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BISCOUHSES

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VARIOUS SUBJECTS.

By JEREMY TAYLOR, D. D.

eHAPLAIN IN ORD1N.ARY TO KING CHARLES THE FIRST, AlfO LikTX LORD BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR.

IN THREE VOLUMES.

roLUMH m.

BOSTON;

PUBLISHED BY WELLS AND LILLT. f*t> »T TAIf WINKLB AND WILEY, NBW-YORK— AND M. CARET, FB(tA9S'l.rnA.

1816.

CONTENTS

TO THE THIRD VOLUME. SERMON I.

Page

The Righteousness Evangelical 7

Ma*, v. 20. For I say unto you, that except your righteousness exceed the right- eousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

SERMON 11.

The Christian's Conquest over the Body of Sin .... 37

RoM. vii. 19. For the good that I would, I do not : but the evil which I would not, that 1 do.

SERMON III. ^

Faith working by Love 65

James ii. 24. You see then, how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.

SERMON IV.

Preached at an Episcopal Consecration 100

Luke xii. 42, 43. And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household, to give tJiem their portion of meat in due season ? Blessed is that servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall find so doi ng.

SERMON V.

Preached at the Opening of the Parliament of Ireland 134

1 Saxm. XV. 22, 23. Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.

CONTENTS. SERMON VI.

Page

Via Intelligenliae 174

John vii. 17. If anv man will do his will, lie shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.

SERMON VII.

Preached at the Funeral of the Lord Primate of Ireland 219

1 Cor. XV. 23.

But every man in bis own order : Christ the first fruits ; afterward they that are Christ's at bis coming.

SERMON VIII.

Countess of Carbery's Funeral Sermon 267

2 Sam. xiv. 14.

For we must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground which cannot be gathered up again neither doth God respect any person : yet doth he devise moans that his banished be not expelled from him.

SERMON IX, X.

The Minister's Duly in Life and Doctrine . . . 302, 332

Tit. ii. 7, 8. In all things shewing thyself a pattern of good works : in doctrine shewing uncorrupiness, gravity, sincerity. Sound speech that can- not be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say of you.

THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL DESCRIBED THE CHRISTIAN'S

CONQ,rEST OVER THE BODY OF SIN FIDES FORMATA ; OR FAITH

WORKING BY LOVE IN THREE SERMONS, PREACHED AT CHRIST

€HURCH, DUBLIN.

TO THE MOST NOBLB AND VrRTUOUS PRINCESS,

THE LADY DUCHESS OF ORMOND,

HER GRACE,

Madam,

1 PRESENT your Grace here with a testimony of my obe- die?ice, and of your zeal for the good of souls. You were in your sreat charity, not only pleased to pardon the weak- ness of this discourse, but to hope it might serve as a memo- rial to those that need it, of the great necessity of living virtuously, and by the measures of Christianity. Madam, you are too great and too good to have any ambition for the things of this world ; but J cannot but observe, that in your designs for the other world, you, by your charity and zeal, adopt yourself into the portion of those ecclesiasticks, who humbly hope, and truly labour for the reward that is pro- mised to those wise persons who convert souls, if our prayers and 3^our desires that every one should be profited in their eternal concerns, cast in a symbol towards this great work, and will give you a title to that great reward : but. Ma- dam, when I received your commands for dispersing some copies of this Sermon, I perceived it was too little to be presented to your Eminence ; and If it were accompanied

VOL. III. 2

VI THi; EPISTLE DEDICATORY.

with something else of the like nature, it might with more profit advance tliat end which your Grace so piously design- ed; and therefore I have taken this opportunity to satisfy tlie desire of some very honourable and very reverend per- sonages, who retpiired that the two following Sermons should also be made fit for the use of those who hoped to receive profit by them. I humbly lay them all at your Grace's feet, begging of God, that even as many may receive ad- vantages by the perusing of them, as either your Grace will desire, or he that preached them did intend. And if your Grace will accept o( this first testimomf of my concurrence with all the world that know you, in paying those great re- gards, which your piety so highly merits, I will endeavour hereafter, in some great instance, to pursue the intentions of your zeal of souls, and by such a service endeavour to do more benefit to others, and by it, as by thai which is most acceptable to your Grace, endear the obedience and ser vices of,

Madam,

Your Grace's most humble

And obedient servant,

JER. DOWN.

SERMON I.

RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL DESCRIBED,

Matth. v. 20.

For I say unto you, that except your righteousness exceed tlie righte- ousness of the scribes and pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Rewards and punishments are the best sanction of laws; and althouf^h the guardians of laws strike sometimes with the softest part of the hand in their executions of sad sentences, yet in the sanction they make no abatements, but so proportion the duty to the reward, arid the punishment to the crime, that by these we can best tell what value the lawgiver puts upon the obedience. Joshua put a great rate upon the takmg of Kiriath-Sepher^ when the reward of the service was his daut^hter and a dower. But when the young men ventured to fetch David the waters of Bethlehem^ they had nothing but the praise of their boldness, because their service was no more than the satisfaction of a curiosity. But as lawgivers by their rewards declare the vahte of the obedience,

8 THE UltiHTEOLSNESS EVANGELICAL Scrm. L

SO do subjects also, by the grandeur of what they ex- pect, set a value on the law and the lawgiver, and do their services accordingly.

And therefore the law of Moses^ whose endear- ment was nothing but temporal goods and transient evils, could nevermake the comers thereunto perfect;* but the i'o-nT-i.-^ay), Kgiirriovo; (xttiSoc, thc siiperinductiou of a bet- ter liope hath endeared a more perfect obedience. When Christ brought life and immortcdity to light through the gospel^ and hath promised to us things greater than all our explicit desires, bigger than the thoughts of our heart, then «>/«fi^sf to gs^, saith the apos- tle, then we draw near to God ; and by these we are enabled to do all that God requires, and then he re- quires all that we can do; more love and more obe- dience than he did of those who, for want of these helps, and these revelations, and these promises, which w^e have, but they had not, were but imperfect persons, and could do but little more than human ser- vices. Christ has taught us more, and given us more, and promised to us more than ever was in the world known or believed before him; and by the strengths and confidence of these, thrusts us forward in a holy and wise economy, and plainly declares that we must serve him by the measures of a new love, do him honour by wise and material glorifications, be united to God by a new nature, and made alive by a new birth, and fulfil all righteousness; to be humble and meek as Christ, to be merciful as our heavenly Father is, to be pure as God is pure, to be partakers of the divine nature, to be wholly renewed in the frame and tem- per of our mind, to become people of a new heart, a direct new creation, new principles, and a new being, to do better than all the world before us ever did, to love God more perfectly, to despise the world

* Hebrews rii. 19. •

Serm. 1. described. 9

more generously, to contend for the faith more ear- nestly ; for all this is but a proper and a just con- sequent of the great promises which our blessed Lawgiver came to publish and etlect for all the world of believers and disciples.

The matter which is here required is certainly very great; for it is to be more righteous tlian the scribes and pharisees; more holy than the doctors of the law, than the leaders of the synagogue, than the w^ise princes of the Sanhedrim ; more righteous than some that were prophets and high priests, than some that kept the ordinances of the law without blame; men that lay in sackcloth, and fasted much, and prayed more, and made religion and the study of the law the work of their lives: This was veiy much ; but Christians must do more.

Nunc te marraoreum pro tempore fechnus ; at tii, Si foetura gregeni suppleverit, aureus esto.*

They did well, and we must do better; their houses were marble, but our roofs must be gilded and fuller of glory. But as the matter is very great, so the necessity of it is the greatest in the woi Id. It must be so, or it will be much worse : unless it be thus, we shall never see the glorious face of God. Here it concerns us to be wise and fearful ; for the matter is not a question of an oaken garland, or a circle of bays, and a yellow ribband : it is not a question of money or land, nor of the vainer rewards of popular noises, and the undiscerning suffrages of the people, who are continjjent iudoes of oood and evil : but it IS the great stake of life eternal. We cannot be

* Virg. iEcIog : 7. v. 35.

Your marble statue which you now behold,

Should Fortune favour, shall be chang'd to gold. A .

10 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL SenH. I.

Christians, unless we be righteous by the new mea- sures : the rigliteousness of the kingdom is now the only way to enter into it; for the sentence is fixed, and the judgment is decretory, and the Judge infal- lible, and the decree irreversible: For I say unto you^ said Christ, unless your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom oj heaven.

Here then we have two things to consider. 1. What was the righteousness of the scribes and pha- risees. 2. How iai that is to be exceeded by the righteousness of Christians.

1. Concerning the first. I will not be so nice in the observation of these words, as to take notice that Christ does not name the Sadducees, but the Scribes and Pharisees.^ though there may be some- thing in it; the Sadducecs were called Caraim, from cara^ to read ; for they thought it religion to spend one third part of their day in reading their scriptures, whose fulness they so admired, tliey would admit of no suppletory traditions : But the Pharisees were called Thanaim^ that is, JvOTsg^a/, they added to the word of God words of their own, as the Church of i?ome does at this day; they and these fell into an equal fate ; while they taught for doctrines the com- mandments of men^ they prevaricated the righteous- ness of God. What the Church of Rome to evil purposes hath done in this particular, may be demon- strated in due time and place : but what false and corrupt tj^iosses, under the s|)ecious title of the tra- dition of their fathers, the Pharisees had introduced, our blessed Saviour reproves, and are now to be re- presented as the ctvliTTApuS-fiyfJin, that you may see that righteousness, beyond wliich all they must go, that intend that heaven should be tiieir journey's end.

1. The Pharisees obeyed the commandments in the letter, not in the spirit : They minded what God

Serm* /. described. 11

spake, but not what he intended : they were busj in the outward work of the hand, but incurious ot the affections and choice of the heart. 'r^e/c^-^vTa <raf«/;cac v«vo«- HAT«, said Justin Martyr to Tryphon the Jew, Ye un- derstand all things carnally ; that is, they rested tv tsTKtiTiA.d.'ruwiliiidLz, as JYazianzen calls it, in the put ward work of piety, which not only Justin Martyr,, but St. Paul calls carnality,, not meaning a carnal appetite, but a carnal service.* Their errour was plainly this; they never distinguished duties natural from duties re- lative ; that is, whether it were commanded for itself, or in order to something that was better; whetlier it were a principal grace, or an instrumental action. ►So God was served in the letter, they did not much inquire into his purpose : and therefore they were curious to wash their hands, but cared not to purify the hearts ; they would give alms, but hate him that received it; they would go to the temple, but did not revere the glory of God that dwelt there between the cherubins ; they would fast, but not mortify their lusts ; they would say good prayers, but not labour for the grace they prayed for. This was just as if a man should run on his master's errand, and do no business when he came there. They might easily have thought, that by the soul only a man approaches to God, and draws the body after it ; but that no washing or corporal services could unite them and the schechina together, no such thing could make them like to God, who is the prince of spirits. They did as the dunces in Pythagoras'' school, who when their master had said, Fabis abstineto, by which he intended they should not ambitiously seek for magistracy-, they thought themselves good Pythagoreafis if they did not eat beans ; and they would be sure to put their right foot first into the shoe, and their left foot into

* Gal. iii, 3. and Gal. vi. 12, 13. Phil. iii. 34.

12 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Serm. I.

the water, and supposed they had done enough; though, if they had not been fools, they would have understood their master's meaning to have been, that thcif should put more affections to labour and travel^ and less to their pleasure and recreation ; and so it was with the Pharisee: for as the Chaldees taught their morality by mystick words, and the Egyptians by hieroglyphicks, and the Greeks by fables; so did God by rites and ceremonies external, leading them by the liand to the purities of the heart, and by the ser- vices of the body to the obedience of the spirit ; which, because they would not understand, they thought tljey had done enough in the observation of the letter.

2. In moral duties, where God expressed himself more plainly, they made no commentary of kindness; but regarded tiie prohibitions so nakedly, and divest- ed of all antecedents, consequents, similitudes, and proportions, that, if they stood clear of that hated name which was set dow^n mJUoses'' tables, they gave themselves liberty in many instances of the same kmdred and alliance. If they abstained from mur- der, they thought it very well, though they made no scruple of murdering their brother's fame; they would not cut his tliroat, but they would call him fool, or invent lies in secret, and publish his disgrace openly; they would not dash out his brains, but they would be extremely and unreasonably angry with him; they would not steal their brother's mo- ney, but they would oppress him in crafty and cruel bargains. The commandment forbade them to commit adultery, but because fornication was not named, they made no scruple of that ; and being com- manded to honour their father and their mother, they would give them good words and fair obser- vances; but because it was not uatned that they

Serm. /, described. IS

should maintain them in theirneed, they thought they did well enough to pretend corban, and let their father starve.

3. The ScribfS and Pharisees placed their righte- ousness in negatives ; they w^ould not commit what Was forbidden, but they cared but little for the in- cluded positive, and the omissions of good actions did not much trouble them; they would not hurt their brother in a forbidden instance, but neither would they do him good according to the intention of the commandment. It was a great innocence if they did not rob the poor: then they were righteous men ; but they thought themselves not much con- cerned to acquire that god-like excellency, a philnu' thropy and love to all mankind. Whosoever blas- phemed God, was to be put to death ; but he that did not glorify God as he ought, they were uncon- cerned for him, and let him alone : he that spake against Moses was to die without mercy ; but against the ambitious and the covetous, against the proud man and the unmerciful, they made no provisions.

Virtus est vitium fugere, et sapieutia prima Stultitia caruisse.*

They accounted themselves good, not for doing good, but for doing no evil -, that was the sum of their theo- logy-

4. They had one thing more as bad as all this:

they broke Moses"" tables into pieces, and gathering up the fragments, took to themselves what part of duty they pleased, and let the rest alone : for it was a proverb amongst the Jews, Qui operam dat prae^

*Hor. Lib. 1. Epis. 1. v. 41.

E'en in our flight from vice some virtue lies, And, free from foJIy, yye to wisdom rise,

Francis, VOL. Ill, 3

14 THE K1GI1TR0USNES5 EVANGELICAL Scrm. L

cepto^ liber est a praecepfo ; that is, if he chooses one positive commandment for his business, he may be less careful in any of the rest. Indeed they said also, Qui multiplicat Legem, multiplicat Vitam ; he that multiphes the law increases life; that is, if he did attend to more good things, it was so much the better ; but the other was well enough : but as for universal obedience, that was not the measure of their righteousness; for they taught that God would put our good works and bad into the balance, and ac- cording to the heavier scale give a portion in the ■world to come; so that some evil they would allow to themselves and their disciples, always provided it was less than the good they did. They would de- vour widows houses, and make it up by long pray- ers: they would love their nation, and hate their prince ; offer sacrifice, and curse Caesar in their heart ; advance Judaism, and destroy humanity.

Lastly, St. Austin summed up the difference be- tween the pharisaical and evangelical righteousness in two words ; Brevis differentia inter Legem et Evan- gelium ; timor et amor. They served the God of their fathers in the spirit of fear, and we worship the Father of our Lord Jesus in the spirit of love, and by the spirit of adoption. And as this slavish principle of theirs was the cause of all their former imperfec- tions, so it finally and chiefly expressed itself in these two particulars. \. They would do all that they thought they lawfully could do. 2. They would do nothing but what was expressly commanded.

This was the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, and their disciples the Jews; which be- cause our blessed Saviour reproves,* not only as imperfect then, but as criminal now, calling us on to

* Sed Belzebulis callida commenta Christus destruit.

Serm.L described. 15

a new righteousness, the righteousness of God, to the law of the spirit of life, to the kingdom of God and the proper righteousness thereof, it concerns us in the next place to look after the measures of this, ever remembering that it is infinitely necessary that we shouhJ do so; and men do not generally know, or not consider what it is to be a Christian ; they understand not what the Christian law forbiddeth or commandeth. But as for this in my text, it is in- deed our great measure : but it is not a question of good and better, but of good and evil, life and death, salvation and damiiation ; for unless our righteousness be weighed by new weights, we shall be found too lijjht, when God comes to weiofh the actions of all the world : and unless we be more righteous than they, we shall in no wise^ that is, upon no other terms in the world, enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Now concerning this, we shall do very much amiss, if we take our measures by the manners and practices of the many who call themselves Chris- tians; for there are, as JVaziajizcn expresses it, the «< TOTS KdLi mv (poLpta-xiot, the old and the new Pharisees. 1 "wish it were no worse amongst us ; and that all Christians were indeed righteous as they were ; est aliquid prodire tenus ; it would not be just nothing. But I am sure that to bid defiance to the laws of Christ, to laugh at religion, to make a merriment at tlie debauchery and damnation of our brother, is a state of evil worse than that of the Scribes and Phari- sees : and yet even among such men how impatient would they be, and how unreasonable would they think you to be, if you should tell them, that there is no present hopes or possibility that in this state they are in they can be saved !

16 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Sentl. I.

Omnes videmur nobis esse bcUiiIi

Et iestivi, Saperdae cum simiis c-nTrpi.*

But the world is too full of Christians whose righteousness is very little, and their iniquities vcrj great; and now-a-days, a Christian is a man that comes to church on Sundays, and on the week fol- lowing will do shameful things ;

Passim corvos sequitur, testa lotoque

Seourus quo pes ferat, atque ex tempore vivit,f

being, according to the Jewish proverbial reproof, as so many Mephibosheths : discipuli sapientium qui in," cessu pudefaciunt praeccptorem suum ; their master teaches them to go uprightly; but they still show their lame leg, and shame their master; as if a man might be a Christian, and yet be the vilest person in the world, doing such things for which the laws of men have provided smart and shame, and the laws of God have threatened the intolerable pains of an in- sufferable and never-ending damnation. Example here cannot be our rule unless men were better, and as long as men live at the rate they do, it will be to little purpose to talk of exceeding the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees : but because it must be much better with us all, or it will be very much worse "with us at the latter end, I shall leave complaining and go to the rule, and describe the necessary and unavoidable measures of the Rio^hteousness Evangeli- cal, without which we can never be saved.

1. Therefore, when it is said our righteousness must exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees, let us first

* Though vain, we are but creatures of a day, To dust devoted, and to worms a prey. A«

f Pursues his pleasures, careless of his soul, And drowns his sorrows in th' oblivious bowl. A'

Serm. I. described. IT

take notice, by way of precognition, that it must at least be so much : we must keep the letter ot" the whole moral law ; we must do all that iies b' ore us, all that is in our hand : and therefore o^yit^icr^a. which signifies to be rehi^ious, the giammrians derive tiTTo nu ;tǤ=ic of>iyi(r^oti, from rcachiug forth the hard : the outward work must be done ; and it is not enough to say tni/ heart is ri<rht^ but my hand went aside, Prudentius saith, that St. Peter wept so bitterly, be- cause he did not confess Christ openly, whom he loved secretly.

Flevit negator deniqui Ex ore prolapsum neCas, Cum mens maneret innocens, Aninjusque servarit fidera.*

Aright heart alone Avill not do it; or rather the' heart is not right when the hand is wrong. If a man strikes his neighbour., and says., am not I in jest ? it is folly and shame to him, said Solomon. For, once for all, let us remember this, that Christianity is the most profitable, the most useful, and the most bountiful institution in the whole ^-iorld, and the best dcfiniiion I can give of it is this ; it is the wisdom of God brought down among us to do good to men ; and therefore we must not do less than the Pharisees^ who did the out-» ward work ; at least let us be sure to do all the work that is laid before us in the commandments. And it is strange that this should be needful to be pressed amongst Christians, whose religion requires so very much more. But so it is ; upon a pretence that we must serve God with the mind, some are such fools ^s to think that it is enough to have a good meanings

* He wept, because his recreant tongue A shameful lalseliood sware ; Though his firm soul in doubt ne'er huRg, For faith was seated there.

