Fifty Sermons, Sermons · Sermon 28
SERMON XXVIII.
Preached to the King, at the Court in April, 1629.
GEN. 1. 26.
And God said, Let us make man, in our Image, after our likenesse.
NEver such a frame, so soon set up, as this, in this Chapter. For, for the thing it selfe, there is no other thing to compare it with. For it is All, it is the whole world. And for the time, there was no other time to compare it with, for this was the beginning of time, In the beginning God created Heaven and Earth. That Earth, which in some thousands of years, men could not look over, nor discern what form it had: (for neither Lactantius, almost three hundred years after Christ, nor Saint Augustine, more then one hundred years after him, would beleeve the earth to be round) that earth, which no man, in his person, is ever said to have compassed, till our age; That earth which is too much for man yet, (for, as yet, a very great part of the earth is unpeopled) that earth, which, if we will cast it all but into a Mappe, costs many Months labour to grave it, nay, if we will cast but a peece of an acre of it, into a garden, costs many years labour to fashion, and furnish it: All that earth, and then, that heaven, which spreads so farre, as that subtile men have, with some appearance of probability, imagined, that in that heaven, in those manifold Sphears of the Planets, and the Starres, there are many earths, many worlds, as big as this, which we inhabite; That earth and that heaven, which spent God himselfe, Almighty God, six days in furnishing; Moses sets up in a few syllables, in one line, In principio, in the beginning God created heaven and earth. If a Livy or a Guicciardine, or such extensive and voluminous authors, had had this story in hand; God must have made another world, to have made them a Library to hold their Books, of the making of this world. Into what Wire would they have drawn out this earth? Into what leafe-gold would they have beate out these heavens? It may assist our conjecture herein to consider, that amongst those men, who proceed with a sober modesty, and limitation in their writing, and make a conscience not to clogge the world with unnecessary books; yet the volumes which are written by them, upon this beginning of Genesis, are scarce lesse then infinite, God did no more but say, let this and this be done; And Moses does no more but say, that upon Gods saying it was done. God required not nature to help him to do it: Moses required not reason to help him to be beleeved. The holy Ghost hovered upon the waters, and so God wrought: The holy Ghost hovered upon Moses too, and so he wrote. And we beleeve these things to be so, by the same Spirit in Moses mouth, by which they were made so, in Gods hand. OnelyOnly, beloved, remember, that a frame may be thrown down in much lesse time, then it was set up. A child, an Ape can give fire to a Canon: And a vapour can shake the earth: And these fires, and these vapours can throw down cities in minutes. When Christ said, Throw down this Temple, and in three days I will raise it; they never stopped upon the consideration of throwing it down; they knew, that might be soon done; but they wondred at the speedy raising of it. Now, if all this earth were made in that minute, may not all come to the generall dissolution in this minute? Or may not thy acres, thy miles, thy Shires shrinke into feet, and so few feet, as shall but make up thy grave? When he who was a great Lord, must be but a Cottager; and not so well; for a Cottager must have so many acres to his Cottage; but in this case, a little peece of an acre, five foot, is become the house it selfe; The house, and the land; the grave is all: lower then that; the grave is the Land, and the Tenement, and the Tenant too: He that lies in it, becomes the same earth, that he lies in. They all make but one earth, and but a little of it. But then raise thy selfe to a higher hope againe. God hath made better land, the land of promise; a stronger city, the new Ierusalem; and, inhabitants for that everlasting city, VsUs; whom he made, not by saying, let there be men, but by consultation, by deliberation, God said, Let us make Man in our Image, after our likenesse.
We shall pursue our great examples;Divisio. God in doing, Moses in saying; and so make hast in applying the parts. But first receive them. And since we have the whole world in contemplation, consider in these words, the foure quarters of the world, by application, by fair, and just accommodation of the words. First, in the first word, that God speaks here, Faciamus, Let us, us in the plurall, (a denotation of divers Persons in one Godhead) we consider our East where we must beginne, at the knowledge and confession of the Trinity. For, though in the way to heaven, we be travelled beyond the Gentiles, when we come to confess but one God, (The Gentiles could not do that) yet we are still among the Iews, if we thinke that one God to be but one Person. Christs name is Oriens the East, if we will be named by him, (called Christians) we must look to this East,Zech. 6. 12. the confession of the Trinity. There's then our East, in the Faciamus; Let us, us make man: And then our West is in the next word, Faciamus Hominem. Though we be thus made, made by the counsell, made by the concurrence, made by the hand of the whole Trinity; yet we are made but men: And man, but in the appellation, in this text: and man there, is but Adam: and Adam is but earth, but red earth, earth dyed red in bloud, in Soul-bloud, the bloud of our own soules. To that west we must all come,Psal. 104. 19. to the earth. The Sunne knoweth his going down: Even the Sun for all his glory, and heighth, hath a going down, and he knowes it. The highest cannot devest mortality,Luac. 22. 