Fourteen Sermons, Sermon 3
THE THIRD SERMON AD POPVLVM. At Grantham Linc. Iun. 19. 1621 .
3 Kings 21.29.
— I will not bring the evil in his dayes: but in his sons dayes will I bring the evil upon his house.
§. 1.I Come now this third time to entreat of this Scripture, and (by Gods help) to finish it. Of the three parts whereof, heretofore propounded, viz. 1. Ahabs Humiliation; 2. The suspension of his judgement for his time; 3. And the Devolution of it upon Iehoram: the two former having been already handled; the last only now remaineth to be considered of. In the prosecution whereof; as heretofore we have cleared GOD'S Holiness, and Truth: so we shall be now occasioned to clear his Iustice, from such imputions, as might seem to lie upon it from this Act. And that in three respects; accordingly as Iehoram, who standeth here punishable for Ahabs sin, may be considered in a threefold reference to Ahab: that is to say, either relatè, as the son of Ahab; or disparatè, as another man from Ahab; or comparatè, as a man (a)4 King. 3.2.not altogether so bad as Ahab. Now what (b)Quisquam est hominum, qui fuisse illum [Jovem] Deum credat, tam injustum, tam impium, nec mortalium saltem constituta servantem; apud quos nesas haberetur magnum, alterum pro altero pl…cti, & aliena delicta aliorum cervicibus vindicari? Arnob. contr. Gen…. lib. 7.Justice first to punish the son for the father? or indeed secondly, any one man for another? but most of all thirdly, the lesse offender for the greater?
It is not a matter of so much difficulty,§. 2. as at the first appearance it seemeth, to clear these doubts; if all things thereto appertaining be duly and distinctly considered. The greatest trouble will be, (the things being of more variety than hardnesse,) to sort them in such manner, as that we may therein proceed orderly and without confusion. Evermore, we know, Certainties must rule Uncertainties; and clear truths, doubtfull: it will be therefore expedient for us, for the better guiding of our judgements, first to lay down some Certainties; and then afterwards by them to measure out fit resolutions to the doubts; and then lastly from the premises to raise some few instructions for our use.
The first Certainty then, and a main one, is this.§. 3. Howsoever things appear to us, yet God neither is, nor can be unjust; as not in any other thing, so neither in his punishments. (c)Rom. 3.5, 6.Is God unrighteous, that taketh vengeance? God forbid: for then how shall God judge the world? (d)Gen. 18.25.shall not the Iudge of all the earth doe right? Indeed the reasons of his Iustice oftentimes may be, oftentimes are unknown to us: but they never are, they never can be unrighteous in him. If in a deep point of Law, a learned discreet Iudge should upon sufficient grounds give sentence, flat contrary to what an ordinary by-stander would think reason, (as many times it falleth out;) it is not for the grieved party to complain of injustice done him: he should rather impute what is done, to want of skill in himself, than of Conscience in the Judge. Right so, if in many things Gods proceedings hold not proportion with those characters of Justice and Equity, which our weak and carnal reason would expresse; we must thence inferr our own ignorance, not his injustice. And that so much the rather; because those matters of Law are such as fall within the comprehension of ordinary reason; whereas the wayes of God, are farr removed out of our sight, and advanced above our reach: and besides, an earthly Iudge is subject to misprision, mis-information, partiality, corruption, and sundry infirmities that may vitiate his proceedings; whereas no such thing can possibly fall upon the divine Nature. David hath taught us in the Psalm, that (e)Psal. 36.6.The righteousness of God is as the great mountains, and his judgements as the great deep. A great Mountain is eath to be seen; a man that will but open his eyes cannot over-look it: but who can see into the bottom of the Sea, or finde out what is done in the depths thereof? Whatsoever we doe then; let us beware we measure not (a)Esay 55.8, 9▪his wayes, by our wayes, nor his works, by our works: howsoever they seem to swerve from the rules of our wayes and works; yet still (b)Psal. 14.5.The Lord is righteous in all his wayes, and holy in all his works. Though we cannot fathom the deeps of his judgements, (for (c)John 4.11The Well is deep, and we have not wherewithall to draw;) yet let the assurance of the righteousnesse of all his proceedings stand firm and manifest as the mountains, which can neither be removed not hid, but stand fast-rooted for evermore. This we must rest upon as a certain Truth; howsoever, whomsoever, whensoever, God punisheth, he is never unjust.
§. 4.The second Certainty. To speak of Punishments properly; no temporal evil is simply, and de toto genere a punishment. By temporal evils, I understand all the penal evils of this lfe, that doe or may befall us from our bodily conception, to our bodily deaths inclusivè; hunger, cold, nakednesse, sicknesses, infirmities, discontents, reproaches, poverty, imprisonments, losses, crosses, distresses, death, and the rest; in a word, all that [d]Eccles. 1.13.Sore travel, which God hath given to the sons of man, to be exercised therewith, and that [e]Sirac▪ 40.1.Heavy yoke which is upon the sons of Adam, from the day that they goe out of their mothers womb, till the day that they return to the mother of all things. I say none of all these are properly and de toto genere to be accounted punishments. For to make a thing simply and properly and formally a punishment, there are required these three conditions: 1. That it be painfull, and grievous to suffer. 2. That it be inflicted for some fault. 3. That it be involuntary, and against the sufferers will. That which hath but the first of these three conditions, may be called after a sort (and truly too) Malum poenae, a kinde of punishment. But foreign, and properly, that Evil onelyonly is a punishment, wherein the whole three conditions concurre. Now these temporal evils, though they have the two first conditions; all of them being grievous to suffer, all of them being inflicted for sinne: yet in the third condition they fail, because they are not involuntary simply, and perpetually, and de suo genere involuntary: (to omit also a kinde of failing in the second condition; not but that they are ever inflicted for some sinne deserving them; but for that, there are withall other ends, and reasons for which they are inflicted, and whereunto they are intended, besides and above the punishment of the offence) It may not be gainsaid indeed, but these things are involuntary sometimes in the particular, and especially to some men, even the least of them: but simply and universally such they are not; since by othersome men, the greatest of them are willingly and cheerfully, not only suffered, but desired. Not but that they are grievous to the best. (It must needs be some grief, as to the Merchant, to see his rich lading cast over-board, and to the Patient to have an old festered sore searched and sindged; so to the Christian, to have Gods correcting hand lie heavy upon him in some temporal affliction: The Apostle telleth us plainly, [a]Heb. 12.11.No affliction for the present is joyous, but grievous.) But involuntary it is no more in him, than those other things are in them. As therefore the Merchant, though it pity his heart to see so much wealth irrecoverably lost, yet getteth the best help, and useth the best speed he can to empty the Vessel of them, for the saving of his life; and as the Patient, though [b]Est planè quasi saevitia, medicina de scalpelli — Non tamen secari idcirco malum: quia dolores utiles affert— ul…lans ille, & gemens & mugiens inter manus medici, postmodum easdem mercede cumulabit. Tert. in Scorp. cap. 5.he smart when the wound is dressed, yet thanketh and feeth the Surgion for his pains, in hope of future ease: so the Christian, though these temporal evils somewhat trouble him, yet he is willing to them, and he is cheerfull under them, and he acknowledgeth Gods goodness in them, and returneth him thanks for them; because he knoweth they are sent for his future good, and that they will at the last (c)Heb. 12.11.Yield him the peaceable fruit of righteousness, when he shall have been sufficiently exercised thereby. See (d)Acts 5.41.Peter and Iohn rejoycing, when they suffered for the name of Jesus, and Saint Paul so farr from fearing, that he (e)Phil. 1.23.longed after his dissolution; and the blessed Martyrs running to a faggot, as to a feast. Verily, Gods children see great good in these things, which others account evils: and therefore they take them not as bare punishments sent to afflict them; but as glorious tryals to exercise them, as gracious corrections to humble them, as precious receipts to purge, and recover, and restore, and strengthen them.
