Works, Book 1 · Discourse 42
DISCOURSE XLII.
GENESIS 3. 15.
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
THE third and last particular remains to be treated of; I will put enmity between thee and the woman, &c. This no doubt intendeth in some things more directly the spiritual Serpent than the brute; yet for the general it may and ought, as well as the rest, to be expounded of the brute Serpent, as a Glass wherein to behold the malice and destiny of the other, the Devil. It containeth two parts; The Enmity, and the Event and Managing thereof. For the Enmity, how it is verified concerning the brute Serpent experience telleth. It is some part of the happiness of the creature to be the Favourite of Man who is the Lord thereof; what honour could betide it greater than this? But between the Serpent and Man is the most deadly enmity, and the strongest antipathy that is amongst the Beasts of the field; such an one as discovereth it self both in the natural and sensitive faculties of them both. For the first, Their humours are poison each to other: the gall of a Serpent is Man's deadly poison; and so is the spittle of a Man affirmed to poison the Serpent. For the sensitive antipathy, it appears in that the one doth so much abhor the sight of presence of the other. Man's nature is at nothing so much astonished as at the sight of a Serpent; and like enough the Serpent is in like manner affected at the sight of Man; and that more especially, as the Naturalists affirm, of a naked man than otherwise. As though his instinct even remembred the time of his malediction, when he and naked man stood before God to receive this sentence of everlasting enmity.
And whereas the words of the Text do in special point out the Woman in this sentence of enmity; the Naturalists do observe, that is greater and more vehement with that sex than with the male of mankind: Insomuch that Rupertus affirmeth, That if but the naked foot of a Woman doth never so little press the head of a Serpent before he can sting her, both the head and body presently dieth; which no cudgel or other weapon will cause, but that some life and motion will still remain behind. Hoc (saith he) ita esse, ipsorum qui per industriam exploraverunt fidâ relatione comperimus. Lib. 3. de Trin. c. 20. You know my Author, who affirms that he had this from the faithful report of such as had purposely bestow'd their pains to find out the truth thereof.
The remaining words of my Text do express the Managing and Event of this enmity, which is far more dangerous and unlucky on the Serpent's part than on Man's: for Man is able to reach the Serpent's head, where his life chiefly resideth, and where a blow is deadly; but as for the Serpent, he shall not be able to prevail against Man otherwise than privily and unawares,Gen. 3. 15. and that but in the lowest part, namely, when he shall pass him unseen, to sting him by the heel. And that this is the nature of a Serpent it appeareth in the words of Dan's blessing, Gen. 49. 17. Dan shall be a Serpent by the way, an Adder in the path; that biteth the horse-heels, so that his rider shall fall backward. And to make an end of this discourse also, it is a thing to be observed in the nature of a Serpent, that assoon as he perceiveth man ready to throw or strike at him, he will presently roul his body for a buckler to save his head; even as though he had some impression of that doctrine which God here read him in my Text, Ipse conteret tibi caput, He shall bruise thy Head; Beware thy head.
AND thus hitherto I have considered these words as they are the curse of the brute Serpent: Now I am to go over with them again, to shew how they are propounded unto us by God as a Glass wherein to behold the Devil's malediction; the Serpent being made now the discovery of his vileness, which once he abused for a mask to hide it from the woman. As therefore the Serpent is the most accursed of all the cattel and beasts of the field; so is the Devil the most accursed Spirit amongst all orders and degrees of Spirits: namely, of the highest of Angels become the abjectest of Spirits; more base and accursed than the most cursed damned Soul; having little or nothing left him of that good which was sutable to a spiritual condition: and this is the state of the Devil for the general, answerable to that of the Serpent.