54. nor the discomfort of mortality. When you see a cloud rise out of the west, straightway you say there commeth a storme, says Christ. When out of the region of your west, that is, your later days, there comes a cloud, a sicknesse, you feele a storme, even the best morall constancy is shaked. But this cloud, and this storme, and this west there must be; And that's our second consideration. But then the next words designe a North, a strong, and powerfull North, to scatter, and dissipate these clouds: Ad imaginem, & similitudinem; That we are made according to a pattern, to an image, to a likenesse, which God proposed to himselfe for the making of man. This consideration, that God did not rest, in that praeexistent matter, out of which he made all other creatures, and produced their formes, out of their matter, for the making of man; but took a forme, a patterne, a modell for that work, this is the North winde,Cant. 4. 16. 37. 22. that is called upon to carry out of the perfumes of the garden, to spread the goodnesse of God abroad. This is that which is intended in Iob; faire weather commeth out of the North. Our West, our declination is in this, that we are but earth, our North, our dissipation of that darknesse, is in this, that we are not all earth; Though we be of that matter, we have another forme, another image, another likenesse. And then, whose image and likenesse it is, is our Meridionall height, our noon, our south point, our highest elevation. In Imagine nostra, Let us make man in our Image. Though our Sun set at noon, as the Prophet Amos speakes;8. 8. though we die in our youth, or fall in our height: yet even in that Sunset, we shall have a Noon. For this Image of God shall never depart from our soule; no, not when that soule departs from our body. And that's our South, our Meridionall height and glory. And when we have thus seen this East, in the faciamus, That I am the workmanship and care of the whole Trinity; And this West in the Hominem, That for all that, my matter, my substance, is but earth: But then a North, a power of overcomming that low and miserable state, In Imagine; That though in my matter, the earth, I must die; yet in my forme, in that Image which I am made by, I cannot die: and after all a South, a knowledge, That this Image is not the Image of Angels, to whom we shall be like, but it is by the same life, by which those Angels themselves were made; the Image of God himselfe: When I am gone over this east, and west, and north, and south, here in this world; I should be as sorry as Alexander was, if there were no more worlds. But there is another world, which these considerations will discover, and lead us to, in which our joy, and our glory shall be, to see that God essentially, and face to face, after whose Image, and likenesse we were made before. But as that Pilot which had harbor'd his ship so farre within land, as that he must have change of Winds, in all the points of the Compasse, to bring her out, cannot hope to bring her our in one day: So being to transport you, by occasion of these words, from this world to the next; and in this world, through all the Compasse, all the foure quarters thereof; I cannot hope to make all this voyage to day. To day we shall consider onelyonly our longitude, our East, and West; and our North and South at another tyde, and another gale.
First then we looke towards our East, the fountaine of light, and of life. There this world beganne;1 Part. Oriens. the Creation was in the east. And there our next world beganne too. There the gates of heaven opened to us; and opened to us in the gates of death; for, our heaven is the death of our Saviour, and there he lived, and dyed there, and there he looked into our west, from the east, from his Terasse, from his Pinacle, from his exaltation (as himselfe calls it) the Crosse. The light which arises to us, in this east, the knowledge which we receive in this first word of our text, Faciamus, Let us, (where God speaking of himselfe, speakes in the Plurall) is the manifestation of the Trinity; the Trinity, which is the first letter in his Alphabet, that ever thinks to read his name in the book of life; The first note in his Gammut, that ever thinks to sing his part, in the Quire of the Triumphant Church. Let him him have done as much, as all the Worthies; and suffered as much as all Natures Martyrs, the penurious Philosophers; let him have known as much, as they that pretend to know, Omne scibile, all that can be known nay, and in-intelligibilia, In-investigabilia, (as Turtullian speakes) un-understandable things, unrevealed decrees of God; Let him have writ as much, as Aristotle writ, or as is written upon Aristotle, which is, multiplication enough: yet he hath not learnt to spel, that hath not learnt the Trinity; not learnt to pronounce the first word that cannot bring three Persons into one God. The subject of naturall philosophy, are the foure elements, which God made, the Subject of supernaturall philosophy, Divinity, are the three elements, which God is; and (if we may so speake) which make God, that is, constitute God, notifie God to us, Father, Sonne, and holy Ghost. The naturall man, that hearkens to his owne heart, and the law written there; may produce Actions that are good, good in the nature and matter, and substance of the worke. He may relieve the poore, he may defend the oppressed. But yet, he is but as an open field; and though he be not absolutely barren, he bears but grasse. The godly man; he that hath taken in the knowledge of a great, and a powerfull God, and enclosed, and hedged in himselfe with the feare of God, may produce actions better then the meere naturall man, because he referres his actions to the glory of his imagined God. But yet this man, though he be more fruitfull, then the former, more then a grassy field; yet he is but a ploughed field, and he bears but corne, and corne, God knowes, choaked with weeds. But that man, who hath taken hold of God, by those handles, by which God hath delivered, and manifested himselfe in the notions of Father, Sonne, and holy Ghost; he is no field, but a garden, a Garden of Gods planting, a Paradise in which grow all things good to eate, and good to see, (spirituall resection, and spirituall recreation too) and all things good to cure. He hath his beeing, and his diet, and his physique, there, in the knowledge of the Trinity; his beeing in the mercy of the Father; his physique in the merits of the Sonne; his diet, his daily bread, in the daily visitations of the holy Ghost. God is not pleased, not satisfied, with our bare knowledge,Heb. 11. 