine, nor our practice herein; And if it be not practiced, there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile in their spirit, that pretend to any part of this Blessedness, Forgiving, or Covering, or Not imputing, without this. For, he that is sorry for sin, only in Contemplation of hell, and not of the joys of heaven, that would not give over his sin, though there were no hell, rather then he would lose heaven, (which is that which some of them call Attrition) He that confesses his sin, but hath no purpose to leave it, He that does leave the sin, but being grown rich by that sin, retains, and enjoys those riches, this man is not entire in his Repentanne, but there is guile in his spirit.
He that is slothful in his work, is brother to him that is a great waster; He that makes half-repentances, makes none. Men run out of their estates, as well by a negligence, and a not taking account of their Officers, as by their own prodigality: Our salvation is as much endangered, if we call not our conscience to an examination, as if we repent not those sins, which offer themselves to our knowledge, and memory. And therefore David places the consummation of his victory in that, I have pursued mine enemies, and overtaken them, neither did I turn again, till they were consumed: We require a pursuing of the enemy, a search for the sin, and not to stay till an Officer, that is, a sickness, or any other calamity light upon that sin, and so bring it before us; We require an overtaking of the enemy, That we be not weary, in the search of our consciences; And we require a consuming of the enemy, not a weakening only; a dislodging, a dispossessing of the sin, and the profit of the sin; All the profit, and all the pleasure of all the body of sin; for he that is sorry with a godly sorrow, he that confesses with a deliberate detestation, he that satisfies with a full restitution for all his sins but one, Dolus in spiritu, There is guile in his spirit, & he is in no better case, then if at Sea he should stop all leaks but one, and perish by that. Si vis solvi, solve omnes catenas; If thou wilt be discharged, cancel all thy Bonds; one chain till that be broke, holds as fast as ten. And therefore suffer your consideration to turn back a little upon this object, that there may be Dolus in spiritu, Guile in the spirit, in our pretence to all those parts of Blessedness, which David recommends to us in this Catechism, In the Forgiveness of transgrestions, In the Covering of sin, In the Not imputing of iniquity.
First then, in this Forgiving of transgressions, which is our Savior Christ's taking away the sins of the world, by taking them, in the punishment due to them, upon himself, there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile in that man's spirit, that will so far abridge the great Volumes of the mercy of God, so far contract his general propositions, as to restrain this salvation, not only in the effect, but in God's own purpose, to a few, a very few souls. When Subjects complain of any Prince, that he is too merciful, there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile and deceit in this complaint; They do but think him too merciful to other men's faults; for, where they need his mercy for their own, they never think him too merciful. And which of us do not need God for all sins? If we did not in ourselves, yet it were a new sin in us, not to desire that God should be as merciful to every other sinner, as to ourselves. As in heaven, the joy of every soul shall be my joy, so the mercy of God to every soul here, is a mercy to my soul; By the extension of his mercies to others, I argue the application of his mercy to myself. This contracting, and abridging of the mercy of God, will end in despair of ourselves, that that mercy reaches not to us, or if we become confident, perchance presumptuous of ourselves, we shall despair in the behalf of other men, and think they can receive no mercy: And when men come to allow an impossibility of salvation in any, they will come to assign that impossibility, nay to assign those men, and pronounce, for this, and this sin, This man cannot be saved. There is a sin against the Holy Ghost; and to make us afraid of all approaches towards that sin, Christ hath told us, that that sin is irremissible, unpardonable; But since that sin includes impenitiblenesse in the way, and actual impenitence in the end, we can never pronounce, This is that sin, or This is that sinner. God is his Father that can say, Our Father which art in heaven, And his God that can say, I believe in God; And there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile in his spirit, the craft of the Serpent, (either the poison of the Serpent, in a self-despair, or the sting of the Serpent, in an uncharitable prejudging, and precondemning of others) when a man comes to suspect God's good purposes, or contract God's general propositions; for, this forgiving of transgressions, is Christ's taking away the sins of all the world, by taking all the sins of all men upon himself. And this Guile, this Deceit may also be in the second, in the Covering of sins, which is the particular application of this general mercy, by his Ordinances in his Church.
He then that without Guile will have benefit by this Covering, must Discover. Qui tegi vult peccata, detegat, is S. Augustine's way: He that will have his sins covered, let him uncover them; He that would not have them known, let him confess them; He that would have them forgotten, let him remember them; He that would bury them, let him rake them up. There is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed, and hid, that shall not be known. It is not thy sending away a servant, thy locking a door, thy blowing out a candle, no not though thou blow out, and extinguish the spirit, as much as thou canst, that hides a sin from God; but since thou thinkest that thou hast hid it, by the secret carriage thereof, thou must reveal it by Confession. If thou wilt not, God will show thee that he needed not thy Confession; He will take knowledge of it, to thy condemnation, and he will publish it to the knowledge of all the world, to thy confusion. Tufecisti abscondite. says God to David, by Nathan, Thou didst it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the Sun. Certainly it affects, and stings many men more, that God hath brought to light their particular sins and offenses, for which he does punish them, then all the punishments that he inflicts upon them; for then, they cannot lay their ruin upon fortune, upon vicissitudes, and revolutions, and changes of Court, upon disaffections of Princes, upon supplantations of Rivalls and Concurrents; but God clears all the world beside; Perditio tua ex te, God declares that the punishment is his Act, and the Cause, my sin. This is God's way; and this he expresses vehemently against Jerusalem, Behold, I will gather all thy Lovers, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated, and I will discover thy nakedness to all them. Those who loved us for pretended virtues, shall see how much they were deceived in us; Those that hated us, because they were able to look into us, and to discern our actions, shall then say Triumphantly, and publicly to all, Did not we tell you what would become of this man? It was never likely to be better with him. I will strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was borne; Howsoever thou wert covered with the Covenant, and taken into the Visible Church, howsoever thou wert clothed, by having put on Christ in Baptism, yet, If thou sin against me, (says God) and hide it from me, I am against thee, and I will show the Nations thy nakedness, and the Kingdoms thy shame.
