Fifty Sermons, Sermons · Sermon 41
SERMON XLI.
Preached at Saint Pauls Crosse. 6 May. 1627.
HOSEA 3. 4.
For, the Children of Israel shall abide many dayes, without a King, and without a Prince, and without a Sacrifice, and without an Image, and without an Ephod, and without Teraphim.
SOme Cosmographers have said, That there is no land so placed in the world, but that from that land, a man may see other land. I dispute it not, I defend it not; I accept it, and I apply it; there is scarce any mercy expressed in the Scriptures, but that from that mercy you may see another mercy. Christ sets up a candle now here, onelyonly to lighten that one roome, but as he is lumen de lumine, light of light, so he would have more lights lighted at every light of his, and make every former mercy an argument, an earnest, a conveyance of more. Between land and land you may see seas, and seas enraged with tempests; but still, say they, some other land too. Between mercy, and mercy, you may finde Comminations, and Judgements, but still more mercy. For this discovery let this text be our Mappe. First we see land, we see mercy in that gracious compellation, Children, (the Children of Israel) Then we see sea, then comes a Commination, … Judgement that shall last some time, (many days shall the Children of Israel suffer) But there they may see land too, another mercy, even this time of Judgement shall be a day, they shall not be benighted, not left in darkenesse in their Judgement; (many dayes, all the while, it shall bee day) Then the text opens into a deep Ocean, a spreading Sea, (They shall bee without a King, and without a Prince, and without a Sacrifice, and without an Image, and without an Ephod, and without Teraphim.) But even from this Sea, this vast Sea, this Sea of devastation, wee see land; for, in the next verse followes another mercy, (The Children of Israel shall returne, and shall seeke the Lord their God, and David their King, and shall feare the Lord, and his goodnesse in the later dayes.) And beyond this land, there is no more Sea; beyond this mercy, no more Judgement, for with this mercy the Chapter ends.
Consider our text then, as a whole Globe, as an intire Spheare, and then our two Hemispheares of this Globe,Divisio: our two parts of this text, will bee, First, that no perversnesse of ours, no rebellion, no disobedience puts God beyond his mercy, nor extinguishes his love; still hee calls Israel, rebellious Israel his Children; nay his owne anger, his owne Judgements, then, when hee is in the exercise thereof, in the execution thereof, puts him not beyond his mercy, extinguishes not his love; hee hides not his face from them then, hee leaves them not then, in the darke, hee accompanies their calamity with a light, hee makes that time, though cloudy, though overcast, yet a day unto them; (the Children of Israel shall abide many days in this case.) But then, as no disobedience removes God from himself, (for he is love, and mercy) so no interest of ours in God, doth so priviledge us, but that hee will execute his Judgements upon his Children too, even the Children of Israel shall fall into these Calamities. And from this first part, wee shall passe to the second; from these generall considerations, (That no punishments should make us desperate, that no favours should make us secure) we shall passe to the particular commination, and judgements upon the children of Israel in this text, without King, without Prince &c.
In our first part,1 Part. we stop first, upon this declaration of his mercy, in this fatherly appellation,Filii. Children, (the children of Israel) He does not call them children of Israel, as though hee disavowed them, and put them off to another Father; but therefore, because they are the Children of Israel, they are his Children, for,Hose. 2. 9. hee had maried Israel; and maried her to himselfe for ever. Many of us are Fathers; and, from God, here may learne tendernesse towards children. All of us are children of some parents, and therefore should hearken after the name of Father,Tertull. which is nomen pietatis & potestatis, a name that argues their power over us, and our piety towards them; and so, concernes many of us, in a double capacity, (as we are children, and parents too) but all of us in one capacity, as we are children derived from other parents. God is the Father of man, otherwise then he is of other creatures. He is the Father of all Creatures; so Philo calls all Creatures sor… res suas, his sisters; but then, all those sisters of man, all those daughters of God are not alike maried. God hath placed his Creatures in divers rankes, and in divers conditions; neither must any man thinke, that he hath not done the duty of a Father, if he have not placed all his Sonnes, or not matched all his daughters, in a condition equall to himselfe, or not equall to one another. God hath placed creatures in the heavens, and creatures in the earth, and creatures in the sea, and yet, all these creatures are his children, and when he looked upon them all, in their divers stations, he saw, omnia valde bora, that all was very well; And that Father that imploies one Sonne in learning; another to husbandry, another to Merchandise, pursues Gods example, in disposing his children, (his creatures) diversly, and all well. Such creatures as the Raine, (though it may seem but an imperfect, and ignoble creature, fallen from the wombe of a cloud) have God for their Father;Iob 38. 28. (God is the Father of the Raine.) And such creatures as light, Iames 1. 17.have but God for their Father. God is Pater l…minum, the Father of lights. Whether we take lights there to be the Angels, created with the light, (some take it so) or to be the severall lights set up in the heavens, Sun, and Moon and Stars, (some take it so) or to be the light of Grace in infusion by the Spirit, or the light of the Church, in manifestation, by the word, (for, all these acceptations have convenient. Authors, and worthy to be followed) God is the Father of lights, of all lights; but so he is of raine,Eph. 1. 17. and clouds too. And God is the Father of glory; (as Saint Paul styles him) of all glory;2 Cor. 4. 17. whether of those beames of glory which he sheds upon us here, in the blessings, and preferments of this life, or that waight of glory which he reserves for us, in the life to come. From that inglorious drop of raine, that falls into the dust, and rises no more, to those glorious Saints who shall rise from the dust, and fall no more, but, as they arise at once to the fulnesse of Essentiall joy, so arise daily in accidentiall joyes, all are the children of God, and all alike of kin to us. And therefore let us not measure our avowing, or our countenancing of our kindred, by their measure of honour, or place, or riches in the world, but let us looke how fast they grow in the root, that is, in the same worship of the same God, who is ours, and their Father too. He is nearest of kin to me, that is of the same religion with me; as they are creatures, they are of kin to me by the Father, but, as they are of the same Church, and religion, by Father and mother too.