So that it is not any of the temporal evils of this life;§. 5. but much rather the everlasting pains of hell, wherein the just reward and punishment of sinne properly and especially consisteth. (f)Rom. 6.23.The wages of sinne is death: the proper wages of sinne eternal death. For so the Antithesis in that place giveth it to be understood, viz. of such a death as is opposed to Eternal Life, and that is Eternal Death; [The wages of sinne is death: but the gift of God is Eternal life.] Rom. 6. By the distribution of those Eternal punishments then, we are rather to judge of GODS righteousness in recompensing sinners; than by the dispensation of these temporal evils. It was a stumbling block to the (g)foreign. Mar moreo tumulo Licinus jacet; at Cato parvo: Pompeius nullo. Credimus esse Deos? Varro. See Plat. de leg. Cic. 3. de Nat▪ deor▪ Senec. de provid. Aug. 3. de lib. arb. 2. Menand. apud Stob. Serm. 104.heathen, to see good men oppressed, and vice prosper: it made them doubt; some, whether there were a God, or no; others nothing better, whether a providence, or no. But what marvel if they stumbled, who had no right knowledge either of God, or of his providence; when Iob, and David, and other the dear children of God have been much puzzled with it? David confesseth in Psal. 73. that (h)Psal. 73.23.His feet had welnigh slipped, when he saw the prosperity of the wicked: and certainly down he had been, had he not happily stepped (i)Ibid. 17.Into the Sanctuary of God, and there understood the end of these men. Temporal evils, though they be sometimes punishments of sinne: yet they are not ever sent as punishments, (because sometimes they have other ends and uses, and are ordinabilia in melius;) and secondly, they are never the only punishments of sinne; because there are greater and more lasting punishments reserved for sinners after this life, of which there is no other use or end, but to punish, since they are not ordinabilia in melius. If we will make these temporal evils the measure, whereby to judge of the Iustice of God, we cannot secure our selves from erring dangerously: Gods purposes in the dispensation of these unto particular men being unsearchable. But those everlasting punishments are they, wherein Gods Iustice shall be manifested to every eye, in due time; at that last day, which is therefore called by Saint Paul, Rom. 2. (a)Rom. 2.5.The day of wrath, and of the revelation of the righteous judgement of God. Implying, that howsoever God is just in all his judgements and acts of providence, even upon earth; yet the Counsels and Purposes of God in these things are often secret, and past finding out: but at the last great day, when (b)Ibid. 6.He shall render to every man according to his works his everlasting recompence; then his vengeance shall manifest his wrath, and the righteousness of his judgement shall be revealed to every eye in the condign punishment of unreconciled sinners. That is the second Certainty; Temporal evils are not alwayes, nor simply, nor properly, the punishments for sinne.
If any man shall be yet unsatisfied, and desire to have Gods justice somewhat farther cleared,§. 6. even in the disposing of these temporal things: although it be neither safe, nor possible for us, to search farr into particulars, yet some general satisfaction we may have from a third Certainty; and that is this. Every evil of pain, whatsoever it be, or howsoever considered, which is brought upon any man, is brought upon him evermore for sinne, yea and that also for his own personal sinne. Every branch of this assertion would be well marked. I say first, [Every evil of pain, whatsoever it be,] whether natural defects and infirmities in soul or body, or outward afflictions in goods, friends, or good name; whether inward distresses of an afflicted, or terrours of an affrighted conscience; whether temporal or eternal Death; whether evils of this life, or after it: or whatsoever other evil it be, that is any way grievous to any man; every such evil is for sinne.
§. 7.I say, secondly, every evil of pain, howsoever considered: whether formally, and sub ratione poenae, as the proper effect of Gods vengeance and wrath against sinne; or as a fatherly correction and chastisement, to nurture us from some past sinne; or as a medicinal preservative, to strengthen us against some future sinne; or as a clogging chain to keep under and disable us from some outward work of sinne; or as a fit matter and object whereon to exercise our Christian graces of faith, charity, patience, humility, and the rest; or as an occasion given and taken by Almighty God, for the greater manifestation of the glory of his Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness, in the removal of it; or as an act of Exemplary justice, for the admonition and terrour of others; or for whatsoever other end, purpose, or respect it be inflicted.
I say thirdly, Every such evil of pain, is brought upon us for sinne. §. 8.There may be other ends, there may be other occasions, there may be other uses of such Evils: but still the original Cause of them all, is sinne. [(a)Ps. 39.11. When thou with rebukes doest chasten man for sinne.] It was not for any (b)Jo…. 9.2, 3.extraordinary notorious sinnes, either of the blind man himself, or of his parents, above other men, that he was born blind. Our Saviour Christ acquitteth them of that, Iohn 9. in answer to his Disciples, who were but too forward (as God knoweth most men are,) to judge the worst. Our Saviours answer there, never intended other, but that still the true cause deserving that blindnesse was his, and his parents sinne: but his purpose was to instruct his Disciples, that that infirmity was not layd upon him rather than upon another man, meerly for that reason, because he (or his parents) had deserved it more than other men; but for some farther ends which God had in it in his secret and everlasting purpose, and namely this among the rest, that the works of God might be manifest in him, and the Godhead of the Sonne made glorious in his miraculous cure. As in Nature, the intention of the (c)See Arist. 2. Phys. c. 8. & 9.End doth not overthrow, but rather suppose the necessity of the Matter: so is it in the works of God, and the dispensations of his wonderfull providence. It is from Gods mercy, ordering them to those Ends he hath purposed; that his punishments are good: but it is withall from our sinnes, deserving them as the cause, that they are just. Even as the rain that falleth upon the earth, whether it moysten it kindly, and make it fruitfull, or whether it choak and slocken and drown it, yet still had its beginning from the vapours, which the earth it self sent up. All those Evils, which fall so daily and thick upon us from Heaven, (whether to warn us, or to plague us,) are but arrows which our selves first shot up against heaven, and now drop down again with doubled force upon our heads. Omnis poena propter culpam: all evils of pain, are for the evils of sinne.