To come to the covering of thy sins without guile, first cover them not from thyself, so, as that thou canst not see yester-days sin, for to days sin; nor the sins of thy youth, for thy present sins: Cover not thy extortions with magnifique buildings, and sumptuous furniture; Dung not the fields that thou hast purchased with the bodies of those miserable wretches, whom thou hast oppressed, neither straw thine alleys and walks with the dust of God's Saints, whom thy hard dealing hath ground to powder. There is but one good way of covering sins from ourselves, Si bona factamalis superponamus, If we come to a habit of good actions, contrary to those evils, which we had accustomed ourselves to, and cover our sins so; not that we forget the old, but that we see no new.
There is a good covering of sins from ourselves, by such new habits, and there is a good covering of them from other men; for, he that sins publicly, scandalously, avowedly, that teaches and encourages others to sin; That declares his sin as Sodom, and hides it not, As in a mirror, in a looking glass, that is compassed and set about with a hundred lesser glasses, a man shall see his deformities in a hundred places at once, so he that hath sinned thus shall feel his torments in himself, and in all those, whom the not covering of his sins hath occasioned to commit the same sins. Cover thy sins then from thyself, so it be not by obduration; cover them from others, so it be not by hypocrisy; But from God cover them not at all; He that covereth his sin, shall not prosper; but who so confesseth and forsaketh them, shall have mercy; Even in confessing, without forsaking, there is Dolus in spiritus, Guile and deceit in that spirit. Noluit agnoscere, maluit ignoscere, S. Augustine makes the case of a customary sinner; He was ready to pardon himself always without any confession; But God shall invert it to his subversion, Maluit agnoscere, noluit ignoscere, God shall manifest his sin, and not pardon it.
Sin hath that pride, that it is not content with one garment; Adam covered first with fig-leaves, then with whole trees, He hid himself amongst the trees: Then he covered his sin, with the woman; she provoked him: And then with God's action, Quam tu dedisti, The Woman whom thou gavest me; And this was Adams wardrobe. David covers his first sin of uncleanness with soft stuff, with deceit, with falsehood, with soft persuasions to Uriah, to go in to his Wife; Then he covers it with rich stuff, with scarlet, with the blood of Uriah, and of the army of the Lord of Hosts; And then he covers it with strong and durable stuff, with an impenitence, and with an insensibleness, a year together; too long for a King, too long for any man, to wear such a garment: And this was David's wardrobe. But beloved, sin is a serpent, and he that covers sin, does but keep it warm, that it may sting the more fiercely, and disperse the venom and malignity thereof the more effectually. Adam had patched up an apron to cover him; God took none of those leaves; God wrought not upon his beginnings, but he covered him all over with durable skins. God saw that David's several coverings did rather load him, then cover the sin, and therefore Transtulit, He took all away, sin, and covering: for the coverings were as great sins, as the radical sin, that was to be covered, was; yea greater; as the arms and boughs of a tree, are greater then the root. Now to this extension, and growth, and largeness of sin, no lesser covering serves then God in his Church. It was the prayer against them, who hindered the building of the Temple, Cover not their iniquity, neither let their sin be put out in thy presence. Our prayer is, Peccata nostra non videat, ut nos videat, Lord look not upon our sins, that thou mayest look upon us. And since amongst ourselves, it is the effect of Love, to cover Multitudinem peccatorum, The multitude of sins, yea to cover Vniversa delicta, Love covereth all sins, much more shall God, who is Love it self, cover our sins so, as he covered the Egyptians, in a red Sea, in the application of his blood, by visible means in his Church. That therefore thou mayest be capable of this covering, Commit thy ways unto the Lord; that is, show unto him, by way of confession, what wrong ways thou hast gone, and inquire of him by prayer, what ways thou art to go, and (as it is in the same Psalm) He shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noon day; And so there shall be no guile found in thy spirit, which might hinder this covering of thy sin, which is, the application of Christ's merits, in the Ordinances of his Church, nor the Not imputing of thine iniquity, which is our last consideration, and the conclusion of all.
