of himself, out of the prophet, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered; and then, the cause of this anger, sin, was so upon him, as that, though in one consideration, the rain was upon all the world, and only this fleece of Gideon dry, all the world surrounded with sin, and only he innocent, yet in another line we find all the world dry, and only Gideon's fleece wets, all the world innocent, and only Christ guilty. But, as there is a vere tulit, and a vere portavit, surely he bore those griefs, and surely he carried those sorrows, so they were cere nostri, surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows, he was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and therefore it must necessarily follow, (as it does follow there) with his stripes we were healed; for God will not exact a debt twice; of Christ for me, and of me too. And therefore, Quare moriemini domus Israel? Since I have made ye of the household of Israel, why will ye die? Since ye are recovered of your former sicknesses, why will ye die of a new disease, of a suspicion, or jealousy, that this recovery, this redemption in Christ Jesus belongs not to you? Will ye say, It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands, Dei viventis, of the living God? 'Tis so; a fearful thing; but if Deus mortuus, the God of life be but dead for me, be fallen into my hands, applied to me, made mine, it is no fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Non satis est medicum fecisse suum officium, nisi ægrotus, et adstantes sua; It is not enough for Christ Jesus to have prepared you the balm of his blood, not enough for us, to minister it to you, except every one of you help himself, in a faithful application, and help one another, in a holy and exemplar conversation. accurate usus dictionibus? How exact and Holy Ghost, in David, in choice of words?

Quam exacte, et

curious was the

He does not say,

Non sanitas mihi, sed non in carne; Not that there is no health for me, but none in me; Non in carne mea, Not in my flesh, but in carne ejus, in the flesh and blood of my Saviour, there is health, and salvation. In ossibus ejus, In his bones, in the strength of his merits, there is rest, and peace, à facie peccati, what face

62 Matt. xxvi. 31; Zech. xiii. 7.

64 Ezek. xviii. 31. 65 Heb. x. 31.

63 Judges vi.

66

Hippocrates.

67 Chrysostom.

soever my sin have had, in my former presumptions, or what face soever they put on now, in my declination to desperation. The Lord waiteth that he may have mercy upon me; he stays your leisure; and therefore will he be exalted, (says that prophet there) that he may have mercy upon you; he hath chosen that for his way of honour, of exaltation, that he may have mercy upon you. And then, Quare moriemini? If God be so respective towards you, as to wait for you, if God be so ambitious of you, as to affect a kingdom in you, why will ye die? Since he will not let ye die of covetousness, of adultery, of ambition, of profaneness in yourselves, why will ye die of jealousy, of suspicion in him? It was a merciful voice of David", Is there yet any man left of the house of Saul, that I may show mercy for Jonathan's sake? It is the voice of God to you all, Is there yet any man of the house of Adam, that I may show mercy for Christ Jesus' sake? That takes Christ Jesus in his arms, and interposes him, between his sins, and mine indignation, and non morietur, that man shall not die. We have done; Est ars sanandorum morborum medicina, non rhetorica; our physic is not eloquence, not directed upon your affections, but upon your consciences; to that we present this for physic, the whole need not a physician, but the sick do. If you mistake yourselves to be well, or think you have physic enough at home, knowledge enough, divinity enough, to save you without us, you need no physician; that is, a physician can do you no good; but then is this God's physic, and God's physician welcome unto you, if you be come to a remorseful sense, and to an humble, and penitent acknowledgment, that you are sick, and that there is no soundness in your flesh, because of his anger, nor any rest in your bones, because of your sins, till you turn upon him, in whom this anger is appeased, and in whom these sins are forgiven, the Son of his love, the Son of his right hand, at his right hand Christ Jesus. And to this glorious Son of God, &c.

68 Isaiah xxx. 18.

69 2 Sam. ix. 1.

70 Paracels.

357

SERMON CII.

PREACHED AT LINCOLN'S INN.

PSALM XXXviii. 4.

For mine iniquities are gone over my head, as a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me.

DAVID having in the former verses of this Psalm assigned a reason, why he was bound to pray, because he was in misery, (0 Lord rebuke me not in thine anger, for thine arrows stick fast in me) and a reason why he should be in misery, because God was angry, (Thy hand presseth me sore, v. 2. And, There is no soundness in my flesh, because of thine anger, v. 3). And a reason, why God should be angry, because he had sinned, (There is no rest in my bones, because of my sin, in the same verse). He proceeds to a reason, why this prayer of his must be vehement, why these miseries of his are so violent, and why God's anger is permanent, and he finds all this to be, because in his sins, all these venomous qualities, vehemence, violence, and continuance, were complicated, and enwrapped; for, he had sinned vehemently, in the rage of lust, and violently, in the effusion of blood, and permanently, in a long, and senseless security. They are all contracted in this text, into two kinds, which will be our two parts, in handling these words; first, the Supergressa super, Mine iniquities are gone over my head, there is the multiplicity, the number, the succession, and so the continuation of his sin: and then, the Gracatæ super, My sins are as a heavy burden, too heavy for me, there is the greatness, the weight, the insupportableness of his sin. St. Augustine calls these two distinctions, or considerations of sin, igorantiam, et difficultatem; first, that David was ignorant, that he saw not the tide, as it swelled up upon him, abyssus abyssum, depth called upon depth; and, all thy waters, and all thy billows are gone over me, (says he, in another place1) he perceived them not coming till they were over him, he discerned not his particular sins, then when he committed them, till they came