6. that there is a God. For, it is impossible to please God, without faith: and there is no such exercise of faith, in the knowledge of a God, but that reason, and nature will bring a man to it. When we professe God, in the Creed, by way of beleefe, Credo in Deum, I beleeve in God, in the same article we professe him to be a Father too, I beleeve in God the father Almighty: And that notion, the Father, necessarily implies, a second Person, a Sonne: And then we professe him to be maker of heaven, and earth: And in the Creation, the holy Ghost, the Spirit of God, is expresly named. So that we doe but exercise reason, and nature, in directing our selves upon God. We exercise not faith, (and without faith it is impossible to please God) till we come to that, which is above nature, till we apprehend a Trinity. We know God, we beleeve in the Trinity. The Gentiles multiplyed Gods. There were almost as many Gods as men, that beleeved in them. And I am got out of that thrust, and out of that noise, when I am come into the knowledge of one God: But I am got above staires, got in the Bedchamber, when I am come to see the Trinity, and to apprehend not onelyonly, that I am in the care of a great, and a powerfull God, but that there is a Father, that made me, a Sonne that Redeemed me, a holy Ghost, that applies this good purpose of the Father, and Sonne, upon me, to me. The root of all is God. But it is not the way to receive fruits, to dig to the root, but to reach to the boughs. I reach for my Creation to the Father, for my Redemption to the Sonne, for my sanctification to the holy Ghost: and so I make the knowledge of God, a Tree of life unto me; and not otherwise. Truly it is a sad Contemplation, to see Christians scratch and wound & teare one another, with the ignominious invectives, and uncharitable names of of Heretique, and Schismatique, about Ceremoniall, and Problematicall, and indeed but Criticall, verball controversies: and in the meane time, the foundation of all, the Trinity, undermined by those numerous, those multitudinous Anthills of Socinians, that overflow some parts of the Christian world, and multiply every where. And therefore the Adversaries of the Reformation, were wise in their generation, when to supplant the credit of both those great assistants of the Reformation, Luther, and Calvin, they impute to Calvin fundamentall error, in the Divinity of the second Person of the Trinity, the Sonne; And they impute to Luther, a detestation of the very word Trinity, and an expunction thereof, in all places of the Liturgy, where the Church had received that word. They knew well, if that slander could prevaile against those persons, nothing that they could say, could prevaile upon any good Christians. But though in our doctrine, we keep up the Trinity aright; yet, God knowes, in our practice we doe not. I hope it cannot be said of any of us, that he beleeves not the Trinity, but who amongst us thinkes of the Trinity, considers the Trinity? Father, and Sonne doe naturally imply, and induce one another; and therefore they fall oftner into our consideration. But for the holy Ghost, who feels him, when he feels him? Who takes knowledge of his working, when he works? Indeed our Fathers provided not well enough, for the worship of the whole Trinity, nor of the holy Ghost in particular, in the endowments of the Church, and Consecrations of Churches, and possessions in their names. What a spirituall dominion, in the prayers, and worship of the people, what a temporall dominion in the possessions of the world had the Virgin Mary, Queen of heaven, and Queen of earth too? She was made joint purchaser of the Church with her Sonne, and had as much of the worship thereof as he, though she paid her fine in milke, and he in bloud. And, till a new Sect came in her Sonnes name; and in his name, the name of Jesus, tooke the regency so farre out of that Queen Mothers hands, and sued out her Sonnes Livery so farre, as that though her name be used, the Virgin Mary is but a feoffee in trust, for them; all was hers. And if God oppose not these new usurpers of the world, posterity will soon see Saint Ignatius worth all the Trinity in possessions and endowments, as that sumptuous, and splendid foundation of his first Temple at Rome, may well create a conjecture, and suspicion. Travaile no farther; Survay but this City; And of their not one hundred Churches, the Virgin Mary hath a dozen; The Trinity hath but one; Christ hath but one; The holy Ghost hath none. But not to goe into the City, nor out of our selves; which of us doth truly, and considerately ascribe the comforts, that he receives in dangers, or in distresses, to that God of all comfort, the comforter, the holy Ghost? We know who procured us, our Presentation, and our dispensation: you know who procured you, your offices, and your honours. Shall I ever forget who gave me my comfort in sicknesse? Who gave me my comfort, in the troubles, and perplexities, and diffidencies of my conscience? The holy Ghost brought you hither. The holy Ghost opens your eares, and your hearts here. Till in all your distresses, you can say, Veni Creator Spiritus, come holy Ghost, and that you feel a comfort in his comming: you can never say Veni Domine Iesu, come Lord Jesus, come to Judgement. Never to consider the day of Judgement, is a fearfull thing. But to consider the day of Judgement, without the comfort of the holy Ghost, is a thousand times more fearfull.