This not imputing, is that serenity and acquiescence, which a rectified conscience enjoys, when the Spirit of God bears witness with my spirit, that, thus reconciled to my God, I am now guilty of nothing. S. Bernard defines the Conscience thus, Inseparabilis gloria, vel confusio uniuscujusque, pro qualitate depositi: It is that inseparable glory, or that inseparable confusion which every soul hath, according to that which is deposited, and laid up in it. Now what is deposited, and laid up in it? Naturally, hereditarily, patrimonially, Con-reatus, says that Father, from our first Parents, a fellow-guiltiness of their sin; and they have left us sons and heirs of the wrath and indignation of God, and that is the treasure they have laid up for us. Against this, God hath provided Baptism; and Baptism washes away that sin; for as we do nothing to ourselves in Baptism, but are therein merely passive, so neither did we anything ourselves in Original sin, but therein are merely passive too; and so the remedy, Baptism, is proportioned to the disease, Original sin. But original sin being thus washed away, we make a new stock, we take in a new depositum, a new treasure, Actual and habitual sins, and therein much being done by ourselves, against God, into the remedy, there must enter something to be done by ourselves, and something by God; And therefore we bring water to his wine, true tears of repentance to his true blood in the Sacrament, and so receive the seals of our reconciliation, and having done that, we may boldly say unto God, Do not condemn me: show me wherefore thou contendest with me. When we have said as he doth, I have sinned, what shall I do to thee? And have done that that he hath ordained, we may say also as he doth, O thou preserver of men, why dost thou not pardon my transgression, and take away mine iniquity? Why doest thou suffer me to faint and pant under this sad apprehension, that all is not yet well between my soul and thee? We are far from encouraging any man to antidate his pardon; to presume his pardon to be passed before it is: But when it is truly passed the seals of Reconciliation, there is Dolus in spiritu, Guile and deceit in that spirit, nay it is the spirit of falsehood and deceit it self, that will not suffer us to enjoy that pardon, which God hath sealed to us, but still maintain jealousies, and suspicion, between God and us. My heart is not opener to God, then the bowels of his mercy are to me; And to accuse myself of sin, after God hath pardoned me, were as great a contempt of God, as to presume of that pardon, before he had granted it; and so much a greater, as it is directed against his greatest attribute, his Mercy. Si apud Deum deponas injuriam, ipse ultor erit, Lay all the injuries that thou sufferest, at God's feet, and he will revenge them; Si damnum, ipse restituet; Lay all thy losses there, and he will repair them; Si dolorem, ipse medicus; Lay down all thy diseases there, and he shall heal thee; Si mortem, ipse resuscitator, Dye in his arms, and he shall breath a new life into thee; Add we to Tertullian: Si peccata, ipse sepeliet, lay thy sins in his wounds, and he shall bury them so deep, that only they shall never have resurrection: The Sun shall set, and have a to morrows resurrection; Herbs shall have a winter death, and a springs resurrection; Thy body shall have a long winters night, and then a resurrection; Only thy sins buried in the wounds of thy Savior, shall never have resurrection; And therefore take heed of that deceit in the spirit, of that spirit of deceit, that makes thee impute sins to thyself, when God imputes them not; But rejoice in God's general forgiving of Transgressions, That Christ hath died for all, multiply thy joy in the covering of thy sin, That Christ hath instituted a Church, in which that general pardon is made thine in particular, And exalt thy joy, in the not imputing of iniquity, in that serenity, that tranquility, that God shall receive thee, at thy last hour, in thy last Bath, the sweat of death, as lovingly, as acceptably, as innocently, as he received thee, from thy first Bath, the laver of Regeneration, the font in Baptism. Amen.
SERM. LVII. Preached upon the Penitentiall Psalms.
PSAL. 32.3, 4.
A LL ways of teaching, are Rule and Example: And though ordinarily the Rule be first placed, yet the Rule it self is made of Examples: And when a Rule would be of hard digestion to weak understandinge, Example concocts it, and makes it easy: for, Example in matter of Doctrine, is as Assimilation in matter of Nourishment; The Example makes that that is proposed for our learning and farther instruction, like something which we knew before, as Assimilation makes that meat, which we have received, and digested, like those parts, which are in our bodies before. David was the sweet singer of Israel; shall we say, God's Precentor? His son Solomon was the powerful Preacher of Israel; shall we say, God's Chaplain? Both of them, excellent, abundantly, super-abundantly excellent in both those ways of Teaching; Poet, and Preacher, proceed in these ways in both, Rule, and Example, the body and soul of Instruction. So this Psalm is qualified in the Title thereof, A Psalm of David giving Instruction. And having given his Instruction the first way, by Rule, in the two former verses, That Blessedness consisted in the Remission of sins, but that this Remission of sins was imparted to none, Cui dolus in spiritu, In whose spirit there was any deceit, he proceeds in this Text, to the other fundamental, and constitutive element of Instruction, Example; And by Example he shows, how far they are from that Blessedness, that consists in the Remission of sins, that proceed with any deceit in their spirit. And that way of Instruction, by Example, shall be our first Consideration; And our second, That he proposes himself for the Example, I kept silence, says he, and so My Bones waxed old, &c. And then, in a third part, we shall see, how far this holy Ingenuity goes, what he confesses of himself: And that third part will subdivide it self, and flow out into many branches. First, That it was he himself that was In doloso spiritu, In whose spirit there was deceit, Quia tacuit, because he held his tongue, because he disguised his sins, because he did not confess them. And yet, in the midst of this silence of his, God brought him Ad rugitum, to voices of Roaring, of Exclamation, to a sense of pain, and a sense of shame; so far he had a voice, but still he was in silence, for any matter of repentance. Secondly, he confesses the effect of this his silence, and this his Roaring, Inveteraverunt Ossa, My Bones waxed old, and, my moisture is turned into the drought of Summer. And then thirdly, he confesses the reason from whence this inveteration in his bones, and this incineration in his body proceeded, Quia aggravata manus, because the hand of God lay heavy upon him, heavy in the present weight, and heavy in the long continuation thereof, day and night. And lastly, all this he seals with that Selah, which you find at the end of the verse, which is a kind of Affidavit, of earnest asseveration, and re-affirming the same thing, a kind of Amen, and ratification to that which was said; Selah, truly, verily, thus it was with me, when I kept silence, and deceitfully smothered my sins, the hand of God lay heavy upon me, and as truly, as verily it will be no better with any man, that suffers himself to continue in that case.