18 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Scrm. I,

Iniquum pcrpol vcrbum est., bene viiU^ nisi qui bene fa- cit. And because we must serve God in the spirit, therefore they will not serve God with their bodies; and because they are called upon to have the power and the hfe ofVodhness, tliej abominate all external works as mere forms; and because the true fastis to abstain from sin, therefore they will not abstain from meat and drink, even when they are commanded ; which is just as if a Pharisee^ being taught the cir- cumcision of the heart, should refuse to circumcise his flesh; and as if a Christian, being instructed in the excellencies of spiritual communion, should wholly neglect the sacramental ; that is, because the soul is the life of man, therefore it is fittinc: to die in a hu- mour, and lay aside the body. Tliis is a taking the subject of the question; for our inquiry is, how we should keep the commandments ; how we are to do the work that lies before us, by what principles, with what intention, in what degrees, after what manner, ut boniim bene fiat t ihdiiiha good thing be done well. This therefore must be presupposed ; we must take care that even our bodies bear a part in our spiritual services. Our voice and tono-ue, our hands and our feet, and our very bowels, must be servants of God, and do the work of the commandments.

This being ever supposed, our question is, how much more we must do ; and the tirst measure is this. Vv^hatsoever can be si^'nified and ministered to by the body, the heart and the spirit of a man must be the principal actor. We must not give alms without a chaiitabie soul, nor suffer martyrdom but in love and in obedience; and when we say our prayers, we do mispend our time, unless our mind ascend up to God upon the wings of desire.

Desire is the life of prayer ; and if you indeed de- sire what you pray for, you will also labour for what you desire; and if you find it otherwise with your-

Serm. I. described. 19

selves, your coming to church is but like the Phari- sees going up to the temple to praj. If your heart be not present, neither will God ; and then there is a sound of men and women between a pair of dead walls, from whence, because neither God nor }our souls are present, you must needs go home without

a blessinpf.

. ...

But this measure ot evangelical righteousness is of principal remark in all the rites and solemnities of religion ; and intends to say this, that Christian reli- gion is something that is not seen, it is the hidden man of the heart; eo-r/ tk escc svcTov, it is God that dwells "within ; and true Christians are men, who, as the Chaldee oracle said, are -woaw m-r^ijuwi vw, clothed with a great deal of mind. And therefore those words of the prophet Hosea, Et loquar ad cor ejus^ I icill speak unto their heart ; is a proverbial expression, signify- ing to speak spiritual comforts, and in the mystical sense signifies ju*>rjA<£(v, to preach the gospel ; where the spirit is the preacher, and the heart is the disci- ple, and the sermon is of righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. Our service to God must not be in outward works and scenes of religion, it must be something by which we become like to God ; the divine prerogative must extend beyond the outward man ; nay, even beyond the mortifica- tion of corporal vices; the spirit of God must go in trabis crassitudinem^ and mollify all our secret pride, and ingenerate in us a true humility, and a Christian meekness of spirit, and a divine charity. For in the gospel, when God enjoins any external rite or cere- mony, the outward work is always the less principal. For there is a bodily and a carnal part, an outside and a cabinet of religion in Christianity itself. When we are baptized, the purpose of God is, that we cleanse ourselves from all pollution of the flesh and spirit, and then Ave are indeed Jtc«9ap5; b.n, clean all

20 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL SerjYl. U

over. And when we communicate, the command- ment means that we should be made one spirit with Christ, and should hve on him, believing his word, praying for his spirit, supported with his hope, refreshed by his promises, recreated by his comforts, and wholly and in all things conformable to his hie ; that is the true communion. The sa- craments are not made for sinners until they do re- pent ; they are the food of our souls, but our souls must DC alive unto God, or else they cannot eat. It is good to confess our sins^ as St. James says, and to open our wounds to the ministers of religion ; but they absolve none but such as are truly penitent.

Solemn prayers, and the sacraments, and the assemblies of the faithful, and fasting days, and acts of external worship, are the solemnities and rites of religion ; but the religion of a Christian is in the heart and spirit. And this is that by which C7e- mens Alexandrinus defined the ri2:hteousness of a

Christian, Aixa/co-wd aufxc^mviu. TCev Tn; -^vy^i^e /ue^aiv : all tllC partS

and faculties that make up a man, must make up our religion ; but the heart is domus principalis^ it is the court of the great king ; and he is properly served "with interiour graces and moral virtues, with a hum- ble and a good mind, with a bountiful heart, and a "willing soul ; and tliese will command the eye, and give laws to the hand, and make the shoulders stoop; hut anima cujusque est quisque ; a man's soul is the man, and so is his religion ; and so you are bound to understand it.

True it is, God works in us his graces by the sa- crament; but we must dispose ourselves to a recep- tion of the divine blessing by moral instruments. The soul is crwsg^of tm @m, it must work together with God, and the body works together with the soul. But no external action can purify the soul, because its nature and operations being spiritual, it can n©

Serm. L described. 21

more be changed by a ceremony or an external so- lemnity, than an angel can be caressed with sweet- meats, or a man's belly can be filled with raiisick or long orations. The sum is this : No Christian does his duty to God but he that serves him with all his heart : and although it becomes us to fulfil all righ- teousness, even the external also ; yet that which makes us gracious in his eyes is not the external, it is the love of the heart and the real chansre of the mind and obedience of the spirit ; that is the first great measure of the Righteousness Evangelical.

2. The Rig:hteousness Evangelical must exceed that of the Scriocs and Pharisees by extension of our obedience to things of the same signification ; Le^es nou ex verbis^ sed ex mente intelligeiidas* says the Jaw. There must be a commentary of kindness in the understanding of the laws of Christ. We must understand all God's meaning; we must secure his service, we must be far removed from the dan- gers of his displeasure. And therefore our righ- teousness must be the purification and the per- fection of the spirit. So that it will be nothing for us not to commit adultery, unless our eyes and hands be chaste, and the desires be clean. A Chris- tian must not look upon a woman to lust after her. He must hate sin in all dimensions, and in all dis- tances, and in every angle of its reception. A Christian must not sin, and he must not be willing to sin if he durst. He must not be lustful, and therefore he must not feed high, nor drink deep, for these make provisions for lust : and amongst Christians, g-reat eatinofs and drinkinofs are acts of uncleanness as well as of intemperance, and what- ever ministers to sin, and is the way of it, it par- takes of its nature and its curse.

* De Legibus 1. scire. VOL. III. 4

22 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Scrm. L

For it is reraarkable that in e:ood and evil the case IS greatij different. Mortitication (e. g.) is a duty of Christianity; but there is no law concerning the instruments of it. We are not commanded to ro!i ourselves on thorns, as St. Benedict did ; or to burn our tlesli, like St. JMartinian ; or to tumble in snows with St. Francis ; or in the pools of water with St. Bernard. A man may chew cdoes., or lie upon the ground, or wear sackcloth, if he have a mind to it, and if he finds it good in his circumstanc- es and to his purposes of mortification ; but it may be he may do it alone by the instrumentalities of fear and love : and so the thing be done, no special instrument is commanded. But although the instru- ments of virtue are free, yet the instruments and min- isteries of vice are not. Not only the sin is forbidden, but all the ways that lead to it. The instruments of vir- tueare of tbemselvesinditferent,tliatis, not naturally, but good only lor their relation sake, and in order to their end. But the instruments of vice are of them- selves vicious : they are part of the sin, they have a share in the fantastick pleasure, and they begin to estrange a man's heart from God, and are di- rectly in the prohibition. For we are commanded to fly from temptation, to pray against it, to abstain from all appearances of evil, to make a covenant with our eyes, to pluck them out if tliere be need. And if Christians do not understand the commandments to this extension of signification, they will be inno- cent only by the measiiresof human laws, but not by the righteousness of God.

3. Of the same consideration itis also that we under- stand Christ's commandments to extend to ourduty, not only to what is named, and what is not named of the same nature and design; but that we abstain from all such things as are like to sins. Of this nature there are many. All violences of passion, irregularities in gaming, prodigality of our time, uudecency of action.

Serm. I. described. 23

doing things unworthy our birth or profession, apt- ness to go to law; ambitus^ or a tierce prosecution even of honourable employments ; misconstruction of the words and actions of our brother ; easiness to believe evil of others, willingness to report the evil which we hear; curiosity of diet, peevishness toward servants, indiscreet and importune standing for place, and all excess in ornaments; for even this little instance is directly prohibited by the Chistian and roval law of charity. For «>«.^« o-j rrc^Tn^ivircti, saith St. Paul; the word is a word hard to be under- stood ; we render it well enough; charily vauntcth not itself ; and upon this St. Basil says, that an ec- clesiastick person (and so every Christian in his pro- portion) ought not to go in splendid and vain orna- ments ; rijtii ydo 0 fMi tPw ;^o6/av, nKKct iin. x.'jLK}M7na-iJi.cv rrAgrtX'xy.Qa.vt'ra.t,

m^'sri^itui (X^i K:tTi,-^r^iuv: Every thing that is not wisely useful or proportioned to the state of the Christian, but ministers only to vanity, is a par-t of this ^^gTs^.t/scrS*/, it is a vaunting, which the charity and the grace of the Christian does not well endure. These things are like to sins, they are of a suspicious nature, and not easily to be reconciled to the Righteousness Evangelical. It Is no wonder if Christianity be nice and curious ; it is the cleanness and the pinifica- tlon of the soul, and Christ intends to present his church to God ctcmxiv mi. !tfj.cc/j.y,Tcv, without ypot or ivrin- kle^ or any such thing. N. B. or any such fhintr. If there be any irregularity that is less than a wiinkle, the Evangelical Righteousness does not allow it. These are such things which if men will stand to de- fend, possibly a modest reprover be more ashamed than an impudent offender. If I see a person apt to quarrel, to take every thing In an ill sense, to resent an errour deeply, to reprove it bitterly, to remem- ber it tenaciously, to repeat it frequently, to upbraid it unhandsomely, I think I have great reason to say, that this person does not do what becomes the

24 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Serm. I.

sweetness of a Christian spirit. If it be replied, It is no where forbidden to chide an olfending- person, and that it cannot be a fault to understand when a thing is said or done amiss ; I cannot return an an- swer, but by saying, that suppose nothing of it were a sin, yet that every thing of it is so like a sin, that it is the worse for it ; and that it were better not to do so ; at least I think so, and so ought you too, if you be curious of your eternal Interest : a little more tenderness here would do well. I cannot say that this dress, or this garment, or this standing for place is the direct sin of pride; but 1 am sure it looks like it in some persons ; at least the letting it alone is much better, and is very like humility. And certain it is, that he is dull of hearing who understands not the voice of God, unless it be clamorous in an express and a loud comnumdment, proclaimed with trumpets and clarions upon mount Sinai ; but a willing and an obedient ear understands the still voice of Christ, and is ready to oijey his meaning at half a word ; and that is the Righteousness Evangelical. It not only ab- stains from sins named, and sins implied, but from the beginnings and instruments of sin ; and from what- soever is like it. The Jews were so great haters of swine upon pretensions of the JMosaick rites, that they would not so much as name a swine, but called it ")n>} "121 Dab&r Jlchcr^ another thing. And thus the Romans in their auguries used altcnmi for non honum. The simile of this St. Paid translates to a Christian duty. Let not fornication be so much as named amongst you k '^simv ^ rot; «<>«/?, as is comely amongst ■ Christians, that is, come not near a foul thing; speak not of it, let it be wholly banished from all your con- versation ; for this niceness and curiosity of duty be- cometh saints, and is an instance of the Righteousness Evangelical.

Serm. I. described. 25

I have now done with the first sort of measures of the Chilstian righteousness ; these which are the matter of our negative duty ; these are the measures of our caution and our first innocence. But there are greater things hehind, which although I must crowd up into a narrow room, jet I must not wholly omit them therefore.

4. The fourth thing I shall note to you is, that whereas the righteousness of the Pharisees was but a fragment of the broken tables of Moses ; the pur- suance of some one grace, lacinia sanctitatis^ a piece of the robe of riohteousness : the Rio-hteousness Evangelical must be like Christ's seamless coat, all of a piece from the top to the bottom ; it must invest the whole soul : Misma^ Dumah, Jllassah, said the proverb of the Rabbins, it is this, and it is the other, and it must be all ; it must be an universal righteous- ness ; not a little knot of holy actions scattered in our lives, and drawn into a sum at the day of judgment, but it must be a state of holiness. It was said of the Paphlagonimi pigeons Ji^rAw c'/jao-fi*/ Twx^gtf/an every one of them had two hearts; but that in our mystical Theo- logy signi-ies a wicked man. So said k^folojnon* the perverse or wicked man, derachaim, he is a man of two ways ; Anp -fi^i^x"^, so Si. James expresses an unbeliever; a man that will and will not; something he does for God, and something for the world ; he hath two minds, and in a good fit, in his well days he is full of repentance, and overflows in piety ; but the paroxysm will return in the day of temptation, and then he is gone infallibly. But know this, that in the Righ- teousness Evangelical, one duty cannot be exchanged for another, and three virtues will not make amends for one remaining vice. He that oppresses the poor, cannot make amends by giving good counsel ; and if a Priest be simonalcal, he cannot be esteemed righ-

* Prov. xxviii. 14.

26 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Scrm. I.

teoiis before God by prcachinc^ well, and taking care of his charo'e. To be zealous for God and for reli- gion is good, but that will not legitimate cruelty to our brother. It is not enoujxh for a man to be a jxood citizen, unless he be also a good man; but some men build their houses with half a dozen cross sticks, and turf is the foundation, and straw is the covering, and they think they dwell securely ; their religion is made up of two or three virtues, and they think to com- mute with God, some good for some bad, 7roxx«^v^/>v"6i« ffw.x* cTs ^K^xi*; as if one deadly wound were not enough to destroy the most healthful constitution in the world. Deceive not yourselves. It is all one on which hand we fail :

Unum operantur

Et calor et frigus, sic hoc, sic illud adurit; Sic tcuebrae visum, sic sol contrariiis aufert.*

The moon may burn lis by night as well as the sun by day : and a man may be made blind by the light of the sun as well as by the darkness of the evening, and any one great mischief is enough to destroy one man. Some men are very meek and gentle naturally, and that they serve God withal ; they pursue the virtue of their nature : that is, they tie a stone at the bottom of the well, and that's more than needs ; the stone will stay there without that trouble; and this good inclination will of itself easily proceed to issue ; and theretore our care and caution should be more carefully employed in mortification of our natures, and acquist of such virtues to which we are more refractory, and then cherish the other too, even as much as we please ; but at the same time we are busy in this, it may be we are secret adulterers, and that

* Tims heat and cold with equal vigour strike, And light and darkness blind our eyes alike. A.

Serin. I. described. 27

will spoil our confidences in the goodness of the other instance : others are greatly bountiful to the poor, and love all mankind, and hurt nobody but them- selves ; but it is a thousand pities to see such loving good-natured persons to perish infinitely by one crime, and to see such excellent good things thrown away to please an uncontrolled and a stubborn lust; but so do some escape out of a pit, and aie taken in a trap at their going forth ; and stepping aside to avoid the hoar frost, fall into a vah'e) full of snow. The Riijhteousness Evangjelical is another kind of thing : it is a holy conversation, a God-like life, an universal obedience, a keeping nothing back from God, a sanctification of the whole man, and keeps not the body only, but the sou! and the spirit un- blameable to the coming of the Lord Jesus.

5- And lastly ; the Pharisaical Kighteousness was the product of fear, and therefore what they must needs do, that they would do ; but no more : but the Righteousness Evangelical is produced by love, it is managed by choice, and cherished by delio-ht and fair experiences. Christians are a Avilling people ; homi- nes bonae voluntatis^ men of good will ; arbores Domini. So they are mystically represented in scripture ; the trees of the Lord are full of sap : among the He- brews the trees of the Lord did signify such trees as grew of themselves ; and all that are of God's plant- ing, are such as have a vital principle within, and grow without constraint. nn^-^vTat toi; ct^ic-fAmn vomc/?, x«/ tok iS'ioti litii; HKAo-t rcuc vou'v;, onc Said it of Christians; they obey the laws, and by the goodness of their lives ex- ceed the laws ; and certain it is, no man hath the Righteousness Evangelical, if he resolves always to take all his liberty in every thing that is merely law- ful; or if he purpose to do no more than he must needs do, that is, no more than he is just commanded. For the reasons arc plain.

28 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGELICAL Semi. L

1. The Christian that resolves to do every thing that Is lawful, will many times run into danger and inconvenience ; because the utmost extremity of law- ful is so near to that which is unlawful, that he will pass into unlawful undiscernably. Virtues and vices have not in all their instances a great land-mark set between them, like warlike nations separate by pro- digious walls, vast seas, and portentous hills; but they are oftentimes like the bounds of a parish ; men are fain to cut a cross upon the turf, and make little marks and annual perambulations for memorials : so it is in lawful and unlawful, by a little mistake a man may be greatly ruined. He that drinks till his tongue is full as a spunge, and his speech a little stammering and tripping, hasty and disorderly, though he be not gone so far as drunkenness, yet he is beyond the severity of a Christian ; and when he is just past into unlawful, if he disputes too curiously he will cer- tainly deceive himself for want of a wiser curiosity.

But 2. He that will do all that he thinks he may lawfully, had need have an infallible guide always hj him, who should without errour be able to answer all cases of conscience, which Avill happen every day in a life so careless and insecure ; for if he should be mistaken, his errour is his crime, and not his excuse. A man in this case had need be very sure of his proposition ; which, because he cannot be in charity to himself, he will quickly fmd that he is bound to abstain from all things that are uncertainly good, and from all disputable evils, from things which although they may be in themselves lawful, yet accidentally, and that from a thousand causes may become unlaw- ful. Pavidus qnippc et formidolosus est Christianus^ sal til Salvian^ — atque in tantum peccare metuens, ut in- terdimi ct tion timenda formadat. A Christian is afraid of every little thing; and he sometimes greatly fears that he hath sinned, even then when he hath no other

Berm. L described. 29

reason to be afraid, but because he would not do so for all the world.

3. He that resolves to use all his liberty cannot be innocent, so long as there are in the world so many bold temptations, and presumptuous actions, so many scandals, and so much ignorance in the thino's of God, so many thmgs that are suspicious, and so many things that are of evil report j so many 11^ customs and disguises in the world, with which if we resolve to complv in all that is supposed lawful, a man may be in the regions of death, before he perceive his head to ache ; and instead of a staif inhis hand, may have a splinter in his elbow.

4. Besides all this ; he that thus stands on his terras with God, and so carefully husbands his duty, and thinks to make so good a market of obedience, that he will quit nothing which he thinks he may law- fully keep, shall never be exemplary in his life, and shall never grow in grace, and therefore shall never enter into glory. He therefore that will be righteoug by the measures evangelical, must consider not only what is lawful, but what is expedient ; not only what is barely safe, but what is worthy ; that which may secure, and that which may do advantage to that concern that is the greatest in the world.

And 2. The case is very like with them that re- solve to do no more good than is commanded them. For 1. It is infinitely unprofitable as to our eternal interest, because no man does all that is commanded at all times ; and therefore he that will not sometimes do more, besides that he hath no love, no zeal of duty, no holy fires in his soul ; besides this, I say, he can never make any amends towards tlje reparation of his conscience. Let him that stole, steal no more ; that is well ; but that is not well enough, for he must, if he can, make restitution of what he stole, or he shall never be pardoned j and so it is in all our inter-

VOL. Ill, 5

■iiO ^he RicnTEonftKEss kvastgilical Serm. t.

course with God. To do what is commanded is the duty of the present; we are tied to this in every pre- sent, in every period of our hves; but tlierefore if ive never do any more than just the present duty, who shall supply the deficiencies, and fill up the gaps, and redeem what is past ; this is a material consideration in the Riorhteousness Evangelical.

But then 2. We must know that in keeping of God's commandments every degree of internal duty is under the commandments ; and therefore whatever we do, we must do it as well as Ave can. Now he that does his duty with the biggest affection he can, will also do all that he can; and he can never know that he hath done what is commanded, unless he does all that is in his power. P^or God hath put no limit but love and possibility, and therefore whoever says, hither will I go and no farther, this 1 will do and no more, thus much will I serve God, but that shall be all; he hath the affections of a slave, and the re- ligion of a Pharisee, the craft of a merchant, and the falseness of a broker ; but he hath not the pro- per measures of the Righteousness Evangelical. But so it happens in the mud and slime of the river Bor- borus^ when the eye of the sun hath long dwelt upon it, and produces frogs and mice which begin to move a little under a thin cover of its own parental matter, and if they can get loose to live half a life, that is all ; but the hinder parts, which are not formed before the setting of the sun, stick fast in their beds of mud, and the little moiety of a creature dies before it could be well said to live : so it is with those Chris- tians, who will do all that they think lawful, and will do no more than what they suppose necessary they do but peep into the light of the Sun of Righteousness; they have the beginnings of life : but their hinder parts, their passions and affections, and the desires of the lower man are still unformed ; and he that

Serm. I. described. 31

dwells in this state is just so much of a Christian as a spung;e is of a plant, and a mushroom of a shrub : they may be as sensible as an oyster, and discourse at the rate of a child, but are greatly short of the Righteousness Evangelical.