I say fourthly, All such evils are for our own sinnes. §. 9.The Scriptures are plain. (d)1 Pet. 1.17.God judgeth every man according to his own works. (e)Gal. 6.5.Every man shall bear his own burden, &c. God hath enjoyned it as a Law for Magistrates, (wherein they have also his example to lead them;) that (f)Deut. 24.16.not the fathers for the children, nor the children for the fathers, but every man should be put to death for his own sinne, Deuteron. 24. If Israel take up a Proverb of their own heads, [(g)Ezek. 18.2, &c. Jer. 31.29. The fathers have eaten sowr grapes, and the childrens teeth are set on edge;] they doe it without cause, and they are checked for it. The soul that sinneth, it shall dye: and if any man eat sowr grapes, his own teeth (and not anothers for him) shall be set on edge thereby. For indeed, how can it be otherwise? or who can reasonably think, that our most gracious God, who is so ready to take from us the guilt of our own, should yet lay upon us the guilt of other mens sins? The only exception to be made in this kind, is that alone satisfactory punishment of our blessed Lord, and Saviour Jesus Christ: not at all for his own sins, (far be the impiety from us, so to imagine; for (a)1 Pet. 2.22.He did no sin, neither was there any guilt found in his mouth:) but for ours. (b)Psal. 69.4. Non rapui & exsolv…b…m: non peccavi & poenas dabam. Aug. Ibi.He payed that which he never took; it was For our transgressions that he was wounded, and the chastisement of our peace was laid upon him. Yet even those meritorious sufferings of his, may be said (in a qualified sense) to have been for his own sins: (although in my judgement, it be far better to abstain from such like speeches, as are of ill and suspicious sound, though they may be in some sort defended.) But how for his own sins? his own by Commission? by no means: (God forbid any man should teach, any man should conceive so; the least thought of this were blaspemy:) but his own by Imputation. (c)Esay. 53 5.Not that he had sinned, and so des…rved punishment: but that he had (d)Delictorum susceptor, non commissor. Aug. in Psal. 68.taken upon him our sins, which deserved that punishment. As he that undertaketh for another mans debt, maketh it his own, and standeth chargeable with it, as if it were his own personal debt: so Christ becomming surety for our sins, made them (e)Delicta nostra sua delicta fecit, ut justitiam suam nostram justitiam faceret. Aug. exp. 2. in Psal. 21.his own, and so was punishable for them, as if they had been his own personal sins; (f)1 Pet. 2.24.Who his own self bare our sins in his own body upon the tree, 1 Pet. 2 That he was punished for us, who himself deserved no punishment; it was, because (g)2 Cor. 5.21.He was made sin for us, who himself knew no sin. So that I say, in some sense the assertion may be defended universally, and without exception: but yet I desire rather it might be thus; Christs only excepted, all the Pains and Evils of men are brought upon them for their own sins.
These three points then are certain: and it is needfull they should be well understood and remembred;§. 10. because nothing can be objected against Gods Iustice, in the punishing of sin, which may not be easily removed, if we have recourse to some one or other of these three Certainties, and rightly apply them. All the three doubts proposed in the beginning, have one and the same resolution: answer one; and answer all. Ahab here sinneth by Oppression: and yet the evil must light, though not all of it (for some part of it fell, and was performed upon Ahab himself) yet the main of it upon his son Iehoram. [I will will not bring the evil in his days, but in his sons days will I bring the evil upon his house.] It is not Iehorams case alone: it is a thing that often hath, and dayly doth befall many others. In Genesis 9. when Noahs ungracious son Ham had discovered his Fathers nakedness: the old man (no doubt, by Gods special inspiration) layeth the curse not upon Ham himself, but upon his son Canaan, (a)Gen. 9.25.[Cursed be Canaan, &c.] And God ratified the curse, by rooting out the posterity of Canaan, first out of the pleasant Land, wherein they were seated; and then afterwards from the face of the whole earth. Ieroboams (b)3 King. 15.29, 30.Idolatry cut off his posterity from the Kingdom; and the (c)1 Sam. 2.33. —36.wickedness of Eli his sons, theirs from the Priesthood of Israel. Gehasi with the bribe he took, purchased a (d)4 King. 5.27.leprosie in fee-simple to him and his heirs for ever. The Iewes, for stoning the Prophets of God, but most of all for crucifying the Son of God, brought blood-guiltinesse, not only upon themselves, but upon their children also, (e)Mat. 27.25.[His blood be upon us, and upon our Children.] The wrath of God therefore comming upon them (f)1 Thes. 2.16.to the utmost, and the curse of God abiding upon their posterity even unto this day: wherein they still remain, (and God knoweth how long they shall) a base and despised people; scattered almost every where, and every where hated. Instances might be endless, both in private persons and families, and in whole Kingdoms and Countries. But it is a needlesse labour to multiply instances in so confessed a point: especially God Almighty having thus far declared himself and his pleasure herein in the second commandement of the Law; that he will not spare in his (g)Exod. 20.5.Iealousie sometimes to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation.
There is no question then de facto, but so it is;§. 11. the sins of the Fathers are visited upon the Children: but de jure, with what right and equity it is so, it is (as Saint Chrysostome speaketh) (h)Chrysost. in Gen. hom. 28.foreign, a question famous, and much debated. The considerations, which I find given in for the resolution of this question, (i)August. qu. 42. in Deuter. Theophylact. in Joh. 9. Perer. 14. in Gen. Disp. 4. Aquin. 1.2. qu. 87.8. Sasb. quodlib. 3.by those that have purposely handled it, are very many. But multitude breedeth confusion: and therefore I propose no more but two only, unto which so many of the rest as are material may be reduced; and those two grounded upon the certainties already declared. The former concerneth the Nature of those Punishments, which are inflicted upon the Children for the fathers sins; the later, the Condition of those Children, upon whom such punishments are inflicted.
As to the first, §. 12.The punishments which GOD bringeth usually upon the Children for the fathers sins, are only temporal and outward punishments. Some have been plagued with infectious diseases: as (k)4 King. 5.27.Gehazies posterity; and (l)2 Sam. 3.29.Ioabs also, if that curse which David pronounced against him took effect, as it is like it did. Some have come to untimely and uncomfortable ends: as Davids children (m)2 Sam. 13.29.Amnon and (n)2 Sam. 18.15.Absalon; and the (o)Num. 16.27.33.little ones of Dathan, and Abiram, and others. Some have had losses, and reproaches, and manifold other distresses and afflictions in sundry kinds, too long to rehearse. And all these temporal judgements their fathers sinnes might bring upon them: even as the faith, and vertues, and other graces of the fathers do sometimes conveigh temporal blessings to their posterity. So Ierusalem was saved in the siege by Senacherib, for (a)Esay. 37.35.Davids sake many yeares after his death; Esay 37.35. And the succession of the Crown of Israel continued in the line of (b)4 King. 10.30.Iehu for four descents; for the zeal that he shewed against the worshippers of Baal, and the house of Ahab. So then, men may fare the better; and so they may fare the worse too; for the vertues, or vices of their Ancestors. Outwardly, and temporally they may: but spiritually and eternally they cannot. For as never yet any man went to heaven for his fathers goodnesse; so neither to hell for his fathers wickednesse.
If it be objected; that for any people or person to suffer a (c)Amos 8.11.famine of the word of God, §. 13.to be deprived of the use and benefit of the sacred and saving ordinances of God, to be left in utter darknesse without the least glimpse of the glorious light of the Gospel of God, without which (ordinarily) there can be no knowledge of Christ, nor meanes of Faith, nor possibility of Salvation; to be thus visited, is more than a temporal punishment: and yet this kind of spiritual judgement doth sometimes light upon a Nation or people, for the unbelief, and unthankfulnesse, and impenitency, and contempt of their Progenitors whilest they had the light: and that therefore the Children for their Parents, and Posterity for their Ancestry are punished not only with Temporal, but even with Spiritual judgements also. If any shall thus object, one of these two answers may satisfie them. First, if it should be granted, the want of the Gospel to be properly a spiritual judgement; yet it would not follow that one man were punished spiritually for the fault of another. For betwixt private persons, and publick societies there is this difference: that in private persons, every succession maketh a change; so that when the Father dyeth, and the son cometh after him, there is not now the same person that was before, but another: but in Cities, and countries, and Kingdomes, and all publick societies, succession maketh no change; so that when (d)Eccles. 1.4. V. responsionem Alfeni J.C. l. 76. ff. de Judiciis.One generation passeth, and another cometh after it, there is not another City, or Nation, or People than there was before, but the same. If then the people of the same land should in this generation be visited with any such spiritual judgment, as is the removal of their Candlestick, and the want of the Gospel, for the sinnes and impieties of their Ancestors in some former generations: yet this ought no more to be accounted the punishment of one for another; than it ought to be accounted the punishing of one for another, to punish a man in his old age, for the sinnes of his youth. For as the body of a man, though the primitive moysture be continually spending and wasting therein, and that decay be still repaired by a daily supply of new and alimentall moysture, is yet truly the same body; and as a River fed with a living spring, though the water that is in the chanel be continually running out▪ and other water freshly succeeding in the place and room thereof, is truly the same River: so a Nation or People, though one generation is ever passing away, and another coming on, is yet truely the same Nation or People, after an hundred, or a thousand yeares, which it was before.
