chievous leprosy. There is no good whiteness, but a reflexion from Christ Jesus, in an humble acknowledgment that we have none of our own, and in a confident assurance, that in our worst estate we may be made partakers of his. We are all red earth. In Adam we would not, since Adam we could not, avoid sin, and the concomitants thereof, miseries; which we have called our west, our cloud, our darkness. But then we have a north that scatters these clouds, in the next word, ad imaginem; that we are made to another pattern, in another likeness, than our own. Faciamus hominem; so far are we gone, east, and west; which is half our compass, and all this day's voyage. For we are stuck upon the sand; and must stay another tide, and another gale for our north, and south. SERMON CX. PREACHED to the king, at the court. The Second Sermon on GENESIS i. 26. And God said, Let us make man, in our image, after our likeness. By fair occasion from these words, we proposed to you the whole compass of man's voyage, from his launching forth in this world, to his anchoring in the next; from his hoising sail here, to his striking sail there. In which compass we designed to you his four quarters; first, his east, where he must begin, the fundamental knowledge of the Trinity, (for, that we found to be the specification, and distinctive character of a Christian) where, though that be so, we showed you also, why we were not called Trinitarians, but Christians: and we showed you, the advantage, that man hath, in laying hold upon God, in these several notions; that the prodigal son hath an indulgent Father; that the decayed father hath an abundant Son; that the dejected spirit hath a Spirit of comfort, to fly to in heaven. And, as we showed you from St. Paul, that it was an atheism to be no Christian, (without God, says he, as long as without Christ) so we lamented the slackness of Christians, that they did not seriously, and parti cularly, consider the persons of the Trinity, and especially the Holy Ghost, in their particular actions. And then we came to that consideration, whether this doctrine were established, or directly insinuated, in this plural word of our text, Faciamus, Let us, us make man: and we found that doctrine, to be here, and here first of any place in the Bible. And finding God to speak in the plural, we accepted (for a time) that interpretation, which some had made thereof; that God spake in the person of a Sovereign Prince; and therefore (as they do) in the plural, we. And thereby having established reverence to princes, we claimed in God's behalf the same reverence to him: that men would demean themselves here, when God is spoken to in prayer, as reverently, as when they speak to the king. But after this, we found God to speak here, not only as our king; but as our maker; as God himself; and God in council, faciamus: and we applied thereunto, the difference of our respect to a person of that honourable rank, when we came before him at the council table, and when we came to him at his own table: and thereby advanced the seriousness of this consideration, God in the Trinity. And farther we sailed not, with that our eastern wind. Our west we considered in the next word, hominem; that though we were made by the whole Trinity, yet the whole Trinity made us but men, and men, in this name of our text, Adam; and Adam is but earth, and that is our west, our declination, our sunset. We passed over the four names, by which man is ordinarily expressed in the Scriptures; and we found necessary misery in three of them; and possible, nay likely misery in the fourth, in the best name. We insisted upon the name of our text, Adam, earth; and had some use of these notes; first, that if I were but earth, God was pleased to be the potter; if I but a sheep, he a shepherd; if I but a cottage, he a builder. So he work upon me, let me be what he will. We noted that God made us earth, not air, not fire: that man hath bodily, and worldly duties to perform; and is not all spirit in this life. Devotion, is his soul; but he hath a body of discretion, and usefulness to invest in some calling. We noted too, that in being earth, we are equal. We tried that equality, first in the root, in Adam; there if any man will be nobler earth than I, he must have more original sin than VOL. IV. I: for that was all Adam's patrimony, all that he could give. And we tried this equality in another furnace, in the grave; where there is no means to distinguish royal from plebeian, nor Catholic from heretical dust. And lastly we noted, that this our earth, was red earth: and considered in what respect it was red, even in God's hands, but found that in the blood-redness of sin, God had no hand: but sin, and destruction for sin, was wholly from ourselves: which consideration, we ended with this, that there was macula alba, a white spot of leprosy, as well, as a red; and we found the over-valuation of our own purity, and the uncharitable condemnation of all that differ from us, to be that white spot. And so far we sailed, with that western wind. And are come to our third point in this our compass, our north. : In this point, the north, we place our first comfort. The north is not always the comfortablest clime: nor is the north always a type of happiness in the Scriptures. Many times God threatens storms from the north. But even in those northern storms, we consider that action, that they scatter, they dissipate those clouds, which were gathered, and so induce a serenity: and so, fair weather comes from the north'. And that is the use which we have of the north in this place. The consideration of our west, our low estate; that we are but earth, but