I have now done Avith those parts of the Christian righteousness, which were not only an tWsgc;^'' or ex- cess, but an uvTt^nr^jicetrtQ to the Pharisaical : but be- cause I ouglit not to conceal any thing from you that must integrate our duty, and secure our title to the kingdom of heaven : there is this to be added, that this precept of our blessed Saviour is to be extended to the direct degress of our duty. We must do more duties, and we must do them better. And in this, although we can have no positive measures, because they are potentially infinite, yet therefore we ought to take the best, because we are sure the greatest is not too big ; and we are not sure that God will accept a worse, when we can do a better. Now although this is to be understood of the internal affec- tion only ; because that must never be abated, but God is at all times to be loved and served with all our heart, yet concerning the degrees of external duty, as prayers, and alms, and the like, we are certainly tied to a greater excellency in the degree, than was that of the Scribes and Pharisees. I am obliged to speak one word for the determination of this inquiry, viz. to how much more of external duty Christians are obliged, than was in the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees. In order to this, briefly thus. I remember that Salvian speaking of old men sum- ming up their repentances, and making amends for the sins of their whole life, exhorts them to alms and works of piety. But inquiring how much they should do towards the redeeming of their souls, an- swers with a little sarcasm, but plainly enough to give a wise man an answer, " A man, (says he,) is

82 THE RIGHTEOUSISrESS EVANGBLTCAL. Strm. L

*' not bound to give away all his goods, unless per- " adventure he owes all to God ; but in that case I " cannot tell what to saj ; for then the case is alter- " ed. A man is not bound to part with all his es- *' tate; that is, unless his sins be greater than his " estate ; but if they be, then he may consider of it *' again, and consider better. And he need not part " with it all, unless pardon be more precious to him " than his money, and unless heaven be worth it ail, " and unless he knows justly how much less will " do it. If he does let him try his skill, and pay " just so much and no more than he owes to God ; but *' if he does not know, let him be sure to do enough." His meaning is this : Not that a man is bound to give all he hath, and leave his children beggars; he is bound from that by another obligation. But as when we are tied to pray continually, the meaning is, we should consecrate all our time by taking good portions out of all our time for that duty ; the de- votest person being like the waters of Siloam* a per- petual spring, but not a perpetual current ; that is always in readiness, but actually thrusting forth his waters at certain periods every day. So out of all our estate we must take for religion and repentance such portions as the whole estate can allow; so much as will consecrate tiie rest; so much as is fit to bring when we pray for a great pardon, and depre- cate a mighty anger, and turn aside an intolerable fear, and will purchase an excellent peace, and will reconcile a sinner. Now in this case a Christian is to take his measures according to the rate of his contrition and his love, his religion and his fear, his danger and his expectation, and let him measure his amends wisely ; his sorrow pouring in, and his fear thrusting it dowii, and it were veiy well, il his

* Si Hier. inCoraracnt. Isai. viji. Isidor. 1. 13. Orig. cap. 13,

Serm I. dbscribeb. S3

love also would make It run over. For deceive not yourselves, there is no other measure but this; so much good as a man does, or so much as he would do, if he could, so much of religion and so much of repentance he hath, and no more : and a man can- not ordinarily know that he is in a saveable condi- tion : but by the testimony which a divine philan- throphy and a good mind always gives, which is to omit no opportunity of doing good in our several proportions and possibihties.

There was an alms which the Scribes and Phari- sees were obliged by the law to give, the tenth of every third years' increase ; this they always paid, and this sort of alms is called cTwa/oo-uvw, rig^hteousness or justice, but the alms which Christians ought to give is ;t^g'c, and it is «>«t«, it is grace, and it is love, and it is abundance, and so the old Rabbins told : Justitia proprie dicitur in its quae jure facimiis ; benignitas in its quae praeter jus. It is more than righteousness, it is bounty and benignity, for that is the Christian mea-» sure. And so it is in the other parts and instances of the Righteousness Evangelical. And therefore it is remarkable that the saints in the Old Testament were called «t;9«?, right men, and the book of Genesis^ as we find it twice attested by St. Hierome* was called by the ancient Hellenists, b«^xoc iv^im, the book of right or just men, the book of Jlbraham^ Isaac, and Jacob. But the word Christians is ;^p»5-t.^ good men, harmless and profitable. Men that are good, and men that do good. In pursuance of which it is further observed, by learned men, that the word ^£st» or vir- tue, is not in the tour Gospels ; for the actions of Christ's disciples should not be m gradu virtutis only, virtuous and laudable, such as these Aristotle presses in his Magna Moralia ; they must pass on to a fur-

"^ Commen. ia 12 Isai. and 1, 6. in Ezek, c. 18.

34 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS EVANGILICAL Serm. I.

ther excellency than so : the same which he calls v^t^tn Txo i^mm ; tlicy must bc sometimcs, and as often as we can in gradu heroico^ or, that I may use the Chris- tian style, they must be actions of perfection. Righ- teousness was the T'jmny.ov for alms in the Old Testa- merit, and TSAs/oTwf, or perfection was the word for alms in the New; as appears by comparing the fifth of St. JMa'th^w,i\n([ the sixth of St. Luke together; and that is the full slate of this diflerence in the inquiries of the Righteousness Pharisaical and Evangelical.

I have many more things to say, but ye cannot hear them now, because the time is past. One thing indeed were fit to be spoken of. if I had any time left; but I can onlv name it, and desire your consi- deration to make it up. This great rule that Christ gives us, does also, and that principally too, concern churciies and commonwealths, as well as every sin- gle Christian. Christian Parliaments must exceed the religion and gfovernment of the Sanhedrim. Your laws must be more holy, the condition of the subjects be made more tolerable, the laws of Christ must be strictly enforced, you must not suffer your great Ma- ker to be dishonoured, nor his religion dismembered by sects, or disgraced by impiety ; you must give no impunity to vicious persons, and you must take care that no great example be greatly corrupted ; you must make better provisions for your poor than they did, and take more care even of the external advan- tages of Christ's religion and his Ministers, than they did of the priests and Levltes ; that is, in all things you must be more zealous to promote the kiniydom of Christ, than they were for the minlsterles oi Moses. Tlie sum of all this is; the Righteousness Evan- gelical is the same with that which the Ancients called *T03-Toxww cf/«>«v TOAmm, to llvc an Ajjostolical life, that was the measure of Christians, the " v/afiTiL^Mi^ia.- §f!rT*: 4/5ymr, mcii that are desired to please God ; that is,

Serm. I. described. 35

as JipostoUus most admirably describes It,* men who are curious of their yery eyes, temperate in their tongue, of a mortified body, and a humble spirit, pure in their intentions, masters of their passions. Men, who when they are injured return honourable words; when they are lessened in their estates, increase in their charity ; when they are abused, they yet are courteous and give entreaties; when they are hated, they pay love; men that are dull in contentions, and quick in loving-kindnepses, swift as the feet of Jlsa- hel, and ready as the chariots o^ Amminadab. True Christians are such as are crucified with Christ, and dead unto all sin ; and finally place their whole love on God, and for his sake upon all mankind : this is the description of a Christian, and the true state of the Righteousness Evangelical : so that it was well

said Ot JltflBYlCliil'OYClS') "f ovSit;'x^^t!j-iTtctvo? Tvovupo; u /lih iivoKgiviTtti tov Xoyoy^

no Christian is a wicked man, unless his life be a con- tinual lie, unless he be false to God and his religion. For the righteousness of the gospel is in short, no- thing else but a transcript of the life of Christ ; De Tiiatthana nahaliel ; de nahcdiel Bamoth, said R. Joshua; Christ Is the image of God, and every Christian is the image of Christ, whose example is imitable, but it Is the best, and his laws are the most perfect, but the most easy, and the promises by which he invites our greater services are most excellent, but most true; and the rewards shall be hereafter, but they shall abide for ever, and (that I may take notice of the last words of my text) the threatenings to them that fall short of this righteousness are most terri- ble, but most certainly shall come to pass ; they shall never enter into the kingdom of heaven ; that is, their

TO-TTifm, «vvo/5tc, K«6ag .TKc, ooynQ a0'j.vtc-fxor o.yycgiuofA.ivo; tt^stiBh, a.ryca-Til>ovfji.i]ias |U>) <r;K«^ou, y.i^w/AivGc uyd^TTO., /SiA^ofAiv.c a.vi^:v, fiXoLircpii/u.cvfjiivoc 7rdLo.j.x.:iKih I'fKga- tflT< Til «y.ct§T;tf, o-Vff-Tat'§a9«T/ Tea Xg.o-Ta, oxm tw AyATrw i^.':T*.^ii :rt tov Kv?iov.

t Legat, pro Ciiristiani?.

36 THE RIGHTEOtTSUESS EVANGELICAL, ScC. Serttl. L

portion shall be shame and an eternal prison, ct<Tf,ciKiaJis ftv/uu., a flood of brimstone, and a cohabition with de- vils to eternal ages : and if this consideration will not prevail, there is no place left for persuasion, and there IS no use of reason ; and the greatest hopes and the greatest fears can be no argument or sanction of laws ; and the greatest good in the world is not considerable, and the greatest evil is not formida- ble ; but if they be, there is no more to be said; if you would have your portion with Christ, you must be righteous by his measures j and these are they that I have told you.

SERMON n>

THE CHRISTIAN'S CONQUEST

OVER THE BODY OF SIN.

Rom. Tii. 19.

For the good that 1 would, I do not : but the evil which I would not, that 1 do.

W' HAT the Eunuch said to Philip^ when he read the book of the prophet Isaiah ; of whom speaketh the prophet this^ of himself or some other man ? Tiie same question I am to ask concerning the words of my text : Does St. Paul mean this of himself, or of some other .^^ It is hoped that lie speaks it of himself; and means that though his understanding is convinc- ed that he ought to serve God ; and that he hath some unperfect desires to do so; yet the law of God without is opposed by a law of sin within. We have a corrupted nature, and a body of infirmity, and our reason dwells in the dark, and we must go out of the world before we leave our sin. For besides that some sins are esteemed brave and honourable, and he is a baffled person that dares not kill his brother like a gentleman ; our very tables are mad© a snare, and our civilities are direct treasons to the soul. You cannot entertain your friend, but excess

VOL. III. 6

^8 THE CHRISTIANAS CONQUEST Scrm. IL

is the measure ; and that jou may be very kind to your guest, you step aside and lay away the Chris- tian ; your love cannot be expressed unlesss you do him an ill-turn, and civilly invite him to a fever. Jus- tice is too often taught to bow to great interests, and men cannot live without flattery; and there are some trades that minister to sin, so that without a sin we cannot maintain our families; and if you mean to live, you must do as others do. Now so long as men see they are like to be undone by innocence, and that they can no way live but by compliance with the evil customs of the world, men conclude practi- cally, because they must live, they must sin ; they must live handsomely, and therefore must do some things unhandsomely, and so upon the whole matter, sin is unavoidable. Fain they would, but cannot tell how to help it. But since it is no better, it is w^ell it is no worse. For it is St. PauVs case, no worse man; he would and he would not, he did and he did not; he was willing, but he was not able; and there- fore the case is clear, that if a man strives against sin, and falls unwillingly, it shall not be imputed to him ; he may be a regenerate man for all that. A man must indeed wrangle against sin when it comes, and like a peevish lover resist and consent at the same time, and then all is well ; for this not only consists with, but is a sign of the state of regene- ration.

If this be true, God will be very ill served. If it be not true, most men will have but small hopes of being saved, because this is the condition of most men. What then is to be done ? Truth can do us no hurt, and therefore be willing to let this matter pass under examination: for if it troubles us now, it will bring comfort hereafter. And therefore before I enter into the main inquiry, 1 shall, by describing the state of the man of whom St. Paul speaks here.

iSerm. IL over thb body op bin. ^

tell you plainly, who it is that is in this state of sad things, and then do ye make your resolutions accord- ing as you shall find it necessary for the saving of your souls : which I am sure ought to he the end of all preaching.

1. The man St. Paul speaks of, is one that is dead, V. 9. one that was deceived and slain, v. 11. one in whom sin was exceeding sinful, v. 13. that is, highly imputed, greatly malicious, infmitely destructive : he is one who is carnal and sold under sin, v. 14. he is one that sins against his conscience and his reason, v. 16. he is one in whom sin dwells, but the spirit of God does not dwell ; for no good thing divells in him, V. 18. he is one who is brought into captivity to the law of sin, he is a servant of uncleanness, with his flesh and members serving the law of sin, v. 25. Now if this be a state of regeneration, I wonder what is or can be a state of reprobation ! for though this be the state of nature, yet it cannot be the state of one redeemed by the spirit of Christ; and therefore flat- ter not yourselves any more, that it is enough for you to have good desires, and bad performances : never think that any sin can reign in you, and yet you be servants of God : that sin can dwell in you, and at the same time the spirit of God can dwell in you too; or that life and death can abide together. The sum of aflairs is this. If ye live after the flesh, ye shall die ; but if ye through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live,* but not else upon any terms whatsover.

My text is one of the hard places of St. Paul; which, as St. Paul says, the ignorant and the unstable wrest to their own damnation. But because in this case the danger is so imminent, and the deception would be so intolerable, St. Paul immediately after this chapter (in which under his own person? as was

Rom. iii, 13.

40 THE christian's coNqPEST Sferm. //.

usual with him to do, he describes the state of a natural man advanced no further than Moses'' law, and not redeemed bj the blood of Christ, or enlight- ened by the spirit of God, and, taught by the wiser lessons and sermons of the gospel, immediately spends the next chapter in opposing the evangelical state to the legal, the spiritual to the carnal, the Christian to the natural ; and tells us plainly, he that is re- deemed by the blood of Christ, is redeemed from the power of sin : he that is Christ's freed man, is not a slave of sin, not captive to the devil at his will : he that is in the flesh cannot please God^ but every servant of Christ is freed from sin, and is a servant of righ- teousness, and redeemed from all his vain conversa- tion : for this is the end of Christ's coming, and cannot be in vain unless we make it so. He came to bless us by turning every one of us from our ini- quities. Now concerning this, besides the evidence of the thing itself, that St. Paul does not speak these words of himself, but by a iM9T*T;^^»^«T<tr^oc, under his own borrowed person, he describes the state of a carnal, unredeemed, unregenerate person, is expressly affirmed by St. Irenaeus and Origen^ by Tertullian and St. Basil, by Theodoret and St. Chrysostom, by St. Jerome, and sometimes by St. Jlustin, by St. Am- brose and St. Cyrils by J\Iacarius and Theophylact ; and is indeed that true sense and meaning of these "Words of St. Paul, which words none can abuse or misunderstand, but to the great prejudice of a holy life, and the patronage of all iniquity.

But for the stating of this great case of conscience, I shall first, in short, describe to you, what are the proper causes which place men, and keep them in this state of a necessity of sinning; and 2. I shall prove the absolute necessity of coming out of this condition, and quitting all our sin. 3. In what de- gree this is to be effected. 4. By what instruments

Serm* TL over the body of sin. 41

this is to be done ; and all these being practical, will of themselves be sufficient use to the doctrines, and need no other applicatory but a plain exhortation.

1. What are the causes of this evil, bj which we are first placed, and so long kept in a necessity of sinninjr so that we cannot do what o-ood we would,

nor avoid the evil that we hate ?

The first is the evil state of our nature. And in- deed he that considers the daily experiment of his own weak nature, the ignorance and inconstancy of his soul, being like a sick man's legs, or the knees of infants, reeling and unstable by disease or by infirmi- ty, and the perpetual leaven and germinations, the thrustings forth, and swelling of his senses, running out like new wine into vapours and intoxicating ac- tivities, will readily confess, that though even in nature there may be many good inclinations to many instances of the divine commandments; yet it can go no further than this velleily, this desiring to do good, but is not able. And it is Lactantius brings in the Pagan or natural man complaining, Volo equidem non peccare^ sed vincor, indutus eaim sum came fragili et imbecillit. This is very true, and I add only this cau- tion : There is not in the corruption of our nature so much as will save us harmless, or make us excusable if we sin against God. JNatural corruption can make us criminal, but not innocent; for though by him that willingly abides in the state of mere nature, sin can- not be avoided, yet no man is in that state no longer than he loves to be so ; for the grace of God came to rescue us from this evil portion, and is always present to give us a new nature, and create us over again : and therefore though sin is made necessary to the natural man by his impotency and fond loves, that is, by his unregenerate nature ; yet in the whole consti- tution of affairs, God hath more than made it up by his grace, if we will make use of it. In pueris cluceS

42 TfiB christian's conquest Serm. IT,

spes plurimorum, quae ubi emoritur aetatCf manifestum est non dcfecisse naturam, sed curam^ said Qinntilian. We cannot tell what we are, or what we think in our infancy ; and when we can know our thoughts, we can easily observe that we have learned evil things by evil examples, and the corrupt manners of an evil conversation : et ubi par socordiam vires, tempiis, ingenium dejluxcre, naturae infirmitas accusatur ; that indeed is too true ; we grow lazy, and wanton, and we lose our time, and abuse our parts, and do ugly things, and lay the fault wholly upon our natural infirmities; but we must remember that by this lime it is a state of nature, ? state of flesh and blood, which cannot enter into heaven. The natural man and the natural child are not the same thing in true divmity. The natural child indeed can do no good ; but the natural man cannot chuse but do evil ; but it is be- cause he will do so ; he is not born in the second birth, and renewed in the baptism of the spirit.

2. We have brought ourselves into an accidental necessity of sinning, by the evil principles which are sucked in by great parts of mankind. We are taught "ways of going to heaven without forsaking our sins; of repentance without restitution ; of being in charity without hearty forgiveness, and without love : of believing our sins to be pardoned before they are mortified; of trusting in Christ's death without con- formity to his life ; of being in God's favour upon the only account of being of such an opinion ; and that Avhen we are once in, we can never be out. We are taught to believe, that the events of things do not de- pend upon our crucifying our evil and corrupt affec- tions, but upon eternal and unalterable counsels ; that the promises are not the rewards of obedience, but graces pertaining only to a few predestinates, and yet men are saints for all that ; and that the laws of (jod are of the race of the giants, not to be observed

tSerm. //. oyer the body of sin. 43

by any grace or by any industry : this is the cate- chism of the ignorant and the profane : but without all peradventure, the contrary propoaitions are the way to make the world better : but certainly they that believe these things do not believe it necessary that we should eschew all evil : and no wonder then, if, when men upon these accounts slacken their industry and their care, they find sin still prevailing, still dwelling within them, and still unconquerable by so slight and disheartened labours. For 'iJianas

Tra.; KAt ctTrui^ijjlot Tgo-rov rtva. Trcth f<rrt : eVCry fool and eVCry

ignorant person is a child still ; and it is no won- der that he who talks foohshly should do childishly and weakly.