Philo calls all creatures his sisters, but all men are his brothers. God is the Father of man in a stronger and more peculiar, and more masculine sense, then of other Creatures. Filius particeps & con-dominus cum patre: as the law calls the Sonne, the partner of the Father, and fellow-Lord, joint-Lord with the Father, of all the possession that is to descend, so God hath made man his partner, and fellow-Lord of all his other creatures in Moses his Dominamini, when he gives man a power to rule over them, and in Davids Omnia subjecisti, Gen. 1. 28. Psal. 8. 7.when he imprints there, a naturall disposition in the creature to the obedience of man. So high, so very high a filiation, hath God given man, as that, having another Sonne, by another filiation, a higher filiation then this, by an eternall generation, yet he was content, that that Sonne should become this Sonne, that the Sonne of God should become the Sonne of Man.
God is the Father of all; Israel.of man otherwise then of all the rest; but then, of the children of Israel, Deut. 32. 6.otherwise then of all other men. For he bought them; and, is not be thy Father that hath bought thee? says God by Moses. Not to speake of that purchase, which he made by the death of his Sonne, (for that belongs to all the world) he bought the Jews in particular, at such a price, such silver, and such gold, such temporall, and such spirituall benefits, such a Land, and such a Church, such a Law, and such a Religion, as, certainly, he might have had all the world at that price. If God would have manifested himselfe, poured out himselfe to the Nations, as hee did to the Iews, all the world would have swarmed to his obedience, and herded in his pale. God was their father… Chrysoft.and, as S. Chrysost…me, (that he might be sure to draw in all degrees of tender affection) cals him, Their Mother too. For, Matris nutrire, Patris erudire; It was a Mothers part to give them suck, and to feed them with temporall blessings; It was a Fathers part to instruct them, and to feed them with spirituall things; and God did both abundantly. Therefore doth God submit himself to the comparison of a Mother in the Prophet Esay, Esay 49. 15.Can a woman forget her sucking child? But then, he stays not in that inferiour, in that infirmer sex, but returns to a stronger love, then that of a Mother, (yes, (says he) she may forget, yet will not I forget thee.) And therefore, when David says,Psal. 103. 1. Blesse the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits; David expresses that, which we translate in a generall word, Benefits, in this word, Gamal, which signifies Ablactationes; forget not that God nursed thee as a Mother, and then, Ablactavit, we and thee, and provided thee stronger food, out of the care of a father. In one word, all creatures are Gods children; man is his sonne; but then, Israel is his first-born son; for that is the addition,Exed. 4. 22. which God gives Israel by Moses to Pharaoh, (Say unto Pharaoh, Israel is my son, even my first-born.) Why God adopted Israel into this siliation, into this primogeniture, before all the people of the world, we can assign no reason, but his love only. But why he did not before this Text, dis-inherit this adopted son, is a higher degree, and exercise of his love, then the Adoption it self, if we consider, (which is a usefull consideration) their manifold provocations to such an exhaeredation, and what God suffered at their hands.
The ordinary causes of Exhaeredation,Exhaeredatio. for which, a man might dis-inherit his son, are assigned and numbred in the law, to be fourteen. But divers of them grow out of one root, (Vndutifulnesse, Inofficiousnesse towards the father) and as, by that reason, they may be extended to more, so they may be contracted to sewer, to two. These two, Ingratitude, and Irreligion. Vnthankfulnesse, and Idolatry were ever just causes of Exhaeredation, of Dis-inheriting. And with these two, did the Jews more provoke Almighty God, then any children, any father. Stop we a little our Consideration upon each of these.