Now for the particulars. The first is, VponUpon thy breast shalt thou go. How doth this befit the Devil? The Devil hath no bodily breast to go upon: But as I shewed in the Serpent, that this groveling signified the abasement of his whole nature from its primitive excellency; so in the Devil it signifies his stooping down and falling from his most sublime and glorious condition. A wonderful stoop this was, when that which had been advanced as high as heaven, was made to fall down as low, yea lower than the earth it self. This is the Devil's going upon his breast, this the groveling of that once so highly reared posture: according to that description of Iude ver. 6. who calls them the Angels that kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation; agreeable to that of S. Peter 2 Ep. 2. 4. God spared not the Angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell.
The second particular is, The dust of the earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. The food wherewith Spirits are fed is analogical, spiritual and not corporal; we must therefore here seek out that which in them hath the fittest resemblance with corporal food. The life of Angels consists in the continual contemplation of the excellent Greatness, wonderful Goodness, and glorious Beauty of the Essence of God, both as it is in it self, and as it is communicated unto his creatures. This is that which our Saviour intimates, Matth. 18. 10. Their Angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. The food of Angels, whereby this their Intellectual life and vegetation is strengthened and continued, is that unspeakable joy and delight which accompanies their contemplation of God, and which they find in the beholding of whatsoever else hath any conformity and sutableness with him, his Power, his Wisdom, his Glory, his Goodness: according to that in the Gospel, There is joy in heaven, and in the presence of the Angels of God, for one sinner that repenteth. Luke 15. 7… 10.This is that Manna which feeds the blessed Angels, and which makes them unweariable and unsatiable in their contemplation and imitation of God, as corporal food enableth the body for the continuance of corporal actions and works.
And such as this had been the Devil's fare, had he not fallen from his first estate by sin: whereas now in stead of that Manna, he is fain with the Serpent to feed on a food as course and as base as the dust of the earth. For as of a glorious Angel he is fallen to be a damned Spirit; so is his diet answerable to continue him in that damnable estate; namely, a food clean contrary to that of the blessed Angels, and a very earth to their heaven; a most execrable joy and a malicious delight in whatsoever is opposite to the Power, the Wisdom, the Goodness, the Glory of God his Creator: this is that he hungreth and hunteth after, and nothing but this. If there were no sin, no confusion, no misery of creatures in the world, the Devil would be soo… starved; for this is that he preys after, this is that carrion he seeks for, when he goeth about (as S. Peter saith) like a roaring Lion seeking whom he may devour. 1 Pet. 5. 8.I have read of a people of America that will eat no flesh before it be stinking rotten, and then it seems to them most tender and delicate: These are of a diet like unto the Devil, for nothing but garbage and carrion are his dainties; the more rotten with sin, the more pleasing to his palate; that which stinks most in God's nostrils, that smells the sweetest in his. Thus much of the second part of this Curse.
The last part remains, I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed, &c. In which we will first consider The parties who are to be at this deadly seud: Secondly, The event and success they have one against the other.
For the first, The parties are on one side said to be the Serpent and his seed; on the other side, The woman and her seed. By the Serpent we are to understand Satan the Prince of darkness and Father of Devils. The Serpent's seed in the first place are the whole crue of Devils and damned spirits, who are fallen from their first estate and condition. These are the Serpent's first-born, begotten by him not by corporal generation, nor as they are Spirits, but by spiritual deformation, as they are Devils. For it is the opinion of Divines, That Satan fell first himself, and afterward propagated his Apostasie by drawing others after him, over whom therefore he worthily deserveth to have the principality and chiefdom; in which respect also, were there no other, yet he might be called their Father, and they his sons or seed, as we know the use of the Scripture is to call Princes Fathers, and Subjects Sons. The latter offspring of the Devil, being a second brood, are the whole company of wicked and reprobate worldlings: for that such as these are the spawn of that foul Fiend, it appears clearly by the words of our Saviour to the Pharisees, Ioh. 8. 44. Ye are of your Father the Devil, and the lusts of your Father ye will do. And again, 1 Iohn 3. 10. The children of God are opposed to the children of the Devil. Therefore Christ calls Iudas a Devil, Iohn 6. 70. And Paul Acts 13. 10. calls Elymas the Sorcerer a child of the Devil. The case is plain: And as the Vanguard consisted of the first crue, so these latter are the Rere of Satan's Army.