This Seale then, this impression, this notion of the Trinity being set upon us,Trinitarii. in the first Creation, in this first plurall word of our text, Faciamus; Let us, (for Father, Sonne, and holy Ghost made man) and this seale being re-imprinted upon us, in our second Creation, our Regeneration, in Baptisme, (Man is Baptized In the name of the Father, of the Sonne, and of the holy Ghost) This notion of the Trinity being our distinctive Character, from Iew and Gentile; This being our specifique forme: why does not this our forme, this soule of our Religion denominate us? why are we not called Trinitarians, a name that would embrace the profession of all the Persons, but onelyonly Christians, which limits, and determines us upon one? The first Christians, amongst whose manifold Persecutions, scorne, and contempt, was not the least, in contempt and scorne, were called Nazarai, Nazarites in the mouth of the Vulgar; and Galil…i, Galilaeans in the mouth of Iulian; and Iudaei, Iews in the mouth of Nero, when he imputed the burning of Rome (his owne act) to them; and Christiani; (as Tertullian says) that they could accuse Christians of nothing, but the name of Christians; and yet they could not call them by their right name, but Chrestians, (which was gentle, quiet, easie patient men, made to be troden upon) They gave them divers names in scorne, yet never called them Trinitarians. Christians themselves amongst themselves were called by divers names in the Primitive Church, for distinction; Fideles, the faithfull, and Fratres, the Brethren, and Discipuli, Disciples; And, after, by common custome at Antioch, Christians. And after that, (they say) by a councell which the Apostles held,Act. 11. 26. at the same city, at Antioch, there passed an expresse Canon of the Church, that they should be called so, Christians. And before they had this name at Antioch, first by common usage, after by a determinate Canon, to be called Christians, from Christ, at Alexandria, Epiph. Heres. 29they were called (most likely from the name of Jesus) Iesseans. And so Philo Iudaeus, in that book, which he writes De Iessenis, intends by his Iessenis, Christians; and in divers parts of the world, into which Christians travell now, they find some elements; some fragments, some reliques of the Christian Religion, in the practice of some religious Men, whom those Countreys call, Iesseans, doubtlesly derived, and continued from the name of Jesus. So that the Christians took many names to themselves for distinction, (Brethren, Disciples, faithfull) And they had many names put upon them in scorne, (Nazarites, Galilaeans, Iews, Chrestians,) and yet they were never, never by Custome amongst themselves, never by commandement from the Church, never in contempt from others, called Trinitarians, the profession of the Trinity being their specifique forme, and distinctive Character; why so? Beloved, the name of Christ involv'd all: not onelyonly, because it is a name, that hath a dignity in it, more then the rest; (for Christ is an anointed person, a King, a Messiah, and so the profession of that Name, conferrs an Unction, a regall and a holy Unction upon us) (for we are thereby a royall Priesthood) but because in the profession of Christ, the whole Trinity is professed. How often doth the Sonne say, that the Father sent him? And how often that the Father will, and that he will send the Holy Ghost? This is life eternall,Iohn 17. 3. says he, to know thee, the onelyonly true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent; And sent, with all power, in heaven, and in earth. This must be professed, Father, and Sonne; And then, no man can professe this; no man can call Jesus the Lord, but by the holy Ghost. So that, as in the persecutions, in the primitive Church, the Martyrs which were hurried to tumultuary executions, and could not be heard for noise, in excusing themselves of Treason, and sedition, and crimes imputed to them, to make their cause odious, did use in the sight of the people, (who might see a gesture, though they could not heare a protestation) to signe themselves with the signe of the Crosse, to let them know, for what profession they died, so that the signe of the Crosse, in that use thereof, in that time, was an abridgement, and a Catechisme of the whole Christian Religion, so is the professing of the name of Christ, the professing of the whole Trinity. As he that confesses one God, is got beyond the meer naturall man; And he that confesses a Sonne of God, beyond him: So is neither got to the full truth, till he confesse the holy Ghost too. The foole sayes in his heart, there is no God. The foole, says David, The emphaticall foole, in the highest degree of folly. But though he get beyond that folly, he is a foole still, if he say there is no Christ; For Christ is the wisdome of the Father: And a foole still, if he deny the holy Ghost: for who shall apply Christ to him, but the holy Ghost? Etiam Christiani Nomen superficies est, is excellently said by Tertullian, the name, and profession of a Christian, is but a superficiall outside, sprinckled upon my face in Baptisme, or upon mine outward profession, in actions: if I have not in my heart, a sense of the holy Ghost, that he applies the mercies of the Father, and the merits of the Sonne to my soule. As Saint Paul said, Whilest you are without Christ, you are without God. It is an Atheisme, with Saint Paul, to be no Christian. So whilest you are without the holy Ghost, you are without Christ. It is Antichristian, to deny, or not to confesse the holy Ghost. For as Christ is the manifestation of the Father, so the holy Ghost is the application of the Sonne. Therein onelyonly are we Christians, that in the profession of that name of Christ, we professe all the three Persons: In Christ is the whole Trinity; because, as the Father sent him, so he sent the holy Ghost. And that's our specifique forme, that's our distinctive Character, from Iew, and Gentile, the Trinity.
But then,An in textu. is this specifique forme, this distinctive Character, the notion of the Trinity, conveied to us, exhibited, imprinted upon us, in our Creation, in this word, this plurall word, in the mouth of our one God, Faciamus, Let us, us. It is here, and here first. This is an intimation, and the first intimation, of the Trinity, from the mouth of God, in all the Bible. It is true, that though the same faith, which is necessary to salvation now, were always necessary, and so in the old Testament, they were bound to beleeve in Christ, as well, as in the new, and consequently in the whole Trinity; yet not so explicitly,Iohn 17. 6. nor so particularly as now. Christ calling upon God, in the name of Father, says; I have manifested thy name unto the men, thou gavest me out of the world. They were men appropriated to God, men exempt out of the world; yet they had not a cleer manifestation of Father, and Sonne, the doctrine of the Trinity, till Christ manifested it to them. I have manifested thy name, thy name of Father. And therefore the Jewish Rabbins say that the Septuagint, the first translators of the Bible, did disguise some places of the Scriptures, in their translation, lest Ptolomee, for whom they translated it, should be scandalized wh those places, & that this textwasone of those places, which say they though it be otherwise in the Copies of the Septuagint, which we have now, they translated Faciam, and not Faciamus, that God said here, I will make, in the singular; and not, Let us make man, in the plurall, lest that plurall word, might have misled King Pt…lomee to thinke, that the Iews had a plurall Religion, and worshipped divers Gods. So good an evidence doe they confesse this text to be, for some kinde of plurality in the Godhead.
Here then God notified the Trinity; and here first,Primo hic. for though we accept an intimation of the Trinity, in the first line of the Bible, where Moses joynes a plurall name, Elohim, with a singular Verbe, Bara; and so in construction, it is, Creavit Dii, Gods created heaven, and earth: yet, besides that, that is rather a mysterious collection, then an evident conclusion of a plurality of Persons, though we read that in that first verse, before this in the twenty sixth, yet Moses writ that, which is in the beginning of this chapter, more then two thousand years after God spake this, that is in our text. So long was Gods plurall, before Moses his plurall; Gods Faciamus, before Moses Bara Elohim. So that in this text, beginnes our Catechisme. Here we have, and here first the saving knowledge of the Trinity.