1 Psalm XLii. 7.

to the supergresso super, to that height, that he was overflowed, surrounded, his iniquities were gone over his head, and in that St. Augustine notes ignorantiam, his unobservance, his inconsideration of his own case; and then he notes difficultatem, the hardness of recovering, because he that is under water, hath no air to see by, no air to hear by, he hath nothing to reach to, he touches not ground, to push him up, he feels no bough to pull him up, and therein that father notes difficultatem, the hardness of recovering. Now Moses expresses these two miseries together, in the destruction of the Egyptians, in his song, after Israel's deliverance, and the Egyptians' submersion, The depths have covered them2, (there is the supergressæ super, their iniquities, in that punishment of their iniquities, were gone over their heads) and then, they sank into the bottom as a stone (says Moses) there is the gravate super, they depressed them, suppressed them, oppressed them, they were under them, and there they must lie.

The Egyptians had, David had, we have too many sins, to swim above water, and too great sins to get above water again, when we are sunk; the number of sins then, and the greatness of sin, will be our two parts; the dangers are equal, to multiply many lesser sins, or to commit a few, more heinous: except the danger be greater, (as indeed it may justly seem to be) in the multiplication, and custom, and habit of lesser sins; but how great is the danger, then, how desperate is our state, when our sins are great in themselves, and multiplied too?

In his many sins, we shall touch thus many circumstances: first, they were peccata, sins, iniquities; and then peccata sua, his sins, his iniquities, which intimates actual sins; for though God inflict miseries for original sin (death, and that, that induces it, sickness, and the like) yet those are miseries common to all, because the sin is so too; but these, are his punishments, personal calamities, and the sins are his own sins; and then, (which is a third circumstance) they are sins in the plural, God is not thus angry for one sin; and again, they are such sins, as have been long in going, and are now got over, supergressæ sunt, they are gone, gone over; and then lastly, for that first part, supergressa caput, they are gone over my head, in which exaltation, is inti

2 Exod. xv. 5.

mated all this; first, sicut tectum, sicut fornix, they are over his head, as a roof, as a ceiling, as an arch, they have made a wall of separation, betwixt God and us, so they are above our head; and then sicut clamor, they are ascended as a noise, they are got up to heaven, and cry to God for vengeance, so they are above our head; and again sicut aquæ, they are risen and swollen as waters, they compass us, they smother us, they blind us, they stupify us, so they are above our head; but lastly and principally, sicut dominus, they are got above us, as a tyrant, and an usurper, for so they are above our head too: and in these we shall determine our first part. When from thence we come to our second part, in which, (as in this we shall have done their number) we shall consider their greatness, we find them first heavy, sin is no light matter; and then, they are too heavy, a little weight would but ballast us, this sinks us; too heavy for me, even for a man equal to David; and where is he? when is that man? for, says our text, they are as heavy, as a heavy burden; and the nature, and inconvenience of a burden is, first to crooken, and bend us downward from our natural posture, which is erect, for this incurvation implies a declination in the inordinate love of the creature, incurvat. And then the nature of a burden is, to tire us; our very sin becomes fulsome, and wearisome to us, fatigat; and it hath this inconvenience too, ut retardet, it slackens our pace, in our right course, though we be not tired, yet we cannot go so fast, as we should in any way towards godliness; and lastly, this is the inconvenience of a burden too, ut præcipitet, it makes us still apt and ready to stumble, and to fall under it: it crookens us, it deprives us of our rectitude; it tires us, extinguishes our alacrity; it slackens us, enfeebles and intepidates our zeal; it occasions our stumbling, opens and submits us, to every emergent temptation. And these be the dangers, and the mischievous inconveniences, notified to us, in those two elegancies of the Holy Ghost, the supergressæ, the multiplicity of sins, They are gone over my head, and the gravata, they are a heavy burden, too heavy for me.

First then, all these things are literally spoken of David; by application, of us; and by figure, of Christ. Historically, David; morally, we; typically, Christ is the subject of this text. David's person, we shall insist no longer upon them, but only to

In