Again secondly; The want of the Gospel, is not properly a spiritual, but rather a temporal punishment.§. 14. We call it indeed sometimes a spiritual Iudgement, as we do the free use of it a spiritual Blessing: because the Gospel was written for, and revealed unto the Church, by the Spirit of GOD; and also because it is the holy Ordinance of GOD, and the proper instrument whereby (ordinarily) the Spiritual life of Faith and of Grace is conveyed into our soules. But yet properly & primarily, those only are (a)Ephes. 1.3.Spiritual blessings, which are immediately wrought in the soul by the spirit of God, and by the same Spirit cherished and preserved in the heart of the receiver for his good, and are proper and peculiar to those that are born again of the spirit: and all those on the contrary, which may be subject to decay, or are common to the reprobate with the Elect, or may turn to the hurt of the receiver, are to be esteemed temporal blessings, and not spiritual. And such a blessing, is the outward partaking of the word and Ordinances of GOD: the want thereof therefore consequently, is to be esteemed a temporal judgement, rather than spiritual. So that, notwithstanding this instance, still the former consideration holdeth good: that GOD sometimes visiteth the sins of the fathers upon the children with outward and temporal, but never with spiritual and eternal punishments.
Now, if there could no more be said to this doubt,§. 15. but only this; it were sufficient to clear Gods Iustice: since we have been already instructed, that these temporal judgements are not alwayes properly and formally the punishments of sinne. For as outward blessings are indeed no true blessings properly; because Wicked men have their portion in them as well as the Godly, and they may turn (and often do) to the greater hurt of the soul, and so become rather Punishments, than Blessings: so to the contrary, outward punishments are no true punishments properly; because the Godly have their share in them as deep as the Wicked, and they may turn (and often do) to the greater good of the soul, and so become rather Blessings, than Punishments.
If it be yet said;§. 16. But why then doth God threaten them as Punishments, if they be not so? I answer. First; because they seem to be punishments, and are by most men so accounted for their grievousnesse, though they be not properly such in themselves. Secondly; for the common event; because ut plurimùm and for the most part they prove punishments to the sufferer, in case he be not bettered, as well as grieved, by them. Thirdly; because they are indeed a kind of punishment, though not then deserved, but formerly. Fourthly, and most to the present purpose; because not seldome the (a)foreign. Chrys. in Gen. hom. 20. Filii bona valetudo, felicitas, patrimonium, per…inet ad patrem. Felicior futu…us, si salvum habu…rit filium; infelicior, si amiscrit. Senec. 5. de Benef. 19. Nihil interest in se quis veritus fuerit, an in liberis: cum pro affectu parentes magis in liberis terreantur. lib. 8. §. haec quae ff. 4.2. Quod metus causa.Father himself is punished in them, who through tendernesse of affection taketh very much to heart the evils that happen to his child; sometimes more, than if they had happened to himself. See David (b)2 Sam. 18.33.weeping and puling for his trayterous son Absalom, when he was gone; more (c)2 Sam. 19.5, 6.affectionately, than we find he did for the hazzards of his own person, and of the whole State of Israel, whiles he lived. For if it be a punishment to a man to sustain losses in his cattel, or goods, or lands, or friends, or any other thing he hath: how much more then in his children, of whom he maketh more account than of all the rest, (as being not only an Image, but even a (d)Natur… pater & filius eadem esse persona penè intelligitur. l. ult. Cod. 626. d… impub. Pars quodammodo corporis ejus. l. 22. Cod. 11.47. de agric. & cens.part of himself;) and for whose sakes especially it is, that he maketh so much account of the rest? The Egyptians were plagued not only in the blasting of their corn, the murrain of their cattel, the unwholesomenesse of their waters, the annoyance of vermine, and such like; but also and much more in the death of their (e)Exod. 11.5, 6.first-born: that was their last, and greatest plague. The newes of his children slain with the fall of an house, did put Iob (though not quite out of patience, yet) more (f)Then Iob arose, &c. Iob 1.20.to the tryal of his patience, than the losse of all his substance besides; though of many thousands of Oxen, and Asses, and Sheep, and Camels. Now if no man charge God with injustice, if when a man sinneth he punish him in his body, or goods, or good name, or in other things: why should it be suspected of injustice, when he sinneth, to punish him in his children? at least there, where the evil of the children seen or foreseen, redoundeth to the grief and afflion of the father? And so was Davids murther and adultery justly punished in the losse of his incestuous son Amnon, and of his murtherous son Absalon. Upon which ground, some think that clause (g)Exod. 20.5.[Unto the third and fourth generation] to have been added in the second Commandement, respectively to the ordinary ages of men; who oftentimes live to see their children to the third, and sometimes to the fourth generation, but very seldome farther: Implying, as they think, that God usually punisheth the sins of the fathers upon the children, within such a compasse of time, as they may in likelihood see it, and grieve at it; and then what ever evil it be, it is rather inflicted as a punishment to them, than to their children. This in part satisfieth the doubt: that the punishments which God layeth upon the children for the fathers sins, are only temporal punishments, and consequently by our second ground not properly punishments.
But yet for so much as these temporal evils, (be it properly, be it improperly,§. 17.) are still a kind of Punishment; and we have been already taught from the third ground, that all evils of punishment, whether proper, or improper, are brought upon men evermore and only for their own personal sinnes: the doubt is not yet wholly removed, unlesse we admit of a second Consideration; and that concerneth the condition of those children, upon whom such punishments are inflicted for their fathers sins.