For,Cui dixit. when God spake here, to whom could God speake but to God? Non cum rebus Creandis, nox cum re nihili, says, Athanasius, speaking of Gods first speaking, when he said, of the first creature, Let there be light. God spake not then to future things, to things that were not. When God spake first, there was no creature at all, to speake to. When God spake of the making of man, there were creatures. But were there any creatures able to create, or able to assist him, in the creation of man? Who? Angels? Some had thought so in Saint Basils time; and to them Saint Basil says, Súntne Illi? God says, let us make man to our Image, And could he say so to Angels? Are Angels and God all one? Or is that that is like an Angell, therefore like God? It was Sua Ratio, Suum verbum, Sua sapientia, says that Father, God spake to his own word, and wisdome, to his own purpose, and goodnesse. And the Sonne is the word and wisdome of God: and the holy Ghost is the goodnesse, and the purpose of God; that is, the administration, the dispensation of his purposes. 'Tis true, that when God speakes this over againe in his Church, as he does every day, now, this minute then God speakes it to Angels; to the Angels of the Church, to his Ministers, he says Faciamus, Let us, us both together, you, and we make a man; join mine Ordinance (your preaching) with my Spirit, (says God to us) and so make man. Preach the oppressor, and preach the wanton, and preach the calumniator into another nature. Make the ravening Wolfe a Man, that licentious Goate a man, that insinuating Serpent a man, by thy preaching. To day if you will heare his voice, heare us. For here he calls upon us, to joine with him for the making of man. But for his first Faciamus, which is in our text; it is excellently said,Rupertus. Dictum in senatu, & soliloquio; It was spoken in a Senat, and yet in a solitarinesse; spoken in private, and yet publiquely spoken; spoken where there were divers, and yet but one; one God, and three Persons.
If there were no more intended in this plurall expression,Rex. us, but, (as some have conceived) that God spake here in the person of a Prince, and Soveraigne Lord, and therefore spake as Princes doe, in the plurall, We command, and We forbid, yet Saint Gregories caution would justly fall upon it, Reverenter pensandum est, it requires a reverend consideration, if it be but so. For, God speakes so, like a King, in the plurall, but seldome, but five times, (in my account) in all the Scriptures; and in all five, in cases of important consequence. In this text first, where God creates man, whom he constitutes his Viceroy in the World: here he speakes in his royall plurall. And then in the next Chapter,ver. 18. where he extends mans terme in his Vicegerency to the end of the world, in providing man, meanes of succession; Faciamus, Let us, us make him a helper; There he speakes in his royall plurall. And then also in the third Chapter,1. 22: in declaring the hainousnesse of mans fault, and arraigning him, and all us, in him, God says, Sicut unus ex nobis, Man is become as one of us, not content to be our Viceroy, but our selves; There's his royall plurall too. And againe in that declaration of his Justice,Gen. 11. 7. in the confusion of the builders of Babel, Descendamus, confundamus, Let us doe it: And then lastly, in that great worke of mingling mercy with justice, which (if we may so speake) is Gods master-peece,Esa…. 6. 8. when he says, Quis ex nobis, who will goe for us, and publish this? In these places, and these onelyonly, (and not all these neither, if we take it exactly according to the originall; for in the Second, the making of Eve, though the Vulgat have it in the plurall, it is indeed but singular in the Hebrew) God speakes as a King in his royall plurall still. And when it is but so, Reverenter pensandum est, says that Father; it behoves us to hearken reverently to him, for Kings are Images of God; such Images of God, as have eares, and can heare; and hands and can strike. But I would aske no more premeditation at your hands, when you come to speake to God in this place, then if you sued to speake with the King: no more fear of God here, then if you went to the King, under the conscience of a guiltinesse towards him; and a knowledge that he knew it. And that's your case here; Sinners, and manifest sinners. For even midnight is noone in the sight of God, and when your candles are put out,Psal. 19. 7. his Sunne shines still. Nec quid absconditum à calcre ejus, says David, there is nothing hid from the heate thereof: not onelyonly, no sinne, hid from the light thereof, from the sight of God; but not from the heate therof, not from the wrath & indignation of God. If God speak plurally onelyonly in the Majesty of a soveraign Prince, still Reverenter pensandum, that calls for reverence. What reverence? There are nationall differences in outward worships, and reverences. Some worship Princes, and Parents, and Masters, in one, some in another fashion. Children kneele to aske blessing of Parents in England, but where else? Servants attend not with the same reverence upon Masters, in other nations, as with us. Accesses to their Princes are not with the same difficulty, nor the same solemnity in France, as in Turkey. But this rule goes thorough all nations, that in that disposition, and posture, and action of the body which in that place is esteemed most humble, and reverend, God is to be worshipped. Doe so then here, God is your Father: aske blessing upon your knees; pray in that posture. God is your King: worship him with that worship, which is highest in our use, and estimation. We have no Grandees that stand covered to the King; where there are such, though they stand covered in the Kings presence, they doe not speake to him, for matters of Grace; they doe not sue to him: so ancient Canons make differences of Persons in the presence of God; where, and how, these, and these shall dispose of themselves in the Church, dignity, and age, and infirmity will induce differences. But for prayer there is no difference, one humiliation is required of all; As when the King comes in here; howsoever, they sate diversly before, all returne to one manner of expressing their acknowledgement of his presence. So at the Oremus, Let us pray, let us all fall down, and worship, and kneel before the Lord our maker.