First then, for the assistance, and the power, that example hath in Instruction, we see Christ's Method, Quid ab initio, how was it from the beginning; Do as hath been done before. We see God's method to Moses, for the Tabernacle, Look that thou make everything, after thy pattern, which was shown thee in the Mount; And for the Creation it self, we know God's method too; for though there were no world, that was elder brother to this world before, yet God in his own mind and purpose had produced, and lodged certain Idea's, and forms, and patterns of every piece of this world, and made them according to those pre-conceived forms, and Idea's. When we consider the ways of Instruction, as they are best pursued in the Scriptures, so are there no Books in the world, that do so abound with this comparative and exemplary way of teaching, as the Scriptures do; No Books, in which that word of Reference to other things, that Sicut is so often repeated, Do this, and do that, Sicut, so, as you see such and such things in Nature do; And Sicut, so as you find such and such men, in story, to have done. So David deals with God himself, he proposes him an Example; I ask no more favor at thy hands, for thy Church now, then thou hast afforded them heretofore, Do but unto these men now, Sicut Midianitis, as unto the Midianites, Sicut Siserae, as unto Sisera, as unto Jabin: Make their Nobles Sicut Oreb, like Oreb and like Zeb, and all their Princes Sicut Zebah, as Zebah and as Zalmana. For, these had been Examples of God's justice: And to be made Examples of God's anger, is the same thing, as to be a Malediction, a Curse. For, in that law of Jealousy, that bitter potion which the suspected woman was to take, was accompanied with this imprecation, The Lord make thee a Curse among the people; So we read it; But S. Jerome, In Exemplum, The Lord make thee an Example among the people; that is, deal with thee so, as posterity may be afraid, when it shall be said of any of them, Lord deal with this woman so, as thou didst with that Adulteress. And so the prayer of the people is upon Booz, Vt sit in Exemplum, (as S. Jerome also reads that place) The Lord make thee an Example of virtue in Ephratah, and in Bethlehem; that is, that God's people might propose him to themselves, conform themselves to him, and walk as he did. As on the other side, the anger of God is threatened so, God shall make thee Exemplum & stuporem, An Example and a Consternation; And Exemplum & derisum, An example and a scorn; That posterity, whensoever they should be threatened with God's Judgments, they might presently return to such Examples, and conclude, if our sins be to their Example, our Judgments will follow their Example too, a judgment accompanied with a consternation, a consternation aggravated with a scorn, we shall be a prey to our enemies, an astonishment to ourselves, a contempt to all the world; We do according to their Example, and according to their Example we shall suffer, is not a Conclusion of any Sorbon, nor a decision of any Rota, but the Logic of the universal University, Heaven it self. And so when the Prophet would be excused from undertaking the office of a Prophet, he says, Adam exemplum meum ab adolescentia, Adam hath been the example, that I have proposed to myself from my youth; As Adam did, so in the sweat of my brows, I also have eat my bread; I have kept Cattle; I have followed a Country life, and not made myself fit for the office and function of a Prophet, Adam hath been my Example from my youth. And when Solomon did not propose a Man, he proposed something else for his Example, an example he would have; He looked upon the ill husbands land, and he saw it over-grown, Et exemplo didici disciplinam, By that example I learnt to be wiser. Enter into the Armory, search the body and bowels of Story, for an answer to the question in Job, Quis periit, Who ever perished being Innocent, or where were the righteous cut off? There is not one example; nowhere; never. Answer but that out of Records, Quis restitit, Who hath hardened himself against the Lord, and prospered? Or that, Quis contradicet, If he cut off, who can hinder him? There is no Example; No man, by no means. So, if thou be tempted with over-valuing thine own purity, find an Example to answer that, Quis mundum, Who can bring a clean thing out of uncleanness? Or that, Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from sin? There is no Example; No man ever did it; No man can say it. If thou be tempted to worship God in an Image, be able to answer God something to that, To whom will ye liken God, or what likeness will ye compare unto him? There can be no example, no pattern to make God by: for, that were to make God a Copy, and the other, by which he were made, the Original. If thou have a temptation to withdraw thyself from the Discipline of that Church, in which God hath given thee thy Baptism, find an Example, to satisfy thy Conscience, and God's people, in what age, in what place, there was any such Church instituted, or any such Discipline practiced, as thou hast fancied to thyself. Believe nothing for which thou hast not a Rule; Do nothing for which thou hast not an Example; for there is not a more dangerous distemper in either Beliefe or Practice, then singularity; for there only may we justly call for Miracles, if men will present to us, and bind us to things that were never believed, never done before. David therefore, in this Psalm, his Psalm of Instruction, (as himself calls it) doth both; He lays down the Rule, he establishes it by Example, and that was our first Consideration, and we have done with that.
Our second is, That he goes not far for his Example; He labors not to show his reading, but his feeling; not his learning, but his compunction; his Conscience is his Library, and his Example is himself, and he does not unclaspe great Volumes, but unbutton his own breast, and from thence he takes it. Men that give Rules of Civil wisdom, and wise Conversation amongst men, use to say, that a wise man must never speak much of himself; It will argue, say they, a narrow understanding, that he knows little besides his own actions, or else that he overvalues his own actions, if he bring them much into Discourse. But the wise men that seek Christ, (for there were such wise men in the world once) Statesmen in the kingdom of heaven, they go upon other grounds, and, wheresoever they may find them, they seek such Examples, as may conduce most to the glory of God: And when they make themselves Examples, they do not rather choose themselves then others, but yet they do not spare, nor forbear themselves more then other men. David proposes his own Example, to his own shame, but to God's glory. For, David was one of those persons, Qui non potuit solus perire, He could not sin alone, his sin authorized sin in others: Princes and Prelates, are Doctrinal men, in this sense and acceptation, that the subject makes the Princes life his Doctrine; he learns his Catechism by the eye, he does what he sees done, and frames to himself Rules out of his Superiors Example. Therefore, for their Doctrine, David proposes truly his own Example, and without disguising, tells that of himself, which no man else could have told. Christ who could do nothing but well, proposes himself for an example of humility, I have given you an example; Whom? what? That you should do as I have done. So S. Paul instructs Titus, In all things show a pattern of good works; But whom? for Titus might have shown them many patterns; but Shew thyself a pattern, says the Apostle; and not only of assiduous, and laborious preaching, but of good works. And this is