3. To our weak and corrupted nature, and our foolish discourses, men do daily superinduce evil ha- bits and customs of sinnmg. Consuetiido mala tan- quam hamus infixus animae^ said the Father ; an evil custom is a hook in the soul, and draws it whither the devil pleases. When it comes to the K^eS^A yiyv/j.v=i<rf^iv» rrMovi^iaic as St. Pcicr^s word is, a heart exercised ivith covetous practices^ than it is also «5-^sv;k, it is weak and unable to do the good it fain would, or to avoid the evil which in a good fit it pretends to hate. This is so known I shall not insist upon it; but add this only, that whenever a habit is contracted, it is all one what the instance be ; it is as easy as delicious, as unalterable in virtue as in vice ; for if Vv'hat helps nature brings to a vicious habit, the same and much more the spirit of God, by his power and by his comforts can do in a virtuous ; and then we are well again. You see by this who are, and why they are in this evil condition. The evil natures, and the evil principles, and the evil manners of the world, these are the causes of our imperfect willings, and weaker actings in the things of God ; and as long as men stay here, sin will be unavoidable. For even meat

44 THE christian's conquest Serni' IL

itself is loathsome to a sick stomach ; and it is im- possible for him that is heart sick to eat the most wholesome diet; and yet he that shall say eating is impossible, will be best confuted by seeing bill the healthful men in the world eat heartily every day. 2. But what then ? Cannot sin be avoided ? Can- not a Christian mortify the deeds of the body? Cannot Chri 4 redeem us, and cleanse us from all our sins ? Cannot the works of the devil be destroyed ? That is the next particular to be inquired of; Whether or no it be not necessary, and therefore very possible for a servant of God to pass from this evil state of things, and not only hate evil, but avoid it also?

He that saithhe hath not sinned^ is a liar ; but what then ? Because a man hath sinned, it does not fol- low he must do so always. Hast thou sinned? do so no more, (said the wise Bensirach i) and so said Christ to the poor paralytick, Go, and sin no more. They were excellent words spoken by a holy prophet, Let not the sinner say he hath not sinned ; for God shall hum coals of fire upon his head, that saith before the Lord God and his glory, I have not sinned. Well ! that case is confessed ; All men have sinned., and come short of the glory of God. But is there no remedy for this? Must it always be so ? and must sin for ever have the npper hand, and for ever baffle our resolutions, and all our fierce and earnest promises of amendment? God forbid. There was a time then to come, and blessed be God, it hath been long come, Yet a little ivhile (saith the pi'ophet) and inifpdty shall be taken out of the earth, and rig/deousness shall reign among you. For, that is in the day of Christ's kingdom, the manifestation of the gospel. When Christ reigns in our hearts by his spirit, Dagon and tlje ark cannot stand together; we cannot serve Christ and BeliaL And as in the state of nature no good thing dwells within us; so when Christ rules in us, no evil thing

Serm. II. over the body of sin. 45

can abide ; For every plant that my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up and cast a way into the fires of consumption or purification. But how shall this come to pass, since we all find ourselves so infinitely weak and foolish ? I shall tell you. // is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle^ than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of hea- ven^ saith Christ. It is impossible to nature ; it is impossible to them that are given to vanity ; it is im- possible for them that delight in the evil snare : but Christ adds, With men this is impossible^ but with God all things are possible. What we cannot do for our- selves, God can do for us, and W'ith us. What nature cannot do, the grace of God can. So that the thing may be done, not indeed by ourselves, hni gratia Dei mecum., saith St. Paid ; God and man together can do it. But if it can be done any way that God hath put into our powers, the consequent is this; no man's 2:ood will shall be taken in exchano-e for the real and actual mortification of his sins. He that sins, and would fain not sin, but sin is present with him whether he will or no, let him take heed; for the same is the law of sin., and the law of deaths (saith the apostle;) and that man's heart is not right with God. For it is impossible men should pray for de- hverance, and not be heard ; that they should labour, and not be prosperous, unless they pray amiss, and labour falsely. Let no man therefore please himself with talking of great things, with perpetual conver- sation in pious discourses, or with inefiective desires of serving God : he that does not practice as well as he talks, and do what he desires, and what he ought to do, confesses himself to sin greatly against his con- science ; and it is a prodigious folly to tisink that he is a good man, because though he does sin, yet it was against his mind to do so. A man's conscience can never condemn him if that be his excuse to say that his

VOL. III. 7

•iti TiiE christian's CONQUEST Scrm. II.

conscience checked him ; and that will be but a sad apology at the day of judgment. Some men talk like angels, and pray with great fervour, and medi- tate with deep recesses, and speak to God with lov- ing affections, and words of union, and adhere to him in silent devotion, and when they go abroad are as passionate as ever, peevish as a frighted fly, vexing themselves with their own reflections : they are cruel in their bargains, unmerciful to their tenants, and proud as a barbarian prince : they are, for all their tine v/ords, impatient of reproof, scornful to their neighbours, lovers of money, supreme in their own thoughts, and submit to none; all their spiritual life they talk of, is nothing but spiiitual fancy and illu- sion ; they sre still under the power of their passions, and tfieir sin rules them imperiously, and carries them away infallibly. Let these men consider, there are some men think it impossible to do as much as they do : the comnoon swearer cannot leave that vice, and talk well; and these men that talk thus well, think they cannot do as well as they talk ; but both of them are equally under the power of their respective sins, and are equally deceived, and equally not the servants of God. This is true; but it is equally as true, that there is no necessity for all this; for it ought, and it may be otherwise if we please: fori pray be pleased to hear St. Paul; Walk in the spirit^ and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the fiesh ;* There is your remedy: For the spirit lusteth against thefiesh^ and the fiesh against the spirit; there is the cause of it ; /i£i^« miwTi, so that ye may not or cannot do the tilings ye ivould ; that is the blessed consequent and product of that cause : that is plainly, as there is a state of carnality, (of which St. Paul speaks in my text) so that in that state a man cannot but obey the flesh; au thejre is also a state of spirituality, when sin is

* Gal. V. 16.

»Sfgrm. //. OVER THE BODF OP SIN. 47

dead, and righteousness is alive; and in this state the flesh can no more prevail, than the spirit could do in the other. Some men cannot choose but sin ; for the carnal mind is not subject to God^ neither indeed can ^c,* saith St. Paid; but there are also some men that cannot endure any thing that is not good. It is a great pain for a temperate man to suifer the dis- orders of drunkenness ; and the shames of lust are intolerable to a chaste and modest person. This also is affirmed bj St. John, Whosoever is born of God, doth not commit sin, for his seed remaineth in hirn^f So that you see it is possible for a good man not to com- mit the sin to which he is tempted ; but the apostle says more, He doth not commit sin, neither indeed can he, because he is born of God.

And this is agreeable to the words of our blessed Saviour; ji corrupt tree cannot brin^r forth good fruit, and a good tree cannot bring forth evil fridt ;% that is ; as the child of hell is carried to s\n pleno impetu, he does not check at it, he does it and is not troubled ; so on the other side, a child of God is as fully con- vinced of rio-hteousness, and that which is unri2:hteous is as hateful to hmi as colocynths to the taste, or the sharpest punctures to the pupil of the eye. We may see something of this in common experiences. What man of ordinary prudence and reputation can be tempted to steal t or for what price would he be tempted to murder his friend.^ If we did hate all sins as we hate these, would it not be as easy to be as inno- cent in other instances as most men are in these } and we should have as few drunkards as we have thieves. In such as these we do not complain in the words of my text. What I would not, that I do ; and ivhat I would, [do not. Does not every good man overcome all the power of great sins .'' And can he by the

* Rom. viii, 7. f 1 Jobn iii. 9. t Matt, vii. 18.

4C THE christian's conquest Serm. II.

spirit of God and right reason, by fear and hope con- quei- GolicJu and beat the sons of the j^lant ; and tan he not overcome the httic children oi" Gath ? Or is it harder to overcome a httle sin than a great one? Are not the temptations to httle shjs very little? and yet are they greater and stionger than a mighty grace ? Could the poor demoniack that lived in the graves, by the power of the devil break his iron ciiains in pieces ? and cannot he who halh the spirit of God dissolve the chains of sin ? Through Christ that strenoihem me^ I can do all things., saith St. Paul : Satis sihi copiarvm cum Publio Decio^ et numquam ni- mium hostivm fore^ said one in Livy ; which is best rendered by St. Paul, If God be with vs, who can be against us f Nay, theie is an i-Wfgi^avusv in St. Paid., We are more than conquerors : For even amongst an army ol conquerors there are degrees of exaltation; some serve God like the Centurion, and some like St. Peter ; some like Martha^ and some like Mary ;

l^ir' VMoxiAc cLTraa-ni- etnv TTovav itcti Ug(muit, all gOod mCU COn(]Uer

theii- temptation, but some with more ease, and some "With a clearer victory; and more than thus, JVon solum viperam ierimus., sed ex ca antidotum conjicimiis, We kill the viper, and make treacle of him; that is, not ojiiy escape from, but get advantages by temp- tations. But we commonly are more afraid than hurt; Let us therefore lay aside every weight., and the sin thai doth so easily beset us ;*' so we read the words of the apostle : but St. Chrysostom^s rendition of them is better ; for the word ivnnptrTcnro; is a perfect passive, and cannot signii'y the strength and irresistibility of sin upon us, but the oulte contrary ; fi'^s/:/<rT:<T(;c i^a^TW sigiiiiies the sin that is so easily avoided, as they that understand that language know very well. And if we were so wise and valiant as not to afhiirht oiu'- selves with our own terrours, we should quickly lind, that by the help of the spirit of God we can do

* Ileb. xii. 1. .

Serm. II. over the body of sin. 49

more than we thought we could. It was said of Jllexander^ Bene ausus est vana contemnere^ he did no great matter in conquering the Persians, because they were a pitiful and a soft people ; only he under- stood them to be so, and was wise and bold enough not to fear such images and men of clouts. But men in the matter of great sins and little, do as the J\Ia- gicians of Egypt ; when Moses turned his rod into a serpent, it moved them not; but when they saw the lice and the flies, then they were afraid. We see that by the grace of God we can escape great sins; but we start at flies, and a bird out of a bush disorders us; the lion in the way troubles us not, but a frog and a worm aifrights us. Remember the saying of St. Paul^ Christ came to redeem to himself a church, and to present it pure and spotless before the throne of Grace ; and if you mean to be of this number, you must endeavour to be under this qualifjcation, that is, (as Paid laboured to be) void of offence both to- ivards God and towards JlJan. And so I have done with the second proposition ; it is necessary that all sin, great and little, should be mortified and dead in us, and that we no longer abide in that state of slave- ry as to say. The good thai I ivould, I do not ; but the evil that I ivould not., that I do.

3. In the next place we are to inquire in what de- cfree this is to be effected ; for thouo-h in neo-atives properly there are no degrees, yet unless there be some allays in this doctrine it will not be so well, and it may be your experiences will for ever confute my arguments: far, Who can say that he is clean from his sin ? (said the wise man :) and as our blessed Sa- viour said, He that is innocent among yon all, let him thro IV the first stone at the sinner, and spare not.

To this 1 answer in the Avords of St. Gregory ; all man's righteousness will be found to be unrigh- teous, if God should severely enter into judgment;

50 THE christian's conq,uest Serm. II.

but therefore even after our innocence we must pray for pardon, ut quae succwnhcre disctissa poterat^ ex judicis pietate commlcscat^ tliat our innocence, which in strictness of divine judgment would be found spot- ted and stained, bv the mercy of our Saviour may be accepted. St. Bernard expresses this well ; JYos- tra siqua est hmnilis justiiia^ recta forsitan sed non pu- ra ; our hurnbSe righteousness is periiaps right in the eyes of God, but not pure ; that is, accepted by his mercy, but it is such as dares not contend in judi^ment. For as no man is so much a sinner, but he sometimes speaks a good word, or does some things not ill ; and yet that httle good interrupts not that state of evil : so it is amongst very good men, from whom sometimes may pass something tiiat is not commendable ; and yet their heart is so habi- tually right towards God, that they will do nothing but (I do not say which God in justice cannot, but) which in mercy he will not impute to eternal con- demnation. It was the case oi David ; he was a man after God''s own heart ; nay, it is said, he was blame- less save in the matter o/* Uriah : and yet we know he numbered the people, and God Avas angry with him, and punished him for it : but because he was a good man and served God heartily, that other fault of his was imputed to him no further: God set a fine upon his head for it, lAit it was salvo contenemento, the main stake was safe.

For concerning good men the question is not, whether or no God could not in the rigour of justice blame their indiscretion, or impute a foolish word, or chide them for a hasty answer, or a careless action, for a less devout prayer, or weak hands, for a fearful heart, or a trembling faith. These are not the mea- sures by which God judges his children ; for he know- eth whereof we are made^ and he remembers that ive are but dust. But the question is, whether any man that

Serm. II. over the body of sin. 51

is covetous or proud, false to his trust, or a drunkard, can at the same time be a child of God ? No, certainly he cannot. But then we know that God judges us by Jesus Christ, that is, with the allays of mercy, with an eye of pardon, with the sentences of a father, by the measures of a aian, and by analogy to all our unavoidable abatements. God could enter with us into a more severe judgment, but he would not ; and no justice tied him from exercising that mercy. But according to the measures of the gospel, he tvill judge every man accordmg to his works. Now what these measures are, is now the question. To which I an- swer first in general, and then more particularly.

I. In general thus : — A Christian's innocence is al- w^ays to be measured by the plain lines and measures of the commandments; but are not to betaken into ac- count by uncertain and fond opinions, and the scruples of zealous and timorous persons. My meaning is this : Some men tell us that every natural inclination to a for- bidden object is a sin ; which they that believe, finding them to be natural, do also confess that such sins are unavoidable. But if these natural and first motions be sins, then a man sins whether he resists them, or resists them not, whether he prevails or prevails not ; and there is no other difierence but this: he that fights not against, but always yields to his desires, sins gi-eatest; and he that never yields, but fights al- ways, sins oftenest. But then, by this reckoning it "will indeed be impossible to avoid millions of sins ; because the very doing of our duty does suppose a sin. If God should impute such first desires to us as sins, we were all very miserable ; but if he does not impute them, let us trouble ourselves no further about them, but to take care that they never prevail u})on us. Thus men are taught that they never say their prayers but they commit a sin. Indeed that is true but too otten : but yet it is possible for us bv tlie

f)'! THE chkistian's CONQUEST Serm. II.

grace of God to please blm in saying our prayers, and to be accepted of him. But indeed it^ God did proceed against us as we do against one another, no snan could abide innocent for so much as one hour. But God's judgment is otherwise : he inquires if the heart he right, if our labour be true, if we love no sin, if we use prudent and efficacious instruments to mortify our sin, if we go about our religion as we go about the biggest concerns of our life; if we be sin- cere and real in our actions and intentions. For this is the a.vAfxufi>,(rta. that God requires of us all ; this is that sinless state, in which if God does not find us, we shall never see his glorious face, and if he does find us, we shall certainly be saved by the blood of Jesus. For in the style of scnptuj'e to be ii^tupm:; mt n'm^c^rn-.n-ot is the same thing ; to be sincere, and to be without offence is all one. Thus David spake heartily, / aiii utterly purposed that my mouth shall not offend ; and thou shall find no wickedness in me. He that endeavours this, and hopes this, and does actions, and uses means ac- cordingly, not being deceived by his own false heart, nor abused by evil propositions, this man will stand upright in the congregations of the just; and though he cannot challenge heaven by merit, yet he shall receive it as a gift, by promise and by grace. Lex nos innocentci esse jubet,noncuriosos, snid Seneca. For God takes no judgment of us by any measures, but of the commandment without, and the heart and the conscience within; but he never intended his laws to be a snare to us, or to entrap us with consequences and dark interpretations, by large deductions and Avitty similitudes of faults ; but he requires of us a sincere heart, and a hearty labour in the work of his commandments: he calls upon us to avoid all that Avhich his law plainly forbids, and wliicii our con- sciences do condemn. This is the general measure. The particulars are briefly these : —

^erm. If. over the body of sin. 53

1. Every Christian is bound to arrive at that state, that he have remaining in him no habit of any sin whatsoever. Our old man must be crucified ; the body of sin must be destroyed ; he must no longer serve sin ; sin shall not have the dominion over you. All these are the Apostle's words ; that is plainly, as I have already declared, you must not be at that pass, that though ye would avoid sin, ye cannot. For he that is so is a most perfect slave, and Christ's freed man cannot be so. Nay, he that loves sin, and de- lights in it, hath no liberty indeed, but he hath more shew of it, than he that obeys it against his will.

Libertatis servaveris umbram.

Si quicquid jubeare velis *

He that loves to be in the place, is a less prisoner, than he that is confined against his will.

2. He that commits any one sin by choice and de- liberation is an enemy to God, and is under the do- minion of the flesh. In the case of deliberate sins one act does give the denomination ; he is an adul- terer that so much as once fully breaks the holy laws of marriage. He that abends in one, is guilt}/ of all, saith St. James. St. Peter^s denial, and David's adul- tery had passed on to a fatal issue, if the mercy of God and a great repentance had not interceded. But they did so no more, and so God restored them to grace and pardon. And in this sense are the words of St. John, 0 mtmv Tm "MstpTm, he that does a sin is of the De- vil, and he that is born of God a^agnstv ov isrHu, he does not commit a sin, he chuses none, he loves none, he en- dures none, talia (juae non faciet bonae fidei et spei Christianus ; they do no great sin, and love no little one. A sin chosen and deliberately done, is, as T<?r-

*0f freedom still you will preserve the shade, If prompt obedience be with pleasure paial. A.

VOL. III. 8

54 THE christian's coNCiUEST Scrm, II.

tullian''s expression is, crimen devoratoriiim salutis ; it devours salvation. For as there are some sins which can be done but once, as a man can kill his father but once, or himself but once; so in those things which can be repeated, a perfect clioice is equivalent to a habit ; it is the same in principle, that a habit is in the product. In short, he is not a child of God, that knowingly and deliberately chooses any thing that God hates.

3. Every Christian ought to attain to such a state of life, as that he never sin, not only by a long deliberation, but also not by passion. I do not say that he is not a good Christian, who by passion is suddenly surprised and falls into folly; but this I say, that no passion ought to make him choose a sin. For let the sin enter by anger or by desire, it is all one, if the consent be gained. It is an ill sign if a man, though on the sudden, con- sents to a base action. Thus far every good man is tied, not only to endeavour, but to prevail against his sin.

4. There is one step more; which if it be not actually effected, it must at least be greatly endeav- oured, and the event to be left to God : and that is, that we strive for so great a dominion over our sins and lust, as that we be not surprised on a sudden. This in- deed is a work of time ; it is well if it be ever done ; but it must always be endeavoured. But in this partic- ular, even good men are sometimes unprosperous. St. Epiphanius^ and St. Chrysostom grew once into choler, and they past too far, and lost more than their argu- ment, they lost their reason, and they lost their pa- tience : and Epiphanius wished that St. Chrysostom might not die a bishop ; and he in a peevish exchange, wished that Epiphanius might never return to his bishoprick ; when they had forgotten their foolish anger, God remembered it, and said jimea to both

Serm. II. over the dody of sin. 55

their cursed speakings. Nay, there is yet a great- er example of human frailty ; St. Pauly and Bar- nabas were very holy persons, but once in a heat they were both to blame, they were peevish and parted company. This was not very much : but God was so displeased, even for this little fly in their box of ointment, that their story says they never saw one another's face again. These earnest emis- sions and transportations of passion do sometime declare the weakness of good men : but that even here we ought at least to endeavour to be more than conquerors appears in this, because God al- lows it not, and by punishing such follies does mani- fest that he intends that we should get victory over our sudden passions, as well as our natural lusts. And so I have done with the third inquiry, in what degree God expects our innocence ; and now I briefly come to the last particular, which will make all the rest practicable ; I am now to tell you how all this can be effected, and how we shall get free from the power and dominion of our sins.

4. The first great instrument is Faith. He that hath faiih like a grain of mustard-seed can remove mountains ; the mountains of sin shall fall flat at the feet of the faithful man, and shall be removed into the sea, the sea of Christ's blood and penitential waters. Faith overcometh the worlds saith St. John; and ivalk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh : there are two of our enemies gone; the world and the flesh, by faith and the spirit of faith ; and as for the devil, put on the shield of faith, and re- sist the devil, and he will fee from you, saith the Apos- tle ; and the powers of sin seem insuperable to none, but to them that have not faith ; we do not believe that God intends we should do what he seems to require of us; or else we think that though God's grace abounds, yet sin must superabound, express-

^6 THE christian's CONQUEST Serm. II.