And first; It is considerable,§. 18. that Children most times tread in their Fathers steps, and continue in their sinnes: and so draw upon themselves their punishments. And this they doe especially, by a three-fold conveyance of sinne from their Parents; viz. Nature, Example, and Education. First, Nature: and this is seen especially in those sinnes, that are more sensual than other, and doe after a sort symbolize with the predominant humour in the body. It is plain from experience, that some sinnes (especially the proneness, and inclination unto them) doe follow some complexions and constitutions of body, more than others; and arise from them: As Ambition, Rage, rashnesse, and turbulent intermedling in other mens affairs, from Choler; Wantonnesse, and Licentious mirth, from Bloud; Drunkennesse, and Lazinesse, from Flegm; Envie, and Sullennesse, implacable thirst of Revenge, from Melancholy. And these kind of sinnes (to note that by the way) doe oftentimes prove our master-sinnes; such as Divines usually call our bosom, and darling, and beloved sinnes, (Peccatum in deliciis) because (a)foreign. Theophrast. Charact. 19.naturally we have a stronger proneness and inclination to these, than to other sinnes. And therefore we ought to pray against, and to strive against, and to fight against these sinnes, and to avoid the occasions of them, especially and above all other sinnes. And if it shall please God so to strengthen us with his grace, and enable us by his spirit, as to have in some good measure subdued these sinnes in us, and denied our selves in them: it is to be comfortably hoped, that we have wrought the main and the masterpiece of our Mortification. But to return where I was; as colour and favour, and proportion, of hair, and face, and lineament; and as diseases and infirmities of the Body; so commonly the abilities, and dispositions, and tempers of the mind and affections become hereditary, and (as wee say) (b)foreign. Eurip. d: apud Stob. Serm. 88.Runne in a bloud. Naturae sequitur semina quisque suae. An evil bird hatcheth an evil egge; and one (c)foreign. Egdo…: ibid.Viper will breed a generation of Vipers.
Secondly; We are (God knoweth) but too apish,§. 19. apt to be led much by examples, more by the worst, most by the nearest. — (d)Juvenal. Satyr. 14.Velocius & citius nos Corrumpunt vitiorum exempla domestica. Young ones will doe, as they see the old ones doe before them: and they will on; Non quâ eundum, sed quâ itur; not as their father biddeth them, but as he leadeth them. (e)Juv. Ibid.Si nociva senem juvat alea— If the [f]— probum patrem esse opportet, Qui gnatum suum probiorem, quàm ipsus furit, postulat. Plaut. in Pseud.father be given to swearing, or gaming, or scoffing, or whoring, or riot, or contention, or excesse in drink, or any thing else that naught is: let him counsel and advise his sonne as often and as earnestly as he can; he shall find one cursed example, (without the singular mercy and grace of God) to do more hurt upon him, than a thousand wholesom admonitions wil doe good. [a]Juvenal. ubi supra.— fugienda patrum vestigia ducunt, Et monstrata diu veteris trahit orbita culpae.
§. 20.A third means of conveying vices from parents to children, is Education: when parents train and bring up their children in those sinfull courses, wherein themselves have lived and delighted. So covetous worldlings are ever distilling into the ears of their children precepts of parsimony and good husbandry, reading them lectures of thrift, and inculcating principles of getting and saving. [b]Juvenal. Satyr. 14.Sunt quaedam vitiorum elementa: his protinus illos Imbuet, & coget minimas ediscere sordes. Idle wandering Beggars train up their children in a trade of begging, and lying, and cursing, and filching, and all idlenesse and abominable filthinesse. And idolatrous parents how carefull they are to nuzzle up their Posterity in Superstition and Idolatry; I would our profest Popelings, and half-baked Protestants, did not let us see but too often. Wretched and accursed is our supine carelesnesse; if these mens wicked diligence, (whose first care for the fruit of their bodies, is to poyson their souls, by sacrificing their sons and daughters to Idols;) shall rise up in judgement against us, and condemn our foul neglect, in not seasoning the tender years of our children with such religious, godly, and vertuous [c]Eph. 6.4.informations, as they are capable of.
§. 21.However it be, whether by Nature, Example, or Education, one, or more, or all of these: certain it is, that most times sinnes [d]— reddit ad authores genus, Stirpem que primam degener sanguis refert. Senec. in Hippol. act. 3.passe along from the father to the sonne, and so downward, by a kind of lineal descent from predecessors to posterity; and that for the most part with (e)foreign. Hom: Odyss. foreign. Et qui Omnia deteriùs tua per vestigia peccet. Juven. Satyr. 14.advantage and encrease: whole families being tainted with the special vices of their stock. Iohn Baptist speaketh of [f]Mat. 3.7.a generation of vipers: and if we should but observe the conditions of some families in a long line of succession; might we not espie here and there, even whole generations of Drunkards, & generations of Swearers, and generations of Idolaters, and generations of Worldlings, and generations of seditious, and of envious, and of riotous, and of haughty, and of unclean persons, and of sinners in other kinds? This ungodly King Ahab; see how all that come of him, taste of him, and have some spice and relish of his evil manners. Of his son Ahaziah, that next succeeded him in the kingdom of Israel, the Text saith in the next Chapter, that [g]3 King. 22.25.He walked in the way of his father, and in the way of his mother. And another Ahaziah king of Iudah, the grand-child of Iehosaphat by the fathers side, and of Ahab by the mothers; drew infection from the mother, and so trod in the steps rather of this his wicked Grandfather Ahab, than of his good Grandfather Iehosaphat: and of him therefore the Scripture saith remarkably in 4 Kings. 8. [h]4 King. 8.27.He walked in the way of the House of Ahab, and did evil in the sight of the Lord, as did the House of Ahab, for he was the Son-in-law of the House of Ahab. Little doth any man think, what hurt he may doe unto, and what plague he may bring upon, his posterity, by joyning himself or them in too strict a bond of nearnesse, with an ill or an Idolatrous House or Stock. Here, we see, is Ahab's house taxed, and not his person onelyonly: even the whole family, and brood, and kinn of them, branch and root. And that Iehoram also, who is the son here spoken of and meant in my Text, did (a)4 King. 3.2.Patrisare too as well as the rest of the kinred, and take after the father, (though not in that height of impiety, and idolatry, as his father) is plain from the sequel of the Story. And so doing, and partaking of the Evils of sinne with his father; why might not he also in justice partake of the Evils of punishment with his father?
Secondly, §. 22▪the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children sometimes, as possessours of something which their fathers left them, with Gods curse cleaving unto it. As in the Law, not onelyonly he, that had an (b)See Levit. 15.2.—11.issue of uncleannesse, made them unclean that touched him; but even the saddle or stool he sate upon, the cloathes he wore, the bed whereon he lay, any vessel of earth or of wood that he did but touch, was enough to bring legal pollution and uncleanness upon any other person, that should but touch them: So, not only our fathers sins, if we touch them by imitation; but even their (c)foreign. Euripid.lands and goods and houses, and other things that were theirs, are sufficient to derive Gods curse upon us, if we do but hold them in possession. What is gotten by any evil and unjust and unwarrantable means, is in Gods sight and estimation no better than stollen. Now stollen goods, we know, though they have passed through never so many hands before, (d)foreign, Chrys. in 1 Cor. hom. 15.that man is answerable for, in whose hands they are found, and in whose custody and possession they are. God hateth not sinne only; but the very monuments of sinne too: and his curse fasteneth, not only upon the agent, but upon the brute and dead materials too. And where theft, or oppression, or perjury, or sacrilege have laid the foundation, and reared the house; there the (e)Zach. 5.4.Curse of God creepeth in between the walls and seelings, and lurketh close within the stones, and the timber, and as a fretting moath or canker, insensibly gnaweth asunder the pinns and the joynts of the building, till it have unframed it, and resolved it into a ruinous heap: for which mischief there is no remedy, no preservation from it, but one; and that is, free and speedy Restitution. For any thing we know, what Ahab the father got without justice, Iehoram the son held without scruple. We doe not finde, that ever he made restitution of Naboths vineyard to the right heir; and it is like enough he did not: and then between him and his father there was but this difference; the father was the thief, and he the receiver; which two the Law severeth not either in guilt or punishment, but wrappeth them equally in the same guilt, and in the same punishment— (a)foreign. Pnocylid.foreign. And who knoweth, whether the very holding of that vineyard might not bring upon him the curse of his fathers oppression? it is plain that (b)4 King. 6.25, 26.vineyard was the place, where the heaviest part of that curse overtook him.