that, for which he recommends Timothy to the Church, He works the work of the Lord, And, not without a pattern, nor without that pattern, which S. Paul had given him in himself, He works so, as I also do. S. Paul, who had proposed Christ to himself to follow, might propose himself to others, and wish as he does, I would all men were even as myself. For, though that Apostle, by denying it in his own practice, seem to condemn it in all others, To preach ourselves, (We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord) yet to preach out of our own history, so far, as to declare to the Congregation, to what manifold sins we had formerly abandoned ourselves, how powerfully the Lord was pleased to reclaim us, how vigilantly he hath vouchsafed to preserve us from relapsing, to preach ourselves thus, to call up the Congregation, to hear what God hath done for my soul, is a blessed preaching of myself. And therefore Solomon does not speak of himself so much, nor so much propose and exhibit himself to the Church, in any Book, as in that which he calls the Preacher, Ecclesiastes: In that Book, he hides none of his own sins; none of those practices, which he had formerly used to hide his sins: He confesses things there, which none knew but himself, nor durst, nor should have published them of him, the King, if they had known them. So Solomon preaches himself to good purpose, and pours out his own soul in that Book. Which is one of the reasons which our Interpreters assign, why Solomon calls himself by this name, Ecclesiastes, Coheleth, which is a word of the Foeminine gender, and not Concionator, but Concionatrix, a She-preacher, because it is Anima Concionatrix, It is his soul that preaches, he pours out his own soul to the Congregation, in letting them know, how long the Lord let him run on in vanities, and vexation of spirit, and how powerfully and effectually he reclaimed him at last: For, from this Book, the Preacher, the she-Preacher, the soul-Preacher, Solomon preaching himself, rather her self, the Church raises convenient arguments (and the best that are raised) for the proof of the salvation of Solomon, of which divers doubted. And though Solomon in this Book speak divers things, not as his own opinion, but in the sense of worldly men, yet, as we have a note upon Plato's Dialogues, that though he do so too, yet whatsoever Plato says in the name and person of Socrates, that Plato always means for his own opinion, so whatsoever Solomon says in the name of the Preacher, (the Preacher says this, or says that) that is evermore Solomon's own saying. When the Preacher preaches himself, his own sins, and his own sense of God's Mercies, or Judgments upon him, as that is intended most for the glory of God, so it should be applied most by the hearer, for his own edification; for, he were a very ill natured man, that should think the worse of a Preacher, because he confesses himself to be worse then he knew him to be, before he confessed it. Therefore David thought it not enough, to have said to his Confessor, to Nathan in private, Peccavi, I have sinned; but here, before the face of the whole Church of God, even to the end of the world, (for so long these Records are to last) he proposes himself, for an Exemplary sinner, for a sinful Example, and for a subject of God's Indignation, whilst he remained so, When I kept silence, and yet roared, Thy hand lay heavy upon me, and my moisture was turned into the drought of Summer. And so we are come to our third Part, He teaches by Example; He proposes himself for the Example; and of himself he confesses those particulars, which constitute our Text.
Three things he confesses in this Example. First, that it was he himself that was in doloso spiritu, that had deceit in his spirit, Quia tacuit, because he held his tongue, he disguised his sins, he did not confess them; And yet, in the midst of this silence of his, God brought him Ad Rugitum, to voices of Roaring, of Exclamation, To a sense of pain, or shame, or loss; so far he had a voice; But still he was in silence, for any matter of repentance. Secondly, he confesses a lamentable effect of this silence, and this roaring, Inveteraverunt ossa, His bones were consumed, waxen old, and his moisture dried up; and then he takes knowledge of the cause of all this calamity, the weight of God's heavy hand upon him. And to this Confession he sets to that seal, which is intended in the last word, Selah.
First then, David confesses his silence; therefore it was a fault: And he confesses it, as an instance, as an example of his being In doloso spiritu, That there was deceit in his spirit; as long as he was silent, he thought to delude God, to deceive God; and this was the greatest fault. If I be afraid of God's power, because I consider that he can destroy a sinner, yet I have his will for my Buckler; I remember, that he would not the death of a sinner. If I be afraid that his will may be otherwise bent, (for what can I tell, whether it may not be his will to glorify himself in surprizing me in my sins?) I have his Word for my Buckler, Miserationes ejus super omnia opera ejus, God does nothing, but that his Mercy is supereminent in that work, whatsoever; But if I think to scape his knowledge, by hiding my sins from him, by my silence, I am In doloso spiritu, if I think to deceive God, I deceive myself, and there is no truth in me.
When we are to deal with fools, we must, or we must not answer, as they may receive profit, or inconvenience by our answer, or our silence. Answer not a fool, according to his foolishness, lest thou be like him: But yet, in the next verse, Answer a fool according to his foolishness, lest he be wise in his own conceit. But answer God always. Though he speak in the foolishness of preaching, as himself calls it, yet he speaks wisdom, that is, Peace to thy soul. We are sure that there is a good silence; for we have a Rule for it from Christ, whose Actions are more then Examples, for his Actions are Rules. His patience wrought so that he would not speak, his afflictions wrought so that he could not. He was brought as a sheep to the slaughter, and he was dumb; There he would not speak; My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws, and thou hast brought me into the dust of death, says David in the Person of Christ, and here he could not speak.
Here is a good silence in our Rule: So is there also in Examples derived from that Rule. There is Silentium reverentiae, A silence of reverence, for respect of the presence; The Lord is in his holy Temple, let all the world keep silence before him. When the Lord is working in his Temple, in his Ordinances, and Institutions, let not the wisdom of all the world dispute why God instituted those Ordinances, the foolishness of preaching, or the simplicity of Sacraments in his Church. Let not the wisdom of private men dispute, why those whom God hath accepted as the representation of the Church, those of whom Christ says, Dic Ecclesiae, Tell the Church, have ordained these, or these Ceremonies for Decency, and Uniformity, and advancing of God's glory, and men's Devotion in the Church; Let all the earth be silent, In Sacramentis, The whole Church may change no Sacraments, nor Articles of faith, and let particular men be silent In Sacramentalibus, in those things which the Church hath ordained, for the better conveying, and imprinting, and advancing of those fundamental mysteries; for this silence of reverence which is an acquiescence in those things which God hath ordained, immediately, as Sacraments, or Ministerially, as other Ritual things in the Church, David would not have complained of, nor repented.