\y against the sajing of St. Paul; or else we think that the evil spirit is stronger than the good spirit of God. Hear what St. John saith, J\'Iy little children, ye are of God^ and have overcome the evil one ; for the spirit that is in you is greater than that which is in the world.* Behevest thou this ? If you do, I shall tell you what may be the event of it. When the father of the boy, possessed with the devil, told his sad sto- ry to Christ, he said ; Master., if thou canst do any thing, I pray help me. Christ answered him, If thou canst believe^ all things are possible to him that believeth.'f N. B. And therefore if you do believe this, go to your prayers, and go to your guards, and go to your labour, and try "what God will do for you. For whatsoever things ye desire when ye pray, believe that ye may receive them, and ye shall have them. Now consider ; do not we every day pray in the divine hymn called Te Deum, Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin? and in the collect at morning prayer, and grant that this day we fall into no sin, rieither run into any kind of danger, but that all our doing may be ordered by thy governance, to do always that which is righteous in thy sight ? Have you any hope, or any faith when you say that prayer.'* And if you do your duty as you can, do you think the failure will be on God's part? Fear not that; if you can trust in God, and do ac- cordingly ; though your sins were as scarlet, yet they shall be as ivhite as snow, and pure as the feet of the holy Lamb. Only let us forsake all those weak propositions which cut the nerves of faith, and make it impossible for us to actuate all our good desires, or to come out from the power of sin.

2. He that would be free from slavery of sin, and the necessity of sinning, must always watch. Aye, that's the point ; but who can watch always } Why,

* 1 Job. iv. 4, f Mark ix. xxiii.

Serm. 11. over the body of sin. Iti

every good man can watch always : and that we may not be deceived in this, let us know, that the running away from a temptation is a part of our watchfuhiess, and every good employment is anoth- er great part of it, and a laying in provision of rea- son and religion before hand, is yet a third part of this watchfulness ; and the conversation of a Chris- tian is a perpetual watchfulness ; not a continual thinking of that one, or those many things which may endanger us ; but it is a continual doing some- thing directly or indirectly against sin. He either prays to God for his Spirit, or relies upon the pro- mises, or receives the sacrament, or goes to his bish- op for counsel and a blessing, or to his priest for religious offices, or places himself at the feet of good men to hear their wise sayings, or calls for the church's prayers, or does the duty of his calling, or actu- ally resists temptation, or frequently renews his holy purposes, or fortifies himself by vows, or searches into his danger by a daily examination ; so that in the whole, he is for ever upon his guard. This duty and caution of a Christian is like watch- ing lest a man cut his finger. Wise men do not often cut their fingers, and yet every day they use a knife; and a man's eye is a tender thing, and every thing can do it wrong, and eyerj thing can put it out; yet because we love our eyes so well, in the midst of so many dangers, by God's provi- dence and a prudent natural care, by winking when any thing comes against them, and by turning aside when a blow is offered, they are preserved so cer-- tainly, that not one in ten thousand does by a stroke lose one of his eyes in all his life time. If we would transplant our natural care to a spiritual caution, we might by God's grace be kept from losing our souls, as we are from losing our eyes ; and because a perpetual watchfulness is our great defence, ancl

58 THE christian's conquest f^rm. 11.

the perpetual presence of God's grace is our great security, and that this grace never leaves us, unless we leave it, and the precept of a daily watchfulness is a thing not only so reasonable, but so many easy ways to be performed, we see upon what terms we may be quit of our sins, and more than conquerors over all the enemies and impediments of salvation.

3. If you would be in the state of the liberty of the sons of God ^ that is, that you may not be servants of sin in any instance; be sure in the mortifications of sin, wiJHngly or carelessly to leave no remains of it, no nesl-egg, no principles of it, no aifections to it ; if any thini^ remains, it will prove to us as manna to the sons of Israel on the second day, it ivill breed ivotms and stink. Therefore labour against every part of it, reject every proposition that gives it countenance ; pray to God against it all; and what then ? Why then,, ask atid you shall have (said Christ.) Nay, say some, it is true, you shall be heard ; but in part only; for God will leave some remains of sin within us, lest we should become proud by being innocent. So \ainly do men argue against God's goodness and their own blessings and salvation, junu. ttkuovoc o: Tixyxc xm Tnt^n^Kiun;, mti v^-iy/txttTitu.: £^w3^^^/vT^t/, (as St Basil says) they contrive witty arts to undo themselves, being intangled in the periods of ignorant disputations. But as to the thing itself, if by tlie remams of sin they mean the propen- sities and natural inclinations to forbidden objects ; there is no question but they will remain in us so long as we bear our flesh about us ; and surely that is a great argument to make us humble. But these are not the sins which God charges on his people. But if by remains we mean any part of the habit of sin, any affection, any malice or perverseness of the will ; then it is a contradiction to s sy that God leaves in us such remains of sin, lest by innocence we become proud : for how should pride spring ia a man's heart,

Serm. II. over the body of sik. 59

if there be no remains of sin lett ? And is it not the best, the surest waj to cure the pride ot our hearts, by taking out every root of bitterness, even the root of pride itself? Will a physician purposely leave the relicks of a disease, and pretend he does it to prevent a relapse ? And is it not more likely he will relapse, if the sickness be not wholly cured ? But, but besides this; if God leaves any remains of sin in us, what remains are they, and of what sins ? Does he leave the remains of pride ? If so ; that were a strange cure, to leave the remains of pride in us to keep us from being proud. But if not so ; but that all the remains of pride be taken away by the grace of God blessing our endeavours, what danger is there of being proud, the remains of which sin are by the grace of God wholly taken away ? But then, if the pride of the heart be cured, which is the hardest to be removed, and commonly is done last of all, v/ho can distrust the power of the spirit of God, or his goodness, or his promises, and say that God does not intend to cleanse his sons and servants from all unrighteous- ness ; and according to St. PauVs prayer, keep their bodies and souls, and spirits unblameable to the coming of the Lord Jesus ? But however, let God leave what remains he please, all will be well enough on that side ; but let us be careful, as far as we can, thai we leave none ; lest it be severely imputed to us, and the fire break out and consume us.

4. Let us without any further question, put this argument to a material issue; let us do all that we can do towards the destruction of the whole body of sin; but let us never say we cannot be quit of our sin, till we have done all that we can do towards the mortification of it. For till that be done, how can any man tell where the fault lies, or whe- ther it can be done or no ? If any man can say that he hath done all that he could do, and yet hath failed of his duty ; if he can say truly, that he hath

60 THE christian's coNauEsx Sevm. II.

endured as much as is possible to be endured, thai he hath watched always, and never nodded, when he could avoid it, that he hath loved as much as he could love, that he hath waited till he can wait no longer ; then indeed, if he sajs true, we must confess that it is not to be understood. But is there any man in the world that does all that he can do ? If there be, that man is blameless ; if there be not, then he cannot say but it is his own fault that his sin prevails against him. It is true that no man is iree from sin ; but it is as true, that no man does as much as he can ao^ainst it : and therefore no man must «:o about to excuse himself by saying, no man is free from his sin ; and therefore no man can be, no, not by the powers of grace : for he may as well argue thus ; No man does do all that he can do against it ; and therefore it is impossible he should do what he can do. The argument is apparently foolish, and the excuse is weak, and the deception visible, and sin prevails upon our weak arguings ; but the conse- quence is plainly this : when any man commits a sin, he is guilty before God ; and he cannot say he could not help it, and God is just in punishing every sin, and very merciful when he forgives us any : but he that says he cannot avoid it, that he cannot overcome his lust, confesses himself a servant of sin, and that he is not yet redeemed by the blood of the Holy Lamb.

5. He that would be advanced beyond the power and necessity of sinning must take great caution con- cerning his thoughts and secret desires : For lust when it is conceived bringeth forth sin ; but if it be suppress- ed in the conception, it comes to notliing : but we find it hard to destroy the serpent when the egg is hatched into a cockatrice. The thought is a^ag7c§tf a^prtci; no man takes notice of it, but lets it alone till the sin be too strong, and then we complain we cannot

Serm. II. over the body of sin. 61

help it. JYoIo sinas cogitationem crescere^* suffer not your thoughts to grow up : for they usually come (as St. Basil says) suddenly, and easily, and without business ; but take heed that you nurse them not ; but if you chance to stumble, mend your pace ; and if you nod, let it awaken you ; for he only can be a good man, that raises himself up at the first trip, that strangles his sin in the birth :

ToioLvrtti T«y ayioiv -^uxf-h Tg/v t?ns-eLv itvia-Tstvluf^ gOod mcn TISC Up

again even before they fall, saith St. Chrysostom. Now I pray consider, that when sin is but in the thought it is easily suppressed ; and if it be stopped there, it can go no further ; and what great mountain of labour is it then to abstain from our sin .'' Is not the adultery of the eye easily cured by shutting the eye- lid ? and cannot the thoughts of the heart be turned aside by doing business, by going into company, by reading, or by sleeping } A man may divert his thoughts by shaking of his head, by thinking any thing else, by thinking nothing. Da mihi Christia- num (saith St. Austin) et intelligit guoddico. Every man that loves God understands this, and more than this to be true. Now if things be thus, and that we may be safe in that which is supposed to be the hardest of all, we must needs condemn ourselves, and lay our faces in the dust when we give up ourselves to any sin ; we cannot be justified by saying we could not help it. For, as it was decreed by the fathers of the 2d. Jlurasican Council, Hoc etiam secundum fidem Catholicam credimits^ &lc. This we believe according to the Catholick faith, that have received baptismal grace ; all that are baptized by the aid and corpora- tion of Christ, must and can (if they will labour faith- fully) perform and fulfil those things which belong unto salvation.

* Ilk laudatur, qui ut caeperint statim iiiterficit cogitata, et allidit ad petram.

VOL. III. 9

G2 THE christian's coNcirEST Serm. 11^

6. And lastly, if sin hath gotten the power of any one of us, consider in what degree the sin hath pre- vailed : if but a little, the battle will be more eat.y, and the victory more certain ; but then be sure to do it thorouglily, because there is not much to be done : but if sin hath prevailed greatly, then indeed' you have very much to do ; therefore begin betimes, and defer not this work till old aj^e shall make it ex- tremely difficult, or death shall make it mipossible.

Nam quamvis prope te, quamvis lemone sub uuo Vertentein sese frustra sectabere cautlium, Cum rota posterior curras, et in axe secundo.*

If thou beest cast behind ; if thou hast neglected the duties of thy vigorous age, thou shalt never over- take that strength : the hinder wheel, though bigger than the former, and measures more ground at every revolution, yet shall never overtake it ; and all the second counsels of thy old age, though undertaken with greater resolution, and acted with the stren<£ths of fear and need, and pursued with more pertinacious purposes than the early repentances of young men, yet shall never overtake those advantages which you lost when you gave your youth to folly, and the causes of a sad repentance.

However, if you find it so hard a thing to get from the power of one master-sin; if an old adulterer does dote, if an old drunkard be fiu'thcr from remedy than a young sinner, if covetousness grows with old age, if ambition be still more hydropick and grows more thirsty for every draught of honour, you may easily resolve that old age, or your last sickness is not so likely to be prosperous in the mortification of

Persian Sat. 5. v. 71.

■*■ The. hinder pair pursue the first in vain, Their distance keep, but no advantage gain ; So flying time is followed close by you. He still escaping, while you still pursue. Drujmmond.

Serm. 11. over the bodt op sipt. 68

your long prevailing sins. Do not all men desire to end their days in religion, to die in the arms of liie church, to expire under the conduct of a religious man ? When ye are sick or dying, then nothing but prayers and sad complaints, and the groans of a tremulous repentance, and the laint labours of an almost impossible mortification: then the despised priest is sent for: then he is a good man, and his words are oracles, and religion is truth, and sin is a load, and the sinner is a fool : then we watch for a word of comfort from his mouth, as the fearful prison- er for his fate upon the judge's answer. That which is true then, is true now ; and therefore to prevent so intolerable a danger, mortify your sin betimes, for else vou will hardly mortify it at all. Remember that the snail out-went the eagle and won the goal, because she set out betimes.

To sum up all, every good man is a new creature, and Christianity is not so much a divine institution, as a divine frame and temper of spirit, which if we heartily pray for, and endeavour to obtain, we shall find it as haid and as uneasy to sin against God, as now we think it impossible to abstain from our most pleasing sins. For as it is in the spermatick virtue of the heavens, which diffuses itself universally upon all sublunary bodies, and subtilely insinuating itself into the most dull and inactive element, produces gold and pearls, life and motion, and brisk activities in all thinofs that can receive the influence and heaven- ly blessing; so it is in the Holy Spirit of God, and the word of God, and the grace of God, which St. John calls the seed of God ; it is a law of righteous- ness, and it is a law of the spirit of life, and changes nature into grace, and dullness into zeal, and tear into love, and sinful habits into innocence, and passes on from grace to grace, till we arrive at the full measures of the stature of Christ, and into the per-

64 THE christian's conquest, &c. Serm. 11.

feet liberty of the sons of God ; so that we shall no more say, the evil that I would not, that I do ; but we shall hate wiiat God hates, and the evil that is for- bidden we shall not do, not because we are strong of ourselves, but because Christ is our strength, and he is in us, and Christ's strength shall be perfected in our weakness, and his grace will be sufficient for us: and he will of his own good pleasure work in us, not only to will but also to do^ velle et perficere, saith the apostle, to will and to do it thoroughly, and fully, being sanctified throughout, to the glory of his holy name and the eternal salvation of our souls, through Jesus Christ our Lord; to whom with, the Father, &c.

SERMON III.

FIDES FORMATA:

FAITH WORKING BY LOVE.

James ii. 24.

You see then, liow that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.

That we are jristificd by faith^ St. Paul* tells us ; that we are dXso justified by ivorks, we are told in my text ; and both may be true. But that this justifica- tion is wrought by faith without works, to him that worketh not, but believeth (saith St. Paul :^ that this is not wrought without works St. James is as express for his negative as St. Paid was for his affirmative ; and how both these should be true, is something harder to unriddle. But, affirmanti incumbit probation he that affirms must prove; and therefore St. Paid proves his doctrine by the example of Abraham^ to whom faith was imputed for righteousness ; and therefore not by works. And what can be answered to this } Nothing but this. That St. James uses the very same argument to prove that our justification is by works also; For our father Abraham ivas justified by works, ivhcn he offered up his Son Isaac.t Now

*Rom. iii.28; iv. 5; v. 1 ; x. 10; Gal. ii. 16. f James ii. 9,

66 FIDES formata; or, iSVrm. ///.

which of these says true ? Certainly both of them ; but neither of thetn have been well understood; in- somuch that they have not only made divisions of heart among the faithful, but one party relies on faith to the disiDaragement of good life, and the other makes works to be the main ground of our hope and confidence, and consequently to exclude the efficacy of faith ; the one makes the Christian religion a lazy and unactive institution ; and the other a bold pre- sumption on ourselves; while the first tempts us to live like Heathens, and the other recalls us to live the life of Jews ; while one says, / am of Paul, and another, lam of St James, and both of them put it in danirer of evacuatino- the institution and the death of Christ; one looking on Christ only as a la\v-g!ver, and the other only as a Saviour. The effects of these are very sad, and by all means to be diverted by all the wise considerations of the spirit.

My purpose is not with subtle arts to reconcile them that never disagreed ; the two apostles spake by the same spirit, and to the same last design, though to differing intermediate purposes : but because the great end of faith, the design, the definition, the slate, the economy of it, is that all believers should not live accordirjg to the (lesh, but acc^ording to the spirit. Before I fall to the close handling of the text, I shall premise some preliminary considerations, to prepare the way of holiness, to explicate the differing senses of the apostles, to understand the question and the duty, by removing the causes of the vulgar mistakes of most men in this article, and then proceed to the main inquiry.

1. That no man may abuse himself or others by mistaking of hard words, spoken in mystery, with allegorical expressions to secret senses, wrapt up in a cloud; such as are faith, and justification, and nn- putation, and righteousness, and works, be pleased to

Serm. III. faith TfORKiNG by love. 67

consider, that the very word faith is in scripture infinitely ambiguous, insomuch that in the Latin concordances of St. Hierome's Bible, published bv Robert Stephens, you may see no less that twenty- two several senses and acceptations of the word faith, set down with the several places of scripture referring to them; to which if out of my own obser- vation I could add no more, yet these are an abundant demonstration, that whatsoever is said of the efficacy of faith for justification, is not to be taken in such a sense as will weaken the necessity, and our careful- ness of good life, when the word may in so many other senses be taken to verify the affirmation of St. Paul, of justification by faith, so as to reconcile it to the necessity of obedience.

2. As it is in the word faith, so it is in ivories ; for by works is meant sometimes the thing done, some- times the labour of doing, sometimes the good will; it is sometimes taken for a state of good life, some- times for the covenant of works; it sometimes means the works of the law, sometimes the works of the gospel ; sometimes it is taken for a perfect, actual, unsinning obedience, sometimes for a sincere en- deavour to please God ; sometimes they are meant to be such which can challeno-e the reward as of

"...

debt; sometimes they mean only a disposition of the person to receive the favour and the grace of God. Now since our good works can be but of one kind (for ours cannot be meritorious, ours cannot be with- out sin all our life, they cannot be such as need no repentance) it is no wonder if we must be justified without works in this sense; for by such works no man living can be justified : and these St. Paul calls the works of the law, and sometimes he calls them our righteousness; and these are the covenant of works. But because we came into the world to serve God, and God will be obeyed, and Jesu*?

68 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Scrm. III.

Cliiist came into the world to save us from sin, and to redeem to himself a people zealous of good ivorks, and hath to this purpose revealed to us ail his Fa- ther's Avill, and destroyed the works of the devil, and gives us his Holj Spirit, and by him we shall be justified in this obedience ; therefore when works signify a sincere, hearty endeavour to keep all God's commands, out of a belief in Christ, that if we en- deavour to do so we shall be pardoned for what is past, and if we continue to do so we shall receive a crown of glory ; therefore it is no wonder that it is said we are to be justified by works ; always mean- ing, not the works of the law, that is, works that are meritorious, works that can challenge the reward, works thai need no mercy, no repentance, no humi- liation, and no appeal to grace and favour; but al- ways meaning works that are an obedience to God by the measures of good will, and a sincere endea- vour, and the faith of the Lord Jesus.

3. But thus also it is in the word Justification: for God is justified, and wisdom is justified, and man is justified, and a sinner is not justified as long as he continues in sin; and a sinner is justified when he repents, and when he is pardoned ; and an innocent person is justified when he is declared to be no crimi- nal; and a righteous man is justified when he is saved ; and a weak Christian is justified when his imperfect services are accepted for the present, and himself thrust forward to more grace ; and he that is justified may be justified more; and every man that is justified to one purpose is not so to all; and faith in divers senses, gives justification in as many ; and therefore though to every sense of faith there is not always a degree of justification in any, yet when the faith is such that justification is the pro- duct and correspondent, as that faith may be imper- fect, so the justification is but begun, and either

Serm. HI. faith working bv love. 69

must proceed further, or else as the faith will die, so the justification will come to nothing. The like ob- servation might be made concerning imputation, and all the words used in this question; but these may suffice till I pass to other particulars.

4. Not only the word faith^ but also charity^ and godliness^ and religion^ signify sometimes particular graces, and sometimes thej suppose universally, and mean conjugations and unions of graces, as is evident to them that read the Scriptures with observation. Now, when justification is attributed to faith, or sal- vation to godliness, they are to be understood in the aggregate sense : for, that I Uiaj give but one instance of this, when St. Paul speaks of faith as it is a par- ticular grace, and separate from the rest, he also does separate it from all possibihty of bringing us to heaven ; Though I have all faith^ so that I could re- move mountains^ and have no charity^ I am nothing :* when faith includes charity, it will bring us to hea- ven; when it is alone, when it is without charity, it will do nothing at all.

'5. Neither can this <pMvofxmv be salved by saying, that though faith alone does justify, yet when she does justify she is not alone, but good works must follow : for this is said to no purpose ;

1. Because if we be justified by faith alone, the work is done whether charity does follow or no; and therefore that want of charity cannot hurt us.

2. There can be no imaginable cause why charity and obedience should be at all necessary, if the whole work can be done without it.

3. If obedience and charity be not a condition of our salvation, then it is not necessary to follow faith ; but if it be, it does as much as faith, for that is but a part of the condition.