§. 23.But that which is the upshot of all, and untieth all the knots both of this and of all other doubts, that can be made against Gods justice, in punishing one for another, ariseth from a third consideration; which is this. That the children are punished for the fathers sins, or indefinitely any one man for the sins of any other man; it ought to be imputed to those sins of the fathers or others, not as to the causes properly deserving them, but only as occasioning those punishments. It pleaseth God to take occasion from the sinnes of the fathers, or of some others, to bring upon their children, or those that otherwise belong unto them in some kind of relation, those evils which by their own corruptions and sins they have justly deserved. This distinction of the Cause and Occasion, if well heeded, both fully acquitteth Gods justice; and abundantly reconcileth the seeming Contradictions of Scripture, in this Argument: and therefore it will be worth the while, a little to open it.
There is a kind of Cause de numero efficientium, which the learned,§. 24. for distinctions sake, call the Impulsive Cause: and it is such a cause as (c)Quae principalem efficientem impèllit ad efficiendum. Keckerm. 1. Syst. Log. 10moveth and induceth the principal Agent, to do that which it doth. For example; A Schoolmaster correcteth a boy with a rod for neglecting his book. Of this correction here are three distinct causes, all in the rank of efficients; viz. the Master, the Rod, and the boys neglect: but each hath its proper causality in a different kind and manner from other. The Master is the Cause, as the principal Agent, that doth it; the Rod is the Cause, as the Instrument wherewith he doth it: and the boys neglect the impulsive cause, for which he doth it. Semblably, in this judgement which befell Iehoram; the principal efficient cause and Agent, was God, (as he is in all other punishments and judgements; (d)Amos 3.6.Shall there be evil in the City, and the Lord hath not done it? Amos 3.) and here he taketh it to himself, [I will bring the evil upon his house.] The Instrumental Cause under God, was (e)4 King. 9.Iehu, whom God raised up, and endued with zeal and power for the execution of that vengeance, which he had detetmined against Ahab and against his house; as appeareth in 4 Kings 9. and 10. But now, what the true proper impulsive cause should be, for which he was so punished, and which moved God at that time and in that sort to punish him; that is the point wherein consisteth the chiefest difficulty in this matter, and into which therefore we are now to enquire: viz. whether that were rather his own sin, or his father Ahabs sin?
Whether we answer for this, or for that; we say but the truth in both: for both sayings are true;§. 25. [God punished him for his own] and [God punished him for his Fathers sin.] The difference only this. His own sins were the impulsive cause that deserved the punishment; his fathers sin the impulsive cause that occasioned it: and so indeed upon the point, and respectively to the justice of God, rather his own sins were the cause of it, than his fathers: both because justice doth especially look at the desert; and also because that which deserveth a punishment is more effectually, and primarily, and properly the impulsive cause of punishing, than that which only occasioneth it. The terms whereby Artists expresse these two different kinds of impulsive causes (borrowed from Galen and the Physicians,) of (a)See Kecker. 1 Syst. Log. 10. called by Brulif. Causa dispositiva, & Excitativa. apud Altenst. in dict. Causa.foreign, would be excellent, and full of satisfaction; if they were of easie understanding. But for that they are not so, especially to such as are not acquainted with the terms and learning of the Schools; I forbear to use them: and rather than to take the shortest cut over hedge and ditch, chuse to lead you an easier and plainer way, though it's something about; and that by a familiar example.
A man hath lived for some good space in reasonable state of health; yet by grosse feeding, and through continuance of time, his body the whilst hath contracted many vitious, noisome, and malignant humours. It happeneth he had occasion to ride abroad in bad weather; taketh wet on his feet or neck, getteth cold with it, commeth home, findeth himself not well, falleth a shaking first, and anon after into a dangerous and lasting fever. Here is a fever, and here are two different causes of it, an antecedent cause within, the abundance of noisom and crude humours, (that is (b)Interiores dispositiones quae irritantur ab externis causis. Melancthon. causa dispositiva. Brulifer.causa foreign;) and the evident cause ah extra, his riding in the wet, and taking cold upon it, (and that is Galens (c)Causa externa irritatrix. Melancthon. causa excitativa. Brulifer.causa foreign.) Let us go on a little, and compare these causes. The Physician is sent for, the sick mans friends they stand about him, and in commeth the Physician among them, and enquireth of him and them how he got his fever. They presently give him such information as they can, (and the information is both true, and sufficient, so far as it reacheth:) they tell him the one cause, the occasional cause, the outward evident cause: [Alas, Sir, he rode such a journey, such a time, got wet on his feet, and took cold upon it; and that hath brought him to all this.] That is all they are able to say to it: for other cause they know none. But by and by after some surview of the state of the body, he is able to inform them in the other cause, the inward and original cause; whereof they were as ignorant before, as he was of that other outward one: and he telleth them the cause of the malady is superfluity of crude and noysom humours, ranknesse of bloud, abundance of melancholy, tough flegm, or some other like thing within. Now if it be demanded, which of these two is rather the cause of his sickness? The truth is, that inward antecedent cause within, is the very cause thereof; although perhaps it had not bred a fever at that time, if that other outward occasion had not been. For by that inward hidden cause the body was prepared for an ague: only there wanted some outward fit accident, to stir and provoke the humours within, and to set them on working, And the parties body being so prepared, might have fallen into the same sickness, by some other accident as well as that; as over heating himself with exercise, immoderate watching, some distemper or surfeit in diet, or the like. But neither that, nor any of these, nor any other such accident could have cast him into such a fit, if the humours had not been ripe, and the body thereby prepared to entertain such a disease. So as the bad humours within may rather be said to be the true cause; and that cold-taking but the occasion of the Ague; the disease it self issuing from the hidden cause within; and the outward accident being the cause, not so much of the disease it self, why the Ague should take him, as why it should take him at that time, rather than at another, and hold him in that part, or in that manner, rather than in another.
From this example we may see in some proportion, how our own sins,§. 27. and other mens, concurr as joynt impulsive causes of those punishments, which God bringeth upon us. Our own sinnes they are the true (a)Causa foreign, interna, antecedens, dispositiva.hidden antecedent causes, which deserve the punishments: our Fathers sins, or our governours sins, or our neighbours sins, or whatsoever other mans sins, that are visited upon us, are only the (b)Causa foreign, externa irritatrix, excitativa.outward evident causes (or rather occasions) why we should be punished at this time, and in this thing, and in this manner, and in this measure, and with these circumstances. And as in the former Example, the Patients friends considered one cause, and the Physician another; they, the evident and outward, he, the inward and antecedent cause: so respectively to God's Iustice, our own sins only are the causes of our punishments; but in respect of his Providence and Wisdom, our Fathers sins also, or other mens. For Iustice looketh upon the desert only; and so the punishments are ever and only from our own personal sins, as we learned from our third Certainty: but it is Providence, that ordereth the occasions, and the seasons, and the other circumstances of Gods punishments.