He is not always ungratefull,Ingratitudo. that does not recompense a benefit, but he onelyonly that would not, though he could make, and though the Benefactor needed a recompense. When Furnius, upon whom Augustus had multiplied benefits, told him, that in one thing he had damnified him, in one thing he had undone him, Effecisti at viverem & mo…erer ingratus, You have done so much for me, (says he) that I must live, and die unthankfull, that is, without shewing my thankfulnesse by equivalent recompenses: This which he cals unthankfulnesse, was thankfulnesse enough. There are men, (says the Morall man) Qui quo plus debent, magis od…rant, Senec.that hate those men most, who have laid most obligations upon them. Leve as alienum debitorem facit, grave inimicum; for a little debt he will be content to look towards me, but when it is great, more then he can pay, or as much as he thinks he can get from me, then he would be glad to be rid of me. Acknowledgement is a good degree of thankfulnesse. But, ingratitude at the highest, (and the Iews ingratitude was at the highest) involves even a concealing, and a denying of benefits, and even a hating,Bern. and injuring of Benefactors. And so, Res peremptoria ingrati…udo, says Bernard significantly, Ingratitude is a peremptory sin; it does Perimere, that is, destroy, not onelyonly all vertues, but it destroys, that is, overflows all other particular Vices; no vice can get a name, where ingratitude is; it swallows all, devours all, becomes all; Ingratum dicas, omnia dixisti, If you have called a man unthankfull, you have called him by all the ill names that are: for this complicated, this manifold, this pregnant vice, Ingratitude, the holy language, the Hebrew, lacks a word. The nearest root that they can draw Ingratitude into, is Caphar, and Caphar is but Tegere, to hide, to conceal a benefit; but to deny a benefit, or to hate or injure a Benefactor, they have not a word. And therefore, as S. Hierome found not the word in the Hebrew, so in all Saint Hieromes translation of the Old Testament, (or in that which is reputed his, the vulgat Edition) you have not that Latine word, Ingratus; Curious sinners, subtile self-damners; they could not name Ingratitude, and in all the steps of Ingratitude, they exceeded all men, all Nations. From the Ingratitude of murmuring, upon which, God lays that woe,Isa. 55. 10. (Woe unto him that says to his father, What begettest thou? or to the woman, What hast thou brought forth? A dogge murmures not that he is not a Lion, nor a blinde-worm without eyes, that he is not a Basilisk to kill with his eyes; Dust murmures not that it is not Amber, nor a Dunghill that it is not a Mine, nor an Angel that he is not of the Seraphim; and every man would be something else then God hath made him,) from this murmuring for that which he hath not, to another degree of Ingratitude, The appropriation of that which he hath,Bern. to himself, Vti Datis tanquam Innatis, (as S. Bernard speaks in his musick) To attribute to our selves that which we have received from God, to think our selves as strong in Nature as in Grace, and as safe in our own free-will, as in the love of God; as God says of Ierusalem, Ezek. 16.(That he had given her her beauty, and then she plaid the harlot, as if it had been her own) by these steps of Ingratitude to the highest of all which is, rather then to confesse her self beholden to God, to change her God, and so to …lide from Ingratitude to Idolatry, Ierusalem came, and over-went all the Nations upon the earth.
Their Ingratitude induced Idolatry in an instant.Idololatria. Exod. 32. 1. As soon as they came to that ungratefull murmuring, (As for Moses we cannot tell what is become of him) they came presently to say to Aaron, (Vp and make us Gods that may goe before us) which is an impotency, a leprosie, that derives it self farre, spreads farre, that as soon as our sins induce any worldly crosse, any clamity upon us, we come to think of another Church, another Religion, and conclude, That that cannot be a good Church, in which we have lived in. Now, against this impious levity, of facility in changing our Religion, God seemes to expresse the greatest indignation,Deut. 32. 17. when he says, They sacrificed unto gods whom they knew not, to new gods. Men, amongst us, that have been baptized, and catechized in the truth, and in the knowledge thereof, fall into ignorant falshood, and embrace a Religion which they understand not, nor can understand, because it lies in the breast of one man, and is therefore subject to alterations. They sacrifice to gods whom they know not, (says God) and those gods new gods too; The more suspicious, for their newnesse; and, (as it is added there) unto gods whom their fathers feared not. Men, that fall from us, (whose fathers were of that Religion) put themselves into more bondage and slavery to the Court of Rome now, then their fathers did to the Church of Rome then; They sacrifice to gods, whom they know not, and whom their fathers feared not, so much as they doe. But, they have corrupted themselves; Ver. 5.(as God charges them farther) They are fallen from us, whom no example of their fathers led that way; fathers have left their former superstition, which they were born and bred in, and the sonnes, which were born, and bred in the truth, have embraced those superstitions; Their spot is not the spot of children, (so it follows in the same place) a weaknesse that might have that excuse, that they proceeded out of a reverentiall respect to their fathers, and followed their example; (for their fathers have stood, and they are fallen. (Their spot is not the spot of children.) And, because Kings are pictures of God, when they trun upon new gods, they turn to new pictures of God too, and with a forein Religion, invest a forein Allegiance. Did not I deliver you from the Egyptians, Iud. 10. 11.says God, and from the Ammonites. and from the Amorites, and Philistims? from a succession of enemies, at times, and from a league of enemies at once, Yet you have forsaken me, and served other gods, says God there; And therefore, (to that resolution God comes) Therefore, I will deliver you no more. And yet, how often did God deliver them after this? Ingratitude, Idolatry, are just causes of Exhaeredation; Israel abounded in both these, and yet, after all these, in this Text, he cals them Children, The Children of Israel, and therefore his children.