So he speakes in our text; not onelyonly as the Lord our King,In concilio. intimating his providence, and administration; but as the Lord our maker, and then a maker so, as that he made us in a councell, Faciamus, Let us; and that that he speakes, as in councell, is another argument for reverence. For what interest, or freedome soever I have, by his favour, with any Counseller of State: yet I should surely use another manner of behaviour towards him, at the Councell Table, then at his owne Table. So does there belong another manner of consideration to this plurality in God, to this meeting in Councell, to this intimation of a Trinity, then to those other actions in which God is presented to us, singly, as one God, for so he is presented to the naturall man, as well, as to us. And here enters the necessity of this knowledge,Iohn 3. 3: Oportet denuo nasci; without a second birth no salvation; And no second birth without Baptisme; no Baptisme, but in the name of Father, Sonne, and holy Ghost. It was the entertainment of God himselfe, his delight, his contemplation, for those infinite millions of generations, when he was without a world, without Creatures, to joy in one another, in the Trinity, as Gregory Nazianz: (a Poet, as well as a Father, as most of the Fathers were) expresses it: ille suae splendorem cernere formae, Gaudebat: It was the Fathers delight, to looke upon himselfe in the Sonne; Numenque suum triplicique parique Luce nitens, and to see the whole Godhead, in a threefold, and an equall glory. It was Gods owne delight, and it must be the delight of every Christian, upon particular occasions to carry his thoughts upon the severall persons of the Trinity. If I have a bar of Iron, that bar in that forme will not naile a doore; If a Sow of Lead, that Lead in that forme will not stop a leake; If a wedge of Gold, that wedge will not buy my bread. The generall notion of a mighty God, may lesse fit my particular purposes. But I coine my gold into currant money, when I apprehend God, in the severall notions of the Trinity. That if I have been a prodigall Sonne, I have a Father in heaven, and can goe to him, and say, Father I have sinned, and be received by him. That if I be a decayed Father, and need the sustentation of mine own children; there is a Sonne in heaven, that will doe more for me, then mine own, of what good meanes or what good nature so ever they be, can or will doe. If I be dejected in spirit, there is a holy Spirit in heaven, which shall beare witnesse to my spirit, that I am the child of God. And if the ghosts of those sinners, whom I made sinners, haunt me after their deaths, in returning to my memory, and reproaching to my conscience, the heavy judgements that I have brought upon them: If after the death of mine own sinne, when my appetite is dead, to some particular sinne, the memory and sinfull delight of passed sinnes, the ghosts of those sinnes haunt me againe; yet there is a holy Ghost in heaven, that shall exorcise these, and shall overshadow me, the God of all Comfort and Consolation. God is the God of the whole world, in the generall notion, as he is so, God; but he is my God, most especially, and most applyably, as he receives me in the severall notions of Father, Sonne, and holy Ghost.
This is our East,2 Part. Occidens. here we see God, God in all the persons, consulting, concurring to the making of us. But then my West presents it selfe, that is, an occasion to humble me in the next words.Adam. He makes but Man; A man that is but Adam, but Earth. I remember foure names, by which man is often called in the Scriptures: and of those foure, three doe absolutely carry misery in their significations: Three to one against any man, that he is miserable. One name of Man is Ish; and that they derive à Sonitu; Man is but a voice, but a sound, but a noise, he begins the noise himselfe, when he comes crying into the world, and when he goes out; perchance friends celebrate, perchance enemies calumniate him, with a diverse voice, a diverse noise. A melancholique man, is but a groaning; a sportfull man, but a song; an active man, but a Trumpet; a mighty man, but a thunderclap. Every man but Ish, but a found, but a noyse. Another name is Enosh. is meer Calamity, misery, depression. It is indeed most properly Oblivion. And so the word is most elegantly used by David, Quid est homo? Psal. 8. 4.where the name of man, is Enosh: And so, that which we translate What is man, that thou art mindefull of him; is indeed, What is forgetfulnesse, that thou shouldest remember it; That thou shouldest thinke of that man, whom all the world hath forgotten? First, man is but a voice, but a sound. But because fame, and honour may come within that name of a sound, of a voice; therefore he is overtaken, with another dampe: man is but oblivion: his fame, his name shall be forgotten. One name man hath, that hath some taste of greatnesse, and power in it, Gheber. And yet, I that am that man,Lam. 1. 3. says the Prophet, (for there that name of man Gheber is used) I am the man, that hath seen affliction, by the rod of Gods wrath. Man, Ish, is so miserable, as that he afflicts himselfe, cryes, and whines out his own time. And man, Enosh, so miserable, as that others afflict him, and bury him, in ignominious oblivion; And man, that is Gheber, the greatest, and powerfullest of men, is yet, but that man, that may possibly, nay that may justly see affliction by the rod of Gods wrath, and from Gheber be made Adam, which is the fourth name of man, indeed the first name of man, the name in this text, and the name to which every man must refer himselfe, and call himselfe by, Earth, and red Earth.
