taken an oath that they will be hanged, but that he in whom (as his great pattern God himself) mercy is above all his works, out of his abundant sweetness makes them perjured when they have 80 sworn and vowed their own ruin. But those that send them, give not the lives of these men so freely, so cheaply as they pretend. But as in dry pumps, men pour in a little water, that they may pump up more; so they are content to drop in a little blood of imaginary, but traitorous martyrs, that by that at last they may draw up at last the royal blood of princes, and the loyal blood of subjects; va desiderantibus, woe to them that are made thus ambitious of their own ruin, Ut quid vobis? Tenebræ et non lut, you are kept in darkness in this world, and sent into darkness from heaven into the next, and so your ambition, ad multas mortes, shall be satisfied, you die more than one death, morte moriemini, this death delivers you to another, from which you shall never be delivered. We have now passed through these three acceptations of these words, which have fallen into the contemplation, and meditation of the ancients in their expositions of this text; as this dark day of the Lord, signifies his judgments upon atheistical scorners in this world, as it signifies his last irrevocable, and irremediable judgments upon hypocritical relyers upon their own righteousness in the next world, and between both, as it signifies their uncomfortable passage out of this life, who bring their death inordinately upon themselves; and we shall shut up all with one signification more of the Lord's day, that, that is the Lord's day, of which the whole Lent is the vigil, and the eve. All this time of mortification, and our often meeting in this place to hear of our mortality, and our immortality, which are the two real texts, and subjects of all our sermons; all this time is the eve of the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. That is the Lord's day, when all our mortification, and dejection of spirit, and humbling of our souls, shall be abundantly exalted in his resurrection, and when all our fasts and abstinence shall be abundantly recompensed in the participation of his body and his blood in the sacrament; God's chancery is always open, and his seal works always; at all times remission of sins may be sealed to a penitent soul in the sacrament. That clause which the chancellors had in their patents under the Roman emperors, Ut prærogativam gerat conscientiæ nostræ, is in our commission too, for God hath put his conscience into his church, and whose sins are remitted there, are remitted in heaven at all times; but yet dies Domini, the Lord's resurrection is as the full term, a more general application of this seal of reconciliation: but Væ desiderantibus, Woe unto them that desire that day, only because they would have these days of preaching, and prayer, and fasting, and troublesome preparation past and gone. Væ desiderantibus, Woe unto them who desire that day, only, that by receiving the sacrament that day, they might delude the world, as though they were not of a contrary religion in their heart; Væ desiderantibus, Woe unto them who present themselves that day without such a preparation as becomes so fearful and mysterious an action, upon any carnal or collateral respects. Before that day of the Lord comes, comes the day of his crucifying; before you come to that day, if you come not to a crucifying of yourselves to the world, and the world to you, Ut quid vobis? What shall you get by that day? You shall profane that day, and the Author of it, as to make that day of Christ's triumph, the triumph of Satan, and to make even that body and blood of Christ Jesus, vehiculum Satana, his chariot to enter into you, as he did into Judas. That day of the Lord will be darkness and not light, and that darkness will be, that you shall not discern the Lord's body, you shall scatter all your thoughts upon wrangling and controversies, de modo, how the Lord's body can be there, and you shall not discern by the effects, nor in your own conscience, that the Lord's body is there at all. But you shall take it to be only an obedience to civil or ecclesiastical constitutions, or only a testimony of outward conformity, which should be signaculum et viaticum, a seal of pardon for past sins, and a provision of grace against future. But he that is well prepared for this, strips himself of all these va desiderantibus, of all these comminations that belong to carnal desires, and he shall be as Daniel was, vir desideriorum, a man of chaste and heavenly desires only; he shall desire that day of the Lord, as that day signifies affliction here, with David, Bonum est mihi quod humiliasti me, I am mended by my sickness, enriched by my poverty, 39 Psalm cxix. 17. and strengthened by my weakness; and with St. Bernard desire, Irascaris mihi Domine, O Lord be angry with me, for if thou chidest me not, thou considerest me not, if I taste no bitterness, I have no physic; if thou correct me not, I am not thy son: and he shall desire that day of the Lord, as that day signifies, the last judgment, with the desire of the martyrs under the altar, Usque quo Domine? How long, O Lord, ere thou execute judgment? And he shall desire this day of the Lord, as this day is the day of his own death, with St. Paul's desire, Cupio dissolvi, I desire to be dissolved, and to be with Christ. And when this day of the Lord, as it is the day of the Lord's resurrection, shall come, his soul shall be satisfied as with marrow, and with fatness, in the body and blood of his Saviour, and in the participation of all his merits, as entirely, as if all that Christ Jesus hath said, and done, and suffered, had been said, and done, and suffered for his soul alone. Enlarge our days, O Lord, to that blessed day, prepare us before that day, seal to us at that day, ratify to us after that day, all the days of our life, an assurance in that kingdom, which thy Son our Saviour hath purchased for us, with the inestimable price of his incorruptible blood, to which glorious Son of God, &c. SERMON XVI. PREACHED AT ST. PAUL'S, IN THE EVENING, UPON. ACTS II. 36. Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord, and Christ. THE first word of the text, must be the last part of the sermon, therefore; therefore let all know it. Here is something necessary to be known, and the means by which we are to know it; and these will be our two parts; Scientia, et modus, Knowledge, and way to it; for, qui testatur de scientia, testatur de modo the scientiæ, is a good rule in all laws, He that will testify anything upon his knowledge, must declare how he came by that knowledge. So then, what we must conclude, and upon what premises, what we must resolve, and what must lead us to that resolution, are our two stages, our two resting places: and to those two, our several steps are these; in the first, Let all the house of Israel know, &c. We shall consider first, the manner of St. Peter, (for the text is part of a sermon of St. Peter's) in imprinting this knowledge in his auditory; which is, first, in that compellation of love and honour, Domus Israel, The house of Israel: but yet, when he hath raised them to a sense of their dignity, in that attribute, he doth not pamper them with an over-value of them, he lets them know their worst, as well as their best, Though you be the house of Israel, yet it is you that have crucified Christ Jesus, That Jesus whom ye have crucified; and from this his manner of preparing them, we shall pass to the matter that he proposes to them: when he had remembered them what God had done for them (You are the house of Israel), and what they had done against God (You have crucified that Jesus), he imparts a blessed message to them all, Let all know it: let them know it, and know it assuredly; he exhibits it to their reason, to their natural understanding, and what? The greatest mystery, the entire mystery of our salvation, That that Jesus is both Lord, and Christ; but he is made so; made so by God; made both; made Christ, that is, anointed, embalmed, preserved from corruption, even in the grave, and made Lord by his triumph, and by being made Head of the church, in the resurrection, and in the ascension and so, that which is the last step of our first stage, (That that Jesus is made Lord, as well as he is made Christ) enters us upon our second stage, the means by which we are to know, and prove all this to ourselves; Therefore, says the text, let all know it; wherefore? why, because God hath raised him, after you had crucified him; because God hath loosed the bands of death, because it was impossible that he should be holden by death; because David's prophecy of a deliverance from the grave is fulfilled in him, therefore let all know this to be thus. So that the resurrection of Christ is argument enough to prove, that Christ is made Lord of all; and if he be Lord, he hath subjects, that do as he does; and so his resurrection is become an argument, and an assurance of our resurrection too; and that is as far as we shall go in our second part, that first Christ's resurrection is proof enough to us of his dominion; if he be risen, he is Lord; and if then his dominion is proof enough to us of our resurrection; he be Lord, Lord of us, we shall rise too: and when we have paced, and passed through all these steps, we shall in some measure have solemnized this day of the resurrection of Christ; and in some measure have made it the day of our resurrection too. First then, the apostle applies himself to his auditory, in a fair, in a gentle manner; he gives them their titles, Domus Israel, The house of Israel. We have a word now denizened, and brought into familiar use amongst us, compliment; and for the most part, in an ill sense; so it is, when the heart of the speaker doth not answer his tongue; but God forbid but a true heart, and a fair tongue might very well consist together: as virtue itself receives an addition, by being in a fair body, so do good intentions of the heart, by being expressed in fair language. That man aggravates his condemnation, that gives me good words, and means ill; but he gives me a rich jewel, and in a fair cabinet, he gives me precious wine, and in a clean glass, that If I intends well, and expresses his good intentions well too. believe a fair speaker, I have comfort a little while, though he deceive me, but a froward and peremptory refuser, unsaddles me at first. I remember a vulgar Spanish author, who writes the Josephina, the life of Joseph, the husband of the blessed Virgin Mary, who moving that question, why that Virgin is never called by any style of majesty, or honour in the Scriptures, he says, That if after the declaring of her to be the mother of God, he had added any other title, the Holy Ghost had not been a good courtier, (as his very word is) nor exercised in good language, and he thinks that had been a defect in the Holy Ghost himself. He means surely the same that Epiphanius doth, That in naming the saints of God, and especially the blessed Virgin, we should always give them the best titles that are appliable to them; Quis unquam ausus, (says he) proferre nomen |