God is kinde even to the unthankfull,Dies. saith christ himself, and himself calls Jerusalem,Luc. 6. 35. The holy City, even when she was de…iled with many and manifold uncleannesses, because she had been holy,Mat. 4. 5. and had the outward help of holinesse remaining in her still. Christ doth not disavow, not disinherit those children which gave most just cause of exheredation; much lesse doth he justify, by his example, finall and totall disinheriting of children, occasioned by single and small faults in the children, and grounded in the Parents, upon sudden, and passionate, and intemperate, and imaginary vowes, They have vowed to doe it, therefore they will doe it; for, so they put a pretext of Religion upon their impiety, and make God accessary to that which he dislikes, and upon colour of a vow, doe that which is far from a service to God, as the performance of every lawfull, and discreet vow is. God calls them his Children, (which is one) and then, though as a Father he correct them, yet he shewes them his face, in that correction, (which is another beam of his mercy) He calls their calamity, their affliction, Not a night, but a day, (many dayes shall the children of Israel suffer this.)
We finde these two words often joyned together in the Scriptures, Dies visitationis, The day of visitation; though as it is a visitation, it be a sad, a dark contemplation, yet as it is a day, it hath alwayes a cheerfulnesse in it. If it were called a night, I might be afraid, that this night, They (I am not told who) would fetch away my soul; but,Luc. 12. 20. being a day, I have assurance, that the Sunne, the Sunne of Righteousnesse will arise to me. At the light of thine Arrowes, they went forward, saith the Prophet Habakkuk. Though they be Arrowes, 3. 11.yet they are Torches too, though they burn, yet they give light too; though God shoot his Arrowes at me, even by them, I shall have light enough to see that it is God that shoots. As there is a heavy commination in that of Amos, (I will cause the Sunne to goe down at noone, and I will darken the earth, in clear day) so is there a gracious promise,8. 9. and a constant practise in God, That he will (as he hath done) command light of darknesse, and inable thee to see a clear day, by his presence, in the darkest night of tribulation. For, truly, such a sense, (I think) belongs to those words in Hosea, That when God had said, The dayes of visitation are come, the dayes of recompence are come, 9. 12.God adds that, as an aggravating of the calamitie; yea, woe also to them, when I depart from them; as though the oppression of the affliction, the peremptorinesse of the affliction, were not in the affliction it self, hut in Gods departing from them, when he afflicted them; they should be visited, but see no day in their visitations, afflicted from God, but see no light from him, receive no consolation in him. In this place we take it, (for the exaltation of your devotion) as a particular beam of his mercy) That though the Children of Israel were afflicted many dayes, yet still he affords them the name of Children, and still their darke and cloudy dayes were accompanied with the light, and presence of God, still they felt the Hand of God under them, the Face of God upon them, the Heart of God towards them.
Those then,Non securi. which have this filiation, God doth not easily disinherit; because they were his Children, after unnaturall disobediencies, he avowes them, and continues that name to them. But yet, this must not imprint a security, a presumption; for, even the children here, are submitted to heavie and dangerous calamities; when Christ himselfe saith, The children of the kingdome shall be cast into utter darknesse, who can promise himselfe a perpetuall,Matt. 8. 12. or unconditioned station? we have in the Scriptures two especiall Types of the Church, Paradise, and the Arke. But, in that Type, the Arke, we are principally instructed, what the Church in generall shall doe, and in that in Paradise, what particular men in the Church should do. For, we doe not reade, that in the Arke Noah, or his company, did waigh any anchor, hoyst any saile, ship any oare, steare any rudder; but, the Arke, by the providence of God, who onelyonly was Pilot, rode safe upon the face of the waters. The Church it selfe, (figured by the Arke) cannot shipwrack; though men sleep, though the Devill wake,Matt. 16. 18. The gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church. But in the other Type of the Church, where every man is instructed in his particular duty therein, Paradise, Adam himself was commanded to dresse Paradise, and to keep Paradise. And when he did not that which he was injoyned to doe in that place,Gen. 2. 15. he forfeited his interest in it, and his benefit by it. Though we be born and bred in Gods house, as Children Baptized, and Catechized in the true Church, if we slacken our holy industry in making fare our salvation, we, though Children of the Kingdome, may becast out, and all our former helps, and our proceedings by the benefit of those helps, shall but aggravate our condemnation. Alpha and Omega make up the Name of Christ; and, between Alpha and Omega, are all the letters of the Alphabet included. A Christian is made up of Alpha and Omega, and all between. He must begin well, (imbrace the true Church) and live well according to the profession of that true Church, and die well, according to that former holy life, and practise. Truth in the beginning, Zeale all the way, and Constancie in the end make up a Christian. Otherwise for all this filiation, children may be disinherited, or submitted to such calamities as these which are interminated upon the children of Israel, which constitute our second part, They shall be without a King, and without a Prince, and without a Sacrifice, and without an Ephod, and without a Teraphim.