Now God did not say of man,Adam: as of other creatures; Let the earth bring forth hearbs, and fruits, and trees as upon the third day; nor let the earth bring forth cattell, and wormes, as upon the sixth day, the same day that he made man; Non imperia…i verbo, sed familiari manu, says Tertullian, God calls not man out with an imperious Command, but he leads him out, with a familiar, with his own hand. And it is not Fiat homo, but Faciamus; not let there be, but let us make man. Man is but an earthen vessell. 'Tis true, but when we are upon that consideration, God is the Potter. If God will be that, I am well content to be this. Let me be any thing, so that that I am be from my God, I am as well content to be a sheep, as a Lion, so God will be my Shepheard: and the Lord is my shepheard: To be a Cottage, as a Castle, so God will be the builder; And the Lord builds, and watches the City, the house, this house this City, mee, To be Rye, as Wheate, so God will be the husbandman; And the Lord plants me: and waters, and weeds, and gives the encrease: and to be clothed in leather, as well, as in silke, so God will be the Merchant: and he cloathed me in Adam, and assures me of clothing, in clothing the Lillies of the field, and is fitting the robe of Christs righteousness to me now, this minute. Adam is as good to me as Ghebaer, a clod of earth, as a hill of earth; so God be the Potter.
God made man of earth,Nonster. not of ayre, not of fire. Man hath many offices, that appertaine to this world, and whilest he is here, must not withdraw himselfe, from those offices of mutuall society, upon a pretence of zeale, or better serving God in a retired life. A ship will no more come to the harbour without Ballast, then without Sailes; a man will no more get to heaven, without discharging his duties to other men, then without doing them to God himselfe.Luke 4. 4. Man liveth not by bread onelyonly, says Christ; But yet he liveth by bread too. Every man must doe the duties; every man must beare the incumbrances of some calling.
Pulvises: Thou art earth, he whom thou treadest upon is no less; and he that treads upon thee is no more. Positively it is a low thing, to be but earth; and yet thy low earth, is the quiet Center. There may be rest, acquiescence, content in the lowest Condition. But comparatively earth is as high as the highest. Challenge him, that magnifies himselfe above thee, to meet thee in Adam. There bid him, if he will have more Nobility, more Greatness, then thou, take more originall sinne then thou hast. If God have submitted thee, to as much sinne, and penalty of sinne, as him; he hath afforded thee as much, and as noble earth as him. And if he will not try it in the root, in your equality in Adam; yet, in another Test, another Furnace, in the grave he must. There all dusts are equall. Except an Epitaph tell me, who lies there, I cannot tell by the dust; nor by the Epitaph, know which is the dust it speakes of, if another have been laid before, or after in the same grave. Nor can any Epitaph be confident in saying here lies; but here was laid. For, so various, so vicissitudinary is all this world, as that even the dust of the grave hath revolutions. As the motions of an upper Spheare, imprint a motion in a lower Spheare, other then naturally it would have: So the changes of this life worke after death. And, as envy supplants, and removes us alive; a shovell removes us, and throwes us out of our grave, after death. No limbeque, no weights can tell you, this is dust Royall, this Plebeian dust: no Commission, no Inquisition can say, this is Catholique, this is Hereticall dust. All lie alike; and all shall rise alike: alike, that is, at once, and upon one Command. The Saint cannot acclerate; The Reprobate cannot retard the Resurrection. And all that rise to the right hand, shall be equally Kings: and all at the left, equally, what? The worst name we can call them by, or affect them with, is Devill. And then they shall have bodies to be tormented in, which Devills have not. Miserable, unexpressible, unimaginable. Miserable condition, where the sufferer would be glad to be but a Devill; where it were some happinesse, and some kinde of life, to be able to dye; and a great preferment, to be nothing.
He made us all of earth, and all of red earth. Our earth was red, even when it was in Gods hands:Terra rub…a. a rednesse that amounts to a shamefastnesse, to a blushing at our own infirmities, is imprinted in us, by Gods hand. For this rednesse, is but a Conscience, a guiltinesse of needing a continuall supply, and succession of more, and more grace. And we are all red, red so, even from the beginning, and in our best state. Adam had, the Angells had thus much of this infirmity, that though they had a great measure of grace, they needed more. The prodigall child grew poore enough, after he had received his portion: and he may be wicked enough, that trusts upon former, or present grace, and seeks not more. This rednesse, a blushing, that is, an acknowledgement, that we could not subsist, with any measure of faith, except we pray for more faith; nor of grace, except we seek more grace, we have from the hand of God: And another rednesse from his hand too, the bloud of his Sonne, so that bloud was effused by Christ, in the value of the ransome for All, and accepted by God, in the value thereof for All: and this redness, is, in the nature thereof, as extensive, as the redness derived from Adam is; Both reach to all. So we were red earth in the hands of God, as redness denotes our generall infirmities, and as redness denotes the bloud of his Sonne, our Saviour, all have both. But that redness, which we have contracted from bloud shed by our selves, the bloud of our own soules by sinne, was not upon us, when we were in the hands of God. That redness is not his tincture, not his complexion. No decree of his is writ in any such red inke. Our sinnes are our owne, and our destruction is from ourselves. We are not as accessaries, and God as principall in this soule-murder. God forbid, we are not as executioners of Gods sentence, and God the Malefactor, in this soule-damnation. God forbid. Cain came not red in his brothers bloud, out of Gods hands; nor David red with Vriahs bloud; nor Achitophel with his own; nor Iudas with Christs, or his owne. That that Pilat did illusorily, God can doe truely; wash his hands from the bloud of any of these men. It were a weake Plea to say, I killed not that man; but 'tis true, I commanded one, who was under my command to kill him. It is rather a prevarication, then a justification of God to say, God is not the author of sinne in any man, but tis true, God makes that man sinne, that sinne. God is Innocency; and the beames that flow from him are of the same nature, and colour. Christ when he appeared in heaven,Apoc. 14. 