red earth, dyed red by ourselves and that imaginary white, which appears so to us, is but a white of leprosy. This west enwraps us in heavy clouds of murmuring, in this life; that we cannot live so freely as beasts do; and in clouds of desperation for the next life; that we cannot die so absolutely as beasts do, we die all our lives, and yet we live after our deaths. These are our clouds; and then the north shakes these clouds. The north wind driveth away the rain, says Solomon'. There is a north in our text, that drives all those tears from our eyes. Christ calls upon the north, as well as the south, to blow upon his garden, and to diffuse the perfumes thereof. Adversity, as well as prosperity, opens the bounty of God unto us; and oftentimes better. But that is not the benefit of the north in our present consideration. But this is it, that first our sun sets in the west. The eastern dignity, which 1 Job xxxvii. 12. 2 Prov. xxv. 23. 3 Cant. iv. 16. we received in our first creation, as we were the work of the whole Trinity, falls under a western cloud, that that Trinity made us but earth. And then blows our north, and scatters this cloud. That this earth hath a nobler form, than any other part or limb of the world. For, we are made by a fairer pattern, by a nobler image, by a higher likeness. Faciamus; though we make but a man, Let us make him, in our image, after our likeness. The variety which the Holy Ghost uses here, in the pen of Moses, hath given occasion to divers, to raise divers observations, upon these words, which seem divers, image and likeness, as also in the variety of the phrase. For it is thus conceived, and laid, in our image, and then after our likeness. I know it is a good rule, that Damascen gives, Parva, parva non sunt, ex quibus magna proveniunt: Nothing is to be neglected as little, from which great things may arise. If the consequence may be great, the thing must not be thought little. No jod in the Scripture shall perish; therefore no jod is superfluous. If it were superfluous, it might perish. Words, and less particles than words, have busied the whole church. In the council of Ephesus, where bishops in a great number excommunicated bishops in a greater, bishop, against bishop, and patriarch, against patriarch; in which case, when both parties had made strong parties in court, and the emperor forbore to declare himself, on either side for a time, he was told, that he refused to assent to that, which six thousand bishops had agreed in the strife was but for a word, whether the blessed Virgin might be called Deipara, the mother of God, for Christipara, the mother of Christ, (which Christ all agree to be God) Nestorius, and all his party agreed with Cyril, that she might be. In the council of Chalcedon, the difference was not so great, as for a word composed of syllables. It was but for a syllable, whether ex, or in. The heretics condemned then, confessed Christ, to be ex duabus naturis, to be composed of two natures, at first; but not to be in duabus naturis, not to consist of two natures after: and for that in, they were thrust out. In the council of Nice, it was not so much as a syllable made of letters. For it was but for one letter; whether homoousion, or homousion, was the issue. Where the question hath not been of divers words, nor syllables, nor letters, but only of the place of words; what tempestuous differences have risen! How much sola fides and fides sola, changes the case! Nay where there hath been no quarrel for precedency, for transposing of words, or syllables, or letters; where there hath not been, so much as a letter in question; how much doth an accent vary a sense! An interrogation, or no interrogation will make it directly contrary. All Christian expositors read those words of Cain, My sin is greater than can be pardoned, positively; and so they are evident words of desperation. The Jews read them with an interroga tion, Are my sins greater, than can be pardoned? And so they are words of compunction, and repentance. The prophet Micah says, that Bethlehem is a small place; the evangelist St. Matthew says, no small place. An interrogation in Micah's mouth reconciles it; Art thou a small place? amounts to that, Thou art not. Sounds, voices, words must not be neglected. For, Christ's forerunner John Baptist qualified himself no otherwise he was but a voice. And Christ himself is Verbum; the Word, is the name, even of the Son of God. No doubt but statesmen and magistrates find often the danger of having suffered small abuses to pass uncorrected. We that see state business but in the glass of story, and cannot be shut out of chronicles, see there, upon what little objects, the eye, and the jealousy of the state is oftentimes forced to bend itself. We know in whose times in Rome a man might not weep; he might not sigh; he might not look pale; he might not be sick; but it was informed against, as a discontent, as a murmuring against the present government, and an inclination to change. And truly many times upon Damascen's true ground, though not always well applied, Parta non sunt parra, Nothing may be thought little, where the consequence may prove great. In our own sphere, in the church, we are sure it is so. Great inconveniences grew upon small tolerations. Therefore in that business, which occasioned all that trouble, which we mentioned before, in the council of Ephesus, when St. Cyril writ to the clergy of his diocese about it; at first, he says, Præstiterat abstinere, it had been better, these questions had not been raised. But says he, Si his nugis nos adoriantur, if they us with these impertinences, these trifles; and yet these vex |