Disobedient children are not cast off;2 Part. but yet disobedience is not left uncorrected. Be mercifull, Non exhaeredantur, Corriguntur tamen. Exod. 23. 22.but mercifull so, as your Father in Heaven is mercifull; Be not so mercifull upon any private respect, as to be thereby cruell to the publique. And be Iust; but, just, as your Father in Heaven is just; Hate not the vice of a man so, as thereby to hate the man himself. God hath promised to be an enemy to our enemies, an adversary to our adversaries; but, God is no irreconciliable enemy, no implacable, no inexorable Adversary. For,Psalm. 139. 22. that hatred which David calls Odium perfectum, (I have hated them with a perfect hatred) is not onelyonly a vehement hatred, but (as Saint Hilary calls it) Odium religiosum, a hatred that may consist with religion: That I hate not another man, for his religion, so as that I lose all religion in my self, by such a hating of him. And Saint Augustine calls it Odium Charitativum, a hate that may consist with Charitie; that I hate no man for his peremptory uncharitablenesse towards my religion, so as to lose mine own Charity; for, I am come to one point of his religion, if I come to be as uncharitable as he. God and Kings are at a near distance, All gods; Magistrates, and inferiour persons are at a near distance, all dust. As God proceeds with a King, with Iehosaphat, 2 Chro. 19. 2.in that temper, that moderation, (Shouldst thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord?) So men with men, Magistrates with inferiour men, learned men with ignorant men, should proceed with Saint Pauls moderation,2 Thes. 3. 14. If any man obey not (but be refractary, unconformable) note that man (saith the Apostle) and have no company with him, but yet count him not as an enemy. The union of the two Natures in Christ, give us a faire example, that Divinity and Humanity may consist together. No Religion induces Inhumanity; no Piety, no Zeal destroyes nature; and since there is a time to hate, and a time to love, Eccles. 8. 3.then is love most seasonable, when other civill contracts, civill alliances, civill concurrences, have soupled and intenerated the dispositions of persons, or nations, formerly farther asunder, to a better possibility, to a fairer probability, to a nearer propinquity of hearkning to one another,Ephes. 2. 16: That Christ might reconcile both unto God, in one body, by the Crosse, having slain the enmity thereby. Civill Offices may worke upon religions too; and where that may follow, (That our mildnesse in civill things, may prevail upon their obduration in religion) there is the time to love. But in cases, where civill peace and religious foundations are both shaked, that the State and the Church, as they are both in one bottome, so they are chased by one Pirate, I hate not with a perfect hatred, not perfect towards God, except I declare, and urge, and presse home, the truth of God, against their errours in my Ministery, nor perfect towards man, except I advance, in my place, the execution of those Lawes against their practises, without which, they are inabled, nay incouraged, nay perswaded, nay intreated to goe forward in those practises. God himself proceeds against his own children so farre, (and dearer then those children were to God, can no friends be to us, no allies to any Prince) That they should be without King, without Prince, without Sacrifice, without Image, without Ephod, without Teraphim; that is, without Temporall, without Ecclesiasticall Government.
First, then, we presume, we presuppose, (and that necessarily) every peece of this part of our Text,Comminatio. to fall under the Commination; they were threatned with the losse of every particular, and therefore they were the worse for every particular losse. Not the worse onelyonly because they thought themselves the worse, because they had fixed their love and their delight upon these things, but because they were really the better for having them, it was really a curse, a Commination, that they should lose them; as well that they should lose their Ephod, and their Image, and their Teraphim, as that they should lose their Sacrifices. But first,(though that other fall also within the Commination, that they should be without a setled form of Religion, without Sacrifice, and Ephod, and the rest) the first thing that the Commination falls upon, is, That they should be without a Civill form of government, without King, and without Prince. For, though our Religion prepare us to our Bene esse, our well-being, our everlasting happinesse, yet it is the State, the civill and peaceable government, which preserves our very Esse, our very Being; and there cannot be a Bene esse, without an Esse, a well and a happy Being, except there be first a Being established. It is the State, the Law, that constitutes Families and Cities, and Propriety, and Magistracy, and Jurisdiction. The State, the Law preserves and disting…shes, not onelyonly the Meum & Tuum, the Possessions of men, but the Me & Te, the very persons of men; The Law tels me, not onelyonly whose land I must call every Acre, but whose son I must call every man. Therefore God made the Body before the Soule; Therefore there is in man a vegetative, and a sensitive soule, before an immortall, and reasonable soule enter. Therefore also, in this place, God proposes first the Civil State, the temporall Government, (what it is, to have a King and a Prince) before he proposes the happinesse of a Church, and a Religion; not but that our Religion conduces to the greater happinesse, but that our Religion cannot be conserved, except the Civil State, and temporall Government be conserved too.