* 1 Cor. xiii. . VOL. III. 10

Tit FIDES PORiMATA ; OR, Serm. Ill-

4. If we can be saved without charity and keeping the commandraents, what need we trouble ourselves for them; if we cannot be saved without them, then either taith without them does not justify, or if it does, we are never the better, for we may be damned for all that justification.

The consequent of these observations is briefly this : —

1. That no man should fool himself by disputing about the philosophy of justification, and what cau- sality faith hath in it, and whether it be the act of faith ihat justifies or the habit ? Whether faith as a good work, or faith as an instrument ? Whether faith as it is V bedience, or faith as it is an access to Christ ? Whether as a hand, or as a heart ? Whether by its own innate virtue, or by the efficacy of the object ? Whether as a sign, or as a thing signified ? Whether by introduction, or by perfection ? Whether in the first beginnings, or in its last and best productions ? Whether by inherent worthiness, or adventitious im- putation ? Uberius ista quaeso^ &c. (that I may use the words of Cicero) haec entm spinosiora prius, uf conjiteor^ me cogunt quam tit assentiar ;* these things are knotty and too intricate to do any good ; they may amuse us, but never instruct us; and they have already made men careless and confident, disputa- tive and troublesome, proud and uncharitable, but neither wiser nor better. Let us therefore leave weak ways of troubling ourselves or others, and di- rectly look to the theology of it, the direct duty, the end of faith, and the work of faith, the conditions and the instruments of our salvation, the just foundation of our hopes, how our faith can destroy our sin, and how it can unite us unto God ; how by it we can be made partakers of Christ's death, and imitators of

* Tijscul. i.

iSerm. III. faith working by love. 71

his life. For since it is evident by the premises, that this article is not to be determined or relied upon by arguing from words of many significations, we must walk by a clearer light, by such plain sayings and dogmatical propositions of Scripture which evidently teach us our duty, and place our hopes upon that which cannot deceive us, that is, which require obe- dience, which call upon us to glorify God, and to do good to men, and to keep all God's commandments with diligence and sincerity.

For since the end of our faith is that we may be disciples and servants of the Lord Jesus, advancing his kingdom here, and partaking of it hereafter ; since we are commanded to believe what Christ taught, that it may appear as reasonable as it is ne- cessary to do what he hath commanded ; since faith and works are in order one to the other, it is im- possible that evangelical faith and evangelical works should be opposed one to the other in the effecting of our salvation. So that as it is to no purpose for Christians to dispute whether we are justified by faith or the works of the law, that is, the covenant of works without the help of faith and the auxilia- ries and allowances of mercy on God's part, and re- pentance on ours; because no Christian can pretend to this : so it is perfectly foolish to dispute whether Christians are to be justified by faith or the works of the gospel, for I shall make it appear that they are both the same thing. No man disparages faith but he that says, faith does not work righteousness; for he that says so, says indeed it cannot justify, for he says that faith is alone : it is faith only, and the words of my text are plain ; You see (saith St. Ja7nes) that is, it is, evident to your sense, it is as clear as an occular demonstration, tkat a man is justified by works and not by faith only.

7'2 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, SertH. IlL

My text hath in it these two propositions; a nega- tive and an affirmative. The negative is this, 1. By faith only a man is not justified. The afiirmative, 2. By works also a man is justified.

When I have briefly discoursed of these, I shall only add such practical considerations as shall make the doctrines useful, and tangible, and material.

1. By faith only a man is not justified. By faith only, here is meant, faith without obedience. For what do we think of those that detain the faith in un- righteousness ? They have faith, they could not else keep it in so ill a cabinet; but yet the apostle reck- ons them amongst the reprobates ; for the abomina- ble^ the reprobates^ and the disobedient are all one ; and therefore such persons for all their faith shall have no part with faithful Abraham : for none are his chil- dren, but they that do the icorks of Abraham. Abra- ham's/aeV/i without Abraham's works is nothing : for of him that hath faiths and hath not ivorks, St. James asks, Can faith save him?* meaning that it is im- possible. For what think we of those that did mira- cles in Christ's name, and in his name cast out devil's ? Have not they faith ? Yes, omnemfidem, all faith, that is alone, for they could remove mountains: but yet to many of them Christ will say. Depart from mc, ye morkers of iniquity^ I know you not. Nay, at last, what think we of the devils themselves } have not they faith? Yes, and this faith is not fides miraculo- rum neither, but it is an operative faith, it works a little, for it makes them treriible; and ii may be that is more than thy faith does to thee : and yet dost thou hope to be saved by a faith that does less to thee than the devil's faith does to him ? That is im- possible. For faith without works is dead., saith St. James. It is manus arida, saith St. JiuMin., it is a withered hand ; and that which is dead cannot work the life of grace in us, much less obtain eternal life

* James ii. 14.

ISerm. III. faith ttorking by love. 73

for us. In short, a man may have faith, and yet do the works of unrighteousness ; he may have faith and be a devil ; and then what can such a faith do to him or for him ? It can do him no good in the present constitution of affairs. St. Paul, from whose mistaken words much noise hath been made in this question, is clear in this particular. JVoihing in Christ Jesus can avail, but faith working by charity ;* that is, as he expounds himself once and again ; nothing but a new creature,^ nothing but keeping the commandments of God.\ If faith be defined to be any thing that does not change our natures, and make us to be a new creation unto God ; if keeping the commandments be not in the definition of faith, it avails nothing at all. Therefore deceive not yourselves ; they are the words of our blessed Lord himself; JVot everyone that saith unto me Lord, Lord., that is not every one that confesses Christ, and believes in him, calling Christ Master and Lord shall be saved, but he that doth the will of my Father ivhich is in heaven. These things are so plain, that they need no commentary ; so evident that they cannot be denied : and to these I add but this one truth ; that faith alone without a good life is so far from justifying a sinner, that it is one of the greatest aggravations of his condemnation in the whole world. For no man can be so greatly damned as he that hath faith ; for unless he knows his master's will, that is, by faith be convinced, and assents to the revelations of the will of God, he can be beaten but tvith few stripes : but he that believes hath no excuse, he is MTCK^rmpimy condemned by the sentence of his own heart, and therefore ttoxkch TrKnym, many stripes, the greater condemnation shall be his portion. Natural reason is a light to the conscience, but faith is a greater, and therefore if it be not follow-

* Gal, V. 6. t Gal. vi. 15, 1 1 Cor. vii. 19.

f4 FIDES formata; or, Serm. III.

ed, It damns deeper than the hell of the Infidels and uninstructed. And so 1 have done with the negative proposition of my text ; a man is not justified by faith alone: that is, by faith which hath not in it charity and obedience.

2. If faith alone will not do it, what will ? The affirmative part of the text answers; not faith alone; but works must be an ingredient : a man is justified by works ; and that is now to be explicated and proved. It will be absolutely to no purpose to say that faith alone does justify, if when a man is justified, he is never the nearer to be saved. JNow that with- out obedience no man can go to heaven, is so evident in holy Scripture, that he that denies it, hath no faith. There is no peace saith my God unto the wicked ;* and I will not justify a simier^'f saith God; unless faith purges away our sins it can never justify. Let a man believe all the revelations of God, if that belief ends in itself and goes no further, it is like physick taken to purge the stomach; if it does not work, it is so far from bringing health, that itself is a new sickness. Faith is a great purger and purifyer of the soul ; pu- rifying your hearts by faith, saith the apostle. It is the best physick in the world for a sinful soul; but if it does not work, it corrupts in the stomach, it makes us to rely upon weak propositions and trifling confi- dences, it is but a dreaming ^jt^ to.\\»c <|.»i7*(rwf, a phan- tastick dream, and introduces pride and superstition, swelling thoughts and presumptions of the divine fa- vour. But what saith the apostle ? Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man can see God :% mark that, if faith does not make you cha- ritable and holy, talk no more of justification by it, for you shall never see the glorious face of God. Faith indeed is a title and relation to Christ ; it is a naming

"■ I«ai. IvU. 21. f Exod. xx. 7. \ Heb, xii. 14.

Serm. III. faith working bt love. 7a

of his names, but what then ? Why then saith the apostle, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.

For let anj man consider, can the faith of Christ, and the hatred of God stand together ? Can any man be justified that does not love God ? Or can any man love God and sin at the same time ? And does not he love sin that falls under its temptation, and obeys it in the lusts thereof, and delights in the vanity, and makes excuses for it, and returns to It with passion, and abides with pleasure? This will not doit; such a man cannot be justified for all his believing. But therefore the apostle shews us a more excellent way : This is a true saying., and I will that thou affirm con- stantly^ that they who have believed in God, be carefidto maintain good works.* The apostle puts great force on this doctrine, he arms it with a double preface; the saying is true, and it is to be constantly affirmed ; that is, it is not only true, but necessary; it is like Pharaohh dream doubled, because it is bound upon us by the decree of God, and it is unalterably certain, that every believer must do good works, or his be- lieving will signify little ; nay, more than so, every man must be careful to do gcood works ; and more yet, he must carefully maintain them, that is, not do them by fits and interrupted returns, but 7rgu<^Ta.<j^cLt to be incumbent upon them, to duell upon them, to maintain good works, that is, to persevere in them. But I am yet but in the general; be pleased to go along with me in these particular considerations.

1. No man's sins are pardoned, but in the same measure in which they are mortified, destroyed and taken away; so that if faith does not cure our sinful natures it never can justify, it never can procure our pardon. And therefore it is, that as soon as ever

'^Titns iij. 8,

76 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Scmi. IIT-

faith in the Lord Jesus was preached, at the same time also tliey preached repentance from dead works : in so much that St. Paul reckons it amons: the funda- mentals and first pnnciples of Christianity ;* nay, the Baptist preached repentance and amendment of hfe as a preparation to the faith of Christ. And I pray consider ; can there be any forgiveness of sins with- . out repentance ? But if an apostle should preach forgiveness to all that believe, and this belief did not also mean that they should repent and forsake their sin, the sermons of the apostle would make Christian- ity nothing else but the sanctuary of Romulus^ a de- vice to get together all the wicked people of the world, and to make them happy without any change of manners. Christ came to other purposes ; he came to sanctify us and to cleanse us by his word ;t the word of faith was not for itself, but was a design of holiness, and the very ^racc of God did appear ^X for this end ; that teaching; us to deny all ungodliness and ivorldly lusts, we should live holily, justly, and soberly in this present world :^ he came to gather a people to- gether ; not like David'^s army, when Saul pursued him, but the armies of the Lord, a faithful people, a chosen generation ; and what is that } The spirit of God adds, a people zealous of good works. Now as Christ proved his power to forgive sins by curing the poor man's palsy, because a man is never pardoned but when the punishment is removed ; so the great act of justification of a sinrjer, the pardoning of his sins is then only effected, when the spiritual evil is taken away : that is the best vrndicatirti of a real and eternal pardon, when God takes away the hardness of the heart, the love of sin, the accursed habit, the evil inclination, the sin that doth so easily beset us : and when that is gone, what remains within us that

'^ Hebr. vi. 1. f 1 John iii. 8. ^ Eplu v. 25. § Titus ii. 11-

Serm. III. faith working bv love. 77

God can hate ? Nothing stays behind, but Gods crea- tion, the work of his own hands, the issues of his Holy Spirit. The faith of a Christian is ^rucrn; a/^ct^rciSo; oLvu-tprriM,, it destroys the whole body of sin ; and to suppose that Christ pardons a sinner, whom he doth not also purge and rescue from the dominion of sin, is to affirm that he justifies the wicked, that he calls good evil, and evil good, that he dehghts in a wicked person, that he makes a wicked man all one with himself: that he makes the members of an harlot at the same time also the members of Christ ; but all this is impossible, and therefore ought not to be pretend- ed to by any Christian. Severe are those words of our blessed Saviour, Evert/ plant in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away* Faith ingrafts us into Christ ; by faith we are inserted into the vine; but the plant that is ingrafted, must also be parturient and fruitful, or else it shall be quite cut off from the root, and thrown into the everlasting burning; and this is the full and plain meaning of those words so often used in Scripture for the magnification of faith, The just shall live by faith ; no man shall live by faith but the just man; he indeed is justified by faith, but no man else; the unjust and the unrighteous man hath no portion in this matter. That is the first great consideration in this atfair ; no man is justified in the least sense of justification, that is, when it means nothing but the pardon of sins, but when his sin is mo'tified and destroyed.

2. No man is actually justified, but he that is in some measure sanctified. For the understanding and clearing of which proposition we must know, that justification when it is attributed to any cause, does not always signify justification actual. Thus when it is said in Scripture, We are justified by the

*-.Tohn XV. 2. VOL. III. 11

rs FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Sevm. III.

dcaih of Christy it is but the same thing as to say, Christ died for us ; and he rose again for us too, that we might iixJeed be justihed in due time, and by just measures and dispositions; he died for our sins^ and rose again for our justif cation ; that is, by his death and resurrection he hath obtained tliis power, and effected this mercy, that if we beheve him and obey, we shall be justified and made capable of all the blessings of the kingdom. But that this is no more but a capacity of pardon, of grace and of salvation, appears not onlj' by God's requiring obedience as a condition on our parts ; but by his expressly' attri- buting this mercy to us at such times and in such circumstances, in which it is certain and evident, that we should not actually be justitied ; for so saith the Scripture, We, when ive were enemies, were reconciled to God hy the death of his Son ; and while we uere yet sinners, Christ died for us ;* that is. then was our justification wrought on God's part ; that is, then he intended this mercy to us, then he resolved to shew us favour, to give us promises, and laws, and con- ditions, and hopes, and an infallible economy of sal- vation ; and when faith lays hold on this grace, and this justification, tlien we are to do the other part of it ; that is, as God made it potential by the death and resurrection of Christ, so we laying hold on these things by faith, and working the righteousness of faith, that is, performing what is required on our |)arts, we, I say, make it actual : and for this very reason it is that the apostle puts more emphasis upon the resurrection of Christ than upon his death. Who is he that condemneth ? It is Christ that died, yea rather^ that is risen again.t And Christ ivas both delivered for our sins, and is risen again for our justif cation ;| im- pl} ing to us, that as it is in the principal, so it is in the correspondent ; our sins indeed are potentially

' Rom. V. 8, 10. i Iloin.viii. 28. { Rom. iv. 25.

Serm. III. faith working by love. ?9

pardoned, when thev are marked out for deatli and crucifixion ; when by resolving and hghtiijf^ against sin, we die to sin daily, and aie so made conformable to his death; but we mtist partake oiChrist's resur=> rection before this justification can be actual; when "we are dead to sin, and are risen again unto righteous- ness, then as we are partakers of his death, so we shall be partakers of his resurrection (saith St. Faid^ that is, then we are truly, effectually, and indeed justified, till then we are not.

He that loveth gold shall not be justified * saith the wise Bensirach ; he that is covetous, let his faitli be what it will, shall not be accounted righteous before God, because he is not so in himself, and he is not so in Christ, for he is not in Christ at all ; he hath no rjo-hteousness in himself, and he hath none in Christ : for if we be in Christ, or if Christ be in us, the body is dead by reason of sin, and the spirit is life because of righteousness .'t For this the to ma-i-ov, that (aithiul thing, that is, the faithfulness is manifested ; the Emun, from whence comes Emunah, which is the Hebrew word for faith, from whence ./^mew is deriv- ed. Fiat quod dictum est hinc inde ; hoc fidum est^ when God and we both say ^mcn to our promises and undertakings. Fac fidelis sis fideli, cavefidcm fluxam geras,X said he, in the comedy, God is faith- ful be thou so too, for if thou failest him, thy faith hath failed thee. Fides sumitur pro eo quod est inter utrumque placitnm, says one ; and then it is true which the prophet and the apostle said, the just shall live by faith, in both senses : ex fide mea vivet, ex fide sua ; we live by God's faith, and by our own; by his fidelity, and by ours. When the righteous- ness of God becomes your righteousness, and exceeds the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees ; when the righteousness of tiie law is fulfilled in us by walk-

* Ecclus. xxxi. I Rom. viii. 10. f Plant. Captiv.

80 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Semi. HI.

ing not after the flesh, but after the spirit ; then we are justified by God's truth and by ours, by his grace, and our obedience. So that now we see that justi- fication and sanctification cannot be distinguished, but as words of art signifying the various steps of progression in the same course ; they may be distin- guished in notion and speculation, but never when tliey are to pass on to material events; for no man is justified but he that is also sanctified. They are the express words of St. Paul, Whom he did foreknow, them he did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son* to be like to Christ ; and then it follows, Hhom he hath predestinated, so predestinated, Mem Ac hath also called, and whom he hath called, them he hath also justified ; and then it follows. Whom he hath jus- tified, them he hath also glorified. So that no man is justified, that is, so as to signify salvation, but sanc- tification must be precedent to it; and that was my second consideration '<^7Tif tin Su^ai, that which I was to prove.

3. I pray consider, that he that does not believe the promises of the Gospel, cannot pretend to faith in Christ ; but the promises are all made to ns upon the conditions of obedience, and he that does not be- lieve them as Christ made them, believes them not at all. Li ivell doing commit yourselves to God as unto a faithful Creator ; there is no committing ourselves to God without well doing, For God will render to every man according to his deeds ; to them that obey unriirhtcousness, indignation and ivrath ; but to them, who by patient continuance in well-doins;, seek for glory and honour, and immortality, to them eternal lifc.'\ So that if taith apprehends any other promises, it is illu- sion, and not faith; God gave us none such, Christ purchased none such for us ; search the Bible over and you shall find none such. But if faith lays hold

* Rom. viii. 29. f Rom. ii. 6, 7, 8,

Serni. III. faith worring by love. 81

on these promises that are, and as they are, then it becomes an article of our faith, that without obe- dience and a sincere endeavour to keep God's com- mandments, no man hving can be justified : and there- fore let us take heed when we magnify the ivee grace of God, we do not exchjde the conditions which this free grace hath set upon us. Christ freely died for us, God pardons us freely in our first access to him ; we could never deserve pardon, because when we need pardon we are enemies, and have no good thing in us ; and he freely gives us of his Spirit, and freely he enables us to obey him, and for our little imperfect services he freely and bountifully will give us etejual life ; here is free grace all the way, and he overvalues his pitiful services, who thinks that he deserves heaven by them ; and that if he does his duty tolerably, eternal life is not a free gift to him, but a deserved reward.

Conscius est animus mens, experientia testis,

Mystica quae retuli dogmata vera scio. Non tamen idcirco scio me lore glorificandum,

Spes raea crux Cliristi, gratia, non opera.*

It was the meditation of the wise chancellor of Paris : I know that without a good life, and the fruits of repentance, a sinner cannot be justified, and therefore I must live well, or I must die for ever. But if I do live holily, I do not think that I deserve heaven; it is the cross of Christ that procures me grace; it is the spirit of Christ that gives me grace; it is the mercy and the free gift of Christ that brings

* My conscious mind and past experience prove The mysteries true, which every sin release ; I count alone on Christ's reedeeming love :

His cross my anchor, and his grace my peace. A.

82 FIDES formata; or, Serm. III.

me unto glory. But yet he that shall exclude the works o^ faith fiom the justification of a sinner by the blood of Christ, may as well excluJe/'««V^ itself; for faith It- self is one of the works of God : it is a i^ood work, so said Christ to them that asked !iim. WluU shall we do to work the works of God? Jesus said^ This is the work of God., that ye believe on him ivhom he hath sent.* Faith IS not only the foundation of good works, but itself is a good work, it is not only the cause of obe- dience, but a part of it; it is not only as the son of (S/rr/cA. calls it, initum adhaerendi Deo. a betrinninc: of cleaving unto Crod, but it carries us on to the per- fection of it. Christ is the author and finisher of our faith, and when faith is finished, a good life is made perfect in our kind. Let no man therefore, expect events for which he hath no promise, nor call for God's fidelity without his own faithfulness, nor snatch at a promise without performing the con- ditition; nor think faith to be a hand to a})prehend Christ, and to do nothing else ; for that will but de- ceive us, and turn religion into words, and holiness into hypocrisy, and the promises of God into a snare, and the truth of God into a lie. For Avhen God made a covenant of faith, he made also the wk-^ ms-na,;, the law of faith; and when he admitted us to a cove- nant of more mercy than was in the covenant of works, or of the law, he did not admit us to a cove- nant of idleness, and an incurious walking in a stute of disobedience, but the mercy of God leadeth us to repentance, and vvlien he gives us better promis- es, he intends we should pay him a better obedi- ence : when he forgives us what is past, he intends we should sin no more : when he offers us his i^races, he would have us to make use of them ; when he causes us to distrust ourselves, his meaning is, we

* John vi. 23, 23.