Now on the other side, against this Army of Hell-hounds stand The Woman and the Woman's seed. The Woman though only named, excludes not the Man, who was to be at enmity with the Devil as well as the Woman: But the reason of this unusual Trope, which call… the Kind by the name of the weaker and inferior Sex, is because o… the words following [of the seed] wherein is contained the great Mystery of Christ's Incarnation, under whose colours and in whose power alone this Army is both to march and overcome. For this great Captain was to be, as you know, the seed of the Woman only, … 7. 14.and not of the Man; A Virgin should conceive a Son, whose name is called Emmanuel. Whence it comes to pass, that some by seed will have no other seed to be understood but the person of Christ only: both because he is alone that seed of the woman, which is not the seed of man; and because S. Paul, Gal. 3. 16. on those words (v. 8.) In thy seed shall all the Nations of the earth be blessed, expoundeth seed singularly and individually of Christ himself alone. But if it be well observed, the case here is not the like; for the seed of the Woman is opposed to the seed of the Serpent, which seed cannot chuse but be taken collectively for Satan and all his regiments of Devils and Hell-hounds. And why should not also the seed of the Woman be understood of Christ mystical, that is, of Christ the Head with all his members, who are incorporate into him by Faith into one mystical body? For although they are naturally the seed of Man as well as of the Woman, yet spiritually by this incorporation they are the seed of the Woman only, as is their Head with whom they are one. And this it is which makes them of the party against the Serpent; for till they once became the seed of the woman only, there was no enmity betwixt them.
The seed therefore of the Woman I expound to be Christ and his Members: He foreign, the seed of the woman by nature; they foreign, by their spiritual engrafment into him. Hence appears the difference of these two Armies. First, In Satan's Army all march under their Father who begot them; but Christ's Army sighteth under the Colours of their elder brother, the first-begotten seed of the woman. Secondly, In their ranging, Christ and his Army are as one body informed by one Spirit; the Devil's is far more disunited. Thirdly, In their fighting: for in Satan's Army every Souldier useth his own strength, and fights with his own weapons; but in Christ's Army the whole strength lies in Christ their General: all our armour is on his back, and our weapons guided by the power of his hand. So we may learn out of S. Paul, Ephes. 6. 11, 12. Put on (saith he) the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil. For we wrastle not against flesh and bloud, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Thus then having seen the marshalling of these two Armies which are at so deadly an enmity, let us at last see The success of their skirmishes and of the stratagems which they practise one against the other. These are described on the Devil's part very terrible, that his head should be mauled; but on Christ's side the loss should be very small, the Devil prevailing but to the wounding or bruising of his heel.
But what is this Head of the Serpent? and what the Heel of the Woman's seed? Those who understand The seed of the woman singularly, of the person of Christ only, make his Head to be the Godhead, against which the Serpent could prevail nothing; but his heel to be the Manhood, which the Serpent so bruised at his Passion, that the grave became his bed for three days together. This indeed is true, and no marvel, for the Head is as it were the whole Bodie's Epitome. But we who have expounded The seed of the woman collectively, of Christ and his Members, must also in this mystical Body find a mystical Head and a mystical Heel; and so in like manner for the Serpent and his seed.