The first thing then that the Commination fals upon,Sine Rege. is the losse of their Temporall State. But the Commination doth not fall so fully upon the exclusion of all formes of Government, as upon the exclusion of Monarchy; It does not so expresly threaten an An…chy, that they should have no Government, no Governours; It is not sine Regimine, but sine Rege, If they had any, they should not have the best, They should be without a King. Now, if with S. Hierome, and others that accompany him in that interpretation,Hi…rome. we take the Prophecy of this Text, to be fulfilled in that Dispersion which hath continued upon the Jews, ever since the destruction of Ierusalem, the Jews have been so far from having had any King, as that they have not had a Constable of their owne, in any part of the world; no interest at all, in any part of the Magistracy and Jurisdiction of the world,Gen. 4. 12. any where, but they are a whole Nation of Cains, fugitives, and vagabonds. But howsoever it be, the heat, and the vehemency of this Commination fals upon this particular, sine Rege, they shall be without a King. It was long before God afforded the Jews a King; and he did not easily doe it, then when he did it. Not, that he intended not that form of Government for them, but because they would extort it from him, before his time, and because they asked it onelyonly in that respect, That they might be like their neighbours, to whom God would not have had them too like: And also, because God, to keep their thankfulnesse still awake, would reserve, and keep back some better thing, then he had given them yet, to give them at last. For, so he says, (as the Coronation of all his benefits to Israel, of which there is a glorious Inventary in that Chapter) Thou didst prosper into a Kingdome; Till the Crown of glory be presented,Ezek. 16. 13. in the comming of the Messias, thou canst not be happier. Those therefore that allow but a conditionall Soveraignty in a Kingdome, an arbitrary, a temporary Soveraignty, that may be transferred at the pleasure of another, they oppose the Nolumus hoc, we would not have, we would not live under this form of Government, not under a temporall Monarchy, Nolumus hoc. Those that determine Allegiance, and civil obedience onelyonly by their own religion, and think themselves bound to obey none, that is of another perswasion, they oppose the Nolumus hunc, We will not have this man to reign over us; and so, make their relations, and fix their dependencies upon forein hopes, Nolumus hunc. Those that fix a super-Soveraignty in the people, or in a Presbytery, they oppose the Nolumus sic, we would not have things carried thus; They pretend to know the happinesse of living under that form, A Kingdome, and to acknowledge the person of the King, but they would be governed every man according to his own minde. And all these, the Nolumus hoc, (they that desire not the continuance of that form, of a Kingdome in an Independency, but would have a dependency upon a forein power;) And the Nolumus hunc, (they that are disaffected to the person of him that governs for the present;) And the Nolumus sic, (they that will prescribe to the King, ends, and ways to those ends:) all these assist this malediction, this commination, which God interminates here, as the greatest calamity, sine Rege, They shall be without a King; for this is to Canton out a Monarchy, to Ravell out a Kingdome, to Crumble out a King.
There is another branch in this Part, which is of Temporall calamities,Sine Principe. That they shall be sine Principe, Without a King, and without a Prince. The word in the originall is Sar; and take it, as it sounds most literally in our Translation, The Prince is the Kings Son; so, this very word is used in Esay; Sar Salem; The Son of God, Isa. 9. 9.is called the Prince of Peace. And so, the commination upon the Jews is thus farre aggravated, That they shall be without a Prince, that is, without a certain heire; and Successor; which uncertainty, (more then any thing else) slackens the industry of all men at home, and sharpens the malice of all men abroad; fears at home, and hopes abroad, discompose and disorder all, where they are sine Principe, without a certain heire. But the word enlarges it selfe farther; for, Sar signifies a Iudge; when Moses rebuked a Malefactor, he replies to Moses, Who made thee a Iudge? Exod. 2. 13.And in many, very many places, Sar signifies a Commander in the Warres. So that where the Iustice of the State, or the Military power of the State faile, (and they faile, where the men who doe, or should execute those places, will not, or dare not doe, what appertains to their places) there this Commination fals, They are without a Prince, that is, without future assurance, without present power, or Justice.
But we passe to the spirituall Commination;Damna spiritualia. that is, They shall be without Sacrifice, without Ephod, without Image, without Teraphim. It is not that their understanding shall be taken away, no, nor that the tendernesse of their conscience, or their zeale shall be taken away; It is not that they shall come to any impiety, or ill opinion of God; They may have religious, and well-disposed hearts, and yet be under a curse, if they have not a Church, an outward Discipline established amongst them. It is not enough for a man to beleeve aright, but he must apply himself to some Church, to some outward form of worshipping God; It is not enough for a Church, to hold no error in doctrine, but it must have outward assistances for the devotion of her children, and outward decency for the glory of her God. Both these kindes are intended in the particulars of this Text, Sacrifice and Ephod, Image and Teraphim.