14. was not red but white. His head and haires were white, as white wooll, and as snow; not head onelyonly, but haires too. He, and that that growes from him; he, and we, as we come from his hands are white too. His Angels that provoke us to the Imitation of that pattern,Act. 1. 10. are so; in white. Two men, two Angels stood by the Apostles in white apparell. The imitation is laid upon us by precept too: At all times let thy garments be white;Eccles. 9. 8. Those actions in which thou appearest to the world, innocent. It is true, that Christ is both.Cant. 5. 10. My beloved is white and ruddy, says the Spouse. But the white was his owne: his rednesse is from us. That which Zipporah said to her husband Moses in anger; the Church may say to Christ in thankfulnesse,Exod 4. 25. Verè sponsus Sanguinum, thou art truly a bloudy husband to me; Damim, sanguinum, of blouds, blouds in the plurall; for all our blouds are upon him. This was a mercy to the Militant Church, that even the Triumphant Church wondred at it.Esai. 63. 1. They knew not Christ, when he came up to heaven in red. Who is this that commeth in red garments? Wherefore is thy apparell red, like him that treadeth in the winepresse? They knew he went down in white, in intire innocency: and they wondred to see him returne in red. But he satisfies them; Calcavi, you thinke I have troden the winepresse, and you mistake it not: I have troden the winepresse; and Calcavi solus, I have troden it alone, all the redness, all the bloud of the whole world is upon me. And as he adds Non vir de gentibus, of all people there was none with me, with me so, as to have any part in the Merit; So, of all people there was none without me; without me so, as to be excluded by me, without their own fault, from the benefit of my merit. This redness he carried up to heaven: for, by the bloud of his Crosse came peace,Coles. 1. 20. both to the things in earth, and the things in heaven. For that peccability, that possibility, of sinning, which is in the Nature of the Angels of heaven, would breake out into sinne, but for that confirmation, which those Angels have received in the bloud of Christ. This rednesse he carried to heaven; and this rednesse he hath left upon earth, that all we miserable clods of earth, might be tempered with his bloud; that in his bloud exhibited in his holy and blessed Sacrament,Apoc. 7. 13. our long robes might be made white in the bloud of the Lambe: that though our sinnes be robes, habits of sinne; though long robes, habits of long continuance in sinne: yet through that rednesse, which our sinnes have cast upon him, we might come to participate of that whitenesse, that righteousnesse, which is his owne. We, that is, all we; for, as to take us in, who are of low condition, and obscure station, a cloud is made white by his sitting upon it,Apoc. 14. 14. He sate upon a great white cloud, so to let the highest see, that they have no whitenesse,Apoc. 20. 11. but from him, he makes the Throne white by sitting upon it. He sate upon a great white Throne. It had not been great, if it had not been white. White is the colour of dilatation; goodnesse onelyonly enlarges the Throne. It had not been white, if he had not sate upon it. That goodness onley, which consists in glorifying God, and God in Christ, and Christ in the sincerity of his truth, is true whitenesse. God hath no rednesse in himselfe, no anger towards us, till he considers us as sinners. God cast no rednesse upon us; inflicts no necessity, no constraint of sinning upon us. We have dyed ourselves in sinnes, as red as Scarlet: we have drowned our selves in such a red Sea. But as a garment, that were washed in the red Sea, would come out white, (so wonderfull works hath God done at the red Sea,Psal. 105. 13. says David) so doth his whitenesse worke through our red,Apoc. 2. 17. and makes this Adam, this red earth, Calculum candidum, that white stone, that receives a new name, not Ish, not Enosh, not Gheber, no name that tasts of misery or of vanity; but that name, renewed, and manifested, which was imprinted upon us, in our elections, the Sonnes of God; the irremoveable, the undisinheritable Sonnes of God.
Be pleased to receive this note at parting,Macula Alba. Levit. 1…. that there is Macula Alba, a spot, and yet white, as well as a red spot: a whitenesse, that is an indication of a Leprosie, as well as a rednesse. Whole-pelagianisme, to thinke nature alone sufficient; Halfe-pelagianisme, to thinke grace once received to be sufficient; Super-pelagianisme, to thinke our actions can bring God in debt to us, by merit, and supererogation, and Catarisme, imaginary purity, in Canonizing our selves, as present Saints, and condemning all, that differ from us, as reprobates. All these are white spots, and have the colour of goodnesse; but are indications of leprosie. So is that that God threatens,Ioel. 17. Decorticatio ficus & albi rami, that the figtree shall be bark'd, and the boughes thereof left white: to be left white without barke, was an indication of a speedy withering. Ostensa candescunt, & arescunt, says Saint Gregory of that place,Greg. the bough that lies open without barke looks white, but perishes: the good works that are done openly to please men have their reward, says Christ, that is, shall never have reward. To pretend to doe good, and not meane it; To doe things, good in themselves, but not to good ends; to goe towards good ends, but not by good ways; to make the deceiving of men, thine end; or the praise of men, thine end: all this may have a whiteness, a colour of good: but all this, is a barking of the bough, and an indication of a mischievous leprosie. There is no good whiteness, but a reflection from Christ Jesus, in an humble acknowledgement that wee have none of our own, and in a consident assurance, that in our worst estate we may be made partakers of his. We are all red earth. In Adam we would not, since Adam we could not, avoid sinne, and the Concomitants thereof, miseries; which we have called our West, our cloud, our darknesse. But then we have a North that scatters these clouds, in the next word, Ad imaginem; that we are made to another patterne, in another likenesse, then our own. Faciamus hominem; so far are we gone, East, and West; which is halfe our Compasse, and all this days voiage. For we are strooke upon the sand; and must stay another Tyde, and another gale for our North, and South.