And to this may well be referred Silentium subjectionis, That silence which is a recognition, a testimony of subjection. Let the women keep silence in the Church, for they ought to be subject: And, Let the women learn in silence, with all subjection. As far as any just Commandment, either expressly, or tacitly reaches, in enjoining silence, we are bound to be silent: In Moral seals of secrets, not to discover those things which others upon confidence, or for our counsel, have trusted us withal; In charitable seals, not to discover those sins of others, which are come to our particular knowledge, but not by a judicial way; In religious seals, not to discover those things which are delivered us in Confession, except in cases excepted in that Canon; In secrets delivered under these seals, of Nature, of Law, of Ecclesiastical Canons, we are bound to be silent, for this is Silentium subjectionis, An evidence of our subjection to Superiors. But since God hath made man with that distinctive property, that he can speak, and no other creature; since God made the first man able to speak, as soon as he was in the world; since in the order of the Nazarites instituted in the Old Testament, though they forbore wine, and outward care of their comeliness, in cutting their hair, and otherwise, yet they bound not themselves to any silence; since in the other sects, which grew up amongst the Jews, Pharisees, and Sadducees, and Esseans, amongst all their superfluous, and superstitious austerities, there was no inhibition of speaking, and Communication; since in the twilight between the Old and New Testament, that dumbness which was cast upon Zacharic, was inflicted for a punishment upon him, because he believed not that, that the Angel had said unto him, we may be bold to say, That if not that silence, which is enjoined in the Roman Church, yet that silence which is practiced amongst them, for the concealing of Treasons, and those silences which are imposed upon some of their Orders, That the Carthusians may never speak but upon Thursdays, others upon other times, they are not silentia subjectionis, silences imposed by a justauthority, but they are in Doloso spiritu, there is Deceit in their spirit; if not in everyone of them, who execute the commandment, not in every poor Carthusian, yet in them who imposed it, who by such an obedience in impertinent things, infatuate them, and accustom them to a blind and implicit obedience in matters of more dangerous consequence. Silence of reverence, silence of subjection meet in this, and in this they determine, That we hold our tongues from questioning anything ordained by God, and from defaming anything done by that power, which is established by his Ordinance. And this silence falls not under David's complaint, nor confession.
We have not long to stay upon this silence, which we call the Good silence, because it is not the silence of our Text; This only we say, That there is a silence which is absolutely good, always good, and there is another occasionally good, sometimes good, and sometimes not so; and that is silentium Boni, or à Bono, An abstinence from speaking, or from doing some things, which of themselves, if no circumstance changed their nature, were good and requisite. Silentium bonum, that silence that is absolutely, and always good, is a quiet contentment in all that God sends, Ne, unde debueras esse dives, fias pauper, lest when God meant to make thee rich, and have indeed made thee rich, thou makethy self poor, by thinking thyself poor, and misinterpreting God's doing: That thou have not praecordia fatui, as the same Father speaks, The bowels of an empty man, whining, and crying bowels; Sicut rota currus, foenum portans & murmur ans, As a Cart that hath a full and plentiful load, and squeaks and whines the more for that abundance. Neither murmur that thou hast minus de Bonis, not Goods enough, nor nimis de Malis, Afflictions too many, but reckon how much more good God hath shown thee, then thou hast deserved, and how much less ill. Sit alone, and keep silence, because thou hast borne it, because the Lord hath laid affliction upon thee; Thine ease is within two verses, For the Lord will not for sake thee forever. If thou murmur, and say, Quid feci, Lord what have I done to thee, that thou shouldst deal thus with me? thou shalt hear the justice of God answer thee, Verumdicis, nihil fecisti, Thou hast done nothing, and that is fault enough; Nothing for me, nothing for my sake, but all for respect of thyself, in thine own ways, and to thine own ends.
The other good silence is not always Good, but occasionally, and circumstantially so; It is a forbearing to speak Truth, which may be good then, when our speaking of Truth can do no good, and may do harm. I will keep my mouth bridled whilst the wicked is in my sight; I was dumb, and spake nothing, I kept silence even from good, and my sorrow was more stirred. Though it were a vexation to him, though he had a sense, and a remorse, that this was some degree of prevarication, to abandon the defense of God's honor at any time, yet his religious discretion made it appear to him, that this present abstinence would, in the end, conduce more to God's glory. It was the Wise man's rule, Kindle not the coals of sinners, when thou rebukest them, lest thou beest burnt in the fiery flames of their sins. Poison works apace upon cholerike complexions; And Physicians may catch the plague by going about to cure it. An over-vehement, and unseasonable reprehender of a sin may contract that, or a greater sin himself. I may reprehend a Blasphemer, in such a manner, and at such a time, as I could not choose but suspect, that he would multiply blasphemies upon my reprehension; and, though that take off none of his fault, yet it adds to mine, and now God hath two in the Bond; He shall answer, and I too, for these later blasphemies. The Wise man gave us the Rule, Kindle not coals, and a good King gave us the example, when Rabshakeh had blasphemed against God and the King; Let not Hezekiah deceive you, saying, The Lord will deliver us, Then they kept silence, and answered him not a word, says that Text; for, (as it is added) The Kings commandment was, saying, Answer him not a word. There is a religious abstinence, in not answering our Adversaries, though their libels, and increpations, and contumelies tend to the dishonor of God. S. Ambrose observed good degrees in this Discretion. He notes in David, that, siluit à bonis, Though it troubled him, he could hold his peace, when hisreply might exasperate others: He notes in Job, (as he reads that place, according to the Septuagint) Ecce, rideo opprobrium, Behold, I laugh at their reproaches; That he could take pleasure in the goodness of his conscience, for all their calumnies. He notes in S. Paul a higher degree then that; Maledicimur, & Benedicimus, That he when he was rev • ed could bless them that reviled him. Religious discretion allows us to disguise our Anger, and smother our sorrow, when either our anger would exasperate, or our sorrow encourage the Adversary, to a more vehement opposing of God, and his Church, and his Children.