Hence may we learn to reconcile those places of Scipture, which seem to Cross one another in this Argument.§. 28. In Ezekiel and Ieremy it is said, that (c)Jer. 31.30. & Ezek. 18.20.Every man shall be punished for his own sinnes, and that the Children shall not bear the iniquity of the Fathers: and yet the same Ieremy complaineth as if it were otherwise, (Lam. 5.) (a)Lam. 5.7.Our fathers have sinned, & are not; and we have born their iniquities, Yea God himself proclameth otherwise, I am (b)Exod. 20.5.a jealous God, visiting the sins of the Fathers upon the Children—Nor only doth he visit the sins of the Fathers upon the Children: but he visiteth also the sins of Princes upon their Subjects; as (c)2 Sam. 24.17.Davids people were wasted for his sin in numbring them: yea and he visiteth sometimes the sins even of ordinary private men upon publick societies; (d)Josh. 22.20.[Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a trespasse in the accursed thing, and wrath fell upon all the Congregation of Israel, and that man perished not alone in his iniquity? Now how can all this stand together?
Yes very well: even as well, as in the act of punishing, Gods Iustice and his Wisedome can stand together. Mark then,§. 29. wheresoever the Scripture ascribeth one mans punishment to another mans sinne; it pointeth us to Gods Wisedome and Providence; who for good and just ends maketh choice of these occasions, rather than other sometimes, to inflict those punishments upon men, which their own sinnes have otherwise abundantly deserved. On the contrary, wheresoever the Scripture giveth all punishments, unto the personal sinnes of the sufferer, it pointeth us to Gods Iustice: which looketh still to the desert, and doth not upon any occasion whatsoever inflict punishments, but where there are personal sinnes to deserve them; so that every man that is punished in any kind, or upon any occasion, may joyn with David in that confession of his, Psalm 51. (e)Psal. 51.4.Against thee have I sinned, and done evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and clear when thou judgest.
Say then, an unconscionable great one, by cruel oppression, §. 30.wring, as Ahab did here, his poorer neighbours Vineyard from him; or by countenanced sacrilege g…ld a Bishoprick of a fair Lordship or Manor; and when he hath done, his prodigal heir run one end of it away in matches, drown another end of it in Taverns and Tap-houses, melt away the rest in lust, and beastly sensuality: who doth not here see, both Gods Iustice, in turning him out of that, which was so foulely abused by his own sinnes; and his Providence withall, in fastening the Curse upon that portion, which was so unjustly gotten by his fathers sinnes? Every man is ready to say, It was never like to prosper, it was so ill gotten; and so acknowledge the Covetous fathers sin, as occasioning it: and yet every man can say withall, It was never likely to continue long, it was so vainly lavished out; and so acknowledge the Prodigal sons sin, as sufficiently deserving it.
Thus have we heard the main doubt solved.§. 31. The summe of all is this. God punisheth the son for the Fathers sin: but with temporal punishments, not eternal; and with those, perhaps so as to redound to the fathers punishment in the son. Perhaps, because the son treadeth in his fathers steps; Perhaps, because he possesseth that from his father, to which Gods curse adhereth; perhaps for other reasons best known to God himself, wherewith he hath not thought meet to acquaint us: but what ever the occasion be, or the ends; evermore for the sons own personal sinnes, abundantly deserving them.
And the same resolution is to be given to the other two doubts proposed in the beginning:§ 32. to that, Why GOD should punish any one man for another? and to the third, Why God should punish the lesser offender for the greater? In which, and all other doubts of like kind, it is enough, for the clearing of Gods Iustice, to consider: that when God doth so, they are first only temporal punishments which he so inflicteth; and those secondly no more, than what the sufferer by his own sinnes hath most rightfully deserved. All those other considerations, as that the Prince and people are but one body; and so each may feel the smart of others sinnes and stripes: That oftentimes we have given way to other mens sins, when we might have stopped them; or consent, when we should have withstood them; or silent allowance, when we should have checked them; or perhaps furtherance, when we should rather have hindered them: That the punishments brought upon us for our fathers or other mens sins, may turn to our great spiritual advantage, in the humbling of our souls, the subduing of our corruptions, the encreasing of our care, the exercising of our graces; That where all have deserved the punishment, it is left to the discretion of the Iudge, whom he will pick out, the Father or the Son, the Governour or the Subject, the Ring-Leader or the Follower, the Greater or the Lesser offender, to shew exemplary justice upon, as he shall see expedient. I say, all these, and other like considerations many, though they are to be admitted as true, and observed as usefull; yet they are such, as belong rather to GODS Providence and his Wisedome, than to his Iustice. If therefore thou knowest not the very particular reason, why God should punish thee in this or that manner, or upon this or that occasion; let it suffice thee that the Counsels and purposes of God are secret: and thou art not to enquire with scrupulous curiosity into the dispensation and courses of his Providence, farther than it hath pleased him either to reveal it in his word, or by his manifest works to discover it unto thee. But whatsoever thou doest, never make question of his Iustice. Begin first to make inquiry into thine own self: and if after unpartial search, thou there findest not corruption enough to deserve all out as much as God hath layed upon thee, then complain of injustice, but not before. And so much for the doubts.
§. 33.Let us now from the premises raise some instructions for our use. First; Parents we think have reason to be carefull, (and so they have) for their children; and to desire and labour, as much as in them lyeth, their well-doing. Here is a fair course then for you that are parents, and have children to care for. Doe you that which is good, and honest, and right: and they are like to fare the better for it. Wouldest thou then, Brother, leave thy lands, and thy estate to thy child, entire and free from encombrances? It is an honest care: but here is the way. (a)Juvenal Satyr. 14.Abstineas igitur damnandis; Leave them free from the (b)foreign. Isocr.guilt of thy sinnes; which are able to comber them beyond any statute, or morgage. If not the bond of Gods Law, if not the care of thine own soul, if not the fear of hell, if not the inward checks of thine own conscience: (c)Juvenal Satyr. 14.At peccaturo obstet tibi filius infans; at the least let the good of thy poor sweet infants restrain thee from doing that sinne, which might pull down from heaven a plague upon them and theirs. Goe too then, doe not applaud thy self in thy witty villanies, when thou hast circumvented and prospered; when Ahab-like thou hast (d)ver. 19. hîc.killed and taken possession; when thou hast larded thy leaner revenues with fat collops sacrilegiously cut out of the sides or flanks of the Church; and hast nayled all these with all the appurtenances, by fines, and vowchers, and entayls, as firm as Law can make them, to thy child, and his child, and his childs child for ever. After all this stirre, cast up thy bills, and see what a goodly bargain thou hast made: thou hast damned thy self, to undoe thy child; thou hast brought a curse upon thine own soul, to purchase that for thy child, which shall bring a curse both upon it and him. When thy Indentures were drawn, and thy learned Counsel fee'd to peruse the Instrument, and with exact severity to ponder with thee every clause and syllable therein; could none of you spie a flaw in that clause [with all and singular th' appurtenances,] neither observe, that thereby thou diddest settle upon thy posterity, together with thy estate, the wrath, and vengeance, and curse of God, which is one of those appurtenances? Haddest thou not a faithfull Counsellor within thine own brest, if thou wouldest but have conferred and advised with him plainly and undissemblingly, that could have told thee, thou hadst by thy oppression and injustice, ipso facto, cut off the entail from thy issue, even long before thou haddest made it? But if thou wouldest leave thy posterity a firm, and secure, and durable estate: doe this rather. Purchase for them by thy charitable works, the prayers and blessings of the poor; settle upon them the fruits of a religious, sober, and honest education; bequeath them the legacie of thy good example, in all vertuous and godly living: and that portion thou leavest them besides, of earthly things, be it much or little, be sure it be (e)foreign. Chrys. in Eph. hom. 2.well gotten; otherwise never look it (a)foreign. Pau…an. in Corinthiacis, v. Juven…l. Satyr. 