First,Sine Sacrificio. it is a part of the curse, to be without Sacrifice. Now, if according to S. Hieromes interpretation, this Text be a Prophecy upon the Jews, after Christs time, and that the Malediction consist in this, That they shall not embrace the Christian Religion, nor the Christian Church entertain them; if the Prophet drive to this, They shall bee without Sacrifices, because they shall not be of the Christian Church, certainly the Christian Church is not to be without Sacrifice. It is a miserable impotency, to be afraid of words; That from a former holy and just detestation of reall errors, we should come to an uncharitable detestation of persons, and to a contentious detestation of words. We dare not name Merit, nor Penance, nor Sacrifice, nor Altar, because they have been abused. How should we be disappointed, and disfurnished of many words in our ordinary conversation, if we should be bound from all words, which blasphemous men have prophaned, or uncleane men have defiled with their ill use of those words? There is Merit, there is Penance, there is Sacrifice, there are Altars, in that sense, in which those blessed men, who used those words first, at first used them. The Communion Table is an Altar; and in the Sacrament there is a Sacrifice. Not onelyonly a Sacrifice of Thanksgiving, common to all the Congregation, but a Sacrifice peculiar to the Priest, though for the People. There he offers up to God the Father, (that is, to the remembrance, to the contemplation of God the Father) the whole body of the merits of Christ Iesus, and begges of him, that in contemplation of that Sacrifice so offered, of that Body of his merits, he would vouchsafe to return, and to apply those merits to that Congregation. A Sacrifice, as farre from their blasphemous over-boldnesse, who constitute a propitiatory Sacrifice, in the Church of Rome, as from their over-tendernesse, who startle at the name of Sacrifice. We doe not, (as at Rome) first invest the power of God, and make our selves able to make a Christ, and then invest the malice of the Jews, and kill that Christ, whom we have made; for, Sacrifice, Immolation, (taken so properly, and literally as they take it) is a killing; But the whole body of Christs actions and passions; we sacrifice, wee represent, wee offer to God. Calvin alone, hath said enough, Non possumus, except we be assisted with outward things, wee cannot fixe our selves upon God. Therefore is it part of the malediction here, that they shall be sine Sacrificio, without Sacrifice; so is it also in inferiour helps, sine Ephod, they shall be without an Ephod.
The Ephod amongst the Jews,Sine Ephod. was a garment, which did not onelyonly distinguish times, (for it was worne onelyonly in time of divine Service) but, even in time of divine Service, it distinguished persons too. For,Exod. 26. 6. we have a Pontificall Ephod, peculiar onelyonly to the high Priest; And we have a Leviticall Ephod, 1 Sam. 2. 18.belonging to all the Levites; (Samuel ministred before the Lord, being a child, girded with a linnen Ephod.) And wee have a common Ephod, which, any man, that assisted in the service of God might weare; That linnen Ephod, 2 Sam. 6. 14.which David put on, in that Procession, when he daunced before the Ark. But all these Ephods were bound under certain Laws, to be worn by such men, and at such times. Christs garment was not divided; nay, the Soldiers were not divided about it, but agreed in one way; And shall wee, (the Body of Christ) bee divided about the garment, that is, vary in the garment, by denying a conformity to that Decency which is prescribed? When Christ devested, or supprest the Majesty of his outward appearance,Iob. 20. 1…. at his Resurrection, Mary Magdalen took him but for a Gardiner. Ecclesiasticall persons in secular habits, lose their respect. Though the very habit bee but a Ceremony, yet the distinction of habits is rooted in nature, and in morality; And when the particular habit is enjoyned by lawfull Authority, obedience is rooted in nature, and in morality too. In a Watch, the string moves nothing, but yet, it conserves the regularity of the motion of all. Rituall, and Ceremoniall things move not God, but they exalt that Devotion, and they conserve that Order, which does move him. Therefore is it also made a part of the Commination, that they shall be sine Ephod, without these outward Rituall, and Ceremoniall solemnities of a Church; first, without Sacrifices, which are more substantiall and essentiall parts of Religion, (as wee consider Religion to be the outward worship of God, and then, without Ephod, without those other assistances, which, though they be not of Gods Revenue, yet they are of his Subsidies, and though they be not the soule, yet are the breath of Religion. And so also is it of things of a more inferiour nature then Sacrifice or Ephod, that is of Image and Teraphim, which is our next, and last Consideration.
Both these words,Image, Teraphim. (that which is translated, and called Image, and that which is not translated, but kept in the originall word, Teraphim) have sometimes a good, sometimes a bad sense in the Scriptures. In the First, Image, there is no difficulty; good and bad significations of that word, are obvious every where. And for the other,Gen. 31. 19. though when Rachel stole her fathers Teraphim, (Images) though when the King of Babylon consulted with Teraphim, (Images) Ezek. 21. 21.the word Teraphim have an ill sense, yet,1 Sam. 19. 13. when Michal, Davids wife, put an Image into his bed, to elude the fury of Saul, there the word hath no ill sense. Accept the words in an Idolatrous sense, yet, because they fall under the commination, and that God threatens it, as a part of their calamity, that they should bee without their Idols, it hath beene, not inconveniently, argued from this place, that even a Religion mixt with some Idolatry, and superstition, is better then none, as in Civill Government a Tyranny is better then an Anarchy. And therefore we must not bring the same indisposition, the same disaffection towards a person mis-led, and soured with some leaven of Idolatry, as towards a person possest with Atheisme. And yet, how ordinarily wee see, zealous men start, and affected, and troubled at the presence of a Papist, and never moved, never forbeare the society and conversation of an Atheist: Which is an argument too evident, that wee consider our selves more then God, and that peace which the Papist endangers, more then the Atheist, (which is, the peace of the State, and a quiet enjoying our ease) above the glory of God, which the Atheist wounds, and violates more then the Papist; The Papist withdraws some of the glory of God, in ascribing it to the Saints, to themselves, and their own merits, but the Atheist leaves no God to be glorified. And this use we have of these words, Images, and Teraphim, if they should have an ill sense in this place, and signifie Idols.