But all this is rather true, in private persons, then in those whom God hath sent to do his Messages to his people. When I shall say to the wicked, (says God to the Prophet) Thou shalt surely die, and thou, The Prophet, givest him not warning, nor speakest to admonish that he may live, the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at thy hands. And, if every single sinful act, and word, and thought of mine, need the whole blood of Christ Jesus to expiate that, what blood, and what seas of that blood shall I need, when the blood of a whole Parish shall be required at my hand, because I forbore to speak plainly of their sins, and God's judgment? It is true, which S. Bernard says, Discretio mater, & consummatrix virtutum, Discretion is the mother, and discretion is the nurse of every virtue, but yet, in this commandment which is laid upon us, for the reproof of sin, Haec omnis sit nostra Discretie, says he, ut in hoc nulla sit nobis Discretio; Let this be all our Discretion, as Discretion is wisdom, that we use no Discretion, as Discretion is Acceptation of persons. Haec omnis sapientia, ut in hac parte nulla nobis sit, Let this be all our wisdom, to proceed in this way, this foolishness of Preaching, in season, and out of season. In God's name, let us fall within that danger, if we must needs, that if the poor man speak, they say, What fellow is this? We are fellows in this service, to God's Angels, to the Son of God Christ Jesus, who is your High Priest, and we fellow-workmen with him, in your salvation: And, as long as we can scape that Imputation, Some man holdeth his tongue, because he hath not to answer, That either we know not what to say to a doubtful conscience, for our ignorance, or are afraid to reprehend a sin, because we are guilty of that sin ourselves; how far States, and Commonwealths may be silent in connivencies, and forbearances, is not our business now; but for us, the ministers of God, Vaenobis, si non evangelizemus, Woe be unto us, if we do not preach the Gospel, and we have no Gospel put into our hands, nor into our mouths, but a conditional Gospel, and therefore we do not preach the Gospel, except we preach the Judgments belonging to the breach of those conditions: A silence in that, in us, would fall under this complaint, and confession, Because I was silent, these calamities fell upon me.
It becomes not us, to think the worst of David, that he was fallen into the deepest degree of this silence, and negligence of his duty to God: But it becomes us well to consider, that if David, a man according to God's heart, had some degrees of this ill silence, it is easy for us, to have many. For, for the first degree, we have it, and scarce discern that we have it: for our first silence is but an Omission, a not doing of our religious duties, or an unthankfulness for God's particular benefits. When Moses says to his people, The Lord shall fight for you, & vos tacebit is, And you shall hold your peace, there Moses means, you shall not need to speak, the Lord will do it for his own glory, you may be silent. There it was a future thing; But the Lord hath fought many battles for us: He hath fought for our Church against Superstition, for our land against Invasion, for this City against Infection, for every soul here against Presumption, or else against Desperation, Dominus pugnavit, & nos silemus; The Lord hath fought for us, and we never thank him. A silence before, a not praying, hath not always a fault in it, because we are often ignorant of our own necessities, and ignorant of the dangers that hang over us; but a silence after a benefit evidently received, a dumb Ingratitude is inexcusable.
There is another ill silence, and an unnatural one, for it is a loud silence; It is a bragging of our good works; It is the Pharisees silence, when by boasting of his fastings, and of his alms, he forgot, he silenced his sins. This is the devils best Merchant: By this Man, the devil gets all; for, his ill deeds were his before; and now, by this boasting of them, his good works become his too. To contract this, If we have overcome this inconsideration, if we have undertaken some examination of our conscience, yet one survey is not enough; Delicta quis intelligit? Who can understand his error? How many circumstances in sin vary the very nature of the sin? And then, of how many coats, and shells, and super-edifications doth that sin, which we think a single sin, consist? When we have passed many scrutinies, many inquisitions of the conscience, yet there is never room for a silence; we can never get beyond the necessity of that Petition, Ab eccultis, Lord cleanse me from my secret sins; we shall ever be guilty of sins, which we shall forget, not only because they are so little, but because they are so great; That which should be compunction, will be consternation; and the anguish, which, out of a natural tenderness of conscience, we shall have at the first entering into those sins, will make us dispute on the sins side, and, for some present ease, and to give our heavy soul breath, we will find excuses for them; and at last slide and wear into a customary practice of them: and though we cannot be ignorant that we do them, yet we shall be ignorant that they are sins; but rather make them things indifferent, or recreations necessary to maintain a cheerfulness, and so to sin on, for fear of despairing in our sins, and we shall never be able to shut our mouths against that Petition, Aboccultis; for, though the sin be manifest, the various circumstances that aggravate the sin, will be secret.
And properly this was David's silence: He confesses his silence to have been Ex dolese spiritu, Out of a spirit, in which was deceit; And David did not hope, directly, and determinately to deceive God; But by endeavoring to hide his sin from other men, and from his own conscience, he buried it deeper and deeper, but still under more and more sins. He silences his Adultery, but he smothers it, he buries it under a turfe of hypocrisy, of dissimulation with Uriah, that he might have gone home, and covered his sin. He silences this hypocrisy; but that must have a larger turfe to cover it; he buries it under the whole body of Uriah, treacherously murdered; He silences that murder, but no turfe was large enough to cover that, but the defeat of the whole army, and after all, the blaspheming of the name and power of the Lord of Hosts, in the ruin of the army. That sin, which, if he would have carried it upward towards God, in Confession, would have vanished away, and evaporated, by silencing, by suppressing, by burying multiplied, as Corn buried in the earth, multiplies into many Ears. And, though he might (perchance for his farther punishment) overcome the remembrance of the first sin, he might have forgot the Adultery, and feel no pain of that, yet still being put to a new, and new sin, still the last sin that he did to cover the rest, could not choose but appear to his conscience, and call upon him for another sin to cover that; Howsoever he might forget last years sins, yet yesterdayes sin, or last nights sin will hardly be forgotten yet. And therefore, Tollite vobiscum verba, says the Prophet, O Israel return unto the Lord; But how? Take unto you words, and turn unto the Lord. Take unto you your words, words of Confession; Take unto you his word, the words of his gracious promises; break your silence when God breaks his, in the motions of his Spirit, and God shall break off his purpose of inflicting calamities upon you.