13.should prosper with them. (b)1 Cor. 5, 6.A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump, and sowreth it: and a little i…l gotten, like a gangrene, spreadeth through the whole estate; and worse than aqua fortis, or the poysoned (c)— a… d…o; Quantum nec atro delibutus Hercules Nessi cr…ore. Horat. Epod. 17. See Sophocl. in Trachin.shirt that Deianira gave Hercules, cleaveth unto it, and feedeth upon it, and by little and little gnaweth, and fretteth, and consumeth it to nothing. And surely, Gods Iustice hath wonderfully manifested it self unto the world in this kinde, sometimes even to the publike astonishment and admiration of all men: that men of antient Families, and great estates; well left by their Ancestors, and free from debts, legacies, or other encombrances; not notedly guilty of any expencefull sinne or vanity, but wary, and husbandly, and carefull to thrive in the world; not kept under with any great burden of needy friends, or charge of children; not much hindred by any extraordinary losses, or casualties of fire, theeves, suretiship, or sutes: that such men, I say, should yet sink and decay, and runne behind hand in the world; and their estates crumble and milder away, and come to nothing, and no man knoweth how. No question, but they have sinnes enough of their own, to deserve all this, and ten times more than all this: but yet withall, who knoweth but that it might, nay who knoweth not that sometimes it doth, (so legible now and then are Gods judgements) come upon them for the greediness and avarice, and oppression, and sacrilege, and injustice of their not long foregoing Ancestors? You that are parents, take heed of these sinnes. It may be, for some other reasons known best to himself, God suffereth you to goe on your own time, and suspendeth the judgements, your sins have deserved, for a space, as here he did Ahab's upon his humiliation: but be assured, sooner or later, vengeance will overtake you or yours for it. You have (d)Hab. 2.9.Coveted an evil covetousness to your house: and there hangeth a judgement over your house for it, as rain in the clouds; which, perhaps in your sons, perhaps in your grand-childs daies, some time or other, will come dashing down upon it, and over-whelm it. Think not the vision is for many descents to come—de male quaesitis vix gaudet tertius haeres: seldom doth the (e)Exo. 20.5.third, scarce ever the fourth generation passe, before God visit the sinnes of the Fathers upon the Children; if he doe not in the very next generation. [In his sons dayes will I bring the evil upon his house.]
§. 34.Secondly; if not onelyonly our own, but our fathers sinnes too may be, shall be visited upon us: how concerneth it us, as to repent for our own, so to lament also the sins of our forefathers; and in our confessions and supplications to God, sometimes to remember them, that he may forget them, and to set them before his face, that he may cast them behind his back? We have a good president for it in our publike Letany; Remember not Lord our offences, nor the offences of our forefathers! A good, and a profitable, and a needfull prayer it is: and those men have not done well, nor justly, that have cavilled at it. (O that men would be wise according to sobriety, and allow but just interpretations to things advisedly established; rather than busie themselves nodum in scirpo, to pick needlesse quarrels where they should not: What unity would it bring to brethren, what peace to the Church, what joy to all good and wise men!) As to this particular, God requireth of the Israelites in Lev. 26. that they should (a)Lev. 26.39, 40.confesse their iniquity, and the iniquity of their Fathers, (b)Psal. 106.6.David did so, and (c)Jer. 3.15.Ieremy did so, and (d)Dan. 9.5.Daniel did so: in Psal. 106. in Ierem. 3. in Dan. 9. And if David hought it a fit curse, to pronounce against Iudas, and such as he was, in Psal. 109. [(e)Psal. 109.14. Let the wickednesse of his fathers be had in remembrance in the sight of the Lord, and let not the sinne of his mother be done away:] why may we not, nay how ought we not, to pray for the removal of this very curse from us, as well as of any other curses? The present age is rise of many enormous crying sinnes, which call loud for a judgement upon the land: and if God should bring upon us a right heavy one, whereat all ears should tingle; could we say other, but that it were most just, even for the sinnes of this present generation? But if unto our own, so many, so great, God should also adde the sinnes of our forefathers; the bloudshed, and tyranny, and grievous unnatural butcheries in the long times of the Civil warrs, and the universal idolatries and superstitions covering the whole land, in the longer and darker times of Popery: and if, as he sometimes threatned to bring upon the Iews of (f)Mar. 23.35, 36.that one generation, all the righteous bloud that ever was shed upon the earth, from the bloud of the righteous Abel, unto the bloud of Zacharias the sonne of Barachias; so he should bring the sinnes of our Ancestors for many generations past, upon this generation of ours: who could be able to abide it? Now, when the security of the times give us but too much cause to fear it, and the regions begin to look white towards the harvest: is it not time for us with all humiliation of Soul and Body to cast down our selves; and with all contention of voice and spirit to lift up our prayers? and to say; Remember not Lord our offences, nor the offences of our forefathers; neither take thou vengeance of our sinnes: Spare us good Lord, spare the people, whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious bloud, and be not angry with us for ever. Spare us good Lord.
Thirdly. Since not only our fathers sinnes, and our own;§. 35. but our Neighbours sinnes too, (aliquid malum propter vicinum malum,) but especially the sinnes of Princes and Governours, (— (g)Horat. 1. Epist. 2.delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi,) may bring judgements upon us, and enwrap us in their punishments: it should reach every one of us, to seek his own private in the common and publike good; and to endeavour, if but for our own security from punishment, to awaken other from their security in sinne. How should we send up (a)1 Tim. 2.1, 2.Supplications and prayers and intercessions for Kings and for all that are in authority; that God would incline their hearts unto righteous courses, and open their ears to wholesom counsels, and strengthen their hands to just actions? when but a sinfull oversight in one of them, may prove the overthrow of many thousands of us: as David but by once numbring his people in the pride of his heart, lessened their number at one clap (b)2 Sam. 24.15.threescore and ten thousand. If (c)Jos. 7.8, 10, 15.Israel turn their backs upon their enemies; up Iosuah, and make search for the troubler of Israel, firret out the thief, and doe execution upon him: one Achan, if but suffered, is able to undoe the whole hoast of Israel; what mischief might he doe if countenanced, if allowed? The hour I see hath overtaken me, and I must end. To wrap up all in a word then, and conclude: Thou that hast power over others; suffer no sin in them by base connivence, but punish it: thou that hast charge of others; suffer no sinne in them by dull silence, but rebuke it: thou that hast any interest in, or dealing with others; suffer no sinne upon them, by easie allowance, but distaste it: thou that hast nothing else; yet by thy charitable prayers for them, and by constant example to them, stop the course of sinne in others, further the growth of grace in others, labour by all means (as much as in thee lyeth) to draw others unto God; lest their sinnes draw Gods judgements upon themselves and thee. This that thou mayest doe, and that I may doe, and that every one of us, that feareth God, and wisheth well to the Israel of God, may do, faithfully and discreetly in our several stations and callings: let us all humbly beseech the Lord, the God of all grace and wisdom, for his Son Iesus sake, by his holy Spirit to enable us. To which blessed Trinity, one only wise, Immortal, Invisible, Almighty, most gracious, and most glorious Lord and God, be ascribed by every one of us, the kingdom, the power, and the glory, both now and for ever. Amen.