But Saint Hierome, and others with him, take these words, in a good sense; to bee the Cherubim, and Palmes, and such other representations, as God himselfe had ordained in their Temple; and that the Commination falls upon this, That in some cases, it may bee some want, to bee without some Pictures in the Church. So farre as they may conduce to a reverend adoring of the place, so farre as they may conduce to a familiar instructing of unlettered people, it may be a losse to lack them. For, so much Calvin, out of his religious wisdome,Institut. 1. 11. 7. is content to acknowledge, Fateor, ut res se habet hodiè, &c. I confesse, as the case stands now, (says hee) (speaking of the beginning of the Reformation) there are many that could not bee without those Bookes, (as hee calls those Pictures) because then they had no other way of Instruction; but, that that might bee supplied, if those things which were delivered in picture, to their eyes, were delivered in Sermons to their eares. And this is true, that where there is a frequent preaching, there is no necessity of pictures; but will not every man adde this, That if the true use of Pictures bee preached unto them, there is no danger of an abuse; and so, as Remembrancers of that which hath been taught in the Pulpit, they may be retained; And that was one office of the Holy Ghost himselfe, That he should bring to their remembrance those things, which had been formerly taught them. And since, by being taught the right use of these pictures, in our preaching, no man amongst us, is any more enclined, or endangered to worship a picture in a Wall or Window of the Church, then if he saw it in a Gallery, were it onelyonly for a reverent adorning of the place, they may bee retained here, as they are in the greatest part of the Reformed Church,1… Eliz. 1559. and in all that, that is properly Protestant. And though the Injunctions of our Church, declare the sense of those times, concerning Images, yet they are wisely and godly conceived; for the second is, That they shall not extoll Images, (which is not, that they shall not set them up) but, (as it followeth) They shall declare the abuse thereof. And when in the 23 Injunction, it is said, That they shall utterly extinct, and destroy, (amongst other things) pictures, yet it is limited to such things, and such pictures, as are monuments of feigned miracles; and that Injuction reaches as well to pictures in private houses, as in Churches, and forbids nothing in the Church, that might be retained in the house. For those pernicious Errors, which the Romane Church hath multiplied in this point, not onelyonly to make Images of men, which never were, but to make those Images of men, very men, to make their Images speak, and move, and weep, and bleed; to make Images of God who was never seen, and to make those Images of God, very gods; to make their Images doe daily miracles; to transferre the honour due to God, to the Image, and then to encumber themselves with such ridiculous riddles, and scornfull distinctions, as they doe, for justifying unjustifiable, unexcusable, uncolourable enormities, Va Idololatris, woe to such advancers of Images, as would throw down Christ, rather then his Image: But Vae Iconeclastis too, woe to such peremptory abhorrers of Pictures, and to such uncharitable condemners of all those who admit any use of them, as had rather throw down a Church, then let a Picture stand. Laying hold upon S. Hieromes exposition, that fals within the Vae, the Commination of this Text, to be without those Sacrifices, those Ephods, those Images, as they are outward helps of devotion. And, laying hold, not upon S. Hierome, but upon Christ himselfe, who is the God of love, and peace, and unity, yet fals under a heavy, and insupportable Vae, to violate the peace of the Church, for things which concern it not fundamentally. Problematicall things are our silver, but fundamentall, our gold; problematicall out sweat, but fundamentall our blood. If our Adversaries would be bought in, with our silver, with our sweat, we should not be difficult in meeting them halfe way, in things, in their nature, indifferent. But if we must pay our Gold, our Blood, our fundamentall points of Religion, for their friendship, A Fortune, a Liberty, a Wife, a Childe, a Father, a Friend, a Master, a Neighbour, a Benefactor, a Kingdome, a Church, a World, is not worth a dramme of this Gold, a drop of this Blood. Neither will that man, who is truly rooted in this foundation, redeeme an Empoverishing, an Emprisoning, a Dis-inheriting, a Confining, an Excommunicating, a Deposing, with a dramme of this Gold, with a drop of this Blood, the fundamentall Articles of our Religion. Blessed be that God, who, as he is without change or colour of change, hath kept us without change, or colour of change, in all our foundations; And he in his time bring our Adversaries to such a moderation as becomes them, who doe truly desire, that the Church may bee truly Catholique, one stock, in one fold, under one Shepherd, though not all of one colour, of one practise in all outward and disciplinarian points. Amen.