Serm. III. faith working by love. 83

should rely upon him ; when he enables us to do what he commands us, he commands us to do all that we can. And therefore, this covenant of faith and mercy, is also a covenant ot holi- ness, and the grace that pardons us does also puri- fy us ; for so saith the apostle. He that hath this hope., purifies himself even as God is pure. And \vl;en we are so, then we are juslitied indeed; this is the i-ojMo? Tno-Tm, the law of faith ; and bv works in this sense, that is by the works of faith, by faith working by love, and producing fruits worthy of amendment of life, we are justified before God. And so I have done with the affirmative proposition of my text; you see that a man is justified by works.

But there is more in it than this matter yet amounts to ; foi' St. James does not say, we are jus- tified by works, and are not justified by faith ; tliat had been irreconcileable with St. Paul ; but we are so justified by works, that it is not by faith alone, it is faith and works together; that is, it is by the Ctto.koi, ma-Ttmc by the obedicuce of faith, b) the works of faith, by the law of faith; by righteousness evangelical, by the conditions ot' the Gospel and the measures of Christ. I have many things to say in this particular; but because I have but a little time left to say them in, I will sum it all u[) in this proposition, that in the question of justification and salvation, faith and good works are no part of a dis- tinction, but members of one entire body. Faith and good works together work the righteousness of God : That is, that I may speak plainly, justifying faith contains in it obedience ; and if this be made good, then the two apostles aie reconciled to each other, and both of them to the necessity, the indispensible necessity of a good life.

Now that justifying and saving faith must be de- fined by something more than an act of understand- ing, appears not only in this, that St. Peter' reckons

84 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Senu. in.

faith as distinctly from knowledge, as he does from patienee, or Ftrength, or brotherly kindness; say- ing, ,/idd to your faith virtue, to virtue knoiclcdo-e •* but in this also, because an errour in life, and what- soever is against holiness, is against faith : and therefore St. Paul reckons the lawless and the dis- obedient, murderers of parents, man stealing, and such things, to be against sound doctrine; for the doctrine of faith is called « kuT iwiQu^^ iiSjiTx.%ua.^ the doc- trine that is according to godliness. And when St. Pault prays against ungodly men, he adds this rea- son, ou 5.«g 7rs.vim ^ TrKXTtc, for all mctt liavc not faith : meaning that wicked men are infidels and unbeliev- ers, and particularly he affirms of him that docs not provide for his own, that he hath denied the faith-X Now from thence it follows, that faith is godliness, because all wickedness is infidelity; it is an aposta- cy from the faith. Ille erii, ille nocens qui me tihi fe- cerat hostem ; he that sins against God, he is the ene- my to the faith of Jesus Christ, and therefore we deceive ourselves if we place faitli in the understand- ing only; it is not that, and it does not dwell there, but iv K-jL^-jLe^tj, auviK^xcrii, salth thc apostle, the mystery of faith is kept no where, it dwells no where but in a pure conscience.

For I consider that since all moral habits are best defined by their operation, we can best understand what faith is by seeing what it does. To this pur- pose hear St. Paul: By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. Ly faith Noah made an ark. By faith Abraham left his country and offered up his son. By faith Moses chose to suffer affliction, and accounted the reproach of Christ greater than all the riches of Egypt. In short, the children of God by faith subdued kingdoms, and wrought righ-

■^ 2 Pet. 15. 1 2 Thes. iii. 2. t 1 'I''™- v- 8-

Smn. III. FAITH WORKINO BY LOVE. 85

teousncss :* To work righteousness is as much the duty and work of Oiith as bclicvini;^ is. So that now we may quickly make an end of this great in- quiry, whether a man is Justified by faith, or by works, for he is so by both ; if you take it alone, faith does not justify, but take it in the aggregate sense as it is used in the question of justification by St. Paul., and then faith does not only justify, but it sanctifies too ; and then you need to inquire no further ; obedience is a part of the definition of faith, as much as it is of charity : this is love, saith St. John, that ive keep his commandments. And the very same is affirmed of faith too by Bensirach., He that believcth the Lord tciil keep his comrnandments.'t

I have now done with all the propositions express- ed and implied in the text; give me leave to make some practical considerations, and so I shall dismiss you from this attention.

The first I take from the words of St. Epiphani- us^X speaking in praise of the apostolical and purest ages of the church ; there was at first no distinction of sects and opinions in the church ; she knew no difference of men, but good and bad ; there was no separation made, but what was made by piety or impiety, or (says he) which is all one, by fideli- ty and inildellty l '^io-t:; f^iv iTnp^ova-a. Tou ^^ta-TluviafJiou (iKCVcf a.7rta-Tlcc Si iTTi^p'-JT^ a.<7iCua.g tov ;^a|a;c7j)gct aat vci^avo/aiuq. r OV faith hath 112

it the image of godliness engraven, and infidelity hath the character of wickedness and prevarication. A man was not then esteemed a saint for disobevino- his bishop or an apostle, nor for misunderstanding the hard sayings of St. Paul about predestination ; to kick against the laudable customs of the church was not then accounted a note of the godly party: and to despise government was but an ill mark, and

■ Hcb. xi. t Ecclus. sxxii. 24. |Panar. lib. i. edit. Basil, p. 8. 1, 46. VOL. III. 12

r.G FIDES FOR MAT a; OR, Serui. III.

iveak indication of being a good Christian. The kingdom of God did not then consist in words, but in power, the power of godliness; though now we are fallen into another method ; we have turned all rehgion into faith, and our faith is nothing but the productions of interest or disputing; it is adhering to a party, and a wrangling against all the world beside ; and when it is asked, what religion he is of, we understand the meaning to be, what faction does he follow: what are the articles of his sect, not what is the manner of his life; and if men be zealous for their party and that interest, then they are precious men, though otherwise they be cove- tous as the grave, factious as Dalhau, schismatical as Corah., or proud as the fallen angels. Alas! these things will but deceive us, the faith of a Chris- tian cannot consist in strifes about words, and per- verse disputings of men: these things the apostle call's, jir of aiie and vain babblings ;* and mark what he says of them, these things will increase i^i -^luov AtnCms rrKtiov A3-iQ'.ii.v' They are in themselves ungodliness, and will produce more; they will increase unto more ungodliness: but the faith of a Christian had other measures; that was faith then which made men faithful to their vows in baptism. The faith of a Christian was the best secuiity in contracts, and a Christian's word was as good as his bond, because he was faithful that promised, and a Christian would rather die than break his word ; and was always true to his trust ; he was faithful to his friend, and loved as Jonathan did David, This was the Chris- tian faith then : their religion was to hurt no man, and to do good to every man, and so it ought to be : True religion is to visit the fatherless and iiidoiv, and to keep ourselves unspotted of the world. That is a

* 2 Tim. ii. 16.

Serm. IIL faith working by love. ' 87

good religion that is pure and iindcji led : so St. James^ and St. Chrysostom defines tvTidw, true religion, to be Trmtv kaSu^hv mi ogQov i2tov, a pui'e faith and a godly lite, for they make up the whole mystery of godliness ; and no man could then pretend to fiith, but he that did do valiantly, and suffer patiently, and resist the devil, and overcome the world. These things are as properly the actions of faith, as alms is of charity, and therefore they must enter into the moral detinition of it; and this was truly understood by Salvian^ that wise and godly priest oi'Aiassilia. What is faith, and what is believing (saith he) hominein fidcUter Cliristo credere^ est fidclem Deo esse^ h. e.fidcUter Dei mandata servare. That man does faithfidly believe in Christ who is faithful unto God, who faithfully keeps God's commandments ; and therefore let us measure our faith here by our faithfulness to God, and by our diligence to do our master's commandments; for Christianomm omnis re- lig-io sine scelere et macula vivere. said Lactanlius^^ the whole religion of a Christian is to live unbiamea- bly ; that is, in all holiness and purity of conversa- tion.

2. When our faith is spoken of as the great In- strument of justification and salvation, take Jlbra- harti's faith as your best pattern, and that will end the dispute, because that he was justified by faith when his faith was mighty in effect ; when he trust- ed in God, when he believed the promises, when he expected a resurrection of the dead, when he was strong in faith, when he gave glory to God, when against hope he believed in liope ; and when all this passed into an act of a most glorious obedience, even denying his greatest desires, contradicting his most passionate affections, offering to God the best thing- he had, and exposing to death his beloved Isaac, his

* Instit. 1, V, c. 9.

G8 FIDES FOKMATA ; OR, Serui. in.

laughters, all his joy at the command of God. By this fiihh he was justified, saith St. Paul ; by these laorks he was justified^ saith St, James ; that is. by this faith working- this obedience. And then all tlie diffi- culty is over; only remember this, your faith is weak and will do but little for you, if it be not stronger than all your secular desires and all your peevish angers. Thus we find in the holy Gospels, this conjunction declared necessary. Whatsoever things ye desire, whctt 1/c pray^ believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them* Here is as sjlorious an event promised to faith as can be expressed, faith sliall obtain any thing of God. True; bu:it is not faith alone, but faith in prayer ; faith praying, not faith simply believing. So St. James ; the prayer of faith shall save the sick ; but adds, it must be the effctual fervent prayer of a righteous man: so that faith shall prevail, but there must be prayer in faith, and fervour in prayer, and devotion in fervour, and righteousness in devotion, and then impute the effect to faith if you please, provi- ded that it be declared, that effect cannot be wrought by faith unless it be so qualified. But Chiist adds one thing more ; When ye stand praying., forgive ; but if ye will not forgive^ neither will your Father forgive you. So that it will be to no purpose to say a man is justified by faith, unless you mingle charity "with it ; for without the charity of forgiveness, there can be no pardon ; and then justification is but a word, when it effects nothing.

3. Let every one take heed that by an importune adhering to and relying upon a mistaken faith, he do not really make a shipwrecl; of a right faith. Hy- menaeus and Alexaiider lost their faith by putting away a good conscience ; and what matter is it of what religion or faith a man be of, if he be a villain and a cheat, a man of no truth, and of no trust, a

* Mark xii. 21.

Serm. III. faith v.-^orking nv love. 89

lover of the Avorld, and not a lover of God ? But I pray consider, can any man have faith that denies God ? That is not possible ; and cannot a man as well deny God by an evil action, as by an heretical proposition ? Cannot a man deny God by works as much as by words ? Hear what the aposde says, They profess thai they know Gocl^ Out in ivorks they deny /im, being abominable and disobedient^ and unto every good work reprobate* Disobedience is a denying God. JYolumus hunc regnare^ is as plain a renouncing of Christ, as nolumus huic credere. It is to no purpose to say we beheve in Christ and have faith, urdess Christ reign in our hearts by faith. 4. From these premises we may see but too evi- dently, that tiiough a great part of mankind pretend to be saved by faith, yet they know not what it is, or else wilfully mistake it, and place their hopes upon sand, or the more unstable water. Believing is the least thing in a justifying faith ; for faith is a conjuga- tion of many in:^i:edients, and faith is a covenant, and faith is a law, and faith is obedience, and faith is a work, and indeed it is a sincere cleaving to, and closing with the terms of the Gospel in every instance, in every particular. Alas ! the niceties of a spruce understandinof, and the curious nothino;s of useless speculation, and all the opinions of men that make the divisions of heart, and do nothing else, cannot bring us one drop of comfort in the day of tribula- tion, and therefore are no parts of the strength of faith : nay, when a man begins truly to fear God, and is in the agonies of mortification, all these new-no- things and curiosities will lie neglected by, as baubles do by children when they are deadly sick ; but that only is faith that makes us to love God, to do his will, to suffer his impositions, to trust his promises, to see

* Tit, i. 16.

90 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Semi. III.

through a cloud, to overcome the M'orltl, to resist the devil, to staud in the day of trial, and to be comforted in all our sorrows. " Tliis is that precious faith so " mainly necessary to be insisted on, that by it we *' may be the sons of the (vee woman, liberi a viliis ac " rilibuf^, that the true Isaac may be in us, which is " Christ according to the spirit, the wisdom and *' power of God, a divine vigour and life, w^hercby " we are enabled with joy and checrlulness to walk " in the way of God." By this you may try your faith, if you please, and make an end of this question. Do you believe in tiic Lord Jesus, yea or no ? God forbid else, but if your faith be good it will abide the trial. There are but three thino-s that make the integrity of Christian faith; believing the words of God, confidence in his goodness, and keeping his com- mandments.

For the first, it is evident that every man pretends to it; if he calls himself Christian, he believes all that is in the canon of the Scriptures ; and if he did not, he were indeed no Christian. But now con- sider, what think we of this proposition ? jlllshallhc damned who believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness * Does not every man believe this ? Is it possible they can believe there is any such thing as unrighteousness in the world, or any such thing as damnation, and yet commit that which the Scriptures call unrighteousness, and Avhich all laws, and all good men say is so ? Consider how many unrighteous men there are in the world, and yet how few of them think they shall be damned. I know not how it comes to pass, but men go upon strange principles, and they have made Christianity to be a very odd in- stitution, if it had not better measures than they are pleased to afiford it. There arc two great roots of

* 2 Thes. ii. 12.

Serm. HI. faith working by love. 91

all evil, covetousness and pride, and they have in- fected the greatest parts of mankind, and jet no man thinks himself to he either covetous or pioud : and therefore whatever you discourse against these sins, it never hits any man, hut like Jonathan''s arrows to Davids they fall short or they fly beyond. Salman complained of it in his time, Hoc ad crimina nostra addimus, ut cum in o^nnibus rei simiis, etiam bonos nos et sanctos esse credamus^'f this we add unto our crimes, \Ye are the vilest persons in the world, and yet we think ourselves to be good people, and when we die make no question but we shall go to heaven. There is no cause of this, but because we have not so much faith as believing comes to, and yet most men will pretend not only to believe, but to love Christ all this while ; and how do they prove this ? Truly they hate the memory of Judas, and curse the Jewc that crucified Christ, and think Pilate a very miserable man, and that all the Turks are damned ; and to be called Caiphas is a word of reproach ; and indeed there are many that do not much more for Christ than this comes to; things to as little purpose, and of as little signification. But so the Jews did hate the memory of Corah, as we do of Caiphas, and they builded the sepulchre of the prophets; and we also are angry at them that killed the apostles and the martyrs, but in the mean time we neither love Christ nor his saints ; for we neither obey him, nor imi- tate them; and yat we should think ourselves highly injured if one should call us infidels, and haters of Christ. But I pray consider, what is hating of any man, but designing and doing him all the injury and spite we can .^ Does not he hate Christ that dis- honours him, that makes Christ's members the mem- bers of an harlot.^ That doth not feed and clothe

t Lib. iii.

92 FIDES FORMATA ; OR, Sevm. Ill

these members ? If the Jews did hate Christ when they crucified him, then so does a Chjistian too when he crucifies him again. Let us not deceive ourselves, a Christian may be damned as well as a Turk; and Christians may with as much malice cru- cify Christ as the Jews did ; and so does e\cry man that sins wilfully, he spills the blood of Christ, mak- ing it to be spent in vain. Fie that haicth yoiu haleth mc, he that receives you receives me, said Clirist to his apostles. I wish the world had so much faith as to believe that; and by this try whether we love Christ, and believe in hirn or no. I shall for the trial of our faith ask one easy question ; Do we believe that the story of David and Jonathan is true ? Have we so much faith as to think it possible that two rivals of a crown should love so dearly ? Can any man believe this, and not be infinitely ashamed to see Christians (almost all Christians) to be irreconcilcably angry, and ready to pull their brothers heart out, when he offers to take our land or money from us ? Why do almost all men that go to law for right, hate one another's person ? Why cannot men with patience hear their titles fiuestioned ? But it Christianity be so excellent a religion, why are so very many Christuins so very wicked ? Certainly they do not so much as believe the propositions and principles of their own religion. For the body of Christians is so universally wicked, that it would be a greater change to see Christians generally live according to their profes- sion, than it was at first from inlidelity to see them to turn believers. The conversion from Christian to Christian, from Christian in title to Christian in sincerity, would be a greater miracle than it was when they were converted from Heathen and Jew to Christian. What is the matter ? Is not repentance from dead iDorks reckoned by St. Paul in Heh. vi. as one of the fundamental points of Christian Religion ^

Serm. HI. faith working by love. 93

Is it not a piece of our Catechism, the first thing we are taught, and is it not the last thing that we prac- tice ? We had better be without baptism than with- out repentance, and yet both are necessary; and therefore if we were not without faith, we shoukl be without neither. Is not repentance a forsaking all sin, and an entire returning unto God ? Who can deny this ? And is it not plainly said in Scripture, Unless ye repent^ ye shall all perish? But slipw me the maa that believes these things heartily ; that is, shew me a true penitent, he only believes the doctrines of repentance.

{{ \ had time I should examine your faith by your confidence in God, and by your obedience. But if we fail in the mere believing, it is not likely we should do better in the other. But because all the promises of God are conditional, and there can be no confi dence in the yjarticular without a promise or revela tion, it is not possible that any man that does noi live well should reasonably put his trust in God. To live a wicked life, and then to be confident, that in the da) of our death God will give us pardon, is not faith, but a direct want of faith. If we did believe the promises upon their proper conditions, or believe that God''s couiQiandments were righteous and true, or that the threatenings were as really intended as they are terribly spoken, we should not dare to live at the rate we do ; But wicked men have not faith, saith St. Pauh and then the wonder ceases.

But there arc such palpable contradictions between men's practices and the fundamentals of our faith, that it was a material consideration of our Blessed Saviour, When the Son of Man comes, shall he find faith upon earth ? Meaning it should be very hard and scant ; every man shcdl boast of his own goodness ; scd virum fideleni, (saith Solomon) but a faithful man, ivho can find? Some men are very good when they are afflicted.

YOL. III. 13

94 FIDES FOiiMATA J OR, Scrm. in.

Hanc sibi virtiitein fracta facit iirceus ansa

Et tristis niillo qui tepet igne focus ; Et teges et cimex, et nudi spouda grabati,

Fit brevis atque eadem iiocte dieque toga.*

When the gown of the day is the mantle of the night, and cannot at the same time cover the head, and make the feet warm ; when they have but one broken dish and no spoon, tlien are they humble and modest ; then they can suffer an injury, and bear con- tempt ; but give them riches and they grow insolent; fear and pusillanimity did their first work, and an opportunity to sin undoes it all. Bonum militem per- didisti, Imperatormnpcssinium a-easti^ said Galba^ you have spoiled a good trooper when you made me a bad commander. Others can never serve God, but when they are prosperous ; if they lose their fortune they lose their faith, and quit their charity : JVou ra- ta fides ubi jam melior fortuna ruit ; if they become poor, they become liars and deceivers of their trust, envious and greedy, restless and uncharitable; that is, one way or the other they shew they love the "world, and by all the faith they pretend to cannot overcome it.

Cast up, therefore, your reckonings impartially ; see what is, what will be required at your hands; do not think you can be justified by faith, unless your faith be greater than all your passions; you have not the learning, not so much as the common notices of faith, unless you can tell when you are covetous, and reprove yourself when you are proud ; but he that is so, and knows it not (and that is the case of most men) hath no faith, and neither knows God nor knows himself.

* Pride would you cure ? then instant change her state To fireless chiranies, and the broken plate ; For sumptuous courts the truckle bed display, And let one rug defend her night and day. A.

Serm. III. faith working by love. 95

To conclude. He that hath true justifying faith, believes the power of God to be above the powers of nature ; the goodness of God above the merit and disposition of our persons, the bounty of God above the excellency of our works, the truth of God above the contradiction of weak arjjuinos and fears, the love of God above our cold experience and ineffec- tual reason, and the necessities of doing good works above the faint excuses and ignorant pretences of disputing sinners ; but want of faith makes us so generally wicked as we are, so often running to de- spair; so often baffled in our resolutions of a good life : but he whose faith makes him more than con- queror over these difficulties, to him Isaac shall be born even in his old age; the life of God shall be perfectly wrought in him, and by this faith so opera- tive, so strong, so lasting, so obedient, he shall be justified, and he shall be saved.