The Head therefore, or, if you had rather, Headship, is nothing else but Soveraignty: The Serpent's head is the Devil's Soveraignty, which is called Principatus mortis, the Soveraignty of death, namely, both objectivè and effectivè; that is, such a Soveraignty as under which are only such as are liable to Death both temporal and eternal; and such a Soveraignty whose power consists not in saving and giving of life, but in destroying, and bringing unto Death both of body and soul. Under the name also of Death understand, as the Scripture doth, all other miseries of mankind, which are the companions of this double Death I speak of. This is that damnable Head of the Serpent, the Devillish Soveraignty of Satan. Now the Sword whereby this Soveraignty was obtained, the Sceptre whereby it is maintained, or, as S. Paul speaks,1 Cor. 15. 56. the Sting of this Serpent's head, is Sin: This is that which got him this Kingdom at the first, and this is still the right whereby he holds the greatest part thereof. Imperium iisdem artibus conserva…ur quibus acquiritur, By the same arts and methods is an Empire conserved by the which it was at first obtained.
This Soveraignty of the Devil, which once overwhelmed …igh all the world, the Woman's seed should break in pieces and destroy; which (according to this Prophecy) we see already performed in a great measure, and the grounds laid long ago for the destruction of all that remaineth. As saith S. Iohn Ep. 1. c. 3. v. 8. The Son of God was manifested for this purpose, that he might destroy the works of the Devil. And Christ himself said,Iohn 12. 31. that the time was come that the Prince of this world should be cast out; and bade his Disciples be of good chear, for he had overcome the world. Chap. 16. 33.If you would see what a wonderful victory he hath long ago gotten of the Serpent, when after a terrible battel he overcame and destroyed the Soveraignty of the Serpent in the Roman Empire, see it described in the 12. of the Revelation, v. 7, 8. where Michael (that is, Christ) and his Angels fought against the great Dragon and his Angels, till the Dragon with all his Army was discomfited, and their place found no more in heaven, that is, he utterly lost his Soveraignty in that state; whence there was a voice in heaven, v. 10. Now is come salvation, strength, and the Kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ. And what he will at the length do with the remainder yet of the Devil's Soveraignty, you may find in the 19. and 20. chapters of the Revelation: For he must reign, as S. Paul saith, until he hath put all his enemies under his feet, until he hath destroyed all power, rule, and authority adverse unto him: And then last of all destroying Death by giving immortality to our raised bodies, shall surrender up his Kingdom unto his Father, as it is 1 Cor. 15. 25, &c.
But Satan, saith my Text, shall prevail something against him, for the Serpent shall bruise his heel. What is this Heel? Those who understood the seed of the woman singularly, as I told you, made it Christ's Manhood: But now we expound the seed Christ's Mystical Body, what shall we make the Heel thereof? I could say that by it were only meant a light wound, or the Devil's assaulting the Body of Christ ex insidiis, at unawares; for that is his fashion since the great overthrow which our Michael gave him, to work his feats underhand, and to undermine our Lord in his members. But this, though true, is not full enough. It may seem therefore the fittest to make hypocritical Christians, who profess Christ outwardly, but inwardly are not his, to make these the heel of his Mystical Body: for against such the Devil we know prevaileth somewhat, and by them annoyeth the rest of the Body with his venome, though he be far enough yet from impeaching our Lord's Headship and Soveraignty. But will you give me leave to utter another conceit? If the Blessed souls in heaven be the upper part of Christ's mystical Body, the Saints on earth the lower part of the same; may not the Bodies of the Saints deceased which lye in the earth be accounted for the heel? For I cannot believe but they have relation to this mystical Body, though their Souls be severed from them, and yet must that relation be as of the lowest and most postick members of all. If you will admit this, then it will appear presently what was this hurt upon the heel, when Christ had once mauled the Devil's head; for the Text seems to intimate that the Devil should give this wound after his head was broken.
I will hold you in suspence no longer. Read the 13. of the Revelation, and see what follows upon Michael's Victory over the Dragon, what the Devil did when he was down: He forms a new Instrument of the wounded Roman Empire, by whose means, under a pretence of the Honour given to the precious Reliques of the Saints and Martyrs, he conveyed the poyson of Saint-worship and Saint-invocation into the Kingdom of Christ; with which wound of the heel, the Devil coming on the blind side, the true Church had been long annoyed, and limpeth still.