In the mean time, when David was not come so far, but continued silent, silent from Confession, God suffers not David to enjoy the benefit of his silence; though he continue his silence towards. God, yet God mingles Rugitum cum silentio, for all his filence, he comes to a voice of roaring and howling, when I was silent, my roaring consumed me; so that here was a great noise, but no music. Now Theodoret calls this Rugitum compunctionis; That it was the inchoation of his repentance, which began diffidently, and with fearful vociferations; And so some of our later men understand it; That because David had continued long in his sin, when the Ice brake, it brake with the greater noise; when he returned to speak to God, he spake with the more vehemence. And truly the word Shaag, Rugiit, though it signify properly the voice of a Lyon, yet David uses this word Roaring, not only of himself, but of himself as he was a type of Christ: for this very word is in the beginning of that Psalm, which Christ repeated upon the Cross, or, at least begun it, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me, and why art thou so far from the voice of my Roaring? So that, Roaring, may admit a good sense, and does not always imply a distemper, and inordinateness; for, in Christ it could not; But does it not in our Text? In our former Translation it might stand in a good sense, where the two actions are distinguished in time, thus, When I held my tongue, or when I roared, whether I kept or broke silence, all was one, no more ease in one, then the other. But with the Original, and with our later Translation, it cannot be so, which is, When I held my tongue, through my roaring, this and this fell upon me: They were concomitant actions, actions intermixt, and at the same time when he was silent, he roared too; and therefore that that he calls Roaring, is not a voice of Repentance; for if he had been come to that, then he had broke his former silence, for that Silence was a not Confessing, a not Repenting.
This is then that miserable condition which is expressed in David's case, (though God delivered David from any deadly effect of it) that he had occasion of Roaring, of howling, (as the Scripture speaks often) though he kept silence: That he was at never the more ease, for all his sins: The eases that he laid hold on, were new sins in themselves, and yet they did not ease him of his other sins; he kept silence, and yet was put to exclamations. And how many examples can we present to ourselves, in our own memory, where persons which have given themselves all liberty to forge writings, to suborn witnesses, to forswear themselves, to oppress, to murder others, to make their ways easier to their ends, and yet have, for all this, though the hand of Justice have not fallen upon them, seen their whole estates consume and molder away? When men out of their ill-grounded plots, and perverse wisdom, think themselves safe in the silence and secrecy of their sins, God overtakes them, and confounds them, with those two fearful blows, those two Thunderbolts, He brings them to Exclamations, to Vociferations, upon Fortune, upon Friends, upon Servants, upon Rivals, and Competitors, he brings them to a Roaring for their ruin, Never man was thus dealt withal as I am, never such a conspiracy as against me.
And this they do, All day, says David here, Through my roaring all day. It was long so with David; A day as long as two of their days, that have days of six months; almost a year was David in this dark, dead silence, before he saw day, or returned to speaking. With those that continue their silence all day, the roaring continues all day too; All their lives, they have new occasions of lamentations, and yet all this reduces them not, but they are benighted, they end their life with fearful voices of desperation, in a Roaring, but still in a silence of their sins, and transgressions. And this is that that falls first under his Confession, Roaring with Silence, pain, and shame, and loss, but all without Confession, or sense of sin. And then, that which falls next under his acknowledgement, is the vehement working, the lamentable effect of this Silence and Roaring, Inveteration of Bones, incineration of his whole substance, My Bones are waxen old, and my moisture is turned into the drought of Summer.
Both these phrases, in which David expresses his own, and prophecies of other such sinners misery, have a literal, and a spiritual, a natural, and a moral sense. For first, this affliction of this silenced and impenitent finner though it proceed not from the sense of his sin, though it brought him not yet to a confession, but to a roaring, that is, an impatient repining and murmuring, yet it had so wrought upon his body, and whole constitution, as that it drunk up his natural, and vital moisture; Spiritus tristis exsiccarat, as Solomon speaks, A broken spirit had dried him up; His days were consumed like smoke, and his bones were burnt like a hearth; and that Marrow and fatness, in which, he says, he had such sat is faction, at other times, was exhausted. This is the misery of this impenitent sinner, he is beggared, but in the Devils service, he is lamed, but in the Devils wars; his moisture, his blood is dried up, but with licentiousness, with his overwatchings, either to deceive, or to oppress others; for, as the proverb is true, Plures gulae quàm gladius, The Throat cuts more throats then the sword does, and eating starves more men then fasting does, because wastfulnesse induces penury at last, so if all our Hospitals were well surveyed, it would be found, that the Devil sends more to Hospitals then God does, and the Stews more then the wars.
Thus his bodily moisture was wasted, literally the sinner is sooner infirmed, sooner deformed, then another man; But there is an Humidum radicale of the soulle too: A tenderness, and a disposition to bewail his sins, with remorsefull tears. When Peter had denied his Master, and heard the Cock crow, he did not stay to make recantations, he did not stay to satisfy them, to whom he had denied Christ, but he looked into himself first, Flevit amare, says the Holy Ghost, He wept bitterly; His soul was not withered, his moisture was not dried up like summer, as long as he could weep.