A SERMON

fREACIIED AT THE CONSECRATION OP

TWO ARCHBISHOPS AND TEN BISHOPS,

CATHEDBAIi CHURCH OF ST. PATRICK, DUBLIN, JANUARY 27, 1660

SAL LIQCEFIT, IIT CONDIAT.

TO THE CHRISTIAN READER;

JVIv obedience to the commands of the Right Honourable the Lords Justices, and the most Reverend and Learned Primate, and to the desires of my Reverend Brethren, put it past my inquiry, whether I ought to publish this following Sermon. I will not therefore excuse it, and say it might have advantages in the delivery, which it would want in the reading ; ajid the ear would be kind to the piety of it, which was apparent in the design, when the eye would be severe in its censure of those arguments, which as they could not be longer in that measure of time, so would have appeared more firm, if they could have had liberty to have been pursued to their utmost issue. But reason lies in a little room, and obedience in less ; and although what I have here said, may not stop the mouths of men resolved to keep up a faction, yet I have said enough to the sober and pious, to them who love order, and hearken to the voice of the spouse of Christ, to the loving and to the obedient- and for those that are not so, 1 have no argument fit to be

TO THE CHRISTIAN READER. 9?

used, but prayer, and readiness to give them a reason when they shall modestly demand it. In the mean time J shall only desire them to make use of those truths which the more learned of their party have, by the evidence of fact, been forced to confess. Rivet affirms Ihal it descended ex veteris aevi re/iV/«u'i), that Presbyters should be assistants or con- joined to the Bishops (who is by this confessed to be the principal) in the imposition of hands for ordination. Walo 31essalinus acknowledges it to be rem antiqiiissimum, a most ancient thing, that these two orders {vis.) of Bishops and Presbyters, should be distinct, even in the midtlle, or in the beginning of the next age after Christ. Dd. Blondel places it to be thirty-five years after the death of Si. John. Now then episcopacy is confessed to be of about sixteen hundred years continuance ? and if before this they can shew any ordination by mere Presbyters, by any but an Apostle, or an apostolical man ; and if there were not visi- bly a distinction of powers and persons relatively in the ec- clesiastical government ; or if they can give a rational ac- count why they who are forced to confess the honour and distinct order of episcopacy for about sixteen ages, should in the dark interval of thirty-five years (in which they can pretend to no monument or record to the contrary) yet make unlearned scruples of things they cannot colourably prove : if (I say) they can reasonably account for these things, I, for my part, will be ready to confess, that they are not guilty of the greatest, tSie most unreasonable and inexcusable schism in the world ; but else they have no colour to palliate the unlearned crime? For will not all wise men in the world conclude, that the Church of God, which was then holy, not in title only and design, but practically and materially; and persecuted, and not immerged in secu- lar temptations, could not all in one instant join together to alter that form of church government, which Christ and his

98 TO THE CHRISTIAN READER.

Apostles had so recently established, and without a divine warrant destroy a divine institution, not only to the confusion of the hierarchy, but to the ruin of their own souls ? It were strange that so great a change should be, and no good man oppose it; In toto orbe decretum est ; so St. Hierom : all the world consented in the advancement of the episcopal order: and therefore if we had no more to say for it, yei in prudence and piety we cannot say, they would innovate in so great a matter.

But I shall enter no further upon this inquiry ; only I re- member, that it is not very many months since the bigots of the Popish party cried out against us vehemently, and in- quired, Where is your Church of England, since you have no unity ? for your ecclesiastick head of unity, your Bishops are gone. And if we should be desirous to verify their ar- gument, so as indeed to destroy episcopacy, we should too much advantage popery, and do the most imprudent and most impious thing in the world. But blessed be God who hath restored that government, for which our late King of glorious memory gave his blood. And that (methinks) should very much weigh with all the King's true-hearted subjects, who should make it religion not to rob that glo- rious Prince of the greatest honour of such a martyrdom. For my part, I think it fit to rest in these words of another martyr, St. Cyprian, Si quis cvm episcopo non sit, in ecclesia non esse;* He that is not with the Bishop, is not in the Church ; that is, he that goes away from him, and willingly seperates, departs from God's Church : and wheth- er he can then be with God, is a very material consideration, and fit to be thought on by all, that ihink Heaven a more eligi- ble good, than the interests of a faction, and the importune desire of rule can countervail.

=!= Ep. 69.

TO THE CHRISTIAN READER. 99

However, I have in the following papers spoken a few things, which I hope may befit to persuade them «hat are not infinitely prejudiced : and although two or three good arguments are as good as two or three hundred, yet my pur- pose here was to prove the dignity and necessity of the of- fice and order episcopal, only that it might be as an econo- my to convey notice, and remembrances of the great duty incumbent upon all them that undertake this great charge. The dignity and the duty take one another by the hand, and are born together : only every sheep of the flock must take care to make the Bishop's duty as easy as it can, by humility and love, by prayer and by obedience. It is at the best, very difficult, but they who oppose themselves to government, make it harder and unconifortable. But take heed, if thy Bishop hath cause to comp'ain to God of thee for thy perversness and uncharitable walking, thou wilt be the loser ; and for us we can only say, in the words of the prophet, JVe will weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people. "^ But our comfort is in God: for we can do nothing without him, but in him we can do all things. And therefore we will pray, Domine, dabis pacem nobis, omnia eniin opera nostra operatns es in no- bis:] God hath wrought all our works within us; and therefore he will give us peace, and give us his Spirit.

Finally, Brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified even as it is with you: and that we may be delivered from unreason- able and wicked men, for all men have not faith.X

*Jerem. ix. 1. f Esa. xxvi. 12. | 2Thes. iii. 1.

SERMON IV.

A CONSECRATION SERMON,

PREACHED AT DUBLIN.

Luke xii. 42, 43.

And the Lord said. Who then is that faithful and wise Steward, whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season ?

Blessed is that Servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall find so doing.

T/f iS'Ttv apct Tria-To; ; Kcti ^poviy.oc oiKOvof/c;.

These wortls are not properly a question, though they seern so, and the particle t<; is not interrogative, but hypothetical, and extends tvho to ivhosoever ; plainly meaning that whoever is a steward over Christ's household, of him God requires a great care, because he hath trusted him with a great employ- ment. Every steward ov K*T2<rT«Ksv o K^gioc, so it is in St. JWatthew* n KUTo-iiwa o k-j^io;, so it is in my text ; every steward whom the Lord hatk or shall appoint over the family, to rule it and to feed it, now atid in all generations of mf3ii, as long as this family shall abide on earth ; that is, tlie apostles, and they who were to succeed the apostles in the stewardship, were to be furnished with the same power, and to undertake the same charge, and to give the same strict and severe accounts. *

''Cap. xxiv. 45,

Serm. IV. a consecration sermon, &c. 101

In these words here is something insinuated, and much expressed.

I. That which is insinuated only is, who these stewards are, whom Christ had, whom Christ would appoint over his family the Church ; they are not here named, but we shall find them out by their proper direction and indigitation by and bv.

If. But that which is expressed, is the office itself, in a double capacity. 1. In the dignity of it, it is a rule and a government : whom the Lord shall make ruler over his household. 2. In the care and duty of it, which determines the government to be paternal and profitable; it is a rule, but such a rule as shep- herds have over their flocks, to lead them to good pastures, and to keep them within their appointed walks, and within their folds ; Movm a-iTCfAir^iov -. that is the work, to give them a measure and proportion of nourishment : Tgo^w ^ Knifu,, so St. Matthew calls it : meat in the season ; that which is fit for them, and when ifc is fit ; meat enough, and meat convenient ; and both to<rether mean that which the Greek poets call ag,««A<w i[jifAmoh the stong wholesome diet.

111. Lastly, here is the reward of the faithful and "wise dispensation. The steward that does so, and continues to do so, till his Lord find him so doing, this man shall be blessed in his deed. Blessed is the servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall Jind so doinsr. Of these in order.

I. Who are these rulers of Christ's family: for though Christ knew it, and therefore needed not to ask ; yet we have disputed it so much and obeyed so little, that we have changed the plain hypothesis into an entangled question. The answer yet is easy as to some part of ihe inquiry : the apostles are the first meaning of the text; for they were our fathers in Christ, they begat sons and daughters unto God ; and where a spiritual paternity is evident, we need

VOL. III. 14

102 A CONSECRATION' SERMON, SerW. IF.

lodk no further for spiritual government, because in the paternal rule all power is founded; they begat the family by the power of the Word and tiie life of the Spirit, and they fed this family, and ruled it by the word of their proper ministry : They had the keys of this house, the stewards ensign, and tliey had the rulers place; for they sat on twelve thrones and judged the twelve tribes o[ Israel. But of this there is no question.

And as little of another proposition ; that this stew- ardship was to last for ever, for the power of minis- tering in this office and the office itself were to be perpetual ; for the issues and powers of government are more necessary for the perpetuating the church, than for the first planting; and if it was necessary that the apostles should have a rod and a stall' at iirst, it would be more necessary afterwards, when the family was more numerous, and their first zeal abated, and their native simplicity perverted into arts of hypocrisy and forms of godliness, when heresies should arise^ and the love of many should ivax cold. The apostles had also a power of ordination ; and that the very power itself does denote, for it makes perpetuity, that could not expire in the days of the apostles ; for by it they themselves propagated a su cession. And Christ having promised his Spirit to abide with his Church for ever, and made his apostles the channels, the ministers and conveyances of it, that it might descend as the inheritance and cten»al portion of the family; it cannot be imagined that when the first minibters were gone, there should not others rise up in the same places, some like to the fu st, in the same office and ministry of the spirit. But the thing is plain and evident in the matter of fact also; Quod in Ecclesia nunc geritur, hoc olim fe- cerunt apostoli, said St. Cyprian ;* What the apostles

*Epist. 73. ad Jiibai.

Serm. IV. preached at Dublin-. 108

did at first, that the Cfuirch does to this daj, and shall do for ever : for when St, P««i/had given to 'he Bishop of Ephcsus rules of government in this family, he commands that they should be observed till the corn- infjr of our Lord Jesus Christ :* and therefore these authorities and charo-es are given to hirn and his suc- Cessors ; it is the observation of St. Ambrose upon the warranty of that text, and is obvious and undeniable.

Well then, the apostles were the first stewards; and this office dies not with them, but must for ever be succeeded in ; and now begins the inquiry, V'ho are the successors of the apostles : for they are, they must evidently be, the stewards to feed and to rule this family. There are some that say that all who have any portion of work in the family, all the minis- ters of the gospel are these stewards, and so all will be rulers. — The presbyters surely ; for say they, presbyter and bishop is the same thing, and have the same harne in Scripture, and therefore the office cannot be distinguished. To this I shall very biiefiy say two things, which will quickly clear our way through this bush of thorns.

1. That the word Presbyter is but an honourable appellative used amongst the Jews, as Alderman amonii;st us; but it si«:nifies no order at all, nor was ever used in Scripture to signify any distinct company or order of clergy : and this appears not only by an induction in all the enumerations of the offices minis- terial in the New Testament,t where to be a presby- ter is never reckoned either as a distinct office, or a distinct order; but by its bemg indiffisrently commu- nicated to all the superiour clergy, and all the princes of the people.

* 1 Tim. vi. 14. t Rom.xii. 6; Eph. iv. 11 ; 1 Cor. xii. 28.

104 A CONSECRATION SERMON, Serm. IV.

2. The second thing I intended to say is this, that although the superiour clergy had not only one, but divers common appellatives, all being called jrgscr/5„T£go; and Stujiovoi, cvcH the apostolate itself being called a deaconship ;* yet it is evident that before the common appellations Avere fixed into names of propriety, they were as evidently distinguished in their offices and powers, as they are at this day in their names and titles.

To this purpose St. Paul gave to Titus, the bish- op of Crete, a special commission, command and power to make ordinations ; and in him, and the person of Timothy, he did erect a court of judicature even over some of the clergy, who yet were called presbyters ; against a presbyter receive tiot an accusation hut before tivo or three witnesses ;t there is the mea- sure and the warranty of the Audientia Episcopulis, the Bishop's \udience Court ; and when the accus- ed were found guilty, he gives in charge to proceed to censures ; i\iyx^ a.'o-oTOfji.a; and S'u iTrKTTay.i^ur You must re- buke them sharply, and you must silence them, stop their mouths :% that is St. Paul's word ; that they may no moi'e scatter their venom in the ears and hearts of the people. These bishops were commanded to set in order things that were ivanting in the churches, the same with that power of St. Paid, other things will I set in order when I come, said he to the Corinthian churches ; in w^hich there were many who were called presbyters, who nevertheless for all that name, had not that power. To the same purpose it is plain in Scripture, that some would have been apostles that were not ; such were those whom the spirit of God notes in the Revelation ;§ and some did love pre-eminence that had it not, for so did Dio- trephes ; and some were judges of questions, and

* Acts. i. 2b. t 1 Tim. v. 19. \ Tit. i. 1 1 . & ii. 15. h Cap. ii. v. 2.

Serm. IV. preached at dubliv. 105

all were not, for therefore they appealed to the apostles at Jerusalem ; and St. Philip^ though he was an evangelist, yet he could not give conHrma- tion to the Samaritans whom he had baptized, but the apostles were sent for, for that was part of the power reserved to the episcopal or apostolick. order.

Now from these premises the conclusion is plain and easy. 1. Christ left a government in his church, and founded it in the persons of the apostles. 2. The apostles received this power for the perpetual use and benefit, for the comfort and edification of the church for ever. 3. The apostles had this go- vernment, but all that were taken into the ministry, and all that were called presbyters had it not. \( therefore this government, in which there is so much disparity in the very nature and exercise and first original of it, must abide for ever; then so must that disparity. If the apostolate in the first stabiliment was this eminency of power, then it must be so; that is, it must be the same in the succession, that it was in the foundation. For after the church is founded upon ito governours, we are to expect no change of government. If Christ was the au- thor of it, then as Christ left it, so it must abide for ever : for ever there must be the governing and the governed, the superiour and the subordinate, the ordainer and the ordained, the confirmer and the confirmed.

Thus far the way is straight, and the path is plain. The apostles were the stewards and the ordinary rulers of Christ's family, by virtue of the order and office apostolical ; and although this be succeeded to for ever, yet no man for his now, or at any time being called a presbyter or elder can pretend to it; for besides his being a presbyter, he must be an apostle too ; else, though he be called in partem sol

l66 A CONSECRATION SERMOW, Scrm. IV.

licitudinis^ and may do the office of assistance and under-stevvardsliip, yet the kv^oc, the 2jovernment and rule of the family belongs not to him.

But then t/c «§* »« nixigcvy who are these stewards and rulers over the household noAv ? To this the answer is also certain and easy. Christ hath made the same governours to day as heretofore ; Apostles still. For though the twelve apostles are dead, yet the apostolical order is not ; it is w'^.n; yi'mrun. a genera- tive order, and begets more apostles. Now who these minores apostoli are, the successors of the apos- tles in that office apostolical and supreme regimen of souls, we are sufficiently taught in Holy Scrip- tures, which when I have clearly shewn to you, I shall pass on to some more practical considerations.

• 1. Therefore, certain and known it is, that Christ appointed two sorts of ecclesiastick persons; Twelve Apostles, and the Seventj-two Disciples; to these he gave a limited commission; to those a fulness of power; to these a temporary employ- ment; to those a perpetual and everlasting: from these two societies founded by Christ, the whole Church of God derives the two superiour orders in the sacred hierarchy ; and as bishops do not claim a divine right but by succession from the apostles ; so the presbyters cannot pretend to have been in- stituted by Christ, but by claiming a succession to the Seventy-two. And then consider the ditference, compare the tables, and all the world will see the advantao'es of ar<xument we have ; for since the Seventy-two had nothmg but a mission on a tempo- rary errand ; and more than that, we hear nothing of them in Scriptures; but upon the apostles Christ poured all the ecclesiastical power, and made them the ordinary ministers of that spirit which was to abide with the church for ever ; the divine institu- tion of the bishops, that is, of successors to the apos-

Senn. IV. preached at dublin. 107

ties, is much more clear than Christ appointed presbyters, or successors of the Seventy-two. And yet if from hence they do not derive it, they can never prove their order to be of divine institution at all, much less to be. so alone.

But we may see the very thing itself; the very matter of fact. St. James ^ the bishop oi" Jerusalem, is by St. Pcti^/called an apostle : other apostles saw 1 none, save James, the Lord's brother.''^ for there were some whom the Scriptures call the apostle of our Lord; that is, such which Christ made by his word immediately, or by his spirit extraordinarily ; and even into this number and title, Matthias and St. Paul, and Barnabas were accounted. t But the church also made apostles; and these were calied by St. Paid, airorrox-i iKH.h--<c-iuv, jjpostles of the Churches^ and particularly Epaphroditus was the JipostU of the Philippians ; properly so (saith Primasivs,) and what is this else but the bishop, saith Theodorct ;

lor TOt/c vuv Kuxouiuivciu; iTrio-KOV/ji aiviiWa^ov st^-ca-TOAoy?, lllOSe who arC

now called bishops were then called apostles, saith the same Father. The sense and full mean- ing of which argument is a perfect commentary upon that famous prophecy of the church. Instead of thy fathers, thou shalt have children ichom thou mayest make princes in all lands ;'\ that is, not only the twelve apostles our fathers in Christ, who first begat us, were to rule Christ's family, but when they were gone, their children and successors should arise in their stead : Et nati natorum, et que nascentur ab illis, their direct successors to ail geneiations shall he principes popidi, that is, rulers and govern- ours of the whole catholick church. De prole enim ecclesiae crevit eidcm pateritas, id est, cpiscopi guos ilia genuit, et patres appellat, et constituit in sedibus pa-

* Gal. i. 19. t 2 Cor. viii. 23 ; Philip, ii. 25. t Psalm xlv. 1«.

108 A COKSECRATION SERMOK, Scrm. IV^

iriim, salth St Austin; the children of the church become fathers of the faitiiful ; that is, tiie church begets bishops, and places them in the seat of fathers, the first apostles.

After these plain and evident testimonies of Scripture, it will not be amiss to saj, that this great affair, relying not only upon the words of institu- tion, but on matter of fact, passed forth into a de- monstration and greatest notoriety by the doctrine and practice of the whole catholick church : for so St. Irenceus^ who was one of the most ancient fathers of the church, and might easily make good his affirmative ; We can (says he) reckon the men who by the apostles ivere appointed bishops in churches^ to be their successors unto us ; leavino- to them the same •power and authority which they had. Thus St. Poly- carp was by the apostles made bishop of Smyrna ; St. Clement bishop of Rome by St. Peter ; and divers others by the apostles., saith Tertullian ; saying also that the Asian bishops were consecrated by St. John. And to be short, that bishops are the suc- cessors of the apostles in the stewardship and rule of the church, is expressly taught by St. Cyprian^ and St. Hierom* St. Ambrose., and St. Austin., by Euthymius., and Pacianus., by St. Gregory., and St. John Damascen, by Clarius a jMnscula., and St. Sixtus, by Anacletus, and St. Isidore; by the Roman (coun- cil under St. Sylvester^ and the Council o( Carthage : and the S'laSox'u or succession of bishops from the apostles hands in all the churches apostolical was as certainly known, as in our chronicles we find the succession of our Enc-lish knij^s, and one can no more be denied than the other. The conclusion from these premises I give you in the words of St. Cyp- rian ; Cogitent Diaconi quod Apostolos, \d est, Epis-

* In 1 Cor. xii.; in Psalm xliv.; Epist. i. Simpronianuia.

Serm. IV. preached at Dublin. 109

copos Dominus ipse ekgerit^* Let the ministers know that apostles, that is, the bishops were chosen by our blessed Lord himself; and this was so evident, and so believed, that St. Austin affirms it with a nemo ig- norat^'t no man is so ignorant but he knows this, that our blessed Saviour appointed bishops over churches.

Indeed the Gnosticks spake evil of this order ; for they are noted by three apostles, St. Paul, St. Peter, and St. Jiide, to be despisers of government, and to speak evil of dignities; and what